She keeps doing that, I'm serious! Clove [Katkin #20] flanked the cream and mocha blur, dropping down on all fours [there goes another reputation point], all three tails flying. She did not sign up for this. She wanted protect Katkins from beast creatures, not Jayce.
"JAYCE!"
***
Spread out on a plain that was once a large watering hole, some way outside and below village proper, was what she liked to call the Festival of the Future, where the careers are laid out before all up-and-coming young Katkins. From Food, Goods, Corps, Health, Arts, Education and Katkinities, any and all careers, professionals and trainees alike were done up in their best, boasting, and rightfully so, of all their greatest accomplishments.
Considering everything, it was best to get there early. By early, Clove Alder means some time before the crack of dawn, a good few hours before the opening ceremonies. First hand experience from last minute preparations.
Even at this ambiguously holy hour, music and color drifted from the Arts, set in vibrant freestyle clusters beside Education and Katkinities, with joint exhibits displaying all manner of Katkin culture. Educators guided young Kats around the pre-fair fair and gave career advice, at times indulging in some idle chat with their past mentees. There wasn't a lack of awkward (if at times productive) moments. Clove, by some sort of miracle, managed to tiptoe past- never mind.
"Ehehehe..." she began, rubbing the back of her head.
"You're here early," the older Katkin remarked. She hardly was at class. Early, that is.
"Yes sir," she grinned, dabbing on some synthetic confidence. "The sound of preparation could be heard all the way to my place, and the food-! The smell, sir!" This was moderately true.
"That's," her mentor considered. "Natural. So I see you're headed toward... not Food?"
"What-? Oh!" Indeed, the direction she was headed suggested a course right toward Goods, which was further from them than Food. "Well, you know what they say about curiosity and Kats!"
"Mhm," he nodded. "I won't keep you, then. If you need any help in choosing your career, don't hesitate to ask."
"I will, sir," she said, as she tried to slink into one of the exhibits.
"I said 'don't'," the mentor said. He was quite the veteran of that bad habit of twisting words.
"Ah, yes, sir," she grinned, squeezing out a last drop of confidence before her glamour faded. "Thank you, sir."
A warm smile and a deep breath.
Goods had all manner of activities, booths, and talks, from marketing to crafting to general arithmetic and much more, most of which were in the final arrangements phase. Unfortunately, a lot of the important parts were part of the final arrangements phase. There was the matter of finalizing who was going to talk about what and when, as well as tracking the Kat who was going to talk about that. Besides this, they had to recheck the inventory of goods up for sale at special LOW prices (free for volunteers!) and the materials to be used in the crafting booths. There was so much to do that visitors and trainees, even high-tier professionals of other careers came to help. The Pawlice were especially good at tracking down missing presenters.
After grabbing what might be her third writing instrument (this time as a reward for finding one of the speakers, who just happened to be having breakfast at an exotic food stall at the far end of the Food area), Clove made a point to slip by the food booths and acquire some free samples.
Bag filled with a variety of little treasures and tasty treats, a quite hefty sum of Purkoins worth, she might estimate, she headed off toward the career that she was most interested in: Health. Theirs was a large tent in the heart of the carnival housing a fully functional health station, displaying all of their medicines and equipment: various herbs and extracts, antiseptic formulas, bandages, gloves, protective gear, even some of those special potions. Professionals in all lines of Health not in active duty ran booths or exhibits around the health center, each touching on different aspects of health: lifestyle; relationships, both with oneself and others; first aid; and many others.
In health center proper, already there were a few Kats being treated for minor injuries. One of them was from Food; they had a minor accident while lighting a fire. Two or three were being treated for bruises or strained muscles concerning the speedy transport of heavy material or falling off ladders and such. The rest and the majority, however, came from Corps.
While helping a Health trainee sort and distribute some supplies, (the trainee was rather patient and took the time to teach her which was what) she chanced upon some snippets of conversation between two Rangers, as identified by a badge signifying they were, or recently were, anyway, in active duty.
"Thought the Dipped Plain was pretty safe a few days ago."
"It is, only minor beasties, the cute ones abound. The dangerous ones come from the Forests."
"I suppose so, that Leatherskin beast ran in there-"
"And it isn't coming back any time soon. We set up the scent fence well."
That's... reassuring.
***
Jayce Tahvin, the Legendary Jayce Tahvin herself, self-stationed at the maze that was the Corps exhibit, was animatedly displaying just how efficiently she could perform any given task. With her oversized feather-tipped spear strapped to her back, she volunteered for any, and ALL errands with an uncanny self-confidence and an impressive story demonstrating her qualifications for the job.
With a story about how she 'carried 100 (or was it 10?) sacks of grain at once' while 'running [her] morning jog' (Yes, RUNNING her morning jog), she managed to score an assignment concerning the transport of a beast dummy for the Rangers' martial arts demonstration. Neither the Rangers nor the trainees actually believed her, but they assigned it to her anyway, thinking that she'd maybe stop and rethink her life, but she went ahead to the beast dummy, assuring them that it would be 'easy as pie' (Did you know that she could make the best pies out of the wild berries that Beast Creatures eat?).
So there she was, at the far-end 'behind the scenes' area of the Corps exhibit, at the top of the incline toward festival proper, about to carry a dummy that weighed more than she did by a significant amount. All right, so she CAN'T really carry it, but she had an idea. Pilfering- ahem, borrowing (no really, she asked permission!) a wheelbarrow from Food, she planned to wheel whole business to the demonstration area, with approving nods from her spectators. Loading the dummy onto the wheelbarrow with an impressive flying kick from atop some crates of supplies lying around, she finds that it STILL was difficult to push. No problem, that wasn't even REALLY her plan anyway.
This was why there was an overloaded wheelbarrow careening toward the Corps exhibits, its riders what appear to be a bedraggled quadruped Beast scarecrow and a small Kat intermittently waving and ground-scraping a spear while yelling 'LOOK OUT YOU GUYS!' Several members of the Pawlice, with some help from Food, were hurriedly setting up a hay barrier, which the wheelbarrow promptly crashed through, even if it had slowed down a bit.
Jayce hurriedly swatted hay away with her cane. Beastly things get everywhere! How was she going to steer-
"HEY LOOK OUT!"
A three-tailed Kat (wait- what) seemed to be trying to create a muddy patch down her route, probably to slow her down. Unfortunately they were in the way.
Jayce jammed her spear as much as she could into the mud, almost breaking it; it would have broken if she didn't jam right into that crazy Katkin-
Clove had to think quickly. Apparently she was slower while carrying a bucket of water than she thought she was, and the first thing that came to mind was something she saw in a show a while back, namely, a literal leap of faith, towards the wheelbarrow.
If magic existed in any one of her three tails, let it take effect.
A sloshy rolling stop later, it seemed that the combined force of Jayce's hurried braking, Clove's- she calls it tail magic, and the safety net that the Corps had set up managed to stop the whole thing with relatively little injury.
"You kits-" a Mewlitary officer sighed, as she helped them up. "Are extremely lucky."
Jayce and Clove both nodded, they were pretty sure they'd get a stern talking to.
"Erm..." Jayce said, looking over her poor spear. "I think I got a little carried away."
"Just a little," Clove grunted, attempting to rub some mud off her fur. The folks where she was staying will not be pleased.
"I'm sorry, all right?" Jayce said.
"Jayce," a Ranger admonished, running up to them. Clearly, this wasn't the first time this sort of thing happened.
The Mewlitary officer was adamant, and suddenly authorative: "Stern talking-to's after the Health inspection. You two: report to the Health center."
A bit shocked by the sudden personality change, the two of them hurriedly scurried toward the tent. As they left, they saw the Mewlitary officer turn to the Ranger:
"The Kits shouldn't be in the area when you bring that in. We should be more cautious . . ."
"Jayce, huh?" Clove said, as they were seated in adjacent check-up tables.
"Yeah," the mocha Kat smiled. "And, by the way, I really am sorry about earlier."
"I got the impression," Clove said. "I'm Clove, by the way."
"Oh, Clove, I guess, thanks?" Jayce continued. "Where did you get that bucket of water anyway?"
"I was going to bring it here," Clove answered, a bit sheepishly. "But then I panicked when I saw you coming towards us so I thought maybe some mud- You know, I have to thank you too, if you hadn't nearly sacrificed your spear, we'd be in a much worse position."
"The Corps were awesome though," Jayce gushed. "Have you thought about your career?"
"Another accident so early today, I see," a Health professional remarked. She reminded Clove of a stereotypical aunt from books. "Hmmm... you walked here, did you not? You're talking, aren't you? Anything hurting?"
***
After a quick check of limbs and tails, as well as quick wash-up, they were both dismissed as 'good to go'. Clove decided to go off and get another bucket of water for Health. Jayce headed off to Mewlitary, waving goodbye to her new acquaintance, an acquaintance that she may or may not have set as a bar that she had to surpass. Honestly, that leap, even if Clove claimed it was pure luck, was pretty impressive.
Clove dragged her bucket toward the Health center. She had, by accident, filled it up too high and was quite unable to lift it. Agh, what would Jayce do?
"Hey, Clove!" Jayce yelled. Speak of the- "The Mewlitary seems to have locked me out."
"Seriously?" Clove blinked, dropping her bucket, water sloshing out around her, eliciting a wince. "I didn't think the whole business was that bad." She hopped out of the mud pool and shook her foot mudless. "I mean, no one really got hurt and-"
A scream. Not a Katkin scream, but a... a...
"A Woodland Screecher," Jayce muttered.
Clove's ears flattened against the back of her head. "I hear those sometimes, a few days ago especially." Her dormitory of sorts was in the area closest to the Dipped Plane where the carnival was being held. From beyond it, screeches such as this could be heard sometimes, but rarely. Actually, she could say these were a little bit different somehow.
"Have you seen one?" Jayce asked excitedly.
"No?" Clove considered. "I don't think they ever come out to the Plain."
"I have!" Jayce said. "I even fought it. It was at least ten Katkins long-"
Another screech. All around, the festival, a mere hour before its opening, held its breath. This time, it was SURELY coming from the Corps area.
They glanced at each other and ran, with some kind of synchronization, toward the sound. With the same sort of synchronization, Health professionals assumed their battle positions, trainees being briefed, a sense of urgency hanging heavy over the station. Clove caught a glimpse of her friend as she jogged past, and she caught a glimpse of her. The trainee's pupils narrowed with worry.
Educators had a special task: gather all the younger Kats. They spread out, silent, with an air of trained calm. Clove's fur stuck up on end: these Kats would, without hesitation, risk their lives for their juniors. A quick glance at Jayce suggested that she too understood this.
"I thought you'd do what a sensible Katkin would and run for the village," Jayce teased, puffing a bit as she ran. Her bravado seemed somehow muted.
"Who'd be looking out for you, then?" Clove returned, keeping up, also a bit out of breath.
"Pff. I've dealt with fifteen beasts with one hand tied behind my back," she said. "Blindfolded. I can handle this."
They stopped short as the Ranger from earlier suddenly appeared in their way.
"Jayce, what do you think you're doing?!" he asked gruffly. Then to Clove: "And what do you think you're doing, being another Jayce?"
"Awww... come on!" Jayce complained. "We just want to see what's going on at Corps!"
"Well, it's none of your business. Did you think this was just some kind of show-?" the Ranger said, suddenly a bit jumpy, though he regained his composure in a heartbeat. "Go along-"
There was another screech, this time coming from behind the trainees-to-be, from the forest. The Ranger's eyes widened.
"Oh no," he muttered. "You kits stay here. Don't panic. I'll come and get you in a bit."
He then turned toward the Corps booths, which were cordoned off. More disturbing however, was the makeshift barrier that seemed to isolate its center, where the screams were coming from.
"That's a good reason to run toward the village and panic," Clove remarked as soon as she could breathe. Otherwise it was dangerously silent. Any evacuation was carefully conducted in stealth. She sighed, all she wanted was to see an actual, real-life Woodland Screecher.
Jayce tightened her grip around her spear, ears flattened down the back of her head, her breath coming out in a sort of low hiss. Her tail was extremely fluffed up right now.
"Jayce?" she asked.
The barrier suddenly tore open as if suddenly and violently hatching, a shockwave of a scream rushing out from it, knocking both Kats off their feet. A Ranger appeared out of nowhere and dragged them away, explaining something quickly about the other Ranger and how he was 'busy right now'. Looking back at the Corps area, the two saw a seemingly wooden Beast, balanced on its spindly hind legs, each as long as a Katkin was high, screeching.
Its skin was like bark: a pallid, mossy brown, its body irregularly contoured and its head extending out into a branching crown tipped with vibrant green. If it stood perfectly still from a distance, it couldn't be picked out from its woodland home. Its mouth was a horizontal crack three-fourths down its log-like elongated face, lined with blunt, crushing teeth. From their vantage point, no eyes were discernible, just depressions where they should have been.
The Ranger ducked behind a Goods booth suddenly, dragging them under and instructing them to stay still and keep quiet.
From where they hid, they could hear the trees move. A creature, about ten Katkins long, with what seemed like tree branches growing from its head all the way the the end of its body, broke the treeline in a shower of broken branches and falling leaves, a blur as it rushed toward the Festival. Shortly behind it a brighter green creature burst with another shriek, forcing the Kats to cover their ears. They could hear the essence bottles and bowls used for the scent fence breaking and tipping over. The Ranger whispered: "The Village..." before quickly adding: "Will be all right, we have a plan, don't worry."
"The fact that you're mentioning it is making me worry," Clove remarked, her ears still buried in her paws.
"True, that," Jayce agreed, and even managed to laugh. "But you really do have a plan, right?"
"Of course!" The Ranger said confidently. "We have protocols for every situation, you'll learn all about it when you become trainees."
"You think I can be a Corps trainee?" Clove asked suddenly, there was hesitation in her voice.
"Hey, you're the mud kit, aren't you? You're good at thinking quickly," the Ranger said. "Wits are better than brawn (sort of) any day in the Corps. Same for you, Jayce." Clearly Jayce has a reputation in the Corps. "You're resourceful, and brave, you're something special."
Jayce was as puffed up with pride as a Kat can be while bunched up under a stall while hiding from a Beast.
Outside, the Beasts were wrecking havoc over the area, one of them making straight for the Corps, while the other seemed to set some kind of perimeter around the festival, tearing down the last scent fence marks, herbs noxious to Beasts (or at least some beasts), but not to Katkins, scattered and neutralized.
Most Kats had been evacuated, and were in Village proper, roll calls were ongoing. Have you seen a Kat with three tails around? What about that tiny kit? She's not a kit? Jayce? Clove? Where were those two-? Clove's and Jayce's mentors glanced at each other. Could they still be...?
Meanwhile, the Corps were rallying. Even while the two Beasts attacked, the smallest of the three had been neutralized, not terminated yet, they didn't have time for that and already reinforcements were coming from the village and some adjacent villages. The Rangers decided on a certain obscurely named formation to deal with the two Beasts, who seemed to attack with some kind of strategy, rare, but not unheard of.
"Do you think," Clove said suddenly. "That the smallest Beast is a juvenile?"
"So you mean..." the Ranger's eyes widened. "That..."
"Woodland Screechers are usually found in that size," Jayce explained, seeing Clove's confusion at the Ranger's reaction. "Hey Clove," she continued. "Do you dare me to set the smallest one free?"
"Whoa there, Kit, you aren't interfering with Ranger business." The Ranger grabbed Jayce by the scruff of her neck.
"Based on how they took down the scent marks first," Clove said, attempting to put on her charm glamour. Let the 'magic' of the three tails not fail her now. "They're pretty intelligent. If we kill the kit or the Screechers, there's a chance that other Screechers might seek revenge."
"COME ON, we're almost too late!" Jayce mewled.
"All right, all right, I'll check it with the higher ups." The Ranger pulled out of their hiding place. Everything about the their stance said 'this is a terrible idea'. "... You guys stay here."
Their instincts were swiftly confirmed. The Rangers suddenly came into view and Jayce and Clove jumped out right before the booth was crushed by a giant trunk of a foot. Jayce still with the spear in hand. This was followed by a terrible shriek. Their companion, clearly better trained for this sort of thing than they were, grabbed their paws and whisked them away.
"All right, the two of you are in active duty now, even only as civilians. You have to do exactly as we tell you, all right?"
The two nodded. They were in the shadow of a huge Beast, 10 Katkins long, as Jayce had said, though it might just have been a lucky guess. A suspiciously lucky guess.
"Good. First of all, you have to follow formation. Right now, we're evenly spaced out, to herd the creature toward where we want it, come on. Stick close to me for now."
"But the little beast-" Jayce began. Clove was a bit flattered by her new friend's faith in her theory.
"We'll do that later, what's important right now is that we don't make any sudden moves, nothing that would make us targets."
"But what about the other Beast?" Clove asked.
"That's why we work in groups," the Ranger explained. "We have to trust them. Rangers trust other Rangers, sometimes the Mewlitary, almost blindly with their lives a lot."
"But do you trust us?" Jayce asked.
"Jayce, calm down," the Ranger said. "Being a Ranger isn't only about dealing with Beasts, or even protecting Katkin society, it's also about protecting one another. If we broke formation now, we'd be putting everyone else in danger too. Don't worry, you'll get a hang of it in time: what to do, when to do it... now."
"What?"
"Now's your chance. GO!"
The Beast had fully turned away from them, and was becoming agitated. The group backed off a bit. It wasn't good to have a Beast feel trapped. It seemed to be pointing out a Ranger that was holding a rod that resembled a torch.
Meanwhile, as instructed, Jayce and Clove dashed off toward the Corps exhibit, where the kit was pretty much left to its own devices save one or two Rangers stationed for safety. Maybe they should have dashed toward the Village instead, but, their instructions were never clear on that.
"Jayce! Three-tails! What are you doing here?"
"We have to free the Beast."
"No, nuh-uh, we can't do that, not even in a figurative sense. We must remain calm."
Remaining calm, however, was a difficult option, because the two Screechers, right before they were herded back into the forest, bounded over the Rangers' formation, both making a beeline toward Festival proper. Plan B was quickly put into effect: reserve forces rushed out to directly attack them.
Except they didn't have to. The smaller beast walked out of the Corps area, legs still unsteady from the amount of fighting it went through, making happy little noises as it was reunited with its... parents, perhaps? The two Beasts stopped in their tracks, the brighter green one even lowering itself down to let the smaller Beast climb onto its back while the duller one circled the two as if guarding them, keeping watch on the reserve forces watching silently from the sides.
With slow, measured steps, they melded back into the forest.
***
In the days that followed, some questions were asked: whose bright idea was it anyway, to put a REAL LIVE BEAST CREATURE on display for EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES? Wasn't that beast dummy enough for you? What was Jayce doing with a SPEAR in a Career Fair? And why was she holding a KNIFE instead of that spear immediately after the whole fiasco? Why does that Kat have three tails?
Most of these questions were never answered, mostly because Jayce's spear and knife story changes every time she tells it. Personally, I'm just happy that two of my questions got satisfactorily answered.
The first one was, where was my bag of treats? I left it back at the Health station when I went to get water (I managed to finally get that bucket of water to the station in the redo of the festival). Apparently my trainee friend saved it for me when they evacuated, so, happy ending, my treats were safe. We even had a little snack after debriefing. It was weird, what happened didn't really feel real until much afterwards.
The second, and more difficult one was: What career will you take? I even talked it over with my mentor and everything. It turns out he and Jayce's mentor tried to go back in to pull us out, and that he had quite a story to tell us about that, but, that's his story.
Mine goes something more like this: when I saw that family of trees walk back into the forest I thought, what if it's always like that, what if there are reasons for the attacks, and we could stop attacks altogether if we only knew them?
First day, first roll call of all the Corps trainees.
"So you went Corps after all," Jayce grinned. "You were undecided about it for the whole of Choosing Period."
"Well, I remembered what our senior said: it's about looking out for one another, and someone's DEFINITELY gotta look out for you."
"Are you kidding? I'll be looking after you."
And so begins a greater and more ridiculous story, of my best friend and greatest enemy, and of me, I guess, with all three of my tails.
***
Right, Jayce?
Jayce? Jayce-
