Fuoco Village

Reason bites back a gasp as she stands up straight. "Well naturally when you're with a person you want to make small talk. I can see that isn't exactly your forte." The heat rises to her cheeks with embarassment. Why had she even bothered? Reason turns her back on him and digs around in the back of the bar, trying to appear busy.

"Should it be?" His question required now answer for he would probably dismiss it anyways. He finished his glass of water and stood up, unsure of what to do now. Should he explore more of the town? No, the village would likely be abandoned and if not, the scum he would encounter wouldn't be worth 'small talk' or anything. "You know...naturally, I should try to kill you. You are the kill that got away. I don't let my kills escape me." The tone is not of malice, but of curiosity. Why was he sitting here chatting with a target? Someone who another being of power had wished dead? Had he really changed so much in the past three years?

She stops moving completely. Frozen with her hands on the counter. "I was very lucky that day," she speaks softly, "I was lucky someone was there to stop you." The back of Reason's shirt shifts slightly off her right shoulder, revealing the top of a reddened, swollen scar. She turns around then to face him, her hair falling over the uncovered shoulder. "Is that why you're here? Were you hoping to have another chance to skin a mermaid?"

"Indeed....that asswipe Valentia interfered that day. But I do not believe it is, or else your pretty little counter top would be stained with blood. As would my hands...and most of the surrounding area." He blinks before continuing. "Wait....mermaid? I thought your blood tasted strange....hmm.."

"You didn't really notice the coloring was rather different, too?" She laughs a little and shakes her head. She just revealed to this man what she is and she wasn't dead. How strange. He really had changed over the years. In the larger cities these days, mermaid blood was revered as a highly priced item with it's properties to heal. "It's all the rage in markets these days. There aren't many of my kind left." Reason smiles a little at Ikusa.

"No, I didn't care to notice." He takes a breath and exhales whilst looking around the tavern. "Is it now? That clarifies why you aren't already dead from the wound I inflicted upon you.." Ikusa notices just how run down this building has become and contemplates how long it has been abandoned seeing as it wasn't that long ago that he was here. "How long has this village been abandoned? When and why did the people leave?"

"It has been a about two years... The Sins drove the people to the main cities. Closer to the Creationists Palace I suppose..." Reason moves out from behind the counter to sit on top of it, next to Ikusa's halberd. She lightly runs her hand over the tip of the blade, reminiscing about the past. "I've been here ever since. I don't want to go back to be tested upon."

Ikusa says nothing for minute or two and then responds, "See? As I said, the years have not changed you. Simply hiding from your problems instead of facing them. No wonder your species is few in numbers." The ice in his voice coats all of his words and Ikusa glances at the girl with what seems to be slight disgust. "I'm thinking about finding those fools, the Sins and Virtues. I wanna see what they have been up to. " The man smirks at this thought and begins to entertain himself with the notion of finding those individuals of power.

"And what, pray tell, do you think you know about me? Who I am? You don't. Cause you're nuts." Reason slides off the counter and heads towards the front doorway. "You're still all the same, Ikusa. Just because you're not chattering about pancakes and monkeysaurs means nothing. You're still so full of yourself and what you think you know." She rolls her eyes and exits the building to head down towards the village lake.

He laughs as Reason begins to insult him. "Do you truly understand the meaning of 'nuts'? Everyone is crazy in some certain way. No one is completely stable of mind...that would be too boring."

She ignores him and walks down to the lake. Once Reason gets to the dock she takes off her shoes and sits on the wood, dipping her into the cool, unfiltered water.

From the perimeter of the forest a white blur dashes from the inside of the bare tree trunks and out into the open, so close to the village. The low figure's footing catches slightly, like it had been on the run for days. Covered in dirt and soot of other villages that had been burned down in it's escape, the white wolf tried to regain it's balance but tumbles into rubble against an old wooden building. She let out a quick yelp, whining low as the garbage of planks topples onto it's already frail and battered body.

Ikusa's attention turns to a crash that seems to have occurred inside the village somewhere. He grabs his halberd and begins to walk towards the doorway to the tavern and as he does this he puts on his mask. I haven't put this on in over a year....not since the fight with that young swordsman...his skill was impressive...but not enough. I hope something interesting will happen here... He makes his way out of the tavern and into the street, his halberd at his side, blade down, and his mask on, prepared for a fight.

Reason's head whips in the direction of the estranged yelp. "What the hell...?" She stands, slipping her shoes back on and heads back towards the village. She looks down each alley she passes until she comes upon a pile a junk, with tufts of white fur in random places. "An animal? ..." Reason's eyes widen. "Oh, Goddess!" She rushes to the animal's side, tearing through the garbage and debris, praying to the goddess of the sea that the wild mammal was still alive.

Ikusa spots Reason racing through the streets, The girl? Perhaps she knows what is happening.. and begins to run after her. Not wanting to draw unnecessary attention to himself, Ikusa scales an unstable looking ladder and stand atop a roof nearby, looking down on the scene. "Goddess?", he whispered to himself, "What does she mean?"

The animal whimper, trying to stand, the weight of debris holding her down. She then notices a figure come to her side who began to lift the garbage off her body. After enough planks were gone, she was able to wearily stand and shake her head back and forth, trying to get rid of any pieces that may have been clinging her to coat of fur. She then turned her head to see a woman with black hair and smelled of the lake side. The wolf backed off from the woman, memories flooding back to town after town trying to capture her, setting blazing fire after blazing fire anywhere she happened upon. She flowered her head, trying to seem on guard but the motion ends up seeming like she was too frightened.

Reason sits back and breathes a sigh of relief. "Thank Goddess..." She looks at the majestic wolf, amazed that it's even able to stand. Reason ignores the cuts in her long sleeved black dress from the debris that nearly crushed the animal. She then kneels in front of the wolf, trying to get a good look at its eyes, trying to feed into the sense of familiarity. "Have I.. Have I seen you before?" She whispers as she reaches a tentative hand out towards the large head of the beast.

The large animal whimpers again and tried to step back again only to be tripped by debris and it plops it butt right to the ground in a sitting position. The startling movement causes a chain reaction throughout her body that hasn't happened in quite some time. In a puff of smoke, a woman with bright green eyes, long curling dark brown hair, and tribal facial marks on her face appears, startled. "Where... where am I?" Her voice doesn't seem familiar to even her anymore.

".....Interesting....most interesting.." Ikusa says slowly and quietly to himself. This animal was a person? He had never encountered this phenomena before, or had he? The white wolf seemed familiar to him, although he could not place why it seemed so. Ikusa jumps to the next roof over and continues his hawk-like surveillance.

Reason yells out in surprise and scrambles backwards slightly. As the smoke clears, she blinks and it takes her a moment to recognize the young woman. "M-Mistress Gabrielle?" Reason stumbles over her words and is then rendered speechless.

Her name seems too foreign for a few moments but she suddenly recolonizes it. Yes, yes that was it! She remembered more again, looking at the face of the girl in front of her. "Oh, yes! That's it!" It came back to her, she was a pack leader. No, not a pack, an order. What was that again? The Virtues, that's what it was. She never realized how strange that must have been so long ago. Where she wore robs and hid from her lupine blood that boiled over after The Fall of the Kingdom and turned her into a werewolf for several years.

She tried getting up, weakness consumed her but she managed to lean up against the building near her. "You wouldn't by any chance know of a restaurant near by, would you?

"Gabrielle....wait...", his eyes suddenly widened with realization, this was the leader of that silly Virtues group. This lady was an enemy of the Sins, who still appear to be nowhere nearby. How interesting that she should come back here...how interesting indeed, thought Ikusa, which produced a chuckle of excitement. He saw this as his opportunity to make his appearance. The man dropped down from the building behind the two, his knees bending and dispersing the force of the impact throughout his body. "Well, isn't this quite the surprise..." Ikusa's smile was full of excitement and curiosity as he began to walk slowly towards them, his halberd at his side still.

Reason laughs a little nervously. "Well.. I know a place.." Her lips start to turn up into a slight smile, but when Ikusa drops down, her smile disappears completely. "Yes, it is a surprise... now if you please..." Reason moves to help Gabrielle by taking the she-wolf's arm over her own shoulder to guide her to her home above the abandoned tavern.

"Now, where do you think you are going, Reason? This is such a nice reunion!" His words begin to quicken in pace as does his waling. He is now holding his halberd out to his side with the front blade facing the two women in case he needs to perform an diagonally upward slash or blocking maneuver.

"What is with you? She needs rest, and she needs food." Reason moves with Gabrielle to pass Ikusa and return to the tavern. Reason is very wary of him, and she keeps her eyes locked with his.