forum A Starry Night

Started May 03, 2019 by @Echo_6 group

tune

"You're changing the subject," Kye rested his elbows on his knees. "My name's Kye, what are you doing out here?"

Kida watched him for a moment, thinking over how to respond and how much to say. "I'm looking for someone."

Kye sighed internally, this dude wasn't going to tell him anything. He decided it wasn't worth continuing on about. "Okay, can you give me a description? I've seen a lot of people running around through here I might have seen them."

Kida shook his head, "They didn't come through here."

"Then Why?" he paused looking up at the sky. "Are you here?"

"Because it cuts time and distance off of the trip," he paused as something dawned on him, "but not if I sit around talking about it." He pushed himself to his feet. Then wavered as his body protested further abuse. However the rest had helped and he was determined to push on."It was very nice to meet you, Kye, but I'm afraid I need to be on my way again."

"Uh, no!" Kye jumped up. "Listen you could probably make to the edge of the woods. If you're persistent enough you could make just outside the woods. But you'd get there and collapse. If you want to cut time off you're trip you should take two or three ours get in a power nap, and then continue going. You'll be nothing but a zombie if you continue like you are now."

Kida refrained from rolling his eyes at the last second."Yeah, you do not have the ability to make that judgment call. Thank you for your concern, but I do have somewhere to be." He started back along his original path, forcing himself not to limp through the pain of overtaxed muscles.

Kye flung his hands in the air in exasperation, and stopped himself from hitting a tree. Then he took a breath, looked down, and put his hands on his hips. He glanced after Kida, and after a moment began walking after him. With no comment or anything. He hated seeing people be dumb. So he figured that the best way to make them stop was to merely follow, without a word.

Kida's eyes narrowed when Kye started after him. He debated whether it was worth arguing over, but he was drained and further conversation seemed painfully exhausting. Deciding to just ignore Kye he silently hoped that he would just give up after a bit. Something told him that wouldn't be the case, but he shoved that little voice down as quickly as it spoke up.

Kye followed quietly for a bit. "Did you know that there are more than seven billion galaxies out there?" he suddenly spoke up.

Kida paused. He didn't have the patience for this right now."Fascinating. "He replied, trying, and failing, to not sound completely sarcastic.

Kye ignored it. "There's also about twenty-five trillion stars out there," he went on knowing that sooner or later he would get on Kida's nerves. "And about sixty-two point three million of them are suns for habitable planets like this one."

Pretending not to hear him, Kida debated if speeding up was a terrible decision or not. He was leaning towards yes because he genuinely didn't know how long he could hold his current pace as it was. Much less hold a faster one. That did not stop him from wishing his apparent companion would just shut up however.

"Caves," Kye was going off about now. "Caves are a lot of fun to wander around in. There are several types of caves. There are the underwater caves and the above water caves. There are also the submerged caves. Don't get those mixed up with the underwater caves. Submerged means that they are fully filled with water, underwater merely means that they're bellow sea level. Most of the caves that are above sea level would be the ones in the mountains and things like that. You have to remember when navigating caves going up isn't always the answer to getting out. For example a cave in a mountain, if you were to focus on only going up and you found your way out you'd likely be on the top of the mountain, but going down to far could put you at lava level. So you have to be careful of that as well. If you're ever in a cave that's filling with water don't try to get away from the water. That's not the way to escape it. See if the water's coming in that means that it's lowering from a higher point. You want to find where the water is coming in and you want to try and get to that spot. Navigating in the dark. Most people wouldn't be able to, because if you've ever been in a cave with no light you would know that you can't see your hand if it's a millimeter from your eye. When navigating in the dark you have to let the cave tell you where to go. Which means you have to listen to it's subtle noises, and hints as to which way to go. If you feel wind and it's getting stronger you're not only near the surface but also near an exit, or entrance depending on how you look at it. If you here water you're probably near an underwater lake, which doesn't always help. Oh but what does help is if you hear water droplets. Those usually come from the surface and can tell you what the weather is like outside. If you can hear rapid water droplets that means that either, you're under a lake, or some other water source, or it's raining a bit hard out. If the water droplets are slower but still there, it's either raining lightly or right after a shower. And if you don't hear any droplets, either you're down a really long way, or it's just not raining."

He resisted the urge to stuff his fingers in his ears, but only barely. He decided to satisfy himself with contemplating the possible repercussions of flat out attacking Kye to get him to close his mouth. The idea was highly appealing but realistically not feasible. Even just walking at his, admittedly slow, pace was almost too much for him at this point and while he was trained to fight in this kind of condition regardless, his skills were severely depleted. He also had no idea if Kye was a fighter or not, he would guess that he was but couldn't actually know what kind of s fighter unless he asked, watched him fight, or fought Kye himself. And asking felt a thousand times more difficult than it should have from his tiredness.

Kye continued. "Holes, they are really hard to find, but essential if you want to keep from dying or breaking something. To figure out if there is a hole or cliff near you, feel the air. The closer to a hole, the lighter the air will feel. And you might be able to feel the wind moving downwards. The heavier the air feels the tighter of a space it is. If you are in a cave in you need to first assess if you have any injuries or if anyone you or anyone you might have been traveling with has any injuries. Then you'll want to start finding you're way back to the surface immediately. Because the dust caused by the cave in can be damaging to your lungs and you need to get above ground to clean them out. And one cave in can cause another. Plus if anyone, yourself included, is injured you would want to get them attention as soon as possible."

(If you ever feel the inclination to, you can join us)

(NOTED!! :D)

A steady pounding had wrapped around Kida's skull and settled in until every thought felt like it was wading through molasses. His entire body ached with every step and his vision had adopted a permanent blurry quality to it. He knew Kye was still rambling on behind him, but Kida had stopped listening long ago. Only his training kept him on his feet now.
Dull as his senses were, they were still sharp enough to pick up on the muffled scuffing of deliberately quiet footsteps. Adrenaline cleared his mind and he looked back at Kye briefly. Instead of slowing down he continued at the same pace. Taking a few turns at random intervals to give the appropriate idea of following a hidden path. The steps continued.

Kye went quiet for a moment to catch his breath. And heard the quiet foot steps. To avoid an immediate attack he continued talking.

Subtly Kida forced his pace to gradually pick up though his body protested it. Careful to do so without setting their pursuers off, he started steering them toward a more open area. If he could find a large enough break in the trees then they could either force them into the open or force them to give ground long enough for him to shake them. He sighed. He was far to tired for this and he didn't even know why they followed or who they were.

Kye rested his hand on his satchel, which hung on his side. In it was his dagger. In case he would need it. "There is an entrance to a cave to the left of us. And two behind us. One entrance is big and the other is small," he was trying to let Kida know that there were two people following.

The sudden switch in what Kye was talking about threw Kida. He almost missed it by not paying enough attention. Unfortunately he had no idea why Kye had changed tactics he figured it was to bother him more. He had no idea if Kye was even aware they had a tail or how to clue him in." That's nice."

Kye went silent now. He was trying to figure out where their tail was, and just how many there were. Without giving away that he was doing that. Hopefully Kida had been clued in enough that he knew there were at least two people following them.

The sudden switch to silence was equally refreshing and alarming. Kida glanced backwards to make sure nothing had happened, Kye looked vaguely distracted but seemed fine otherwise. Feeling a ridiculous amount of relief about the confirmation of his annoying companions wellbeing, Kida decided to chalk it up to a combination of stress over their mysterious stalkers and lack of sleep.

Kye noticed Kida turn back to look at him, and had to suppress a smile. He does care, he said to himself. Then he made a final count of how many were following them. Two on their left, four behind, and either one or two on their right side. He wasn't positive about the right side. He was positive that they were trying to box them in, and he didn't want to find out what would happen if they did.