cross-species bonding [closed]

[worthpraise]

Characters: Amaterasu (worthpraise) and Xion (notasham)
Setting/Location: Entrance to District 2
Date & Time: Day 0, afternoonish?
Summary: After Xion helps Amaterasu with the Junogam, the two decide to meet up.

Comments

[worthpraise]

Amaterasu was a goddess, but she was neither all-knowing nor all-powerful. She could be fooled by illusions as easily as anyone else. But there was no one she wanted to see, apart from Issun, and it would have to take a powerful illusion indeed to make Xion seem like the tiny bug that Issun was. And Amaterasu didn't want to see him that badly. Xion appeared as she did to most others: a teenage girl who smelled of soap, with a whiff of something darker beneath it.

She snorted and shook her head, hoping that Xion didn't mind that she couldn't speak. Though her Junogam had been modified to fit her paws better, it was still very awkward to type. She didn't want to do it any more than she really had to.

Amaterasu stretched out towards Xion, her nose barely touching the girl's leg. She wasn't sure what the girl expected - honestly she wasn't entirely sure what she expected. But she liked meeting people, and Xion made her think of that other girl from before, the one who wanted someone to be there for her. Maybe this would be enough, maybe not - Amaterasu didn't mind either way.

[worthpraise]

Well, that was always a good way to start a conversation. Amaterasu grinned at the compliment, pulling herself forward enough to lay her head on Xion's leg, right above her knee. Surely the girl could admire her better from here - or give her a scratch if she was so inclined. Amaterasu wasn't really that vain, but she knew that she often had to make the first move. It was rare to find a person who was completely comfortable around a wolf straight from the start - she wondered if it would make people easier or warier when they knew she could talk, marking her as no ordinary wolf.

Xion, however, seemed pretty relaxed right now, and Amaterasu exhaled softly, letting the tension go out of her muscles. Despite that bit of...something in the girl's scent, Ammy decided there wasn't anything for her to be wary of either.

[worthpraise]

It would have made Amaterasu's life much simpler if she could talk, especially here. Back home, even with Issun's help, she'd been too busy with demons to ever stop and really try to have long conversations with people. Most of her recent conversations consisted more of people telling her what she'd missed in the past 100 years and what they needed her to do to fix things. Not something that needed a lot of input on her part.

Of course, Amaterasu could both fight and do magic, though Xion was apparently unable to see her markings or weapons. And that mouse might be a king, but Amaterasu was a goddess. Just saying. Lest Xion started to believe that Ammy was somehow lesser than a duck, dog, or mouse.

It was strange, though not unwelcome, how they had managed to form a small pocket of calm in the middle of all the chaos that was at least a hundred people running around this town. Amaterasu was certainly enjoying the gentle scratches behind her ears - she'd been leaning into them pretty much the whole time - but now she tilted her head to one side, allowing her to stare up at Xion curiously with one eye. She shifted her paw, making the bell tied around her ankle chime softly. She wondered who this girl was, about the all-concealing black robe that she wore - Ammy'd never seen anything like it, and the girl had mentioned it as something unusual for Amaterasu to look for. But what the girl told her or not was her choice; it was not in her nature to doubt those she met.

[worthpraise]

Amaterasu had not always been a wolf. It was the form she had chosen when Orochi dragged her to earth, the disguise she had taken on as she wandered for 99 years, waiting for the chosen warrior, for the chosen night. But she liked it, marveling at the way the world was painted by scents, enjoying how quickly she sped over the fields. Her limitations were few, and those she could handle. Inside she was still the same, after all.

The sun was shining down on them, Amaterasu's fur growing warm to the touch as she sighed, practically melting under the light as it seemed to sink into her bones. It wasn't that the sun recharged her, not really, but she wouldn't like to see what happened if she went without it for too long. A moment like this was almost perfect, between the sun and Xion's hand on her head. Moments like this were exactly why Amaterasu didn't care at all about her form - try doing this in human shape!

Maybe, just maybe, this journey wouldn't be so bad after all. She still had no idea why she had been brought here, why any of them had been, really, but it did not seem like anything more than an inconvenience. In some ways, it was a vacation - she hadn't gotten a chance to do anything like this back home, not really. She had been busy.

[worthpraise]

Amaterasu lifted her head just enough to shake it lazily side to side, moving her paw to chime the bell again, just once. Peace bell indeed, Amaterasu thought as the sound faded. It did its job of calming monsters, but she admittedly loved the sound just as much.

Amaterasu was gradually becoming more comfortable with revealing bits about herself to others - most of the people here seemed very accepting, very believing. On principle she didn't mind about people knowing who or what she was, as long as they didn't get all formal on her. She'd much rather have people be in the dark and scratch behind her ears than people fawning over her; she had no patience for that.

At Xion's sigh Ammy moved again, this time to push her nose into Xion's hand in what was hopefully a comforting gesture. She didn't know what had caused it. If Xion felt like confiding, she would listen (she was awfully good at that, considering). But she had her secrets and others did as well.

[worthpraise]

Ah, people from the world before. Lots of people were worried about that same thing, all for apparently different reasons. Amaterasu certainly had people she cared about back home, but Sakuya had been restored and Waka could watch over himself. And Issun...well, Amaterasu had better worry more about what Issun would do to her when she returned from this adventure. Whatever he thought about her sudden disappearance, it couldn't be good. And everyone else who lived there should be fine with Orochi gone.

Amaterasu resettled. There was nothing she could do here for the people who were left behind, in her world or in others. She could and would think about them, but they could not become a distraction, not if this place was as potentially dangerous as the Way Warrant had so easily claimed.

She understood why some of the others here had a harder time separating those worries. Amaterasu took a long view of things, much longer than most mortals could. If it took ten years to get to Loophole, most people here would be furious. But it was a drop in the bucket to Ammy - and to her friends.

[worthpraise]

Amaterasu waited as Xion fidgeted; she knew how to recognize when a person was feeling troubled. Her ears turned back against her head at the words "sick" and "trouble", and she drew in a large breath, chest expanding, before letting it out in one long sigh.

She looked up at Xion in concern, trying to evaluate the girl. It's hard to tell how capable the girl was at defending herself; she didn't seem helpless by any means, but there was a lot of unknown danger out there. Even Amaterasu was hesitant to try to go it alone.

And really, that was what decided her. If she wasn't willing to do that, she shouldn't let someone else take that risk, not when they could pay a worse price than she would. Even if she went with Xion they could easily get overwhelmed - Amaterasu was aware that she was far from invincible, especially here.

She decided to make her point in an emphatic, unmistakable way. Standing, she paused for a moment, looking at Xion, and then stepped forward and turned, laying down on top of the girl's legs, head pressed against her chest and stomach - there's a light pressure pushing Xion backwards and down, like Ammy's trying to get her to lay down. Nope, Xion. Amaterasu thinks you should stay with everyone else and take the caravan.