It's Going to be a Beautiful Day (Open!)

[Ossac Naegling & Calypso]

Time and Date:: November 29th
Weather:: Cold air, clear skies
Previous Threads?:: nope

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    Ossac squinted his eyes against the bright sun peeking in through the mouth of his cave. He sat up, rubbing his eyes. Usually, he didn't spend the night in the cave, he preferred to sleep under the stars, but the rain last night had made him think better of it. A few of the more skittish sheep had joined him under the shelter. Standing up, he took his staff and herded them outside. Ossac put his boots on before stepping out onto the dewy grass.

    Calypso noticed immediately when her rider came out into the open. She growled quietly in greeting as she slunk toward him. He reached out, putting his hand on her nose and sliding it up between her eyes to give her a scratch. "Hey there, Cal..." the dragon fidgeted her wings, indicating that she was ready to take a fly. She also created a small gust in the process. "Hey, I know! We'll go out soon. You know I have to look after these guys first," he said, motioning toward his flock.

    Dragon followed rider as he stepped around the groups of sheep in his care, urging them forward as he made progress. The cold weather setting in was making the sheep lazy, forcing Ossac to give out more prods than usual in order to get them all moving. Once he had moved the flock down into the valley, he could take a fly, but he needed to have them closer to the village before he could take his eyes off of them for a few minutes. Calypso scared any sheep that strayed away from the group back into the flock.

    Working together, they soon had the entire flock nestled into the valley. Ossac stopped and looked over the waking village. A few people mulled about as the merchants began setting out their goods, preparing for the day ahead. And up in the sky, he could see dragons flying high and low. Calypso gave him a longing look.

[Deleted]

Vidar was not happy.
The hunting party had thought it would be absolutely hilarious to leave him behind that day, after he had been 'a hindrance' on the trip before.
It wasn't his fault that Sheepswipe had decided to chase after the prey herself, and in doing so, the fragile dragon had scared it so far away from the party it might of well have jumped off the edge of Berk; leaving the men to return to the settlement empty handed.

"You're a pest, you know that?" Vidar reached up to scratch lovingly at the scaly nose of the yellow Shrieking Glider that was currently perched on the Viking's fur-clad shoulder plates.
He didn't know what he was going to do for the rest of the day. He decided that he couldn't risk going into the market-place for fear of being jeered at because he got left behind; so he settled for roaming the hills.

"What do you want to do today?" The man asked his dragon casually, a grin spread across his features.
Less than twenty minutes later, the young Viking man had thought of something entertaining that would help pass the time...

"Come on girl! Show me what you got!" He brought his arm down in a swiping motion and jumped back, narrowly avoiding a collision with a very hyperactive dragon.
Sheepswipe hurtled her way down the valley that they had found themsleves in; twisting and turning with her wings pinned to her sides, streaking through the valley as quickly as she could.
When she deemed that she had gone far enough away, she turned wing sharply and returned to her friend, landing on his outstretched arm like a bird of prey.
"That was amazing girl! Wanna see how far you can go this time?!" Vidar scratched her under the chin, flinging his arm up and releasing the dragon into the sky.

The beast whirled and twisted through the bends in the valley until she reached a straight that she hadn't made it to before.
Squawking in excitement, she flew even faster than before.
Vidar was running behind her, (not quickly enough to keep up with her, she was a dragon, no mortal man could keep up with a dragon.) but quickly enough not to lose sight of the little yellow streak.

Vidar hadn't seen the sheep, but it looked like Sheepswipe had.
She flew low over the flock, panicking them and roaring at individuals. She couldn't breathe fire so they had no fear of being burnt to a crisp, but they didn't know that.
Vidar watched on from a distance; he secretly thought the whole thing was hilarious. He didn't however, want to meet the shepherd in charge of the flock, well, what little of the flock there was left as Sheepswipe lashed out playfully at the fluffy white animals, sending them scattering in every direction.

[Boom and Lockjaw]

Things had been peaceful at one point.

While Boom wasn't all about peace she was all about being able to take a snooze in the tall grass of the fields whenever she felt like it. The times she felt like it were proportionately higher on days where the sun was actually shining, which made it warmer - it might not actually be warm but it could get around to feeling that way if one stayed put long enough.

A good way to stay put long enough was to take a nap.

One she was abruptly woken up from with a rather large and uncomfortable mouthful of panicked sheep hoof.
"Mmblargh?!" Alarm and disgust warred for the best adjective as she bolted upright only to be pushed over by another stray sheep or two trampling into and over her. She slowly pushed herself back up into what was mostly a sitting position, glaring at the bleating mess of wooly creatures that had just passed over her. "Do you mind?" She intoned loudly, only to have one last sheep run up her back and jump off her shoulders to join the others.

This did not please her, and with a foul four-letter word or three she was up on her feet with a scowl as she wiped smushed grass and other residue off her person. That's when she heard... it. It was Sheepswipe, a squawking trouble making annoyance that had Boom reacting viscerally. Her livid yellow eyes wheeled on to the Glider like a homing device, her scowl breaking out into an almost animal growl as she gave a bellowing roar of challenge and charged after it with her fists raised.

"Get your slimy tail back here!" She shouted after the faster and better-able creature with enough conviction that it sounded like she might actually believe it would do some good. There was a Thor damned sheep terrorist on the loose, and Boom wasn't going to let it get away that easily.

[Deleted]

Freyy stared at the scarf in her hands. Somehow she had screwed up. Probably the sudden turn her dragon had made, flipping from belly up to belly down always threw her off. She tucked the scarf into her tunic and looked up, "Buzzer?"
The Sky-Richk didn't glance down, but tipped his wings in a longer than normal dip, pointing to the ground as he started a dive. He banked his turn and swept into a hard brake, pulling his tail up as he stopped and dropped from the sky. Freyy landed in a crouch on all fours, catching the weight of her dragon before pushing herself up as his tail coiled around her waist and his wings spread, catching a light wind pushing through the trees. A quick flap launched her into the air over a stampede of sheep and a low-flying Shrieking Glider she remembered seeing around town. She landed in the snow again, this time unexpectedly, and on her face.
Above her, she could feel her dragon stretching up, putting all of his weight on the harness. Not for the first time, she was glad she had put steel support rods in the sides of the saddle. They were keeping her ribs from suffering the indignity of being crushed into the cold, wet surface. Another flap tore her above a charging, swearing viking. She reached down and yanked the release cord for her harness, and fell to the snow, rolling to the side to get out of the way before her dragon and pack crashed into the ground again.
"What in Hel's name!" She snapped around, popping to her feet, as another viking charged past. The rider of the running dragon. She started after them. She could always finish that scarf later. She had to get more information. She started through the snow, her dragon following in a swooping soar, with loops every few yards to keep close.

[Deleted]

Everything seemed to happen at once for Vidar.
Sheepswipe seemed to sense a threat and wheeled away from Vidar as fast as a bolt of lightening thrown by Thor himself.
Vidar panicked and chased after her, the realisation of the extent of the damage she'd caused finally catching up to him, he'd be the one to pay the price not him!
This day was quickly turning from bad to worse...

"Come on girl! Come back!" he shouted in poorly spoken Dragonese. He couldn't see what had spooked the Glider, but the Viking had already figured it wasn't good; he chanced a guess that it might be the shepherd coming back to his or her non-existent flock, but knowing Sheepswipe, she could have attracted any sort of trouble.

"What're you running from?" He cried out.
Sheepswipe turned back slightly to look at her Viking companion, she wasn't slowing any time soon.
"Ssss' trouble" she pointed with a taloned wing at something behind Vidar, "me's not coming down when ssss' trouble" she flew faster, leaving the Viking stumbling and tripping over an unexpected pothole in the ground.
He sat up and spat a mixture of heather and mud of of his mouth; some of the long, scratchy grass had got stuck up his nose and it was extremely unpleasant to say the least.
"Ugh! Oh Gods this is the worst day ever!"

Crawling out of the filth, Vidar finally realised what it was that his dragon had been darting away from.

"Ahhhh, hi Boom!" Now was a very good time to run.

[Boom and Lockjaw]

Though there was practically a procession of warm bodies lining up behind her at this point (Freyy and Buzzer in this instance), Boom paid them no mind. She was very much a bull on the charge, her line of focused locked very keenly on the yellow-scaled menace that had disrupted her slumber. Her eyes were gleaming and nearly glowing, much like a mad dog's as her fingers worked hurriedly at the straps on her vest to free something...

That something just so happened to be her very heavy, very ornate mallet that was usually riding comfortably on her back. Not this time, no - the metal weapon was raised skywards in what was clearly the offensive charge, progressively angling her arm when a voice managed to bring her to a stop.

Like an animal being pulled out of it's delirium, she snarled, whirling on the owner of the voice with bared teeth. Poor Vidar.
"You..." She rumbled, holding the arch of her hammer and turning her upper body to face Vidar. "This is your fault!" The accusation turned into a roar, throwing the hammer into the wet earth next to Vidar with a very dangerous squelching sound that would have hurt and probably broken bones if it had hit him or Sheepswipe. As it stood, the gesture was there to make a point.

She paid the idea of personal space absolutely no respect as she closed the few feet of distance between them, angrily angling her chin to glare up at the taller rider so that they were only a few inches apart. If he stalled long enough and gave her the chance, her grubby little hands would grab onto his collar and pull him down to eye-level, the burning amber of her gaze speaking for itself. Still, she interpreted her aggression into a word. "Explain."

[Deleted]

Vidar made a disgruntled high-pitched squawk that was very un-Viking-like as the hammer lodged itself into the muddy, wet ground by his feet.
His fear of being pulverised by the shorter Viking was replaced by his sudden temper;
”What are you doing Boom?!” he stuck his muddied face down to meet the furious eyes of the shorter female, ”It’s not my fault that Sheepswipe doesn’t listen to a word I say is it? I didn’t try and cause this problem!”
Vidar had a nasty temper at the best of times, and shin-up in filthy, stinking mud with long, scratchy grass stuck up his nose and a dragon that was causing more trouble than she was worth, yet again; was certainly not the best of times.

This did not help the situation at all. Boom was looking about ready to explode into an inferno of fiery rage, and better still, Vidar noticed that they had acquired an onlooker and her dragon hidden within the undergrowth.

Vidar was about to open his mouth to yell again when he realised that Boom would eventually pick up on the fact that he was meant to be out hunting and had been left behind. The first step to winning an argument with another angry Viking was not to be a possible laughing stock before picking a fight.
Vidar was not known for backing down however, so even though he was not on the upper hand he continued to grind his teeth and glare down into the mean little eyes of his aggressor.

[Deleted]

Freyy stepped up, dancing lightly between the dragons and the vikings. Her hands slid around the dragons as she tried to figure out what they were all huffy about, before dropping between the vikings, "Hey, what's up?

Buzzer landed nimbly on a tree branch and started clicking, "Hey, what's going on over here? I heard the commotion, but the hunters are all supposed to be over there," his wing pointed towards the hunting grounds, "These sheep aren't for food." He curled his head upside down, staring at the vikings for a long minute. "They don't seem too happy with you, Sheepswipe. Maybe you should go hide until they get done complaining and arguing."

He sniffed at his wing thoughtfully, where Freyy had brushed her hand across it during their chase, "I should go see if Freyy can stop making this escalate, or if she'll make it worse..." She was already animatedly spinning, trying not to get stuck into a focus lock, which would make her better at arguing, but worse at actually winning the argument.

Freyy glanced over at the dragons, watching her own Sky-Richk as he curled around the air and a tree branch like a scarf in the wind. Like the scarf she intended to be making just as soon as these two figured out their problem.

[Boom and Lockjaw]

Vidar's temper warred with her own, the situation ultimately boiling down to two angry sets of eyes leering at eachother with rising temper and a moment of silence so thick with the potential for violence it could have well turned sharp itself - but instead, the first thing to turn sharp was Boom's predatory grin, amber eyes awash with her typical animalistic anger.
"Oh?" The syllable was contrary, a challenging and breathless little growl as she willingly set her brow against his.

"Not your fault? Didn't try?" She parroted him mockingly, lifting one hand and cupping four fingers while her thumb jiggled in place of a mouth. "Blah, blah, blah."
If Vidar's guard was down enough, he'd find that hand had soon balled into a fist and was aiming to clock him on the head - enough force to hurt, but not too much more than that if she didn't wind up swiping at the air like an angry toddler instead.
"You moron - ..." She hissed this accusation at him angrily, but didn't get too much further.

What's up?

Boom turned her angry eyes on to Freyy, pointing a very accusatory finger at Vidar.
"THAT can't train a damned dragon, that's what's up!" She gave a garbled sound of frustration, both hands now dropping over her face and slowly slipping down as she hissed and peeked through her fingers at them both in what was very obviously poor self-restraint.

For good or ill, Boom hadn't caught on that Vidar had been left behind by the hunting party today as of yet... she also hadn't caught on to the fact that Vidar's face was covered in muck and he was probably suffering as much as she was, but that was more a lack of empathy than anything else.

[Deleted]

Vidar was also struggling to keep his temper in check; he hissed through his teeth, trying to keep the air flow going in and out of his nose, giving him the appearance of an enraged bull.

”I CAN train a dragon! I just can’t control her that well yet!” Vidar ground his teeth together in case something far more unpleasant was spoken., it was a personal insult to him considering he had failed the Dragon Training test so many times that his own family had told him to give up trying.
He used the back of his hand to wipe some of the mud off his face, but just ended up smearing it around more, the stuff was like glue.
His hands clenched into fists at his sides, he had no qualms about hitting a girl, after all, they were Vikings.

At that particular moment in time Sheepswipe decided to return to see what was happening to her human companion.
”You’d better get down here you dirty rat!” Vidar swore at the little Glider and pushed the sole of his boot into the ground to stop him from lashing out at something.

”Me’s not comingsss down if you’s speaks to me likesss that” Sheepswipe stuck out her tongue and wheeled away again,
Vidar’s face went red as the pressure built up, and then with a screech he kicked the ground…
The mud splashed up and into Boom’s face…
”Oh Thor” Vidar’s voice suddenly weakened and his face went pale of all colour.

[Deleted]

Freyy barely dodged as a large clod of mud spattered into the air. It wasn't like she minded getting muddy, but if she was, she would have to take a bath. Not that big of a deal, really, but the water was going to be cold this time of the year, and Buzzer couldn't heat it as well as the fire-breathers.

"Whoa!" she kept herself back from the clenched, muddy fists, "Chill. No reason to start a fight here. Seriously. We'll get all muddy, and you'll have to take a bath," she indicated the snow on the ground, showing just how cold that water would be, even with a fire-breather to heat it up.

Up above, Buzzer looked at the Shrieking Glider whirling around, and rolled his eyes, "You should probably go down there. He should stop yelling, since you'll be right up there."
He watched as chunks of earth got thrown up. He didn't like the ground, but he knew his mistress did, so he was preparing to get muddy, and having to land to take a bath. His tail began to uncurl from the branch, only to tense back up slightly at the realization that none of it had hit Freyy.

[Boom and Lockjaw]

Vidar's anger didn't seem to impressive the shorter and equally volatile Viking, shooting the man a half-lidded deadpan stare that ended in a role of her eyes and shrug of her shoulders as she looked directly upwards at the pair of long dragons looping around skywards.
"Then do it." She encouraged flatly, crossing her arms over her chest with a huff as Vidar screeched Dragonese unsuccessfully at Sheepswipe.

Boom didn't know a lick of Dragonese, but she understood the context of the situation enough to let her silence hurt more than words ever would as she raised one brow in an accusatory and wordless question at Vidar.
Well?
... And was promptly sprayed in the face by mud. Boom was still - the dangerous kind of perfect still, like the eye of a hurricane. Her livid yellow-amber eyes opened, wheeling with a fire of their own, setting on Freyy for just a moment. "We're already muddy."

The tiniest, hoarsest growl could be heard under a veneer of obviously false sweetness, one that grew into a sound of challenge that meant that Vidar was indeed very doomed.

Boom had already launched herself at the taller man's solar plexus, aiming to headbutt him right in the middle of the chest with a crazy too-toothy grin and mud-dripping face. Her fists were drawn back to her sides, not something she was interested in moving - at least not yet. Her goal was to knock Vidar down to the ground first.

[Deleted]

Vidar tried to side-step her, but ended up tripping over his own clumsy feet and got well and thoroughly butted in the chest in the process.
The air was knocked clean from his lungs, and he wheezed, scrambling to get back up; he knew Boom and she wasn’t the sort of woman to go easy on someone she classified as an opponent.

’I’m going to wring her neck!’ Vidar thought bitterly of the Shrieking Glider that had seemingly disappeared off the edge of the Earth.
Right now he had bigger problems to deal with, the main one being that Boom was bringing down one of her fists towards his face.
He blocked her successfully and rammed back into her legs, trying to knock her to the ground also.
Vidar wasn’t skilful, but he certainly could hold his own in a fight.
Being a hunter he had grappled with plenty of wild boars and even some wild dragons, even if he almost died from exhaustion, at the end, he still always came out in one piece if not a bit bruised and bleeding.

Boom was a member of the Hooligan community; therefore killing her was instantly wiped off the top of the list, however with the young hunter’s rage at full peak he was just about ready to.
He grabbed a fistful of Boom’s hair and yanked it roughly; he needed to get her on the ground, either that or he needed to get back on his feet.
The ground was definitely the safest option; he could wrestle her more successfully, she had brute strength that rivalled his own and would knock him to the floor again if he tried to rise to meet her attack.
Running was no longer an option; he’d have to fight her until one of them gave up.

[Deleted]

Freyy stepped back from the two as they went down. It wasn't necessarily her part to get involved in a fight, but as one of the village seamstresses, and a guard, if low ranking, it was kind of her duty to stop them before clothing started tearing. To facilitate that, she leaped up onto the two and started kicking and rolling around, not really caring which one she hit, "HEY, Knock it off! Solve this without violence, like our dragons are!" More punches and kicks. She felt someone pulling her hair, and swung her head back, attempting to hit the puller.

Buzzer drooped from his perch, hanging like a vine, upside down, 'See, now that's why you should go interfere...' he didn't want to see Freyy hurt either, but he knew she could hold her own, and if push came to shove, he could always just go and club them with his tail. His aim was good enough. 'They're scaring off the sheep. That'll make it really hard to hunt them down later. Pay attention, you two."
His wings tensed into gliding position, getting him ready to swoop in and snag the back of Freyy's harness in his teeth before dropping his club-tail on the other two vikings, since their dragons didn't seem too involved in the fight.

[Boom and Lockjaw]

Boom's victory of knocking the wind out of him was short-lived. The reason why was simply that the hunter's attack had worked. He would be pleased with his handiwork, fighting with a wild boar wasn't all that far away from fighting with Boom. At the very least, he'd be able to hold her at bay.

With her legs literally swept out from under her and Vidar's successful reach for her hair wound up being successful, and with his sharp tug her center of gravity came tumbling down and on to him with the force of the human bowling ball that she was. This brought her down into the mud with another unceremonious splash of earth-goop.

He'd find it familiar, the way her eyes seemed alight like freshly leaked magma and the way her teeth were bared in that feral snarl that she didn't hold back now that they were on eye level with one another once again. As her hand reached out it caught...

Freyy? Yes, Freyy. Freyy who was yelping something about no violence and dragons and things that weren't nearly as important as the fingernails that she wanted to dig into Vidar's face. Boom had no problem letting the watchguard go, rolling on to all fours and holding herself there even with the kicks to her sides. Immovable, she took one creeping crawl closer to the hunter.

It was with a sneer of cruel victory that her fingers finally and rather harshly dug into Vidar's scalp - the lift of her hand was initially gentle, though it didn't take genius to know that her next move would be harsh and unforgiving... but not nearly as unforgiving as the tail of a Sky-Rich, something which caused her to roll to her side and out of the way with wide eyes as the feeling of heaviness and wind blew past her - missing her nose by mere inches. She'd let go of Vidar entirely in the process.

Disoriented for a moment, Boom was half-propped up and shook her head as if to shake out the animal instinct out of herself. It only sort-of worked.
"Dragons?!" Her voice was hoarse and low, the kind of quiet livid of a barely contained beast, not even able to formulate her question into something beyond one word. This was fine, as her disorientation was only herded along by a distressed sheep bounding into and over her as she stared after the long-bodied creature of Freyy's, distracted and slowly raising herself into a sitting position.

Lockjaw was nowhere to be seen.