Evening
Clear
70°
The yearling was alone that night -- for the first few nights in forever. Things admittedly weren't the same without Centri's parents, nor her younger siblings chasing after her and nipping on her heels, but as the elders had willed it to be the young girl wouldn't have it any other way. She had come of age, and just like her ancestors and the ones who would be of the future, Centri would start anew for the sake of the family. To make her grandmother proud would've been Centri's biggest accomplishment.
If only she knew where to start from there...
As the young woman waltz through the barren Glen that night, however, her thoughts had been drifted away at the sight of a small, glowing orb by her feet....no, two. Three! Three she found surrounding her, yet as she follwed one's trial surrounded by highlights of yellow, she'd come to find more than just a couple. There were hundreds of them.
"Fireflies..." She whispered, mouth slightly agape in awe at the sight of them. In that moment Centri's surroundings were droned out by the noise of buzzing and sight of yellow lights -- and the young girl could do nothing but allow the scenery to set her into a dazed trance...
To be a juggernaut was to have someone pulling your strings. A huge, driving force, meant to crush, to oppress, but you needed cohesion. Without it, you would be left floundering.
Juggernaut had no puppetmasters to direct him. He was left adrift, no one on the end of his leash. He couldn’t tell if that was meant to register as good, or as bad. Good, because he was free? Bad, because he was not being told how to be anymore? He didn’t know. The cruel hand of the master had passed him over for another, and Juggernaut had been allowed the “opportunity” to be released.
He knew how to fend for himself, at least.
The bear-like boy moved without care, his head held low, his eyes dull. There was little to be said. He was tired, had been born it, marinated in it. The only thought he had, was to move forward.
Until a small speck of light landed directly on his nose. Juggernaut stared cross eyed at it, for a moment, frozen in place, before it would pick up and fly back the way it had come, to its fellows. Clustered around a pretty blonde girl, who didn’t seem scared of them. But Juggernaut wasn’t a boy who let things lie.
Do you know what these are?
He would call, half worried he was about to be bitten by one of them.
Distracted by the flight of a thousand-and-one tiny lanterns, it hadn't truly come to the flower nymph's attention that someone else might've watched, too. Centri turned her sunlit crown over her shoulder, and her murky water gaze lit in surprise to see someone who towered several stories over her (At least, that's what it felt like from the view)! What she'd been more surprised about was not the height difference, however, it was his question.
"Why Monsieur, these are fireflies!" she said, her voice soft yet lingering with a hint of surprise. "Have you no knowledge of Fleur's night creatures? They are quite common in summer's eve." Centri often got to see the clouds of Fireflies in the grasslands she grew up in. She enjoyed chasing them with her brother at night before their parents called them in for bed. The memory alone made the dame's heart pang with nostalgia, and her attentions were soon brought back to the behemoth with sky light eyes.
She was distracted by his stature at first but….his features did not seem very aged at all.
Tri chuckled bashfully. "I say Monsieur, yet you don't seem that much older than me. Are you a teenager, too??"
She was small, pale, and he considered she’d have to look up at him if he got any closer. Juggernaut considered the question, looking at the bugs, the “fireflies” as she had called them.
Never. I’ve heard of bugs who light up, but we called them “lightning bugs”. I never saw them.
He knew only because his mother had told him stories, before she became too tired to care.
His eyes traveled back to the wisp of a girl, and he thought over her other question.
I..yes. My birth date passed recently.
He thought, at least. He had to be somewhere around a year.
"Lightning bugs."….Well, that was one way to describe them. She had never recalled her people calling them that, at least. She pursed her lips and glanced to the side in thought. "That’s one way to describe them, I suppose. Lighting is a rather explosive description, don’t you think? I’d like to think of them as small vessels of slow, simmering flames…" she looked to the tall boy as if to seek an answer, but did not expect a response to her useless rambles.
A softened smile lit her gentle features at the mention of his birth date. "Happy birthday garçon! Goddess Fleur has great plans for us youth – though we cannot see it yet." strangely enough though, he did not seem all that excited for his coming of age. Maybe it was because it passed already?
Small, bleached paws made movements toward him, crunching the damp evening grasses beneath them. Looking up to him, Centri could now see how big he was – especially with the closed distance. What really made her curious though was his scent. It was as if he wasn’t entirely….wolf.
"I am Centri. Centri Auclair." the young girl greeted."--and you?"
She talked a lot, Juggernaut noted, his brain struggling to keep up with all of it at once. Maybe it was the sleep deprivation talking, but she felt technicolor in a word of fuzzy black and white.
He caught only her name, in the end. And an ask for his own. Briefly, he considered all his mother had told him about aliases, about hiding who he was, about running at the first sign of trouble. But she didn’t care after that. Nobody had.
Juggernaut.
He said after a long silence, offering a dip of his great head. She was so very small, he noted, worry in the creases of his eyes. Was she a runt? Or was she simply born that small?
Probably not polite to ask such, Juggernaut.
Its good to meet you. Thank you for telling me about the fireflies.
He noted he sounded like he was reading his words off a teleprompter. He put a smile on his face, considered it, then allowed his muzzle to fall back into the placid, tired face he normally held.
"You’re welcome~" the young woman responded in a melodic tone, swaying her tail constantly. This
Juggernaut fellow was a tad strange – from the ways in which he spoke, to his strange flip of expressions (well….lack thereof). Regardless of it all, Centri was still grateful for the company of someone in a new, unknown world – especially someone around her age. Besides, she finds his behavior rather endearing. He sort of reminded the girl of her uncle Laurent – and he rarely smiled!
The smile Jugger had flashed seemed more forced than anything, though, and she was curious as to whether she’d be able to get a genuine one from him. A glint of playfulness had beamed in her pale gaze when the idea struck her just then, coupled with a mischievous grin, as she would slowly lower herself into a play bow. Which soon turned into what one might see as 'tap dancing'
She seemed nice, this young woman. Juggernaut watched her sway musically, like a daffodil, with something of a bemused expression. This slowly seemed to morph into befuddlement as she ducked low and began to…
Dance?
He assumed that’s what she was doing anyway. He was slow to follow the rhythm, trying to copy her footwork, but with his beefy frame it wasn’t easy. He rather looked like a beef cow trying to do jazz tap than anything graceful like Centri. Which just increased a slowly bubbling befuddled amusement in his chest, a warm, fizzy feeling. Like soda.
As he copied her, she giggled. It looked more like he was easing into it rather than understanding her motives, but she didn't mind either way. It was strangely adorable to watch, actually.
The movement in her paws soon took a detor when the woman skidded around the grass and turned around, running away from the gargoyle boy in playful, hopping steps. Every now and then she'd turn around to see if he was following her, as Centri wished for him to chase her.
She always won when it came to tag....well not always, she was good at it. The fae would not loose to what look like a rookie though!
