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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:38:54 GMT -6
Just as Fiera was about to leave however, there was a familiar hiss- the rush of water. That wasn’t unusual or concerning to Fiera, but she did perk up when she heard Harding start squeaking with surprise. She turned around- normally he was very reserved, calm, accommodating. That kind of noise was out of the ordinary for him, and the moment her brain finished processing that, the water hit her. Well, the mud hit her. She managed a brief yowl as the freezing cold water soaked into her clothes before she was pulled down by the sudden wave, knocked end over end across what was once the shore. She scrabbled along the bottom for purchase before the wave started pulling back again, slopping back out into the heavily receded river. After a few tense moments it finally became calm, though Fiera was still left buried in who knew how many feet of mud.
Fiera 16 Harding 28.1/30.1 26
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:39:33 GMT -6
Freak waves like this weren’t unheard of, but they were certainly rare, especially this time of year. The river was too low and dry for these freak waves to happen. Or so she had thought- apparently they could, it’s just that most of it was mud by volume now. Lovely. After a few moments of calm, Fiera’s sense of up and down finally returned and she was able to push herself off the bottom, breaking the surface with a loud popping noise. She gasped for air and immediately looked around. Her first thought was of how her outfit was just ruined. And oh gods, her tail, her TAIL. It was going to take her HOURS to wash and comb out all the mud. This was a nightmare. A complete nightmare. A choked wail started from her throat, but then she remembered- Harding. Where had he gone? She looked around frantically.
Fiera 17 Harding 28.2/30.2 27
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:39:47 GMT -6
Luckily, he wasn’t far from the river- which made sense, considering he was in it at the time the wave hit. Unfortunately, all she could see of him was his tail fluke sticking straight up in the air, mere feet from the water, thrashing madly. “Aw geez.” She muttered to herself before she began pressing forward through the mud. “Don’t worry, Harding! I’ve got you!” She shouted, hoping he could hear her. The progress through the mud was far slower than she would have liked, but luckily Harding seemed to be making pretty good progress on freeing himself on his own. By the time she made it over to him. All she had to do was give him one final shove on his tail. The neptica squeaked loudly and finally flopped over sideways into the river, which by now was more a light sludge than water, but it was at least liquid enough to support his weight.
Fiera 18 Harding 28.3/30.3 28
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:40:03 GMT -6
He also didn’t have gills, so he didn’t have to worry about passing water through them. Instead he just floated at the surface, clicking angrily. “I know baby, I know.” Fiera said, patting him on the head. “I just need to find the bucket and then we can… go…” Fiera said, looking out across the mud plain that had formed. Hm. Well. She could see a sharp looking metallic lump about ten feet away from her. That was probably her bucket full of shells. But now that the immediate crisis had passed, she realized that it had really only passed for her and Harding- there were plenty of other creatures who’s lives had been turned upside down by the wave. Literally. Just glancing around she picked out at least five creatures that had been left stranded, along with several much smaller fish and a few extra shells. She had some work to do.
Fiera 19 Harding 28.4/30.4 29
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:40:33 GMT -6
First things first- she slogged through the mud and grabbed her bucket. She filled it with water that had filled into the holes made by her footprints, and tossed a few of the still living fish she could see into it. “Congratulations, it’s not your day to die.” She said, tossing a starfish in with them. Then she turned to the larger creatures. There were a few stranded ramfish, and a couple of crustaceans. “Right, the crabs and… that… thing… can wait.” She said to herself. They were a bit better adapted to surviving without water than the fish, so she could afford to leave them a little larger. With that in mind, she struggled back towards the shore, where she had a cooler. Normally she had it filled with ice so she could have a drink while fishing, but this time she dumped it out, and instead filled it with river water.
Fiera 20 Harding 29.0/31.0 30
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:41:15 GMT -6
It was, admittedly, a pretty bad spot for a fish, but she figured it would be better than suffocating on mud. Plus, it was only temporary until she could get them to her kennels. Once the container was full of river water (obtained from a bit further downstream), Fiera slowly hauled it back towards the newly formed mud flats until she started sinking down again. Then she made her way over to the ramfish, which were sadly flopping around on the surface of the mud. Normally these creatures could actually move pretty well along the riverside, with their massive pectoral fins allowing them to “walk” a bit like a mudskipper. But the substrate here was so much softer than the usual rocky, shell covered riverside that they just kept sinking right back down again, their weight pulling them into the mud. By this point they looked exhausted from the effort of trying to pull themselves back out again.
Fiera 1 Harding 29.1/31.1 31
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:41:33 GMT -6
That meant that it shouldn’t be too hard to rescue them… right? Fiera had definitely been burned in this regard before, but she wasn’t about to let an animal suffocate to death. Unfortunately, these were very heavy creatures- Fiera had great difficulty in wrapping her arms around one to haul it up and out of the mud, and her legs struggled to support its weight. Something in her back protested loudly. Even worse, the moment its head was freed from the mud, it seemed to realize that something was pulling on it instead of it moving of its own accord. The fish began to thrash, hard, and Fiera screeched with surprise as it tore itself from her grasp, smacking her upside the head in the process. Of course, it immediately landed itself in the mud, still gasping for water that wasn’t there. Fiera pinched her nose, hoping it wasn’t bleeding.
Fiera 2 Harding 29.2/31.2 32
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:41:53 GMT -6
“I’m trying to help you, you stupid… ugh.” She said, realizing the futility in arguing with a fish. “You want to wrestle? We can wrestle.” She said with a hiss, refusing to lose to an animal. This time, she grabbed the powerful tail at the base of the fin and started pulling it backwards through the mud. It tried to dig its fins into the mud, but it was too soft to get any real traction, and even though it thrashed as hard as it could it couldn’t outpace Fiera’s constant tugging backwards towards the cooler. By the time she made it over, she was able to quickly haul it over one shoulder, dumping it into the comparatively clean water. After a few desperate moments the ramfish seemed to realize that it was free and calmed a bit, pumping its gills to free them from mud. Fiera took a moment to catch her breath.
Fiera 3 Harding 29.3/31.3 33
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:42:11 GMT -6
The job still wasn’t done though. There was a second ramfish she spotted stranded- this one a deep rust color instead of the forest green of the first one. This one had been tossed further up the shore however, and was stranded on its back to boot, gasping in the dry winter air as it loosely flopped its fins above it, growing weaker by the moment. “Please don’t fight me on this too…” Fiera muttered, and tried lifting it. She grabbed it by the tail on one end and by digging her fingers in between its head plates on the other and lifted with her knees, picking the whole creature up like some sort of large mutated baby. It wiggled a bit, briefly, but was too weak to put up any sort of significant fight by this point, the poor thing. Within a few hobbled steps, she made it back to the cooler.
Fiera 4 Harding 29.4/31.4 34
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:42:25 GMT -6
When she put the second ramfish in, the cooler became uncomfortably full (given the size of the animals), but that was made better by the fact that they were both completely exhausted. Fiera gently set the lid on top to give them a bit of quiet and darkness. Hopefully they’d stay put until she could get everything out of here. From there, she turned back to the rest of the stranded animals. There was still a pinchclaw, a snapclaw, and a sand skimmer (if she was remembering her ‘wildlife of the river’ guide right) left to be rescued. The sand skimmer was pretty easy, all things considered- it was simply flipped upside down, the upper side of its shell half submerged in mud, leaving the rest of its limbs flailing madly at the air. Fiera winced a bit at the sort of gross chitinous, undulating mass of its underside, but comforted herself with the thought that it was simply an animal in distress.
Fiera 5 Harding 30.0/32.0 35
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:42:43 GMT -6
Luckily for her, it was also pretty small. She wasn’t sure if it had a stinger, but she wasn’t going to risk it. The humanish grabbed the skimmer by the tail, hauling it up into the air in one swift motion. The creature waved its legs in distress, and strange markings on its back lit up. To Fiera’s surprise, she felt a faint buzzing sensation. For a moment she was worried that she had grabbed a creature that could deliver an electrical shock, but she soon realized what the sensation actually was- the thrum of magic. The same hum she felt every time she found an elemental crystal in the mines or a remnant crystal in the mansion. This wasn’t just a weird “crab”, it was a slightly magical weird crab. “...Well I’ll be damned.” Fiera said, raising an eyebrow. Despite everything, this was still a very lucky find for her.
Fiera 6 Harding 30.1/32.1 36
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:43:48 GMT -6
She didn’t want to risk losing it, so she hurried as quickly as she could to shore. She found her fishing bucket, full of shells and a few small fish, but still with plenty of water in it, and dropped the sand skimmer in. It sunk to the bottom where it scurried around the perimeter of the bucket for a few moments but eventually calmed down, apparently glad to just have some fresh water. In addition, it even nestled itself down into some of the sediment that had settled out of the muddy water, apparently happy to have some sand to skim, as it were. Fiera went ahead and slapped the lid on the bucket, not wanting her special new find to be able to escape. She didn’t hear any sloshing from the bucket- apparently it was quite satisfied. She DID hear chirping from the river though- Harding was trying to get her attention.
Fiera 7 Harding 30.2/32.2 37
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:44:05 GMT -6
She glanced back in his direction and sure enough, the snapclaw and pinchclaw were still there, their claws tangled in each other and only sinking deeper in the mud as they struggled to free themselves. Fiera glanced around- she was well and truly out of containers to keep all of these creatures she had found in, so she would just have to hope that the two crablike beasts wouldn’t chase her down and pinch her ankles once she set them free. Unfortunately, that did seem pretty likely- they started fighting even harder as she approached, as if they could quickly finish each other off and move on to her. “Look, just- let’s all just calm down here.” She said, trying to reach in a hand to uncouple them. That just got her slapped with a few crab legs however, so Fiera leaned back to look around and reassess the situation.
Fiera 8 Harding 30.3/32.3 38
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:44:24 GMT -6
Just to her left, there was a branch sticking out of the mud. She yanked it out and waved it around a bit. It seemed perfectly sturdy- not broken or rotted, just something carried in by the wave. It even narrowed nicely at the end- it would be perfect for this task. “Alright, let’s see about this.” She said, looming over the crab creatures. With a swift movement, she jammed the narrow end of the stick in between the hinges of their claws, attempting to lever them open enough that they could slip out. The animals hated it of course- while they both disliked being stuck like this, they hated the idea of the other one getting free first even more. Fiera was stronger than both of them however (or at the very least better at using tools to get what she wanted), and after a few minutes of careful poking and prodding she was able to drag the two animals apart.
Fiera 9 Harding 30.4/32.4 39
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Jan 3, 2024 20:44:41 GMT -6
“Finally! Now, you go over here… and you go over here.” She said, nudging the two creatures apart. “And you know what… how about…” She muttered, digging around in her pockets. She had brought some fish treats for Harding, but everything in her pockets was waterlogged and covered in mud now. She wasn’t going to be keeping these or store them again, so she might as well get rid of them. So instead she tossed them in front of the pinchclaw and the snapclaw, who were now on either side of her and so hopefully wouldn’t fight over the food. If they were grateful they’d appreciate it, and if not, well, they’d probably need the extra energy to recover from their ordeal. Either way, Fiera’s little rescue operation had proven greatly successful. Now all she had to do was get all of her her new friends home.
Fiera 10 Harding 31.0/33.0 40
[Taming Done- 15 Posts]
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