Wotz

IC: Noka Noka simply shook her head and sighed. "I, really, I didn't mean for you to see that, I just, I'm sorry-"

IC: Kuhrin The boulders this high in the mountain had been frozen in place. If it wasn't for the several feet of snow between him and the ice, Kuhrin would more than likely have broken something by now. Not that it mattered, giving the wind threatening to tear him from the ground, and the very air itself turning his blood into a solid. These, and the slightly disgruntling fact that he was going into business with a grizzly bear. With his sonic abilities constantly turned on to a low level, Kuhrin searched the surrounding area with his sonar, seeking signs of his quarry as he marched. At first, there was nothing but the occasional rahi corpse, or a scratch in one of the rocks. But as he delved deeper into the maze of jagged grey stone, more and more signs of an inhabitant began to show. Burnt wood from a fire, more remains of wild creatures that would not wander this far on their own, and eventually one or two abandoned caves that had evidently been used as dwellings. He was close now. By now, he mused, the sun could be going down, and he would never know until it was too late. He'd have to hide under one of these overhanging rocks, which logically would not be hospitable given their abandonment by his weaker prey. A blizzard was beginning to take shape now, but it simply motivated him to move quicker. Soon, the blizzard had transformed into a blinding white sheet trying to stunt his progress, but it was in vain; nothing would stop him finding his target. At last, he found it: A circle of elongated boulders, forming a sort of fence around what appeared to be a primitive shelter built out of rock, with a torn cloth hanging over the entrance to cover the flicker of a flame within. Kuhrin smiled triumphantly as he dropped from his perch into the circle. The snow grew shallower as he neared where it had been compressed into hard ice around the shelter. The fire was suddenly blocked by a slender shadow, which stretched out across the snow, fragmented by the curtain. The smug grin on Kuhrin's face faded slightly as he came to a stop, seeing that the man he sought was no longer the proud hero he had been in days gone by. Where there had been muscles, there was now only flesh and bone. His once gleaming silver armour was matted and grey. His face was scarred, frozen into a look of concern. His eyes questioned Kuhrin's presence - why had he come here, what more was there to take. Then they burst into flames, and the anger, the strength of his past self returned as his body stretched and twisted out of proportion. Claws grew from his hands; his eyes turned pitch black; his height increased by two thirds. What was once a painful transformation had grown comfortable. Kuhrin looked up at the Parakuka creature in awe, proud of his work from so long ago, and smiled. "Hello, Desuka."

IC: Noka Kutsan stumbled back, tripping over the bed and falling to the ground. For a moment, he was back to being a senile old man, withered away and fragile. The weakness pulled at Noka's heart, and she stepped past Khervos to try to help her grandfather up, but he pushed her away. "Get... Out..." He growled, dragging himself off the ground to try and regain his power, even while dribbling from the corner of his mouth. "GET OUT!" He picked up a vase and threw it at the two Matoran. He missed, but the message was clear as it shattered with a deafening crash on the wall. Noka whirled around and grabbed her other sword from where it was mounted on the wall. Kicking open the door, she gestured for Khervos to follow with haste as she sprinted out of the house.

OOC: It's alright, Kutsan is an NPC. IC: Noka The fire in Kutsan's eyes was clear as his gaze shot back and forth like a blade between Khervos and Noka. She swallowed, forcing herself to her feet. "Grandfather, please listen. He hasn't done anything wrong," she croaked, but the old man did not reply. He merely stood between them, gritting his teeth, words failing to reflect his fury. "...And neither have I." At this, his wrath descended upon her. He swung his cane, striking her in the knee, then the hip, then the neck, then the face, then the body, and again, and again. She fell to the ground under its force, crying in agony and pleading for him to stop, but all he responded with were more words of abuse and hatred. Every few seconds she would hold her eyes closed and try to shut out the pain, but then he would only hit her harder, until flecks of blood began to join the droplets of tears and dust in the air around her.

IC: Noka Just as the final edges of Khervos disappeared under the bed, the door creaked open. Noka spun around to find Kutsan standing in the doorway, leaning on his cane, the eyes of his Pehkui narrowed suspiciously at her, standing alone in the middle of her room. If Khervos could see her eyes, he would see the most desperate plea for help, for she knew what was about to happen. "Who were you talking to?" Kutsan asked, his eyes darting around the room in search of potential hiding places. "What do you mean, Grandfather?" Noka replied innocently. "I wasn't talking." "Don't lie to me, child, I heard voices. Where is the man you have here?" "I don't-" He dashed forward at a speed far quicker than expected for a man of his age, grabbing his granddaughter by the neck and holding on tight, his fingers an iron vice from which she could not escape. "Where is he?!" "Grandfather!" She squealed, unable to force out any more words. Without thinking, she glanced briefly at her bed. Kutsan followed her gaze. With his attention now taken, he released her, and she fell back into a chair, gasping for breath and coughing. Khervos saw Kutsan's accusing eyes appear before him and glare. Gritting his teeth, he reached under the bed to grab the Matoran.

IC: Noka "So if I did bring him back, he would still be convicted?" Noka replied, raising her voice slightly. "That isn't fair! The real Kuhrin is an innocent man, it was the stupidity of society and Makuta's darkness that turned him into this... Monster. This murderer you speak of isn't Kuhrin, it's an agent of darkness!" Suddenly, glancing at the door, she realised how loudly she was speaking, and moved closer, now speaking in hushed tones. "Please, just give me a chance, one opportunity with as much security as you like for me to speak to him. I swear I-" There was a knock at the door. Noka froze. "Hide."

IC: Kuhrin Miles from where Ferron and Rhea sat by the fire, over mountainous slopes and perilous drifts, was their prey. He was a mere whisper on the breeze, the slender assassin whose magnificent form sliced through the cold like a razor blade slices through flesh. In his possession were no heatstones, no weapons, not even a single piece of fur to keep the cold away - only his wits, a long rope he had found along the way, and the strength of Ferron's Pakari, now worn like it were his own. The rope was used to tie his waist to a point slightly further down the rock face he now scaled. He didn't weigh much, in fact his weight was now lower than ever due to his undernourishment and lack of rust. As a result, the mask allowed him to quickly scamper up the rock face, occasionally tearing the rope from its previous position and tying it to a higher one, leaving hoops of rope tied around rocks at regular intervals. This also meant that his rope was growing shorter and shorter as he grew nearer to the peak, and would soon expire its use. The winds were picking up, carrying with them bladed frost flakes which bore themselves into the chinks in his armour and organic muscle, threatening to freeze his life solid in that instant, stuck eternally as a climbing statue of ice. He gritted his teeth, and swore never to allow that to happen. "Never die..." He murmured to himself. "Never die!" He repeated, forcing his limbs to function, forcing them to haul him up, up, just a little further- -snap!- After growing brittle and hard from the icy winds, the rope gave, being stretched one inch too far. He was left with a belt of rope with a small stubby strand sticking out of it. He would have to go this final stretch alone. With the cold eating away at his fingertip and the extremities of his face, Kuhrin dragged his half-frozen form higher and higher up the rock, scarcely daring even to look up, until finally, his outstretched hand found not more stone, but open air. He looked up to find that he had arrived. The frozen lagoon. He brought his hand down onto the the ground and pushed, lifting his body up and over the edge and onto the cold, flat rock. He lay there on his back, freezing and exhausted, for a lifetime, holding his fingers in his hands and breathing on them, the temporary warmth of his breath reflected back into his face to give some passing comfort. Eventually, he knew, he would have to move, if he were to get anything done. But for now, he lay. The cliff had been conquered. That was one obstacle off of the list.

IC: Noka Noka shrugged. "Your guess is better than mine," she leaned forward in her chair urgently. "Please, whatever incling you or your client has of where to find him, you must take me to him. I'm sure there is yet good in him, deep down."

IC: Noka "Right," Noka replied, a little smile sneaking onto her face in fond memory of days gone by. "It was ages ago, really. When the Charred Forest was just the Forest, and people were too naive to really understand the danger of the darkness over us. I used to take dance classes in Ta-Koro. More just to have an excuse to get away from here, but I enjoyed it. "Anyway, we used to practise outside from time to time, when other people needed to use the studio. We were just over the hill from where the lava farmers used to work, and one of them would scive off of work to watch us dance. He had these incredible eyes, these powerful, perceptive green eyes, like he could see right inside you. And I suppose, him seeing inside me, and all the pain and twisted broken thoughts and feelings and all the filth of my soul, and then coming back day after day like it didn't matter, I grew to admire him. "So I went to talk to him eventually. I asked him why he was watching us, and he shrugged, all shy. It caught me off guard - I guess I expected him to be some kind of overconfident, reckless adventurer that watches girls dance because he doe what he wants. Instead he was sort of awkward and sheepish, and that was sort of... Cute, I guess. "Eventually I got him talking, and things got better and better between us, and then one day everything came crashing down. I don't know what it was that made him do it, it was just... He got some kind of infection on his hand, and nobody understood what to do about it. Slowly, as time went on, the realisation dawned on him that it was going to spread and maybe kill him, and that fury and anger at how unfair the world was started to consume him. I felt I knew him less and less each day, and he became more and more volatile, and violent. He had lost his job, you see, him and his friend, Krell. They had bent the rules out of shape and their boss just laid them off. He felt like his whole life was crashing down around him, and when he looked at me, he looked right through me, like he had finally left this astral plane and I was nothing anymore, just a memory, a thing that existed in the horrible cruel world. "He joined the Guard before long, and I followed. I figured it would be the only way to see him again. Except it just made him start to despise me. I was clingy and needy, a stupid rock headed Po-Matoran that couldn't get it into my thick skull what a bleak awful place the world was. When he would say stuff like that, I would just boil up, ready to explode. He didn't know the first thing about suffering, and sorrow. He had everything he could ever want, the darkness was within him. Now, I wish I had said that to him before the Battle for Kini-Nui. "One of his squadmates, Traxin, disappeared during the battle, and was marked down as MIA. He never got a proper funeral or any kind of memorial as one of the deceased. Traxin was simply forgotten as if he were just a pawn in a huge game played by the authorities. He lost it - after that, I barely saw him again. Eventually, he too was marked down as MIA. I thought he was dead, and it has crippled me inside to know that I failed to save him, to convince him that it's all okay. I suppose it's hard to tell people those things when you don't even believe them yourself." Noka took a deep breath, and tilted her head back, attempting to stop the tears from flowing. "Kuhrin... I can't believe he's alive, and that he... He..."

Wait, wasn't there meant to be a way of getting them off that we were meant to learn later on? Or has that still not been uncovered yet?

IC: Noka Noka lived a short distance out of town with her grandfather in a lonely-looking hut by the road. A box-like shape as opposed to the customary dome, many sections on its bricked walls were covered by black wood faded to a dull grey from years of weathering in the sand. All of the windows featured opening shutters in the same material, through which lay crimson curtains, all of which were closed. "Here we are," Noka said softly as they arrived, making sure to keep her distance. "Grandfather was once a very welcoming Turaga, but he's grown bitter. So you'll have to keep as quiet as possible until we reach my room, got it?" With a final finger-to-the-lips, she stepped forward and opened the door, ushering Khervos inside before she closed it again, quietly. Khervos crossed the threshold into a central room, the largest in the house, which was comprised of a slight step down into a square indent in the floor, like an arena, in the centre of which was a circular column carved from stone, surrounded by six smaller columns, acting as a dining table and chairs. Around the edge of the arena were three doorways with similar curtains to those seen in the windows from outside. One set of curtains was open, and through it could be seen a study of some sort. The other two, Khervos could only assume, led to Noka's and her grandfather's bedrooms. The two of them crossed the arena to about halfway, Khervos on his tiptoes, and Noka walking quietly, when a withered, hateful voice like two great rough stones being ground together erupted from behind the far left curtain. "Noka? What are you doing back so early?!" "I'm just grabbing a few things, grandfather," Noka responded as sweetly as possible, trying to hide the resentment in her voice. "Well keep it down, child! I'm busy!" She narrowed her eyes at the curtain, then pressed on, guiding Khervos across to the curtain on the right. Behind the curtain was a door made of a thicker, different wood than that of the shutters and repairs on the outside, which she shut behind them as they entered. "Right then," she breathed a sigh of relief, taking a seat on her bed and inviting Khervos over to sit as well. "Where to begin?"

IC: Noka She shook her head. "I haven't seen him in... Oh, a very long time." For a moment she dwelt upon her thoughts, contemplating the sanity in telling this total stranger all about her Ghost of Christmas Past. As if you ever tried to be sane before, she pointed out. What is there to lose? "It's a long and difficult story to tell," she warned Khervos. "You'd better come back to my hut - I promise I won't murder you or anything." She smirked slightly at her own dark humour.

IC: Noka Noka's eyes widened, and she drew back a little in horror. When she spoke, it was fractured, the many thoughts in her head spilling out into one garbled mess like many people speaking over each other. "Killed- No, he couldn't have- Alive, he's alive then? Of course, but- Oh, Kuhrin!" She held her head in sorrow and confusion, breathing deeply and heavily. "Not now," she murmured, "not now..." Tilting back her head, she swallowed, hard. She fought away her foggy vision, blinked, and focused. "And this is all you know?" She croaked, not looking for an answer. "It isn't like the Kuhrin I know- The Kuhrin I knew to do something like that." There was a brief silence as she gathered herself again. "What sort of information are you after, anyway?"

IC: Noka Noka scanned up and down the alleyway to check no one was listening in, then whirled around and stood uncomfortably close to Khervos, so that their noses almost touched. Her hands fidgeted and scrambled for something to busy themselves with, but in vain. "First things first," she murmured in the Matoran's face. "Who are you, and what do you know about Kuhrin?"

IC: Noka At this, Noka's defences failed. Her expression fell into one of wide-eyed shock. Her arms sagged down by her sides, unsure of where to go. A long silence rang in the air between them as she gaped at him in fear and he returned her gaze with confusion. After several millennia had passed in that dark, dusty corner of the room, Noka rose to her feet and blinked, snapping out of her trance. "Could you..." She gulped, forcing the flood of words and phrases and questions back down inside her. "Let's go outside. I need... Let's go outside." Without waiting for the Matoran, she whirled around and paced out of the back door into a darkened alley between the inn and the neighbouring hut.

IC: Noka Noka raised an eyebrow, taking her hands off the mug and folding her arms. "A business deal?" She enquired. "What sort of business would that be exactly?"

IC: Noka The first unusual thing about Noka was that the flagon in front of her was filled with hot chocolate and not any kind of alcoholic beverage. The second was that none of the other three chairs at her table had anybody in them. A recently burnt-out green candle slouched weakly in the centre, a little stream of scented smoke drifting up into her nostrils. She was gazing at it, clutching her drink intently, deep in thought- "...Noka. You seen her?" Her ears perked up, locating the source of the sound. A Matoran - of earth, or gravity, she couldn't tell - was walking between tables, chewing on something, asking for someone, asking for her. Noka's brow furrowed. People did not come looking for her, and when they did, it was bad news. She watched the Matoran for some time before she realised that her hand had drifted to the hilt of her sword, and she snapped it off and back onto the table. She had only just attempted to return to busying herself with the candle when the Matoran had reached her table and asked the same question he had asked everybody else. Raising an eyebrow, she gave her reply with the utmost imposition. "You're looking at her. Have we met?"

IC: Kahlynn The door of the Great Takea swung open, sunlight peering in through the gap over the shoulder of the being swaggering in through the door. All those at the bar could see was a silhouette until the door shut, revealing a poncho-clad Skakdi with a cigarette between his lips and a fiendish smirk across his face. His strides were deliberate and slow, his face angled so that it was shrouded in shadow, only the pulsing orange glow of the cigarette managing to cast any light upon it. His clawed feet scraped along with his thudding footsteps, slowing moving forth towards a stool at the bar. The light of a candle light up Kahlynn's face as he took a seat and looked up at the Skakdi behind the bar. Taking the cigarette from his mouth, he took in and unleashed a puff of smoke which dissipated amongst the foggy light of the inn. Baring his teeth in a familiar grin, he nodded his respect to the barman and took his order: "Vodka Martini," he croaked. "Shaken, not stirred." Before the barman could turn away, Kahlynn went on. "Oh, and tell Rhow I'm home." OOC: calling all horde members do you read me

Oh yeah, and I kind of killed Readra a while ago while no one was looking. Unless we're only talking about Part 2 of this arc, in which case, throw stones at me.

Well for starters, now that I'm back my bloodlust is ready to be vented, so with any luck people will die. And if they don't, I can always bite their face or something.

*sniff* That really shouldn't have made me feel the feels it did when I'm the one who killed her, but still :'(

IC: Kuhrin Hurriedly drawing in energy from the sound of his own clunking footsteps, Kuhrin began to form a sonic barrier. Once complete, he set the wall behind him, spanning across the spit. It was only strong enough to repel Ferron once, but that single repulsion would hopefully be enough to delay him. The Toa of Sonics did not wait to see if his barrier had worked - there was not a moment to lose. He clambered up the rocks and over the top of the tunnel, disappearing into the unknown. OOC: Kuhrin to Ko-Wahi.

IC: Kuhrin Even Kuhrin himself was surprised by his reflexes and agility as he somersaulted onto higher ground and ducked behind a large boulder, crossbow bolts pinging off the rocks and whistling past his head. Behind cover, he took a moment to take in his newfound health. The Mask of Healing hadn't just healed him - it had regenerated him beyond even his former self, to the absolute pinnacle of health. Smiling to himself, he activated his Pakari, and tore his cover from the ground, before throwing it at his opponent. Using this as a distraction, the Toa of Sonics sprinted off up the spit of land towards the main shoreline, the mask giving him the strength to power his legs forward.

Yeah, I went there. Emotions, man. I genuinely flipped a coin to decide her fate. Never defy the coin.

OOC: Okay, I guess I just assumed the actions weren't really all that important so went ahead and took care of them myself. Sorry about that. IC: Kuhrin There was a long silence as Kuhrin waited for more, but nothing came. He scoffed. "Is that it?" He put on a deep voice, mimicking Ferron. "'She wouldn't lie, she's Zuria!' Well, my dear boy, you'd be surprised. Even the most resolute of souls reveal their true colours when within an inch of death. They shed their righteous exteriors and show you the cowardly imps they really are. People are all the same underneath: In it for themselves. I suppose I'm braver than you'll ever be, in that I'm not afraid to show it." "I'm sorry, Zuriana." She could feel and smell his foul breath on her face as he pulled her closer. "You were always my favourite. Would you like to know Krell's last words?" He hissed, so Ferron could just about hear him. "'Sorry'. Yes, he apologised. What for, I wonder? Krell was like me. He saw the darkness at the core of every living being, the pain and turmoil of the world. Only he had been where I can never leave and escaped, and he could handle the shadows. That made him brave in life, but that 'sorry' right at the end made it all worthless. I'm glad he's dead." With that, Kuhrin activated the Pakari, crushing Zuria's throat and spine in his fist. Blood poured from her mutilated neck onto his hand and forearm, eventually dribbling from his elbow to the ground. The Toa of Sonics threw the Onu-Matoran's body to the ground, where she lay utterly still. Kuhrin raised his arms up and turned to face Ferron, revelling in the bloodshed he had caused. "Go on, Ferron. Give me your best shot. See if I can die twice."