Scouting Out The Enemy (NDE)

[Colina Conejita]

In the far south of the Southern Rukongai, a hole in reality began to tear open, like a giant mouth with teeth forming out of the sky and yawning as it opened. From within the dark space of the Garganta stood a young woman, cloaked in blinding white. The robe covering her body hid almost all of her body, coming up in a turtleneck over the lower half of her face and a hood to cover over her forehead. The hood was also very large, being pushed up by a pair of hierro bunny ears, pushing the top of the hood off of her head by one and a half inches. This girl's eyes and nose were the only exposed parts of her head, her black hair poking out just a bit along the edges of the hood.

Her purple iridescent eyes stared out as she walked on the air, looking over the area below her, a white hierro band seeming to be just above these eyes and only slightly being exposed as well. The woman's features made her seem more like a child within the robe, being only five feet and four inches while having a flat chest and slim hips. Upon the back of this young woman was a large four pointed chakram, golden in color with green markings within the blades and along the inner circular handle. This charkram was strapped to her robe by a white piece of leather sewn into the robe, allowing the chakram to swing slightly from it's secure point, bouncing against the woman's back.

Colina, the young woman in the air, focused on hiding her spiritual presence as the garganta closed and fell to the ground below, controlling her descent with ease. She then began sniffing the air around her. She was in a dense forest, the ground sparsely covered in vegetation and mostly filled the area with dark brown dirt. The smell of it filled her senses and she licked her lips. She was searching for vegetation that would be both tasty and full of spiritual energy in order to fill her belly. And the area she was in gave a good chance of it. From within her robes, which covered her hands with long white sleeves, she pulled out a shovel and began to dig up the dirt around her feet for possible soil use later.

As she dug, she focused for a moment, summoning a white rabbit from within her robes. This rabbit, blindingly white look her robe, sniffed at the air with it's three inch long horn prominently pointing up and forward from it's skull. It's beady red eyes stared off into the forest and ran off into the brush, east of Colina's body, and hid within, keeping a lookout as Colina continued digging. Colina also began to hum as she made a large pile of the soil for later use. After finishing this task, she gave a deep sigh, putting the shovel into the ground next to her pile, and headed off eastward into the forest to find some edible vegetation for her garden back home.

[Rafael]

Moving throughout the forest Rafael was looking for something to claim as a source of food to those back at his home. Although it was still light outside Rafael had decided that he wished to be the one to come out and hunt. Wanting to have a change of pace for once as he usually went out at night where his pitch fur would aid him in claiming victory over those that sought their own survival and those that sought the same prey for themselves. They still had enough food at home for the next two days, but he knew how much they all ate and if they didn’t hunt regularly then they’d all have to go out at once which left what they had built for themselves empty to anything else.

As he moved throughout the area that he had come towards today which was a bit further South then he normally went, he heard the sound of something moving quite swiftly across the ground. It took him a moment to find the source that seemed to be a white rabbit. “Strange, it’s not winter.” Rafael ponded to himself knowing that either this rabbit was someone else’s pet that had gotten outside or something more interesting was the cause for it to have this winter fur. Sure enough going off his suspicious Rafael sniffed the air finding that off in a distance a bit there was someone else.

Female, sand, blood, soil, sweat. The aspects of the individual that Rafael was able to gather just from the scent he could pick up front the distance between them. Walking towards the individual Rafael picked up further information from his other senses such as a more accurate position due to picking up the sound of her shovel. What he didn’t get though was why someone was out here by themselves just digging? The only time he had encountered someone besides a Beast out here in the wilderness had been when they’d come to attack him.

This was different though, this time he had been the one to find them and he was engaging out of curiosity not a desire to kill. Once the individual came into sight what he had picked up from his senses was confirmed. It was indeed a female that was digging a hole. For what though he couldn’t fathom. “Rather small, haven't seen a Shinigami in white before.” Thought Rafael as he viewed the girl. No doubt she would be able to see him now as well. His massive frame and height at nearly nine feet tall and several hundred pounds of muscle. Staring at her hooded head with his own grey pupiless eyes. “Long way from your stronghold aren’t you?”

[Colina Conejita]

Colina jumped a bit as she heard a voice from behind her but then relaxed as she sniffed the air, not recognizing the scent but not picking up an energy signature of a shinigami either. As she turned back to see who it had been, she let her hood slip off, showing her snow white bunny ears in plain view, her hair cascading over the forehead band of hierro that made it obvious that it was a mask. This she had done on purpose, to hide her true nature while in this area. She had heard rumors of beastly humanoids and thought she might be able to easily pass herself off as one if she got caught in a situation that she couldn't handle alone.

"Oh, I'm not a shinigami. You could say I'm like you." With that, she moved her nose a bit and giggled, trying to pull off a nose wiggle like a rabbit might. She then turned back to digging up the soil, remarking as to the reason she was digging. "You see, I don't have a lot of fresh, healthy soil where I burrow so I decided to come here. I need to get some good ol' mulch to properly grow my garden to a healthy state. No reason for me to be wasting time digging around in dead earth, y'know?" She wiggled a bit as she hurriedly tried to get her mulch digging done so as to not overstay her welcome. 

When she finished, she produced a bag from within her robe and placed it on the ground. With one hand she held the bag open and, while kneeling, used the other hand to begin scooping the mulch into the bag for safe keeping. As she did this, she spoke to the stranger while not looking at him, feeling quite comfortable with him to her back. "So what brings you this far out to the edge? Do you live around here, or did I disturb you? I'm sorry if I'm being a bother." She decided to keep up the innocent routine. He seemed more inquisitive than aggressive, atleast for the moment. And Colina wanted to keep it that way so she might be able to find some edible vegetation.

[Rafael]

The woman that was in front of him showed signs that she hadn’t been able to tell he was there until after he had spoken, a bit of information that told Rafael she wasn’t the best at utilizing her senses. The massive panther stood stoic to the woman as she spoke trying to state that she was similar to him, a Beast-Clan. Rafael wasn’t certain what sort of thing could be similar to a Beast as he hadn’t come across anything quite like them. There were those that wore white masks, but even they were much different in various ways. This woman though was different than both, her appearance betrayed any sort of legit trust she may have gained towards Rafael if she wanted him to believe her a Beast. She simply didn’t have the features of a Beast especially when most of what she wore looked like a similar costume.

“If you seek to garden, why not just move to better soil instead of taking it? Just making more work in the end.” Rafael although he wasn’t quite sure really what this woman happened to be didn’t have much interest in what she was doing. Everyone in his pack had a hobby and none of them were into gardening, although Zadora was likely going to pick it up soon. Rafael had a thought as he watched the woman move some mulch into a bag she pulled from her clothing. While the woman was covering the majority of her build in clothing, Rafael, like a true Beast for the most part was bare. A simple loin cloth covering his lower region while the rest of him was displayed proudly as a symbol of strength.

The little thought that popped into the mind of the panther though was perhaps he could find some potatoes in the Rukongai. They’d been his favorite vegetable while he had been a human. Something that could be cooked in many different ways that he was certain Zadora would be able to pull off. He’d have to remember to look for some the next time he went to the Rukongai to trade for additional supplies. As for what was going on in front of him now he couldn’t care less at this point. “I live out here, but not here. Just don’t bother anyone. Others may not be so nice to outside like you.” Rafael although he didn’t like individuals that looked human like this woman wasn’t going to attack her for nothing. The minor warning to her though was towards he knew would do that very thing.

[Colina Conejita]

Colina tilted her head as the large black panther person spoke, telling her that perhaps she should move to a place with a more suitable soil as a location. She giggled slightly and covered her face with her right hand, her sleeve hanging limply over her hand and dangling to just below her chin. “I feel that that idea is quite an impossible feat to accomplish at the current moment… But maybe someday.” She then went back to her work, bending down and digging up the dirt and placing it into a pile. The work was making Colina sweat just a bit, having been digging for more than a few moments and the shovel was as tall as she was, making her look like a toddler doing a large man's job.


When the pile was of sufficient size, Colina pulled a bucket from within her robes and using her shovel to place the rich soil into the bucket, letting it fall in cascading clumps. As the dirt fell from her shovel and into the bucket, she watched and squeaked for a moment. She began to think of all the delicious vegetables and fruits that would grow from such soil. The thoughts were even causing her mouth to salivate and her nose to twitch. She looked to be in complete nirvana as she let her thoughts wander, the idea of the carrots, apples, lettuce, and even cabbages filling her mind. He stomach could barely control itself as it growled in the want for such delights.


As she finished, she would turn back to her new friend and grin. But this grin was not her average variety. There was something more in it, the need to satiate a different hunger; one for knowledge. “So you live out here, but not here? What does that mean? Afraid to get to close to ‘them’?“ Colina would use one hand to make quotation marks for the ‘them’ portion, obviously turning her eyes towards the Soul Society’s capitol. “They certainly aren’t the kind type. And no wonder that they would frighten you with those big old nasty swords.” Colina giggled as if she had just made a joke, but she wanted to learn more about the current relations of the beasts and the Soul Reapers. Maybe it was something to exploit in the future.

[Rafael]

Whoever this woman was Rafael was starting to get the feeling that she was doing something magical. Not from the way she spoke or some sort of feeling that she was giving off. The large mammal just was starting to have disbelief that someone of her size would be able to hold all these tools underneath her clothing and still walk around fine. That was quickly becoming the more weird thing about her which up to this point had been her outfit. Still she wasn’t anything that Rafael needed to concern himself with and thus he had other things to do and would be on his way so he could actually get to them. That was his choice and the decision that he started to enact until the woman spoke again, this time making it more than clear she knew about the Shinigami.

Rafael stopped moving and turned around to face the woman again with a new air of attitude. Before he had been indifferent and curious now he was stern, fortified and ready to find out something. “Fighting the weak constantly gets boring, that’s why I stay so far away. Now who are you? Why do you speak of them as if they’re an enemy?” Rafael was now even more curious, but determined not to show it. Could this woman be something else that was different, something that wasn’t human nor Shinigami? Rafael had only come across one individual that could fit that description, but hadn’t learned what he had been. If this woman was the same as that walking muscle head though this could turn ugly pretty quick.

[Colina Conejita]

Colina's head perked at this man-thing's suggestion that fighting weaklings could easily get quite boring, which made her think that perhaps he was someone who might be quite exceptionally strong and a challenge to be addressed. Colina then began to giggle as she stood, allowing the handle of her shovel to slip from her grasp and set down her bucket full of soil before slowly turning around and allowing her hood to fall from atop her head and rest gently against her back and the white robe the hood was connected to. She knew she was revealing her nature in that moment, but didn't much care, as the white of her hierro bunny ears showed fully in the sunlight. "Do you think you might challenge me...?"

Colina then ran hard to the tree behind this manimal, her new term for these hybrids between bipeds and furry creatures, and found her stashed zanpakutou in all it's glory. The large four-headed chakram that almost matched her body in size was pulled from the bushes around said tree and glinted in the sun of the Soul Society, the light bouncing off of the razor edges as she stood, smiling with one hand on her hip and the other hoisting the weapon over her right shoulder. Her stomach continued to growl a little at the need to feed, but Colina only thought that perhaps she had stumbled onto a meal. "Shall we dance for a moment, manimal? Or will you fall too quick to taste?"

[Rafael]

Rafael was starting to feel like he didn’t have anything to gain from this interaction, but was determined to find out exactly what this individual was. He didn’t have a lot of knowledge about how things worked or what exactly happened in this second life with all these worlds, but the only way he could protect his friends was by finding those things out. The only thing he could think of at the moment was that this girl was similar to the muscle head he’d fought not long ago. That theory was reinforced when she pulled her hood back revealing that she had bunny ears that looked like they were made of bone.

"Do you think you might challenge me...?"

“I have nothing to gauge. Challenge welcomed.”

Rafael tossed the meat he’d caught early in the morning to the side. He’d still need to make it to the Rukongai in order to trade it for other things, but he could spare some time to enjoy a fight. Stretching his neck and arms a bit while he watched the girl run over to the tree and pull out a large circle with sharp edges. Obviously something that one would expect her to throw as a weapon. For that reason Rafael would have to remind himself that she likely could use it up close as well despite the size.

Underestimating others was a great way to get yourself hurt. That was a lesson that Rafael had been taught as a human when he had been learning martial arts and one that meant even more to him now that he had been in several life and death situations. The weapon wasn’t something that Rafael had any experience dealing with so it was best to finish this quick. “Just don’t blame your hunger when you’ve lost cottontail.”