once upon another time (luffy!)

[SAMAEL ARCHIBALD DUBOIS]

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[atrb=align,right] FOR DOO! 459 WORDS. short and rushed but. \O/ Samael stared. It was not an odd thing for him to do, granted, but it was not something that he often had cause to do - unless, of course, he was deliberately staring in one of those classic intimidation acts or did so to emphasize the oft-felt sensation of what-the-fuck-are-you-on-about. He believed that it was completely justifiable to call himself intelligent and for that reason alone Samael rarely had to ruminate upon something for more than a minute or so before he knew its inner mechanisms or deemed it too unimportant for him to worry about. This, however... This was completely different. And so, the cheetah found himself quite thoroughly flabbergasted, completely still as he absorbed the sight that was laid out before him with the exception of a few idle ear flicks and tail twitches. There was absolutely no reason for this... this barrier to be there and yet here he was, staring it in its fibrous face. Samael was far from believing in any of the deities that the residents of his homeland revered so completely and as such the male was completely firm in the belief that it had to be there for a reason. He just had to find that reason. Sam made a disgruntled noise, finally shifting in his spot for the first time in close to an hour. So far the answers evaded him, but the male was completely certain that his determination, wit and wisdom would aid him in the end. He was simply a tad brain dead for thinking so intelligently for such a long time. The cheetah rolled his neck about on his shoulders, a long, indulgent sigh easing out past his lips as the stiff muscles were worked. In one fluid movement following that he stood and brought himself forward in a luxurious stretch, his fur gleaming in the dappled shade and toes curling in delight. Before he could convince himself to do otherwise, Sam finished his bow with a flourish of his banded tail, shaking himself off and padding silently over to the fence. He had examined it to the point where it was no longer a threat, despite the somewhat bitter, artificial scent underneath the many layers of earth and other animals. Feeling absolutely no shame for an action that would no doubt make him look like a bit of an idiot, the feline pressed his face into the filigree of what man-kind called plastic, forcing his fur and flesh through the diamond-shaped holes and even going so far as to chew it a little. Well. It may have been alien and it may have evaded his excellent interpretation, but it certainly made for a good face scratcher! "Nnyeghhh..."

[LUFTANZA DUBOIS]

"Samael, what the fuck are you doing?"

Lately, Luftanza had been relishing that word, saying it whenever she possibly could interjecting it into even the most civil of conversations - "that was a fucking nice catch," or "what the fuck is in your eye" or even better "you don't have any fucking spots". Granted, she wasn't one who was very prone to civil conversation, yet that didn't mean she didn't try.

There was something very… very tangible about the word fuck. It meant something concrete, yet its definition was not so rigid that she couldn't cast it into another context, such as when she wanted to use it to stress a point or quantify ("a fuckload").

And so lately it was increasingly difficult to have a conversation with the young cheetah without hearing the word "fuck" approximately once every two sentences.

Luftanza's tail-tip twitched. She'd snuck up on her brother and now was allowing herself a few seconds of childish glee. It had been a long day: she'd awoken in an uncharacteristic good mood, one of the honest kinds of good mood, the kinds that made you want to clean things up in your life and start again as a new, better person. It was quite a peculiar feeling, really, and Luftanza still hadn't gotten around to deciding whether or not she liked it. She'd even offered someone a smile. Now if that wasn't crazy, she didn't know what was. And she'd started off her day productively, catching a small rodent like creature for breakfast instead of lazing about hungrily until nature's wiles pushed her to her paws to hunt for the day's first meal. The rest of the day passed by with delightful ease: chasing after birds, padding surreptitiously under the canopy of the hot trees, doing nothing and having a wonderful time.

She hadn't recognized her brother at first - every time she saw him, she felt that he'd gotten larger than the time before - but as soon as she had she'd almost given into a small burst of happiness. The day couldn't get stranger.

"I wonder why I have a feeling that you're up to no good," she added, padding up to his side and glancing over to where their pelts almost met. "What are you doing?" She reiterated, curiosity and a feeling of something close to disgust mingling as she saw him push his face against the fence.

[SAMAEL ARCHIBALD DUBOIS]

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[atrb=align,right] FOR DOO! 443 WORDS. aliens. He froze, visibly tensing. It was safe to say that Samael was considerably startled but the male violently forced down his knee-jerk reaction to leap away until all that remained of his fright was a bristling tail and a brief pause of the face-scratching. Managing to make himself look less like an alarmed porcupine and regaining composure with a pointed clearing of his throat, the spotted feline deemed it necessary to ignore his little sister for a few moments. How dare she sneak up on him; where had she even come from anyway? It amazed him, really (though the male would never dare admit it), how she was able to evade even his sharp olfactory senses. Even so, he felt rather than heard her pad up to his side, trying to think of the best way to regain his dignity - because really, being caught off guard by your baby sister was the absolute worst thing to happen. " Constantly throwing out that word doesn't make you seem very refined, you know. " Samael threw out offhandedly, giving his face a final rub against the foreign, criss-crossed material before turning around, breathing out a purr, " Though I suppose it's natural not to be as demure and civilized as your amazing - " He paused here, just for emphasis, " - big brother. I suppose you'll learn, though! " His pointed muzzle cracking open in a somewhat goofy grin, he lifted a paw to bat gently at the side of his sister's head, just waiting for her to get riled up before turning his attention back to the barrier, frowning. As if it would aid the process of thinking, the male sat himself down, perching himself down on the dirt as if it was a throne. " I am not 'up to no good'. Samael does not get up to no good. Silly female. " Fearing her wrath, he hushed the end of his statement. Samael found he couldn't really answer her question (not that he really intended to, anyway) for the simple reason alone that she didn't know what he was doing. Sure, he was scratching his face on the surface, but there had to be a more poignant and deeply instinctual reason for him to do such a thing - He was not, after all, a clown. Only a clown would simply rub their face against the fence. " Where do you think this came from? " The young cheetah blurted suddenly, curling his claws into the dirt in frustration. Ears twitching at an extraordinary rate, Samael abruptly stood up without warning and paced along the border with his distinctive jaunty strut, each step heavy as if his paw weighed a ton.

[LUFTANZA DUBOIS]

"Constantly throwing out that word doesn't make you seem very refined, you know," Luftanza's brother retorted, and, much to Luftanza's own mortification, something warm flickered in her belly. It had been long since she'd seen her brother - they stumbled across each-other's paths occasionally, and she'd thought she hadn't missed him (after all, missing was that sort of yearning, wasn't it? The kind that didn't exist except in disgusting love stories?) but now that she was with him she realized she hadn't had this sort of exchange in a while. She didn't mind being teased by Sam. Not really. She knew he didn't mean her harm, and he was one of the few. Luftanza flicked an ear as if to dislodge a pestilential fly, consciously derailing her train of thought before it could get too fond.

"Refinement comes naturally to me, idiot," she scoffed back, watching bemusedly as Sam drew his spotted face against the mesh one last time, as if by means of farewell.

"… Though I suppose it's natural not to be as demure and civilized as your amazing… big brother. I suppose you'll learn, though!"

Luftanza distorted the neutral line of her mouth into a frown. Perhaps she'd spoken a bit too quickly about missing her brother. "When will you grow out of your childhood antics, little brother?" she retorted, adding an extra layer of resignation to her tone.

He grinned then, and it was the grin of Luftanza's childhood. Sam had grown - grown out of his gangly limbs and too-big eyes, grown into a young adult like herself, but that grin never really did, that grin was the same as —

She barely had time to dodge the paw aimed at her direction and glared up at him reproachfully. "Don't hit me, twat," she muttered accusingly, and as Samael sat, she followed his motion, delaying it by a few seconds so there was no risk of him believing that she'd copied him or, worse, found his idea good. Even if it came down to sitting. The hard-packed dust felt hot and comforting against her, and she struggled against her desire to sprawl out onto it like she had as a cub. She, contrary to Sam, had grown out of her childhood antics, and would not…

"I am not 'up to no good'. Samael does not get up to no good. Silly female."

"Hey!" Luftanza sprang to her paws, unsure herself whether she was irritated or half irritated and half amused. "I'm not a silly female! I'm not the one rubbing up against this thing," she added, instantly regretting the last sentence. After all, it wasn't a thing, it was…

"Where do you think this came from?"

Just the question she'd been about to ask herself, but obviously she wasn't about to let her own musings shine through. She rocked back slightly and placed her rear onto the ground again, letting her thin, strong tail wrap around her paws, preparing to pontificate - or, as she saw it, teach Sam the truth. "It's not this," she corrected him. "It's… something beyond our understanding." She paused, repeating the sentence in her mind and deciding that her word choice had indeed been suitable. "And it was placed here by the Gods, no doubt."