[Beam]

Originally Posted by Constellation

Timid gave a slight wide of her green orbs. It was hard to believe that the tom didn't have a nickname! Everyone had a nickname - right? Even within the syndicate Timid was known as Titi. Or, maybe even something less thrilling such as a ‘Coward’ and the occasional ‘Scardey Cat’. Though a name was a name. And a nickname was unique. “I had all sorts of nicknames! Like Coward and Scaredy Cat!” She blurted out, as if that was a good thing. She didn't notice it at first, but realized that the names...sounded bad. So, she pinned her ears to her head, wanting to shrink in the tom’s presence. “Okay...those don't sound very appealing.” But, what else was to be expected of the Syndicate? It was a lonely cold place. Rough exterior. Tough interior. When the tom agreed that their names sounded like a pair, Timid thought of two turtle doves. She didn't notice the slight blush that the tom hid, or how sheepish he must had been when she first brought it up, but Timid simply blinked her eyes and smiled at him. “Yep! I've been always told that two is better than one.” She purred, a content feeling inside her as she happily remembered those words. Only from who, she didn't remember. A team was better than going solo after all. And, Timid felt that her and Fennec would make a great team.

When a delicate calmness settled between the two, Timid stared at her friend for a moment. He seemed to be deep in thought. Maybe, he was thinking about his family. Or, something important. The small golden cat didn't want to ruin his thoughts. So, she continued to look around the area, her eyes landing on a soft pastel colored butterfly as it hovered over a flower bed. She started to imagine the language of the butterflies, and wondered if they different in any way from a cat. As soon as that thought left her brain, she somehow crossed the Syndicate. Just thinking about the place made her upset. She was very depressed, but being around the other animals brought life to her lonely heart. And, Fennec had showed her this. He showed her a new side of life, and he had soared her life. Timid was afraid of so...many, many things. It was apart of her nature to be frightened. She couldn't help but scream on impulse when she met the unimaginable. Or, met anything that suddenly jumped out at her. On the plus side, Timid found herself to be marvelously friendly, which made up for the fact that she would tremble at anything and everything. The she cat shook her head, scattering her thoughts around. She saw Fennec staring at his shoulder, and she thought she caught a glimpse of a scar. She wanted to ask 'How did you get your scar?' But, maybe it wasn't the right time to be asking such questions.

Soon after, Timid immediately jumped to her paws, entering into a playful crouch. She giggled upon hearing Fennec's words. "Give up already? Well, I am a hunter. We had to practice running at fast speeds." She stated proudly, once again embracing her syndicate culture. It wasn't anything to be proud of. Timid could visionally remember her hunter trainee. One of brute force who made her run for days it seemed! Her small legs always tired out, and when she slowed down, he would yell at her. Timid became apprehensive when being yelled at. It made her want to run further and longer than she ever could. But, with her stubby legs it was still hard to keep up with much longer legs like the ones Fennec had. Timid shot up once more, almost ready to bound off again. Her eyes were shining with mischief, and she noticed how Fennec was showing off his well brawny legs. Well athletic and powerful for running. Obviously, he could beat her. "Yeah - no need to show off," she brushed her tail to the side in a bashful manner. "But it's all about the technique. Pretty sure I can corner you like the last finch I caught." Fennec was pretty smart. It was like a game of cat and mouse. He was the prey, and she was the predator. The mouse ran, and the cat tried any technique in order to catch them. Because mice were fast, no doubt. Other than that, the she cat deemed she was very tired. Even if she learned repeatedly to keep up endurance. Timid was built for endurance. She lasted longer than a lot of other cats because all hunters did was run. Run. Run. And more running. She was glad there was no one in her ear and yelling at her to continue running. She could relax for once.

Animals - as in other species, always been a type of admiration for the young she cat. In her free time, which she rarely had, she would watch the birds, or the insects, even she was aware of the predator animals that every cat needed to watch out for. The thing was; the forest was large. For a she cat her size, she was in deep awestruck at it. Sometimes, it was so large, you would get lost in it! Which happened on more than a couple occasions for this feline. At one point she found herself crossing two leg territory, almost being hit by many monsters. Obviously, she was panicking. She was beyond scared. She thought she was going to die. It was a miracle that she even made it back to the forest. Where the trees were able to lead her home. One thing she did learn while venturing out? So many different animals. The forest was not limited to the common species. In the outside world, there were plenty of them. Even if she didn't understand their language, she stayed long enough to observe their peculiar ways. "Pouches do sound nice," she thought about the little makeshift bag that was attached to any animal considered a marsupial. "But, I think I prefer nursing my young - out of a pouch. If given the chance, I have any." She nodded, cheerily. It was a rare occurrence when Timid thought about kits of her own. Since she was young, all she focused on was surviving and hunting. Kits were cute and all, but if she were to have any in the syndicate. They surely wouldn't survive. Kits hardly ever survived the syndicate.

They were on to a good start. A great friendship. Earlier, Fennec had invited the small feline to stay with him. She didn't know how she could ever repay him for such a wonderful proposition. Internally, she felt that she would had been a disgrace. Unwanted company. What if danger came around? Timid knew how to run and avoid it, but she didn't know a thing about fighting. Nothing about her was sharp or athletic. Sure, she had ran, built up her stamina and endurance, but that was it. She took up his offer, and even gave him an affectionate nuzzle. Which was meant to be friendly, but had ulterior motives to it. This has went unbeknownst to Timid however since she remained to be a sweet feline with no intentions of breaking their friendship apart.

Suddenly, he had pulled away. He backed up out of a warm embrace, and it made the she cat feel baffled. Why had he backed away? Did she do something wrong? That's what her first initial thought was, and she started to consider his offer to be a failure. Maybe, it was best that she did leave. As she was about to, the she cat stopped in her tracks. Her body was still turned away from him, but her ears stayed alert. She felt herself become tensed when she did turn around to face him.

She wished she hadn't. A part of her was frightened, and another part had felt bad for her friend. When he talked about parts of his past, Timid flattened her ears to her skull. She didn't know what to say. She felt a whimper escape her maw, her eyes growing wide at his words. She shook her head vigorously. "I'm scared of death, Fenny! I don't know if-" Timid paused, breathing in deeply. Okay, now here she was about to have a breakdown. Her tail was twitching irritably and her eyes flitted around every corner. Death was scary. Yet, it was inevitable. If she chose to go back to the Dusk Syndicate, wouldn't she be torn apart anyway? That was sure to happen. But, in this open, if she were to die...Timid didn't want to think about that.

The tom sounded so sorrowful. And, why wouldn't he? His entire family died is what Timid picked up on. Truthfully, she had no words. Nothing to say. Possibly, this was because she was from the Syndicate. Cats died everyday. She was left to die on the outskirts by her own mother. Her eyes held a blank stare for a moment. Just blinking repeatedly at looking at her friend. She didn't bother to move from her spot. "Hey," she spoke softly. Very softly, that one needed to strain their ears in order to hear her. "I'm from the syndicate - remember? If I survived there for so long," she paused. Surviving by hiding, begging, cornering herself. She continued, "then I could survive anything!" She wanted to bring anything lighthearted to the conversation. It was steering onto a dark path pretty quickly. That was the last thing they needed.

The she cat used her two front paws to grasp onto Fennec's shoulders lightly. "If you're bad luck, then so am I. Fenny and Timmy is a team," she purred. "We're a pair, remember?" She giggled, and let go of his shoulders as she sunk to the ground. The golden cat stared at her friend with bright moon-like eyes, and she hoped she had sparked some kind of inspiration into him. Even so, maybe she was good luck. A dynamic duo. Who knows.

Fennec gave a small, awkward smile next to the small golden cat, his cream colored ears folding back with his bashful demeanor. He still didn’t understand this cat would join the Syndicate-from what he heard was an awful place. It was like putting a ray of sunshine in a moonless night. But sometimes nothing can shine without darkness, like how fireflies always waft in the nighttime. Timid gave him a cheery nickname- and it didn’t take much thought for him to figure out that the cats in the Syndicate weren't the nickname type. His eyes dilated as she spoke, and his head dropped back in a look of disbelief. She had blurted those names like they were good things to her. Fennec shook his head after watching the small cat’s ears fall back, ”Not really, no” he mewed lightly. Fennec repeated his small smile again when she purred. Having cats around was better than not; but it could go either way. He enjoyed the time he lived with his family, but mainly his sisters. Although, living alone was good too.
He frowned again. He was very touchy and sensitive about his thoughts of family. If he saw a holly bush, he would launch into his longing thoughts of his sister. And what surprised him he most was that he already hinted to Timid more than he had ever said to anyone else- and they practically just met. He knew it was harder to keep a wall up than to let it fall, because you needed every ounce of effort to make it stand, but when one thing falls the whole wall collapses too. Destruction, in a sense, was extremely easy. Peace, not so much. It was much easier to turn on one than to love one another, in fact, if he had chosen to, he could’ve turned away those lost kits he had met a while ago or maybe even chased them out. He could have even attacked Timid, but he stayed nice. There were so many bad options to choose from, and so little nice ones. No wonder why his mother had turned out the way she did-she was tired of straining through the nice options. And no wonder why there was a Syndicate, there was always bad in a world full of peace. His eyes studied the pink mark on his shoulder, his amber orbs shifting to accumulate the long tiny mark from the day Holly caught her first prey. His eyes flicked upward just to see Timid looking at him. “Sorry.” he mewed quietly, drawing his gaze away from his shoulder and back to Timid’s pretty-hued irises, “Um, your eyes are very-” he trailed off for a moment after he said the first thing that came to his mind, his eyes still looking at hers. He didn’t know quite how to finish that sentence, beautiful sounded too…it just didn’t sound right, it made his fur prickle nervously. “-dainty?” he finished questionably, a small grin peeking at the corners of his mouth.

He threw his feathery cream tail lazily to the side. He gave a little scoff-laugh to himself at Timid’s running words, planting his paws carefully next to each other. He was sure they had to sprint back and forth to capture prey, but she should try running away from everything. A mist glazed his eyes while a faraway smile imprinted on his maw. He had to run from his mom, for sure, he had to run towards his father the time he had spotted him in the woods, the time he had to run for what seemed like hours after Holly, then running and fear away from what happened to her. And still, still running from reliving, or rather, retreating form being hunted and chased. He perked his ears once Timid spoke again, and not quite hearing her, just smiled charismatically. He tilted his head playfully at Timid, “I think if I were a finch, I’d fly away from being hunted.”

He turned his attention back to the deer, watching its gentle hooves, and he remembered sometimes these delicate creatures were hunted. He tried to recall this one time when he and his sibling were every young, they stumbled across an antler of a buck. It was amazing then, and father brought it back to the den for safekeeping, and he had thereafter wondered how it got there, but now he knew it probably (and hopefully) just fell off. He then listened intently to Timid's opinion on pouches, his head bobbing. However, when she spoke of having kits of her own his whiskers twitched with a sudden reflection. Fennec had really never thought of having kits, he was too occupied with the thought of how his siblings, mother and father were dead. He wasn't sure if it was a good thing or a bad thing to have miniature Fennecs running around all day. “Kits?” he chuckled quietly, “wonder what it's like to have them. Must be a total pain.” he released another one of his small laughs and turned to Timid, leaning towards the other cat “I'm joking” he purred smoothly. “They seem...fun.”

Then the words came, his sudden thoughts of his family and everything: like that one thing making the wall crumble and fall. He knew at the moment that he had hurt Timid. But it was just another one of his attacks, like his head was a cave and it was where everything and became something new, vibrating and vibrating bd shutting out the whole world until all he could focus on was that he was just being overdramatic. He had a relatively tough personality, easily surpassed by kindness, but he really knew how to ruin a moment and turn everything wrong. Oh, why couldn't he just accept the fact that what happened had happened and everything is past that point in his life? That would make everything so much easier instead of him having thought attacks every two seconds.

Fennec, now telling at himself internally for being such a dramatic being, watched apologetically as Timid turned around to him. His eyes darted around, everyone was scared of death, yet none would ever escape it. He perked his ears a little more as Timid turned back to him. Why did he have to overdramatize everything? He heaved a sigh, Good job Fennec, way to go he thought to himself. He just needed to keep his mouth shut.

His eyes became much more alert as She spoke again. Timid had a great point, she survived in a literal dog pack for many moons, so his luck wouldn’t be so hard to avoid, right? He was just overthinking coincidences. “Anything?” He echoed her, “If you’re sure…” . His fur prickled again and Timid’s paws rested on his shoulders, he tried moving his gaze down, but they found the other feline’s irises again. He gave a small laugh at her lighthearted pep talk. He liked the sound of a pair, as in he and Timid as a team. The two against the great outdoors. And memories, lots and lots of memories…

He stopped himself there, focusing on the Tiimmy and Fenny Team Against the Wild, and stared back at her widened eyes as she let go of his shoulders. “Sounds good to me.” he nodded with an apologetic look plastered on his face, a sudden cloud of embarrassment opening up. He never knew he could be such a ditz. He smiled at her awkwardly, unsure of what to do now that his big dramatic scene had peaked in its limits. He relaxed his posture, making a more comfortable sitting position for himself as the cloud of embarrassment slowly passed over his head. He cleared his throat, his ears still flat against his head-the reason why they were doing that was not there, however. “What would you like to see now?”