RP between Emroidz, Zoo and Ave
>
Emroidz
It was an amazing thing for Edie to look out her storefront window each day and see her ideas--schematics beyond the scope of a candy recipe--brought to life. City Hall, thanks to Ara, had taken her blueprints for the New Haven Memorial Park very seriously, and within the course of a few months, had added both the sprawling tree and a shallow but expansive water feature. Each were wonderful examples of how artificial life could be incorporated into an unnatural habitat without compromise: hydroponic growth-lighting and aqueduct well-springing weren't just futuristic in the functional sense...they could be aesthetic too!
The sow had donned her anti-grav boots with the intent of getting some fresh air and exercise this morning. At this point in her pregnancy, they truly were the only thing keeping the poor old gal mobile when out-of-water.
"Darling?" Edie called to Ajax moments before navigating from her apartment in the back through her sweet shop in the front. "We're taking a stroll if you'd care to join; otherwise, I will be right across the street." Even going just a short distance, the otter woman knew her husband, if not escorting her himself, would insist upon her bringing along one of their security droids--so she had one in tow with her already.
But that wasn't the only thing she was bringing along with her today. There in her purse, which was a cute little handwoven bauble that resembled a picnic basket, only with a rather fashionable, brooch clasp, were two knitting needles and several spools of cotton candy pink and lemonade yellow yarn. Yes, Edie had entered the endgame of her nesting phase: the ambitious endeavor...to make baby clothes.
Ajax
"Certainly, just let me grab my shoes." In the endgame of pregnancy, ajax had become just as paranoid and over protective as ever. Even without looming threats on the radar- she could also potentially go into labor at any minute. The thought of her enduring any part of that without his support terrified him almost as much as the bounty on his head.
He arrived with his cane and sensible casual park attire- though always ever so slightly overly formal. He offered an arm to her. "Shall we?"
He cast a sympathetic glance to her anti gravity shoes. "Soon you will have a beautiful daughter in your arms, and hopefully shortly thereafter, a bit of relief."
Emroidz
Edie smirked as she caught Ajax's sympathetic glance at her clunky footwear. "Are you saying you don't like my astronaut booties? The lady at Spaceless said they were what all the most fashionable, swollen cankles are wearing this season."
Self-deprecating but no less cheerful than any other day, the extra-blubbery, bun-in-the-oven Willy Wonka waddled along with a well-assisted bounce in her step. "I can't wait to be pushing a stroller through the park, Ajax. I'm so excited I could just burst!" A pause, before she patted his lapel lovingly, obviously very aware that he might just take her seriously. "Not literally, dear."
After a slow, lumbering lap around the thick, healthy, mangrove-girth of the park's centerpiece, Edie gestured to the one other thing she'd insisted on in her expansion blueprints: stone benches sturdy and large enough to support the weight of a fully grown Dobarr couple. (What? It wasn't like smaller species couldn't sit on something bigger and better--it was just the other way around that became problematic when wooden benches splintered under their race's thunder thighs!)
Ajax
"You are a vision no matter what you wear. Even more of one when you wear nothing at all, hurr hurr." Corny flirting, typical.
"I just hate to see you in pain. I can see it now, though, you and I and a pram, our youngster the queen of the playground. Blissful." He moved in for a smooch.
Emroidz
"Hang on, I'm taking notes: anti-grav boots and nothing else," Edie scratched the air with a claw as if she truly was dictating a memo. "Got it."
Struggling to sit, when the bull inevitably helped her down onto that bench beside him, the sow would sigh and link paws with him the way otters often did to keep from drifting apart in the ocean. Winded, but still in good spirits, Mrs. Killdevil did her very best to reassure her husband that the scales had never tipped towards not being worth it: even with the obvious added difficulty. "I like to imagine that our little girl's taken it pretty easy on her momma. A kick to the bladder here, a few nausea-inducing somersaults there, but...well, hell, she hasn't deterred me from wanting to give her at least a few siblings in the short years to come, hmm?"
Heh. Leave it to Edie to start planning a second and even a third before she even had the first!
Pecking Ajax's whiskers, the Dobarr woman went rummaging around in her bag as their conversation lulled. Pulling the spool of yarn free first, it was not until the candy maker equipped herself with the knitting needles necessary to give this pastime a go that something became very apparent almost immediately.
Knitting needles were supposed to fit in a full hand, in each hand, much like a pencil would. However, the ones Edie had purchased, well...they--like so many things in New Haven--were obviously not made for a Dobarr. They were tiny in her paw and yet she didn't seem to realize the now impossible task she was endeavoring in.
Bless her, she seemed so very excited to give it a try!
With knitting needles turned sewing needles pinched ever-so-daintily between her claws, as her padded palms dwarfed them too much to be maneuverable, she wound the yarn from the spool between each and cultivated the starting loop. One down! Success!
...and then she promptly dropped one of the knitting needles.
"Oops," Edie laughed, still blissfully oblivious. "Be a love, will you, Mr. Killdevil?" Ajax's wife, heavy with-child, asked of him patiently, hoping he'd fetch the fallen instrument for her.
Ajax
Content to just be near his mate, Ajax had taken a comfortable spot next to her, soaking in the peace of the little park (which was swarmed by a flock of security droids)
But then the question snapped him out of his reverie. "Oh, yes. Of course."
He bent over with a grunt and fished the tiny thing off the ground between his massive fingers after a couple failed tries, and then produced it. "Quite fiddly little things, aren't they."
Emroidz
While both Dobarr were comfortable to be surrounded by their familiar entourage, parents and children alike at the playground had definitely noticed the influx of security droids: the youngsters with curiosity...and their guardians with concern.
Edie paid them no mind. Re-equipped with her teeny tiny knitting needles, she began the starting loop between the sticks once more and clacked them together clumsily in an effort to replicate the same, connective thread that would begin the foundation of her baby's handmade afghan, the one she intended to make with love in every stitch.
...only...
...only...
...only she looped claw, which was bigger than the needle itself, into the stitch, and in trying to free it, stretched the meager knitted portion, tangled the needle's twin trying to unhook it before any additional damage was done...and in doing so lost hold of the spool of yarn she was using and watched it promptly run away from her upon the ground that poor Ajax had struggled to pick up her utensils from a moment prior already.
Quite fiddly little things, aren't they?
Where Ajax had meant no harm in his aforementioned commentary, all of a sudden, Edie took his words as though they were an absolute slight to her hand-eye coordination, and furthermore, an insult to the great effort and loving gesture she was trying to make in caring for their daughter even while still in-utero.
"I know what you're thinking!" Edie accused, and threw the mess of (thankfully blunt-ended) needles and (still unspooling, the cord of which had now run across the width of the sidewalk) yarn alike at her husband's chest. "The lady at the craft store said anyone can make a blanket, that it doesn't get any easier for a beginner than that and--and--" From anger to a different sort of upset in 2.5 seconds flat, the sow promptly burst into hormonal tears and sobbed woefully. "AND I CANT EVEN MAKE MY PRECIOUS BABY A BLANKET HOW IS SHE GONNA KEEP WARM?! MY BABY IS GOING TO FREEZE AND ITS ALL MY FAULT!"
Ave
A goat lady (honesty that is literally the best way anyone can immediately describe this person), a bit on the large side, clip-clopped on the concrete with hands holding grocery bags. She wore a bright pink blouse and a flowing skirt to match, but no shoes. Kind of hard to wear ‘em when one has hooves, alas. She had blue fur and yellow-green hair, looking strikingly like a starburst gone awry in a candy factory.
The spool of yarn made the goat lady stop, blinking down with odd horizontal slits for pupils. The commotion grabbed her attention next. Looking up, she could see a heavily pregnant sow sobbing uncontrollably next to what could only be her bull husband. Giving a bit of a buck-toothed smile, the young nanny goat picked up the yarn and clip-clopped up to them. She was quite brave to do so, for that bull had an anxious, menacing look about him, and that can be very dangerous. She at least approached the pair respectfully, but not without casting Ajax a furtive look.
“Pardon me, sir and ma’am, I hope it’s alright if I intrude for a moment,” she said sweetly. She had a blatant southern accent. “There, there, ma’am. “How about I show ya, we can do it together?” The doe dropped her bags by her hooves and proceeded to show Edie the easiest way to make loops with the needle by chaining a multiple of three and four stitches for the foundation. “It can be purdy frustratin’ doin’ anything with a needle at the start. Don’t give up, you’ll get the hang of it. I can help with the process.” The doe gave the sow’s hands a reassuring pat and a big, genuine, buck-toothed smile. “We just gotta take it a bit slow-like.”
Ajax
"Edie I..." he stammered in surprise. "I didn't mean it like that! Please dearest, its not your fault, the baby will be fine- don't cry now. Edie."
He helplessly tried to pat her on the back, give her some modicum of comfort. The powerful surge of hormones and discomfort she must be experiencing though, who could possibly help that...
Well, this stranger seemed to want to try. She was a technicolor vision. Just the sort of person he knew Edie would take a shine to. And she had appeared just in the nick of time with a helpful tone?
Was he sitting in a beam of light?
"Ah.. hello ma'am." He tried to sound more polite than confused. It didn't work.
Emroidz
There was a version of Edie sane enough to know her baby would be born with both fat and fur enough to keep them warm, truly there was, but that version of herself had gone on vacation for the third trimester of this pregnancy: sorry Ajax.
And while the patting didn't stem the flow of tears, the sow did seem to take comfort in the bull's physical reassurance...in that she left his lapel a snotty mess when she buried her face against his broad chest. "Ican'tevenmakeherablanketAjaxnextI'mgonnaforgettofeedherorrolloverontopofheror...or...LEAVE A TOASTER PLUGGED IN TOO CLOSE TO THE BATHTUB! IM THE WORST MOTHER EVER!" (Uhhh...w-why would you be making toast in the bathroom in the first place there, Edie? blinkblink.)
Thank god reinforcements arrived, because even the most dedicated of husbands and aspiring of first time fathers--which Mr. Killdevil really truly was--could not have possibly hoped to talk sense to this poor woman.
What she needed was a distraction.
What she needed was a win.
And bless Chartreuse for her colorful, angelic, and serendipidous arrival on scene. She looked like a starburst, and Ajax was right: that was just the version of Mary Poppins our seal-pointed Willy Wonka needed to show up right now.
Edie sniffed and looked shamefully between Ajax and the Caprus, her big, baleful eyes red and puffy with the self-inflicted hurt of presumed failure turned hopeful...at least in a still-doubting, highly scrutinized sort of way.
Chartreuse got her to try again, which was a start, but unfortunately those knitting needles were just entirely too small for the expectant mother's enormous paws to wield with any coordination or precision. You could see Edie getting frustrating again as she tried, but it wasn't a matter of what she was doing wrong...it was the instruments she was using not being conducive. But! Ever heard of arm-crocheting?
It was an amazing thing for Edie to look out her storefront window each day and see her ideas--schematics beyond the scope of a candy recipe--brought to life. City Hall, thanks to Ara, had taken her blueprints for the New Haven Memorial Park very seriously, and within the course of a few months, had added both the sprawling tree and a shallow but expansive water feature. Each were wonderful examples of how artificial life could be incorporated into an unnatural habitat without compromise: hydroponic growth-lighting and aqueduct well-springing weren't just futuristic in the functional sense...they could be aesthetic too!
The sow had donned her anti-grav boots with the intent of getting some fresh air and exercise this morning. At this point in her pregnancy, they truly were the only thing keeping the poor old gal mobile when out-of-water.
"Darling?" Edie called to Ajax moments before navigating from her apartment in the back through her sweet shop in the front. "We're taking a stroll if you'd care to join; otherwise, I will be right across the street." Even going just a short distance, the otter woman knew her husband, if not escorting her himself, would insist upon her bringing along one of their security droids--so she had one in tow with her already.
But that wasn't the only thing she was bringing along with her today. There in her purse, which was a cute little handwoven bauble that resembled a picnic basket, only with a rather fashionable, brooch clasp, were two knitting needles and several spools of cotton candy pink and lemonade yellow yarn. Yes, Edie had entered the endgame of her nesting phase: the ambitious endeavor...to make baby clothes.
Ajax
"Certainly, just let me grab my shoes." In the endgame of pregnancy, ajax had become just as paranoid and over protective as ever. Even without looming threats on the radar- she could also potentially go into labor at any minute. The thought of her enduring any part of that without his support terrified him almost as much as the bounty on his head.
He arrived with his cane and sensible casual park attire- though always ever so slightly overly formal. He offered an arm to her. "Shall we?"
He cast a sympathetic glance to her anti gravity shoes. "Soon you will have a beautiful daughter in your arms, and hopefully shortly thereafter, a bit of relief."
Emroidz
Edie smirked as she caught Ajax's sympathetic glance at her clunky footwear. "Are you saying you don't like my astronaut booties? The lady at Spaceless said they were what all the most fashionable, swollen cankles are wearing this season."
Self-deprecating but no less cheerful than any other day, the extra-blubbery, bun-in-the-oven Willy Wonka waddled along with a well-assisted bounce in her step. "I can't wait to be pushing a stroller through the park, Ajax. I'm so excited I could just burst!" A pause, before she patted his lapel lovingly, obviously very aware that he might just take her seriously. "Not literally, dear."
After a slow, lumbering lap around the thick, healthy, mangrove-girth of the park's centerpiece, Edie gestured to the one other thing she'd insisted on in her expansion blueprints: stone benches sturdy and large enough to support the weight of a fully grown Dobarr couple. (What? It wasn't like smaller species couldn't sit on something bigger and better--it was just the other way around that became problematic when wooden benches splintered under their race's thunder thighs!)
Ajax
"You are a vision no matter what you wear. Even more of one when you wear nothing at all, hurr hurr." Corny flirting, typical.
"I just hate to see you in pain. I can see it now, though, you and I and a pram, our youngster the queen of the playground. Blissful." He moved in for a smooch.
Emroidz
"Hang on, I'm taking notes: anti-grav boots and nothing else," Edie scratched the air with a claw as if she truly was dictating a memo. "Got it."
Struggling to sit, when the bull inevitably helped her down onto that bench beside him, the sow would sigh and link paws with him the way otters often did to keep from drifting apart in the ocean. Winded, but still in good spirits, Mrs. Killdevil did her very best to reassure her husband that the scales had never tipped towards not being worth it: even with the obvious added difficulty. "I like to imagine that our little girl's taken it pretty easy on her momma. A kick to the bladder here, a few nausea-inducing somersaults there, but...well, hell, she hasn't deterred me from wanting to give her at least a few siblings in the short years to come, hmm?"
Heh. Leave it to Edie to start planning a second and even a third before she even had the first!
Pecking Ajax's whiskers, the Dobarr woman went rummaging around in her bag as their conversation lulled. Pulling the spool of yarn free first, it was not until the candy maker equipped herself with the knitting needles necessary to give this pastime a go that something became very apparent almost immediately.
Knitting needles were supposed to fit in a full hand, in each hand, much like a pencil would. However, the ones Edie had purchased, well...they--like so many things in New Haven--were obviously not made for a Dobarr. They were tiny in her paw and yet she didn't seem to realize the now impossible task she was endeavoring in.
Bless her, she seemed so very excited to give it a try!
With knitting needles turned sewing needles pinched ever-so-daintily between her claws, as her padded palms dwarfed them too much to be maneuverable, she wound the yarn from the spool between each and cultivated the starting loop. One down! Success!
...and then she promptly dropped one of the knitting needles.
"Oops," Edie laughed, still blissfully oblivious. "Be a love, will you, Mr. Killdevil?" Ajax's wife, heavy with-child, asked of him patiently, hoping he'd fetch the fallen instrument for her.
Ajax
Content to just be near his mate, Ajax had taken a comfortable spot next to her, soaking in the peace of the little park (which was swarmed by a flock of security droids)
But then the question snapped him out of his reverie. "Oh, yes. Of course."
He bent over with a grunt and fished the tiny thing off the ground between his massive fingers after a couple failed tries, and then produced it. "Quite fiddly little things, aren't they."
Emroidz
While both Dobarr were comfortable to be surrounded by their familiar entourage, parents and children alike at the playground had definitely noticed the influx of security droids: the youngsters with curiosity...and their guardians with concern.
Edie paid them no mind. Re-equipped with her teeny tiny knitting needles, she began the starting loop between the sticks once more and clacked them together clumsily in an effort to replicate the same, connective thread that would begin the foundation of her baby's handmade afghan, the one she intended to make with love in every stitch.
...only...
...only...
...only she looped claw, which was bigger than the needle itself, into the stitch, and in trying to free it, stretched the meager knitted portion, tangled the needle's twin trying to unhook it before any additional damage was done...and in doing so lost hold of the spool of yarn she was using and watched it promptly run away from her upon the ground that poor Ajax had struggled to pick up her utensils from a moment prior already.
Quite fiddly little things, aren't they?
Where Ajax had meant no harm in his aforementioned commentary, all of a sudden, Edie took his words as though they were an absolute slight to her hand-eye coordination, and furthermore, an insult to the great effort and loving gesture she was trying to make in caring for their daughter even while still in-utero.
"I know what you're thinking!" Edie accused, and threw the mess of (thankfully blunt-ended) needles and (still unspooling, the cord of which had now run across the width of the sidewalk) yarn alike at her husband's chest. "The lady at the craft store said anyone can make a blanket, that it doesn't get any easier for a beginner than that and--and--" From anger to a different sort of upset in 2.5 seconds flat, the sow promptly burst into hormonal tears and sobbed woefully. "AND I CANT EVEN MAKE MY PRECIOUS BABY A BLANKET HOW IS SHE GONNA KEEP WARM?! MY BABY IS GOING TO FREEZE AND ITS ALL MY FAULT!"
Ave
A goat lady (honesty that is literally the best way anyone can immediately describe this person), a bit on the large side, clip-clopped on the concrete with hands holding grocery bags. She wore a bright pink blouse and a flowing skirt to match, but no shoes. Kind of hard to wear ‘em when one has hooves, alas. She had blue fur and yellow-green hair, looking strikingly like a starburst gone awry in a candy factory.
The spool of yarn made the goat lady stop, blinking down with odd horizontal slits for pupils. The commotion grabbed her attention next. Looking up, she could see a heavily pregnant sow sobbing uncontrollably next to what could only be her bull husband. Giving a bit of a buck-toothed smile, the young nanny goat picked up the yarn and clip-clopped up to them. She was quite brave to do so, for that bull had an anxious, menacing look about him, and that can be very dangerous. She at least approached the pair respectfully, but not without casting Ajax a furtive look.
“Pardon me, sir and ma’am, I hope it’s alright if I intrude for a moment,” she said sweetly. She had a blatant southern accent. “There, there, ma’am. “How about I show ya, we can do it together?” The doe dropped her bags by her hooves and proceeded to show Edie the easiest way to make loops with the needle by chaining a multiple of three and four stitches for the foundation. “It can be purdy frustratin’ doin’ anything with a needle at the start. Don’t give up, you’ll get the hang of it. I can help with the process.” The doe gave the sow’s hands a reassuring pat and a big, genuine, buck-toothed smile. “We just gotta take it a bit slow-like.”
Ajax
"Edie I..." he stammered in surprise. "I didn't mean it like that! Please dearest, its not your fault, the baby will be fine- don't cry now. Edie."
He helplessly tried to pat her on the back, give her some modicum of comfort. The powerful surge of hormones and discomfort she must be experiencing though, who could possibly help that...
Well, this stranger seemed to want to try. She was a technicolor vision. Just the sort of person he knew Edie would take a shine to. And she had appeared just in the nick of time with a helpful tone?
Was he sitting in a beam of light?
"Ah.. hello ma'am." He tried to sound more polite than confused. It didn't work.
Emroidz
There was a version of Edie sane enough to know her baby would be born with both fat and fur enough to keep them warm, truly there was, but that version of herself had gone on vacation for the third trimester of this pregnancy: sorry Ajax.
And while the patting didn't stem the flow of tears, the sow did seem to take comfort in the bull's physical reassurance...in that she left his lapel a snotty mess when she buried her face against his broad chest. "Ican'tevenmakeherablanketAjaxnextI'mgonnaforgettofeedherorrolloverontopofheror...or...LEAVE A TOASTER PLUGGED IN TOO CLOSE TO THE BATHTUB! IM THE WORST MOTHER EVER!" (Uhhh...w-why would you be making toast in the bathroom in the first place there, Edie? blinkblink.)
Thank god reinforcements arrived, because even the most dedicated of husbands and aspiring of first time fathers--which Mr. Killdevil really truly was--could not have possibly hoped to talk sense to this poor woman.
What she needed was a distraction.
What she needed was a win.
And bless Chartreuse for her colorful, angelic, and serendipidous arrival on scene. She looked like a starburst, and Ajax was right: that was just the version of Mary Poppins our seal-pointed Willy Wonka needed to show up right now.
Edie sniffed and looked shamefully between Ajax and the Caprus, her big, baleful eyes red and puffy with the self-inflicted hurt of presumed failure turned hopeful...at least in a still-doubting, highly scrutinized sort of way.
Chartreuse got her to try again, which was a start, but unfortunately those knitting needles were just entirely too small for the expectant mother's enormous paws to wield with any coordination or precision. You could see Edie getting frustrating again as she tried, but it wasn't a matter of what she was doing wrong...it was the instruments she was using not being conducive. But! Ever heard of arm-crocheting?
