[B] Auto-Berserk [Red Alert, Cue Queue]

[Maxx D]

Red Alert was being very structured about her approach. She first went to query 'round, and was told that there was a Legendary at Rise & Shine. Marching off to Rise & Shine, she stiffly and solemnly asked to see their boss, who turned out to be a very eerily pleasant buck of sunset colours. She'd requested "a private audience," he'd cooed and told her to wait at a rock a little way off their shop. As she sat still at the rock, she heard a "Cuuueeeeeeeeee" drift across the shop and the surrounding area.

Now that she was waiting, and her ears were alert to all the little productive noises of kin and pets, sunning pelts and meat, the infuriating and alien sizzle of a salamander heating fruits, she was...

Panicking.

But Red attempted to sit there still and stiff, waiting for the Legendary. She had her speech all planned out. This was going to happen. Just. As. Planned.  

[Jun D]

Cue Queue sauntered over, gold eyes burning, sucking at a dried plum in her cheek. She had, she thought, glumly, gone soft in motherhood, that there were Kin who could walk up to Rise & Shine, and find her there, a dried plum in her cheek.

She hated it.

But the dried plum was nice.

The doe looked nice too - young and callow, but lean and, from the cut of her perch, disciplined.

"Does it have to be private?" not because she minded, but she wanted to know why.  

[Maxx D]

"It seemed appropriate?" She said, sort of thrown off by the majesty and casualness of this Legendary. "I - well - um"

And all the preparation went out the window.

"I'M HAVING CHILDREN -" she blurted, her glowing blue eyes suddenly wide, "AND - AND I - I DON'T KNOW WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN!" Her front legs bucked, and her stare instead redirected to the floor. "I came for, for a blessing but I don't think anything could save them now, oh Swampmother, what if they turn out terrible? What if..." and the eyes then darted around her, head whipping to regard the busy scene of Rise and Co., "what if you all kill me to sun and eat? Oh no...oh no -"  

[Jun D]

Suddenly, Cue was very glad it was private, and that was basically the only thing she was glad about - what was up with this doe?!

"Alright, alright, calm down," she said, sounding for all the world as dry and indifferent as her voice, in spite of her inner bewilderment, "nobody here is going to kill, sun, or eat you.

"Kin don't taste great," she added, when the doe did not look any more assured.  

[Maxx D]

Predictably, she looked even less assured.
"How do you know..." she said in a low not-very-whisper. "Have you eaten one? Please don't eat me I'm pregnant." Her eyes got ever wider, the blue glow threatening to swallow her forehead.  

[Jun D]

Cue decided that actually saying it was a joke out loud would be too much of an indignity.

"Nobody is going to eat you," she repeated instead, a tad wearily. Such a pity - she had looked nice, too, this doe, all lean and disciplined.

"You came for a blessing?" she quickly followed with, in hopes of steering the conversation away from cannibalism.  

[Maxx D]

"Yes..." she said distrustfully, but also distant as her gaze swept beyond Cue. "But maybe I shouldn't be anymore...It might be for the best."  

[Jun D]

The declaration was just ominous and unhinged enough to both alarm Cue and make her not want to ask more.

"Let's not be hasty," she said, flicking her ear in a futile attempt to curtail the pounding that was beginning to pulse behind her eyes, "why don't you tell me what sort of blessing you had in mind?"  

[Maxx D]

She seemed to give it real thought, before drawing herself up, eyes wary, "I want them to be fearless." Not like me, it pretty much projected over her head. "That's too good to be true, is it? I don't want to say this of the Motherfather, but it seems like a sham..." and those eyes swept around once more.  

[Jun D]

"It's not a sham," she snapped, then some of her old self stirred over the taste of plum in her cheek, and her eyes began to gleam, "it's something...you have to work for."  

[Maxx D]

"Oh," and her voice settled, her face relaxing from the panic and hardening to ready for a familiar rigour. "Then that makes...sense. How do I work for this?" The tone was solemn, with a slight edge of panic, but thankfully calmer than before.  

[Jun D]

Cue trotted her to the edge of the shop and gestured at the sunning rocks, "You see where the little fruits are laid out to dry? There has been a mongoose, quick as a slip, stealing from their numbers. Patrol that border, and if you make it to sundown without another fruit gone...the Motherfather will grant your wish."  

[Maxx D]

"Will do." She clicked her hooves together in stiff acknowledgement, and set off with evident determination in her walk. Red Alert began to work.  

[Jun D]

Well, now that doe would be out of her fur for a while. Job done for the moment, Cue sauntered back to the rock. She'd work back towards her old cutting-edge self tomorrow, the dried plum wasn't quite done yet.  

[Maxx D]

At sundown, the patriarch himself escorted the now off-duty doe back to Cue's resting rock. Red Alert, determined to get the blessing she worked for, held the limp body of a thieving mongoose in her mouth until they were in Cue's sight, and dropped it primly as proof. Rise, quite unaware of the circumstances of the blessing, exclaimed most chipperly and obviously: "She killed the mongoose! I say, this doe you've found - or the doe that found you - is quite a trooper. I'd like to hire her." His head inclined and he smiled at the now rather pleasant-looking Red, before turning back to Cue with a hopeful look.