[ti]spawn[/ti]Careful Steppes

Kitten walked solidly beside him, pressed against his leg as much as she was able, purring and chirping and making worried little question-sounds. Verai just walked, having no true goal in mind- save that he needed to repair his armor.

Thanks, Kazuki.

They stopped before an obelisk, Verai... learning, how it sounded when he was close, the way footsteps subtly changed. "Alrigh, Kitten." He said. "See if you can break some of it off."

<And this makes the armor?> Kitten asked, swiping at the obelisk and watching as another bit tumbled free.

"Yes- When it gets hot, it turns very aoft, like clay. Then we can shape it into armor." Thoughtfully, she pawed at it, and- now certain Verai was not looking- chewed on it a bit.

Kitten flipped her head onto her back to try and look at Purrai. <Why don't you try???> She asked, out of kindness and not because this was hard.

"Me?" Verai echoed.

<Yeah!!! With your cool new powers!> She moved and flopped down by the 3 gathered pieces of ore. <You can do it!!>

"How? Just..." The thought of slamming his fist into a rock was. Unpleasant. But was he asking Kitten to do anything better? He slammed an armored fist into the stone-

<Yeah!!! That's so many!!!!>

Verai moved towards the ore, casting his hands over it with Kitten's help. "This... should be enough, don't you think?" He asked. <Yeah! Yeah yeah yeah!> Kitten said, hopping.

She then looked up at Verai, wide eyed. <Are you gonna make Sprigatito armor too?>

"I could, probably, if he liked."

<And Kazuki???>

Verai paused at that. "Wh... why would I do that?"

Verai took in a shaky breath. He could hear Kazuki behind, stalking back to his waiting spot after harassing a small bird.

<Don't you love him?>

"No," Verai answered, because there were plenty of reasons to not love Kazuki[. Such as that Kazuki stalked him, and beat him up on multiple occasions, and had gotten them trapped in some sort of coding test wasteland.

But...

Kitten scrunched up her face. <But you do everything together. And we went into the scary place to find him. And you get grumpy when he hasn't been on in a while. And->

Verai simply picked Kitten up, who bec=gan writhing and hollering. "Kazuki!" He called, trying to keep her contained all the while. "There should be a small cave around here... Kitten, will you help us look, too?"

<NO!!>

Verai sighed. "Kitten..."

<Not until you say it!!!!>

He hears Verai call his name, and Kazuki clicks his tongue, ceasing the game of shotput he’s playing with a few birds. As the shotput balls.

“What!” He yells back, returning with his fists already crackling. There don’t appear to be any immediate threats, but as he approaches, he finds Kitten in some kind of argument with Verai, demanding both of them to say—something.

“The hell is she talking about?” But his question is shoved to the backburner as a Rufflet skulks its way into the huddle, going full throttle on Verai after being ignored.

Kazuki scoffs, wondering why the place is suddenly littered with meddlesome birds. He winds his arm back and prepares to punch it.