Monika caught Hiroshi's off guard and twiddled with his feline ears all of a sudden while standing on her toes. With a prankish grin on her face, the teenage girl was delighted to see the Japanese male's suprised face following her antic. "They are real! How do you say 'cute' in Japanese?" She was impressed by the cluster of eccentrics who were equally odd as herself.

As the strapping man looked at her with inquiringness and asked about her nature, she restrained her frolicsome laughter, "I'm a Hexe. Hold on, what's the word... I mean I'm a pretty, perky witch." Monkia chuckled. In fact she was not very good with magic. She only learnt magic from her peers and family members, who had been executed before she arrived at the civilized metropolis, when she was just a child. Not spending enough time on equipping herself adequately, her knowledge of witchcraft was not ample no matter how witty she was. The spells she knew were enough for her hoaxes though.

The entire time Hiroshi had kept walking with the group to make their way back to the large abandoned town that he and Monika were at earlier. Unaware about there being two others there at the very moment they were making their way there, both of his cat-like ears couldn't help but continue to twitch slightly as he had listened to everyone speak with one another in the English lanuage. Some of the words he did understand but yet there were still some words he couldn't figure out as well. Hiroshi had guessed that after meeting these people and noticing how nice they had sounded, it hadn't even crossed his mind that any of them would mean any harm. After-all, if they had meant any harm they probably would've attacked or done something at least by now.

However, being caught off guard from behind when he had felt someone's touch upon his ears. Hiroshi's tail quickly straightened up against his back, still hidden within his kimono. Both of his eyes widened up in shock as a light gasp of his own escaped his lips before turning his head over his shoulder to look and find that it was Monika playing with his ears. The question she had asked about how to say cute in Japanese was one thing he actually was able to understand. Chuckling quietly to himself he had grabbed back onto his kimono as he tried to hide his ears once again. It wasn't really an annoyance that she had played with them, it was more just for him not to be caught off guard so much. Hiroshi was mostly afraid to hurt anyone with his claws by accident if he were to be scared too quickly one of these days. "K..Kawaii." That was the only word to escape from his lips to answer her question as he continued to venture down the road with the rest of the group, doing his best to relax his tail.

Overhearing their conversation between Monika and the other male in the group, the first thing Hiroshi seemed to hear from her was that she was a witch. This was indeed shocking to him, so the girl he was going around with this whole time was actually not even human after-all. At least he hadn't needed to worry now that if any human were around here, he wouldn't have to go running off once more to escape capture.

Umm. Yeah. It's just a couple cracked ribs. I'll be fine. He decided to just lean on the arm of the couch, wincing slightly as he did so. He sighed and ran his hand over his face. He was exhausted. It took him a while to realize it, but he really was.

So, ummmm... Do you like deer? He thought it sounded like a very strange and stupid question to ask, but that was about the only food he had and Josephine was probably hungry. He hoped she would say yes, since he would have to cut up the deer anyway. He didn't want it to go to waste.

Mary wandered through the forest, not too far from the village, in search of some herbs that Lenna had asked her and Michael to pick for her home-made disinfectant. Finaly finding some of the thyme she needed to get, she turned to get the basket from her brother, only to find that he wasn't there anymore.

"You have got to be kidding me! I turn around for one minute, and he's gone!" She grabbed some thyme before starting back the way she had come, hoping to find her errant brother.


Meanwhile, Michael was nearly skipping through the trees, looking around to see any of the things Lenna had asked them to get.

"Let's see, rosemary, thyme, and sage. Shouldn't be too hard. Ah!" He spotted a rosemary bush, big enough for at least one batch of the herbal formula. Picking only what he needed, he dropped the sprigs in the basket, before turning to show his sister his find. Except she wasn't there. Looking around, he realized that he had wandered too far, and didn't recognize this part of the forest. Not to mention it was getting dark. "This isn't good..."

He started backtracking, trying to find any sign of the direction he had come from. Hearing a twig snap behind him, he started running, going faster when he heard a female coming from in front of him. He broke from the trees onto a path, only to run smack into something, falling flat on his back and scattering herbs everywhere. Looking up, he realized he had run into a rather large man, over two feet taller than him, with a large scar running across his chest.

Panicking, Michael yelped and jumped to his feet, backing into a tree."Ah! I'm sorry! Please don't eat me!"

Lenna wandered back into town, a few sprigs of lavender in one hand while she fetched a herb bag from her backpack. Stopping for a minute to safely put the flower into her bag, she caught the scent of blood. Following it to Damien's house, she frowned, catching the scent of recently killed deer, Damien's blood, as well as the blood of someone she didn't know. Sighing, she knocked on the door, letting her nails scratch lightly on the wood like she always did so that he would know it was her, and waited for an answer.

"Oh, I hope it heals soon.." Josephine made a mental sigh of relief that Damien had not been hurt too badly. I wouldn't know what to do if he had been severely injured..She began to chew a little on her bottom lip, then looked back up at Damien when he has if she liked deer.

"Umm..I've never really had deer before..So I'll never know unless I try!" She smiled sheepishly and put a little pressure on the wound. Her leg was beginning to get very cold, which caused her whole body to get goose bumps. She shivered and tried not to pay attention to it.

Tay walked along the imaginary path that he set before him. The town was getting close, and his feet really ached from walking. He absolutely hated walking. "Well I hope th--" Tay was cut short when he saw the boy bump into Reese. "Oi! Who's that?"

He pointed like an idiot to the boy as if no one else would have seen him otherwise. One thought crossed his mind, if the case was that the boy were looking for trouble Protect Maggie was all he thought. Eh? Stop that! Tay mentally blushed and lowered his pointing finger and just folded his arms over his chest.

Reese stood there like a brick wall as the boy collided with him. He blinked staring down at him, scratching his head a little confused both by the statement and by where the boy came from."Eat you?!" he seemed horrified that someone would even think such a thing. "Why would I want to eat you?" he hunkered down so he didn't see so big and threatening. "What's your name kid?" he asked trying to appear as nice as possible.

When the boy tumbled out of the trees it took all the control Maggie had not to let herself spark. She could feel her temperature rising, the redness tugging at the edges of her eyes. Again she found herself wanting to cling to Tay but she wouldn't let herself. She don't want to hurt him on accident. Instead she half stepped behind him, keeping him as a barrier between her an everyone else. Rubbing her hot hands on her dress she singed the fabric but it was better that than lighting someone else on fire.

Okay. sounds good.He then heard a knock on the door. Who the- Lenna. Of course.He stood up and walked over the front door. He opened it. He was right, it was Lenna.


Ummm, Hey. How's it goin'? What a stupid question. He was just nervous. He wasn't sure how she was going to react to Josephine being there. It had been a while since he had talked to any girl besides Lenna; since he had talked to anyone really. He thought she would think it was weird that this girl was in his house, especially since Lenna would know they had just met.

Josephine closed her eyes, she was really tired again and didn't know if she would be able to eat anything and keep it down. She wanted to sleep.

She nestled down into the couch, bringing the hood up over her head. She stuffed her hands in the side pockets and hoped that the ice pack wouldn't fall off of her leg. She tuned out the noise, and focused on sleeping. Soon she drifted off to sleep again, not really wanting to know who had knocked at the door.

Lenna gave Damien an unimressed look, and started sniffing at him. Finally she got to his ribs, sighed in exasperation, and walked past him into the house. She stopped when she saw an unfamiliar girl sitting on the couch, and recognized the scent from earlier as hers. Lenna could see she was injured as well. Both her eyebrows lifted, and she looked back at Damien, and nodded towards the girl with her head with a questioning look, while pulling out her medical kit.

She motioned for Damien to sit down again, and walked over to the girl to kneel in front of her. She set her kit on the floor, and gestured between herself and the obviously wounded leg, trying to ask if she was allowed to look at it. She started sniffing, and could smell fresh blood, but it didn't smell like there was an infection. Still, best to check and make sure.

Michael sniffled and looked at the man now crouching in front of him. He didn't seem so scary when he wasn't towering over his own small form. "I'm Michael. And you're big. Like, really big. And you have that scar, and Lenna always says that you should be cautious around people with scars, cause they're either bad or have had bad things happen to them, and it's better to be safe than sorry. Not to mention..." he leaned closer, covering one side of his mouth with his hand, and whispering, "you're a bear." Michael nodded solemnly. "And Mary says that bears eat people, which is why I shouldn't wander off alone... Like I did. Oh, she's going to be so mad at me!" he wailed, head falling back to thunk lightly against the tree.

Meanwhile, Mary had finally reached the path into and out of Teelu, and decided to follow it away from the village, assuming that her brother had gotten lost again, and Lenna prefered when they stayed on the paths when she wasn't with them. After a short while, she heard voices. More specifically, she could hear her brother talking, and that might not be a good thing. Speeding up, she could finally see a group of people, her brother against a tree slightly in front of them, with a rather large bear-man in front of him. Running as fast as her legs could carry her, she skidded to a halt just next to her brother, stepping in front of him with her arms spread wide and a glare on her face. "Who are you and what do you want with my brother!"

Damien sighed with a tired smile when Lenna had started sniffing him. He was used to it, and he knew she could always tell when he was hurt. He then watched her walk past him heading for Josephine.

It's kind of a long story. He said as she looked back at him. He walked over and sat on the arm of the couch. He nodded when she gestured towards Josephine. It would probably be best. He sighed again, wondering how this was going to turn out. Hopefully they won't have any issues. He was hoping Josephine wouldn't wake up. He realized she was still wearing his hoodie and blushed a little. Of couse Lenna would notice, but how she would react to it, who knows.

Lenna sighed, opening her kit and taking out her disinfectant, a pair of tweezers, some cotton swab, and some medical tape, as well as proper bandages. She motioned for Damien to talk while she tended to the girl first, gently lifting the ice pack off the injured area, noticing how she didn't have much of anything on except Damien's hoodie. She made a mental note to get the girl some of her old clothes. They might be a bit big, but they were warm, and they could be adjusted.

Carefully untying the bandage from the cut, she grabbed a cotton swab with them, before soaking it in the disinfectant. She hoped the sting from cleaning the wound wouldn't wake the girl - she looked like she needed the rest, and walking on an injury like this couldn't be good. She started to gently wipe the area down, getting all the blood from around the cut, and checking to make sure nothing had gotten under the bandage.

Josephine turned over a little, which caused her to fall over onto the couch, her long black hair sprawled out over her face as she inhaled and exhaled silently. She winced a little and coiled back when she felt something stinging on her leg. A little tear rolled down her cheek as she lay there fast asleep.

He rubbed the back of his head. Well...ummm...where do I begin. Okay, I was hunting. I scared the deer off so I walked off looking for something else. I found her and she was hurt. I uhhh... helped her. I got some stuff for her here and then ran back and gave it to her. She couldn't walk so I carried her here. She's been here ever since.

He stood up and walked over to the fridge. He opened it and took out a bottle with a mix of soda and blood, a regular drink for him. He opened it and turned around. She's a shapeshifter, ya know.He raised an eyebrow, waiting for a response.

"Thanks for the compliement," Monika giggled mischievously. She had two purposes asking for the Japanese word: one was that she really had no idea how to say "cute" in Japanese; the second was to con Hiroshi in praising her. "Ka... Kawaii right? Kawaii cat ears," she tried to pronouce the exotic word though there was still an accent. Not knowing her grammar was wrong, she was pleased to have learnt a new word - to commend herself.

Someone bumped into Reese when the young witch was giving an answer to his question. The tallest male was well distracted and not likely to have heard Monika's response. Twirling her straight hair reflectively she slightly frowned at the panicking kid. Ich mag Gören einfach nicht! (I just don't like brats) she silently thought. Not making any noise she stood beside Hirashi and listened to the conversation between Reese and the juvenile. To be frank, she was surprised when the little one called Reese a bear. "Bear?"

Tay flailed his arms in defeat and shouted out to himself "Waarom is dit niet geweldig. Ik hoop dat je geen honger, want ik heb maar zoveel eten dat ik ben bereid op te geven!" (Why, isn't this wonderful. I hope your not hungry because I've only got so much food that I'm willing to give up!) Tay Had a habit of yelling out in dutch. It was one of the languages one of his caretakers always spoke to him in. So he caught on real fast at what she was saying.

Tay shook his head and just continued walking. He really didn't like a lot of people, Especially if they looked the same age as him. He grabbed Maggie's hand and practically dragged her behind him. He had hoped that Reese would come with them too. He really didn't care about the others so much. "Come on Maggie, you need to cool off your practically burning my skin" He didn't mind how warm her hand felt. Mainly because when he transforms into a werewolf, he feels like his entire body is burning up in flames. So her warmth, he could handle.

[FONT=Century Gothic]Reese sat there and listened to the kid as he tried to explain some things. His eyes got a bit wide as the kid called him a bear. How could he have known that? Reese's hand traced his scar with a frown. you don't have to worry kid. I won't hurt you." Reese chuckled. "And I'm only part bear. I don't eat people." thats when the girl came out to defend the boy. Reese blinked. "Another one?" he looked at her and scratched his head. "He bumped into me..." reese tries to explain a bit confused.

Maggie was a bit shocked at Tay's sudden outburst. Then he grabbed her hand and started to storm off. Her cheeks burned at the contact but she hung her head when he mentioned her temperature. "I'm sorry." she mumbled. But swallowing hard she let her hand grasp his and hold on tight as e pulled her away from the others. It was releaving to be away from so many and not have to worry about hurting everyone. It was also nice that Tay seemed to care enough to take her with him.

Reese looked over his shoulder at the pair as they headed off. "Maggie! Tay! Hey!" he got to his feet his large size becoming imposing once more as he stepped away from the pair of new comers. He frowned. He looked back to the kids. "I have to make sure they are okay... I can't... I can't just let them go off alone." he took off after them.[FONT]

Lenna nodded while Damien was talking, letting him know that she was listening, while she cleaned the girl's wounds. Once that was done, she grabbed the bandage she had gotten out, along with the medical tape, and taped down the edges of the bandage after making sure the whole cut was covered. Nodding to herself now that that job was complete, she turned to Damien only to see him not sitting down, but walking around.

She stormed into the kitchen, grabbed one of the chairs at the table, and dragged it into the living room, placing it so that it faced the couch. "Sit", she growled out, pointing at the chair. He should know by now not to walk around with injuries, especially when she was there to see it.

Michael was about to answer the man when he ran off after two kids about his age. Surprised by his sister's sudden appearance, he looked around to notice more people than just the large man were standing there. Looking down, he realized all of his gathered herbs were scattered everywhere. He scrambled to pick them up before his little sister could scold him, even though he knew she would.

Mary huffed, crossing her arms as the bear-man and the two kids walked off. The girl was odd; her aura looked like fire, but even her grandfather, who's specialty was fire magic, didn't look like that. Confused, she turned to look at the last two members of the little party. Her eyes widened as she finally got a good look at them.

"Hey, you're like Lenna, a big cat, right?" she asked, looking at the man in the kimono. She turned to the girl. "And you're a magic user, like my brother and I - you're a witch!" Mary was excited over this; she hadn't seen any new magic users in quite a while. "Do you have any specialties? Or are you more of an all around spell caster? Oh, you guys are heading to Teelu, right? Why don't we go with you. Our caretaker will be upset if we're not back by dark."

Well, someone isn't in a very good mood. he said teasingly. He grinned, purposely showing his fangs. Besides, it hurts more sitting down anyways. He took another drink of his soda and continued to just stand there. He was trying to annoy her, if only slightly. It was true though; it did hurt more sitting.

He looked down at his shirt. there was a bit of blood seeping through it now, but not a ton. He was hoping Lenna wouldn't notice, but she could definitely smell it. That was for sure.

Lenna growled when Damien grinned, showing teeth. She bared her own fangs, snarling at him before catching herself, shaking her head to snap out of it. She glared at her friend, knowing he played off her instincts - like showing teeth, which is normally a challenge - to annoy her.

Sniffing, she noticed that she could smell very fresh blood, and it was Damien's. She marched over to him, yanking the bottle and cap out of his hands, screwing the cap back on before throwing it over her shoulder, grinning to herself when she heard the mixture shaking around inside the bottle. She then proceeded to yank the vampire's shirt over his head, not caring that moving his arms would hurt; he's a vampire, he can take it. She sighed when she finally got a good look at the injury, giving him an exasperated look at the obviously hoof-shaped bruise forming. She walked back over to the chair and her supplies, bringing both over and sitting on the chair in front of Damien, before cleaning the wound.

The entire time the group had continued to make their way throughout the forest to reach the abandoned town up ahead. Hiroshi stayed silent most of the time, mostly because he wasn't really sure what to say. Monika had asked him how to speak the word 'cute' in Japanese and he had told her how to, surprisingly when she had tried to speak the actual word; she had gotten it pretty good compared to any normal person would get it. Indeed when she had said it herself, it did sound wrong since she wasn't Japanese. However, it was still pretty good for a first time. When she had complimented on his ears being 'cute', a light chuckle escaped his lips as he bowed his head a couple of times just as though he was nodding. "H-he-hehe, Thank you."

Within simply moments though, Hiroshi quickly came to a complete stop as both of his ears began twitching slightly. There was something that sounded like running footsteps going around the forest, it could've simply been an animal that was running around but the scent was of no animal; that was for sure. As the footsteps came even closer only to end up having a random boy coming dashing out of nowhere and go slamming into Reese, who looked like nothing had even harmed him one bit. The boy seemed to had been really afraid of the older male as though he was going to be eaten. Tilting his head curiously, Hiroshi stared down at the boy and listened to conversation between the boy and Reese for a moment before seeing another female jump out to block the the boy from Reese as though she were protecting him.

Watching as how Tay and Maggie had began to go back toward making their way to the abandoned village ahead of them. Hiroshi simply watched as how Reese had joined them soon right after. Blinking in a bit of confusion on why they didn't just stay and speak with the new young boy and girl that just appeared out of nowhere, he had returned his gaze back onto the two newcomers. This was a bit awkward, Hiroshi was stuck here with Monika and these two newcomers and he barely even knew complete English yet. Trying to figure out what to say, when the young girl suddenly spoke up on asking that Hiroshi was partially a cat like someone else called 'Lenna'; his own eyes widened up in shock. There was another person like him this whole time? Someone else could change into what he was and had these strange ears and tail? Hoping on that was what she meant, he had nearly blurted out in Japanese but was able to hold himself back for a moment. "Where..uhh..Lenna?" He had done his best to explain his question on wondering if they had known where that person was.

Right after, when the same girl asked Monika if she was a magic user, he was surprised to find that they had already known that about her so easily by just looks. Continuing with the questions, when she had asked to go toward a place called 'Teelu' Hiroshi had turned his head over to look at Monika curiously. "We go?" he asked on wondering if she would trust these two kids or if they should go follow the others who ran off without them.

Monika was about to follow the gang. Yesh, about to. The little girl who had just appeared a couple of minutes ago stopped her. That girl, who had not even voice out her name, could identify her by simply a few glances. Surprised by her, Monika raised an eyebrow, "Was zum Kuckuck? (What the heck?)" she gasped. Then before her eyes the little girl became so excited at finding a witch and started to ask for details. The teenage witch had no idea what she wanted. "I don't understand what you..." when she was confused or absent-minded, her accent became more obvious.

At last the kids offered to lead them back to the town. "We go?" the male she had been unconciously clung to asked. Not knowing what else they could do, she nodded and started following the fired up kids.

Hey! You know it isn't nice to take things from people. He said as she took the bottle out of her hands and threw it behind her. Then she started pulling off his shirt. Since he was only an inch taller than her, it made it only slightly uncomfortable when she pulled it off.

When she looked at him he gave her a weak smile. I guy's gotta eat. He said quietly. It should last me a few days, hopefully. ​He glanced over at Josephine real quick, and then looked back at Lenna, who was sitting now. She was starting to clean the wound, but he had barely noticed it.

Lenna glared slightly at Damien as the lightly placed a small bandage over the cut. "Be more careful, or I hunt for you. Now, tell me if this hurts." She started to press very lightly on the area that was definately bruising, and was most likely either fractured or broken ribs. It didn't feel like there was anything crunchy or moving under the skin, so they most likely weren't shattered or broken, but she would have to check all of them.

Michael nodded as he stood up from his gathering. He started walking with Mary and the other two. Looking at the older boy, he decided to answer his question and let his sister answer the girl. "Lenna is our caretaker, mine and my sister's, so she'll be in Teelu, the village that it seemed like you all are heading for. She's also kind of like the village doctor. She's a snow leopard, and while she doesn't have the ears or tail, she has other traits. Uh... Things that make it obvious that she's a cat if you know what to look for."

Mary fell in step next to the older girl. "I was wondering if you have any specialties in your magic. As in things that you're better at than others. I myself am better at illusions and... some of the darker spells. My brother is better at using the elements: fire, water, air, that kind of thing. We're also from a long line of magic users, and have an... inherited ability to see auras. That's how I know you're a witch, and he's a shape shifter." She realized she hadn't introduced herself yet, and held out her hand to the other girl. "I'm Mary, by the way. And that's my brother, Michael.

He chuckled when she glared at him. Vampire vs. snow leopard shape shifter. Now that would be an interesting fight. I wonder who would win. You would have your claws, teeth, speed, strength, and stealth. I have my fangs, unnatural speed and strength, and my ability to pretty much get out of anything. Sounds like it would be a pretty equal fight.

She pressed on his side and he winced. Uh, yeah. That does hurt. I'm pretty sure I cracked a few ribs. He looked down and inspected his wound. There was a bandage on it now. He watched Lenna as she was touching around his wound.

Josephine Went to go roll over, which caused her to fall off of the couch. Surprisingly she was still fast asleep. Although the pain in her leg felt a lot worse when she was not on something soft. This caused her to moan a little, something she did a lot when she was asleep.