:Taekhii's Story:

You race through the forest. Twigs lash your face as you hurtle by, but you can't stop. If you do, THEY will get you.
The screeches of the flock of mutant korbats fill your ears. Your breath barely comes to you, and when in does, in comes in raggedy sobs accented by sharp pain in your lungs. Your legs ache; you feel like giving up. Or throwing up.
In your weariness, you stumble and sprawl on the ground, your hands skinned and bleeding. There is a sudden silence, broken only by your harsh breathing, and in it the leader of the korbats swoops down triumphantly towards you.
You curl up into a ball and try to protect yourself, but you are too tired to keep going.
Then there is a flash of darkness. The silence is broken suddenly by the korbats' enraged shrills. A neopet, a large dark shape, brings an immense paw down on the leading korbat. It slams into a tree and flops lifelessly to the ground. The korbats flee.
Everything fades to gray.

You wake up in a cave. Your wounds are healed, and you feel rested. A large black lupe sits in the back of the cave, watching you. When he moves, you see that he has glistening feathered wings, and a feathered tail.
Wha…?" you gasp drowsily. The lupe gives you a wry look.
I have a story to explain. Would you like to hear it?" he says in a deep, smooth voice. You hesitate. It seems to you that you've heard a great deal of stories (from pets and their pages) and you are very nearly sick of them.
No?" says the lupe, amused. "Well, you have no choice. I will tell you nonetheless.

I was born with these…mutations. With the tail and wings of a bird. To your eye, they may seem beautiful. To my pack's eyes, they were something to be abhorred and destroyed. To my eyes they were a curse.
My pack, like many lupe packs, avoided the unknown at all costs. What they had was superior, in their mind, to anything they didn't have but didn't know of. I remember that, in the weeks after I was born, my parents spoke worriedly and in hushed voices. I was too young to understand, but I realized later that they were discussing whether or not to get rid of me.
The leader of my pack disliked me even more vehemently than the others, but her entire mind was anchored in tradition. To break the tradition would be to set her mind loose, like some sort of ravaging animal. It was fortunate for me that it was against tradition to kill a lupe of the same pack, or I would not be here today.
Despite this, there were times when I wished myself dead. My extra growth of wings and tail were like what a lack of limbs would be to humans. Not one lupe in the pack would meet my eye. I had the lowest of all ranks, and did only the foulest chores and got only the meanest portion of meat. Sometimes, I would find some small bit of spare time and practice flying, but I did this very little. I had been warned that if I was caught flying, my wings would be torn off.
I was very young at this time. Because of my low rank and small size, many lupes would pick on me, and quickly I learned to fight among or above the best of the pack. This did not spare me from my pack's derision, though. Rather I would be used. They would promise to treat me with respect if I took down this deer for meat, or this bear threatening us. I would also do as they would ask; they would never do as promised.

I remember one night the pack went out hunting a stranded elk. They left me behind to watch the cubs. It was incomprehensible that the cubs would ever be left alone, because they were the future of the pack. I was glad that the cubs were sleeping, for even they treated me as if I were inferior. As I daydreamed, or nightdreamed, I heard a screech from the forest. It was very near, and sounded like a neopet being mauled. At first I thought I had dozed off. I glanced warily at the sleeping cubs, and another cry of pain echoed in the forest. Uncertain, I began to head toward it, looking to help whatever creature was there.
You better not leave us here," a voice said. It was the oldest cub, awake and sneering snobbily. (Yay, alliterations...)
Please..." I replied, keeping the anger out of my voice as best as I could, "somebody has to help the neopet." The cub snorted in laughter.
You're a freak. You couldn't help anybody! You can't even help yourself!"
In a rush of anger, my mind was cleared. Whirling, I gave the leader's cub a swipe powered by blind rage, and then with a beat of my wings, swept up into the night.
I found a young eyrie being attacked by a huge, monstrous skieth. I will not detail the fight. I will say only that I won, by a sliver of claw, and paid the price. I was ripped and torn all over. I left the eyrie unconscious, and with only a few wounds, and dragged myself, bleeding, to my pack.
It is against the tradition to leave the cubs. It is inhumane, it is immoral. This is what they told me, and then they drove me out. I left a trail of blood in my exhausted wake.
I took refuge in a cave by the forest, this cave we are in now. The forest was not, is not, a safe place. It was only my wings that kept me alive. In my solitude, the cub's words drove my mind on and on, circling and reeling in uncertainty. Was I really good for nothing?
Am I really good for nothing?

Here the lupe pauses, and with a solemn smile he stares at you
. "I've found the answer tonight. I can help neopets, and in doing so I can help myself. As I told you, this forest is not a safe place. I will be the guardian of the travelers, I will keep them safe and in doing so I will…"
He doesn't finish his thought. He doesn't know what to say. He only laughs, and turning to the mouth of the cave, leaps up and into the sky.


Well, it's really clichéd, but there you have it. I've designed a clichéd character. *Hits character* Oh well. They're fun and easy to do. Ha. Neomail me.