Luieno

[petdr89]

Abby continued walking down the street, observing the houses and stores. Some were boarded up and others weren't, none of them looked open though. She walked up to one store and pawed at the handle. The sign at the shop said they were open, but the door was locked, which puzzled her. She stood there for a couple minutes while trying to open the door, but the longer she stood there, the more frustrated she became. "Bloody freaking son of a gosh dang biscuit!" She cursed and pounded her shoulder into the door repeatedly. She backed up a good ten steps before charging toward the door, pounding her shoulder into it once more, and finally breaking the door down. She cracked her neck in three different ways and rolled her shoulder around before continuing forward. She was glad to be out of the sun, but this store made her feel uneasy. There were cobwebs and dust everywhere, and she left little kitty tracks when she walked across the floor. Boxes were stacked in the corners, and the front counter had a bunch of old papers littered on it.

[ultraviolet]

Ku's eyes widened when he saw Abby desperately trying to get in. He rushed over to help, but she had already broken the door open by that time.

He shrugged and continued down the street, thinking Abby might need some rest from the time in the sun. It really was deserted. The town had a familiarity about it, but he couldn't quite put his paw on it. Like he'd been here when he was a cub.

Then he saw it. The thing that made his blood freeze.
A deserted campfire at the end of the street.
He rushed down there quickly to see if there were any remains.

Around the blackened campfire were few things littered across the now-empty campsite. Mostly it was just kougra-prints everywhere on the ground, but a few things caught his eye. one was an old, discarded piece of wood. Ku turned it over, uninterested.

In faded print, the piece of wood became a sign. 'Coal Valley' it read.
"Hey guys!"
Ku picked it up in his mouth and ran back down the street.

[petdr89]

In the time that Ku was wondering around the burnt out campfire, Abby was making herself at home in the building she had just broken into; acting like she owned the place. She went into the back store room and rummaged through some of the boxes, not finding anything interesting. She was about to turn to leave when she heard something in the corner. It was very faint, barely audible, but it sounded like small squeaks followed by the pitter patter of little paws. Abby turned to investigate the noise, and in doing so probably found the only remaining resident of the abandoned town. "Well hello there, little guy." She said to a hidden feepit. That's when she heard Ku calling for everyone, and she lifted up her head in the direction of his voice. "Come on, let's see what's up." She picked up the feepit in her mouth before trotting out of the building and walking up to Ku. She placed the feepit down before speaking, "Yeeeesss? What's up?"

[Kiweh]

((Sorry...))

Lue was peering through the dusty windows when Ku had called out; he followed Abby down the street to where Ku was. He looked at the piece of wood and then at the feepit, obviously missing something. “Where did you find that?” He asked Ku, reading the block of wood and now curious about it. It seemed this place had been undisturbed for a while now, but the reason it was abandoned was unclear. The town seemed like a fair place to live; there were nice houses and stores, there were banks and other things… Something major must have happened for it to be so deserted…

[ultraviolet]

"It was over there somewhere. I remember coming here when I was a cub, though I don't remember much about it." He said, shrugging. He smiled at the feepit and stroked it behind it's ears.
"Where'd you find this little fella?" he asked Abby, his heart melting at its adorable cuteness.

[petdr89]

Abby twisted her head so that she could read the piece of parchment from a better angle. "Coal Valley" she muttered so silently that it was almost indiscernible. She had heard that before, but where? A book maybe? Or maybe she was thinking about Coal Village; an abandoned mining town. What had that book said again? She didn't remember it describing the town being abandoned; only remembered something about the people unleashing a terrible evil that engulfed the town or something like that. She couldn't remember now, and was also positive that that was a different town and not the one that they were in right now.

Ku's question snapped her out of her thinking trance and back to reality. "Oh, uh, I found him over there." She looked back at the building she was just in and pointed with her tail. "He was all alone though, and that store had a bunch of maps of the town in it, as well as some boxes packed with stuff. It almost looked like the people were going to move out of town, but then forgot to take all of their stuff with them or something." She shrugged as she turned her head to look back at Ku, and then looked down at the petpet. "You want him you can have him." She was actually going to eat him later while no one was looking, but she couldn't eat the creature if Ku had become attached to it.

[Kiweh]

Lue looked down at the feepit and shrugged, he had never had an interest in petpets... "Well lets take a look at those maps, maybe they can tell us something." He said and started heading back to the store Abby had pointed at. He stepped onto the dust floor of the little building and started looking into the boxes that Abby had already opened. She was right, there were maps and everyone of them were labeled 'Coal Valley' like the sigh. There were no clues on what might have happened to 'Coal Valley' though...

[petdr89]

Abby watched Lue walking toward the building for a moment before looking at Ku. "Here, take him! I insist." She didn't wait for him to reply before pushing the small feepit toward his feet. What the heck was wrong with her anyway? How could she even think about eating something so cute? She disgusted herself at the very thought.

She turned and started padding toward the shop she was just in, relieved to be out of the sun again once she was inside. She sat, watching Lue looking through the boxes and at the maps. She had already seen all of this stuff; she didn't need to look at it again. Based on what she had seen of the maps, this looked like an incredibly small town. And based on the maps there looked like there was a labyrinth of caves located just outside of the town. Would the town's people hide in the caves if there was a major catastrophe? And if they had, why hadn't they returned? "It is rather odd, isn't it?" She asked out loud, though she wasn't really talking to anyone.

[ultraviolet]

Ku looked at the Feepit, puzzled. He'd never had to look after anything before. He hoped it wouldn't die or something.
The Feepit shrieked happily and bounced on to Ku's back, resting somewhere in his fluffy tail.

He shrugged, and padded into the abandoned shop. Everything was covered in a thick layer of dust. Ku sneezed. It seemed there was nothing in these boxes except maps, books, and jars of things that made his stomach turn. Ku moved one of the boxes stacked on the other when it fell from a hole in the corner of the box.

It landed with a dull chink on the dusty floorboards. It was a necklace, with a small gemstone charm connected by an old, tarnished chain.

[petdr89]

One of Abby's ears twisted to face behind her when she heard the clink, and then her head slowly followed. Her eyes immediately became glued on the necklace and her pupils grew large. She stood as if she were frozen in time, and since not even her chest moved during respiration it was a little creepy. "Ooooo, shiny" she finally said. Females; I swear. She still didn't move though, and she didn't even blink as she asked "What is it?"

[Kiweh]

Lue took his eyes off of the map and looked down at the necklace, "Some kind of jewelry, i guess..." he said reaching for it. He held it front of his face for a while, admiring it, "Here," he said and walked over to Abby, wrapping the chain around her neck and fastening it. "It, ummm, matches your eyes...?" he said not really intending for it to be a compliment but he had to say something.

[ultraviolet]

"Yeah, it does." agreed Ku, then realised what he'd just said and busied himself with a box, blushing. "It looks really ancient, it must uh, be worth a lot."

[petdr89]

Abby's eyes stayed glued on the necklace while Lue was putting it on her, and she smiled at the two compliments she was given. She probably would have started blushing too if it were at all possible, but in order for the blushing process to occur one needed warm blood running through their body. The liquid running through Abby's body wasn't blood, and it certainly wasn't warm.

"It probably is worth a lot, it looks really old. We could probably hock it for a ton of money." She paused for a moment and looked down at the necklace which rested on her chest. Although it might be worth a lot, she doubted she would sell it. "We should probably search the area for the missing town’s people. They may need our assistance" she finally said.

[Kiweh]

Lue nodded, "Yeah ok well..." He started and grabbed one of the maps again, "There is a weird maze of caves outside the city we can go there or check to see if any of these houses has a weird secret passage thing or..." He listed off, coming up with the weirdest ideas. He opened the map and set it on the floor, pinning the curled up edges down so that they all could see it.

[Kiweh]