Walk | Talk | Think
Padding across ground that was muddy and soft, only recently revealed as the initial onslaught of the flood began to recede, Callisto paced. Mud coated her paws and lower legs, turning the grey fur there dark and murky. Travel was uncomfortable and almost unpredictable as the ground was slick and dangerous, but the healer could not risk giving up and quitting now. A little mud was not going to make her turn back. Not when she had her rescuer to find.
At intervals, she stopped to call his name, but each time she did she received no answer. Thankfully her companion, the sleek black cat following wordlessly at a distance, kept any and all opinions to herself, no matter how rational and founded they were. Too much time had passed. If they were going to find him at all, it was going to be dead. There was no sense wasting their time searching for a body and nothing else. Callisto's own safety and health were more important, especially given his life had been risked for her own.
It was stupid, she knew it, and yet she continued to trot along the released floodwaters of the Aspen Dam, as if her efforts might eventually pay off. With her luck - the very same piss poor luck that had landed her in this situation - it was unlikely, practically guaranteed to fail, but this was not her life at stake here. This was Jakart's. He might have played the subservient role sometimes, but at heart Callisto felt he was a good person, wholly undeserving of the hand fate had dealt him. You can't take him, he deserves better than this!
Before she could decide to move on, to begin her search anew along another stretch of flooded valley, her pale, silver-blue eyes alighted on a collapsed figure in her path, freshly drawn from the water but appearing lifeless there in the mud. As her gaze skimmed across the prone, grey figure, Callisto's chest constricted. "Jak." Shocked, she froze for a split second before she was spurred into action, rushing to his side and nearly slipping in her haste. "Jakart!" Halting at his side, she nosed at his frame, inhaling his familiar scent to confirm his identity. "Jakart. Jakart, can you hear me? Say something," she demanded in stern, desperate urgency while she worked her muzzle beneath his, her eyes wide as she tried to get the lifeless shape to respond to her and lift his head.
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