Stand Strong

[Neela Garcia]

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OOC text here

It was quiet in the mine, too quiet. Neela wasn’t used to silence; wolf ears always seemed to pick up the surrounding noises of small wildlife and the rustling of greenery in the wind and despite their floppy appearance, Neela’s ears were definitely wolf ears, when she wasn;t distracted by something her hearing was very sharp, making up for her less than stellar sense of smell. Neither of those sounds penetrated deep down into the mines where Neela now stood, hands ghosting along rough walls as she made her way forwards, trying to find the fluorite as quickly as she could and get the hell out of this damned place.

Neela’s own breathing was all she could hear, unnaturally loud in the silence and it was starting to cause a minor panic attack for the collie; the past ten minutes she had taken to purposely making noises to try and break the monotony but it didn’t abate the sense of panic welling up inside her, after all she knew perfectly well that she had made the noises, that she was the only disruption to the eerie silence down here.

Panic. Neela stilled for a moment, mulling it over. She had been feeling that emotions a lot lately, at the ball, when she was out alone at night, when she thought of the possibility of Tony being hurt. She had petitioned Jazper to join the brotherhood to fight against her panic, to empower herself to protect her family and pack without being crippled by her own fear. Neela set her face and continued, forcing her panic down as her eyes scanned the gloom for a hint of purple. Damned rock, would be much simpler to use some sort of symbol rather than traipsing around some old human hole in the ground looking for a shiny crystal.

Thankfully she found it fairly quickly. Gratefully Neela knelt down by the crystal, one hand running over the smooth surface while the other drew one of her ship knives. The serrated blade of the knife was designed for cutting and it broke through a piece of the crystal fairly quickly, the purple mineral was places in Neela’s pouch and she quickly made her way back out of the mine.

The ambience outside hit Neela like a tidal wave of sound and the collie just stood there for a moment, eyes closed ad ears drinking up the sound of leaves rustling in the wind and insects chirping like it was water in the hands of a dying man. She allowed herself to wait a few moments longer and then reopened her eyes, making her way over to the hot springs. She was supposed to use this night to reflect over her choices and motivations so she sat down cross-legged, arms resting comfortably and closer her eyes.

And… that was where she stalled really. Neela was an active person and when she didn’t have something in particular attracting her attention sitting still. She was having to put so much attention into staying still that she barely had any brain left over to do the thinking. With a frustrated sigh Neela opened her eyes again, huffing quietly in frustration. Then her eyes caught sight of the pool in-front of her and a small smile spread onto her face.

The quiet night was disturbed by a faint splash as Neela slipped down into the water, letting out a content sigh as the hot spring lived up to its first name. Humming happily the collie paddled out to the center of the pool before floating up onto her back, closing her eyes and becoming silent once more. This was much better; Neela had always felt an off connection to water and it was much easier to relax and think floating like this, the warm water lulling her into restfulness the same as sun often did when she was fishing.

Neela had lost everything that remained of her old life. Her home, her family, everything she knew had been torn away from hero through no fault but her own. She had since spent a lot of time working on her anger and she had clawed a new life for herself, fighting past her own self doubt to regain a family, a pack, a home.

The thought of losing that made her furious. She had nearly lost Tony to Kaer, nearly gotten Jace’s child killed, both times because she was too weak to go out and face her own battles. So she had trained, she had awoken her old fighting skills and improved upon them. The brotherhood represented her motivation, the dedication to protect the pack, her family.

In the past Neela had run and hid from her problems. Her mistake had been carrying that habit on when she had others depending on her; she had thought that her temper would go away if she ignored and repressed it but it hadn’t, it had bided its time and come full force at the worst possible moment, and Julian and Leon had paid the price.

No more would she run from her problems, her fears, her anger. She would face them head on, shed her own blood to defend the life she had carved for herself. Tony liked to think himself her defender but she was just as dedicated to protecting him as he was her. Size wasn’t everything and Neela was a capable warrior, certainly more adept at the technical side of fighting than some of the pack’s warriors if her sparring with Enzo was any judge.

This was her life now, her family. No matter how much she didn’t deserve it, she would die before she allowed somebody to take it from her.

There was a moment when even Neela’s thoughts were quiet and then the relaxed, muscles she hadn’t even realised were tense loosened. In the morning she would leave the springs, take the walk back to the fort and present herself before Jazper. For now, she would float and think.

Word Count :: +1003