14849/Themyscira: Hunting a Different Unicorn

Themyscira: Hunting a Different Unicorn
Date of Scene:	05 May 2023
Location:	Enchanted Forest
Synopsis:	Caitlin and Donna slay a mythical unicorn known as a kartozonos.
Cast of Characters:	Donna Troy, Caitlin Fairchild

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Donna Troy has posed:
    Of all the supposedly mythical beasts that can be found in the Enchanted Forest on Themyscira, amongst the most rare and unpredictable are the /monokeroi/, the one-horns. The rangers of the enchanted forest are clear: it's a category, not a single species. The unwary, accustomed to notions of unicorns in the world outside Themyscira might think of sparkly-white horned ponies who fart rainbows, but on Themyscira they think rather differently.

    It's not that it's impossible to find a pretty and good natured monokeros, it's just that they are rare. It is speculated that the creatures that inhabit the Enchanted Forest come from more than one world, so perhaps there are worlds in which unicorns are generally creatures of mild temperaments. When reports come in of a single-horned horse like creature in Themyscira though, it is treated with extreme caution. An effort is made to determine what type of unicorn the creature is, and if it's one of the feared /kartazonos/, destroy it.

    This is a mission for Troia and Aikaterine!

    Their own horses, perfectly mundane if exceptional creatures, have been left tied to a post not too deep in the woods. The deep forest isn't a place for riding. The pair have been following a map provided by the rangers to the spot the sighting had been made -- a location not /too/ deep in the woods, so there's a fair chance the map will be reasonably accurate. Mapping the deeper woods is hard, because the deeper woods seem to change every time they are visited. A few miles from where they had left the horses, and a couple more to the place they were heading, Troia raises a hand and drops to a crouch to study the ground, where something has trampled the grass.

    "It's fresh," she tells Caitlin. "Less than a day. But the prints aren't clear. Something large. Could be our creature." She stands, studying the ground out to the side, where a trail of broken undergrowth can be made out for a few dozen feet or so. She looks thoughtful for a few moments, then turns back to Caitlin.

    "It could be virtually anything else, though. I suggest we detour for a half-mile or so to see if the ground gets soft enough ahead to show a proper print, then come back and continue as we were going if it does not. Agreed?"

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
While Donna examines the grass, Caitlin looks around the narrow trail they're following. It's not a proper game trail; no lines from shelter to water. But it follows a natural levelling grade in the land and there's plenty of mute evidence that their quarry isn't the only critter in the Forest.

Much like Donna, Caitlin's donned in lightweight leather armor over a tunic. The skirt's pteruges move loosely over her bare legs. Her soft-soled leather hunter boots come up to her midcalf and tie off with an elabourate criss-cross laddering.

"Got some fur here," she calls over to Donna, and plucks the patch from the end of a broken stick. She examines it critically and sniffs it a few times, then grumbles and tosses it aside.

"Nevermind. Deer," she says. The red head re-settles the satchel on her back and makes sure her bow and hunting spear are readily accessible. She moves along, looking for the next bit of evidence. It doesn't take her long to find it, and a tuft of short black hair is recovered from a thornbush. "Hey, I think I got it," Caitlin tells Donna, and takes a sniff. The redhead immediately winces and holds it away from her face. "Golly. I'm glad I took my Zyrtec today," she tells Donna. "That thing has quite the odor to it. I can scent-track it pretty easily if we get into rocky terrain."

Donna Troy has posed:
    Troia takes the tuft of black fur from Caitlin and gives it a smell herself. "Smells of boar," she says, her voice dropping down to a near whisper. "Could be the tail fur from a kartazonos, but it's a bit short. Definitely worth following a bit though."

    She unslings her bow, and takes three arrows in her off-hand. She nods her head to Caitlin and grins a little. "You're getting good at this. Take the rear, ten paces behind, and go quiet. They're crafty. Sometimes they circle a hunting party and attack the rear from one side, so ears open and hiss if you hear anything moving. Either of us hisses, we both stop very still and listen, okay?"

    Troia starts advancing cautiously, stepping in a crouch with feet tilted to minimize the impact of each step, careful not to snap any twigs underfoot. She rests her off-hand on the string of her bow, but does not knock an arrow or pull the string back yet.

    After a hundred feet or so, there's a sound -- but it's from above, not the vegetation around. A bird takes flight from the pair of Amazons, wings crashing through upper branches as it flies into the air. Troia stops and straightens. "Can't be a kartazonos too close," she says. "Birds don't hang around."

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin dutifully falls into place behind Donna's path, and focuses her attention on the forest behind her. Her instincts are pretty good-- thanks to a lot of studying with the Amazons-- but her sense of hearing is exceptionally sharp. And, like Donna, Caitlin moves with a cautious pace through the soft old loam. No twigs, no rocks to stumble on. Clumsy as she can be at times, hunting is one of those tasks where her intense focus wins out over her terrible sense of proprioception.

It only takes her a moment or two to attach her spearhead to the stave that accompanies it. It's a good boar blade, with a long taper and broad, spike-tipped flanges to keep a creature from running itself through on the weapon.

When Donna stops, Caitlin stops, keeping her back to Donna's and drifting a few yards closer. "Sheesh. Worse than kartazonos?" she mutter over her shoulder. "I thought you said there wasn't anything that nasty out except for the unicorn."

Just to be safe, Caitlin looks skywards, too. After all, there are plenty of flying predators in the Forest-- and other dangers like tree snakes and falling spiders, to boot.

Donna Troy has posed:
    Troia grins back at Caitlin. "The Kartazonos is a unicorn /of sorts/," she says. "You'll see. They're nasty. Nobody's going to call one 'Sparklemane' or something though. Cross between a rhino and a horse, with a horn about three feet long and a short bristly tail. And quills." "

    "The only good thing about it being a kartazonos, if it is, is that they're distinctive. Some of the other kinds of monokeros are... well, unpredictable. They can look exactly what you think a unicorn should look like, and if you see something like that you don't know if it's something harmless or something ten times as dangerous as a kartazonos. Meeting one of those... well it's like running into a manticore. They're fierce, violent, prone to attacking... but they're basically just animal drives. Other types of unicorn..." she pauses a few moments, thinking of the words, and gives a shrug. She continues forwards, a little more relaxed now.

    "Some people say that the difference between humans and animals is that animals act only according to their nature, humans can choose to be good or evil," Troia says as the pair continue through the forest. "I don't really buy that. But unicorns... well, more often than not, you'd probably want to say they were evil."

    The pair continues on another eighty feet or so before Troia raises her hand and hisses. She herself stops stock still, listening. There are few sounds in the forest apart from the faint sound of a gently breeze through the branches above. Somewhere in the distance something small chatters to itself, and the whine of flying insects can sometimes be heard. After a few moments, Troia gestures Caitlin forwards, points to the ground at her feet, and holds a finger to her lips.

    In the dirt at her feet, a roughly Pac-man shaped footprint can just about be made out in the soft ground. A cloven hoof. "Not a kartazonos," Donna whispers. "Hippine though. Uh.. equine."

    She points forwards. "Clearing ahead, three hundred feet. I go left, you go right. Approach from the sides and keep hidden." She points to the sides of the path to indicate where each of them should go to approach the clearing.

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin stoops and examines the track for herself. She brushes careful fingertips over the dirt to see how densely compacted it is. "Half inch deep. This thing is heavy," Caitlin murmurs to Donna. "And from the shape of the print I think it's pretty good-sized."

The redhead unlimber her bow and tests the string with a fingertip. Finding it satisfactory, she nods once at Donna and walks around her and into the vegetation. She can be seen for a few moments by the sunlight glinting in red hair before she vanishes completely.

It doesn't take her long to make her way to Donna's ambush site. She gets herself set up with a good view of the clearing, well-sheltered by the tree backdrop behind her and out of any patchy sunlight. Three arrows are pressed into the earth near her feet for quick access if she needs follow-up shots from her longbow. The weapon was designed to make use of Caitlin's prodigious strength, and could throw even very heavy arrows a significant distance-- or at near-supersonic speeds. A shot across the whole of the clearing wasn't even out of the realm of possibility.

Donna Troy has posed:
    At first it looks like there's nothing in the clearing. It's quiet, though there's a faint animal smell in the air. There's no movement visible until light glints in Caitlin's eye -- Troia flashing sunlight from an arrow head to attract her attention. She makes a rapid flicker of hand gestures across the clearing -- the symbol for 'safe' followed by symbols for 'animals', three fingers, then the symbol for 'go quietly'. She points towards a hillock at the far side of the clearing, makes an over-the-top gesture, then points to two spots further along the edge of the clearing, one on Caitlin's side and one on her own. Then she vanishes back into the undergrowth.

    Whether or not Caitlin understood all of that, the final part, that Caitlin should move around the clearing to the next position, is obvious enough. When she does so, it's clear enough why. Lying on the ground in a huddle behind the shelter of then hillock are three... horses? There are no horns visible, at least.

    Two of the creatures are white. One, the largest, is black. The three seem alert, ears twitching and heads moving as they look around. The black-furred one flares its nostrils and snorts slightly. The other two look around as if the sound were some kind of alarm, and then Caitlin sees something that at first doesn't make sense to her, a movement around the back of one of the white horses. It takes a moment to realize the creature is ruffling a pair of /wings/. Somehow the wings had not been noticeable at first, yet now as Caitlin looks closer she can see all three have huge sets of wings folded on their backs.

    Caitlin's T-Com vibrates softly, the signal for a message. Troia has sent 'Not our quarry. Step out slowly let them see you but do not get close.'

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin signs back acknowledgement of Donna's signal. Granted, it would be impractical to ask *why*, but such is the trust she has in Donna that the redhead doesn't question her reasoning. Instead she shakes her arrows free and replaces them in the quiver. She keeps her head low and breaks into a low woodman's shuffle, loose-kneed and deceptively quick. It's not until she's confident she's outside the line of sight that she actually allows herself to walk upright again.

Once she comes around, Caitlin's eyes widen. "Pegasus!" she exhales in a near-whisper. Afflicted with a sudden elation, she bites back her urge to rush towards the animals. Instead she makes the approach that Donna suggested, moving slowly and cautiously into the peripheral line of sight of the larger black one. With her weapons stowed and palms showing in genuine peaceful intention, the redhead is clearly presenting herself as a non-threat (and giving the horses a chance to respond to her from a safe distance, rather than surprising them up close).

She does touch a finger to her ear, activating the T-com's microphone. "I don't think I've ever seen these in the wild," she sends to Donna's position, her words nearly inaudible to the critters. "Do we have any snacks they like? I think I left my apples with the horses."

Donna Troy has posed:
    "Got any soft candy on you?" Troia replies over the T-Com. The three pegasodes get to their feet, startled, but when they see that Caitlin is not acting threatening they stand cautiously, moving from foot to foot, but not bolting. They watch her warily, flaring their nostrils in her direction.

    Troia shakes the bushes by her, and the ears of all three flick back in her direction. All three glance that way, but the two white pegasodes turn back to Caitlin while the black keeps watch. Troia steps slowly out into the clearing too, like Caitlin her bow slung and her hands empty and visible.

    "They are very nervous," she calls out in a calm and steady voice to Caitlin, though her eyes remain fixed on the black. "You don't normally see them in the forest. They live on the mountain and sometimes go to a little way in, but never this deep. They're tired, I think they've been running from something. Maybe too tired to fly, even though they found a clearing they could take off from.

    The black nickers at Troia, and she tilts her head. "Kallisti?" she says. "Is that you?" The creature paws the ground. One of the whites gives a whinny.

    Troia catches Caitlin's eye. "We can approach. But /slowly/. They're friendly, but scared."

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin moves in very carefully. It's a relief that Donna can identify at least one of the critters by name. It surely knows her scent, and Caitlin's togged out much like the other Amazons in her leathers and hunting goods. The same scent pattern should carry easily.

The redhead also unlimbers a secret weapon-- her emergency chocolate protein bar. It's unwrapped carefully and she tucks the wrapper into a convenient belt pouch so as to not litter. A piece is broken off and held on the flat of her hand. Caitlin knows horses pretty well at this point, and meets up with Donna near the trio.

Once they're settled enough, Caitlin takes a few moments to look them over for injury. "I see a little blood but nothing major," she tells Donna. "I think the little one has a hurt on its wing. I've got some of the salve with me, I'll see if I can help him out."

She entreats the smallest pegasus with her chocolate bar, letting him decide when he's ready to snarfle it up out of her palm. Caitlin makes soothing noises and starts examining the pegasus with careful fingertips, communicating a helpful intent to the animal. "Do you think the, uh, you-know-what ran them out here?"

Donna Troy has posed:
    The offer of chocolate seems to be a persuasive one, and soon Caitlin has both the white ones enjoying the proffered snack and whinnying with pleasure. On closer inspection it's clear that they're quite young. None of the injuries either has are much more than scratches, the wound on the wing being much the worse. The rest may just be scratches from running through dense undergrowth.

    The black one is larger, a full adult. Perhaps looking out for the two young ones. It glances back at Caitlin and the two white ones from time to time, but seems reasonably comfortable with her. It seems more set on making the same short nickering sounds at Troia. Unlike Caitlin, Troia does not approach, but stands still, reaching a hand out towards it. "They shouldn't be this deep in the forest," Troia replies to Caitlin. "So very likely, yeah. Probably found them exploring at the edge of the forest and chased them. Hard for them to take off with all the trees, which is why you don't see them far into the woods. They'll have come to the clearing to try to take off, but young ones have trouble flying. They're probably too tired and needed a rest first."

    The black pegasos nickers again, and Troia calls out <<Kallisti! Come to me!>> in Themysciran. The pegasos nickers again louder. Neither Troia nor the pegasos move.

    There seems to be a test of wills going on.

    <<Kallisti, come,>> Donna repeats calmly. Winged horse and Amazon stare at each other a few moments longer, before the black pegasos lowers its head a little, almost as if nodding, and trots forwards to snuffle at Troia's hand and then rest its head against her shoulder.

    Troia looks over at Caitlin with an expression of unalloyed glee as she strokes the pegasos' nose. "I haven't seen her in years," she says. "I wasn't sure she'd remember me."

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin looks up at Donna and grins brightly at her friend's exultation. "And you're so forgettable!" she says with a cheeky wonderment for the situation. "This is why we always pamper pets, they'll come back and love on us later."

*whumpf* Caitlin promptly gets a faceful of feathers from the other young pegasus, who is feeling frolicsom after a little sugar rush from Caitlin's treat.

"Ech! Ptah!" Caitlin sputters to get the down out of her mouth and grimaces. "Thanks," she tells the little one. The redhead digs into her little hip satchel; it doesn't contain much, but there is some tincture that is a powerful pain remedy. Caitlin very carefully daubs a few drops of it against a leaf and rolls it around before applying it with her palm to the wound site. The little one nickers and protests, but quickly calms once he realizes the pain is diminishing quickly.

"...nine, ten." Caitlin removes the improvised bandage and pastes a clean leaf on in its place. Much like her wrapper, it's carefully tucked away for safe disposal later.

"Can you find out what direction they came from?"

Donna Troy has posed:
    Troia sticks her tongue out at Caitlin. She must be in a good mood. "I haven't seen her since before I went to America," she says. "Well, once. In the distance. When I was a kid growing up here, I'd climb the mountain to watch them sometimes and when I saw her... well. They tend to be white, she stood out. She's so beautiful, so I named her 'Kallisti'. And I tried to befriend her." She grins a little sheepishly. "I hoped she'd let me ride her one day. Maybe."

    Troia watches Caitlin's ministrations with approval as she continues. "They're not pets," she says. "And they're a lot smarter than horses. Which isn't hard, to be fair. And I was sixteen or so last time she saw me. I've changed more than she has in that time. "

    She glances back the way they'd come. "Not sure. I wonder if it was their trail we were following," she says. "Except that tuft you found... if that's from the kartozonos, then it should have got here ahead..."

    Troia stiffens, pets Kallisti twice on the nose and steps away from the pegasos, uncoiling her lasso. "Cait," she hisses. "It may be watching us."

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
A lot of people would react by alerting and jumping to their feet. Caitlin instead goes quite still, eyes flickering to follow Donna's movements without moving her head. She sniffs the air two or three times, cautiously. "It's upwind of us," she tells Donna. Which only narrows it down to a fairly broad arc of terrain. Caitlin's bow is on her back, but her spear is at hand and she curls her fingers around it without raising the glittering blade up, lest it catch the sunlight.

"We can't leave the pegasus here. The little ones won't make it out alive." She pauses, thinking. "It might not be willing to attack us all packed up tight like this."

Donna Troy has posed:
    "Or waiting for a good opportunity to charge," Troia replies, scanning the treeline. "They'll try to circle around behind their prey and charge to impale. And those horns are very strong and very sharp."

    Kallisti's nostrils flare, and she raises her head to catch the breeze. The two young ones seem to have picked up on the what's going on between the two Titans and the older pegasos, and huddle together nervously.

    Troia looks torn, unsure what to do. Kallisti nudges her with her nose. "I think we need to draw it out, Cait," Troia says with a frown. "We can't lead them out while being stalked, too much chance of it being able to get close and pick one off. Stay close to the young ones, keep your T-com open, and watch what Kallisti does. If she scents it coming, she'll stand between it and the young ones. If she runs, the young ones will run with her. Stay with them. I'm going to head up and see if I can see where it is from above, but it's hard to see anything through the canopy. If you see anything here, any movement in the trees, anything at all... yell. Okay?"

    She gives Kallisti's ears a quick rub and rockets upwards into the clear air above the clearing and then beyond. In a moment she's lost to sight past the trees. <<Not seeing anything yet...>> Donna says over the comm.

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin unlimbers her warbow again and tests the string tension with an absent fingertip. It's plucked with a beautifully clear tone that makes a single vibrating note, the steel and wood of the composite bow resonating pleasantly with it.

"Stay with me, guys," she whispers encouragingly to the pegasus. The little ones nicker fearfully and brush against her knees. With her feet planted like an oak, Caitlin stops looking like a hunter and starts looking like an unmoveable presence in the clearing. She pulls a heavy arrow from her quiver and sets it against the bowstring, holding the weapon at a casual half-draw with the fletching near her right shoulder.

Silence-- then rustling. Bushes shake. And then with no more cue than that, the kartozonos charges from the treeline!

The redhead gives it no more than two strides before that bow is at full draw. Muscles knot behind her brawny shoulder and she aims the broadhead arrow for the clavicular gap.

THRUMMM. The arrow is gone, fast enough to threaten a crack in the air. Almost before it hits she has another arrow set and looses a second, slightly sloppier shot at the monster while it closes in.

Donna Troy has posed:
    The unicorn is a monster. Easily a foot taller than Kallisti at the shoulder and much broader, with far thicker legs and a body that ripples with strength. A short and patchy brick-red coat of fur and a thick, elephant-like hide does little to disguise a musculature that would impress on a bull. A quill-like mane rises up from its neck and runs down the back all the way to a short, bristling tail. Hooves curve forwards in a cruel scythe-like shape, like huge talons. Its lips pull back revealing sharp, spittle-flecked teeth, more lion-like than horse-like and large yellow eyes roll with insane fury. Atop its head, the near four-foot long horn is twisted and ridged and ends in a sharp point.

    The two young pegasodes scream, an almost human-like sound, and try to scatter away in a tangle of long legs as Caitlin meets the charge with two arrows. The first thuds into the beast, embedding itself deep into the hide, but the creature isn't slowed. The second cuts a gouge in it's flank, leaving a trace of blood, but the arrow does not stay in.

    The beast lowers its head as it closes on Caitlin, the long horn aimed straight at her chest, and it's on her...

    ...But just before the horn can hit its mark, the golden glow of Troia's lasso hurtles down and catches it. Hovering above, Troia hauls hard to the side, pulling the creatures head around.

    There's a flash of black, and Kallisti enters the fray, rearing up to strike down on the back of the kartozons with her front hooves.

    "Get close!" Troia calls down to Caitlin. "Grab its neck and pull it down! Don't let it bite you!"

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin doesn't hesitate for a second. She dives in, taking a striking hoof to the shoulder and writing it off as the cost of doing business. It hits hard enough it might leave a bruise in even her redoutable flesh.

The opening is seized and she wraps her arms around the unicorn's neck. There's some scrabbling and rodeo clown work that ultimately ends up with Caitlin on the creature's back. The redhead clamps her legs down around the stallion's neck and starts applying bone-breaking pressure by forcing her knees together.

"You're up!" Caitlin shouts at Donna, and grabs the lasso, forcing the unicorn's head back and around at a painful angle.

Donna Troy has posed:
    The creature is huge, powerful, and fast. There's no doubt that even for someone like Caitlin, that horn could do real damage at full charge. With its charge slowed and Caitlin up close though, the story soon turns. It's huge and heavy, several tons of animal with very dense muscles, but it simply can't compete with the power Caitlin can bring to bear at close quarters.

     It starts bellowing, a horrible booming roar that shakes the trees. It bucks, trying to throw Caitlin off, but her legs are clamped too tightly on its neck. When she pulls its head around it struggles to bend its neck back, teeth snapping, but Caitlin's grip is too strong for it to break. All the time, Kallisti keeps crashing down on its hindquarters with her powerful hooves, and Caitlin can feel it struggling to stay on its feet. The rage in its eyes changes to panic and it redoubles its efforts to shake Caitlin loose, but she's too strong. The unicorn bucks its front legs in the air to try to throw Caitlin, but with its head pulled around to the side it's uncoordinated, and its front feet slip as it crashes back to the ground.

    Caitlin feels the other end of the lasso come loose, dropping down over her shoulder, and then Troia drops down to the ground in front of the beast where Caitlin has it pinned. Troia swing a fist, punching the beast in the side of the head with an almighty crack. It's forelegs shake and tThe creature stumbles a little, then quite suddenly its rear legs give way under the relentless attacks from Kallisti. Troia punches again, and it falls. Caitlin rides the unconscious beast to the ground.

    Troia holds a hand out to Caitlin to help her up. "Are you okay?" she asks with obvious concern. "Did it get you? I'm so sorry Cait. It must have been hiding right in the treeline. I went past it without seeing it."

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Rodeo: successful. Caitlin is flat on her back, staring at the sky overhead. "Owww," she wheezes. She seems pretty content to lay there until Donna offers a hand up, which Caitlin accepts and rises smoothly to her feet. "Gonna have a few bruises, but I don't think I'm bleeding," she reassures Donna. And just to be safe, she checks Donna too, to make sure in the adrenaline of the moment that the princess didn't overlook a serious injury of some kind.

"It's sneaky. I didn't even hear it coming until it started to charge," she reassures Donna. The redhead looks down at the unconscious equine, and shifts her feet uneasily. "... I feel a little nauseated at the idea of killing this," she admits. "I know it's a danger to the forest. But we probably don't want it waking up with a grudge, either," she admits. The redhead starts looking around for her dropped spear. "Or is there some isolated place we can release it safely?"

Donna Troy has posed:
    Caitlin isn't the only one checking for wounds. Fierce as she had been moments before, as soon as the kartozonos is down, Kallisti snuffles around Caitlin and Donna as if checking they're both alright. The two young ones start moving cautiously closer until Kallisti neighs them back, and they stand at a distance watching on, still nervous.

    Troia is untouched -- clearly Caitlin took the brunt of the attack, but she too has come away with nothing more than bruises. Now the beast is out cold and there's time to look closer, that horn looks like it could have done some real damage. It glints with an almost metallic sheen. Troia has mentioned to Caitlin before that unicorn horn is considered a valuable material by the Amazons, that blades made from it never lose their edge. There's probably some natural enchantment to it.

    "The moon?" Troia suggests. "It wouldn't be able to cause much damage up there." She frowns a little. "Sorry Cait. It's got to be done."

    Kallisti takes a gentle hold of Troia's sleeve with her teeth, and tugs. She wants them all to leave, obviously. Troia pats her nose absent mindedly.

    "You go on," Troia says after a few moments. "Lead them out and I'll catch you up in a minute."

    Some things just are too dangerous to the forest and its other inhabitants.

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Cait's expression is a little mournful, but she nods once at Donna in appreciation. It's a necessary task, no matter how distasteful it might be. At the end of the day, Caitlin is an Amazon, and she knows what fates can befall people who leave themselves vulnerable.

And she offers her spearhead to Donna. Because Donna's doing the task, but Caitlin isn't going to pretend she is absolved of it either.

"C'mon guys," she tells the pegasus, and beckons them along with clicks of her tongue and some gesturing. Once she gets them going, Caitlin looks back at Donna once, nods, and walks them over to the otherside of the clearing without looking back once.