The Tale of Mr. Buttons, or should I say..."tail?"
“Rimo, slow DOWN you bumbling liverwort. We’ve been on the move nearly a week.
Azure surely isn’t going anywhere” the half-elf grumbled as he trudged through the decaying underbrush, made cumbersome by the shoddily made prosthetic attached at his left knee. Rimo shot him a look of annoyance as they marched on, mental wounds of betrayal still fresh in their minds.
The pair had been cast out, exiled from their guild. The Fervent Willow had come to the decision that the pair was “too soft” to travel among their ranks. Not that they were incompetent, Rimo and Aryas had a penchant for breaking and entering. If a building existed, they would find a way inside. This was their challenge, what they lived for. However, the guild had recently become more violent once the reigns of leadership were handed to Tarfire, a Drow with a point to prove. Tarfire had not taken kindly to the halflings’ release of innocent prisoners.
The Fervent Willow held an impressive permanent camp, arguably as large as a small city. The camp was hidden deep in the wood across the bay southwest of Azure, the city where the friends had been raised since birth. Aryas grumbled and continued down the crudely made path, staring at his feet until he felt Rimo’s hand on his chest, stopping him in his tracks. He held a finger to his lips. Aryas looked ahead, he didn’t know what to make of the scene. It looked as if a finger of God had swept down from above and blasted the earth with a perfect ring of fire, remnants of trees still smoldering.
Walking the perimeter of ring, the two half-elves gleaned little as to what happened here. Figuring it best to leave this place, they began to carry on with their journey until they heard a faint cry. “What the bloody hell was that?” whispered Aryas. They looked at each other, just as they heard it again, slightly louder this time. “Was that a meow?” asked Rimo. Confused but ever curious, they tiptoed towards the direction from which this strange cry came. Again, they heard the sound closer now, accompanied by a shuffle of brush.
As they stepped closer, the sound appeared to come from right in front of them, yet they saw nothing. Rimo kneeled, he was sure the sound came from right here, next to a tree right outside the charred patch of land. As he reached down to the forest floor, his hand felt something soft. It moved, he felt, but his hand rested in thin air. “Holy shit” he swore, and looked to Aryas, equally shaken. Whatever lay there, invisible, felt like fabric. He pinched a corner and pulled. As he pulled, a tiny head with pointed ears emerged.
“
Is that a fucking cat?” Aryas spoke quizzically. The creature let out a soft cry as it tried to grasp at the invisible cloth it had been wrapped in. “I’ve read of these but have never seen one myself,” remarked Rimo. “This must be a Tabaxi.” “Well, what do we do?” asked Aryas. The creature could have been no more than a weeks old, a month at most.
“Well, I don’t think it could have done this,” Rimo said, gesturing to his burnt surroundings. “This might be the cutest thing I’ve ever seen, more so than your own mother.” Aryas slapped him in the back of the head. As Rimo lifted the babe up, Aryas picked up the cloak. “This thing’s got to be worth more than I’ve made in a lifetime, you know that Rimo?” Still infatuated with the tiny Tabaxi, Rimo noticed something glint in its hand. He slid it out with minor protest. The babe held a large silver button, emblazoned with what looked to be the head of dragon, with two crossed arrows above its head.
“I’ll call you Buttons.” said Rimo as he nuzzled the little fluff ball. Aryas let out a sigh, rolling his eyes. The pair set off once again for Azure, along with their newfound companion.
Thirteen Years Later
A young Buttons awakes in his bed, ready for another day of training. He could hear the sizzle of bacon awaiting him. He walked into the kitchen, and was promptly greeted by Rimo. “Morning kid, eat up. We have a long day ahead of us.” Buttons obliged happily, quickly emptying his plate. From the moment he had learned to speak, Rimo and Aryas taught Buttons everything they knew. They would make sure that, no matter what, he would survive. Not only did they teach him to fight, but to be swift while doing it. He learned to pick any lock, no matter how complicated. Above all, they taught him goodness. The world was a dark place, but he would carry on their light.
Of course, Buttons discovered early that he wasn’t like the others of this city, for he was surely was not human, halfling, half-elf or any of the other races that have traveled through. The friendly people of Azure however treated him as their own. Rimo and Aryas remained best of friends, while Aryas had met a woman and had two sons of his own. They were as close to brothers as they could be to young Buttons, the boys Heliod and Elric.
Just as Rimo and Buttons were to head out for a day of training, Aryas burst through the door. “Rimo! We must speak, come with me!” Something had happened, Rimo looked at Buttons, told him to wait for him and set off with Aryas out the door. Buttons sat at the table, running over scenarios in his head. “What could possibly be going on?” he wondered allowed, nervously scratching his nails against the table.
An hour or so later, the men returned. They sat down at the table, on either side of the young Tabaxi. Rimo looked quite distraught, quickly noticing the fresh scratches on their wooden table. “WHAT did I TELL you about that?! No matter. Buttons, my boy, we have matters to discuss.” Buttons didn’t know what to think, “Rimo, what is going on?” Before Rimo could speak, Aryas grabbed Buttons’ hand. “Do you ever wonder where you came from, Buttons?” “Of course, how could I not?” “Well, last night I met a powerful Mage, traveling through the city. We spoke for some time. He knows of a place where Tabaxi such as yourself have lived for millennia.”
Buttons sat there for a moment, stunned. He didn’t know what to think, he had never laid eyes on another of his kind before. Neither had the men who had raised them as his own. “It’s been some time since we’ve had an adventure, Buttons.” The Tabaxi looked him dead in the eyes. “When do we leave?”
Provided with a map with a crudely drawn route by the mage, the trio set off for a great fortress that the Mage had called “
Kittsadora .” He had told them that this fortress was set on top of a great mountain on the coast, nestled between the cities of Aeturnum and Precipice. There was only one way to reach this place, and this was through the mountain itself. The mage had given Aryas a box which contained a small obsidian key, etched with runes. The only other instructions provided were to find the waterfall.
SPEED TRAVEL
Seven days had passed since the two half-elves and the young Tabaxi had set off, they finally had reached what appeared to be the base of the mountain. On the East, ocean facing side of the mountain, they saw what appeared to be a small waterfall glinting in the sunlight. Setting off, Buttons was enduring a rush of emotions “What will they think of me?” he wondered. “What will I think of them?”
After a long dangerous trek, the trio had reached the waterfall. “You do the honors, cat.” Aryas handed Buttons the strange key. With his feline grace, he leapt up the rock face, and disappeared behind the beautiful waterfall. For a moment, all was silent. Aryas and Rimo looked to each other, worry plainly on their faces. A minute passed. “What are you waiting for, I’ve found the entrance!” they heard Buttons yell.
Once his caretakers made it up the rock face, Buttons plunged the key into a small, barely noticeable notch in the rock, surrounded by runes similar to the ones etched on the obsidian key. Rock ground against rock, slowly sliding to reveal an opening to the greatest spiral staircase the men had ever laid eyes on. The mountain was semi hollowed out, a circular chamber opened out through the entire mountain roughly 300 – 400 feet in diameter. A polished stone staircase rose from the floor to the ceiling.
Before they could take a single step, everything went black.
The three woke up on a cold floor, the walls were barred. Standing on the other side of the bars, sat a Tabaxi. Cross legged in a chair, puffing a long ornamental pipe. “So travelers, what brings you to Kittsadora?” the Tabaxi spoke in heavily accented common. “Please don’t mind the necessary precautions. We haven’t had any unannounced visitors in almost 50 years. I am Silent Plume.” The half elves immediately spoke of their journeys purpose, as Buttons sat silently staring at the first of his kind he had ever had the pleasure of meeting.
After recounting their story of finding young Buttons in the woods, Aryas handed Silent Plume the button he had been found with. Silent Plume’s pipe slides from his mouth to the floor, as he goes still. “What is it?” asked Aryas and Rimo simultaneously. Silent Plume looks up, “Nothing, I’ve yet to see a mark like this.” They could tell something was wrong, but did not press him on it.
Baring Fangs
Buttons spent the next decade studying under the tutelage of Silent Plume and Kittsadora's monestary. though Aryas and and Rimo were bid to return home to Azure shortly after their arrival. Button's early days of training in thievery and stealth-based combat proved a boon in learning the martial arts of Kittsadora, and in very little time he became something of a prodigy. And yet, the young cat grew bored; he missed the days of his roguish adventures with his dads.
Twelve years after his arrival in Kittsadora, he finally got his chance at a new adventure. The Dragon's Fangs, a revolutionary group fighting to depose King Snowthorne of
Crucible, had come to Kittsadora seeking shelter and aid, as well as to bring news of a dire conspiracy their spies had unearthed: Snowthorne wished to seize the mountain fortress for himself. Buttons leapt towards the call to action and departed with the Dragon's Fangs to defend his fellow tabaxi. Along the way, he became friends with the Fang's leader, Dorian Havik and quickly climbed the ranks of the freedom fighters.
He would fight alongside them for three years until the fateful day where he and a small detachment of Fangs cross the path of a wandering adventuring party travelling to
Crucible to bring news of an undead army marching across Horizon. Buttons joined them to act as a guide and remained as a steadfast companion for many a world-changing battle.
He remained with this group until the conclusion of
The Extinction War. Once the dust of the Collision had settled, Buttons returned to his ancestral home of Kittsadora and led the reunited clains of the Silent Mountain and Roaring Peaks into a new age of harmony. Under his guidance, Kittsadora was a great boon to the recovery of Horizon in the years that followed. He spent the remainder of his days with the family he sired with his fellow tabaxi, Mist of Morning. He also oversaw the reering and training of the orphaned black dragon Naarmundus, who proved to be an interesting case study in the duality of nature vs nurture.
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