The Littlest Show (Jokor & Keres)

[Verduth]

40th Day, Fall 510 A.V. Verduth surveyed the street with his hands on his hips. It was a good street with plenty of people about and in an area he hadn't tried before so his act would be quite new to any audience. He made a satisfied face. All he needed now was to find a raised surface so that he was easier to see and they would be in business. It was all so exciting! The pycon strolled casually down the street, humming happily to himself while keeping an eye out for a good location. Occasionally, he'd offer a bow and a 'how do you do?' to a passerby, most of which ignored him but he wouldn't let that get him down. The thought crossed his mind that in the future, he might as Keres to carry a crate for him to stand on, but for now he was sure that he'd spotted something similarly appropriate. He began to dig around in his little bag and soon produced his trusty hook. Well, perhaps not so trusty considering he'd only succeeded a couple of times since he'd gotten the idea, but practice was all that he needed. The little clay man approached a set of barrels that someone had left at the corner of an alley, swinging his hook around his head. He loosed it and watched it sailed through the air to the top of the barrel. He let his chest swell with pride as he pulled and it caught on the lip of the barrel. In only a couple of minutes he had managed to climb his way to the top of the barrel with the hook and line giving him some greatly needed assistance. He dusted both himself and the barrel off before turning to survey the passer-bys. His little chest expanded as he prepared himself to loose a loud voice. “Ladies and gentlemen, please! Your attention! For I shall please your attention if you stop for but a moment! I am here to provide you with a few moments of delight and fancy! For tales will be told and verses will be sung and all for not but a copper if you wish to be so generous!” As Verduth spoke, he saw Keres walk up and pause to listen as if curious, just as they had agreed. Just as Verduth had predicted, with the attention of one came the attention of others and one by one a crowd slowly began to grow. “Allow me to introduce myself!” Verduth graced the crowd with a sweeping bow, “I am Verduth, the littlest ringmaster and my greatest pleasure is to fulfill your fancy. So please step right up, for the show is about to begin!”

[Jokor]

Jokor smiled a bit when he saw a gathering crowd, Most of them interested in some guy that was yelling a bunch of unimportand things, Something about pleasure and fancy's, anyway it wasn't importand. There was a crowd and they where distracted, an easy prey for a thief like him.

Jokor made his way towards the crowd feigning interest in wathever was going on at the center of it,His small smile went to a fulblown grin when he saw a woman whose clothes where of a more expensive material then the other people. Even better she was completely distracted by wathever was going on at the center of it. Jokor carefully made his way towards the woman,making sure that he didn't step on any thoes in the process. He really didn't need any attention on him right now.
When he was practicly behind the woman he reached towards the womans purse in a fairly inconspicius manner, keeping a close eye on the people around him, Pickpockets rarely got away unscated if they got caught, if they got away at all.

[Keres]

Keres didn't like this arrangement much: it put him in the open in front of everyone, but he had admitted to himself that it would probably work. He had followed Verduth from a distance making sure to keep his cloak gathered around him so as to not draw any attention to himself. He watched in anticipation as Verduth climbed to the top of the barrel, and took in a deep breath when Verduth began to address the street. That was his cue.

He stood for a moment against a wall a little down and across the street after uncovering his head. After what seemed like it must be a few sentences, he approached trying to look like he was not following directions. After a short time of acting as if he were not only able to tell what Verduth was saying, but was actually also interested, a crowd had developed. Now was his cue to move to the edge of the gathering and simply watch for his other cues. When Verduth bowed he was supposed to clap, and at some point he was supposed to place a few copper coins on the barrel in front of Verduth, a task that Keres was still not comfortable with as he still hadn't found a way of obscuring the claws on his fingers.

He watched in anticipation, now not so much Verduth as the small crowd. He watched the way they moved and the way that they still did not look at one another, but only at Verduth who now looked overjoyed and spoke loudly and energetically.

[Verduth]

“And what a wonderful show I shall give you today. My good sirs and madams,” he lowered his voice into a dramatic fake whisper, a trick he'd heard his father use once. “Have you ever heard the tale of the good and gallant Sir Gantry who gallivants among the Cobalt Mountains?” He received a few shakes of the head and a low murmur from the crowd, sending a thrill of delight through him. They hadn't heard his favorite story! What excellence! The little clay man rubbed his hands together and cast his eyes across the crowd, hoping to judge their mood. There was a major advantage to being where he was, in front of the crowd, he could generally see what was going on quite well. A fact that he was learning to take advantage of. If the crowd wasn't enjoying whatever entertainment he had chosen for them, there was always an alternative, and watching them for little signs was a good way of preventing the disastrous results he'd experienced the first few times he'd tried to put on a show. Not that he was now managing to avoided disaster, but he was getting better at making his escape sooner. So as Verduth told one of his favorite stories about a silly knight who wandered the lands in search of giant creatures that didn't exist, he noticed a man doing the strangest thing, at least Verduth thought it was strange. After all, didn't people usually keep their hands in their own pockets? He wondered to himself at it, perhaps she had dropped something and he was returning it. The good man just didn't want to interrupt her from her rapt attention on the show! What a good Samaritan! Verduth paused for dramatic effect, gave the audience a sly smile and then shot his finger out in the direction of the man. “You there sir! With your hand on the lady's purse! What do you suppose our gallant hero did next?!”

[Jokor]

“You there sir! With your hand on the lady's purse! What do you suppose our gallant hero did next?!”

Jokor immediatly pulled his hand back from the womans purse, Cursing himself on getting caught, cold sweat begining to form on the back of his neck when he heard a few people begin to chuckle,No doubt that they where going to have some "fun" with him after this. Jokor tried to get away only to be stopped by one of the bigger bystanders. "Common kid, why don't you answer the pycon's question?" he pushed Jokor forward letting him land in front of the barrel the small clay man was standing on. The other people in the crowd giving shouts of approval.

Jokor stood back up trying to find a way out of this. But being completely surrounded by a crowd that was completely aware of what he was doing severly limited his escapepaths.
"Ey kid! Give the answer already! Or do you wan't me to become impatient!"
Jokor quickly decided to play allong with that guy. Maybe he could buy himself some time.

"Euhm, He burned the house?" He blurted out, cursing himself for not following the story."

[Keres]

Well this isn't good, Keres said to himself mentally. He had watched as Verduth changed tactic from simply telling a story to singling out an individual. The only problem was that the individual who he had chosen was now going to turn things rather ugly rather quickly.

Keres felt the inside of his cloak for where he had affixed the Tamo Daggers even though he knew very well that he had no idea how to use them. The basic principal didn't elude him though: push the sharp end into anything that might hurt you. He stiffened his body, ready to lunge forward to snatch Verduth off his stage and make a run for it, anything to keep from being part of what this might turn into.

Then the strangest thing happened. Well, perhaps it wasn't strange for humans, but a Zith would certainly not have simply tossed the man out and demanded that he answer a question. Or, at least, that's what it sounded like had just happened.

The man who had been singled out gave an answer and the crowed began to shift uneasily: energetically in fact. They began to speak amongst themselves, rather loudly. When the woman whose purse the man had his hand in stated something that sounded like she wasn't missing anything, the crowed shuffled even more, but this time the order seemed to be disturbed and those who spoke began to lower their voices and glance at Verduth, still standing high on his barrel.

Keres argued within himself, but quickly decided that any significant action by anyone would set the entire situation off, and he certainly didn't want any of them to notice how different he was from them. He clenched his fists to obscure the claws and reached out from under his cloak when he thought no one would notice and drew the hood back over his head. Best to hide his red hair and oddly colored eyes from the humans. He then began to move with the rhythm of the crowd's movements, inching his way nearer Verduth and the singled out man in front of him.

[Verduth]

Verduth was rather perplexed by the crowd's reaction to the man. Perhaps, they were jealous because they knew the answer when this kid obviously did not. This was when Verduth's crowd observational skills were best put to good use. He raised his hands with the palms towards the audience. “Now now, it's all part of the show, my good folks. Just a little something to get all of you feeling more involved.” He flashed them with his best grin. “And it worked didn't it?!” The crowd muttered and shuffled and looked between each other but though they continued to look displeased perhaps this was one of those times when he should just ignore it and go on with the show. “Now then, my good friends! Perhaps you're all tired of hearing this story! We all know that in the end the knight never finds his giant targets.” By the looks of a few, they hadn't known that, for which Verduth felt a little guilty in ending the story so abruptly, but now he had a volunteer! He gestured for Jokor to come closer, “Worry not! I have something even more entertaining for all of you. My assistant here will hold out his hands to allow me to stand on them and I shall proceed to show you a trick the likes of which you have never seen!” By assistant he seemed to be talking about Jokor.

[Jokor]

“Now now, it's all part of the show, my good folks. Just a little something to get all of you feeling more involved.”The pycon flashed his best grin towards the crowd.“And it worked didn't it?!”

Jokor was dumbstruck,here he was getting caught pickpocketing and the thing who called him out on it was now helping him out of this mess. What the heck was it thinking? Still from the sounds behind him not anybody bought wat it was saying and still wanted to give a beating or two to let him learn his lesson, or they where just bored and wanted to beat him for their ammusement that was also possible. The pycon began to motion him closer, a large grin on his face, for some strange reason it only made jokor more uncomfortable.

“Worry not! I have something even more entertaining for all of you. My assistant here will hold out his hands to allow me to stand on them and I shall proceed to show you a trick the likes of which you have never seen!”
The pycon said in an enthousiastic voice.
Jokor just held out his shaking hands towards the clay man, hoping that he didn't just do something he would regret later.

[Keres]

Keres was simply dumbfounded. Verduth had, with his strange way of seeming to not understand what was happening, accidentally and seemingly unknowingly provided a way for this pickpocket to live through the encounter.

Keres simply stood and stared out from under the hood of his cloak. He wanted to do something, but nothing felt right. His mind screamed at him and he tensed even more than before with the anticipation of what he was sure was about to happen in the pickpocket's hands, but his instincts held him firmly to remaining motionless.

He muttered silently to himself in frustration: the war between feeling and instinct that was raging inside him would have to be stoped, but this was not the time to deal with that.

[Verduth]

The Pycon stepped carefully onto the boy's hands, making sure the boy could handle the weight of him. He smiled up at him. “No worries ol' chap, this wont hurt a bit. Now if you'll just hold me up where everyone can see. Not too high now.” He waited until he was held up in the air and once again faced his audience. He'd never exactly done this trick while in someone's hands but surely it would work out fine. “Now then ladies and gentlemen, for the finest part of the show! If I could kindly ask you to remain silent.” He closed his eyes and a look of intense concentration covered his face. A moment passed before the pycon slowly began to get shorter, his legs melting away underneath him. The clay slowly dripped through the boy's fingers and formed icicles, or at least Verduth hoped they looked like icicles considering he'd never seen them before. His upper body remained intact and when he was finished he held up his hands and opened his eyes to look at the audience. “Tada!” He grinned at their open mouths, wishing he knew exactly what those strange looks on their faces meant, but they must just be astounded by his trick.