//------------------------------// // Chapter thirty five, Far North of Normal: Un-usual affection. // Story: Airship Mauled // by Darkonshadows //------------------------------// -Paprika, frozen highlands- Are we lost? I’m usually lost all the time and I can do pretty well by myself, but loves of eyes aren’t going to last long like this with food being limited. Wait… I think I know this area. Oh… maybe… help, shelter and supplies all in one! First, I stop to refresh rope, then sniff area to see if they are here. -Arizona- So here we were just riding through a somewhat thick snowfall, it was almost a blizzard and hard to see where we were going. “Arizona, something is up with this weather. It feels a bit… unnatural.” Really Velvet? I didn’t feel anything, then again I wasn’t one of the two magical savants of the group. Though it didn’t look like Paprika could feel whatever Velvet currently did. Paprika suddenly came to a stop and poked at the rope around her neck while looking to me, I guess I needed to shake it out again. Once Paprika pulled the rope off, I reeled it in and started to shake it until most of the frost fell off of it and then tossed it back around her neck. “Paprika doesn’t seem to notice a problem.” I commented idly and thinking of all this snow I added. “Hearth’s Warming this year is going to be quite bad for me.” “What makes you say that?” Our lovely companion Velvet, sitting next to me on the blanket on the intricately made lightweight ice sleigh, asked. “Also Paprika hardly notices when she hurts people by being too affectionate with them.” The sleigh wasn’t too hard for Paprika to pull and she started to do so again, this was much better than the hastily made sled. Also Paprika has been going for hours and didn’t even look to be flagging one bit. “Well I certainly won’t be celebrating with my Aunt Grace this year or any of our other friends and people we could consider family.” It may be a pony made holiday, but I still liked to think that it was for everyone and not just ponies. “I’ve never really celebrated Hearth’s Warming at all.” There were a few things wrong with that statement Velvet and not celebrating a good holiday was one of them. “I don’t know why, but we reindeer are always pretty weird about holidays with a commercialism focus to them.” “Hearth’s Warming doesn’t have a commercialism focus… well it didn’t start out that way anyway.” I had to admit that Hearth’s Warming was more about buying or making gifts to give to others, commercialism was kind of a given when you bought materials to make a gift or bought a gift premade. “Do you think we’ll get out of this blizzard soon?” As I asked my question, the world suddenly jerked to the left and our one alpaca sleigh started picking up speed. It wasn’t long before we saw what Paprika was pulling us towards and blinked, a cave? Well it would certainly get us out of this blizzard. In fact Paprika seemed rather excited about it… why wasn’t she slowing down? “Uh… Paprika?” I called out only to receive a warm smile from the alpaca for a few seconds and she pulled us into the cave. We were engulfed by the darkness for a bit and all we could hear was the sound of Paprika’s hoof beats as we continued onwards. She wasn’t stopping? We could have set up camp in the cave. “Why do you suppose she’s still going?” There was a slight quiver in Velvet’s voice. “Do you thinks she knows where we are and that’s why she seems excited about something?” Eventually we could see a light at the end of the tunnel Paprika was pulling us through and then Paprika’s form slowed down and fluffed up in front of us. She slowed us down and we stopped before the end of the tunnel. Paprika motioned for us to get off the sleigh and follow her, we did so and walked forward looking at each other uncomfortably. The first step we took out of the tunnel was onto green grass and a sunny grassy hill and we both stared at our surroundings in awe. This was a warm sunny place, and it was beautiful. Paprika bounded ahead and squealed, we looked at the alpaca she just nuzzled… alpaca… alpacas! There were so many of them around, all so colorful and…. oh for the love of, Paprika just jumped off of a cliff! We both ran forward with worry and saw a huge splash of water as our alpaca landed a powerful cannonball. Paprika popped out of the water tackling the closest alpaca and started to snuggle them and she was snuggled back and soon the alpacas started to gather together to welcome her. A bunch of adorable little cria surrounded Paprika and started climbing all over her. Soon she was playfully bounding through the grassy knoll with all the other friendly looking alpacas. I looked to Velvet and she looked like someone had shined a flashlight in her eyes. Velvet’s right eye twitched. -Alpaca Accretion, Velvet- So… we ended up in a place where Paprika’s entire family currently happens to be, I could feel the horror creeping up my spine at the thought. “Come on Velvet, stop looking so horrified.” Can’t there be a little time to panic about this Arizona, you do realize that all of these alpacas can possibly hug as strongly as Paprika could? “Let’s go greet the locals and maybe even meet Paprika’s parents!” Arizona hefted her pack and set off, I blinked and quickly caught up with the cow. Did she not realized we were surrounded by numerous alpacas?! One’s that were all now giving us curious looks. Some of them were even starting to follow us from a distance. If one were to ask if I was nervous, well they certainly weren’t currently paying attention to my shivering at the number of alpacas currently around me. We were on approach for a very large tepee styled tent, which was where our Paprika was currently parked in front of with a lot of other alpaca. We eventually came upon Paprika looking happy and joyous as she leaped before a large female alpaca twisting and turning, was that her mother? Certainly looked large, the thick curly raven fur and gentle blue eyed alpaca watched as Paprika excitedly bounced around before her. Eventually the large alpaca gave off a soft smile and held out a hoof, she somehow caught the wildly bouncing Paprika and then pressed downwards slightly to make Paprika stand still on the ground. Eventually the alpaca moved forward and engulfed the smaller in a tight hug that seemed to start crushing Paprika. Despite this, Paprika was still quite happy to be hugged by the larger alpaca and tried to wrap her hooves around her. At least we know where her crushing hugs come from now. If that is her mother, then those hugs were of a dangerous crushing force just by size alone. A male alpaca sighed and shook his head as he moved forward, he seemed tiny compared to the larger alpaca. With smiling lips and amused pink colored eyes barely seen hidden under his dull brown fur, he made a noise and the female alpaca cuddling Paprika calmly moved back. The male alpaca moved forward to start nuzzling the peppy Paprika who returned the affection with fervor. “Do you suppose these are Paprika’s folks?” Jumping at Arizona’s sudden voice, I turned to her with a glare and she chuckled. “You seem jumpy, I don’t think all the other alpaca are nearly as crazy as Paprika is. They seem lazy and calm to me.” Paprika then turned and pointed towards the entry way we came out of and then tried to make her way back that way, until she spotted us and then changed course becoming a blur. She stopped before us and motioned at us excitedly to come over to meet the two elder alpaca and the gathering of many other younger alpaca coming together. From what I understood of alpaca breeding, they only get together intimately for about one month out of a whole year. If an alpaca got pregnant, then they wouldn’t be able to get intimate from then until giving birth. “Now hold on Paprika, don’t go getting your fluff all twisted up now.” At least Arizona tried, I certainly knew that it wasn’t going to work at all. Still, we made our way up to the group with a sedate pace and we looked at all the alpacas and they all looked back at us as we made our approach. They all seemed curious and a little more than interested, but they weren’t nearly as excited as Paprika was. Paprika pointed Arizona and then to the male alpaca, Arizona gave me a shrug and moved forward. Paprika then motioned me to meet the large alpaca that looked kind of like Paprika given their similar fur style. I moved up to and looked up at the large alpaca, we looked into each other’s eyes and she eventually placed her forehead against mine while giving me a gentle smile as the look went a bit deeper. “Are you Paprika’s mother?” Seeing the smile widen by quite a bit, I soon found the large alpaca nuzzling me gently before pulling me closely into her tender embrace. “I’ll take that as a yes. Hello, I’m Velvet and that’s Arizona. Am I to know the name of my friend’s mother?” Looking to Paprika who seemed to be glancing at me with those heart shaped pupils again, the large alpaca turned back to me and started snickering into one of her hooves loudly. I couldn’t fathom why she would be laughing, she shook her head after a moment and then threw a hoof around me and pointed us towards the tepee nearby. Her coat was radiating so much warmth it was hard not to snuggle into it. I liked being cold and usually didn’t like too much warmth, only this warmth felt very different though. It almost felt like the warmth Paprika radiated constantly, but not quite the same. It was so inviting that I followed Paprika’s mother to the tent to where I could see some steam rising from it. I looked back to see Arizona having a staring contest with the male alpaca and shrugged a bit as I was led to the wonderful smell of boiling vegetables in a very wide and large pot. I was feeling kind of hungry. The motherly alpaca held up a hoof for me to wait as she set off and came back with a bowl. She scooped up a large portion of the soup and offered it to me. “Why thank you.” I answered gratefully as I took the soup and took a sip, my eyes widened. It was a bit spicy, but it was delicious and even savory. In fact there was something about it that made me blush. The large alpaca giggled at me before grabbing another large bowl and motioned for me to move off to the side. Upon sitting down, I consumed more of this vegetable soup and watched as the alpaca passed out food among many of what I assumed to be Paprika’s extended family. I counted out seven younger sisters, nine younger brothers and one that seemed older. Said older brother came to sit down next to me quietly, he smiled towards Paprika and then looked to me tilting his head questioningly. “Paprika is a work in progress I think.” I had only assumed what he was asking of me with his silent glance and friendly demeanor. He nodded solemnly as Paprika played with all the cria running around. “Are all of you her brothers and sisters?” The light brown furred brotherly alpaca with the green eyes nodded, before pointing towards the large alpaca and the one Arizona was still having a staring contest with. “Your parents?” Again he nodded at my assumptions and I decided to ask a pertaining question after a sip of the warm and fulfilling, if a bit spicy, vegetable soup. “So… has Paprika always been that…” I rotated my hoof out towards Paprika trying to find the word for it. He just put my hoof back on my bowl and grunted audibly while sighing, then he nodded after a bit. After a moment he smiled faintly in Paprika’s direction as she came over to us and gave her brother a bone crushing hug, the hug ended quickly as he gave as good as he got from his little sister. They were some of the first born by the looks of it. Paprika ran off to her mother and then, much to my surprise, she patiently waited for her mother to scoop her out some soup as well. “Do you all have names or just Paprika?” Again her brother nodded and started to trail his hoof into the dirt. I read the two names out loud. “Kayamba or Rattle? Either of those sounds like a nice name. I’m sorry, but I think I’m more than a little bit curious about your parent’s names Mr. Rattle.” He waved off my concern and then pointed at me with a raised brow. “My name is Velvet, the cow over there near your father is Arizona.” He nodded and then wrote down two names for me and pointed to both the female and male alpacas that were his and Paprika’s parents. “Pepper and Tamale? Well that’s nice to know.” He nodded and politely went back to his soup and I did the same while watching all the alpacas interact with one another. Watching them be playful, watching them be affectionate and most of all just watching how they interacted. I witnessed two alpaca seemingly carry out a whole conversation with just their expressions and looking into each other’s eyes. It made me realize that every single alpaca could communicate at a glance what they were feeling and what they wanted to say, they didn’t need to talk as that looked far too slow for them. My alpaca gazing was cut short when something created a trench before us sending dirt and rock flying up into the air. Arizona sat up from the trench, her hoof slapped against the ground creating cracks where it landed and she cracked her neck before she went charging back towards a waiting Tamale who had a faint smile on his face. “You're on, let’s do this thing!” It seemed Arizona would be busy for the foreseeable future. Quite a few alpacas were making a space for the two and I watched the ensuing fight with awe. The fight started when Tamale kicking off the ground with his rear legs and his brown fluff, acting like springs, struck out at the ground launching him high into the air. Tamale fought almost like Paprika did, except his moves were less affectionate and more on the aggressive side. From what I was seeing Tamale wasn’t nearly as gifted or even powerful as Paprika was physically, but I could tell he taught Paprika everything he knew in his movements. Tamale was relying entirely on experience to keep up with Arizona’s overly aggressive fighting style. Upon waking up the next day, after staying the night with Paprika’s overly affectionate family, we would learn that the nomadic alpacas were having problems with something dangerous. Until then we would thoroughly soak up some alpaca culture well into this lovely evening.