fandomhigh | Rangering!, Friday, Period Five [ 06/12 ].

"Good afternoon, class!" Today, they would find themselves being greeted by their brusque teacher in the usual Danger Shop clearing, although the woods seemed a bit thicker, the rocky bits rockier, and there was the sound of a waterfall and a river off in the distance, which spilled out into the sea. It was all very pretty.

"Today we are working on two very important ranger skills! Tracking, and plant finding!" He started to hand out some papers, which were probably pretty helpful and full of information, but Minsc would not be offended if anyone made paper planes or blew their noses in them...because they had a lot of information on them and reading was hard. "Being able to recognize signs of creatures in the area recently might be a big difference between a successful raid or being eaten by a bear! And knowing the difference between a plant that can a heal and a plant that can give you explosive stomach pains is very good, too! You'd be surprised how similar they make some of those! So please look over the material, ask any questions if you've got them, and I'd like you to pair up, go into the woods, and start tracking! Try to find the lair of a creature or monster hidden in these woods, and then try to locate at least three bad plants and three good plants! When you are done, you may work on your sparring or target practise. Now go!"

[[ OCD ~~on the way~~ has been eaten by a grue! ]]

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"Don't look at me, I'm not doing it either. None of those are edible anyway, I think." Tahiri snuck a quick glance at him and made note of the poison ivy on the back of the handout, then pointed at a clump of dandelions nearby. "Those, on the other hand . . . I have no idea."

"I'm pretty sure those won't kill us," Ben said, "even if they aren't exactly bouquet material."

"No," Tahiri agreed, taking a sample of the leaves. "But bouquets aren't supposed to be for eating anyway."

"It would make them a lot more useful," Ben said, noticing a set of animal prints on the ground.

"Bigger than a mynock?" he asked.

Tahiri came over to peer at the prints, biting her lip in concentration. "Bigger than a mynock. They're kind of deep, too."

"Not Blind Seer's footprints?" Ben checked.

"No, his are bigger than this," Tahiri assured him, having seen them plenty of times around the paddock at the Gig. "But good catch. I didn't think of that."

"I think Firekeeper would laugh herself sick if we tracked them through the woods."

"She'd think it was the most hilarious thing ever," Tahiri said, grinning for a moment. "They both would."

"And we'd never hear the end of it," Ben said, laughing for the first time in days.

It was nice, hearing him laugh, and she even laughed softly in response. "She'd find ways to tease me about it forever. I can just hear her now."

"So can I," Ben agreed, standing up again. "So let's follow these, and not find any wolf tracks."

"Or if we do, let's not follow them," Tahiri added, falling in step beside him, but not too close. A few dozen meters off, she noticed a bird eating berries from a shrub. "Hey, I bet that plant's probably safe too."

"Because the bird likes it? Good call," Ben replied, nodding.

"Thanks." Tahiri drifted over to grab a berry-laden twig from another shrub closer to them. "Last night, were you okay? With the fire drill, I mean."

"It was wet, but I'll live," Ben said. "It wasn't like I was that asleep anyway. You?"

"Wet. Muddy. Nothing I haven't had to put up with before, except I wish it hadn't been right after I fell asleep. It would've been fine if my little brother hadn't decided to come say hello." It was pretty obvious Tahiri wasn't thrilled about that.

"I saw that," Ben said, because of course he'd been watching. "I was going to come over but I figured you could take care of yourself with him."

Tahiri gave him a grateful, almost shy smile. "He's going to get himself kicked one of these days. I saw you too. You didn't look so happy."

"I'm sure if you put up a poster, there'd be a line through the dorm to help you," he said, ignoring the second part of her comment.

"That'd be overkill." Tahiri leveled a quick glance at him. "I know you weren't, Ben. I notice these things, you know."

"It's been a long week," he said quietly.

"For both of us," Tahiri answered. "I hate it when you're unhappy, and I can't help."

He moved a little closer to her. "I hate you being unhappy because I'm unhappy."

"It's because I care about you, dummy," she said gently. "That is kind of how this works."

Re: Start your Tracking! -- 06/12.

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