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Jaime ran his hand through his brown curly hair and smiled impishly, his eyes alight with mischief. Elena glared at him, her blue eyes steely, her mouth thin and firm in its displeasure. She held his gaze for a moment longer, clenching her fists she turned sharply and Jaime heard her sigh loudly with contempt.

“It was a joke cuz!” he said to her rapidly disappearing figure, his impish grin quickly fading. Well shit.

Now he would be in the doghouse with her for weeks. If there was thing Elena knew how to do, it was hold a grudge. Sometimes it amazed Jamie that they were related, even if they were just cousins. Jaime's cheerful, playful and relaxed nature could not be more different then Elena's well organized, stiff and stubborn demeanor. There were things they could agree on, music, tattoos, and tokotas for example – the last being the reason they had joined forces and they had tattoos on their shoulders that linked together when they stood side by side.

But even all of that would not get Jaime out of trouble, he knew that from experience. Even though he knew exactly how Elena would react, it was too much fun pushing her buttons – which he knew very well.

That also meant that he sometimes had long stretches where he was not on speaking terms with Elena, though not by his choice, but due to her own grudge holding, tight lipped self. Kendrick, Robyn and Alex had all quickly learned or decided not to get between the two, and they refused to be messengers.

If Elena had been around she would have played the world's smallest violin for the pity party he was currently throwing himself. Since Elena was not speaking to him, and Kendrick was busy handling Zyndel, Ganso, Songbird's Melody and Daiyu in Zyndel's third rite of dominance, and Robyn and Alex had taken Akamu and Zavala to The Late Autumn Festival that meant he would just have to unload his burdens on a tokota.

But which tokota to pick? Even with six tokotas, maybe seven if his guess was correct in that Robyn had likely found Turikali to go and cool off on her own gone that still left at least thirteen ride-able tokotas to choose from. Admittedly a few of those were not quite ready to accept Jaime or Robyn as riders but that only cut the number down to ten. All of which could use exsercise, all of which had their own personalities, gaits and habits to keep in mind.

A sharp bark distracted him from his pondering, and he turned to see Zilar, the gray dun sphinx female tokota standing there, she was panting and her legs were covered in mud. “What's the matter girl?”

Zilar barked, and ran toward the south, barked then ran back, her eyes full of pleading as she tried to communicate what she needed to the human.

Jaime's brow wrinkled, it was obvious she was trying to signal something, it must be urgent for her to have run here. Thinking quickly Jaime ran to the tack area, grabbing one of the emergency packs they had set up specifically for a situation like this when they might not have time to think of everything they might need, find it and stash it in a ready to go bag.

He vaulted easily onto the sphinx's back, knowing that the tokota, even if tired would be much faster then he could be, and his right leg had barely rested against Zilar's barrel when the tokota was off like a shot. He wished he had some mane to hang onto as the tokota raced down the path that led to the south. Bending over Zilar's shoulders he felt the cold fall wind whip at his face, fortunately he had been dressed for the weather but it was still a shock to his system.

Dirt flew up under Zilar's paws, her body was stretched long and low over the ground, and Jaime knew the fur-less tokota had to be feeling the chill of the wind as well. His mind raced as he tried to think of where they could be going, but he did not know the area that well yet, so he did not know what he would face.

A scream echoed through the air suddenly, coming from a short distance away. Jaime's heart raced, had Elena been hurt? A pang of guilt over pranking her washed over him. Zilar was going as fast as she was able and he quickly saw the fallen tree laying ahead and a bit of color, and a plea for help came again, one that was laced with pain.

Zilar quickly reached the tree, and slid to a stop, her chest heaving as she panted tiredly, but she looked proud of herself and in a distant part of his mind Jaime reminded himself to praise the tokota later. For now though his mind was concentrated on helping. He dismounted and ran toward the tree, sliding and kneeling down next to the figure.

To his relief the person trapped under the tree was not Elena, though he had no clue how this young lady had gotten here, or why she had been out here, but now was also not the time to think about that. She looked younger then Elena or Robyn, maybe about sixteen to eighteen though he had never been good at guessing ages. She had red hair that mixed with the red, orange and yellow leaves that were tangled under her head and in her hair. There was no bleeding from her head that he could tell, and it looked like most of her was out from under the tree, only her right leg was pinned beneath a large branch.

“Its alright, I am here to help” his voice came out gruff, but tender. “Now can you move your leg? Does anything hurt?”

The girl sniffled and her voice came out scratchy and raw, giving Jaime the impression that she had been out here for a while, and the dirt was scraped away around her leg, she had obviously been trying, and failing, to dig herself out. Part of the problem appeared to be that her left shoulder looked like it was dislocated, but that was easily fixed, whereas her leg, if it lost circulation for too long might cause a more long term issue, besides the possibility that some of her bones may have been broken or even crushed as they bore the heavy load.

“Well, my arm hurts some, but I can not move my leg out from under the tree. It hurts a lot more.” Her thought process was extremely logical and a lot calmer then he had expected, but shock did strange things to people.

Without a second thought he took off his coat and wrapped it around the girl. “Did you hit your head?” he asked, worried about a concussion and how movement might affect any internal injuries.

“I landed on my arm, I think that's how I dislocated it.”

“Better a dislocation then brain trauma” he said, his voice a bit grim, and nodded. “Alright, I'm going to try and lift, or roll the branch off your leg, let me know if something starts hurting.”

He got the long rope out of his pack, tying it around the branch tightly, now he needed leverage. Looking around he spotted a wide branch of a tree, not too far away and not so high that he couldn't easily swing the rope up and over, he quickly climbed the tree to firmly tie that in place. Once back on the ground he whistled for Zilar who walked over to him and he quickly tied the rope in a harness like shape around her chest. “Alright, on the count of three we are going to pull” he instructed. “One, two, THREE”. With all his might he tugged on the rope and Zilar backed up, their muscles bulging. With a creak the branch lifted, only a few inches but the girl managed to scramble backwards.

“Let it go now Zilar, gently” Zilar walked forward and the branch settled back into place. Jaime rushed over to the girl who was panting, a grimace on her face. Taking out his knife he cut open her pants leg and boot, trying to be gentle, but he had to see the damage.

Zilar wiggled out of the harness and joined Jaime, and curled up next to the girl trying to provide her with more warmth. “How bad” the girl, paused, she had her eyes closed and Jaime realized she must not have looked at her own leg yet.

The leg was red, and would definitely be turning purple, black, and blue later. There were marks from the bark digging into her skin and scrapes from when she had been trying to wiggle out. He ran his hands gently over the leg, She cried out as his hands touched her knee and again when he brushed her ankle. “Well, good news, its not crushed, I think there must have been a hollow there and it saved your leg from further damage. You will have bruising for sure, and you have some scrapes and scratches. I am not sure if your knee or ankle might be twisted, bruised, dislocated or broken – that would be something for a hospital to determine. Do you have a phone on you?”

Reaching with her good arm her fingers fumbled into one of her pockets digging out her phone, the screen was broken and when she tried to power it on it had no response. “Well, I did.”

Jaime had been digging in his backpack while she had been checking her phone, and he made a noise of triumph as his fingers found what he was looking for. He pulled out a walkie talkie. If he knew Elena, and he did, she would not have gone out without one.

Fiddling with frequencies he repeated “10-17:urgent business, 10-38: ambulance needed” over and over. Finally Elena's voice came over the talkie and he breathed an inward sign of relief “10-4, this better not be another fuckin' prank.”

“Elena, I fuckin' swear to god. I am with Zilar, she came up to me and she was barking like crazy. She found this girl in the woods, the girl's leg got trapped under a fallen branch somehow. I got her out but I need help getting her out of here. I do not want to move her on my own in case she has other injuries. Over.” His words all jumbled together, the reality of the situation hitting him as he tried to remain calm.
“Christ Jaime, I leave you alone for thirty bloody minutes. Where are you at? Over.”
“Southeast of the barn. Zilar's pretty tired, and I want her to keep the girl warm. Bring another tokota and the sled just in case the ambulance can't get out here. Call the ambulance as soon as you can though.. Over.”
“10-4, I will contact you once I have called them. Over.”
“10-4, Over and Out.” Now all he had to do was wait. He dug the water bottle out of the pack and made sure the girl got a good drink of it.

“What's your name?” he asked, right now his plan was to keep her talking to try and distract her from her pain. “My name is Jaime, and this is my tokota Zilar. What were you doing way out here? I had no idea anyone lived close to us.”

“I am Alexis. As for why I am out here, well, its kind a funny – but mostly dumb story. I am looking for my tokota Ravi, she's a sphinx, like your girl actually. I only recently trained her to be ride able and she got spooked by something and dumped me. I was looking for her when this branch fell on my leg out of no where. When I saw Zilar from a distance I thought she might be Ravi, but now I am afraid Ravi might be really lost and alone.” Tears welled up in Alexis' eyes.

“Ravi will just be fine. If I know tokotas, and trust me, I do, she's got plenty of wild instinct to get her through. In fact I bet she might have even found our tokotas by now and is hanging out with them. But why didn't you call your parents when Ravi dumped you? Y'know call for backup?”

Alexis looked away, her cheeks flushing red. “I kind of bought Ravi without them knowing. They are not fond of tokotas because of how much they shed and their eating habits. I only convinced them to let me keep Ravi because she's a sphinx and I promised I would train her all by myself and feed her. I was afraid if they knew she'd dumped me they'd make me sell her.”

Jaime sighed, he understood this in more ways then perhaps Alexis knew, and she certainly seemed like she knew how to handle herself – or at least knew how important it was to keep calm in a bad situation.

“Tell me more about Ravi” he urged, and just then a squawk came from the walkie “Hello?” came Elena's voice. “Yeah, I am here” Jaime said. “I have called the ambulance. I bringing the cell phones, and GPS and I will see you soon. Over.” “Roger, over and out. See,” he turned to Alexis, “We'll get you taken care of in no time. And as soon as the medics have got you safe and sound me and Elena, we will look for Ravi and take care of her for you until you can get back on your feet. Sound good?”

Alexis grinned, tears coming to her eyes. “Thank you… That would mean so much to me. You've already helped me so much. I wish I could pay you.”

“Don't worry” Jaime said with a twinkle in his eye. “I am sure we'll work something out. Now then, you were going to tell me more about Ravi.”

After that it was easy to keep her talking until Elena got there and then they went through the whole introduction thing again, and Jaime explained the situation and generally kept her spirits up while the ambulance made its way there.

None too soon they heard the wailing sound coming from the road that led up to the barns, and after some careful maneuvering the paramedics made their way to the posse. With their medical expertise they safely got Alexis into the back of the vehicle on a stretcher and thanked Jaime and Elena for their help and soon the medics had left to get Alexis to the nearest hospital.

Elena smiled at Jaime “Well cuz' looks like I am going to have to lift my no talking rule with you for now. Mind, I am still not happy with the prank, but what you did today, well.”

Jaime saved her from saying an embarrassing speech by holding up his hands and he smiled broadly “I am glad you are talkin' to me, cause otherwise it would be real hard to find that girl's tokota. See, I kind of promised her we would take care of it.”

For a moment Elena just stared at Jaime, then shook her head “I should have known all these heroics came with a catch. Alright. I will help you look. What am I looking for to be exact?”

Just then Zilar barked and got up from where she had been laying with Turi, the yeti had been keeping both the sphinx and Alexis warm until the medics had taken her away but now both tokotas were standing.
Zilar wagged her tail in a friendly manner and Jaime saw a shape move between the trees.
“Ravi?” he called, hesitantly. The shape emerged from the trees, revealing a piebald sphinx tokota, with a little heart on her neck, just as Alexis had described.

Elena reacted first, digging a treat out of her pocket and holding it out for the sphinx. “C'mere girl, we're going to take care of you until Alexis is all better. I promise we won't hurt you.”
Ravi, seeing the treat abandoned caution to the wind and trotted up to Elena just Turi or Zilar would when getting a treat. Gently Jaime slipped a rope around the sphinx's neck while she munched happily on the treat.

“Ready to go home?” Elena asked, taking the rope and mounting Turi. For a moment Jaime looked up at his cousin with amusement. Turning, he swung up onto Zilar's back. “I'm ready if you are.”
“I'll always have your back cuz'” Elena said softly.
“I know” Jaime nodded and with that they headed home.

Description
Jaime ran his hand through his brown curly hair and smiled impishly, his eyes alight with mischief. Elena glared at him, her blue eyes steely, her mouth thin and firm in its displeasure. She held his gaze for a moment longer, clenching her fists she turned sharply and Jaime heard her sigh loudly with contempt.

“It was a joke cuz!” he said to her rapidly disappearing figure, his impish grin quickly fading. Well shit.

Now he would be in the doghouse with her for weeks. If there was thing Elena knew how to do, it was hold a grudge. Sometimes it amazed Jamie that they were related, even if they were just cousins. Jaime's cheerful, playful and relaxed nature could not be more different then Elena's well organized, stiff and stubborn demeanor. There were things they could agree on, music, tattoos, and tokotas for example – the last being the reason they had joined forces and they had tattoos on their shoulders that linked together when they stood side by side.

But even all of that would not get Jaime out of trouble, he knew that from experience. Even though he knew exactly how Elena would react, it was too much fun pushing her buttons – which he knew very well.

That also meant that he sometimes had long stretches where he was not on speaking terms with Elena, though not by his choice, but due to her own grudge holding, tight lipped self. Kendrick, Robyn and Alex had all quickly learned or decided not to get between the two, and they refused to be messengers.

If Elena had been around she would have played the world's smallest violin for the pity party he was currently throwing himself. Since Elena was not speaking to him, and Kendrick was busy handling Zyndel, Ganso, Songbird's Melody and Daiyu in Zyndel's third rite of dominance, and Robyn and Alex had taken Akamu and Zavala to The Late Autumn Festival that meant he would just have to unload his burdens on a tokota.

But which tokota to pick? Even with six tokotas, maybe seven if his guess was correct in that Robyn had likely found Turikali to go and cool off on her own gone that still left at least thirteen ride-able tokotas to choose from. Admittedly a few of those were not quite ready to accept Jaime or Robyn as riders but that only cut the number down to ten. All of which could use exsercise, all of which had their own personalities, gaits and habits to keep in mind.

A sharp bark distracted him from his pondering, and he turned to see Zilar, the gray dun sphinx female tokota standing there, she was panting and her legs were covered in mud. “What's the matter girl?”

Zilar barked, and ran toward the south, barked then ran back, her eyes full of pleading as she tried to communicate what she needed to the human.

Jaime's brow wrinkled, it was obvious she was trying to signal something, it must be urgent for her to have run here. Thinking quickly Jaime ran to the tack area, grabbing one of the emergency packs they had set up specifically for a situation like this when they might not have time to think of everything they might need, find it and stash it in a ready to go bag.

He vaulted easily onto the sphinx's back, knowing that the tokota, even if tired would be much faster then he could be, and his right leg had barely rested against Zilar's barrel when the tokota was off like a shot. He wished he had some mane to hang onto as the tokota raced down the path that led to the south. Bending over Zilar's shoulders he felt the cold fall wind whip at his face, fortunately he had been dressed for the weather but it was still a shock to his system.

Dirt flew up under Zilar's paws, her body was stretched long and low over the ground, and Jaime knew the fur-less tokota had to be feeling the chill of the wind as well. His mind raced as he tried to think of where they could be going, but he did not know the area that well yet, so he did not know what he would face.

A scream echoed through the air suddenly, coming from a short distance away. Jaime's heart raced, had Elena been hurt? A pang of guilt over pranking her washed over him. Zilar was going as fast as she was able and he quickly saw the fallen tree laying ahead and a bit of color, and a plea for help came again, one that was laced with pain.

Zilar quickly reached the tree, and slid to a stop, her chest heaving as she panted tiredly, but she looked proud of herself and in a distant part of his mind Jaime reminded himself to praise the tokota later. For now though his mind was concentrated on helping. He dismounted and ran toward the tree, sliding and kneeling down next to the figure.

To his relief the person trapped under the tree was not Elena, though he had no clue how this young lady had gotten here, or why she had been out here, but now was also not the time to think about that. She looked younger then Elena or Robyn, maybe about sixteen to eighteen though he had never been good at guessing ages. She had red hair that mixed with the red, orange and yellow leaves that were tangled under her head and in her hair. There was no bleeding from her head that he could tell, and it looked like most of her was out from under the tree, only her right leg was pinned beneath a large branch.

“Its alright, I am here to help” his voice came out gruff, but tender. “Now can you move your leg? Does anything hurt?”

The girl sniffled and her voice came out scratchy and raw, giving Jaime the impression that she had been out here for a while, and the dirt was scraped away around her leg, she had obviously been trying, and failing, to dig herself out. Part of the problem appeared to be that her left shoulder looked like it was dislocated, but that was easily fixed, whereas her leg, if it lost circulation for too long might cause a more long term issue, besides the possibility that some of her bones may have been broken or even crushed as they bore the heavy load.

“Well, my arm hurts some, but I can not move my leg out from under the tree. It hurts a lot more.” Her thought process was extremely logical and a lot calmer then he had expected, but shock did strange things to people.

Without a second thought he took off his coat and wrapped it around the girl. “Did you hit your head?” he asked, worried about a concussion and how movement might affect any internal injuries.

“I landed on my arm, I think that's how I dislocated it.”

“Better a dislocation then brain trauma” he said, his voice a bit grim, and nodded. “Alright, I'm going to try and lift, or roll the branch off your leg, let me know if something starts hurting.”

He got the long rope out of his pack, tying it around the branch tightly, now he needed leverage. Looking around he spotted a wide branch of a tree, not too far away and not so high that he couldn't easily swing the rope up and over, he quickly climbed the tree to firmly tie that in place. Once back on the ground he whistled for Zilar who walked over to him and he quickly tied the rope in a harness like shape around her chest. “Alright, on the count of three we are going to pull” he instructed. “One, two, THREE”. With all his might he tugged on the rope and Zilar backed up, their muscles bulging. With a creak the branch lifted, only a few inches but the girl managed to scramble backwards.

“Let it go now Zilar, gently” Zilar walked forward and the branch settled back into place. Jaime rushed over to the girl who was panting, a grimace on her face. Taking out his knife he cut open her pants leg and boot, trying to be gentle, but he had to see the damage.

Zilar wiggled out of the harness and joined Jaime, and curled up next to the girl trying to provide her with more warmth. “How bad” the girl, paused, she had her eyes closed and Jaime realized she must not have looked at her own leg yet.

The leg was red, and would definitely be turning purple, black, and blue later. There were marks from the bark digging into her skin and scrapes from when she had been trying to wiggle out. He ran his hands gently over the leg, She cried out as his hands touched her knee and again when he brushed her ankle. “Well, good news, its not crushed, I think there must have been a hollow there and it saved your leg from further damage. You will have bruising for sure, and you have some scrapes and scratches. I am not sure if your knee or ankle might be twisted, bruised, dislocated or broken – that would be something for a hospital to determine. Do you have a phone on you?”

Reaching with her good arm her fingers fumbled into one of her pockets digging out her phone, the screen was broken and when she tried to power it on it had no response. “Well, I did.”

Jaime had been digging in his backpack while she had been checking her phone, and he made a noise of triumph as his fingers found what he was looking for. He pulled out a walkie talkie. If he knew Elena, and he did, she would not have gone out without one.

Fiddling with frequencies he repeated “10-17:urgent business, 10-38: ambulance needed” over and over. Finally Elena's voice came over the talkie and he breathed an inward sign of relief “10-4, this better not be another fuckin' prank.”

“Elena, I fuckin' swear to god. I am with Zilar, she came up to me and she was barking like crazy. She found this girl in the woods, the girl's leg got trapped under a fallen branch somehow. I got her out but I need help getting her out of here. I do not want to move her on my own in case she has other injuries. Over.” His words all jumbled together, the reality of the situation hitting him as he tried to remain calm.
“Christ Jaime, I leave you alone for thirty bloody minutes. Where are you at? Over.”
“Southeast of the barn. Zilar's pretty tired, and I want her to keep the girl warm. Bring another tokota and the sled just in case the ambulance can't get out here. Call the ambulance as soon as you can though.. Over.”
“10-4, I will contact you once I have called them. Over.”
“10-4, Over and Out.” Now all he had to do was wait. He dug the water bottle out of the pack and made sure the girl got a good drink of it.

“What's your name?” he asked, right now his plan was to keep her talking to try and distract her from her pain. “My name is Jaime, and this is my tokota Zilar. What were you doing way out here? I had no idea anyone lived close to us.”

“I am Alexis. As for why I am out here, well, its kind a funny – but mostly dumb story. I am looking for my tokota Ravi, she's a sphinx, like your girl actually. I only recently trained her to be ride able and she got spooked by something and dumped me. I was looking for her when this branch fell on my leg out of no where. When I saw Zilar from a distance I thought she might be Ravi, but now I am afraid Ravi might be really lost and alone.” Tears welled up in Alexis' eyes.

“Ravi will just be fine. If I know tokotas, and trust me, I do, she's got plenty of wild instinct to get her through. In fact I bet she might have even found our tokotas by now and is hanging out with them. But why didn't you call your parents when Ravi dumped you? Y'know call for backup?”

Alexis looked away, her cheeks flushing red. “I kind of bought Ravi without them knowing. They are not fond of tokotas because of how much they shed and their eating habits. I only convinced them to let me keep Ravi because she's a sphinx and I promised I would train her all by myself and feed her. I was afraid if they knew she'd dumped me they'd make me sell her.”

Jaime sighed, he understood this in more ways then perhaps Alexis knew, and she certainly seemed like she knew how to handle herself – or at least knew how important it was to keep calm in a bad situation.

“Tell me more about Ravi” he urged, and just then a squawk came from the walkie “Hello?” came Elena's voice. “Yeah, I am here” Jaime said. “I have called the ambulance. I bringing the cell phones, and GPS and I will see you soon. Over.” “Roger, over and out. See,” he turned to Alexis, “We'll get you taken care of in no time. And as soon as the medics have got you safe and sound me and Elena, we will look for Ravi and take care of her for you until you can get back on your feet. Sound good?”

Alexis grinned, tears coming to her eyes. “Thank you… That would mean so much to me. You've already helped me so much. I wish I could pay you.”

“Don't worry” Jaime said with a twinkle in his eye. “I am sure we'll work something out. Now then, you were going to tell me more about Ravi.”

After that it was easy to keep her talking until Elena got there and then they went through the whole introduction thing again, and Jaime explained the situation and generally kept her spirits up while the ambulance made its way there.

None too soon they heard the wailing sound coming from the road that led up to the barns, and after some careful maneuvering the paramedics made their way to the posse. With their medical expertise they safely got Alexis into the back of the vehicle on a stretcher and thanked Jaime and Elena for their help and soon the medics had left to get Alexis to the nearest hospital.

Elena smiled at Jaime “Well cuz' looks like I am going to have to lift my no talking rule with you for now. Mind, I am still not happy with the prank, but what you did today, well.”

Jaime saved her from saying an embarrassing speech by holding up his hands and he smiled broadly “I am glad you are talkin' to me, cause otherwise it would be real hard to find that girl's tokota. See, I kind of promised her we would take care of it.”

For a moment Elena just stared at Jaime, then shook her head “I should have known all these heroics came with a catch. Alright. I will help you look. What am I looking for to be exact?”

Just then Zilar barked and got up from where she had been laying with Turi, the yeti had been keeping both the sphinx and Alexis warm until the medics had taken her away but now both tokotas were standing.
Zilar wagged her tail in a friendly manner and Jaime saw a shape move between the trees.
“Ravi?” he called, hesitantly. The shape emerged from the trees, revealing a piebald sphinx tokota, with a little heart on her neck, just as Alexis had described.

Elena reacted first, digging a treat out of her pocket and holding it out for the sphinx. “C'mere girl, we're going to take care of you until Alexis is all better. I promise we won't hurt you.”
Ravi, seeing the treat abandoned caution to the wind and trotted up to Elena just Turi or Zilar would when getting a treat. Gently Jaime slipped a rope around the sphinx's neck while she munched happily on the treat.

“Ready to go home?” Elena asked, taking the rope and mounting Turi. For a moment Jaime looked up at his cousin with amusement. Turning, he swung up onto Zilar's back. “I'm ready if you are.”
“I'll always have your back cuz'” Elena said softly.
“I know” Jaime nodded and with that they headed home.