Name: Nilak

Gender: Cow

Age: Calf, about half a year younger than Tuktu and Tupilek

Species: Caribou

Herd: Born – unknown, current – possibly Taifa’s

Likes:  looking at the stars, watching the other calfs or fawns play, wind, running, watching the trees in the breeze, walking in the forest, staring at the dancing shadows on the streams, watercress

Dislikes:  hot days, full moons, droughts, warm water, bullies, days without clouds

Hates:  Unknown

Fears:  aggressive bulls or bucks like Indigo, sometimes man

Friends: 

Tupilek

Taner  (c) Saske

Tuktu (c) Saske

Kapik(attempts) (c) MW

Personality:  Meek and timid, Nilak was always quiet and never spoke much. She is very insightful and can often tell many things about an animal by watching them awhile. Nilak is very, very shy and has a painful lack of self-confidence and is very self-concious. She often times tries to avoid being around those she doesn’t know, making it very difficult for her to make friends. Usually the other must actively engage her, not letting her shy away at all.  She can’t stand hurting anyone’s feelings and may not say a word for days if she does.

Everything was different than that when she met Taner, though, who she approached on her own to speak to.

Nilak is very curious, too, and enjoys learning about anything and everything. She has a habit to say the oddest things and sometimes stares off into space, muttering things. Nilak often stares at the leaves and streams, often silently. If someone would be to approach her at that time and try and talk to her, she would probably either ignore them or say something cryptic in a distant, quiet voice, usually something semi-prophetic.

Despite her odd outershell, once one manages to get to know Nilak she’s open-minded and very polite. She oftentimes is very brave for her friends, and extremely loyal. When in times of danger, she doesn’t even think about herself and completely forgets about her own safety until she knows her friends are safe. She is a very, very good friend because of that.

Nilak doesn’t know anything about her past or her birth herd. Her first memory was not a picture, a place, a scenario: No, her first memory was a feeling. A feeling of complete loneliness. Nilak doesn’t like to talk about that memory though, or her past, since she feels very vulnrable when she does. She is very determined and often attempts to use all her free time to find out who her herd was, her parents, if she has siblings, and most importantly, learn who she should be. However, she doesn’t let these thoughts get in the way of her life, since she feels that she knows her purpose and feels at home in Bambi’s forest.

She also loves to eat.

Crush(es): Taner © Saske Italian Wolf

Crush(es) on her:

History: Nilak doesn’t know much about her early history but her first memory was nothing but a feeling.

At a very early age, the first thing Nilak knew was loneliness. She could feel nothing else and only knew she was alone. No thought of her family or herd crossed her mind; she may not have even known what these things meant at the time. The little caribou was in the foothills of the Northwest.

The next memories got much clearer for Nilak.

She was walking in the trees, only a very thin layer of snow under her feet. She was travelling – wandering – to some place she did not understand. She did not know. The caribou had no name at the time, for she did not know anything except her wandering.

She, unlike Taggarik and Tupilek, didn’t have a travel companion at any time – no kind mountain goat to be her eyes, no mountain lion to offer her protection. Only her shadow was by her.

Alone for most of her time, Nilak was very scared of other animals – especially man. She oftentimes avoided them to be sure that they would not see or harm her, instinctively, she felt these things could not help her and should not be trusted. Her paranoid ways may have saved her life many times.

The small caribou may have been wrong in that. She couldn’t know and couldn’t risk it. She wasn’t sure why she was important at all – she may not have been. But it was only instinct that drove her. She was not sure what it was that she was looking for and thus from her first memory on, she wandered. Endlessly, Nilak moved from one valley to the next in the foothills, never stopping or even looking at the creatures she passed. She often strayed from her ultimate path.

At one point, Nilak found herself in a sheep and goat farm. She didn’t know what these strange animals were. For awhile, she avoided them until a lamb seeked her out. She tried to stay away from it for all she could, but it wouldn’t leave her be, so finally she gave up. “Who are you?” The little, fuzzy animal which Nilak had no word for bleated. It had white and brown wool.

Nilak did not and could not respond for she could not speak. She simply watched the chattery little lamb. It asked many questions: “Are you a girl?” “What kind of goat are you? I’ve never seen one your size.” “Do you talk? I learned two weeks ago. I’m a month old now. How old are you? Are you hungery? Do you still drink milk?” The little animal certainly was very bold and very curious, and it’s sudden, ceasless noise was comforting to Nilak.

Eventually the lamb, named Butter, brought Nilak to meet the other sheep. She wasn’t comfortable but she didn’t feel the need to protest. Butter introduced her to the sheep and goats which lived there. They greeted her most enthusiastically, all the kids and lambs gathering around and bleating an endless stream of questions. Nilak couldn’t answer though, as she couldn’t speak. She filled her stomach with corn and grass, grazed with the two herds and soon, they taught her to speak.

For the first time in her life, Nilak felt safe, warm, and above all else, she wasn’t alone.

That was when she realized what she was looking for. Nilak hadn’t realized it until then, but her wanderings were driving her to one ultimate goal: A herd. She needed a herd. Here she had one. But how long could she stay? She still didn’t know what she was.

So Nilak went on.

Eventually, Nilak made her way to meet the one who would once again cause her to become afraid of others.

Ronno.

She didn’t approach the other deer, but he made a point to approach her: Ronno charged at her from a group of several the minute he saw her. “Who’re you?” he snapped viciously, glaring at her and circling her.

Nilak shrank back. “I-I…”

“Answer ‘im!” Snarled another. He looked like he could be related to this first deer.

“I don’t know,” she whispered.

“Stop lying!” Ronno growled aggressively. “Every other caribou I met made a huge point of how great they are!”

“I don’t know what a caribou is.” Nilak tried to get around him but the other deer blocked her way.

“How stupid could you be? Surely you know!” He sneered, laughing at her.

“I’m not..” Nilak pushed past them, not looking at the others who had not approached. She would have recognized two others like her, Tuktu and Tupilek. She ignored them and ran, not wanting to be followed. She didn’t stop until she came to a log which she jumped up on, only to be stopped by a porcupine. It told her to leave, and with head and tail down, she turned and leaped down, walking upstream a ways and leaping on a rock. There she sat, staring at the water.

That was when the strangest of things happened.

Staring at the flickering shadows on the surface of the stream, shapes began immerging in front of Nilak. She saw the shape of a large, majestic buck, flickering across the water as if walking through a field. Around him were many younger bucks. Fawns bound to a stop at his feet. He had the utmost respect. Nilak blinked at it was gone. She stared. What had she seen? She had no clue. Who was that great beast? She’d never seen him. Soon another image appeared: Two more “deer”, with many more “Fawns”. She sensed these were her kind.

That was what she had to find.

After awhile of staring at the water, two fawns approached her: Bambi and Faline. With them was a rabbit. Nilak didn’t notice them until the rabbit, Thumper, pushed on her leg. She looked up. “Huh?”

The deer stared at her. “What?” Nilak blinked. “Is there something wrong?”

“You just told Bambi not to trust blindly. You said something like, ‘you’re trusting someone blindly. That trusting – not safe, not smart.’ It was… strange.” Faline answered.

“I’m sorry,” Nilak immediately spoke. “I didn’t…”

“It’s fine,” Bambi spoke slowly. “I was… getting that same impression about someone…”

“What’s your name?” Faline asked the little caribou.

“I, um… I don’t…” She looked away. “I don’t think I have one.”

“Really?” Bambi blinked. “Come on, then, I think you should meet someone.”

That was when she met Tupilek. “Who…?” His greyish blue eyes grew wide.

“She doesn’t know,” Faline answered. “Ever seen her?”

“No.” Tupilek walked up to her. “I haven’t. But she looks just a bit younger than me. Do you know how old you are?”

“No,” Nilak looked away. “Does that make me… stupid?”

“No,” Tupilek snapped. “Who would ever call you that?”

“These other two fawns…” Nilak told them about Ronno and the other, Indigo.

Tupilek looked enraged. “Believe me, Ronno will regret that,” he promised gravely.

Undoubtably, Ronno did.

Later on, Tupilek took Nilak to meet the other caribou. When she got there, she met Tuktu as he ran up to meet the new face alongside his cousin, Taner. “Who are you?” Tuktu asked her curiously.

“Nilak,” the calf immediately answered with the first thing that came to mind. Broken ice. She was staring at Taner – there was something about him.
It didn’t take long before she developed a crush on him – the problem was that he had a crush on Kapik. Who also liked him… but she liked Tupilek too. Nilak couldn’t stand the way Taner looked at Kapik,  but wouldn’t say anything – when ever she saw the two she retreated to the stream, seeking answers, though none would come to her.