My legs grow tired, tell us: where must we wander? [ closed ]

[paeon]

It was hard to miss when another building appeared from nowhere up in Mor Dhona. It was another Crystal Tower phenomenon, although this one seemed eminently more approachable. As always, the inspection fell to a brave adventurer. Not without any sort of backup of course, but word had spread of how O'danya had managed to befriend the mysterious and beautiful Lightning during her brief sting in Eorzea, which apparently meant she was now an expert on people and places that did not originate in the realm. It was laughable, but she had no qualms at being given another job — and an important one at that.

Her only regret was the urgency that her exploration was placed under, or she would have waited for Alichi'ra to wake up and drag him along. Regardless, she had left him a note and message both at the Carline Canopy and hurried to Mor Dhona through the aetheryte pathways. The Immortal Flames had even managed to spare one of their units to guard her back as she braved the mysterious building first. Had monsters made this place their lair? Was anyone inside? Would they be alive?

She couldn't be sure, but then again, it wasn't her job to know that going in. Bow drawn, she stepped inside.

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[caladrius]

Time paradoxes changed anything, did anything, and when they had still been rampant in the world, all Hope could have done was shrug and say "time paradox" and try and keep people out of its way.

However, he'd never heard of a time paradox transplanting an entire building from one place to another, and while there was always a first time for everything, he still couldn't be sure it was a paradox, considering they should all have been eradicated by now, with what Serah and Noel had done. The only conclusion he could come to for now was that that seething mass of dark mist, that energy that had flowed out of the tear in the sky after Serah and Noel returned, was responsible for all of this.

Whatever "this" was. Looking out the window, he didn't know where he was. Earlier, when he'd first taken a look at the outside world, still reeling from the violent shaking of the building (presumably from it being transplanted), he thought he was in another time, Gran Pulse before the war.

But Cocoon was not in the sky, nor on its crystal pillar that would have told him that he was in Gran Pulse during the years he'd spent asleep in his time capsule. He was elsewhere.

And most definitely alone. The security system of the Academy HQ had told him this much. And it told him that there was unauthorized personnel in the building, labeled an unknown, but definitely armed.

He breathed to steady himself, because he needed to concentrate. He knew what to do and he needed to be able to do it and push aside all that hurt he'd gone through just recently. It's like being in Gran Pulse for the first time all over again, but this time, without magic, and without companions.

Hope still had his boomerang though, and kept a hand on it as he moved down to greet his guest. He wasn't going to make the first move, just to see if they were friendly, but he wasn't about to be foolish and go in unprepared either.

[paeon]

Someone was in here. O'danya motioned for her companions to remain wary but keep from advancing just yet — as far as she could see, it was only a young hyur who looked just as confused as the rest of them. Her instincts said to trust him, that he was no enemy despite the strangeness of the building and his own attire; it was nothing like the Garleans or, Twelve forbid, beastmen wore. Nothing like she had seen in her life, save for perhaps once instance...

"Hello," she greeted, brows raised expectantly. Would that set him off or calm him down? She could feel the uneasy shifting of the company behind her, but they would have to deal with it until this young man's allegiances were made clear.

[caladrius]

Oh, it seemed like his visitors had some courtesy in them-- their leader in particular, and that was a relief. But he knew he couldn't relax, not just yet, because the rest of them were nervous, and nervous people (even those cat-like people, those short and squat like toddlers, those with different skin and those tall with long ears and just what kind of world is this?) tended to do rash things.

So at the very least he wanted to come out of his own building intact, not with arrows and blades sticking out everywhere.

"Good morning," he replied, before looking out the windows. "Or is it afternoon? It's day at the very least, am I right?"

[paeon]

"Only just reached the seventh bell," O'danya agreed. It was still quite early in the day and the time was responsible for the lack of a usual presence at her back; Alichi'ra's nocturnal habits meant he had already been up for the entirety of the night before and would do little good so soon after he had gotten to sleep.

With a turn back to her companions, she nodded to them and put her bow away. She was a quick enough draw that, with the distance between them, she didn't feel threatened by the idea of a sudden attack from the hyur. Two of the archers and a single thaumaturge kept their weapons at the ready, while the others followed the signal and sheathed their own. "You lot, head outside and tell the company we've a guest with manners." She paused, turning to eye Hope questioningly. "Or... is it guests today?"

[caladrius]

He tilted his head at the phrasing. He understood it, obviously, it was seven in the morning here, but did this world follow the same kind of system to tell time that Gran Pulse did? He shook it off as something to think or ask about later, because he still had other things to worry about.

Like whether or not there were other people in the building his guests needed to know about (she called him 'guest' though, and he didn't deny it, but he was still protective of his building, as Director, but something in her tone made him wonder if they got enough of people like him).

"There's no one else in here, I've checked, so you only need to deal with me." Like the party's leader, he let go of his boomerang and spread his arms to show he didn't have any tricks in his hands.

Better him than his employees or the military, really. Starting a skirmish over a misunderstanding would have been terrible.

[paeon]

O'danya smiled at the answer. She approached, still cautious of any hidden secrets in the building, but this young one (about her age, actually, still young enough to count) seemed trustworthy enough. With little else between them, she held out a hand for greeting. "Well met, then. My name is O'danya, and I would presume that you'd like to know where you are? This entire place wasn't here scant bells ago and neither was it found anywhere else in Eorzea. You yourself are likely of similar unfamiliarity."

While not a completely formal tone, her speech was definitely erring on the side of polite than assuming this person would welcome her reasoning aloud. Best do it with the least chance of offending and giving him reason to pull his weapon back out.

With a chuckle, she jokingly added, "We had a similar incident but only recently. You wouldn't happen to know Lightning, would you?"

[caladrius]

Hope reached up to take her hand to shake it-- and yes, apparently that indeed was a tail, so clearly the ears weren't just an affectation or some sort of headgear-- but he stopped, his body feeling like it locked up when he heard "Lightning".

"Lightning, you said?" At any other time, he would have been embarrassed at how hoarse his voice was, but all he could think of now was that name. There were so many variables, so many possibilities, but Hope only concentrated on one: this Lightning was the one he'd known.

"As in a woman with pink hair and a gunblade?"

[paeon]

Ears twitching up with surprise at the description (it had only been a jest, for the sake of the Twelve), O'danya gave a somewhat startled nod. The rest of her was eager and curious, suddenly brought alight by the connection between the two fascinating happenstances actually being related.

"Yes, that Lightning!" she said. "She was here about a moon ago. Is it called that? A gunblade? It was very effective against the foes we fought, and we never had all that much time to speak outside of the battles for me to ask her any proper questions. Did she visit your realm as well?"

[caladrius]

He breathed again, and when did he forget to breathe? But he did, and he ran a hand over his face, before settling it over his forehead as he listened and attempted to parse the information.

"Moon" likely meant one lunar cycle, which meant one month. "Visit" implied that she'd been here for just a little while, but was gone. Disappeared. Like before.

She'd been here before, made her impression on these people, and he had missed her. By an entire month.

"She never visited-- she came from my realm. But I haven't seen her in thirteen years."

And that was painful.

[paeon]

O'danya let some of her interest fade in deference to the expression on the young man's face. That was probably not an easy subject to broach at the best of times, and now it seemed the gods were testing all of them with these appearances, disappearances and the timing of it all. She turned contemplative.

"She said... she had been sleeping, before," O'danya recounted carefully. "It had seemed innocent enough at the time, but now—perhaps there's more too it than she had time to explain. If you are one of her friends, she was ready to fight for you. Fight against whatever god had seen fit to test her in our lands. Though that likely does not ease whatever you're feeling now, does it?"

[caladrius]

"Sleep? She wouldn't have mentioned that kind of unimportant thing unless... it was the crystal stasis." He was talking more to himself than to her, trying to fit this new knowledge into the cluttered, false memories that he had in his mind. But it corroborated with Serah's claims, and definitely confirmed that Lightning had been with them on Gran Pulse before suddenly disappearing from Serah's sight. Not like what he remembered.

It was something, at least.

But he forced himself to relax, to calm down before he went overboard with his thoughts.

"No, it doesn't... But I have an idea of what's going on with her."

[paeon]

O'danya couldn't help the brief chuckle at seeing the tumblers all click into place and some sort of lock open behind the young man's eyes. She loved watching others work; wondered if that was the look all of her mentors saw when she herself made a breakthrough in her constant, vigilant training. It wasn't exactly an epiphany, but the look of someone taking a step forward while more puzzle pieces were doled out to solve a particularly difficult riddle.

"I'd love to hear it, should that be the case," she entreated. Mayhap it would answer the question of Lightning and Friends' Fantastic Eorzean Vacations.

[caladrius]

"I'm unclear of all the details myself."

Because there was only so much that he knew of, that he had gleaned over the years by listening, watching and searching. The Oracle Drive had only given him so much, as did Serah, and for all of his research and work, there were still missing pieces of this puzzle.

"But I'll tell you," he nodded a little in her direction, brushing his hair back and tidying it up, "in a little while. When I understand enough of it myself."

[paeon]

"In that case..." O'danya stepped to the side, motioning back toward the entrance of the very alien building they were standing around in. "Would you like to be somewhere more comfortable while we work out the finer details of our current situation?"

Unlike Lightning, this man seemed to be in a much more stable position of apparition. If he wasn't going to be appearing and disappearing in the same manner as his friend, it would stand to reason that he might need a bit of a course on Eorzean way. No one would hold him against his will, but many would clamor to learn of him and his mysterious building should he wish to make the spectacle of himself. Or if anything happened to make said spectacle for him.

"There's a camp, Saint Coinach's Find, close enough to us to be convenient if you wish. Much more defensible and closer still to Revenant's Toll," she explained. Not that the name of Mor Dhona's largest camp would mean anything, but it was still worth mention; the aetheryte there would be invaluable to him if he could attune to it, creating a shortcut back to the area should he needs must return to the site of his own mystery.