ORIGIN

An unusual silence reigned along the stretch between Orion and Monoceros. In dim light verging on total darkness, not a hint of activity could be heard. Tunnel runner hooves did not click their way across stone to another cave and a well-deserved nap. Neither did the ceiling harbor the customary shrieks and rustling wings of roosting bats. Perhaps the nocturnal and diurnal were in the midst of an artificial dusk, and their different lives had overlapped for a moment. Maybe both were still stuck falling to and rousing from their respective slumbers.

Whatever the reason, the matter didn’t apply to East. Nor did it to those that had never lived to begin with. Their shadow-shrouded figures clung to tunnel walls and fixed frozen eyes upon the bird standing below them. His feathers were neat and slick, his demeanor seemingly calm despite the unmoving audience. Head on a smooth unhindered swivel, he surveyed the poorly lit surroundings. Then, tilting his beak until his neck could’ve snapped from how far back it leaned, a cool gaze lifted to meet another’s.

When he at last spoke, the first words were delivered in gravelly tones.

“Long time no see.” And that it’d been, though the tunnel might as well have existed outside of time for what little changes had taken place since he’d last visited this well-worn pathway. Aside from the rags and metal scraps displaced by passersby or the dust motes that drifted at so much as a soft exhale, this was a gravesite. Yet another among many. "How's business been?"

No response came other than the whistle of winds escaping from Monoceros. As they whisked by and lightly tousled his crest feathers, a touch of amusement gleamed within yellow irises. He'd expected nothing more from the stone visage. No doubt he would leave with the same questions as usual about its purpose.

Nevertheless the one-sided interaction, part jest and part genuine curiosity, persisted. East hopped for a better perspective on the bowl grasped between his untalkative companion's great talons. Rapid wingbeats arrested his fall for a few seconds more than ordinary, barely enough time for a proper peek at the collection of items inside. But enough to know no change had happened here either. His landing, unsteady but safe, was announced with a soft chuckle that fell from his beak.

"Slow then," came the answer to himself, shaking his head in mock disapproval. "Be easier if you spilled on what you want, pal. Better yet, why."

At least the beast didn't look like one for blood sacrifices—after all, they had the arena for that whole messy affair.

When the only company around was unfeeling stone and the musty, tattered possessions of those long gone, hearing the sound of anything besides your own breath was bound to cause more curiosity than usual. Loneliness might spur the tilt of a head, followed by a sharp glance over the shoulder to whoever or whatever might be waiting to be noticed. Someone particularly starved for interaction might even spin around with a greeting ready in their beak, eager to strike up the conversation they yearned for. East could've done any of those, but he chose not to. He'd had more than his fill of existing among other Gembounds; the deathmatches had seen to that, leaving him just as hungover as he was hopeless by their end.

So while the leaves that couldn't have been leaves rustled, he took his time, continuing the private joke he'd started for a while longer. The gleam hadn't left his eyes. If anything, it intensified. Whether it was due to the one-sided talk or the mystery behind him was anyone's guess.

"Ah, sorry. I'm afraid I don't catch your, eh, drift. Mind repeating that in the common tongue by any chance?" A pause kept up the pretense of conversation though his partner remained stoic and tight-lipped, and an exaggerated sigh came promptly after. "Fine, be that way. I just hope the next fella's got better manners than you."

Parting words delivered, a casual pivot faced him to what'd been at his back. Typical for the bird, his expression was unreadable at the sight of fluttering pages. The rest of his body revealed much the same, save for the light-footed manner in which he approached the book. The steps were those of one daring to draw near to a sleeping beast, uncertain of the outcome—whether it'd doze on or wake to snap its displeasure. What marked the pages was a blur to East as he semi-circled where it lay, the flipping at the whims of the wind too fast for his mind to process the images upon them. He'd need something to pin them down, either talons or a tool. Caution a dear friend of his, the latter would be the obvious preference if possible.

Scanning the floor yielded a flimsy metal scrap, thin and long with edges rather sharp, judging by how he almost cut himself handling it. A worn rectangle that had more holes than fabric was found next and was wound round the other item to allow a safer grip. Then, held carefully between a front and back talon, he lifted the combined creation up and lowered it upon the flurry of pages so that it might rest horizontally across their surface. Its weight might not be enough to hold them down for long, but at least he could try.

"Yes, where—and your who, what, and why as well." For all the narration's independence, it might as well have been part of a dialogue for how easily East picked up from where the other left off.

Considering how the "next fella" he'd mentioned in passing had manifested as a disembodied voice, a more dumbfounded reaction wouldn't have been amiss. Perhaps he actually was. But other than a tremble of crest feathers, too slight to be caused by the wind's playful touch, and an inquisitive head tilt while his talon traced over incomprehensible drawings, strong emotion was as foreign to him as the untidy scrawls upon those pages. A hint of bemusement crept into his voice, but nothing more.

"Almost a complete set there. You've got a how, which, and when to go with it?"

The stranger, mysterious as the mystery itself, had fished all the questions straight out of his stream of consciousness. Every interrogative they'd caught on a hook and reeled into the open air for the tunnel's listening pleasure. The thoughts were common enough, but the detached sense of knowledge behind their delivery wasn't. It gave the impression of a being playing games, asking plenty and dangling a whole bundle of answers just beyond the bird's reach.

Normally, he'd peck the clues loose from such teasing fingers. Against an invisible force though, without clear motives, one might want to take a more careful approach than that. Who knew whether their other hand hovered at the back of his neck, prepared to crush any impertinence from him between deceptively indifferent observations of the act.

"Anyway," he said, shrugging, "can't know where next until you know where before." He lifted the metal scrap at an angle so that the wind could help flip through a few more pages for perusal. Then, once it was set aside, a foot closed the book to its front cover and pinned it shut. East leaned over, a critical eye searching for telltale wear and tear. "Journal... What sort of journey would a journal have had?"

An odd situation to talk to nothing, only for the nothingness to begin talking past him.

At its held angle, the metal scrap proved to be an imperfect tool even more so than when laid across the strange book's pages. End pressed with only the slightest application of force against aged paper, the entire length bowed like a sapling would to a violent gust of air. It trembled within East's grip, and if the present breeze had been any stronger, the cloth-wrapped piece might have blown out of his talons and far from reach. Luck was what kept the precarious arrangement intact.

An unwitting accomplice to knowledge's pursuit, the wind pushed the pages along, the speed at which it did so fluctuating based on whether or not the scrap was being lowered back into place. Writing meaningful to East as random scratches of dirt passed by in a blur, the markings' sole distinguishing feature the varying sharpness of their valleys and peaks. Images went by slower, easier to comprehend than symbols whose meaning he'd no idea of.

The first and second images were a curiosity but warranted not much more than a momentary pause. The series of sketches following after them evoked greater interest, the sights depicted a mixture of familiar and far from recognizable.

It was here, pondering over the crossed-out caves amongst the compilation, that a low and disbelieving exhale responded to such bold description of himself.

Hero? Flattering, but hardly accurate.

"Oh, that all depends," the hawk murmured. Vision sharp in the dim surroundings, his gaze raked from side to side and climbed up to where carved creatures observed, ever unbreathing and silent. Searching for a shudder of movement amongst their ranks or a glimpse of life hiding in the shadows below them. "Does a voice have a throat?"

His own constricted as he returned to the open book, a second look bringing to notice the flaws upon the sketch he'd left: stains speckled the rendered rock and the water cutting through it. Spatter from the genuine article perhaps. At least that's what his initial assumption was—its reappearance at the text's end brought forth other possibilities, ones that caused his shoulders to tense and him to lean in, trying to determine whether the brown spots had always been such and never before been tinged a rusty hue.

When he at last finished, the cover settled into place and examined as well, East straightened up. Without a figure to lay eyes upon, he resigned himself to directing his thoughts at the wall the journal had been abandoned beside.

"A hero's decisions are as good as their storyteller's. Their identity defined by the words behind them, I'm sure you understand. So which ones have you reserved besides cunning for your cluechaser?"

In what manner did they intend their puppet to dance?

The Narrator wove their words. He listened. Then once silence gripped the tunnel again, a low whistle rose out of it, not the melodic perfection of a songbird but a rough, appreciative sound. "If these walls could talk... with you around, an awful lot."

A head shake. Smugness, teasing and admonishing at the same time, edged his tone. The meaning couldn't be any more obvious than if it'd been spoken outright: Careful there. I thought you weren't supposed to give the game away. Not that he necessarily objected to what almost could have been addressing him instead of speaking over him.

"Stumbling's a bit much, I'd say," East rejoindered, a glint in his eyes. "More of a meeting with an old friend by the name of Chance, leaving behind pieces for me to pick up."

Ruins. Bones. Creatures in varying stages of rot, varying degrees of gruesome. This new find just happened to be a little more unique than those, an entire personality attached to its cryptic pages.

He surveyed the book again, withdrawing his talons from their resting spot on the cover. Other than the four-toed print left, not a speck of leather binding was untouched by dust. Age was worn into its surface, beaten into every crease. Whatever hazards it might have encountered, in the care of however many owners it had survived them all. And that same voice might have crooned over their shoulders as well.

The eagerness of his invisible observer possessed a contagious quality. As if they were on a shared wavelength, a similar urge vibrated in his feathers. However the sensation was not as pure, tinged by suspicion and hesitance. Rubbing toes together, East considered their friction and, though he lacked the magic to do so, couldn't help wondering at setting the entire affair ablaze. To let the ashes settle and see if the voice from nowhere—or rather somewhere?—kept their breath.

Due to mutual interest, he decided to play the role he'd been cast in. At least until the potential risks outweighed the reward of satisfaction.

"Pushing up daisies. Doesn't sound pleasant. Can't be any worse than tromping on them." Not that he knew what a daisy was. All guesswork, him. In an exaggerated show of caution, he shifted weight. Tipped to one side, a foot turned inward, revealing the dust accumulated on its bottom. "Let me shake this off, and I won't even bother touching the ground."

Circles within circles. Representative of what exactly, he had no clear idea. But his stone-walled world held a couple decent options, ones that'd require venturing either forward or back, journal in tow. He threw a glance in both directions before choosing promptly.

Was it the right place or time to start? Only the other fella knew that, and there was no guarantee of anything certain from them besides their entertainment at his success or pending failure.