ORIGIN - on the cruelty of the passage of time

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She had planned to ignore Pride from that moment on, to sit and wait until the inevitable time that her Master returned and she had something to answer to again. She didn't know what to do otherwise - it would not listen and she was still too weak. She could feel it in her bones, still waking from hundreds of years, her muscles felt smaller, deteriorated after such a long time asleep. She would not risk herself for something so petty.

She gave a visible reaction at his words, a twist of the jaw, an amused snarl as best she could muster. Tyranny? Abuse? He understood nothing. A young, foolish creature that knew nothing of the cruelties of the era she had been lost from. Those words meant nothing in the face of their purpose. Were they supposed to set down their arms and allow the caves to go to waste? Well, apparently that had already happened. Why it hadn't been ravaged by the Creator and destroyed for its ineptitude was anyone's guess.

But then Pride's voice shifted. His attention - not at her, but at the Throne behind her. Cyan pupils turned to glare at him and she slowly began to rise, feeling something tickling the back of her mind. What was he planning? What was he doing?

She almost didn't follow his command. Stubborn as she was, but sense got to her in time enough to shift away far enough to be out of the blast when it eventually came. She stared into it, shocked, horrified, utterly blinded in more ways then one as the Throne exploded in white hot flame, melting, ruined. She stared, and it was that moment that truly, she felt the span of time. It hadn't just been a few hundred years. Thousands had passed. Tens, maybe hundreds. She didn't know. Because no memory of the time before, no notion of the world she had come from, allowed her to even conceive someone to be so bold as to melt the Throne before an Overseer's very eyes.

It wasn't just the challenge to her position and authority. It was a visual representation of everything she had known crumbling to dust. She was confused. She was furious. She was...terrified.

Instinct took over as her brain seemed to just completely stop working. She whipped around, a heavy set of claws lashing out to grab that deer by his neck, close tight, and lift him into the air. To question on what fucking audacity he had to destroy the Throne. To demand answers to the questions she had before. And to right everything here and now so that she did not have to handle living with doubts for a second longer. But she couldn't get close - a barrier stopped her and suddenly her arm was wrenched back as Pride's magic activated, stopping her attack.

She didn't try again.

She simply stared, wide-eyed, at the stag. She wanted to say something. But what the fuck was she supposed to say? He had just destroyed the Throne. It wasn't like...that piece of rock hadn't particularly been important in her life, but it felt like he had just exploded a pillar holding up the core of her being. Her purpose. The Throne had always stood, her Master had always sat upon it. And she had always fulfilled her purpose. And now that there was no Throne, it was all gone. And she was thrust into cold, harsh reality.

She stared a moment longer and then she turned and left him standing before the smoldering, melting throne.

She simply walked away.

Wordlessly.

*exit, unless stopped

@Pride

He closed his eyes against the flash, blinding, and felt a quiet flow of satisfaction. Not one of rage fulfilled but some sort of... righteousness, or justice in it all. But was it? It was just a rock, in the end. A symbol, but-

Claws on stone.

He was already stepping back, summoning up his magic and opening his eyes wide with alarm, when she came for him. She was fast--and some disjointed part of his mind recognized that her massively long legs, compared to his, would probably do that. But she'd closed the gap in a heartbeat. That latent magic lashed, and she... stared back.

Wide eyes to wide eyes, and he couldn't tell what she was thinking: incoherent rage? Shock, that he'd try that? ...Fear? Certainly not of me. Surely Gembounds, or Valkhounds or whatever one had called them, had always had such power with magic. He didn't think himself unique in that. But she had turned, then, walking off, and he puzzled briefly over this. Adrenaline was racing through him so that it was hard to parse a course of action in the few seconds that he had before she vanished into the shadows.

His anger was ebbing, at least. It seemed he had 'won' for now, but he felt she was likely storming off to whatever Master she answered to, intending to bring hell back with her to rain down on him. Let her. The thought lacked animosity. He'd fight the lot of him; probably, he'd die. But that wouldn't be the end and he knew it--he couldn't shy away from it. That was the responsibility he'd taken on and he was mostly at peace with that much, at least.

On impulse--pure impulse--he sent his mind to hers as she moved away. But what could he show her, tell her? He had but seconds before she was gone, and if he wished to answer her questions--indeed to potentially head off legitimate bloodshed from her misplaced... or rather mistimed... loyalties, he had to act. He should.

It was likewise blind impulse that chose the scene--one here in Orion, the Forum (has she seen it? I imagine it was not so decayed) worn by time, half-ruined and crumbled but still kept clean enough. Dozens of Gembounds, all shapes and sizes (and would she know these new forms? Vargas had seemed confused by them) in the stands. Felines and deer, birds and horses and other things--more fantastical things, dragons and yes, Valkhounds among them. And in the center, down below, Vargas, and what looked like a brown version of Pride himself and perhaps she'd recognize Astraea's voice or the ruby at his forehead.

'This is the nest.' And the stag gestured around with his nose. 'The entire cave exists to be a nest, for you, the children. The creations. The life.' He shrugged. 'And a nest is temporary, for most. The children grow and leave. The parents stay behind to raise the next brood. But yes, Lord Dhracia is the one who took Raheerah—the dragon—and killed Jupiter. Below the Spire is... the remnants of the Spire that came before it. It is a well of the magic that was originally native to the caves, and that some of the creatures here share,' his nose pointed to Vargas, 'like in Vargas, and in me.'

Would this be enough? Enough to explain? A Master and his Overseer, explaining to dozens of modern creatures a past that was so clearly long-lost? Explaining a history beyond him? Explaining, too, incidents through which this Tectus had likely slept?

Pride left it at this; she could keep this information, or she could turn back to ask of it, or she could ignore him. He could hardly call it a 'gift' given what he'd just done to the Throne, which she seemingly valued, but it was given nonetheless.

red deer img credit - dan seagrave

@Tectus (possibly just for visibility?)

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