ORIGIN

There it was again! The small fruit bat descended from his circling flight onto a moss covered stone. Sure enough, hidden by its color among the plant life, there was a small egg-like rock.

Just a few moments earlier Zeno had been on his long and winding morning flight through the cave when a barely-audible knock grabbed his attention. Now sure, he often encountered unexplained noises; an unseen greater gembound kicking rocks around, a lesser one scurrying between hiding spots on pure instinct. This sound, however, had been much more like the former than the latter despite there being no soul in sight.

"How long have you been there?" he asked the malachite rock. He received no response in return of course. Even if the young one inside could hear and understand it would have no way of communicating back.

The bat waited there the rest of the afternoon, breaking his previous habit of spending most of his day slowly memorizing new portions of the cave system. He would have to save cataloging the room that sounded of wind and the room beyond the dragon's tunnel for another time, this discovery had perked and renewed his interest.

And thus a new routine was formed. As before he would circle the caves and find food in the morning, but a decent bit of his afternoon was spent near this living stone. Of course he was not the only one to find it, various other gembounds of both the greater and lesser varieties came near before going about their own business. The greater ones held within them the potential for enlightening conversation, while the lesser always moved on quickly, having no interest in something that was not edible.

Eventually there came a day where Zeno arrived at the mostly hidden resting place of the egg to find the stone shattered into pieces, and laying right beside it in obvious wonder a small bird, similar to the one that had greeted him on his first day of true consciousness.

A small shutter found its way through the bat's spine; that day had not been entirely happy, nor had been the many cycles of unrelenting darkness that followed. He would have to see to it that this new life got a proper welcome to the world.

"Good morning!" he called out as his flight descended; landing upon the very same rock he had perched upon when first discovering the egg. Whether it would be able to respond was unknown- all gembound emerged with varying degrees of skill in movement and communication. Hopefully this one would be able to at least recognize his benign intent.

Zeno smiled softly at the young owl's quiet acclimation to the new world, staying still on his perch a few feet away so as to not accidentally spook it. This was certainly not as scenic a spot as his ledge above Orion had been, but he felt a small form of envy of the emotions hatched one must have been feeling being able to experience sight and movement and fresh air for the first time.

"So you already have a handle on speech? How wonderful!" he spoke with a cooing voice. Of course speech was not uncommon at this stage, with much knowledge being cemented into the mind in the period of time before emergence. No need to go into details like that however, that would only discourage the youth.

With the owl looking at him he decided to chance approaching, slowly of course. The small bat crawled down the side of the mossy rock and onto the cool ground. He stopped and perched himself up on his wings as much as possible once he was a comfortably short distance away.

"My name is Zeno, do you have a name yet?"

Though a bit surprised by the small bird's stumbling motion toward him Zeno made no motion to retreat, even stretching his wing out a bit to more comfortably accommodate the youth. He could understand the feeling of being overwhelmed, he certainly had gone through his fair share of surprise when he entered this world too.

"Aloo is it?" he remarked with a soft smile, steadying his wing to act as a proper tent, "In that case, until you come upon another title, that's what I will call you. Or perhaps something a bit more akin to Aluë. Is that okay for now?"

As the tiny owl settled Zeno's attention shifted toward the stone from which it came and its brilliant green hues. The same green, it seemed, that perched itself upon Aluë's beak. A twinge of envy surfaced in his mind, observed but quickly discredited.

He had emerged into the cave from a stone that burned with the colors of the rainbow, yet he bore no sign of that rock's glow. Aluë would always be easily identifiable as one of the greater gembounds, beings capable of cognizant thought, while having no gem he would forever appear to be little more than a winged rat. Such was the nature of life, though, and he realized well that begrudging the different fates of the greater ones would lead only to suffering.

"Don't worry, young one." he assured the owl under his wing, his hidden envy drifting away now that it had been acknowledged, "There is nothing directly around here that could pose danger to you. You have time to rest and acclimate to this place."