ORIGIN

When Kera returned to Orion, it was empty-handed.

Vargas might be pissed to hear that she was going home without finding him a cat, but a quick glance around the winding valley told her that he was, for the time being, still out. If he was seeing Giggle, or Rift, or whoever, she did not know. All Kera wanted was a brief rest.

She was surprised to return to her den-- a crumpled building, as many were in Orion --was still intact after Vargas' visit. The bioluminescent mushrooms, glowing green-blue, were still crawling contentedly up the walls of the entryway. It was a good signifier for where she lived-- the piercing light in Orion's dark was something of a comfort to her.

The wolf entered, settled down, and shut her eyes to sleep. But that didn't last very long.

Her ear flickered when she heard her own name being called out. It didn't seem to be a call for aid-- not someone in danger, and the very next sentence at least told her why she was being searched for.

Kera hadn't actually thought about Blackberry and the trial for some days. It was easier, that way. Thinking about it too much made her head dizzy, her stomach sick. Vargas, and operating as some Hand of the Overseer, was a good distraction.

Wearily, she stepped out, glancing up. Against the quartz-studded ceiling of Orion was a smallish shape, white and flying, with a disc-like face. It looked like--

".... Aka?" She called out quizzically, tense. "What do you want?"

Kera jerked backwards, briefly, as the owl got closer. Aka hadn't shown his face near her since they were children- -not since he stole from her. Though, a closer inspection of the thing up close and there was no brown on it, and it's face wasn't quite the same.

The gem, too-- it was different.

... and the name.

Kera's tongue swiped along her jowls, though she didn't speak further on it. "Well, we haven't just met, you've arrived at my den without much warning and you're asking me about a murderer," she said a little dryly. Owls still sent that feeling of dread over Kera's shoulders, even after raising two half-bird children.

The wolf turned, sitting under her doorway, the mushrooms gleaming off her pale coat. For a moment she studied Aetius with flicking ears, thinking. Surely, Rift wasn't as stupid to give Blackberry automatic forgiveness...? Mercy, maybe, but surely even he couldn't forgive her.

Not after what she'd seen when they first met-- when he tried to kill Ritonai for accidentally burning a plant. But people changed, surely.

She huffed. "I'm Kera, the Lightbringer, Hand of Vargas," she said half-distantly, lifting her nose towards the barely-lit lanterns hanging along the cave wall, powered by the generator. "I turned the lights back on, when the caves were dark."

What she knew about Blackberry was a different beast all together, however. The wolf lifted a massive paw to scratch behind her ear, absent-mindedly. "I've known her all my life. All her life," she explained. "We hatched around the same time, if not the same day. What exactly do you want to know about her?"

Usually, someone would have questioned the Lightbringer title, or question how Kera had managed to turn the lights on, or asked for the story. Even Vargas, who seemed fairly apathetic to these things, wanted to know what the hell she meant by it, other than she received the title for turning the lights on.

Maybe she already knows, Kera considered. Or maybe she's obsessed with the goose.

Many people seemed to be, these days-- but she filed that away for the time being, to mull it over further down the line in the conversation. She seemed polite enough-- but birds always put on a damn act for no reason.

Kera grumbled, for a moment. "She attacked me," she began. "No older than a few sleeps old, either of us, and she attacked me on sight. She was rude, and arrogant, and loud and angry, for reasons even Blackberry herself knows."

There was a long pause, for a moment. Even if this owl didn't quite understand, someone had to tell her-- "listen, very carefully. We're all born a certain way. We have traits and quirks that we can't grow out of, and Blackberry can't help herself." Kera took a long breath. "After she attacked me, she went on to keep attacking other people. She hurt a lot of my friends and built up a reputation for herself in a mere half-cycle for being unpredictable and dangerous."

"When I saw her again, just before the lights were brought back, she had gotten worse," Kera's voice was gradually lowering-- soft, but not kind or sympathetic. No, even after her visit to the goose in Eridanus, she still hated her. For everything she'd done. "She deemed herself someone to be feared and avoided in the caves, that anyone in her path should fear death. She threatened to kill me, so I..."

Defended herself? No, not quite. Kera's tongue lashed out at her lips for a moment as the memories-- no matter how hard she tried to push them back --flooded back to her. The blood and the screaming, the crunching of bones in her jaws, the coppery taste in the back of her throat.

It scared Kera, truthfully, to think there wasn't that much difference between them.

"I did what I thought was right," she finished, after a long pause. "I thought the caves would be much safer without her around, and I even mourned her for a while. But she came back, guarded by the damn moose she'd made friends with, somehow."

A longer pause.

"She killed my friend, as some sort of vengeance," --poor Alan, poor, stupid Alan-- "and left his body behind for me to find, near my den. And she didn't stop."

Not until the damn war, anyway. She gave a small huff-- clearly not finished with everything she knew about Blackberry, but pausing to let Aetius digest and ask questions, if she had any.

No, there was definitely something not quite right going on here. Perhaps old habits died hard, but Kera didn't feel entirely at ease here. The wolf narrowed her eyes briefly in response to the lone question, flicking her ear.

Nothing more to say than 'that's horrible' and move on. No, Kera was fairly sure this wasn't old paranoia about birds-- owls in particular. Perhaps she was something along the same vein as Blackberry herself, lacking in the empathy department. Going through the motions.

At least Blackberry seemed to be learning.

"I'm a guardian," Kera said simply. "I vowed to protect everyone in the caves, and for a long time, I was protecting people from Blackberry and her spawn." Murder-dumplings. "They're not around anymore, and her children have scattered to the winds. Some have changed their names, some haven't."

She licked her muzzle. "Blackberry is a gembound like the rest of us. She isn't a monster like everyone-- including herself --makes her out to be. It's in a guardian's right to show compassion to everyone, no matter what they've done, but do not mistake compassion for forgiveness," Kera continued. "She doesn't deserve to be forgiven, or to have what she's done shoved away and forgotten. She doesn't automatically deserve a second chance, and she sure as fuck, does not deserve to die. Not while she wants to die."

Kera let out another huff, quieter, as she spent a few moments itching her broad shoulder. This might have been a little harsh, she realised-- maybe not as harsh as murdering half the caves, but still harsh. For a moment, she watched Aetius, and then sighed a final time.

"I know she wants to change," she said. "But it's a lot harder than just asking people to accept her apologies, no matter how genuine she might be. Nor can she ask people to give her a second chance. She has to prove that she's worthy of more, that she can be trusted, and that she can fit into regular society like the rest of us. I'm a guardian. I'm willing to help her earn that, but I'm not going to forgive her for what she's done to me, my friends, and her own children."

'I understand?' No, she didn't think the owl did.

She was too young-- this much was obvious. The owl didn't seem to realise how rude it was to wander up to someone's den and pester them about an old enemy without actually listening to them. Before Kera could even speak, however, she was leaving.

"What?" She barked alarmedly, pushing up as a brief flutter of quiet wings sounded, and the owl was diving out of sight. What the fuck?

Kera, for a moment, was bewildered. Who the fuck just left mid-conversation, after acting weird as hell? The wolf paced out of her den and into the open, nails clicking against the cave floor. She stared out towards the entrance to tunnel I, where the white dot faded.

Kingdom of Eridanus. Rift's lot.

Kera ruffled her fur out as she started padding out of Orion and towards the tunnel as well, her brow furrowed. Someone had to warn Rift, at least.