ORIGIN

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The little alligator pressed back out from between the ferns of Eridanus, peering around quietly.

They're gone. Finally.

He had lain still and quiet for some time, his ambush predator instincts serving him well. Nobody had come or gone, and so at last--after several hours--he pushed himself forward, sliding down into the twin pools of Eridanus with the slightest of splashes.

Dragon was after offerings, offerings for Aquarian. His offering pile was nearly complete. He'd collected carcasses of all kinds; he'd collected gems, defunct light orbs, he'd collected a glowing magical rock and a glowing magical dead deer. He'd found a golden collar with a tattered crimson cape attached.

But this place--this was water, like he was water, like Aquarian was water. Dragons in the water made perfect sense to him, and he wondered if perhaps there might be something here to find. The pools felt to him like they might be important.

The lights were dimmer; it was likely the cave's equivalent of "night," or maybe something was draining the orbs' power. He didn't think about this, though--he didn't know what "night" was, or "day," or anything else outside the confines of Origin Cave.

Dragon slipped out further along the dark surface, legs tucked up to his sides, thick tail propelling him in very slow, gracefully powerful sweeps until he was floating just above the center of the left pool. He then ducked his head down, peering.

Despite the clarity of the water, and his excellent sight in dim light, he couldn't quite see to the bottom. Or maybe the water was so clear that it was hard to judge quite where the bottom was: it could be a few feet down, or a mile. He just wasn't sure.

The young alligator took one last look around. The shores were empty. Eridanus was quiet. He was alone.

Dragon took a deep breath, filling his lungs, and then dove. He cut down through the cold, trying to get as deep as he could as quickly as he could, in search of an offering worthy of Aquarian.

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Dragon surfaced with a splash several long minutes later, gasping for air. There was nothing--or rather, he could find nothing. It seemed empty, quiet and peaceful--at least for now.

He blinked away the water, then--after catching his breath, and looking around to get his bearings--headed for the other pond. He crawled out of one Eye of Eridanus and to the other, the right one, tasting its crystalline clarity with a tip of his thick tongue before lowering himself to his belly and sliding in.

He sank briefly and then bobbed back up, and again swam out to the pond's center with his thick tail as slow propulsion. There was something vaguely eerie about these pools, and that to an entirely un-superstitious dragon who lived in a black marsh with a sea monster in it. It was something about the beauty and the stillness, the clarity of the water.

It felt, he reflected suddenly, as if something were here, waiting. As if the ferns along the shore were watching him.

Dragon looked around, eyeing the ferns suspiciously--taking his own thoughts too literally. They didn't move, but he knew that he didn't move when he was lurking for prey. The instinct to simply leave the water and go home struck him, but against his better (though, granted, young and brash) judgement, he instead took a deep breath, and dove.

He arrowed down into the cool darkness once again, tail thrusting to and fro to send him deeper and deeper, his eyes probing the darkness for anything at all that he might use. He was single-minded in his quiet determination, but that didn't stop one stray, doubtful thought from slipping past as he descended.

I hope I'm right about this.

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As the alligator dives deeper into the pool, he will find that the darkness is upon him quickly, despite the pools lacking a depth that light could not reach. There is a sudden stillness in the water, and his mind will begin to grow fuzzy, like the static of an old television. There are images of faces, unrecognizable, that stare at him through his mind's eye - but they too are glitched and difficult to discern. Words, incoherent, flicker in and out of realization. The water will suddenly turn icy cold, and the alligator is left with a feeling of deep foreboding. It would be wise to swim back to the surface.

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He almost didn't turn back. He was hungry to see what the faces were hiding. What was down there. He hadn't been attacked, so he assumed it was a display--a bluff--by things that couldn't actually hurt him.

But damn it, they were scary!

The little alligator hesitated, blinking to try and see through the cold dark, but even his low-light vision couldn't pick anything out--anything past the strange flickering imagery that coursed through his mind. With a hiss of bubbles through the water he turned, propelling himself swiftly right back out again.

Upon gaining the shore he turned, hissing throatily at the pool in fear and defiance, before scurrying off into the bushes of Eridanus.

I'll ask Aquarian. He'll know what that was.

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