ORIGIN

In the shadow of a crumbling stone wall, a chrysalis was cracking.

Dewberry emerged rather awkwardly, tangled up in herself. Everything felt so very strange, and even the dim light from the glittering quartz crystals above seemed too bright for her eyes. Her heart rate was normal, but she had a vaguely remembered sense of urgency and ... danger?

She flicked out her tongue, tasting the air uncertainly. She couldn't remember exactly why, but she thought she had been in a hurry before - before the edge of her memory blurred and faded. What was wrong with her? She hadn't hit her head on something, had she? Dewberry cast her mind back as far as she could remember. She'd come out of a stone like she had just now, once before. There had been a mother to welcome her - soft, feathery, welcoming, and oh-so-warm. It should have been a comforting thought, but the more she tried to recall about the figure, the more her sense of unease grew.

Danger. Danger. Hurry. There had been a threat of some kind - surely it hadn't come from the mother? She distinctly remembered wanting to be closer to the bird, trusting her, loving her. There was no mother to welcome her now. Maybe the danger had already come.

Dewberry's unease mounted. There was a danger here, surely, but what? She felt for her magicka, reaching out to call it up. Perhaps it could give her some insight. But she could feel nothing. No, really - nothing. When she reached for magic, all she felt was a yawning emptiness inside her. Panicking, she raced away from her broken chrysalis, not quite sure what exactly she was running from.

What was wrong with her?

She realized, after a while, that she had no idea where she was going.

Dewberry slowed and coiled around herself into a loose loop. infinite quartz stars glittered above her, illuminating the surroundings. Now that she had a chance to calm down, she became aware of a gnawing sensation in her belly. Snakes didn't eat as often as other animals, but she had been in hibernation inside her chrysalis for quite a while. It was probably time for her to hunt something.

But now that Dewberry was shaking off the residual grogginess from hibernation, she recalled what she had been fleeing from. That giant green lizard who had murdered Father. And, perhaps more importantly, she remembered what she had been slithering toward:

Tunnel N, the Bloodberries' home.

She had been going to warn them.

If snakes could cry, Dewberry would have. How long had it been since she had gone to sleep, encased in her chrysalis? How long had it taken her to reawaken? There was no small chance that her family was already dead. Suddenly she didn't have much of an appetite anymore. Everything seemed unimportant next to Father's loss, and the potential loss of Mother and Jayberry and all her siblings.

No. No no no no no. She couldn't just lie there and do nothing. Even now, there was a slim chance that the Bloodberries remained alive and well. She had to go find them. She would warn them of the lizard if, by some miracle, it had not attacked yet. If it had, but her family had won in the end, she would beg them for forgiveness and simply hope that Mother and her siblings would accept her apologies. Anything was better than doing nothing, because doing nothing was what had gotten her into this situation in the first place.

She flickered her tongue in and out of her mouth, tasting the air. Faint though it was, she thought she detected a hint of sweetness coming from the north. No blood, though. She'd always found her family's habits of leaving blood and body parts in their home fairly disgusting, and disliked the stench that came with the mess. Now, though, the change worried her. Tunnel N's sugary smell had never been enough to overpower the smell of blood and death before. What had happened to make such a change? As quickly as she could manage, she slithered in the direction of the sweet smell.

-exit