Within the darkness, the stone shuddered.

Something within was threatening to be born.

A stout snout shoved stone aside and the ghost white bat emerged from its shimmering gem. She shook off the dust and shell, and fur bristled up from the cold of being alive.

She yawned, stretched open her wings and gave them a flap. She managed only a small hop off the cave floor and a smaller leap forward. With a huff, she spread her wings out against the cave floor, pressing her fingers and thumbs of her wings against the ground and pushed.

It was shaky but she was up, fluttering awkwardly against the dark backdrop. She released an ultrasonic sound and felt the shape of the cave return to her and form around her. It was big, to put it mildly.

The problem with being alive, she realized, was the confusion of what to do next. All she knew is she wanted to find the night and the stars and those felt a long way away.

Filth was picking its way through Orion, exploring the cavern's nooks and crannies, when it heard a faint crunch not unlike the sound of its own hatching. Its ears swiveled towards the sound as it crept closer, red eyes straining to spot the newborn. The shape was indistinct in the murk, but it could swear something was fluttering.

Could this be food? Vivilene had said that biting people was rude, so Filth knew it should check whether this was people before trying to eat it. Bugs were generally not people, it knew, and grass definitely was not people. Fruit wasn't either, or berries. None of those things fluttered except bugs, but this seemed a little too large to be a bug.

Filth paused to listen for it, but the sounds around it were indistinct. The heartbeat of the fluttering thing mixed with too many others, including its own; it could not get a good sense of the flutterer's size or shape. Filth snorted in frustration.

"Hello," it called in its wheezing, high-pitched foal voice, resorting to speech to figure out what this creature could be. "Are you people or food?"

@Ekko

Ekko hoovered in the air, scattering back and forth in a failing attempt to remain stationary while in flight. She fluttered towards Filth, bouncing through the air around the foal to get a good look at it. It was certainly not the same at her and she wondered if other things share their shapes. So far, based on recent findings, it seemed unlikely.

“Food?” she glanced across at her wings, around the space, and then back down at Filth. “Nope! No food here, just us creatures.”

It was perplexing. How come it didn’t have wings? Why were its legs so long and hers almost non-existent?

“Hey! You’re new, too, right?” Ekko swooped around and hoovered at a distance from Filth’s face, a flash of white in the dark. “Maybe we can be new together!”

--
@Filth

"I'm a child, which I think means I am new," said Filth. "I started existing less than a cycle ago, which doesn't seem like very much. My name is Filth. I'm a horse," it continued, gaze following the other creature to the best of its ability. She was a little easier to see now that she was closer.

The stranger looked like a bat. Bats were normally food, although trying to eat one had given Filth a tummy ache, which it understood to mean that something was awry. This bat spoke, however, so the foal sorted her into the potential 'friend' category.

"You look like a bat," it repeated aloud, nosing at the air in the stranger's general direction. "Bats are good. We can be friends, if you want. Do you have any name?"

@Ekko

“A horse? And I’m a bat?” she swooped back and assessed the differences. She was pleased and excited to see what other forms creatures took. Maybe she could find more friends out in these caves.

She looked up at the smattering of crystals above her, taking in their glow. They weren’t quite the stars that she woke up longing for but they made comfortable simulacrums.

“I think horses must be good, too,” she said, with a fang filled smile. She hoped to find other horses too, perhaps another bat if she could be so lucky. This world already felt huge to her and she wondered what world might exist beyond this cave. She stared down the way Filth came for a moment.

“My name is Ekko!” she declared, swooping up and fluttering above Filth. “Since we’re friends, I’d like to see the rest of the world. Maybe we could go together? We’re new, let’s find somewhere together.”

And with that she began to flutter back the way Filth came, leaving her gem shell discarded to become dust for the cave.

-----
@filth

Filth trotted along as best it could. Its gait was still unpracticed, stumbling, and nowhere near as nimble as the bat's movement. It wondered, briefly, if Ekko - like most people seemed to - could see better than Filth, or perhaps hear better, to know where she was going so quickly. That would certainly help them explore the gloomier or downright aphotic nooks of the cavern.

"Pride's garden is this way, I think," it said, craning its neck to sniff in the direction Ekko was moving. "He's nice. He gave me food when I was very new, and he's a grandfather." Filth's tone was appreciative; its limited experience of grandfathers so far had been pleasant.

"And this cave is called Orion," it continued in Ekko's general direction, walking a little straighter as it took pride in knowing things. "I don't know everything that's in here yet, but there are a lot of bats. Most of them don't talk, though. Also a lot of them are bigger than you, so they might try to eat you." It understood, vaguely, that being eaten was disagreeable to many creatures, though it had not yet figured out why.

@Ekko

“You seem to have an excellent idea on things for someone so new! Thank you,” she said, swooping around Filth. Her expression shifted to puzzled as she watched Filth move. “I can see that your movements aren’t as confident as your words. Your eyes, are they not treating you well?”

It feel into place. Her purpose rose inside of her. Finding things and those things could be finding the way. She found an outcropping and clung to the stones for a moment, her wings not used to so much movement.

“If you wished it, I could help become your eyes? We can find our way together.”

---
@filth

"Pride told me most of it. He's a deer. He's got four legs, like me, and spiky antlers on his head," said Filth, who was enjoying being a knower of things.

At the mention of its eyes, it squinted at the bat, or at least the pale spot that it thought was the bat.

"I don't know. I think other people see more than I do," it admitted as it pawed at some rocks, a little put out. It didn't know exactly how much time had passed since its hatching, nor how much would elapse until it was full-grown, but if its sight was going to improve, it surely would have by now.

"I can see a little better if I get very close, but most things aren't very close, and sometimes things run away when I try to get close enough. I can hear well, though," it added. "Finding our way together sounds nice, anyway. Do you know where you want to go?"

@Ekko