As Khloros listened to Nemesis speak, he found his mind--as it had during her story--drifting along to consider her words.

Where are our parents...?

He peered back at her, tilting his equine head quizzically.

He cast his mind back to the moment of his own birth. He couldn't remember the words, now, but he did remember whispering, murmurs of a purpose, and of his name. Sharply, he looked to Nemesis, mind working.

"...Do you remember anything about when you were born? Aside from... setting yourself on fire, I mean? ...How did you get your name?"

It might have seemed a random question, or at best a bizarre leap of logic, but he asked the question with sudden intensity. If she'd heard things, as he had, maybe it was a clue as to their births?

Even more, maybe it was a hint to their purposes, their origins, and their eventual fates. He thought this in simpler terms--in a sort of vague idea of "maybe it will tell us about us, but it was still intense, his curiosity burning with sickly heat as he peered at his new friend. His new family.


________________

BRING OUT YOUR DEAD

@Nemesis WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN

Nemesis

Nemesis considered, and quietly, she fell into another, although briefer, story.

"When I was born, I remember being aware of... of the air-- of Wind, and of Fire. I remember, thinking, that the air that rushed around me was waiting to fuel the fire in my spirit. I dreamed of spreading, of casting fire through the grass and air, of greedily being free-- but I wasn't able to move, not yet. It became so frustrating. I remember, breaking loose, nearly falling off of the cliff in the process, and that the first thing I ever saw... Was Wind, the great tempest, in the middle of my home."

She stared off towards the empty, dry center of Monoceros, the noise of vents above nothing compared to the roar of the great twister that had since all but disappeared.

"I was so eager to be alive, and I used my magic immediately. I became Fire-- and like I said, Fang noticed me and told me how to stop it-- because, well, it hurt. Being on fire, and all." It was silly to look back at her child hood antics, of the innocence of youth... It was kind of startling how at first she had been powerthirsty, hungry to grow her flames, but age had mellowed her out a bit... Her family had helped her get that under control.

"Fang asked me who I was, and I told her I was Fire," she said with a breathy laugh, shaking her head. Sure, she was Fire, and Fang still called her that, but she had come to know she was more made of Fire than Fire itself. She left the story there for now, waiting for what Khloros thought of the situation.

Khloros shifted from front hoof to front hoof slowly, regarding Nemesis with the same empty gaze he always held. But now it was actually empty; his mind, for a moment, was blank.

Her name wasn't fire, and she'd not actually answered him in the slightest--... Or had she?

Khloros considered, eyes narrowing slightly in thought. His memory tickled at the back of his own brain, unclear, but... lurking.

"I think I remember something like that when I was born. I think it was something about me being--not just me. Something else. I don't know. But you were--fire? How did you get the name Nemesis?"

He paused, peering at her for a moment, then added, "It's just... You said you wonder where our mothers are. I do too. Were we all born the same way? Did we all think of names right away?"

The young horse shifted from foot to foot again, but this time deep in thought. Maybe if he and Nemesis had a similar experience, others had, too? She was born thinking she was fire, and he was--... What was he?

He was a carrier of Death, he thought. If he wasn't misremembering. He wasn't sure what that meant, aside from maybe that his friends, his bacteria, might be deadly, but what about others? Was Booker born with the idea that he was a mushroom?

Khloros squinted and shook the thought aside with a toss of his mane, shifting his focus back to Nemesis and her Fire.

________________

BRING OUT YOUR DEAD

@Nemesis

Nemesis

Nemesis nodded at the colt's question, her tail swishing back and forth slowly as she remembered her youth. "For a long time I went by the name Fire-- Fang still calls me it, y'see." It was more of a pet name now, but the fact of the matter was the same.

"I don't know if I always knew my name or not-- I was pretty fixated on the whole Fire deal. Anyway, I went down to the Wind, after a while, and I would run around-- see, the Wind was like this huge twister, a cyclone of air-- and I would chase it, sort of. I did that a lot, as a newborn... I was sure it would make me tougher."

She had never really told the whole story to anyone, but no one had asked, either. "It was in the Wind that I first realized my name, first thought about it I guess. It sort of... Came to me, I guess. I don't think the Wind told me it, but the answer was there, and I knew it was, I guess? I wanted to chase the Wind even before I was born and that's where I came up with Nemesis, so..."

She didn't know if that really answered his question, but she wondered it-- she had never asked anyone where they had come up with their names. It had never seemed important before.

"So yeah. I raced around the Wind, and I was thinking to myself like, I'm Fire but-- I'm... I'm more than just that, I'm an enemy to all who threaten my family, I'm Nemesis..."

Khloros half-closed his eyes in a sort of gentle smile. She was sort of adorable, this gentle giant, clumsy with her words but obviously big in her heart.

He shook his mane a bit. She didn't seem all that interested in theories and histories, but rather slightly stumbling over her own words, babbling almost... shyly? About her past. It was endearing, and for a moment, Khloros felt the slightest bit protective of his new big sister.

"So... You are fire? Can you--make, fire? You can still set yourself on fire? What can you do with it? Is it like... friends? I mean, for Booker and me, we have... friends, tiny ones--lots of them--inside us. Is that what fire is like for you?"

He peered at Nemesis, her tale of her name still swimming in the back of his mind, her enthusiasm at her magic taking over his thoughts and washing away all questions about their origins. Instead, he wanted to know, now, how Fire used her, well, fire.

________________

BRING OUT YOUR DEAD

@Nemesis

Nemesis

... Like friends? Nemesis blinked at him-- no, it wasn't like that, not at all. She didn't know how to explain it, it was a connection deeper than fire, stronger and more... Instinctual than even a wild animal's mind. To eat, to consume, to burn. It was less like hundreds of small voices, tiny and lots and lots, and more like one, overarching, controlling thought and impulse.

The rhino had no idea how to explain it to the horse, however. "Um, yeah, I can still set myself on fire and stuff. It doesn't even hurt too bad if I do it right," she explained, taking a deep breath. She could show him. It was easy.

The fire built up timidly under her skin, her wide feet starting to smoke. Her ears caught fire first-- for some reason, perhaps it was the proximity to her gemstone, but her audits blazed, fire crackling in her ears in a way that made it hard to hear. Her nose grew hot, and so did her tail, but the fires didn't seem to take anywhere else-- she was being careful not to make a flame that would hurt her new family.

"See, fire?" She commented lightly, lifting her head. "And as for Fire-- it's not really... like, lots of small friends, its more like... A single energy, a spirit. It grows if it is fed, and it dies if it is smothered, but it can always return, and it is always the same, always hungry and eager to spread and burn. Dangerous, but if you know how to treat it-- it is warm, safe, protective even."

Khloros leaned closer, ears pricking up, to sniff toward the flames. The air was immediately warmer even a couple of feet away and quickly Khloros pulled back, sneezing.

He blinked at Nemesis, listening closely. Not like many small friends? Yet the way she described it, the overarching something, felt almost right. Almost. Not quite, though. He struggled to put it into thoughts, but then decided to try to translate the concept directly into words, instead.

"I... think I know what you mean. With my friends it's kind of like that, too--one big idea, one... goal, one feeling. Only it's made up of a thousand thousand tiny ones. Like they all decide, together." The idea felt foreign, difficult to put to words, after all. His friends wanted to live, to see, to spread where needed, but he felt that there was some deeper goal that kept them lurking within him until the time, or times, came.

Had the foal known what cells were, known that the entirety of any body was made up much the same--of millions of tiny "friends" that decided something all together, decided to be called Khloros, or Nemesis, and to live and lurk and spread--then he might have been able to better form the thought. But as it was, he only fidgeted, a little, at his own inability to word it properly.

"Nemesis? Does... everyone have friends, or... or Fire? Does everyone have magic?"

________________

BRING OUT YOUR DEAD

@Nemesis

Nemesis

Nemesis blinked, letting her flames turn into smoldering pillar of ashy grey smoke, flitting up towards the ceiling, only to be carried off by a gentle wind. She snorted, shaking her head, making sure the flames were completely out and not about to catch again on her sensitive ears. "I... I think everyone has magic," she replied shortly, trying to think about all of it. Mag had her magic, which, Nemesis thought let her see-- or at least, feel, where the others went, but she didn't understand it very well. Nothing made sense except for Fire-- Fire she got down pat, for sure.

Fang... Did Fang have magic? Well, she probably did. She tried to think about it, tried to understand what kind of magic she had-- but really, it was complicated. No one else just went around setting themselves on fire all the time-- she had a vague memory of a lion pulling and pushing on her, and... But really, Nemesis couldn't imagine someone without magic, though to be fair she had rarely seen others use magic. "But I don't know," she admitted, finally, reaching down her nose to scratch at the inside of her leg.

"I really never thought about it much."

Khloros didn't want Nemesis to feel stupid. He wasn't sure if her leg truly itched, or if she was embarrassed, looking away to avoid eye contact while admitting that she didn't know something. He nickered softly as he considered her words, before speaking.

"I don't know, either. I bet nobody does... I bet there's a lot of stuff nobody knows."

Khloros paused, hesitating.

"Is there... someplace safe to sleep, here?" he asked, a little forlorn all of a sudden at the memory of just how alone he was. "I made sure Louie made it here, but--... He left, again, and he kinda forgot me, I think. Is there somewhere else I can stay?" He tried to keep the hopeful tone from his voice. It would be rude, after all, to impose on Nemesis, and maybe she didn't really have any place for him to sleep.

"I can just sleep anywhere, I mean, if not," he added hastily.

________________

BRING OUT YOUR DEAD

@Nemesis ((maybe they can go off to sleep and wrap it up soooon? Or not idm!))

Nemesis

Nemesis nodded, relaxing slightly as the colt said he had no idea either-- that there was stuff that nobody knew, anyway. She wondered if that was true... Fang seemed to know a whole lot, but the idea that she might not know some stuff made the rhino feel a soft tingle of bemusement. She'd have to test and see if there was anything Fang didn't know, next time she saw her.

But for now, the rhino was going to address the situation with Khloros' sleeping quarters. Of course Louie didn't think to set him up with a place to stay. Well, there were plenty of cracks 'round this area, and probably a few more nooks that could fit a scrawny horse. "Well let's see... You could stay down in the gorge, there's a nice pool of water down there, nice and shady, if you don't want to find a lil' crack to nestle up in up here," Nemesis began to suggest as she started poking her nose into holes along the wall, looking for a nice place for the new family member to stay.

Sure enough, she found a little cave alcove just fit for a horse to stand around in, if he wanted. With a decisive snort, she backed up and gave a wide swish of her tail. "Or, y'know, you can stay here. Didn't see any spiders, so you should be fine."