For many cycles, a tanzanite stone grew on a strange cliff at the edge of Polaris where a hallucinating gembound careened off the edge. Death didn't end the suffering of the gembound, the ill effects of loss and abandonment wearing down the being down to nothing before finally letting his magick get the best of him. Instead, he succumbed to his chrysalis which perched precariously on the edge of a narrow cliff. The large stone would soon be too heavy for the edge and soon it would collapse, taking the fully formed stone and mutated gembound inside down with it.

There was a loud crack! that crackled through the massive room before the chunk of rock fell towards the ground. Although it was no more than a few feet off the ground, unreachable however, the rock shattered and sent chrysalis skating across the ground. The tanzanite had sustained quite a bit of damage in the fall, however, and the crackling from that was no longer hidden under the sounds of the louder cracks from the cliff. The stone wouldn't last long and soon the being on the inside became uncomfortable will the impact of the landing and their encasing in this stone. The legs of the being stretched, however they were much too short now to reach like they once had. He remembered this. He remembered having longer legs, a short body and a long neck. He distinctly remembered being in this situation before, however he was able to touch the walls of his chrysalis.

Othello grit his teeth inside the stone and forced with his shoulder instead, shoving the stone as hard as he could from the inside. The tanzanite must have been stronger than Othello expected, but he was still groggy from the fall. Having used most of his strength to try and break the stone, he needed some time to rest. He would try again soon, after a short little break.

@ghanyarah

An idea had been gestating in his mind as of late, and though Ghanyarah had only spoken briefly of it in excerpts of his innermost feelings, he hadn't elaborated on it to anyone. But it nagged at him and prompted him to act, perhaps to build on it, in a subtle kind of way that could easily blossom into something real or fade as a passing trend. It wouldn't be the end of the world if nothing came from this stirring desire in his heart, but he hoped that something did - that was why he had ventured out to Polaris again, searching to see what he could find, who he could find, if someone else existed out there that wanted the same thing as him.

It was the extinction of solitude he craved. A real purpose, like one he had back when he was among the Children of Rot. Where he had to protect, and he had a group of Gembounds that he dared to call his family. Dragon's morals were hazy at best, and his goals were often to disrupt life in the caves, which meant Ghanyarah was constantly on his toes trying to ensure his groupmates were safe and in prime condition. He'd wanted something like that, but had to try and think of how to execute it. If he wanted to emulate Dragon's family ideal, it meant that he'd have to send his companions out for conquest, but Ghanyarah and grown and found that he didn't desire conquest. He didn't want to harm other sentient Gembounds, much as his primitive and hungry stomach compelled him to.

He'd have to execute this gathering some other way. The simplest way he could think to do so was to simply gather Gembounds that wanted to be around him, or wanted to live in the same place, that desired his protection. What better way to do so than to venture out and search for them? He'd produced this idea to Lituus, if a little vaguely and mostly along the lines of seeking companionship, and now was following through with the quest while further refining it among his thoughts. Polaris was the best place to start. It was where he'd found Odin, after all.

The reptile wandered, eager for signs of life, and quickly found it thumping dully from within an indigo coloured crystal lodged up on a cliff. The sound attracted him and caused him to pause, craning his neck to peer up at the chrysalis. It was fairly large - a new Gembound, or a mutant, like him? He chose to sit and wait, observing what would come from the chrysalis.

@Lituus @Othello

His first shove didn't work, but Othello had to keep trying. He couldn't give up now and be trapped in here until someone wandered up on him. He needed out before anyone saw him, for he hadn't seen himself. How long had he been in there anyway? What had he missed? Were the Merrymen even around anymore? Questions swirled around in his mind and it gave him the strength to break out of his chrysalis and pull himself out and onto the floor of Polaris. His first sight was where he assumed he fell from, but he was quick to survey the area. There was another gembound there, nearby, and he wondered if they saw him fall or simply wander in afterwards. Panicing, he didn't know what to do.

His body was much longer than he remembered and as he pulled the rest of his body out of the stone, he turned back to look at himself. Much longer than he remembered. His tail even. Before, he'd hardly been able to see it and now it was nearly the length of his new body. His forelimbs were short, maybe half of their prior length. No matter how much he stretched, his hind limbs barely held him any higher, if at all. What was this? He'd heard of mutations causing strange effects and changing the body, but what had he done to change like this? Othello huffed and looked back towards the lizard. There was no way he hadn't seen him now.

What exactly had this gembound seen? Othello narrowed his eyes at him and willed him to stay back, some how. Othello was scared, uncertain of all of this. "Stay back!" His eyes widened as he heard words, yet did not make them with his own voice. He'd been watching the gembound and certainly the words hadn't come from them. Certainly he hadn't spoken, right? Othello never felt his lips move, but the voice wasn't something that would sound like it came from the large, reptilian gembound... Had it come from him?

@ghanyarah

Slowly, he watched something emerge from the chrysalis. Something large, something silver, something very much alive. Ghanyarah's long, whip-like tail quivered behind him. He instinctively moved away from the beast that sat in the chrysalis above his head, flicking his tongue for a taste of the warmth that emanated from him. He didn't know what to think of the creature, if it was hostile or not; he couldn't tell, truly. But he was beginning to feel the buzz of his magic on his hide, ready to lash out of the creature attempted to attack.

Then a voice pierced his thoughts. Stay back!

Ghanyarah stiffened, immediately looking left and right, trying to locate the source of the voice. Where had it come from? He couldn't even tell where in the room it had been spoken, and he couldn't see any Gembounds other than the one in the chrysalis. It felt like it had cut straight into his brain, into his thoughts. The komodo locked his eyes back on the creature, deciding that it must have been him that inserted the words into his mind. He was silent for a moment longer, wondering what they could have meant. "I am not here to cause harm." Ghanyarah said out loud, staring at the snaky canine before his gaze shifted elsewhere, intending the message for anyone that was listening.

@Othello

Othello narrowed his eyes at the shape walking towards him in the darkness of the room. He could barely see, but he could tell the gembound stopped when the mysterious voice spoke. He'd answer back, claiming to cause no harm to him or whoever the voice was. Othello still had a hard time believing it was him, but who else would it have been? No one else was around, at least no one that either of them knew about. It made him nervous thinking someone else was out there, but maybe it was him that made the voice. Othello really had no reason to talk before now, and did he really even want to? Othello found little use in words, unless maybe he saw Odyssey again. He had plenty of words for him in particular.

Regardless, there wasn't an answer that made him convinced someone else was here. "Then what are you here for, huh?!" He called back, but swallowed afterwards. Maybe it was him. Those words were his exact thought to the gembound, and it was a little strange that they had been projected somehow during his thought...

@ghanyarah

The long canine seemed surprisingly defensive, if that was who was transmitting the messages. Ghanyarah narrowed his eyes and tried to pick out more details, but really, in the dim glow cast only by the distant spire, there wasn't much he could see beyond a hazy silhouette. Ghanyarah took a tentative step closer. "Looking." He answered evenly, perhaps even softly, trying to muster up some kind of reassurance or comfort for the newly emerged Gembound. "Were you asleep?" Like he had been, after the white dog made an attempt on his life?

@Othello