Kera licked her muzzle, and then turned her attention to the space next to her. Gem shining pale pink against white fur, an orb soon appeared next to her. It folded in on itself as it came into existence, cascading warm, white-gold light onto the dark stone.

"A goose is a bird," she explained, as the shimmering orb began to shift, stretching itself like dough until it formed a long, slender neck, a pointed head, a fairly robust body with the faint outline of wings, and webbed, duck-like feet. "It's shaped like this, but brown. It's head and neck are black, with a white patch on its cheeks."

It should be noted, as Kera realised herself, but it didn't look like it was capable of cycles of murder.

Kera crinkled her nose. She let Vargas get a good look at the orb before it vanished, and she continued listing everyone she knew-- starting from the very beginning, this time.

"The first person I ever met was a big cat called Zevruu," she said. "He had light magic, and offered to lighten up the room where I hatched. He was apathetic to the lights going out and I thought for a long time he turned them off, but I don't think so. He's shit at magic. The last time I saw him was during a magic competition and all he did was make a pretty light and then started screaming."

Then there was Blackberry, but she'd already been explained. "Then I met another wolf-- she was sort of.. yellowish-brown? And a lot skinner than me. She had a weird purple cloth around her neck that was hooked into her gemstone, and she made a gemstone sort of casing for my leg when it had broken. I don't know where she is, the last time I saw her, she was judging the magic competition in Polaris, near the Spire."

"There's an owl I met when I was a pup-- a bird, like Blackberry, but smaller and more agile. His name was Aka, and he was... absolutely nasty. We almost drowned together in the river in Polaris. I saved him, and he stole from me," Kera spat at the memory, bristling briefly. "I never saw him again. He might be dead, or he's just been very good at avoiding me."

"Then, in Canis, I watched a lizard hatch. A small one, though she might have grown. She was a bit like Aka-- totally nasty, but she didn't steal anything from me. She was just.. unpleasant, and I heard she was killed recently. I don't know what her, or Aka, did for magic, if anything at all."

And then she paused again, watching Vargas.

@Vargas

This was good. This was very good. Kera's memory was sharp, and though she obviously brought her own grievances into her information, it was otherwise useful. Vargas was, as she spoke, categorizing the names--magic, body size, so that's what a goose is shaped like-..., personality.

Aka would have done well in Hydra--well. Except for the almost drowning part, he supposed.

The "magicka competition" had him interested at once.

"Magicka competition? What is that?" It sounded like a test, that was for certain. Something new Astraea had implemented, perhaps--or maybe one of the other Masters? Perhaps they haven't been as derelict as I'd begun to think.

There was only one other thing that Vargas said--and this was an idle sort of thought, and a little behind the conversation. "That 'Huckleberry' sounds repulsive." Definitely prey; definitely the sort of thing (crying when fighting-? I almost feel bad. Almost.) they'd have killed and fed to the survivors. "Tell me of this magicka competition, though."

@Kera

Vargas seemed interested in what Kera had to say, at least-- and he was very interested in the magicka competition. Kera had taken part in there twice, now, and won second place in the wrestling.

Why did they do it? Fucked if Kera knew.

"Every few cycles-- I don't really keep a track of how many, exactly," she didn't really keep track of the cycles anyway. "Some gembound host, uhh-- 'olympics,' they call it. It's three competitions taking place, one of them is a magicka competition, where you have to show off how good you are with magic."

"There's also the wrestling competition, where you show off how good you are at fighting-- I won second place, the last time. It's not real fighting either, it's just sort of slapping each other around until yield or when a judge says so."

"And then there's the obstacle course," she went on. "When you run through a track, and you have to jump over things, and pick up others, and run faster than everyone else. I think I would have won that one, too, but someone got injured and I dropped out to go see what happened." Someone had been Jayberry. She should have killed Jayberry.

On the subject of Huckleberry-- "he is," she said a little dryly. "He's weak, and a whiny crybaby. I don't know him very well, but I've heard that he tends to resort to screaming and crying like a little pup a lot."

She hated the -berries.

Kera stretched out again, thinking. There was Dragon and Rift, who she already talked about-- "there was a fox, a really small pale thing, who used fire. I met her when I met Rift, they got in a fight when she set fire to one of Rift's plants. Her name was-- Ritonai? I think? She was equally as vile as Aka and Reseda."

She spat, briefly. "I remember she burned Rift, and when I lead him to water to try to cool them, she got really angry about it and said something about 'oh, you're afraid I'll take him from you,' whatever the fuck that meant." Twenty cycles later, and Kera was still mildly bewildered by the concept of 'romance,' and 'dating,' and 'like liking' someone. Relationships weren't for heroes.


"After that, I met the Three Kings of Orion. Do you know about them?" She asked, peering up at Vargas curiously.

@Vargas

Vargas listened intently to the descriptions of the competitions. They sounded like the sort of things the Masters might arrange, albeit with less-... death for failures, at least the way Kera told it. An injury, though, that was--good? Maybe it was to find promising youths for future endeavors, or... something.

"Who hosts it?" he asked, after a moment. "Some Gembound" didn't really narrow it down and Vargas was wondering at whose behest they had done so. It didn't even occur to him that they might have started testing amongst themselves--that was ridiculous.

At the mention of the Three Kings, he snorted. Very slightly. But it was there. That was kind of funny, he said to himself, for a moment reminiscing--then looked to Kera again. "I know of them, yes; they are still around, and active, then?"

@Kera

Kera eyed Vargas for a moment longer, but she eventually shrugged, gently. "I don't know," she admitted. "The first time I heard about it was when I was still young. I found a hybrid-- a black sort of wolf-looking thing like me, but he had-- hands, I think, and wings and feathers. His name was Oliver, he made lights. I didn't ask him where he heard about it, or who was hosting it."

"There are judges who will announce when it starts, and who wins, but I don't know who decides that. There's been different judges, too-- Mercy was a judge, once, with another big cat. I don't know his name, though. This year, there was a white horse, two wolf-looking things like me, one was black, the other was the one with the purple cloth. There was a bird, an eagle, who used fire magic, and a white horse-looking hybrid who didn't really do anything."

Now that she was saying it out loud, the olympics were strange. Who even came up with it?

Vargas, meanwhile, seemed amused, somehow, at the mention of the Three Kings. He knew of them, at least-- "I don't know if they're still around," she said. "Mintaka was in control of them when they fused together, the last I knew. They were looking for the stone of the Architect, and I think they managed to revive him. I don't know much more than that, though."

"There were a lot of different people giving them stones when I first met them, though. I don't know all of them, but I know some. There's Winter, who's like a white legless lizard. She does magic that lets her see into the past and stuff. There was another legless lizard like her, and a lot of wolf-looking things like me, with different markings and colours and stuff."

"There were some different birds-- a little black one, a bird that looked like a wolf with wings, Blackberry was there, I think, before she went murderous. There was a little thing shaped like you, sort of-- but it was a lot smaller, with red and grey fur and some feathers on his legs."

Kera paused again, thinking for a moment. "There was Aztec, too, but I don't know what happened to him. He was a big cat a bit like Rift, but he was bigger and had spots. He was nice, but.. sorta dry and boring to talk to, but he made lights."

@Vargas

Vargas puzzled all this over, briefly drumming his claws against the rock as he discarded bits of information and analyzed, and kept, others.

"There seem to be a great many wolves," he observed, aloud. He wasn't sure what wolves were, bar having seen Kera, but apparently there were a lot of them. White ones, black ones, brown ones, ones with various markings and--apparently--ones with cloth. "And--cats, too, by the sounds of things. If you are all truly random, then perhaps those shapes are the most successful." He examined Kera, trying to wonder what she might have been useful for, back in his time. She probably wouldn't have lasted very long in Hydra, at least--not with that thick fur coat--but in cold places, perhaps. Though she was very small-... Perhaps cold places without much food-? As a soldier, however, she seemed too small--and being white, wingless, too noticeable as a scout. Though if she bears light magic, she can hide herself, I suppose. That was a possibility, and it made sense, given the affiliations.

He turned his mind toward other things. He didn't particularly care about the Kings, bar to note them as a vague thing still active in the caves (and had they been active this entire time..?); but the mention of something similar to him fascinated him at once. Was it one of the old creations, then?

"Like me? But--feathers, and fur? Do you remember its name, or know where I can find it? Or can you describe it more clearly?" Perhaps it was a descendant of one of them..? Mixed with--with birds, and... things with fur? Cats, or wolves, perhaps?

Vargas tried to imagine this creature--himself, but tiny, furred and feathered. What a strange concept it was!

@Kera

Kera thought, for a moment.

There were a lot of wolves, or half-wolves. And dogs, which were just weirdly-shaped wolves. Predators with four legs were definitely abundant in the caves, it seemed-- maybe they weren't really that random at all.

Though, looking at Vargas' teeth, she didn't really want to risk him thinking she was correcting him if she brought this up.

When it came to the little creature she'd seen, she had to take a moment to think about it. "I don't know who it was, or where it is, and I haven't seen it since," she said. "He was far smaller than you-- smaller than me, even. He didn't have scales and he wasn't purple. But he stood the same way you do."

"He had less toes, too-- I think the same as the Collector has. Maybe the same shape, too, but sharper. Uhh. He had a sort of flat face, a round head. No ears? Or horns. It's legs were sort of rough, like a bird's was, and his tail was sort of rounded and furry."

She licked her muzzle, thinking. "It might be dead," she concluded. "It looked sort of... gross, and skinny, I remember. But it gave some rocks to Mintaka, if he might have any connection to find out where it is?"

Trying to recount the appearance of a creature she'd only really had a good glimpse at was difficult, at best, but regardless Kera did her best. A good memory helped-- even if some details were wrong. It would have been helpful, she realised, if she asked the names of everyone attending.

... and what magic they had.

... hindsight's twenty-twenty.

Kera paused before she continued rattling off the list of everyone she had seen, or knew, to see if Vargas had any further questions about the Kings or Mysterious Mini-Vargas.

@Vargas

Vargas spent some time trying to imagine this creature, and found that he truly could not. He was picturing a light gray and pale reddish-feathered thing--no, he reminded himself, furred but with feathered legs--bird legs?-- and adjusted his mental image accordingly. But all in all it was a strange mental image, with a bird-face, but with a flat nose the way Kera described it, and he-...

Vargas blinked.

"Are you claiming me gross?" he demanded, abruptly. Twinned outrage and hilarity threatened to bloom up inside him--the AUDACITY, if she was!--but he waited, first, to see he were misinterpreting. To say he was taken aback was an understatement, to say the least.

@Kera

Slowly, the wolf tilted her head.

Was Vargas gross? Yeah, a little fucking bit. Was he mysterious Small-Vargas levels of gross? Not really.

"No, I'm claiming it gross," she said very matter-of-factly. She thought for a moment, trying to think of a different word to describe it. "Sickly, kind of gross. Like when cave deer don't eat for a long time and you can see all their bones sticking out of their skin, and they're sort of paler and crusty."

Disgusting to try to eat, incidentally, but an easy catch. Those cave deer usually didn't have the energy to keep running for very long, not without any food in them.

"You're skinny, but you're not skinny like he was," she explained further. At least, she assumed Vargas was skinny-- it was difficult to tell past all the spines. "You don't look that sickly, either. His eyes were sort of-- hollowed out, I guess? I dunno. He just didn't look good, or healthy. He looked gross."

@Vargas

"Hrmph," Vargas offered, both mollified and a little disappointed as he looked off over Orion. It was always-... interesting when one of them sassed him this way. Ahh, well; at least she'd still do as a hand.

"Hollowed eyes? I see. Perhaps a failed creation." It could be one of theirs, then. Certainly there'd been... yes, failures. And with no one here to weed them out, over the--however long he'd been asleep-... Could there be descendants of them, roaming about even now?

He'd have to have a look. If there were, they should certainly be wiped out before spreading any further. Assuming this one had even survived; Kera thought it might have died.

"Go on, then; what more do you know?" he pressed, rocking back into a slouched sitting position on the rock.

@Kera