A Look At The Organization Known As Avalon – The Other Survivors Of Camelot
Present Day
With a gentle ding from the bell above the door, a figure in a gray sweatshirt with the hood up and dark green jeans walked into a quiet flower shop in the middle of an out-of-the-way neighborhood on the edge of a small town somewhere in Nebraska. The town had nothing that would make it stand out to any Bystander. With a population of only a few thousand, almost no one who wasn’t already from the town would do more than glance idly out the window at it as they drove by on the nearby freeway. Meanwhile, the flower shop itself had been a part of the town for as long as anyone living could remember. It was a family business.
Well, as much as something could be a family business when it had been owned and run by the same person since the town was founded over two hundred years earlier.
Not that any would have guessed that the man who stood with his back to the figure who had just entered had been tending the plants here for so long. He wore a red and black flannel shirt with simple jeans and western-style boots. His rugged, yet achingly handsome face looked like the stuff of romance novel cover legends, and his long, dark hair fell in slight curls down to his shoulders. Only one imperfection marred that otherwise perfect visage, an elaborate scar that ran from almost all the way across his left temple before cutting abruptly upward just above his nose and forking out like lightning to the top of his head. The scar was the single defining feature which, without the Bystander Effect, the ordinary humans of this town might have used to recognize his incredible longevity. As it was, they simply tended to forget details about the quiet person who had run the flower shop any time his ‘son’ inevitably took over.
Running his hands through the dirt of the flowerpot he had been working on, the man spoke without looking toward the figure at the door. “Sorry, the radio’s busted. If I’d known you were coming, I would’ve done something about that earlier.” His fingers brushed up through the soil after ensuring the seed was in place before he picked up a nearby watering can and used it to sprinkle over what he had just planted. “After all, I heard about how much you like making dramatic entrances to classic rock songs.”
Raising an eyebrow, Guinevere reached up to take the hood of the sweatshirt down, a slight smirk crossing her face. “I would have visited earlier so you could get all the cracks about that out of your system properly, but I’ve been a bit busy lately.”
“So I’ve heard,” the man noted, finally turning to face her. “Are you here because it’s time to bring him back? We’ve been waiting even longer than we thought.”
“Believe me, Bors, no one wants Arthur back on his feet more than I do,” Gwen replied with a very slight hint of pain in her voice. “And we’re close. But if we’re going to go the rest of the way and resurrect my husband, we need a living, full-blooded Reaper.”
“Oh, is that all?” The old knight made a show of patting down his pockets. “Consarn it, I seem to have left my personal Reaper-summoning phone in my other pants.”
Snorting, Gwen retorted, “It probably wouldn’t have helped anyway, considering we need a very specific Reaper. The one the Crossroads people have locked up in that lighthouse of theirs. Turns out he’s the one who saw Arthur the day he met the dragon. So apparently we need something that Reaper has locked up in his Archives.”
Bors gave her a long look. “If you’ve come to ask for help raiding the impenetrable pocket universe of Crossroads itself in order to steal the very thing that gives all of them their powers, I sure hope you’ve got a really big army to back you up.”
“Isn’t that what you and the others have been working on all this time?” Gwen flashed a quick smile that way. “But don’t worry, we’re not to that point yet. One thing at a time. First, we have to hit a completely different impenetrable Crossroads building and steal one of their other prisoners. But don’t worry, they’re about maybe six percent less obsessed with keeping this one so I think we can pull it off with the right help and a good plan.”
There was a brief pause as Bors processed that before grunting. “Morgan. You want to go in and rescue the old witch from the Crossroads prison. Can’t say I ever expected to see you advocating for something like that.”
“She goes by Gaia now,” Gwen reminded him. “And she’s changed more than her name. But no matter how I feel about her, we need her. Because we need that Reaper and she spent decades as the Headmistress on that island. She’s our best–only chance of actually putting together some way of getting what we need.”
“And now, you want to see what sort of resources you’re working with for a possible rescue mission?” Bors lifted his chin. “What about your new allies?”
“We’ll have help from them in more ways than one,” Gwen confirmed. “But given what this is–who this is, I thought it was important that we be the ones to pull her out of there. Us and a few others who want to tag along for the ride.”
Bors met her gaze for a moment, seeming to consider her words. Then he brushed his hands off and nodded. “In that case, I should bring you up to speed, your majesty.
“Let’s go see how the rest of Avalon is doing.”
********
A Thousand Years Ago, Just After The Fall Of Camelot
Standing atop a hill overlooking a forest, Guinevere watched the bright fires burn down a village in the distance. The village was one of dozens that had been arranged along the outskirts of Camelot territory. Even that far away, the village and its people had once been protected, the bandits and monsters now looting the place too afraid to come anywhere near its boundaries thanks to Arthur and his army.
But now that army had been routed, its soldiers, knights, and wizards scattered across the countryside. Camelot itself had fallen. And Arthur… Arthur was gone.
“We got as many people out of the villages as possible, my Lady,” Bors, the knight standing nearest Guinevere, intoned quietly. “But we need to leave now.”
Several more knights and a handful of soldiers were arrayed further back, keeping their eyes on the surrounding countryside as well as the skies. The main Seosten attack had long-since tapered off, as the alien invaders did what they were best at: manipulating others into doing their dirty work. Most of the creatures ravaging the countryside now had no real connection to those people, they were simply taking advantage of the opportunity that had been put before them.
They were too far away to hear the screams of people who had not been rescued, of course. And yet, Guinevere imagined she could. In the back of her mind, she heard their cries, heard the sick sound of their deaths. She heard every painful moment of every person they had failed to save. She heard the flames, heard the buildings crumbling. She’d heard Arthur’s dream shattering bit by bit, over these past few days.
And she saw her own failure to keep that dream alive after he was taken from her, from all of them. He was gone, and with him went the protection that had kept the Seosten from openly attacking Camelot. Guinevere and the knights around her had barely managed to escape the battlefield. The queen herself had knocked down several of her own soldiers and guards in an attempt to find the place where her husband had fallen, only for those closest to her to remind the woman where her true duty lay. They had to evacuate everyone who was still alive. There had been a plan in place for saving people if Camelot fell, and they had to follow it as best as they could.
For these past few days, all of Guinevere’s focus had gone to that. She knew her husband was gone. She knew Arthur was dead. Her grief could wait until as many of the people he had promised to protect were as safe as they could possibly be. She had failed to keep Camelot standing. She would not also fail to protect all of his people, just to indulge her own sadness. Grieving would come once they had done all that they could.
With that in mind, Guinevere turned away from the sight of the burning village. It was just one of many. What mattered was ensuring that the people who had been evacuated were taken somewhere safe. Or at least safer than what Camelot had become. No matter how painful of a thought that was.
And yet, as she turned to face Bors and the other knights, she found quite a different sight waiting for her. The quiet, dark woods had given way to a simple log cabin, with a crackling fireplace, and a familiar man standing near the door.
“Arthur!” In an instant, Gwen was there, her arms moving to wrap around the man. Yet she moved through him like smoke, his form distorting before coming back together as she took a reflexive step back, lips trembling. “What–”
“Gwen… my Gwen.” A smile crossed the man’s face as he looked… not at her. He wasn’t seeing her. This wasn’t him, it was a message of some sort. “If you’re seeing this, I’m so sorry. But I want you to know that whatever happened, no matter how you feel right now, it’s not the end. It’s not the end of Camelot, or the end of us. There’s a plan, a failsafe. It’s going to take a long time, and it won’t be easy. But I know you can handle it. There’s no one in this world, or any other, that I trust more than you. You are the queen, you are their leader now. And I promise, you are ready for this.
“Things are going to get better. You just have to be patient.”
********
Present Day
“He wasn’t kidding about the patient part,” Gwen muttered to herself as those memories passed through her mind. She and Bors had just moved to an unmarked door at the back of the flower shop, which opened seemingly of its own volition to reveal an elevator.
“What’s that?” the old Camelot Knight asked as the two of them stepped aboard and the lift began to descend with a gentle whoosh.
Gwen shook her head. “Nothing, it’s okay.” She glanced over to the scarred man. “How are you doing? I know–I know I don’t visit here as often as I should. I’m–”
“Don’t you dare apologize,” Bors interrupted. Yes, she was his queen and had been for generations, but their relationship had evolved far beyond formalities. “You have a whole world out there to keep track of, and you know what we’re doing here. You don’t need to babysit us. Coming back every year or so is more than enough until it’s time.” He paused before giving a thoughtful grunt. “And from the sound of things, it almost is.”
The elevator door slid open a moment later, allowing the two to step out into a truly massive underground chamber with a ceiling over a hundred feet up. Straight ahead of them was a runway, stretching off several thousand feet to either side. An assortment of hangars were visible on the far side of the runway from where they were, with an eclectic assortment of craft in and around them. There were two incredibly modern fighter jets that looked like they had just rolled off the assembly line, as well as five clearly alien space fighters in various states of repair, seemingly after having been shot down and put back together. But far more numerous than that tiny handful of advanced craft were the ancient-looking World War 1 and 2 planes. There were over two dozen of those, each of which had dozens of magical enchantments scrawled across them. Even Bystanders would have considered them old and primitive, yet the sheer power of the enchantments radiating off them would prove to those who knew about such things that they were more than capable of keeping up with more advanced craft. The people who lived and worked down here had spent decades building up the enchantments on each lovingly and carefully repaired aircraft.
Planes and fighters, of course, weren’t the only pieces of equipment down here. There were also ten helicopters from various parts of history, and thirty or so tanks, APCs, artillery trucks, and more. This underground chamber, deep beneath a sleepy town in Nebraska, was home to a small army’s worth of military equipment. And when the magical enhancements were added into the equation, that ‘small army’ became much more dangerous.
There were almost two hundred people of various species and races going about their day in that chamber, working on the equipment, walking several combat-trained animals, or going about their training. When they saw who Bors had brought with him, all of them rushed to greet their queen.
“We have ten more chambers like this all across the continent,” the knight informed her, while Gwen cheerfully interacted with the people she saw all too seldomly. “And a few more back home. Whatever you need, be it a distraction or full war, we’ll be ready.”
For hundreds of years, since the very fall of Camelot, the organization known as Avalon had been preparing. The Seosten thought they were broken beyond repair, shattered and dead. But Guienvere and those loyal to her had spent these centuries very quietly and patiently gathering supplies, training, and getting ready for the inevitable rematch. Camelot had fallen, but her people survived. Her queen survived. Half of Camelot’s survivors had become the Atherbys, whose primary focus lay in opposing the Boscher Heretics, pawns of the Seosten. But the other half, those who had followed their queen, went for a more long-term approach. Their true enemies weren’t the Boschers, but those who manipulated them. The Seosten would be driven from this world, and its rightful king put back in his place to protect not only one city, not only one kingdom, but the entire planet. As Arthur had said, there was a plan.
And the next step of that plan was rescuing his sister.
*******
Checking In On Tristan, Aureus, Jones, And The Others With The Carnival
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It was a strange group who stepped through the doorway leading from the Carnival mindspace to what was apparently the edge of the joint Reaper Prime Archive. Leading them was Jones, the pink-haired, pizza and turtle-loving actual Reaper who had been gently yet firmly cast out from this place and away from the rest of her people for her own oddities. At her side was her Natural Bonded young human ‘sister,’ Casey, the two of them newly reunited. Right behind them were the second-generation Olympian Seosten Aureus, human-second-generation Olympian Seosten hybrid Tristan, the primary creator of the Carnival itself, Denny, and Dakota, the plant-manipulating young Natural Kwur Heretic who had accompanied Casey on her attempt to transport to Jones. Neither of them had expected to end up here, but they were more than willing to help locate the missing Aspects who had apparently been scattered throughout the secret Reaper space.
Finally, several of those Aspects who hadn’t been lost were accompanying them on this trip. The male-presenting, militarily-dressed Bang-bang, the red-skinned fire manipulator known as Flak, another male-presenting magic-focused Aspect who went by Austin Tasious (a fitting name considering his habit of dressing in a bright pink suit, silk shirt, black and pink cape, and matching top hat), and a final Aspect who looked nearly identical to Denny herself aside from skin that was very dark green, and eyes that were bright gold with no visible whites. This last Aspect was known as Crow, an androgynous personality with powers focused almost entirely around seeing and finding things. Crow was an obvious addition to the group if they were going to search for their missing friends.
The remaining free Aspects including Bijou, Peanut, Jordan, Crystal, Bucket, Belfry, Butternut, and Tick and Tock, were staying back along with Theodore, the last vestige of innocence from the boy whose soul had been so thoroughly corrupted by his own father. They would wait in the Carnival grounds just in case anything went wrong, or some of the missing Aspects found their way home by themselves.
Once they were through the doorway, the group spread out a little bit so everyone could look around to take in the sight. And what a sight it was. Ahead of them was a busy street. Or rather, pieces of a thousand or more busy streets all cobbled together. It looked as though someone had chopped apart bits of streets, buildings and all, from worlds all across the universe and simply pasted them onto one another. Straight ahead of them was the bright red, metallic roadway that would have been seen on the world of Morshon, with an ancient human Roman road attached to its left side, and a dirt path that could have been plucked off almost any known planet in the universe attached to the right. That dirt path led to a modern human freeway, while the Roman road was attached on its opposite side to a series of gray and black machines where the road should be, each humming as they projected an invisible energy field that would keep anything moving across them situated several feet up. A hallmark of the transportation system on the canyon-filled world of Eldias Kosch.
Meanwhile, the buildings were just as chaotic. An old human-style log house sat next to a massive needle-like building that towered thirty stories up despite being no wider than the nearby cabin, aside from the large ball structure at the very top that was several hundred feet across. Next to that was what appeared to be a two-story tall anthill with glass domes over dozens of holes, followed by yet another building that appeared to be a random assortment of red and black metal spikes sticking out ten feet or so in every direction from a pulsing heart structure that was very clearly biological.
On and on it went. Every building they saw came from a different world or time period. They were mixed together with no apparent rhyme or reason. And throughout those streets moved what at first appeared to be people, beings who were also of all shapes, sizes, and colors. Yet even as they watched, several of those beings abruptly completely changed form. A human switched into being an enormous ogre. A pixie who had been fluttering along became one of the wooden Relekun. A crocodilian figure with six legs became what looked an awful lot like a stereotypical human accountant. And no sooner had those beings changed, than another set transformed. On and on it went, every few seconds a different assortment of the people they saw walking around changed shape to something completely different.
“Oookay,” Bang-bang murmured while turning in a circle to take everything in. They were surrounded by these same sights on all sides. The doorway they had come through seemed to be attached to a simple New England-style house that could have come from any suburb in America. Except they all knew this house.
“That’s our family’s home,” Denny announced quietly. “Or a copy of it.”
“All these buildings are copies,” Tristan realized. “The people too. They’re not real, they’re like… NPCs in a video game, aren’t they?”
“Not real?” Dakota swallowed hard, reaching out to take Denny’s hand before squeezing it gently while the Carnival Aspects tore their own attention away from the sight of a home they didn’t actually remember, and continued looking around.
Aureus took several quick steps forward, her gaze snapping around as she took in the sights with the eagerness of a child who had just arrived at Disney World. “This is remarkable.” She seemed to have entirely forgotten that she was supposed to see herself as a prisoner of these people, especially Tristan himself. “The Archives. The actual Reaper Archives. They store everything here, all the details they have about every person and place throughout all existence. All of it kept here, in this other universe far from any occupied space, so that it can never be entirely lost.”
“Maybe that’s a good idea. If the Fomorians get their way, this place might be the only record that any other species ever existed,” Tristan muttered.
“Yes, they are quite the threat,” Aureus agreed. “Which is why you should all stop making things so difficult and simply work with my people in order to save the entire universe.”
“Oh believe me, we’d love to work with you and the rest of my mother’s people,” Tristan shot back. “But you all don’t exactly like the cooperation bit. You just want everyone to–wait why are we even having this argument? You’re not working with the other Seosten, you’re working with Kushiel. You do know that she’s not exactly on the up and up with your people, right? I mean, even before she was…” He hesitated, not wanting to say the wrong thing in that moment, sensitive as the situation was.
“Even before she was what?” Aureus prompted dangerously, scowling that way.
“Mmmmaybe we should focus?” Dakota piped up, interrupting the two. “I mean, we’re sort of… in a dangerous place right now. Debating about who is on what side and who should be doing what can probably, umm… wait?”
Casey, who seemed overwhelmed by all of this, nodded slowly while shrinking back a bit against her Reaper friend and bond-sister with a soft gulp. “Yeah, especially since we have to search this whole place for the missing Carnival people, right?”
“Not immediately,” Jones murmured. She lifted a hand, pointing far into the distance toward the tallest, most impressive structure in the entire Prime Archive. It stood fifteen miles tall (the top of the building far out of sight), three thousand feet across at the base, and was shaped like a two-tined fork. “First, we have to go there. They know we’re here. They know… a lot, but we have to present ourselves and ask permission to be here, to find your friends. We have to explain what is going on.
“We have to visit the Solemn Ones.”
*************
NON-CANON A couple slight changes to their meeting means Flick very accidentally seduces the younger version of Gaia in the past (Part One Of Several To Come)
Maybe leaving Cerberus and Persephone back at the village was a bad idea, but Flick couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something more to the disappearance of Millersby than it seemed on the surface. If there was going to be some sort of attack, she didn’t dare leave those people alone. Besides, she could probably handle tracking the man down. And on the off chance that something worse was happening, it would be a simple matter for Percy to do a partial or full recall to her, or for Flick to transport back to the village. Whatever happened, whatever was actually going on, she wanted the people she had become close to over these past couple of months to be protected. And there was no protection she could think of that was better than Percy and Cerberus.
So, she examined Millersby’s campsite by herself, and eventually made her way to the hidden cave where he had set up his secret communication spell.
And there, standing up in the cave, she found herself facing one person she had never expected to see in this place or time. Her old headmistress, Gaia Sinclaire. At the last possible second, Flick shifted herself into a male form with dark hair. She could do little about the Incubus-gained attractiveness, but at least the woman wouldn’t immediately recognize her when they met in the future and end up completely changing the entire timeline.
Introducing herself by the first male name she could think of, Jacob, she explained at least the immediate issue of why she was there. Which led Gaia to tell ‘him’ about sensing the spaceship nearby and coming to investigate.
Eventually, the two of them left the cave to look around the campsite and surrounding area a bit more for clues about what the ship could have been or where it had gone. When none immediately presented themselves, Flick stopped next to the tent and held both hands out to either side of herself. Her eyes were closed as she focused on trying to sense any death in the surrounding forest. She had already ensured that Millersby hadn’t died in the area, but this was about finding any other dead things that might be able to give her more information. Even if they were only animals with no ability to communicate, there was always the chance that they had seen something they couldn’t understand.
So intently was Flick focusing on very carefully summoning the ghosts of dead creatures throughout the forest, that she almost forgot about her companion. Only her item sense warning her about the familiar figure stepping closer snapped her out of the distraction. “Sorry, did you find something?” she asked without opening her eyes. She didn’t want to lose the link she had already begun to establish with those animal spirits.
“No, I–” There was a brief pause as Gaia seemed to collect herself before continuing. “That magic you’re using, it’s… new. I can tell you’re using some sort of Necromancy, only you aren’t actually converting the energy to do so. You’re just… using it. How?”
“Oh.” Well this was awkward. Flick shifted a bit, deciding how much was safe to say. “Well, I sort of have a special affinity for it. My energy can be used for Necromancy without doing anything to alter it first. It just uhh, you know, works right off the bat.”
“Off the bat… does this involve some sort of animal familiar then?” Gaia sounded even more intrigued. “If you are channeling the energy through–”
“Oh, no, no. Not–not the animal.” Crap, why did she even use that phrase? “I just meant it works immediately.”
“Fascinating,” came the quiet, thoughtful response. She could feel Gaia staring at her. Or at ‘him’ as far as the woman was concerned. “The level of–” She seemed to stop herself with realization. “Apologies for the distraction.”
Gaia stopped talking then, but Flick could still feel the woman staring at her with wonder. Part of her felt self-conscious, while another part wanted to show her old headmistress just how much she had improved since the woman had been… taken. Which was ridiculous, of course, because this was a Gaia from hundreds of years before she had even become headmistress, let alone met Flick herself. But that didn’t really matter, no matter what she told herself. It was Gaia, and part of her just wanted to hug the other woman as tightly as she could and start telling her everything.
Fortunately, common sense won out and she kept it together. It helped that she could pour all of her concentration into what she was doing. Summoning the ghosts of various animals throughout the forest and checking to see what they had last seen by looking through their memories. The overwhelming majority of them were absolutely no use at all. They had died long before the ship had been present. But, gradually, Flick figured out how to narrow down her search to only those who had died much more recently. The… ‘flavor’ of the dead things was different when it was fresh.
Yes, that was utterly disgusting, but she tried not to think about it too much.
Finally, after searching through the memories of dozens of dead animals, Flick took a step back and opened her eyes. Grimacing from realizing how long she had been standing there, she cracked her neck a bit. “Ugh. Okay, I’ve got something. A few different animals around this place saw the ship when it showed up. One of them was a hawk. It was chasing after this mouse on the ground that was running away from the sound of the ship, and ended up getting caught up in the updraft when the thing passed over the–it wasn’t pretty.” A slight grimace crossed her face at the memory she had absorbed. “Anyway, the hawk saw the ship going that way right as it died.” She pointed. “I think maybe if we move that direction, we can check in with other dead animals along the way and see if any of them saw it. You know, assuming they were going somewhere here on Earth and not straight out into space.”
“Well, in that case, we should start walking,” Gaia noted thoughtfully. “Perhaps with any luck, the vessel was simply gathering water from this lake to take back to a nearby camp. Even if the ship itself has left, the camp may still be there.”
Flick nodded quickly. “Yeah, that’s what I was thinking. But we don’t have to walk. I can just–” She focused briefly, transporting herself and the other woman from the edge of the lake, all the way to the top of the hill in the distance, as far as the hawk had been able to see the ship go. “–do thi–whoa!”
So focused had she been on, to be honest, showing off her teleportation power to the woman who would one day be her headmistress and friend, that Flick hadn’t thought to warn her. As soon as they arrived, Gaia, taken completely by surprise, stumbled a bit on a nearby rock and nearly fell over. Flick had to quickly catch the woman by the arm and waist, her enhanced reflexes and strength ensuring that she stopped Gaia from taking a nasty tumble down the side of the hill.
“Sorry!” Flick blurted, firmly yet gently keeping one hand on the woman’s bicep while the other was pressed against her back to keep her upright. “I’m so sorry, I should’ve warned you about what was about to happen, I wasn’t thinking. I just–I just–” She winced a little, slowly stepping back while guiding Gaia away from the edge of the hill before hesitantly releasing her. Looking away with a blush of embarrassment at her own mistake, Flick couldn’t bear to look at the woman directly. She’d wanted to impress Gaia and then ended up almost making her fall down a hill?! How much would history change if she made Crossroads’ future headmistress and Avalon’s future adopted mother break her neck?! Dumb, dumb, it was so dumb.
With some effort, she pushed those thoughts aside, though the heat from her blush was still there. Oh right, face shifting power. She made that go away too before straightening up with a cough. “Are you okay?”
It took a moment for Gaia to respond, long enough for Flick to get worried about possibly having upset her with that little stunt. She quickly looked that way, but the expression on the woman’s face wasn’t one of annoyance. It was… it was… huh. She wasn’t sure what it was. It almost looked like a blush, but–oh. Oh, right, this was Gaia. Of course she would be embarrassed about almost falling over and tumbling down a hill, duh. Probably almost as embarrassed as Flick herself felt about causing the situation in the first place.
Before she could apologize again, however, Gaia cleared her throat and wiped the expression off her face. Though a faint blush remained (apparently she did not have a face-shifting power of her own right now) as she assured ‘Jacob,’ “I am quite alright, yes. I–thank you. Taking a spill like that would have been a rather poor start to our investigation, wouldn’t it?” The words came with a faint smile.
Now Flick was blushing all over again. “Oh God, I am so sorry about that. Seriously, I should’ve warned you. I was just–umm…” She paused, realizing she had no way to follow that up. “I’m sorry. I promise I’ll warn you if I decide to do that again. I mean, if I can. I probably shouldn’t take the time to warn you if there’s some sort of attack coming, or something is about to explode, or–” Realizing she was babbling as Gaia stared at her, she cut herself off. Yup, blushing, deeeefinitely blushing again. “I’ll try to be careful. Oh, by the way, I can transport us places. Just so you know. Cuz it’d be really awkward if I didn’t tell you that ahead of time and then just took you somewhere without any warning at all. And I’m definitely not awkward like that, no ma’am.”
Giving a soft chuckle while shaking her head, Gaia replied, “I shall keep such a useful ability in mind. You… are able to transport so easily with no apparent magic use, use Necromancy with such ease and no preparation, and you are here to help a missing non-human friend… I am… surprised I haven’t heard of you.”
Squirming a little on her feet, Flick hesitantly spoke up. “Umm, yeah, I tend to keep to myself whenever possible. I–yeah.” God, what was she supposed to say to that without giving too much away?
“The world is poorer for it,” Gaia replied simply. That odd look was back in her face as she gazed at ‘Jacob’ for a long moment before giving a faint, almost embarrassed-looking smile. “Apologies, I only meant that given what I have seen so far, you could do a lot of good in this world.”
The two of them met one another’s gazes briefly. Flick felt… odd. Was there something she should say? Should she–
“Well, we should get back to work.” Turning pointedly, Gaia gestured across the way.
“Our search continues.”