110508-unexpected-outcomes

== Content ==
			
Summary: Kaelish, a popular wee thing of an Aurin Spellslinger on Stormtalon, is out with her companions staking Explorer paths when they're accosted by a group of Dominion. The tides turn as her friends are quickly overwhelmed and she rushes to save them, but the Dominion have it out for her and draw her to the front where she is brutally assaulted. Through a chain of unusual events, she tries to escape into The Void only to end up.... somewhere else? Dun dun dun, an intro post for Rocio/Kael Adventures!
 
Deplicator used with permission; Icelus, well, he'll lol it.
 
~~~~~~
 
Some days were worth the hand over her face and the heavy sigh few, if any, paid any attention to. Deplicator and Icelus were at it again. Showboating, as she heard Humans call it, for her attention. If it wasn't so frustrating it'd be amusing and flattering, but the two kept up their rivalry despite both having a place in her life. Sometimes she let them continue with their antics of training creatures away from her as she staked paths through rough terrain for other Exiles to use. An Explorer's work was never done on Nexus and they did keep things out of her way to make the task a bit easier. There was once a time she felt like a failure as an Explorer until they taught her otherwise with their supportive presence.
 
Their heckling continued on in the background as she triangulated where the next stake went. Mostly it involved Deplicator, an overly manly Human, trying to insinuate Icelus was a girly-man because of his pastel pink fur color. It was part of the reason Kaelish found the aggressive Aurin Esper so attractive. They matched. Maybe the Human was jealous because he lacked a head of hair to dazzle her with. Not that she ever insinuated baldness wasn't a handsome look on him!
 
Kaelish rarely ever knocked someone down with harsh words. Her congenial nature more often than not diffused heated situations whenever she walked in and said: "Hello, my loves, what's wrong?" Compassion radiated off her in abundance, a soothing balm to even the most difficult of Exiles (read: the Mordesh). There was a bearing in her carriage that welcomed anyone to approach and talk to her. She listened like, well, a Matria should, even though she never claimed to be one. Whatever happened to her before the Exiles arrived on Nexus remained a well guarded secret. Kaelish didn't talk about it and those who knew awarded her the privacy she needed to overcome the traumatic experience. Yet, despite it all, her smiles were genuine, her playful antics full of heart, and the few times anger made her fur stand on end, the Spellslinger was a force to reckon with. She earned the respect of her peers through hard work and persistence that no one Exile should ever be left behind. Quite a few of the older Exiles said she pushed herself to help the community because she was running away from something she couldn't talk about. Something that was eating her away from the inside.
 
With the only visible aquamarine eye darting upward then down in a traditionally Human eye roll she drove the last remaining stake into the Nexus soil. Her dainty foot stomped around the pole to stabilize it. No sense in it toppling over once she released it.
 
"Okay," she muttered with the back of her wrist sliding across her forehead. "I'm done, loves!" The hot day wore her out, though Icelus had earned a smack for insinuating there were better ways to be worn out on a hot day.
 
"About time, I was getting bored!" Icelus dashed her way with his pink rainbow hair bouncing in a way he knew would best distract her. Everyone knew she had a fondness for the Aurin who seldom ever took off his mask. Occupied with the excellent eye candy he made for, she wasn't prepared for the arms he wrapped around her waist and hoisted her up as high as he could. She expected a hug, not that! Surprise flashed across her fair features and the wind tussled her own vibrant pink hair to reveal two wide aquamarine eyes. Her arms were spread for balance even as she instinctively used magic to slow her descent.
Her hair style obstructive the full visage of her face, a thing he often lamented on though she was quick to point out he wore a mask all the time. Those brief moments permitted him to see her face as the breeze streamed through her hair. It was one of the small things he didn't take for granted, not with all the dangerous things on Nexus to worry about. Of course, Deplicator was not to be outdone by the little Aurin as he summoned her mid-air, cheating with his gobbledygook science, and brought her to his side.
 
She made a disagreeable sound at the disorienting sensation of finding herself, once again, somewhere else. "Show offs, both of you," she mumbled with hands rearranging her hair. An eye squinted up at the Human stretching with a smug look on his face. The stretch revealed several lacerations along his arms and a few extra dents in his armor.
 
"You're bleeding," she pointed out. A finger aimed at one in particular to which Deplicator shrugged off.
 
"A mere scratch and I have a gadget for it!" He claimed as he showed her one of the little relics on Nexus they had acquisitioned on an adventure. The one he possessed was for healing, and heal it did... one tiny scratch. Icelus doubled over laughing at her stormy expression when the Human proudly showed her the gadget's handiwork.
 
"I don't have a single cut, see?" The little Aurin showed her his arms, turning in a full circle as he boasted, only to have Deplicator scoff.
 
"You can heal," the warrior waved him off. "While you stop to heal, I take down things with my bare hands. That is manly." His voice deepened, chin rising as he dared anyone to argue otherwise. They probably would have continued the never ending banter if Deplicator hadn't been shot with a Spellslinger's magically crafted bullet. His armor deflected the worst of it, but the situation put them on alert.
 
Or so she thought.
 
"Stay here, we got it!" Icelus called even as he darted off. He was always revving for a good fight and the Dominion advancing their way beckoned to him like nothing else could, well, except maybe her.
 
"No, I've got it, puny man. You just stand back and watch." Deplicator clapped a hand on her shoulder and gave her his traditionally cocky wink as he jogged after the little Aurin. She groaned. There were several Dominion heading towards them. She trusted they could handle themselves, but the numbers weren't promising and they had spent the day fighting with crazy Eldan constructs and augmented beasts. Where had their senses gone?
 
It wasn't long before she saw her friends begin to fall back, overwhelmed with the opposition. She drew her mag pistols from their holsters and ran towards them. It didn't surprise her that she recognized a few faces in the crowd of Dominion. What did surprise her was when a warrior pulled her from behind Deplicator and Icelus into the thick of them all. She forgot about that particular ability, her concern for her friends put her too close, it left her in their range.
 
"Kaelish!" The guys yelled in unison.
 
She wasn't supposed to be on the front line of any attack, as their healer, so when she found herself blind and on the ground, she whimpered. They kept her friends away and prevented her from leaving by tethering her in place. Kaelish kept her arms up over her face, feeling the blades bite into them. Shallow, from the feel, but she channeled energy into healing it nonetheless. Big mistake, it irritated them and the attacks grew more violent.
 
Every chance she had to dash away ended with someone hoisting her up and tossing her back into the mess. It was a game of cat and mouse. Kaelish wasn't much of a fighter, she knew the basics, but she spent most of her time focusing on healing magic, not offensive.
 
The tangy taste of blood saturated her mouth as she squinted through her arms with hazy vision. Repeatedly they blinded her to keep her disoriented. At some point, her tail was pulled and her delicate feathery ears were violently tugged. She swore a Chua was laughing at her, his high braying nothing more than salt in her wounds. Abusive and petty, the Dominion were just playing with her, but like all predators, they didn't pay attention to when their prey was teetering on the edge.
 
Everything sounded muffled before long, the loud jeering voices were falling away as the world around her started to dissipate. Her pulse raced in her ears and drowned out the rest. They could stop her from Gating away from them, but the Void beckoned her with urgency. Kaelish wrestled with the strength to focus on it, the world slipping away in pieces as she tightened her grip on the mag pistols still in her possession. They tried multiple times to disarm her, but she tenaciously held fast to them. Her mag pistols.
 
With a breath easing out of her, she aimed the guns in front of her and let the Void take her where it would. The last of her energy went into finding some relief in the bland world of muted colors she no longer could see. She welcomed the sudden silence as she fell forward, unaware the Void would eject her anywhere other than where she'd spent the hot afternoon planting Explorer stakes in the Nexus earth.
 
~~~~~~	
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Rocio stood in a dense stand of ferns, ignoring the persist flies that were buzzing and crawling about his face. His eyes were wide and dilated in his head, transfixed by the sight in front of him.
 
A Cassian Explorer was in Celestion.
 
He was armed, a spellslinger and very, very nervous. He knew his was in unwelcome territory, unfamiliar territory, and was pointing his pistols at anything that moved. So Rocio stood still, his navy blue skin melding seamlessly into the shadows, until the Cassian had passed him. Then he slid beneath the stiff ferns. The rigid stems would not give away his position.
 
The man was a fool to come here alone and he was unlucky to come here alone while Rocio was patrolling the outer edges of the woods looking for unlucky fools. The Cassian was blinded by his ignorance of the forest. He didn’t know what to look for or what to listen for. He was afraid of the shadows, so he stood in the open. Rocio just waited for him to turn his back, for a distraction. He watched as the man slowly slid his backpack off his back, his eyes scanning up and down the trees for any movement. He froze, staring up into the branches, then he hurriedly unzipped his pack, all the while not taking his eyes off the trees. He never looked toward the undergrowth where Rocio was watching him. The Cassian was a mere ten yards away.
 
From his pack, the Cassian removed what Rocio recognized as sample bags. Apparently he was curious about the flora here. With one last glance about him, pulled out a small pair of snips and began clipping at some moss at the base of the tree.
 
Rocio’s attack was swift and silent. He waited until just before he collided with the man to spin his mental abilities into a glowing spectral sword. The sound of it burying into his victims back was the signal to leap away again and vanish into the dark.
 
Rocio peeked out from the underbrush. The Cassian was thrashing on the ground in confusion and pain, but Rocio’s strike was true. The Aurin stood up and waited.
 
The Cassian Spellslinger removed his pistol with a shaking hand to try to give one last incantation before he expired. Rocio recognized it as a Void Slip. The Cassian vanished, leaving only a small pool of blood where he had been.
 
All in all, the forest had remained relatively silent and undisturbed. Other than a crimson reminder, there was no evidence that anything had transpired at all. Rocio flipped his tail and smiled in satisfaction. Deep down, he felt the wood would be pleased with him for such a clean kill.
 
But before he could move away, brightly shining runes appeared where the Cassian had been. Rocio scowled. He lived to come back? But why back to the same spot? Perhaps he was slow to die. Rocio would be happy to expedite the process. When the limp body reappeared, Rocio pulled a knife from his belt.
 
He knelt by the figure, pulled its head back but his knife fell from his hand and he staggered back. “An Aurin? What?” He could only stare, not believing his own eyes. It was a Cassian who had disappeared. Where did this Aurin come from?
 
He looked around and sniffed the air but there was no sign of any Cassian scent around. He returned to her. “Hey…” He said. She didn’t react. Her head was covered in bruises. Her arms were cut up.
 
He only had a small flask of balm and some thin bandages but it was better than nothing. He gingerly licked the excess blood and dirt off her cuts and applied the ointment and bandages until he was all out of supplies. Then he gathered her over his shoulder like a child and began making his way back to Sylvan Glade.	
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In all the commotion, it was almost a blessing to be unconscious during the discovery and the relocation. There wasn't extra pain to endure, no sensation of surprise to see her surroundings changed, nor the lack of familiarity of Rocio's scent. Had she been awake and in less of a dire state, she'd have stood her ground about being carried. As it were, Rocio didn't have to deal with any of her sass, yet. Who knew what later would bring? Or even it?
 
It'd been hours since she left the Void and was found by Rocio when the sounds permeating the house roused her. Her feathery ears twitched at the sharp cries she heard from not very far away. Exhaustion, pain, and a touch of disorientation misconstrued the sound. Her muscles strained with tension and the need to escape. In another life, she would have fiercely fought back rather than shirk the encounter. What were a baby's cries to one were anything but to the terrified Aurin. Were those her friends shrieking in the distance somewhere? "D-dep," she tried to say the Human's name, her lips dry and the foreign word itself unfriendly. "Icelus!" The name found itself easily enough, a bit of energy following it as she coerced herself up from where she was laying prone. She tumbled out of the cot with unsteady legs. By chance or fate, she ended up leaned against the edge of the cot with hands spread out over the contours of it. Pain helped clear some of the fogginess in her head, it sharpened her awareness as she lamely tried to stand up.
 
Everything hurt.
 
From the tip of her tail to the feathery ears, she felt as if someone rung her through one of those silly Human science chambers and rattled her around like a baby's toy to see how resilient she was. She willed her pulse to slow as she concentrated on her surroundings. The cries sounded less like a Human and nothing like Icelus. Where were her friends? Whenever she tried to open her eyes, the light stung and forced her to shut them. It left her limited in way of sight, but she tipped her head back and drew in a stuttered breath. Her ribs ached, there were bruises all over her where the bandages didn't cover. She only then realized her arms were wrapped. A thorough, if slow, inspection of her person caused her to fret. Was she in some medical facility? Where were her friends?
 
Kaelish probably expected everything except the toy her hands found as she spread trembling fingers over the ground by her.
 
"Toy?" Her voice was rough and hoarse. As if she'd been screaming for too long, and perhaps, she had. The toy hit the ground with a soft thud as she realized her mag pistols were missing. Missing wasn't acceptable. Frustration was making her eyes water, the tears stung them anew, but her vision turned from opaque to blurry. She couldn't make out shapes, but saw where there was light and darkness.
 
The toy she found fit with the cries she heard, a child babbling only confirmed it, and the absence of familiar scents was only minimized by the fact she identified them as Aurin.	
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“You shouldn’t walk.”
 
Kaelish looked up to see who spoke and spotted an Aurin, a male, standing in the doorway, holding a baby – the source of the shrieking -- in his arms. He wore a mask, one that was similar to Icelus’s, but his hair was slate grey, his skin deep blue. Around him, stepped another Aurin, a thin female with green hair and tailfur. Her eyes were wrapped in gauze, but she seemed to have no problems moving around the room, carrying a tray-table with water, a broth soup and a small vial of medicine.
 
“My name is Deely.” She gestured to the man and the child. “This is Rocio. That’s Lurk. Please lie back down. You’re not ready to move around just yet,” she pleaded. She set the tray next to the bed, and reached out her hand to Kaelish, though her face stared sightlessly at a wall. “Please don’t be afraid. You’re safe here. You can stay here while you mend.”
 
Kaelish's eyes shifted back to the man in the doorway. He was watching her closely, even as the squirmy infant struggled to escape his grip to get at his toys and greet their guest. The man nodded to her. 
 
"I found you unconscious in the woods. You've been asleep for a long time." He said.	
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The voice itself didn't frighten her, nor did the message, it was merely the lack of familiarity with the owner that caused her to turn too fast to face the speaker. It caused her head to protest rather fervently, as if she needed anything else to ache to tell her to stay put. Silence followed the instructions as she kept trying to clear her vision with rapid blinks. She didn't want to waste precious energy on the healing arts when, and if, she might need it soon. Caution, she told herself. For all she knew she was in one of those Dominion hologram rooms. She'd heard stories of those on the ship about what things the Dominion could do to an Exile's mind. The tricks. 
 
Were they so cruel as to use a baby though?
 
Please, she told herself, what aren't they capable of? She had precious few moments to fight with herself, but one thing was certain, The Weave wasn't fake. Her palm rubbed at her gritty eyes, they were inflamed from whatever was used to blind her during the assault. "Where am I?" It was only naturally she leaned back and away from the hand reaching out to her. "I'd be less troubled... if I knew where I was." 
 
Doubts continued to linger about the situation. She lived long enough to know how far the Dominion would go to trick someone, though they hadn't any real reason to work her over. Aside from the community loving her, they had nothing to gain. Her head hurt just trying to understand things. Last she knew the Dominion overcame her friends and she was trying to escape. "I'd rather not," she confessed about laying down to the woman with gauze over her eyes. Her fingers plucked at the bandages on her arms absently. 
 
Rocio saw her face briefly illuminate with some emotion as her eyes landed on him, but it quickly disappeared as she realized he wasn't who she thought he was. The names of Rocio and Lurk belatedly had a reference. Her fingertip pointed at the baby, then the man. "Rocio, Lurk," and back to the woman, "Deely. I'm Kaelish. Why are your eyes covered?" Aurins were innately curious creatures, there were simply some things they didn't do discretely. 
 
As she heard him say she was found in the woods her face scrunched up. "What?" Then she appeared to try and get up. "Where are my friends? Where am I?" 	
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Deely continued to hold her hand out to her. "You're in Sylvan Glade in Celestion. You're in our little hut. And you're in Lurk's little play room.  As for my eyes...  I don't have them any more. Rocio is an Esper. When he is with me, I get some ability to see, so long as he knows what I'm looking at." That was only part of the story, of course, but Deely could barely understand the deep connection between herself and Rocio that sprang from the time they became mates until now, much less explain it.
 
After a moment of silence, Deely stood up. "Please eat and take the medicine. It will help with the pain." She walked up to Rocio and held her hands out to Lurk who was beginning to become frustrated.  
 
"I didn't find the ones who attacked you," Rocio said, shifting the child to his mother who left the room. "Do you know where they went? Who they were?  Your wounds were fresh and they're likely nearby. I won't tolerate enemies anywhere near here."  His eyes glittered with ferocity, communicating what his words did not. He clearly resented the enemy's escape even more than their presence.	
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Her initial "How the bloody he..." was only forestalled by the fact there was a child present. She was tugging at the bandages on her arms. To anyone else, it may have appeared as if she were unappreciative of the fact they'd gone to the effort to patch her up, but to a healer, she needed to know. Fatigue made the process jerky at best and all that more frustrating. Deely's lack of eyes caused her face to tilt, she'd seen numerous cybernetic implants around on the survivors to know it was an option, but she had enough sense not to push the issue. "That's one way to keep a mate close," it was said with a soft lilt, to convey a small joke, though she hardly felt it herself.
 
"What did you make?" A dip of her chin, matched only with a slight grimace as the gesture itself hurt, to the medicine. Kaelish had to know, though she could smell much of the contents already. Deplicator would harass her later if she just openly accepted anything, like that one time she drank something Icelus gave her and it turned her skin purple for a week. 
 
Trusting Kaelish, that's how she got into these things.
 
Her palm brushed over her eyes, the tattered bandages looking more like accessories of an All Shade's Eve outfit. "It be better outside, for me, and the baby can have his room back." A Skybright always had problems being cooped up inside. It's why she became an explorer in the first place, much to the relief of the crew she initially served with. Her normally high-energy presence wore everyone out, except the Mordesh, they just went to their cryopods and ignored her until she wildly pressed buttons in areas she shouldn't have been. But that was all well and in the past. Before Nexus. Before things changed.
 
"Probably won't," she muttered, tipping her head back as if listening to sounds no one else heard. "I was in Malgrave," she told him slowly. "Staking the area out," no energy for what would normally be a shrug as she paused. "Dominion popped up everywhere, I got... pulled to the front, bait." Her hand rose up to brush over her forehead and tug at her shorter pink hair. "I tried everything to get away, back to... to them, but," she flipped her hand out. "Last thing I remember is praying to The Weave as I tried to escape into the Void." The Weave was everywhere, some even had the ability to use it to travel, but for most it was only a philosophical thing.
 
"I'd guess if anything, they're still there." She scrubbed at her face. "My friends, my companions," a sense of hopelessness, she was wondering if they managed to escape, did they survive, did someone else die because of her again?	
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Rocio watched her compulsively remove her bandages with worry. She was clearly greatly distressed and needed to rest.  "Malgrave is nowhere near here. There was no one but you and I in the forest. Are you sure you weren't dreaming? I've never heard of anyone Void Slipping so far a distance."  When she started to rub at her face he walked forward and took her hand to make her stop. Thin smears of blood were left over her eyes. "Can't you see you're hurting yourself?"
 
His face was close to hers. "I'll find your friends if I can but you're in no condition to be removing your bandages or going anywhere."	
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His remark caused her to half laugh, half cry. Malgrave was in an entirely different area. It made no sense unless her prayer was answered and The Weave relocated her somewhere else, somewhere safer, but then what happened to her companions?
 
"No, it's not." Her words were dry and hallow. The low drop of her voice introduced all that worry her fidgeting compelled one to see. No doubt Deely meant well with the medicinal brew and broth left out for her, but Kaelish had reservations about the bizarre feel of it all.
 
"No where near here at all." 
 
Her hand reached up to brush over a tender bruise on her forehead, then flicked her hand out to him with a touch of disgust. Not at him, but herself, though he could easily misinterpret it. "I don't believe a dream would do this," Kaelish remarked with a sniff. Crying wasn't something she typically did. If at all. The entire situation was traumatic all over again. "I didn't do this to myself," she uttered once more, shoving her arm outward towards him. It was a gesture to emphasize the lacerations and large hand prints caused by the enemy. The Dominion.
 
As she drew the hand back to her face she hadn't expected him to touch her and physically flinched at the contact. Aurins were a touchy, feely race and sometimes tactile gestures were necessary. Afraid she'd offend him as she felt she had Deely, she tensed up, but didn't reject the touch. The baby's occupied vocals still lingered in the background, reminding her she was in his space. She felt like floaters were in her eyes, occasionally blurring her vision, but she also knew it was more the tears free falling than anything else. How did one handle an all out attack, being treated like prey and finding themselves somewhere that made no sense? 
 
The mask itself provided the necessary divide. He was on his side and she on hers, in as far as personal space went. For an Aurin anyway. There was a bit of a squirm of her hand to wiggle it free of his.
 
"But they could be dying," she countered with as much energy as she could muster. Healers, they made the worst patients ever.	
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"I know."  Rocio let her hand go.  His heart hurt for her. It really did.   But if her friends were dying in Malgrave, they were dead. "I'll put out a call to Malgrave and let you know if anything comes back. But in the mean time.  eat something. it'll clear your head.  If you need us, we'll be right here. Just ask."
 
Rocio walked out the door and went to his radio comm. It was like a commchannel but had more of a global range.  As soon as he turned it on, Lurk started his loud babbling. Rocio felt a tug on his tail than a sharp pain. "Erg! Hey!"
 
Lurk had sunk is tiny claws into him. Rocio smiled and flicked his tail back and forth. whacking the baby in both his fat cheeks.  He growled gently. "Little monster."
 
Turning back to the task at hand, Rocio radio'ed out about a Domnion attack and Malgrave and any victims.  There was silence on the other side. No one seemed to have any information and sent back an inquiry.
 
"I've got a victim, a Aurin spellslinger, says that she and two of her friends got waylaid in Malgrave."
 
"Where are you?"
 
"Celestion. She voidgated all the way out here."
 
Silence on the other end. "That sounds pretty unbelieveable."
 
"She believes it."
 
No one responded and Rocio left the console. No one was going to look. The story was too crazy and the desert was too hot to be running around after crazy stories. Deely brought him fruit and cheese and he nibbled at it halfheartedly. "I might need to go to Malgrave."
 
She frowned.
 
He looked over at her. "I don't want to go but..."
 
"It's okay, love. We'll be here when you get back." She smiled, stroking his hair. "You go out there and do your thing."	
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She watched him go as far as the door before closing her eyes to everything around her. Her fingers spread out against floor as she took a steadying breath despite the protest of her aching ribs. For as tired as she was The Weave answered her within seconds, like a mother answering the call of a lost child. Its calming essence hummed through weary limbs and helped her focus on what she intended to do. Kaelish didn't let her thoughts wander to Icelus or even her Human companion as she tipped her head to the side. Even without the mag pistols, she could possess the healing arts with The Weave at her back. She'd always been able to, even as a child. Healing came to her as naturally as breathing. 
 
Sigils flared into life around her wrists as energy crackled around her arms. Kaelish wasn't looking to expend herself into unconsciousness again by overhealing, but she could at least dissipate the worst of it and she did. The bleeding lacerations over her arms sealed themselves, turning into pink welts that would, without attention, scar if she wasn't careful. Yet none of that mattered to her as she painstakingly focused on herself for a moment. Just long enough to channel the warm and comforting energy The Weave lent her into those injuries.
 
Her head hurt less as the energy abated, but the crackling lightning continued to linger even after she rose from the cot. Steadier steps than she should have had led her to the doorway where she overheard the conversation in part.
 
"I'm not lying," Kaelish's voice sounded firmer, stronger. She wasn't a delusional, battle worn Aurin with her head in the sky. Aquamarine eyes landed on the trio as she leaned against the doorway. Fingers deftly tugged away the bandages that were no longer necessary. At the very least, she didn't drop them on the floor, but chose instead to wad them up in her palm. 
 
"And I'm not insane." She took another step into the room. Aside from the disheveled appearance, the shreds in her clothes, and the remaining smears, she was better for the look of it. Her last step towards them coincided with the Spellslingers surging power dissipating around her.
 
"And you're not going alone." The way she leveled her head said she wouldn't take a 'No' and he'd have a heck of a time restraining her if he tried. Plus it added years to her that said she wasn't a youngster rebelling against orders, but someone who had seen her homework burn, someone who lost her family and wasn't ready to lose more. 	
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The Malgrave desert spread out before them like a golden sea. Rocio was leaning back in the taxi cab, looking out at the expanse but also scanning it with his mind. There was no one out here. As he suspected, if her friends were in danger, they were dead at this point but he did not have the heart to tell Kaelish and doubted it would do anything but upset her further.
 
“Hey!” He said to the holo cabbie. “Let us out here.”
 
“Here? Oh no, I’m not going to fall for that again. Last time I tried that I got robbed and stuck in a mudpuddle for weeks!”
 
Rocio snarled. “I said, let us off! Now do it before I turn your projection into a naked Granok’s rear!”
 
“Alright! Alright! I’ll do it! Just calm your tail, kid!”
 
The cabbie drifted down and opened the door. “That’s some boyfriend you got there chick. Best of luck to ya.” He closed the doors. “NOT!” he snapped as he lifted back into the sky.
 
Kaelish immediately ran off, calling for her friends. Rocio chased after her. It was the R-12 containment area. The monsters here were augmented and dangerous. The sun was beating down on them. Rocio was already beginning to sweat heavily. The air should cool in an hour or so but they still had to last until then. “Calm down. Don’t run yourself out. I’m not sensing anyone else here anyway.”	
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Her hands were firmly over her feathery ears most of the taxi ride over because if there was one thing that successfully annoyed the Aurin, it was the holo cabbie. Even her lips were set in a grimace. Someone once told her it was a gender thing, that ladies couldn't stand the incessant chatter the cabbie offered. That'd ended in a minor scuffle that Icelus had to break up after catching his breath from laughing so hard. Deplicator ended up picking her by the scruff like some wild puppy and bidding the instigator a good day. There were moments she did revert back to a rebellious teenager and gender jokes were the trigger. Ah, Aurins, it wasn't just the males that got a little ruffled over things.
 
"Oh will you just shut it!" 
 
No sooner than it hit the ground, she was bounding out of it with a frustrated sound. Maybe that's why Deplicator always summoned her from place to place. Then again, she also made use of the portals available. Anything to avoid the cabbie.
 
The boyfriend remark either went unheard or hardly bothered her because all she did propel herself forward. Everything looked right, but felt off. Her aquamarine eyes darted around to the familiar cliff formations and before long she was pausing in the sweltering heat out of breath. "This is wrong," she pointed at the edge of several cliffs. "There's nothing. I spent all day marking them. I know I did." 
 
To make matters worse, she didn't recognize anyone they passed by.
 
The Exiles were huge, but with how often she helped out the community and literally was everywhere, it was hard to imagine no one knew was around. Her hands bundled themselves up in her hair with a combination of worry and frustration. "ICELUS!" The very name echoed around. "Stop playing! Where are you!?" Those were the cries of someone desperate for an answer. "Please!" 
 
When he said he wasn't sensing anyone, she whirled around to stare at him, one wide eye saying that was impossible. If by chance they made it to anyone who served in the area, to inquire about her friends, they themselves wouldn't recognize Kaelish either. Further adding to the illusion she was very much deranged.	
----
			
Rocio squatted down and started making circles in the dirt with his finger while Kaelish ran around shouting into an empty desert. He told her that it was empty but her delusions were so strong that she continued. She must have seen something truly awful to suffer such a profound mental breakdown and he sympathized all too well.
 
She was looking at him for some confirmation of her story. Some acknowledgement that her friends were fighting in the desert somewhere. He just stared back at her. There was nothing he could say that she would believe until she accept what her eyes, ears and nose were telling her.
 
There was no one here who knew what she was talking about. The all thought she was sunstruck.	
----
			
"You think I'm crazy," her tone was rather high like one expected from someone losing their mind. She whirled around to glare at the harsh barren area around her. From one beast in the distance to the buzzards in the sky, she was angry and rightly so. Her entire life up to then had been turned around all because of an ambush that put her in another location without her companions. Without her consort.
 
"Fine," dust followed after her as she pressed forward to the very spot she was last. "This place." Her dainty foot kicked up a small rock out of her way. There should have been saturation from her blood there, something, anything. Apparently he'd given her the mag pistols back, as they'd been with her when she left the void, but as a stranger in his house with those injuries on her, she didn't blame him for leaving them somewhere out of reach until he ascertained her stability. Part of her wondered if he was regretting it now as she lofted her mag pistols before her. 
 
"By the Weave, let's replay things," and she didn't give Rocio time to stop her as sigils seared into life around her hands and started to form around them. If she was right, and he was unlucky enough, there'd be something worth showing him to prove she wasn't crazy. Though Kaelish was beginning to doubt herself as well. The Weave billowed around her as she harnessed the magic a Spellslinger tapped to travel in the Void. She was willing to Void Slip again as the environment turned sepia and everything around them disappeared from sight. 
 
One step, two, she started to run and left it up to Rocio if he'd follow, if he even managed to slip with her. "Icelus!"
 
"Kael, Kael, babe, wake up."
 
"Puny man, talk louder, she can't hear your soft girly voice."
 
"What the hell, man. Not the time," she heard in response. 
 
"I'm right here! Where are you?!" But the Void only lasted seconds before their voices faded out. Her stomach felt as if someone punched it and not because of the voices she heard. Kaelish doubled over like Void Slipping itself had taken a toll on her.	
----
			Rocio's ears flattened when she screamed at him. Though he had tried to keep his abilities as an empath discretely deafened, her mind was howling with pain and it was getting to him. She started to run away, in desperate panic, or so he thought."Wait!" He ran after her. He reached out to her, but she vanished. He felt the pull of the Void as well but resisted at the last second. He heard her cry that name again, then he heard a faint answer. The dimensional portal shut. He spun around looking for where she would re-emerge.There! She was swaying as though sick. There was definitely something strange going on. Rocio steadied her with one hand. "Tell me what happened! What did you see?"	
----
			
A more sensible Kaelish would have picked up on his sensitivity and adjusted accordingly. The happy, go lucky, playful Aurin had in a matter of hours turned back into the nerve wracked girl she was years ago. All it took was being separated from those she heavily invested a bond with. The people who grounded her and kept those nightmares at bay. Her deeply seated issues stemmed from abandonment in any form. Kaelish required companionship, someone she trusted there to always be at her back. It's how she kept moving forward in life because between the two who always rivaled for her attention, they supported her wholly. 
 
And now they were out of reach.
 
She pressed the map pistols against her knees as she doubled over ready to hurl. Somehow she managed not to lose herself to nausea when Rocio helped her stand up. Kaelish looked a little peaky, her visible eye wide in confusion. "Nothing. Nothing at all, but," she wet her lips and drew in a ragged breath. "But I heard him, them," her fingers dug into his arm. "Tell me you heard them." That was as good as a plea to tell her she wasn't crazy.	
----
			
"I heard them. I did.  I really did."  He winced a bit.  "Well... there is some strange magic going on here.  I'm not sure what it is.  But I'll do what I can to get you home."  He pulled a small napkin out of his pocket, moistened it with some water from his canteen and dabbed it on her forehead. "I think the heat is getting to you. Let's go sit over here in the shade." He pointed to a shadow of a large rock.
 
Even in the shade the temperatures were barely tolerable.  Rocio made every effort to keep her cool.  "Who is this Icelus?" he asked, fanning her with a small metal sheet.	
----
			
Emotional relief washed over her features when he confirmed what she heard. She wasn't crazy after all. Not if he heard their voices, even in part. Kaelish gingerly took the napkin away from him, tipping her head in thanks, as she tried to calm herself incrementally. It was a roller coaster ride of emotions for her, from the confusion to dread then elation and confusion all over again. Provided he released the napkin, she'd more or less obediently make her way to the rock. Shade or not, it was bound to be warm just from the hot sand underfoot.
 
In a less than graceful descent, she settled down with the napkin well over her face. His question went unanswered as she collected herself. "Icelus." The name was said in a soft undertone lavished with every bit of affection it deserved. She pulled the napkin away enough to glance at him with one steady eye. "He's... an Esper. A very energetic, courageous and fierce man." It was like she didn't know what to do with her hands and had to move them if she was sitting still. Maybe it was just talk about Icelus that caused her to fidget. 
 
"Dep likes to call him girly man because his fur matches mine," there was a touch of a smile. Like she was trying not to let it fully blossom. "They're two I would do anything for and they'd do anything for me."	
----
			
Rocio sat down next to her and began fanning himself against the heat. "So it sounds like they're not dead and won't die easily.  That's a relief."  He sighed. "So what's the last thing you remember when you disappeared from them? If we can copy those conditions we may be able to get you back."  He opened his shirt a bit and drew one hand across his forehead.
 
The sun if anything had grown more intense. The heat made the ground in the distance wavy and blurred.  There were a few animals walking about, appearing to float over the surface of the baked earth.	
----
			
"It was odd." The urgency of their voices sounded different than when they were trying to reach her. Before the slip whisked her away somewhere else. Why tell her to wake up? One hand threaded fingertips through her hair, pushing it away from the side of her neck in an attempt to cool off. 
 
"I think... they're beyond that part." Her gaze fell to the hot sandy floor they occupied only to escape the scorching hot sun overhead. One of the few times she wished for pants. Not that she'd ever admit it. No way in an augmented jabbit's wildest dreams would she confess to that. She shifted to brush the hot sad off her bare legs and hooked a wrist over one upraised knee. The way she stared at the ground was one of reflection, giving true weight to his question.
 
Or it was her looking away from his own actions in a respectful manner. Hard to tell. They were strangers in an awkward situation; he felt responsible for finding her and she wanted to go back 'home', wherever that was now.
 
"Panic?" A dry, humorless laugh. "Fear. Lots of it. I don't fight up front, that's... well, that's their job. I hang in the back. Fear, dear jabbit, and pain. I wanted so desperately to either escape and let them stop focusing on getting to me or to get to them so they could work on defending us. We've always been great at getting out of tough situations." Her voice was low and almost melodic after the first few stuttering words tumbled through. A wall breached in the knowledge her friends were safe, but somewhere else, and that she wasn't crazy.
 
She shook the napkin to fan it out, then offered it back to him. "So we need... several Dominion, another life or death struggle, and scaring the life out of me?" Her sole visible brow lofted itself up as if daring him to say that was a splendid idea.	
----
			
Rocio listened carefully. She had been panicked and in pain, desperate to escape. Perhaps those intense feelings affected her spells. He was reasonably sure they did. Every spellslinger learned Void Slip early on in their training. By the time they were fully trained, slipping was second nature. But she had slipped far away.
 
So perhaps it wasn't something she did, but something she felt.
 
Rocio's ears suddenly flattened and his gaze turned fierce. People were approaching. They weren't within sight yet. He felt their mental presence.
 
"Wait here."
 
He dashed away on all fours like a dagun. He crawled up a boulder and lay on it. He pulled out a pair of binoculars from his pack. They were Dominion. More than a routine patrol. It seemed to be a few scientists guarded by about a dozen soldiers. It was time to go.
 
He galloped back to Kaelish. "Dommies. We have to get out while we can."	
----
			
His return found her standing, the mag pistols drawn, with feathery ears shifting as they swept the area for unusual sounds. That they both pivoted his way long before he drew near showed she was more alert now. With a pistol flipped around a dainty clawed fingertip she turned to look in the area he'd gone. "Why?"
 
An aquamarine eye locked on him. "Why leave? Isn't that what you wanted?" Though she was pale despite the horrible heat of the area, she seemed steadfast to repeat what brought her here in the first place.
 
"Didn't you want to replay things?" Her gun pointed at the area the Dominion were in and if he knew anything about Spellslingers, it was their damnable range. A sigil started to form around the hand aiming, he literally had seconds to stop her from firing a shot off into the distance. Suicidal wasn't it, by her act, but she wanted to go home and if they needed to repeat things, well, she saw it as a sign there were Dominion closing in on them.	
----
			
Rocio grabbed her hand and dragged her away, running full tilt and expecting her to keep up with him.
 
She seemed to resent the contact and pulled out of his grip.  Rocio turned around. "Kaelish!"
 
She turned back to where they had run, not realizing how many Dominion soldiers there were until she saw them. And when she saw them, they saw her.
 
Rocio leaped on top of her as the soldiers opened fire on them.  "Geist!"
 
The psionic projection separated from his body and drew the fire of the soldiers while Rocio and Kaelish made their escape. There was no place to hide, they had to just run as fast as they could.
 
Rocio suddenly seemed to glow a bright yellow color. He completely transformed his body into that of a shining dawngrazer and bearing her on his back, he began to run in a zigzag pattern across the sand. Bullets winged and pinged around them. 
 
Kaelish abruptly was thrown forward into the sand. She popped her head up. Rocio was lying on the ground, visibly wounded. She got up and ran toward him.	
----
			
She actually snarled at him trying to drag her away from what she felt was the best way to get back to her consort. Hard to expect anyone in her situation not venting their frustration and anguish. Icelus would have been proud to see her go up against uncertainty for the sake of them, but he'd also have set her on her tail for being reckless with her life. 
 
"Kaelish!" Rocio shouted even as she sprinted off, it didn't have the same startling impact as him toppling her over and pinning her down. Her earlier snarl was nothing compared to feeling defenseless even as "Geist!" sought to drag her attention to the battle rather than the esper on her. By mercy of the situation, Rocio only had a startled Spellslinger on his hands that seemed responsive to the prompting and his manhandling. Icelus probably did the same when the time called for it in their skirmishes with the Dominion. While he found perverse pleasure in their fights, he also prioritized her safety and no doubt being apart from her now was eating at him as much as it was her.
 
He manipulated his dawngrazer form in a different way than Icelus, further surprising her, but the way he vaulted her into the air was nothing she couldn't handle. Surprised or not, Spellslingers were acrobatic by their very nature and she spun forward with arms tucking around her to land with mag pistols aimed behind where they once were. Aquamarine eyes scanned the area before she ran towards him with a curse filling the air.
 
"You bloody, stupid idiot," the flustered Aurin said as she sank to his side. Her hand slammed down into the earth with her pistols wedged between palm and soil. Sigils broke out into the air around them as her eyes closed, opening only to reveal chaos energy she converted from The Void to harness the power of healing. Beneath them the ground transitioned into an oasis of soothing energy. She channeled the arcane power from her pistols into the very air around them. Without necessary guidance it worked furiously on the wound she saw while her spare hand started tugging at his clothes.
 
"All you had to do was stay away. That's it! You're the one who said to find a way to repeat it." If he wasn't hurt, she might have slammed her fisted pistol down against his chest. Her face was wet from tears of frustration. "It could have worked, it would have worked!" With every outburst she started to tremble from anger and fear, the unknown of if it would have worked or turned worse. 
 
Kaelish shuffled aside the torn parts of his outfit to focus on the wound. "It'll hurt," she said with a sniff, the pointed over the wound as she gathered The Void's energy to quicken the healing pace as if her Void Spring was too slow for her.	
----
			
Rocio, paralyzed by agony, could only lay on the ground helplessly, hoping that Kaelish somehow managed to escape in the chaos.
 
Then he saw her knees and heard her mag pistols fire. "You bloody, stupid idiot," she growled.
 
"You're welcome." He grunted through clenched teeth.
 
She immediately got to work on his injuries, trying to heal them, but Rocio was more concerned about the approaching soldiers. She had to get away! He took a sharp breath to speak and an equally sharp pain made his words come out as a senseless groan. She was still talking, crying and looking upset.  Could this be an opportunity?  He thought back to his wife and son at home for a moment. He couldn't die here!
 
The Void Spring hit him like a lightning bolt. "ARRRGH!" He gathered himself up and threw his arms around her. "Kaelish!  Void slip us out!"
 
Too shocked to do anything but obey, Kaelish's mag pistols took them into the Void with a subtle woosh. They both vanished right before the hail of bullets impacted where they had just been.
 
Rocio opened his eyes to a very strange place.  This place was the Void.
 
Trained to obey commands as an Exile, despite the instant flare of anger at him ruining her focus while she tried to heal him, because that was her priority, she threw them into the Void. What were once sigils for healing bled out into angry runes that slung them from the reality of his world into what Scientists called the Void. It was devoid of life as far as the eye could see and illuminated with an ethereal golden aura. No matter where one looked, it only contained them, but the voices where there again.
 
"Please babe, wake up, just open your eyes." A man's voice, softly uttered, but urgent nonetheless. 
 
"Pun---," another man's voice, interrupted by the deep growl of the former speaker.
 
"Shut up or get out before I throw you out," the initial voice painfully enunciated. 
 
Kaelish dug her claws into Rocio's sides as she fought to push him back, yet maintain a grip on him. "We have to go or the Void will throw us back where we were," she snapped at him with as much energy as she could bolster despite the voices bouncing around in the nearly silent world of sepia tones.
 
"Those voices!  Is that them?" Now it was Rocio's turn to be dragged along as they made their escape. Kaelish didn't answer.  Rocio could feel his wounds closing, he was regaining health by the second.  But time was also running out. "Icelus! Can you hear me at all?"
 
He focused his mind as hard as he could, trying to find the other Aurin. "Icelus! Kaelish is with me!"  Suddenly, the entire Void seemed to warp and bend. Rocio's felt a sickening sensation that he was falling!  
 
The Void spit them out in mid air. It wasn't a long way down but they both hit the ground in a heap.  "Ooow... Where are we now?" Rocio sat up and saw a rowsdower chewing its cud and staring at them with a bored expression.  Kaelish got up next to him. Rocio leaned away from her. She looked angry enough to hit him, but she held back.  Rocio followed her gaze. They were back. They were back in Celestion.
 
"You're a... you're a living Transmat..." He felt at his body. His clothes were stained and torn, but at least his wounds were healed. "This is... this is amazing!"
 
"AMAZING?"	
----
			
Her beret fell off in the madness of being shucked from the Void while trying to maintain her grip on him for fear it was contact alone that kept him in there to begin with. Tussled hair messily billowed around her brooding face as she glared vehemently at him. All those emotions fluttered through her expression while he sat there elated from being freshly healed and surviving what was probably a near fatal encounter. It would have been fatal had things not worked out as well as they had. Her second jaunt through the void was less intensive than the first, but she was still pale from the draining effect it had bringing them so far. 
 
The pistols in her hand almost complained at the fierce grip she had on them. Counting, as she heard Humans say, was not doing anything for how incredibly angry she was at him saying things were amazing. They were so very far from it in her mind as she edged closer to him and whirled with the speed of a Spellslinger to slam the butt of her pistol against the side of his head. Rocio would have escaped the loss of her temper if he hadn't of said she was a transmat. Really, it's what set her off.
 
"Do you think this is funny?!" Her voice arched angrily. "Do you think this," her hands gestured outward to encompass Celestion where Malgrave should have been, "is amazing." Kaelish rarely ever got angry, but her loss of temper displayed itself in the environment around her, which was something she usually had tight control over. The tie to the very world around her would have earned her the title of matria on Arboria. She wasn't done with simply rounding on him with the pistol, no. Kaelish pursued and would have nothing other than him back down, on the ground, prone with her venting at him. This was the fierce side of Kaelish that Icelus did his best to keep from premiering. It hurt his ego to have her handle things herself.
 
"I'm not some stupid science experiment! I'm not a Transmat! I'm a person that just wants to go home." Her pistols had fallen to the ground with vines tenderly curling around them by the time her fingers curled into Rocio's shirt like she wanted to punch him outright and was stopping herself.
 
Meanwhile, the rowsdower continued to chew out of boredom despite the sight of a female Aurin accosting a male in the middle of Celestion's suddenly living forest. 	
----
			
By the time he realized what was happening, Rocio was on the ground, seeing stars and feeling like she had just stabbed him in the head with a knife.  "I'm sorry! I'm sorry!  I... I didn't mean to call you an experiment..." He rubbed furiously at his temple. "Bloody Rot! That hurt! Did you hit me with your gun?"
 
She leaned back as though to hit him again and he held out his hands to defend himself. "Hey! Hey! Stop! Ugh... Ow!" He checked his hand for blood before resuming massaging his head where an ugly bruise was already starting to form. 
 
She pushed him back and stood up, walking away a distance. Rocio stood up, wobbling and sighing and moaning to himself.  "Ohh... wow... ok. Why don't we sit down talk about what just happened."	
----
			
Ultimate irony of ironies being that she normally healed people, therefore being injured by a healer, well it meant he truly hit a nerve. While he was healed from the worst and majority of what the Dominion had done, he had several bruises as a reward for the remark she was some silly notion of a transmat. She growled down at him in disgust at the hands moving to defend himself. Not that anyone would blame him. Who wanted a pissed off female on them while they were down from whiplash?
 
By the time she pushed herself off him and walked a few paces away, the grass had stopped crawling in response to her anger. The mag pistols stayed idle on the ground, vegetation having ceased its crazy life-like motions. Everything went back to normal after a few drawn out breaths. She kept her back to him, something Icelus would have fumed over, and left her arms folded over. It was clearly the silent treatment for a while until she could talk with the bare minimum of a snarl.
 
"So you can sum it up as something comical again? No thanks." Maybe the fact her guns were theoretically in his possession, as they were closer to him than her, was a concession for striking him with the butt of them.	
----
			"Okay... well... I'm going home."  Rocio looked up. "You? You can take your transmat magic and your Void boyfriend and just... go plant yourself." He stomped off. "I tried to help and this is what I get for it.  A rotten goose egg the size of a goose egg...." His conscience immediately dug at him for his words, but he didn't listen to it. He was hungry, he was tired, and his head felt split open. He just needed to go home curl up next to Deely and let Lurk chew his ear with his toothless mouth.	
----
			
The clench of her jaw went unnoticed with the way her back was turned to him. 'Void boyfriend' hit another nerve, one of many he was becoming a master at nailing with ease. She waited for the sound of his retreat to fade from her ears before she turned around, slowly at first with a glance over her shoulder, then fully to retrieve her guns. 
 
Kaelish leveled the green and gold pistols at the back of Rocio's retreating head, almost out of range, and exhaled. Spellslingers were notorious for shooting people with arcane energy that pierced armor, but she wasn't loading a shot to finish him, despite wanting very badly to put a stop to his mumbling. Instead she focused on the channeling of that chaotic energy the Void gave her to vitalize him as she had earlier. It wasn't like the Void Spring which jabbed at someone like a thousand needles and forced the body to repair itself. This shot streamed the soothing magic around him in a flurry of golden light where it could invade every wound and set to work on those bruises with a warm, tingling sensation as opposed to the biting snap Void Spring had.
 
With a flip of her pistols, she turned on her heel to head the direct opposite of him. If she had to walk back to Malgrave, she would, but since the area was no different than her own reality she had a hunch she could use currency on her to pay for a taxi back. Then, well, she'd get to that when she got there.	
----
			
Rocio felt the immense relief when the healing magic worked on his injury.   He turned back to her, feeling like a cad.  What was he thinking? Yeah, she got him into trouble but without her he would have died out there. It's not like Kaelish wanted to be here. He muttered again to himself. "Rocio, you are an idiot."
 
What now? If she disappeared she might not come back. He let out a small groan and turned around and jogged after Kaelish. "Wait!"  The forest was suddenly illuminated in white.  In the distance, thunder growled low.  Large droplets began to fall through the canopy. The wind picked up. "Kaelish?!"  The loud clap of thunder swallowed his voice. "... oh... Raspberries."	
----
			
The crackling of thunder overhead spooked her in part only because of the day she had, the roller coaster ride didn't appear to be over just yet. His cries for her were drowned out by the storm rolling in, which only made matters all that more troublesome for him. Did it really matter if she didn't come back? He wanted to be rid of her and by the very nature of things, it seemed like he was getting his wish as she shuffled through Celestion with her beret tucked down the front of her uniform.
 
"Bloody idiot," she muttered under her breath. "Should have left him to rot with the bruises." The first few drops rolled off her feathery ears without any problem. It was the downpour clinging to her tail that made things uncomfortable as she loped towards a large tree with massive limbs stretching upwards into the vastness of canopy overhead. The large roots provided minimal coverage from the direct falling rain as she rung out her outfit then settled on combing her tail dry.
 
A wet rat if ever she was anything to the untrained eye. Her hair was sopping wet, matted to her face and back as she shifted around to unhook her belt. She didn't want the mag pistols wet for fear of rust. They'd still work regardless, but she preferred her things unsoiled and they were already splattered with blood and debris from being thrown around.
 
"He can go plant himself," she continued to grumble. She hadn't made it very far before she sought refuge under the massive tree. That is if he kept looking.	
----
			Rocio knew she couldn't have gotten far.  The sun was going to set and with the rain, the dark and the woods would close on them.  Shivering, cold and hungry, he resigned himself to a night out in the open. He climbed a tree to hide in the thick canopy. His cybernetic eye glowed faintly behind his mask. As a trained hunter and assassin Rocio didn't have any issues picking up her trail, crawling squirrel-like through the tree branches.  He glanced down on the ground and sees her, sitting miserable and wet. He couldn't help her, he realized. He pressed himself into the curve where the branch met the trunk and it was relatively dry.  The most he could do is watch over her for now.  The lightning flash and thunder were farther away now.  The winds were letting up.	
----
			
Kaelish knelt under the tree with the soaked clothes hanging off her in the perfect picture of misery. Alone, without anyone she trusted, and of course, separated from her precious Void boyfriend. She ground her teeth in frustration still. A resourceful Aurin at heart, her thoughts weren't focused on the thunder crackling around her or even the chill surrounding her wet form. As the sun began to set she lifted an item from one of her pockets and held it out before her, tilting her head in concentration before the luminescence crawled up her arm and swarmed her. A Goldensun Essense by the effect as it spread the wispy rays of sunlight all around her as she had done thousands of times before. As an Explorer it provided her the perfect way to navigate at night even if, in less than hospitable territories, it made her a target. With a swish of her tail, she waited out the remnants of the storm.
 
Exhaustion tugged at her, causing her head to gently dip down on occasion before it jerked upward, wide awake. She thought every time she drifted off she heard someone talking to her, which caused her to wake up and then the voice was gone. Nothing was more frustrating than feeling like someone's experiment. Again. Rocio's advantage for the evening as he stalked her was that she made for a lousy Explorer. Though she had the basic training every Exile went through, she wasn't much of a tracker or alchemist. She preferred not to fight because she simply wasn't any good at it. Queen Myala suggested she try Exploring because of her wanderlust. Certainly she ended up in one tangle of events after another, but nothing quite so serious -- or unusual.
 
Kaelish examined her fingers, then slowly let her gaze trail up over her bare arms. Pink welts, wounds mostly healed. A few that would scar if she didn't devote some tender loving care to them with the right ointments. There were worse from her time on Arboria. Her ears perked as the rain drifted off and the wind eased its assault on her damp outfit. Her gaze turned to the side as if she heard someone out there, while awake, though she couldn't have known it was Rocio tucked away and watching her from out of sight. 	
----