Beginning of Fall, 515 AV
[between 1st of Fall and 30-somethingth of Fall]
The coyote's nose was pressed to the ground. At some points he walked, sniffing carefully, picking up the scent. Other times he ran quickly, leaping through the low brush, whispering through tall grasses, climbing over rocks, fielding the low, rolling hills. Outside, he was intent, taking no distractions. His dogs tried to get him to hunt and play, nipping at his side or rolling to show their bellies, paws bucking. He did not appease them.
The coyote had something to do. He had realized it, days past when he was still living in the blue city. He had someone to find.
It had not been a good time in the city. He had loved the place for its people, even if most of them were the blue men; it didn't matter, human-forms were human-forms. He had played with the little lost children in the streets, and splashed in the strange largest-saltiest-lake called the Sea. He had romped in what the human-forms called the other 'Sea'-- the Sea of Grass, which he was in now. But back then he had stuck close to the giant, sturdy walls of the city, afraid to go too far. Afraid he would be lost or his dogs would not let him go back or something else would happen to keep him from that place.
But it had not been a good time.
The city had been sick, sick. First there had been the bad-happening, the turn-around that made him afraid to get close, made his dogs act wrong, Brother angry and snarling and snapping and Sister meek and submissive. He had had to leave the city from that, and had waited out in the grass, checking every day for differences until finally something happened, and the sickness was gone, and the people were themselves again. He had gone back in, so happy.
And then a different sick had come. Strange places opening, all wrong. Doors. But they were not like regular doors.
Before the coyote had come to the blue city he had been in the wilds, not knowing what he was doing, always running. Coming to the city meant he had to check every place for his boy. Every street, every building, every room. He had come to the blue city to search, and for a long time he had looked and found nothing, not even the whiff of a scent, not even a glimpse. And then the doors. Suddenly his boy was there. He was in the doors. He was everywhere.
Kyo chased him. Kyo chased him round and round, never stopping. And that had been sick, too.
He hadn't realized what it was, not for a long time. He went in a different door every day, and every time he was brought to a new place, a wrong place, and there he had to search for his boy. It was a hopeless search. There was never a smell to lead him, like his boy had lost his scent. Sometimes he would see him, and run faster, calling out. But his boy never stopped. He was gone. Always gone.
And still Kyo had followed.
There had always been the next door.
It got harder. In the beginning there had been no scent of his boy, but he could see him and chase after. Soon it got worse. There would be no sight, either, no taste or heat, nothing but a white-darkness that blinded the eyes, a cotton-mouth like rags rammed in between the teeth, wrapping the snout and clamping the jaws and plugging the nose so there was no breath to help. There in that white-lost place had been his boy, so close, but unable to be found. And there he had heard his boy crying. In pain. And there Kyo had been, unable to do anything. Stumbling blind and gagged. Helpless. Hopeless.
Hopeless.
Sick.
When he had come out of that door the coyote had laid on the ground and cried. He had not been able to eat. Everything he tried came back up, even water. He couldn't sleep, or if he did there were bad dream-terrors, where his boy was weeping and screaming and he could do nothing. He was too weak to go back in the door, but he did. He could not stop. And it had happened again and again. Worse, worse.
People attacking his boy. An angry man. Striking him. Choking him. Doing things-- doing such things Kyo had no words for. And every time his boy was hurt and attacked and left crying. Left dying. Alone. And every time Kyo could do nothing. And time was gone. And he left him.
He left him.
In the end there had been nothing but that feeling growing emptier inside. In that feeling, lost, had been his boy. Here now, or a memory? "Run!" The boy had said, and so Kyo had run, though where he didn't know. Trees brushing by on either side. "Run, run!" He had left him. He had left him. The smell of smoke and blood. It got so he didn't know what was there and what was past. "Run!" Now, or then. He felt so wretched. He had promised. There was the emptiness, and the promise to keep looking. To keep searching.
There had been a final door.
His boy had talked to him in that last place, but there his boy was the one who could not see, and he spoke to Kyo as if to the air. He was not himself; his mind was not itself, not like it had been when Kyo had known him. He had been so old-looking, like he had grown up too fast and stretched his body til it broke. So thin and wobbly-frail. His eyes staring and dull-grey. Not smiling. He had said things the coyote did not understand. "They wanted you back but you were gone, and run! Run!" "It's too hot in here, what is this place, I can't breathe, I'm lost, it's dark." "They said I need your heart. I'm trapped. Please, you have to give me your heart. But I don't want it! Please, no. Give me your heart." "I can't get out. I'm in the ground. I'm scared. I can't get out."
