Quest It's Our Time To... (Open)

[Gossamer]

Timestamp: 42nd of Spring, 517 AV.

It's our time to make a move
It's our time to make amends
It's our time to break the rules
Let's begin...

The storm that raged the night before was a fierce one. The palms bent double and the coconuts flew like ballista through the air, causing damage where they landed. Plants became displaced, and any rubbish laying around be it man-made or biological was scattered to the four winds. Ill made housing and unsecured tents felt the wrath of the Suvan as the windstorm continued. Thunder cracked the sky, rain drove punishingly down, and even some of the new ranchos lost sight of their proud little decks, so high the seas rolled. The Suvan raged, pushing itself up on the banks , depositing burdens and filling the air with a tang of magic that was unlike anything anyone had ever seen.

People who actually slept woke feeling empty. Those that didn't sleep felt something deep in the heart of the night, when the mystical bell rest itself, that felt like a rending.

Uta crossed herself and whispered 'soul eaters!' fearfully as she dashed outside of her home and tried to make her way towards the heart of the settlement to Mathias home. She never made it. Halfway there she clutched her chest and flailed a moment, going down on her knees and loosing consciousness.

Everyone else did too... in that instant... if they were awake, and as they felt their consciousness slip away, there was a rending inside of them as if something was stolen from their very being, and in loosing it they lost consciousness altogether.

But storms can't last forever. Morning comes. Clouds break. The wind died down and Zulrav turned his head elsewhere. The settlement might have been in pieces, but everyone was alive.

Alive and empty.

They woke feeling an acute loss of something, something indescribable. No one knew who they were. No one knew what they had known when they felt torn from the world that previous night. There was no sense of home, no sense of belonging, no sense of who they were indeed.

Nameless, faceless, without memories, the denizens of Syka woke to a cold heartless world. It was a frightening place. If people left their dwellings, wandered, they'd find that everyone was in this state. Everyone was dazed... everyone confused... and everyone a little... surprisingly angry.

If anyone explored further, they'd find other things washed up on the beach among the flotsam and storm debris. A small gathering occurred around the biggest most unusual flotsam of all.

On the beach lay a man, naked from the waist up. He was barefooted and his trousers were torn at the knees giving him the look of a vagrant beggar. He looked older, more Mathias' age... late fifties, and on his back were two swirling vortexes of light... obviously gnosis marks. His right hand was empty, but in his left he clutched a small bag. The bag was the size of perhaps two spans of his hands, made of cloth, and filled with lumps that looked like worn smooth river rock.

He groaned, moved slightly, and sat up. People moved back. He touched his bare chest with his free hand, then glanced down at the bag he clutched in his other one. His left hand shook, as if the weight that was in the bag was far greater than it should be. He set it down abruptly, the items in the bag chiming as they struck the sand.

"Who am I? Where am I?" He asked suddenly, abruptly, his voice rasping and sounding as if it had been abused. He was as confused as the rest of them. He ran his tongue across parched cracked lips, and spit to one side, his mouth tasting of foulness.

"Gods, is that magic I smell? Is that magic I taste all over? What in the world is going on here?" He started again, his voice sounding no better than it did a moment ago.

More people gathered, until almost everyone in the whole settlement was standing there... even a blind man who suddenly found that he could see.

[Bay'Lin La]

Tired wasn't the word for what Bay'lin was. It felt as if it had been days since he had slept; and even if he made that very claim, could not even remember if it was the truth. All he knew was that something was missing and the only sensation he could compare the empty feeling to was the lethargy of fatigue. And yet, he wasn't tired.

As his consciousness started to take in the reality of his surroundings, Bay'lin realized he laid prone atop a small bridge leading towards a home. As he looked up, he could tell from they way his body feel that he'd collapsed atop a dock way leading from the shore to a beach side rancho.

Once he'd gotten up to his feet, Bay'lin started to take inventory of his body to learn anything he could about himself. The palm of his hand grazed against the kelp armor he was adorned in, then down to the dagger that was strapped to the armor by a thin piece of cloth. “Armor... and weapons? Am I a fighter? Was I in a fight? If so, then who was I fighting?” They were thoughts that distracted him for a brief moment until he heard faint sound coming from the house ahead of him.

His bare webbed feet made it easier to hide the sounds of his footfalls as he entered into a small crouch then make his way over to the door. He moved to the side to hide behind the edge of the door frame, then peaked inside. The first person that he'd noticed was a female that had his same racial appearance. That was what gave him the motivation to approach her.

"Who are you," Bay'lin responded simply, turning away from a woman whom he'd just met; forgetting that she was his sister.

May'lin wasn't seeing her brother standing in front of her, no. She was seeing the man that had broken into her home? Is this even my house? She thought as she backed away from Bay'lin until her back hit the wall. She slid down the wall and curled her fingers tightly around her knees, pulling herself into a ball, rocking from side to side slightly as she tried to regain her composure, completely unaware of anything going on. Too frightened to respond to the mans questions.

"Fine. You know nothing. But, you are never going to find out what's happened if you sit there sniveling. And I'm not going to hurt you, so help me look around." He cast her a stern look to try and coax her self preservation instincts into action. That was all the help he could offer her before turning to the dining area table where he spotted a backpack and a trident. He picked up the trident then looked it up and down before glancing down to the weapons harness straps running across his chest. It took him a tick before finding that he could wear the weapon on his back.

"Okay, so this weapon is mine." As he looked around, he started to set the building into his memory. It was 'his'. At least he knew something about himself. He walked back over to May'lin and crouched down in front of her. "Woman. I have no memory of you, but I think we lived here together. We must be friends, family, or lovers. No matter what, any option means we are loyal to each other to some degree. If you want to come with me, say something. If not, I will leave you here... alone."

May'lin's eyes focused on him when she felt Bay'lin touch her hand and offer to help up. "I..i'll come with you." A quiet whimper slipped past her lips as she slowly looked at the man, starting to tremble slightly again. She took a deep breath, then stood up and followed meekly behind him. Without knowing that he'd done it before, Bay'lin grabbed his backpack and made the woman carry it, like he always used to do, as they left.

***

The two Charoda siblings walked along the shore until they saw the 'shipwrecked' man. Bay'lin was going to help him up until he noticed the glowing on the human's back. He'd forgotten about the need for personal space when he tried to touch the man's gnosis marks, but pulled his hand back when the human started to stand up. "What does 'magic' even taste like?" He spoke aloud to the group. It was clear that it was a rhetorical question, but the look on his face made it clear that he wished to know the answer.

He reached into the backpack that the female Charodae held, then pulled out his waterskin, and held the fresh water out for the haggardly human to take a drink from. "Here, drink. Your dried lips are almost as unsettling to me as our memory loss."

[Karin]

Blonde hair fell across a face as the striking light of morning broke across a woman's concious. Syna's caress highlighted tanned cheekbones, and caught in the deep blue eyes of the woman, who blinked painfully. Her hand swept up to brush the loose hair and sand that was catching in her eyes, and she pushed herself to sit upright, looking around the room she found herself in.

It was not exactly pretty, she thought. A hammock nudged the back of her head, and scattered here and there were bits of wood. A small wooden chest lay nearby, mysteriously unknown. In fact, she didn't know where she was... or even who she was. That made her stop, her gaze suddenly snapping to the entrance where the soft crying of a seabird sharply came into focus. Who am I? Then a headache lanced into her skull, and she doubled over groaning.

The headache passed, after a chime or so, letting the woman try to understand what was happening. The first thing she did was to go over to the chest. She opened it carefully, catching the clasp and creaking the lid open. However, if she thought she'd find something to give her a clue of who she was, she would be mistaken. A jumble of clothes revealed her to be a conservatively dressed woman, with no bright colours at all. The blonde stared for a moment, and then pulled out the coil of rope as well as picking up a quarterstaff, that presumably belonged to her.

After fully exploring the rest of the room, and only finding a backpack with equally uninteresting contents, she sat back on her heels and thought, hard. What had happened? It was difficult to explain how she felt- there were too many conflicting thoughts fighting for her attention. She felt like she needed to know something, but couldn't. Like whatever the thing was, it was important.

Her head clouded and she ground her teeth in frustration- petch! She didn't even know her own name, and it was getting to her. This house, if it could be called that, was like a bandage tied too tight, restricting her, keeping her in the dark. So she got up, and ran on unsteady feet from the shelter into the blinding light of the daytime.

Her feet stumbled and tripped on tangled strands of seaweed and other debris, but she needed to find someone else, anyone else, it didn't matter. She just needed to know whether or not she was entirely alone in this world. With no idea of where she was going, she ran along the white beach, following the just-visible signs of a settlement.

When she found the crowd of people, she was out of breath and cradling a splitting headache with both hands. Her arrival had made a few look up, but not many said anything to the blonde woman. She was glad that she wasn't alone, but it seemed everyone else was just as confused as she was herself. She had just been able to catch the last of what the strange man had said, from his position on the floor, and although she had described him as 'strange', in actuality there was nobody here who wasn't a stranger to her.

A tall, rubbery-skinned man spoke, making her look around. He spoke of magic, and although she had never once in her life knowingly tasted magic, she could smell it now. There was a certain tang in the air, sharp on the tongue, that left her feeling woozy yet on edge all at the same time. Then there were the swirling marks on the man's skin, that the green man had touched. Perhaps the man, forgetting like all of them, had unwittingly caused this? She knelt in the sand besides him, and turned a fierce, ocean-blue gaze on his haggard one.

"Did you do this? Make us like this? Do you know how you got here?" Even as she was speaking she knew they were futile questions, and so she fell back again, shaking her head and retreating. It wouldn't help to accuse and to blame. No, they needed to find answers, but this man seemed to be just as caught up in the problem as much as they were. She felt guilty as she watched the man drinking from the bottle he had been offered, and wondered why she hadn't followed suit. Was this who she was?

[Xen]

There's No Rest For The Wicked.
No time for sleep when you are cursed

Through the darkest nights illuminated by lonesome stars and during the harshest days ruled by the impassive sun, Xen remembered himself. It was the only thing—despite the failures, painful experiences, and loses—that remained sound and unbroken throughout. But he never imagined losing a sense of who he was, including all memories and associated experiences too.

Xen opened his eyes and looked around; circular pupils dilated and then shrunk as an unfamiliar world manifested before him. He was surprised, confused and slightly hurt but he did not know what caused his bodily pain. First, Xen's thoughts were wild and vivid like hallucinations and ramblings summoned by a bad fever dream. Then they calmed and became still: reminiscent to a quiet slumber. Slowly, questions formed, multiplied and became infinitely more complex by the second like cells. Questions were answered by questions, leaving the unfulfilled to fill in spaces that were absent of truth and memory.

Quickly, Xen's mind descended into panic and disarray like before then it calmed, inflamed and proceeded to repeat over and over again. “ What a mess, ” Finally, Xen spoke; his voice hoarse and tinged with ache. He fell when he attempted to stand, causing dirt and twigs to become entangled in his hair. But, stubbornly, Xen persisted until he rose to his feet but needed to brace himself against a tree to remain upright. Then he looked around. He heard nothing around him besides a high pitch ring inside his skull. Xen groaned and placed his free hand over his eyes; he figured he hit his head on something before he lost consciousness. Though, the idea that something struck him wasn't too far-fetched either.

“ Branches and downed trees everywhere; wet sand beneath my boots and I feel like I was caught in a wave or something, ugh. What happened here? ” Xen uttered sluggishly within his black, leather armor still moist from the torrential rain. He felt like it was a miracle he was able to survive the wrath of the sky and seas. However, he did not know how he got outside of the bungalows, only pain and the fact he woke up on the jungle floor served as his answer.

“ I hear people. I could get some help, ” Xen made his way to the beach in a half walk and half hobble. He used the trees that offered themselves to him as support until sand replaced mud and twigs, and people stood in place of the trees. But the scene he stepped into scared him till his hands trembled in their gauntlets and his machete-sword and katana rattled in their sheathes.

A man asked for his name amongst people that looked they'd just awakened from a fit of night terrors. “ How can you forget your name? This man must be—” Xen's thoughts stopped as a dark reality loomed over him. He did not know his name, nor remembered who he was before he opened his eyes upon this new morning.

“ We need to help him, ” Xen said slowly and softly: it was almost like he tried to whisper his words. “ The man is just like us or perhaps worse, ” Xen continued in a clearer tone.

Xen walked ungracefully through his fellow sykans and approached the man. He extended his hand to help him. Xen did not know his past anymore, yet a part of him was oddly overjoyed. The loneliness, self-loathing, misery and the agony of existence. The suffering that was Xen had been wiped away; no more secrets, insecurity, and fear of helping others. He could be of use without charging a price. He could truly be kind and trusting of others.

“ I cannot answer your questions, Stranger. I don't know my name or much of anything. Not even this magic you speak of, ” Xen answered honestly, knowing that he probably wasn't any more helpful than the souls that thronged the beached.

[Ines]

Ines awoke, like much of the settlement, exhausted. Morning light streamed through tiny tears in the woven mats that made up her walls, tiny tears from the storm that ravaged the night. Her home, normally somewhat water-tight, had a leak in the corner, dripping onto nothing but the floor. Nothing seemed to be particularly damaged - just wet.

Ines felt empty, like a jug waiting to be filled with water. Like something was missing, something just out of reach and on the tip of her tongue. She felt sore, her upper shoulders and neck hosting a dull, achy pain. The bat stretched, standing up swiftly and regretting this action immediately as her head was wracked in pain, forcing her to sit back down. Her thoughts raced - perhaps she had been shipwrecked, and this was a fisherman's home. No one seemed to be around, and perhaps it was best to stay in bed - though still the kelvic was drawn outside, and she stood up again, slower, and slipped on a pair of leather boots left next to the bunk.

Facing the full humidity and range of sounds, sights, and smells of the jungle, Ines felt strangely comforted. A semi-visible, moderately traveled path was visible from the steps of the hut, and with little else to do, the witch followed them. Once in the full midst of the jungle, the bat felt a little overwhelmed. It was almost as if she could feel the ebb and flow of the land itself - a sensation that could not be considered normal. Shoving her confusion aside, she trekked on. It took perhaps half a bell for her to stumble upon the beach. A quick glance down and she could see a crowd, perhaps another half bell away, near a handful of buildings that decried "settlement".

The kelvic wandered down the beach, the resistance of walking in sand made the exhaustion worse. She pushed herself down past the berm, where the sand was firm and the water lapped. Walking this way was a much easier feat. The humidity of this place surrounded her like a cloak, brushed away every few ticks with a gentle breeze from the sea.

The walk felt much shorter than it was, and Ines quickly found herself amidst a crowd, surrounding a man with two bright swirls on his back. Gnosis. She did not say anything, but as he decreed the magic in the air, Ines was suddenly keenly aware of it too - it felt entirely off. Looking around, she noticed that others seemed to be in a similar state as her, appearing just as lost and confused as she was. However, the bat could feel the jungle, and she could feel the djed around her, and it felt strange. Strange, despite her inability to put a finger on what exactly she was comparing the strangeness to.

"I feel the magic, too."