Fandom ─── ❝ ancient dreams ❞

[Kveykva]

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ in a modern land

i'm trying to get back as fast i can ━━━━━━

time to crack open pandora's box
Blu_lifee × Kveykva​

 

[Kveykva]

It should have been the most significant moment in her fledgling career so far. Vashtyee was all set to go off on a grand adventure into the unknown - that's how everyone around her put it. The reality wasn't nearly as grand, and that alone should've been grounding. It was a routine expedition to the baleraa breeding grounds to do a population study. All that was expected of the newly recruited navigator was to shadow her mentor, a prestigious avian known as Issic. He was from the capital city and piloted some of the fleet's grandest baleraa ships in his prime. Issic had long since retired from his career assisting the court, spending his retirement teaching a new generation. Vashtyee had no interest in becoming a pilot herself, but the wonder of the night sky always seemed to call to her. Someday, she wanted to travel across the universe and find her way home with the dancing figures of the constellations as her muses. That day, of course, would not be today.

Lakarain ships were equally intriguing and humbling, if not a little terrifying. The young aquatic had read plenty about them in her classes, and she even had the opportunity to board one when she studied abroad. They were elegant and gentle creatures, but baleraa were even more imposing in person than they were in films. Colossal, cetacean creatures that floated on air by filling gas bladders with light elements like helium and hydrogen. Trying to compare herself to one was enough to turn her knees to jelly, so she boarded the ferrous coach without delay. How the avians managed to domesticate such large things and fit them with saddles capable of withstanding space travel was beyond her, but she supposed she ought to just be grateful it all worked. If she thought about it too much, she'd start to think about just how much of it could go wrong.

There aren't as many stars as I hoped for, she mused dejectedly, her eyes scanning the shining dots that pinpricked the nebula around them. The ocean of dust and gas was said to be a peaceful place, where the beauty of nature was just as pure as the earth. Vashtyee wished she could see it as they did, but the world around her swam in muted greys, with only the bright lights of newborn stars adding character to her vision. She wasn't adapted to this kind of life, and she doubted she ever would be.

How things changed so quickly was a mystery, but to be honest, Vashtyee was prepared for this sort of thing already. There were a bunch of terms thrown around, trilled from harried lakarain tongues, and much of it went over her head. It didn't sound terribly awful. It was like someone talking about the eyewalls of a hurricane - she didn't know there was such a thing as a space hurricane. Still, the amount of panic in the air set off the right amount of alarm bells ringing in Vashtyee's head to have her fearing the worst, despite Issic's assurances for her to remain calm. Vashtyee could do anything but remain calm.

A number of things happened in rapid succession to lead the benthic lakarian where she was at this moment.
1) the storm was far too turbulent to be weathered by the baleraa while carrying passengers.
2) a decision had been made to make an emergency dive, to avoid the worst of the solar storm.
3) a sizeable number of the crew chose to abandon ship instead, sweeping Vashtyee along with them.

Although Vashtyee didn't quite grasp the entirety of the situation, there were a number of engineers who did. This particular baleraa wasn't trained for slip-space diving, and the risks posed by the lifeboats were less than those posed by an untrained space whale punching a hole in the fabric of reality. The end result was the young apprentice finding herself forced into an escape pod of her very own by a saurian nearly three times her size. He uttered some brief instructions and shut the hatch, slowly growing smaller as the pod launched itself from the coach. Her beady eyes were filled with fear, and she could only dwell on how much worse things could get. Vashtyee wished she'd been given the opportunity to be a hero; she would swoop in and save the day, using the stars to path find her newfound crew back to Te Lyuthtya's light. Instead, she was going to die in a torrential solar storm.

Neither extreme was plausible - reality often settled for something in the middle. This time, reality chose something a little to the left.

The dive sent ripples across the fabric of space, distorting it in fantastical ways. It was bizarre to feel yourself floating with reality itself adjusting beneath you, and usually, that was the extent of the oddity. For Vashtyee, things went one step further; she sank. Down, impossibly far into the ocean of space. It was so far that the aquatic blacked out at some point during the fall, only waking when alarms blared around her gelatinous head. Still falling, yes, but falling into atmosphere. She was set to crash land.

"No, no no no no!" Her voice ignited a musical string of whistles and chirps thinly veiling sheer terror. "What if I die here? I'm not ready to -" A collision rocked the pod's frame, and several more followed until it at last ground to a halt, somewhere in the dirt. An eerie hiss signaled the breaking of the pod's seal, and Vashtyee struggles to recall what the saurian engineer had told her before sending her to her doom. Her mind drew a blank, so she instead ventured to timidly peer out into the world. Dusk was falling, and the world of grey began to blossom with crisp lights. It was strange to see so many bright splashes on the surface, where bioluminescence was almost nonexistent. Here, however, brilliant arrays of UV and blue hues practically adorned the trees like festive lights. Unfortunately, this meant Vashtyee was very far from home.

 

[Blu_lifee]

Peytme was a young apprentice, who had just gotten their Ikran, and was integrating more into his society as a hunter. He felt great about being someone that could provide for his people and took that very seriously. Peytme took the protection of their people seriously, so when they saw a light falling from the sky on their patrol…He was worried.

He kept to the trees as he traveled to where he saw it land, not wanting to sacrifice his stealth for his speed. He didn’t know what he was dealing with so he had to be careful. Perhaps it was a sign from their mother….or it might be something worse. Either way, he wouldn’t risk it. It took him a while to reach the area, hiding against the tree as he watched what looked like a large egg split open…someone coming from out of it.

He stayed in the tree as he watched the other, look around at the surroundings. The person seemed lost, which relaxed Peytme a little, they weren’t here on purpose. He slid slowly down the tree, moving to follow the other. The low light and bioluminescence often kept him and his people hidden, many creatures not able to distinguish the difference between his skin and the plants that layered along the trees and the ground.

The pod had left a gouge in the earth, making it easy to see the first impact and where it had rolled to a stop. Peytmes heart ached to see the destruction to even a small part of the forest. He hadn’t seen this kind of destruction in his lifetime, even in such a small quantity. He had heard of great wars but…. listening to the stories as a child and seeing the charred dirt was a different thing. He smelled the ash in the air from the burning gas the pod had caused from burning through the atmosphere. The low gravity allowed for survival from great heights, but the impact would have been great at that height and speed.

Peytme stopped at a distance, hidden in the brush as he readied his bow. Though his kind was mostly peaceful, outsiders were something to be wary of, no matter the situation. He narrowed his eyes, waiting to see what the outsider would do. He didn’t have any idea who this person was or why they were here. He would stay watch and intervene if necessary.

 

[Kveykva]

Although the world around her danced with beckoning lights, Vashtyee maintained an air of caution. This was very, very wrong for her. If she wasn't in the nebula's sea, then she had clearly been cast onto a planet somewhere (which, she supposed, was more ideal than falling into the maw of any of the thousands of newborn stars within the gas cloud). The question was, though, which planet?

Not Lakarah, of course - her home planet didn't have such expansive bioluminescent forests on the surface. There were a handful of other colonized planets on the outskirts of the nebula. Vashtyee hadn't visited any of them personally, so it stood to reason that she could have crashed on any one of those. It was a comforting thought, but not the only one gnawing at the back of her skull. What if she was in none of those places? Was that even a possibility? To Vashtyee, anything that could go wrong absolutely would (in truth, it never did). This is bad, very very very bad, her negative thoughts insisted. But what if it isn't? Another, less intrusive thought murmured. Vashtyee decided to take her chances, because she wouldn't be getting anywhere by staying put.

With some trepidation (and much difficulty), the benthic dweller clamored out of the escape pod, shimmying her way down to the ground. Her fins shuffled beneath her clothes and her tail swayed along the ground as she walked, taking time to observe the forest's light show. A small indicator flashed red on Vashtyee's respirator, as a reminder that its contents would need to be refreshed fairly soon. It was not a major worry - all it meant is that Vashtyee's first priority would need to be fresh water.

The air surrounding the towering trees was comfortably humid, enough that Vashtyee's device used for testing water quality was able to determine the surrounding air had a concentration of other gases unsafe to inhale. It was yet another problem Vashtyee wouldn't need to worry about, so long as that didn't also ring true for whatever water she found. Nitrogen, xenon, oxygen, methane... Varying amounts of each gas, though the most abundant was nitrogen. This came as no surprise, but what did was the struggle of simply walking. She hadn't made it more than a few steps before she tripped, landing painfully on the scorched earth. A trill of discomfort buzzed from her quartered lips, her hand raising to her nose to ease the sudden pain. The air here felt... weird. She couldn't really understand why, and after a few more failed attempts of stumbling along the ground, Vashtyee took her steps far more carefully until she could find her footing on a planet with significantly less gravity than she was accustomed to.

 

[Blu_lifee]

Peytme watched the other stumble around. It was as if they had just been born, stumbling around as they walked further and further from the egg they had hatched from. With that Peytme started to walk along the brush, being careful to not be spotted but less so. If the creature could barely walk well...Peytme was a lot less worried about how dangerous it was. It made a strange trilling noise when it fell, sounding almost like it was in pain.

He moved alongside the creature, watching it. He was thankful to be away from the scorched ground, the smell stinging his nose. His ears went back, curious about where the other had come from. It had looked like it came from the sky but walked...well, tried to walk on two legs like him. Was it a sign from Ewya? Was it dangerous?

Peytme didn't know. He wanted to approach, to ward off the creature, but was smart enough to not be too hasty. He would watch and learn, then when he knew enough he would handle the situation...one way or another. He put his bow on his back, more focused on learning about the creature than being prepared to kill it. Peytme didn't feel like he was in any danger just yet. If anything...the creature was. They were wandering in the middle of the forest....In the middle of the night.

 

[Kveykva]

After a few minutes, Vashtyee managed to get her footing, albeit unsteadily. It was manageable enough for her to walk, but unfortunately, the shift in gravity wasn't her only concern. Everything in the forest was massive. From the trees to their roots, the flowers, and drip leaves, it was all of impressive size. It did leave her a bit awestruck initially, but after the first few minutes, she was just irritated. Every few feet was like trying to climb a mountain, and like many other things, Vashtyee was not built for climbing. "Mother's mercy, how am I supposed to find water or shelter when I can hardly get around the place?" She exclaimed to herself in her native tongue, the statement coming in the form of clicks and whistles. "I'm much too small for this," the lakarain added, heaving herself over yet another pile of roots to slide down the other side.

After what felt like a lifetime of walking, she, at last, happened upon a quiet glade. A deep pool of water was illuminated beautifully by the surrounding trees, and across the water, Vashtyee spotted what she guessed was some of the local wildlife. It was unlike anything she'd ever seen, but she truthfully had very little experience to pull from - she'd never been off-world before now. It didn't seem like the type of thing to pick fights, so Vashtyee figured she'd just leave it alone while it took its fill from the spring. The ocean dweller examined the readings from the tool after she dipped it into the water, breathing a quiet sigh when the results were favorable. At least the water's safe. She looked around reflexively - not that she expected anybody to be there - before shedding her overcoat and stepping into the spring Most of the clothing she wore topside wasn't meant to get wet regularly, but the undergarments were designed with her species' necessities in mind.

Once she'd submerged herself almost entirely in the water, Vashtyee released the respirator from her face, inhaling a deep breath of the crisp liquid. She missed the convenience of having refresh stations in every washroom on the surface, but nature was nature she supposed. It would take some time for the mechanism to filter out the old water, but for the moment she seemed safe enough. Nothing dangerous above or below.