There is only the water-vapor scent of the mist on the breeze--
--and then, suddenly, there's the woman.
There's a grey mask covering her face, itself only a shade darker than her silken grey skin, but her height, posture, body-language, muscles, and taloned hands and feet--not to mention that wild shadow-hair--betokens a wolf in Glabro form, not a human, even if the scent is... not exactly right. She doesn't smell like a Glabro wolf. She smells like mist and silk and shadows and the moon.
She wears a short sleeveless tunic of rough-spun silver the same color as her mask--and that is the only thing she wears.
Colin, where are you when you're needed. The place, the odd form, and the seemingly nonsensical place (incomplete; lacking sound, lacking scent, lacking ...dimension, somehow) seem to urge Laughs to one simple conclusion, and after spending over a season feeling in is element it's jarring to feel out of it. Less out of it than he is used to, not as bad as within the towering circle of houses of a city, mind, but still far from what he could easily navigate.
He can't pinpoint what kind of entity he is dealing with, yet, but if this is their realm...
"I didn't mean to intrude." As much as he definitely didn't come here of his own volition, going forward with an accusation in the face of what he is getting the strong impression might be an Incarna or the avatar of a Celestine (...but could it truly be her? How can you even smell like the moon, and yet she does) is probably a really bad idea.
"You didn't intrude," she says in a low, growling voice. "I brought you here to my conversation space when I found you. I am the Moon. You are a child of one of my reflections."
Lowering his head and tail, Laughs looks at her and then lets his eyes wander towards the too-large moon behind her. So his impression was right. The thought that this creature might just pretend that it was right, might have created the impression themselves, tries to rise to the surface of his mind but it drowned thoroughly by awe.
"This is a part of a larger place called 'Liminal Space,'" the Moon says. "At times, people are pulled here. When they are, we claim them for our own based on who suits us best. You were already one of my own, Laughs, under the face I wear in your world of darkness, so I made you my Chosen here too."
All of that makes sense, somehow, as much as he feels like the pieces aren't quite matching. Something not quite right, not quite wrong. But there is one thing that stands out starkly.
"Where's my pack? You know I shouldn't be without them."
"I do," she says and there is a tinge of bitter regret to her words. "The way you were brought here works by chance and by luck, as its maker intended. That chance and that bad luck brought you here alone from your pack."
After a long moment she adds, "There are other wolves here. A small pack. Different from the wolves of your world, but you will not be completely alone."
That's bad news. Really bad news. Sure, Silent-Death will still be around the Kinfolk pack they've been looking after for the past weeks, which is good, but that's a small comfort when he's this cut off. The same goes for there being other wolves. Different from the ones from his world, too...
"Wolves or Garou?"
...it's not like he won't do his level best to return home. He should be able to find the way reasonably easy enough, between being able to know where he is in relation to Gaia and being able to track a target from the distance if he knows anything about them, after all- And that is when he notices.
"This isn't Gaia." That can't be. That's absolutely impossible. It's not even just that she's far away, she isn't there.
"No," the Moon says. "It isn't. Liminal space... it is a place between the worlds and detached from them." She hesitates, then says, "Your Moon is part of me, but I am made of many such Moons. Your Gaia is one of the parts that makes up my sister. She is the natural world and her brother-husband cities and civilizations. We who care for you here are more ideas than people, even moreso than the spirits of your world."
There is a pause and then she adds, "One wolf. The rest can be called Garou. They are from other worlds than yours. The Garou there are not exactly the same as yours. But they are here."
It's not right. Every time he feels like he might find his footing again, he slips on the moving. grinding ice beneath her feet, like the surface of a river dammed by ice in the spring, an equally dangerous. Perhaps he should treat it as such. There is nothing more dangerous than thinking too much when encountering such a river, treacherously stable piles of ice plates stacked and crammed into one another. One must follow one's instinct, or be surely pulled under.
Or perhaps more thinking than he can supply is required. Tuuli might do well.
"What are your sister and her brother-husband's names, here?"
He'll have to figure this out eventually. Track down this Empress, that'll probably be a part of it. But not now. Now he just shoves all of this into a corner of his memory.
"Where are they?"
And all the other people Moon mentioned. They are clearly alone here, and he's getting the distinct feeling that the door out of this place will be hard to find.
"Mei and Hakan are in conversation spaces of their own, on other levels of Liminal Space. Your fellow wolf and Garou are on yet another. Do you wish to join the other Travelers?"
There are no more questions to ask, and he certainly doesn't want to overstay his welcome with an entity that is a version of a Celestine. And it sounds more like an order phrased as a question. So the answer is simple.
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--and then, suddenly, there's the woman.
There's a grey mask covering her face, itself only a shade darker than her silken grey skin, but her height, posture, body-language, muscles, and taloned hands and feet--not to mention that wild shadow-hair--betokens a wolf in Glabro form, not a human, even if the scent is... not exactly right. She doesn't smell like a Glabro wolf. She smells like mist and silk and shadows and the moon.
She wears a short sleeveless tunic of rough-spun silver the same color as her mask--and that is the only thing she wears.
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Colin, where are you when you're needed. The place, the odd form, and the seemingly nonsensical place (incomplete; lacking sound, lacking scent, lacking ...dimension, somehow) seem to urge Laughs to one simple conclusion, and after spending over a season feeling in is element it's jarring to feel out of it. Less out of it than he is used to, not as bad as within the towering circle of houses of a city, mind, but still far from what he could easily navigate.
He can't pinpoint what kind of entity he is dealing with, yet, but if this is their realm...
"I didn't mean to intrude." As much as he definitely didn't come here of his own volition, going forward with an accusation in the face of what he is getting the strong impression might be an Incarna or the avatar of a Celestine (...but could it truly be her? How can you even smell like the moon, and yet she does) is probably a really bad idea.
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"Why?"
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"Where's my pack? You know I shouldn't be without them."
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After a long moment she adds, "There are other wolves here. A small pack. Different from the wolves of your world, but you will not be completely alone."
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"Wolves or Garou?"
...it's not like he won't do his level best to return home. He should be able to find the way reasonably easy enough, between being able to know where he is in relation to Gaia and being able to track a target from the distance if he knows anything about them, after all- And that is when he notices.
"This isn't Gaia." That can't be. That's absolutely impossible. It's not even just that she's far away, she isn't there.
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There is a pause and then she adds, "One wolf. The rest can be called Garou. They are from other worlds than yours. The Garou there are not exactly the same as yours. But they are here."
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Or perhaps more thinking than he can supply is required. Tuuli might do well.
"What are your sister and her brother-husband's names, here?"
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"Where are they?"
And all the other people Moon mentioned. They are clearly alone here, and he's getting the distinct feeling that the door out of this place will be hard to find.
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"Yes."
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