Unexplored Lands :CRACK: - Private

[Lolita no Hime]

Crack/Off-shoot Topic for Unexplored Lands - Private.

PLEASE TO BE NOT POSTING HERE.

[Lolita no Hime]

The past few days had been lonely for the doctor. Not only was nobody home, but... well, that was it. No one was home. Nobody! Ike and Quinn were off visiting Quinn's home, Lunia was off on some business, and not even Homegoroshi was sticking around these days. Somehow, in these past few years, Muralei had found himself in constant need of companionship.

It was one night when he found himself feeling a tad low when he was doing busywork at the main table. Stacks of paper swallowed him up and his mind was filled with patient data and diagnosis. After many hours, he planted his face down on the papers, grumbling, "I can't work like this..." He sighed and shut his eyes, wrapping his arms around him on the table so as to support his head. "Maybe a nap will do me some good..."

As the doctor drifted off to the land of sleep, a small spec of light appeared in the room. It was glowing bright pink and fluttered about inside the room for a few moments before landing on the doctors head. There was a powerful gust of wind and a bright flash...!

And the doctor was gone, save for his familiar stack of papers, as though no one had been there at all.

--

It felt as though a few hours had passed when the warmth of sunlight was shining against his face. Muralei grumbled in response, wondering whether he'd left the curtains open. Deciding to ignore it, he turned over and went back to his nap. Unfortunately, he was far too comfortable to notice he was leaning against a large tree and surrounded by a field of fresh grass.

This certainly wasn't Jet City.

[Little Pastry]

Nessa was, in simple term, worried out of her skull.

After Quinn's father Cyrus mysteriously reappeared and that creepy gray guy Rem appeared at all, they were informed that sweepers were coming to Ereg Amar to comb it for destructive magic users. That put Quinn and Cyrus in great danger, so they were taken to the next town over - just for the night, Cyrus said, to keep them out of harm's way. They would be brought back the next day, he said.

But Cyrus was wrong. The sweepers went through Ereg Amar without a problem, but they left much earlier than anticipated. And Quinn, Ike, Cyrus and Rem never came back.

That all happened a few days ago, and now Nessa was wandering through the woods, trying to get her mind off of things. But everywhere she went made her think of Quinn and how he could be injured or captured or any numberof horrible things...!

Nessa squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head briskly, heading for the clearing with the large oak in it. Whether it reminded her of Quinn or not, that space had always been a good place to put one's mind at ease. And the view from the treetop was amazing!

But when Nessa got there, she found that she wasn't alone. Seemingly sleeping against a tree was a blond man wearing glasses on his face rather like Rasain's. Frowning, Nessa slowly and quietly approached the sleeping figure of the man, kneeling next to him and getting a good look at his face. She hadn't ever seen him before, and those clothes were so strange! It reminded her a little bit of Ike.

Reaching up, Nessa pushed her finger against the side of the man's face. "Hey, you're not dead, are you?"

[Lolita no Hime]

Muralei was very quickly brought out of his sleepy state by Nessa, and his eyes shot open. He blinked a few times before sitting up and looking around. He looked up at Nessa, adjusted his glasses, and then looked again. "...dear God I've worked myself into insanity. Either that or I'm dreaming... I swear I was just sitting at home doing paper work..."

He paused, thinking over the situation. If he'd gone delirious, certainly he'd see something far stranger than a girl in a forest. If he were dreaming, well, the girl would be of legal age and possibly wearing less clothing. Unless, of course, this was a nightmare and she was just about to strike him dead, somehow aware that these thoughts were taking place!

Realizing then that he hadn't said anything for quite a few seconds, he pulled himself to his feet and dusted his clothes off. He was certainly taller than Nessa, and as he reached up to brush his hair from his face, he made visible the fact that he wasn't an elf, due to his rounded ears. "I hope you don't find it odd in my asking, but could you tell me exactly where I am? For whatever reason I haven't a clue as to how I've arrived here..."

[Little Pastry]

Nessa jumped as the man suddenly came to life, muttering something about insanity and paperwork. He then sat like that, staring off into space, and Nessa's frown of confusion deepened. Then he got to his feet, so Nessa did the same, and she realized that this man was a giant. Wait, no, he was just a human.

"Um! No, that's not too odd. I've heard weirder lately..." A little, sad smile came onto Nessa's face, but then she shook her head and looked back up at the man. "But you're in the woods just outside of Ereg Amar. But if you don't know how you got here, how did you get here? I mean... well, exactly what I said! 'Cause that's kind of really weird."

[Lolita no Hime]

"I wish I knew..." Muralei said with a sigh, "I was working on some paper work for my patients and I fell asleep... and then I woke up here. So this is either one amazingly lucid dream, or perhaps..." His expression turned to shock and he muttered an expletive under his breath. If he wasn't dreaming and he was really here, that witch had to have something to do with it!

And furthermore, if that was the case, he was stuck here... and maybe even for good. He quickly pushed away any worrisome thoughts, however, and instead decided to try and make the most of it. Still, as he turned back to Nessa, there was an obviously distressed frown on his face, "I don't mean to be of trouble, but if you could perhaps point me in the direction of the nearest city it would be a great help..."

[Little Pastry]

Nessa pursed her lips at mention of this being a dream, because to her, it was obviously not. But this man was obviously troubled, so she took it upon herself to help him however he could. And then he presented an opportunity to do just that by asking for advice to get to the next town.

Nessa smile brightly up at him and nodded, "Sure! In fact, I can take you back to Ereg Amar myself... it's not that far and I was just goin' for a walk anyway. But, um, the nearest city is kinda far away so you'll wanna stop in town first." She turned to go, motioning for the man to follow her, but the she stopped and looked back. "Oh and I'm Nessa~! What's your name?"

[Lolita no Hime]

"Far away, huh..." That made sense, seeing as there was mostly foliage. Jet City was definitely well-known for their lack of nature, save for the scattered concentrations of parks. "I don't suppose I have a reason for going to a city, specifically... where I come from, all we have is cities..." Unlike other elemen city-states, Jet City was the only main City of Thunders, with nearby towns usually considered to be suburbs of the city rather than separate entities. "I must be farther form home than I though..."

And that was most definitely an understatement. But assuming this wasn't a dream, who would honestly believe he was from some other world?

When Nessa brought up her name, he managed to bring out a smile; at the very least, he'd managed to come across someone who not only spoke his language, but was friendly. "My name is Muralei..."

Still, something about this felt familiar, and he couldn't quite put his finger on it...

[Little Pastry]

"Hah, nice to meetcha, Muralei!" Nessa's smile turned to a grin and she began to lead Muralei out of the clearing, through one of the many slightly-worn paths that led back to the main one. As she did, she decided to keep making conversation with the mysterious man.

"Weeell I'm not surprised if you're kinda far from your home, since..." She looked back at Muralei and squinted before turning her gaze back on the path. "...well, since I'd guess you're human aaand therefore from beyond the border. Or even if you're from the border cities, cause those are pretty far too..."

Nessa was quite curious about Muralei, and she wasn't really bothering to hide this. After all, it wasn't every day you found a very confused human in the forest, especially these days...

[Lolita no Hime]

The the mention of being human, this brought two questions to Muralei's mind: one, if she was assuming he was a human, she couldn't be an eleman or she's have known what he was; and two, if he was being referred to as a human, then just what did that make her?

"If this isn't a normal place for humans, then I hope you don't mind me asking what that would make you...? And as for where I live, your explanation would make sense, if I were human." Muralei said, a slight frown on his face. "I'm an eleman. Similar, except with control over elements. I control lightning, and I could prove it if you don't feel inclined to believe me, although it's rather difficult to produce when it's such a nice day outside..." Since Muralei rarely used his element, he never really learned how to produce it; he was only good when around other sources of electricity that he couple simply manipulate.

[Little Pastry]

The moment Muralei said the word 'eleman', Nessa frowned and stared at him. Didn't Ike say he was an eleman...? Granted, he was mixed, rather than lightning, but Nessa knew about his electric abilities. After a second, Nessa realized she was staring, so she blinked a few times and looked back at the path.

"Nah, I... I believe you. I've seen one of you before! Weird, right?" She shot a grin at Muralei, and then she said, "Buuut I'm an elf." She reached up and pulled at the tips of her long ears, "The ears probably shoulda tipped you off. Uhm, although I guess you might not be used to elves if you're an eleman!"

[Lolita no Hime]

At the mention that she'd met an eleman, for a moment Muralei considered that maybe he was in his own world all along... until she said she was an elf, and then the look of surprise was on Muralei's face. "Elves and elemen... listen, this may seem like a shot in the dark, but the eleman you met... his name didn't happen to be Ike, did it?"

He crossed his arms, appearing quite perplexed, "And if it was, is it safe to assume you are also familiar with an elf named Quinn? Because if that's the case then I know exactly where I am... and it's certainly nowhere near my own home..."

[Little Pastry]

Nessa stopped walking and turned around to face Muralei as he spoke, a puzzled expression on her own face that quickly turned to a look of surprise. This man knew Ike, and then moments later he brought up Quinn's name! Maybe this was another person Quinn had been staying with?

"Actually yeah!" She said, a bright grin appearing on her face. "I know both of 'em! Quinn's an old friend of mine aaand I know Ike is his new boytoy. Not that he'd ever put it that way," she added with a laugh. "But yeah! If you're from Ike's world theeen, you're... not there anymore. Like, at all. But this is cool~!"

[Lolita no Hime]

Muralei found it rather difficult to hide a small laugh at the term boytoy. In one sense, it was perfect, but in another... well, Ike seemed much more the type to consider other people in such a manner, but even Muralei knew the two were quite serious. "I assumed as much when you said you were an elf... although I can't say for sure how I got here..."

He cleared his throat, deciding maybe he ought to reintroduce himself, "And yes, I do know the both of them. They've been staying with me; I'm Ike's legal guardian...err, basically his father, just not related by blood." He really did hate technical definitions. If he could, he'd just go ahead and say Ike was his son, but seeing as there never was an official adoption and Ike's never used the term "dad" for Muralei, well... it just never seemed appropriate.

"Well, if you're a friend of Quinn's, then Ereg Amar is his hometown, yes? I thought the name sounded familiar..." He smiled, suddenly relieved to know he wasn't somewhere entirely random. "Are both of them here now? I suppose they'd be surprised to see me here..."

[Little Pastry]

"Aww~" Nessa's grin softened as Muralei explained his relation to Ike. So this was pretty much Ike's father she was meeting! That was nice. But the question was, how did he get here? Nessa was about to question him a little more, but then Muralei was asking if Ike and Quinn were in town. She would have loved to say yes, but that simply wasn't the truth, and the grin slowly faded from her face.

"W-Well... they would be surprised to see you, if, um..." She bit her lip, unsure if now was really a good time to tell Muralei that Ike and Quinn were on the run from the law and had been missing for days. After a moment, she decided that news should wait, and she looked back up at Muralei. "...l-let's head into town, alright? It's not that far from here. Only a few minutes' walk!"