Welcome to Gaia! ::

[Note to self: takes place about mid-teen quest for Lethe. I'm kind of bending the fabric of time here for myself. I shall fanwank it all into place later.]

There was nothing to waiting in line. It required no words, no action, very little attention: just enough consciousness to recognize when the person in front had moved, and enough coordination to follow after, that was all. Lost in a crowd of umbrellas and thick raincoats, the pale ghost-like little girl stared up at the menu, occasionally shuffling forward as the line demanded it, without comprehension.

Lethe found the noise and activity of the rainy-day coffee crowd -- not comforting, it mattered very little to the emotional levels of a river, but right now, necessary. They may be little to them now, only could only see the vague, bright outline of fingers, and everything above the elbows was a gradient of visibility from opaque to see-through, but she still had hands like everybody else. She hadn't used it for a few days now, not since her guardian's de...disappearance, but she had a voice that was just as capable of producing similar cacophonies of sound. Her eyes were still capable of interpreting the letters Tzao had painstakingly taught her, even if her active mind found very little current interest in sustenance. It was a ritual of a sort, coffee and tea, and Lethe needed to go through the motions of still being human because she was capable of doing nothing else.

Finally she came to the front of the line.

"Can I take your order, please?" The cashier, a tired and overworked high school student, addressed Lethe without really looking at her. The River Fa'e noted in silence how the older kid's eyes naturally slid off of her like water on duck's feathers, how easily he was distracted by the smallest and most insignificant of noises in an attempt to find something more stimulating than what was standing directly before him.

"Something hot," said the River in a voice she thought too distant to have issued from her own throat.

A few moments later, her nonexistant fingers curled, against all logic and reason, around the cup of hot chocolate enough to allow her to transport it. It was busy inside, warm and lively, but there were no seats, and Lethe's natural instinct to return to rest won over her desire for other people's company. She wandered listlessly outside, nearly set out in the rain -- getting wet was the least of the sensations she worried about, right now -- but she paused, for a moment, wondering where she would go if not 'home', and finally her gaze alighted on Caoimhe.

She had seen her before. Fa'e? Most likely. The corner of her mouth crooked upward like a question mark as she sharply turned on her heel and began to approach the other; she was not too much taller than Lethe, her age probably, a kid who still knew nothing about the untapped potential of their kind. She wondered what she would see in turn, whether she looked as hungry as she felt, if her limbs -- cramped and uncomfortable, like too much material stuffed beneath lumpy fabric-like skin -- seemed too long for her body, the general look of someone just before they hit puberty. She suddenly realized she didn't care.

"Hi," she said, sliding into the chair across from Caoimhe. "I'm Lethe. Tell me about your life."

The rain was a completely new experience. It was coming out of the sky. It made him think of standing in the shower, except it was as if the world itself were taking one. At home, there was no rain. Or snow. There was either windy, or not-as-windy. There was no other weather. And this was so very different.

He was walking in the rain, the golden tips of his hair dripping; he was nearly getting soaked, and he smiled.

It's a huge shower! he thought, turning his head up to the sky. His eyes were forced shut as the water poured over his face. He laughed. Good thing he'd left his feathered pin at him. The strangest thing...he'd found it on the floor of the foyer, sitting neatly square in the middle of the flagstone, as if someone had placed it there for him. He'd run around calling for Dusty, thinking he was there, but had found no sign of anyone.

So, he'd decided to walk to Dusty's house. It had felt like rain, so he left everything of importance at home. His intention had been to get to Dusty's house rather quickly, but he became horribly distracted, and instead wandered around this way and that, amazed at everything around him. Look at this! And that! All these colors!

He went on foot, keeping his money and such in his pocket. He'd bought a little stuffed quail in one of the stores: it was so non-magical, so simple, that he loved it. Something at home might have made a noise, or done a flip, or some other such thing, but Iarla liked these little toy for what it was. He kept it wrapped up in a plastic bag to keep it from getting wet.

All the water coming down: it was starting to get cold. Quickly he began walking, his boots splashing through puddles as he went. I can't get too cold, or I'll change form. Cold. He hated cold. Water he liked, as long as it wasn't too cold! I know, I'll stop for something warm to drink.

There was a shop coming up on his right, and he recognized the smell of coffee even in the wet air. Smiling, he cheerfully entered the coffee shop, presenting an interesting image for the waiter: with his odd hair as wet as a mop he shook himself like an animal might, only to apologize immediately after realizing what he'd done. Oops. I'm not a swan. Remember that! The waiter looked put-out, but seated him anyway.

He slid into a chair at a tiny two-person table, squelching around as he picked up the menu. Kuraino-mama won't be happy about this. I'm going to have to get home soon so I don't get sick.

He began to peruse the menu, becoming utterly engrossed in reading the descriptions of the different coffees.

Caoimhe bristled at Lethe's rediscovery of her more acidic edge, the familiar frown playing across the River Fa'e's mouth. Caoi pushed her shoulders back, as she usually did when trying to (futilely) look more intimidating. Lucky for her she didn't have to stretch up too high, not like when she saw Amitai or Mortimer or Faye or... most everyone that was actually her age. The selkie's nostrils flared out slightly, and she glanced down to the hot chocolate on the table. For an instant, she contemplated throwing it on Lethe -- the unfortunate snap aggression that she had been learning how to control ever since she set foot in Gaia. "You're a kid. I'm a teenager," she said. "I just haven't hit my growth spurt yet." That was what Gristla told her, and what she wanted to believe. She leaned back, trying to look self-assured. "I can do all kinds of things that you can't because you're too young. You need a babysitter." She paused. "I could be your babysitter, you know." Hah, so there.

And who cares where people come from? It doesn't matter. The present is much more interesting, much more important. Caoimhe felt certain of that, as certain as she was soaking wet. Lethe might know more about her past, but the selkie Fa'e didn't care, not much. "My present life is really exciting. That is what matters. What do you have to be excited about? Because if it's all in your past then you don't have much of a life now, do you?" The Celtic rise and fall of her voice grew thicker and thicker as she made her case for herself. Maturity wasn't Caoimhe's strong point, and it didn't take much for Lethe to rile her up. Self-control was on her list of things to learn. She ignored the rain comment, pushing clumped strands of curled her out of her face.

The conversation was taking a delightful turn, at least in the selkie's eyes. She was more comfortable with a little jabbing than with a perfectly pleasant conversation. It made her more at ease -- no one likes a perfectly smooth sea. It's the waves of life that rock the boat. Stormy seas lead to sunny skies. There's always a rainbow after the rain. Or some other water metaphor. This is going to be a very watery experience overall.

"I'm no plant," Caoimhe said, sitting up straighter as if to prove it. "I have spots." She pointed to her arm. "And pearls in my skin. And webbed fingers!" To prove it, Caoimhe spread her fingers wide. The opaque webbing looked gossamer, mostly clear; hell, it kind of sparkled.

To be honest, the Fa'e had never really considered her appearance and what that might mean. Trying to consider all the complexities of the Fa'e identity took up too much of her mind. Caoimhe was more concerned with learning to read and making jewelry and just experiencing more of the life that Gaia had to offer. And she was happy with that. Actually, looking objectively at all of those physical traits, Caoimhe could only assume one thing.

It seemed clear.

She must have been a frog in her past life.

It all added up! Spots, webbing, greenish-bluish-brownish self. Okay, so the pearls were a little weird -- but what was that story Gristla had read to her? The Frog Prince? Maybe she was, like, the Frog Princess? Caoimhe started to nod along to her string of thoughts. Yes. Yes, this was it. Great! Now she knew, and she could lord it over Lethe. But not today. She would need to do a little research first...

"Well, what are you? You've got blue skin and your arms are all wrapped up in ribbons. That's pretty weird, too. How do you run? Or climb a tree? You must sit around a lot."

Lethe, too, straightened in her seat and thought very mean things about the other girl -- she was still slightly smaller than Caoimhe, and not at all talented in the ways of mind-speaking, so she would not win their silent battle of intimidation. Neither would she back down, though, and she firmly set down her mug with a tinny little clink that she hoped was deep and meaningful and reverberated through Caoimhe's soul, with fear of the temperature of her hot chocolate. The only thing that betrayed any effect the other girl had on her was the hot, slightly purple flush that stained her cheeks and across her wrinkled nose. "You can't be--" She began crossly, deciding right then and there that she hated liars more than anything else in the whole world, and then her gaze slid down and onto the other Fa'e's chest.

Oh.

Well.

"There are things kids can do that teenagers can't get away with," she amended quickly, looking away (and noting, just as suddenly, that the previous teal-gold-haired figure from before had sat at a table nearby. She was not making eye contact though, and was being very quiet, and was probably a whole lot prettier than the person currently sitting across from her. Why hadn't she gone and sat down with her, instead?) She pressed her lips into a grim line and forced herself to look back at Caoi, hoping she looked convincingly staunch in her own beliefs.

"Exciting," Lethe then scoffed, immediately conjuring to mind all of the episodes of Days of Our Lives she had seen. Very few scenes took place with single characters, and those that were alone kept themselves company with the sounds of their own voices lamenting over the excitement of their lives -- Caoimhe had certainly not been dramatically monologuing before Lethe showed up. "Sitting outside, in the rain, by yourself, is exciting. I will remember that the next time I find myself in need of mental stimulation. We are Fa'e, aren't we? We were capable of... of things. Great, world-changing things, lives. We mattered to people. Well, maybe you didn't, because you are probably just seaweed and people eat that by the bucketfuls in -- in those countries," she gestured vaguely to the distance, glowing serenely in her own cultural knowledge and sensitivity.

Her attention returned to Caoimhe as the other Fa'e demonstrated her attributes, and silently Lethe was forced to reconsider the situation slightly. Pearls -- those were precious. And she'd seen that kind of skin-flaps on Arkie, a long time ago, and on similarly slimy things, and while being slimy was not a particularly attractive attribute, sparkly was. At a different time, under different circumstances (namely, had Lethe not thoughtlessly made such a brash, bad first impression of herself), Caoimhe would have probably been the kind of Fa'e she would have wanted to get into the good graces of. She didn't have wings, or a tail, which definitely worked against her, and there was no telling what sort of abilities she did have, so she wouldn't have been someone Lethe would have necessarily fallen all over herself for, but... she was not beneath her.

Not above her, either, though. Only barely in height. And her attitude -- that she was one of the few who addressed her so frankly -- Lethe expelled twin huffs of air from her nostrils that, done any harder, would have been called a snort.

"I'm a River," she told her plainly, "Of Oblivion. You wouldn't have heard of me. I took people's memories." There was a telling pause, a glimmer of something unsure in the twist of the corners of her mouth, and she rushedly amended, "I take people's memories. I am all water, in the veins." And returned to water, should the ribbons be loosened -- once upon a time she would have shown this off, but she didn't do that anymore since Xo. That and... and there would be nothing to show, not with her hands, and she didn't want to think about that.

"You don't need your arms to run! And Rivers don't need to climb trees," she snapped back, "That's for cats. I can get Dusty to do that, if I need trees climbed, because that's efficiency." Actually, not so much, not with Dusty's hooves, but the thought that her best friend had her back even only in passing in an argument with a virtual stranger made her feel slightly better. "So you know what you're not. What are you, then? You must know, if you're a teen. All teen Fa'e know. I already know, so..."

But she'd already been over this before, mentally. It wasn't for a lack of knowledge. And.. and it wasn't because her guardian, because her guardian--well, and it couldn't have been for Airi's grace either, because Lethe did bucketloads of things for Airi and nothing ever came of that. And it seemed like asking about others' obvious growths was taboo, in their weird culture, but still -- "How did you become a teen? I mean... You had to do something, right? Important things. And then suddenly, you just woke up and you were -- well, you didn't grow, obviously, but still."

"We are Fa'e, aren't we?"

The statement caused Iarla to jerk ever so slightly. His breath caught in his throat. Immediately he mulled more deeply over his hot chocolate, the sound of the rain pouring down outside lost on him. Fa'e...they are Fa'e! His greenish-grey eyes flicked toward the nearby table; he felt a deep inward shudder of awe. It was them. More, like Dusty, like those around the bonfire. He couldn't remember seeing either of these two the night that he came to Gaia. But they were Fa'e!

His mind jumped around inside his skull frantically. What should he do? Should he speak this very moment? He felt another deeply emotional shudder go through him. Instead of acting immediately on impulse, he forced himself to sit still. The two - the pale girl, and the blue-skinned girl - were still discussing. His eyes grew wide as he listened. He took in a breath listening to the blue-skinned Fa'e's story. Clearly there was some animosity between the two girls, but what was more: the younger of the two Fa'e, the River, knew much. And the other was like him.

She's come from another world, just like me?

Again his eyes roved over the girls' table. It's real, this is really happening! He clutched the plastic bag sitting in his lap, causing it to crinkle. His grip tightened listening to the banter at the next table: Fa'e...Fa'e...they're Fa'e... He kept glancing at them, forgetting now his hot chocolate entirely. He felt a strange liking for the River girl somehow. He didn't know what it was, but he felt she was pained, even for all her talk. The other girl, though, the blue princess Fa'e - she was very beautiful, he thought. I wish Dusty was here, he found himself thinking. He would know what to do. He had never thought of another person as his actual brother, but he felt it for Dusty. Strangely, he felt like Dusty was an older brother rather than a younger one. An older brother would know what to do in this situation.

What would Dusty do? he thought, his eyes sliding over the frothy brown of his hot chocolate as if it wasn't even there. He clutched the wet plastic of the bag in his lap so tightly that his hand hurt. He was nervous. Oh no. Calm down. If I change form here, I'll probably horrify them...unless they can do it too, and understand.

No, he thought just as quickly. I surprised even Dusty when I did it the first time. And he, surely, knows a lot about Fa'e... Like the River girl. He turned his gaze to her, though he was still hunched over his drink. She had such pretty ribbons on. The deep blue color reminded him of what the sea was supposed to look like. But he had never seen that before. No, it must be like a river...

What would Dusty do? Iarla groaned inwardly. He would do something brash and outspoken. Then again, that seemed almost like a good idea right now. He couldn't possibly not speak to two other Fa'e...

He stood up from his table, leaving his hot chocolate there. He turned to the girls' table and walked slowly forward, stopping in front of it, with his bag still in his right hand. "Excuse me," he almost whispered. He glanced between their eyes. "I couldn't help overhear...I apologize...but I..." He closed his eyes and then opened them again, as if thinking very hard. "...I, too, am a Fa'e."

Saying it caused his stomach to knot up.

Yes, this was all going quite well. The tides seemed to be turning ever-so-slightly in the teen Fa'e's favor! She even had the testy little River Fa'e calling her Majesty. Euphoria flooded across Caoimhe's features. Even Lethe's little jabs felt like rubber arrows. It wasn't often that Caoimhe bested someone with her words. She was used to more of a we-punch-until-someone-cries-uncle kind of victory. This was most certainly an impressive day for her -- hey, maybe the rain was her good luck charm?

Straightening up, Caoimhe tried to look a little more regal. She watched plenty of daytime TV -- Beastmaster, Xena, Young Hercules -- and there were plenty of royals in those shows. She dropped both feet to the floor (though they didn't quite touch down) and curled one arm across herself as if she were a maitre'd. She might be soaking wet and enjoying a conversation with a minor, but she was ready to follow this possibly-true story to the ends of all time.

As Lethe spoke, the Fa'e could not get her mind away from one point -- no guardian? Even as the strange teal person approached (another Fa'e, cool), Caoimhe held her hand up to his face in an effort to silence him. (She really is quite the charming girl.) The teen Fa'e couldn't focus on many things at once, and she was much more preoccupied with something that Lethe had said. "No guardian?" Caoimhe interjected, blatantly ignoring Lethe's clear discomfort at the topic. "When will they be back? You shouldn't be living alone." There it was again. That maternal tinge. She really needed to start hanging out with people older than her to avoid these kinds of emotions. An expression akin to constipation flared up on the girl's face for a moment. "I mean, not that I care a lot, but it really isn't good. Can't you stay with a friend or something? Dusty and you are friends, yeah? He'd let you. Gristla would probably let you camp out for a few days too. We live on the beach." Caoimhe didn't think to explain who Gristla was, but she was speaking fast, reckless. Her body urged her to move on, to change the subject, but like most rational urges, Caoi ignored it completely.

She hated, really hated, the idea of a child being left alone to fend for itself. In fact, an inexplicable feeling of guilt washed over her in a wave so strongly that her wide eyes rolled back into her head. Little black spots sprang up across her field of vision, and her body slumped forward like a wet rag, knees bumping into the table. Her eyes flung open again, and she found herself staring straight forward at Lethe's legs. How did she get here? It had seemed like a momentary lapse, and yet, here she was, sitting in a puddle of muddy water underneath the table.

Clmibing slowly to her feet, Caoimhe pulled her mouth into a straight line. How to explain this one? "I had," she said, dragging the toe of her shoe along the cracks of the tile below her, "...a vision." Folding her arms over her chest, the teen Fa'e felt woozy. Lethe and the newcomer had fuzzy outlines, and in her swimming head, their colors blurred into a blue-green gold puddle. It looked kind of like the ocean, actually, on a sunny day.

Hoping to save face but being remarkably unskilled at doing so, Caoimhe took a seat and looked up to the newcomer. "Yeah, yeah. Sit down. I'm Caoimhe." She paused and added, "Nice to meet you." The girl had much more to say, more questions to ask Lethe, more insults to throw, but she feared that saying much more might cause her to vomit -- and if she vomited, Lethe would probably know that she wasn't really royalty. Or was she? The lie made sense. Hell, it probably wasn't a lie at all!

Pressing two fingers to her temple, Caoimhe offered a short wave and quietly waited for everything to stop moving.

"My guardian's not coming back. I don't have one anymore."

Lethe shifted uncomfortably in her feet, plastic raincoat crinkling as she slumped down into the pooling fabric and tried to drown Caoimhe out by paying attention to anything else. It did not seem like the other Fa'e to unnecessarily worry about other people, being both Royalty and a Royal Pain in the Butt, and the reason for Lethe's slow mental unraveling was not a subject she would have chosen Caoimhe to actually take an interest in. The River Fa'e watched Iarla for a little bit, memorizing her features in an attempt to satisfy her cravings for something new to look at -- she seemed very stylish without meaning to, well-dressed in a manner that didn't necessarily draw attention to the fit of the clothes or the style. It was a little odd, actually, how well the clothes covered her up: not very feminine--

The fleshy sound of a body hitting an unyielding solid surface broke Lethe from her thoughts, and suddenly sitting up straight, she observed Caoimhe's newly semi-conscious position with obvious alarm. "Caoi--" She balanced precariously on the edge of her seat and started to simultaneously stand up and lean down, hands outstretched with nonexistent fingers, to help or to poke at her and possibly laugh, but Iarla had already leapt in to help with a steady grip and loud words, and Caoimhe seemed to recover well enough to stand anyway.

She took note of the muddy water that rose with her, lips pressing into a grim line as if she were suddenly mortally offended at the thought of someone supposedly so royal having an apparent moment of klutziness. Lethe hovered, half-sitting and half-standing, to make sure she would not fall again, but Caoimhe seemed stable enough -- and Iarla was still with her, after all -- and so she sat once more and delicately offered the other a napkin. "A vision?" This was more familiar territory, more comfortable, other people's memories. "What did you see, then? Was it frogs?" She paused and mentally compared Caoimhe's current state with that of when Lethe had first wandered up to her. "...Did it really affect you so, physically? Must have been unpleasant, then... It doesn't sound like you were a very nice Princess."

She felt as if it would be polite to offer something -- an aspirin, a phone with which to call a doctor or guardian, a heavy piece of wood to knock herself out again. But there was nothing in her pockets. The keys she had left on the stand next to the door, because she knew she wouldn't be coming back. It hadn't crossed her mind to take money, and even if she had, doing so felt a little like defiling the dead. Even her cell-phone had been left behind, all of her ribbons and stuffed animals and trinkets. Caoimhe didn't seem like she would appreciate it anyway, and.. and there was nothing really to be done. Nothing could cure the past, so to speak, and it seemed most Fa'e were powerless to such visions.

Next to her, Iarla didn't seem to be having a very good time of it either. Inwardly Lethe bristled; she was more inclined to be sarcastic and mean to match Caoimhe, being the stronger voice of the duo, but she didn't necessarily want to speak so with Iarla. On the other hand, to be suddenly soft-spoken and nice for the teal-and-gold-haired girl's sake might make her appear weak to the other.

In the end, Lethe decided it didn't matter; Caoimhe already had a strange impression of her as it was, and in her compromised state, might not even think anything of it. Iarla, on the other hand, looked as if she wanted to flee or faint or attempt both at the same time, and seemed to be looking at Lethe for direction, so to not address her appropriately had the greater possibility of making the situation worse.

"It's okay," Lethe said, realizing she had no right to, "It doesn't happen to everybody, that I know of, but it's still a common 'side-effect' (so to speak) of being a Fa'e. Some people hit puberty, we hit psychic visions and dramatic quests. It's part of the process. Mortals have this too, sometimes, though... um..." ...Well, it was called 'post traumatic stress syndrome', from what little Lethe knew watching soap operas, and such characters were crazy and damaged. And, to be honest, medication aside, she was not quite sure when these visions would stop. Theoretically it would be when all of one's history and past was uncovered, but... For these Fa'e, who forgot things all the time, would there ever be a moment for them when that existed? Couldn't they one day forget some aspect of their history and then be plagued with visions until they relearned it? It was hard to be anyone else but Lethe.