Welcome to Gaia! ::

Public spaces. Malls sported large congregations all ill-focussed, shoppers and frustrated parking. They looked more for carjackers than supernatural soul-thieves. Such places were worth a patrol, even with the increased visibility: Senshi were still largely vilified by suspect media and law enforcement. People as a whole, as a unit, were worth the possible sacrifice.

He told himself this with each heavy crunch on the macadam of hard stone running. His scars hurt for keyed-up memories of other parking lots and blades-gone-Gevaudan. Others would happily take up the place carving at his ribcage to release the sparrows kept there. A shadow? small-

The movement was low, but the gait was an unimpeachable familiarity of a cat. The eternal senshi paused only a moment to watch which direction the shadow was heading under the falling early night of winter’s witching twilight. Trajectories he could correct to attempt to arrive to a place ahead of the little creature and try to coax it. It could be a stray, or a very brave pet from an outlier apartment complex that had street savvy and ranged wide.

What a luck, a cat on any night. If it’s feral, it will take time to coax…

Color screamed against greys as he landed the calculation. The tiny hat tumbling caught Thraen’s spy, a thing connected to the attention of his target and the same trajectory. A skid, speed-snag, and scooped the little thing from the pavement with cat only a breath away. No one seen, no one near. Few are the cats that wear elaborate fashion accessories as it is. Let alone chase them lost, as things valued. Not as toys.

Being near and close allowed the confirmation of sighting the telltale forehead star on this particular cat. No, Mauvian. An so close, able to feel the little aura, it felt off. Like long ago conversations in a cemetery over plant bulbs and grave dirt. He held the little hat out, regardless. “This is yours-”

Neither startling to hold his own hands up as threatened, nor backing down from holding out the hat, Thraen waited with the same stone expression and shifted down slowly in a crouch that made allowances for the creak of wood and sprays of flowers. He still held out the little hat. “A matter of courtesy, not war, to offer it back to you. “



“It is a cold season for bare paws? “ A shoulder and senshi or officer seemed a better choice of getting about. Faust, still, roams at large when fit and fancy take him. Whatever the weather. They each have their own agency.

“So you must. So must we all.”

Thraen set the tiny hat softly on the little head, and admirably limited himself to that. He wanted badly to stroke down the furry shoulders and flank. It was not invited yet. It could be that would be all there was to the encounter-polite exchange and nothing more, having little common ground to go further while remaining at some useful armistice. No, there is common ground…

How long ago had it been? Years on years, piled and buried as much as the box social that Mauvian had been advertising. Some of her songs, especially of burying dark and deep, had verily garnered more chilling meaning since. She had been only so mad as some non-normatives. TV and Movies would have branded her a cloud cuckoo lander, rather than wholly insane. Worth the venture:

“Do you know Lyssa? She is a ruby-hued, unkempt Mauvian. I wonder, worry, if she is still alive?“

What is ‘a while’ to a Mauvian, I wonder. Less than years, I hope. Should it be hoped that the Mauvians who serve the Negaverse remain alive? Dour, that. There wasn’t much more to go on from the answer. The persian-looking cat didn’t offer introduction, or question back. Petting, under those circumstances, could still color an aggressive move. Speaking much more without the introductions risked interrogation, which was a mode ill-advised for cats, magical or otherwise. Carrying the conversation by way of starting introductions himself, with the other seeming as closed mouth, felt risky—an officer or corrupted could be waiting in the wings after all, or nearby for a meeting and become curious that their cat was late. Distracted by a mauvian was no way to get ambushed and start a melee.

Do they carry and use starseeds as officers and corrupted do? Do they drain energy? How do they serve the Negaverse, exactly. No knowing. Thraen slowly stood and offered a Victorian nod.

“Good Morrow, then,” The eternal headed away into the maze of cars and dark.