Welcome to Gaia! ::

They definitely weren't on Earth anymore.

That was the first thing he noticed when the air was suddenly less tense and less thick, and the ground was less grey and brown and more vivid and colorful, Looking up gave him the next clue; that wasn't quite the sky above them, and if it was, there was a layer of water in-between. Neptune, he was guessing. Not sure where else Pendour could have gotten them to as quickly as she did.

He relaxed into her relaxing into him, taking a deep breath and absorbing the air of the wonder, the sea-- "Yeah. I was patrolling and came upon her. She strutted over so I figured she might be open to a chat or at least listening to some music and being on her way."

Honestly, Abzu should have listened to his initial wariness. It might have prevented him from needing to scream fire and hoping someone would notice.

"Figured this was Pendour. Thank you for the welcome." His laughter was warm and relaxed, as if he was already over what happened, even if part of him was still processing the fact that he had just almost died. "Seems peaceful here. A lot like you, actually."

"Don't think I like the tricky ones very much." To be honest, Abzu didn't necessarily like any of them. They were all theoretically deluded, and that delusion made many of them unfriendly. He had certainly had great conversations with a couple of them, but...

Maybe he needed this transcendence for himself so he could have some conversations with the type like that agent without worrying about her going for his chest again. He'd like his soul to stay where it was supposed to. Generally a preference he was likely to stick to.

"How do you transcend? Does that just happen, or?" His brows knit before his eyes lit up just as quickly, and he looked to the waterfalls while offering her hand a gentle squeeze. "We can talk about that on the way to the cuddle room and the waterfalls. That I want to see."

And maybe take a nap afterward.

A nap sounded good and it was definitely better than nearly dying--

"Your wonder's gorgeous by the way."

Abzu walked alongside her, hand in hers, eyes wandering as he took in everything around them. The mosaic pattern of the path they walked was gorgeous. He couldn't help but wonder who had done this, who has spent the time to create such fine handicraft below them, who had spent the time to maintain it and repair it if that had been needed. He couldn't help but wonder how Neptunian architecture had created the sounds of the waterfall he could hear in the distance.

Maybe she had restored it if it was part of Transcendence to do so.

The more she said, the more he could understand how the Negaverse deluded people into thinking that knights were aliens or sworn to other planets. If they dedicated themselves to their place in space and got rewarded, it was hard to argue the base logic of "they're clearly more concerned with space than us." It still missed that they were all born on Earth. It still missed they killed people on Earth.

He made a small noise of confirmation as she continued, before once of surprise followed. "Dead fish and people and dry? Hard to visualize with how beautiful it is." He definitely didn't see any sign of dead things, although he supposed dead things made sense if these places were last populated hundreds of years ago...

... Was the darkness of his wonder hiding the same?

He bit his lip. "My wonder would probably be less unnerving if it wasn't so dark." Unless it was dead, but he wouldn't put any further thought into that. "Yours is so bright and inviting." Abzu laughed. "But maybe part of taking care of my Wonder is figuring out how to make it the same."

It made sense. Unless Neptunians had been gifted with dark vision, he didn't really know what else would have worked.

Snails, pearl oysters, fish-- life was here, now, even if not human life. She had been able to do that much? That much life in what must have been a very dead place was just, "Impressive," and he meant it, accompanying that with a low whistle as they passed a bit closer by the cove.

Well, she was evidently the expert here -- "I'm willing to talk to him! If he can get results anything close to this, he clearly knows what he's doing." And Abzu was lazy, so if someone else could either help him find the solution or just outright find it for him, that was the ticket.

Maybe they could have a party afterward.

Was his wonder made for parties--

The room that Pendour brought him too almost didn't fit, but it fit Pendour, and it also fit his constant mood. He slipped over to a large beanbag chair without hesitation and flopped into it.

Abzu closed his eyes and took in a few deep breaths.

"This is perfect." If Pendour wasn't careful, it was about to be his nap room. "I assume you put this room together, too? Definitely doesn't fit the appearance of everything else.

"The vibes, though? Yes. This is very relaxing."

And Abzu was quite content with the closeness, leaning right into it and scooting his body just that much closer for ease. Physical touch and the cuddle room itself was an infinite improvement over nearly dying because he had tried too hard to be open or trusting when his intuition had been telling him to flee--

Not important now, he supposed.

An eye popped back open for a moment when she intimated just how long this Encke had been involved in everything. He had already transcended by the time she awoke? How long had this s**t been going on? It made him wonder just how many of the news reports he saw could be linked to other things; how many of the house fires he saw were actually Chaos? How many deaths? How many fights?

It was so prevalent as to be a bit terrifying, but not enough to actually interrupt his vibes.

"Oh! This feels like your room. It's nice." His laugh was warm. "Go right ahead. Wash day was yesterday so it should feel pretty soft, too--"

He paused, closing his eyes again, and then asked, "How long has this Encke been at this?'

There were a few suspicions he had with the effort she took and the effort he must have taken to already be here before she even started, but so much of his page life had been about establishing what this even was. A timeline seemed important.

If she wasn't careful, Abzu was going to fall right asleep. He was already halfway there, comfortable with human touch and closed eyes and the nice sounds in the background, and maybe his concern wasn't so important with a whole scalp massage as a reward--

But like their casual conversation in the hot tub, he welcomed the serious interludes in-between.

It was nice to be able to have conversations like this calmly, without the potential stressors of a fight, of his soul being taken, of another's being taken--

"Over a decade," he repeated, letting out a low whistle. He had a feeling the fight was extensive, but he honestly hadn't realized just how extensive. How long had this truly been going on? Decades? Centuries? Was the Negaverse just the latest in the eternal struggle between good and evil to rise to prominence? It was heavy; it was a lot to think about.

It was easier with her braiding his hair, admittedly.

"Still would like to see her defeated," he mused. "If they're the major faction at the moment, it'll at least give us some breathing room to rebuild before the next wave."

But he supposed that wasn't the point--

"How long have you been part of this?"

Four years...

It hadn't even been a year for him, but a year had already been so much. He learned of aliens, of the force that was Chaos, how even evil magical organizations trapped people the same way as everything else, of the force that fought against them because they had to and there was no real option for anything else--

His chuckle came out more like a whiff at how relaxed he was despite the buzz of thoughts as she untangled her fingers from his hair. "Ancient conglomerations of primordial evil seem like they'd be difficult to be friendly to." And honestly, he had questions for anyone who succeeded...

Those general-sovereigns, maybe.

He yawned, and it was the only reason why his eyes cracked back open for a moment before he settled back in, closing his eyes and scooting just a tad closer. "Sounds like a," another yawn, "plan though..."

His words dragged as the concept didn't quite finish.

The nap room had done its job.