Welcome to Gaia! ::

The sun has yet to break when one of the island portals activates. A hooded figure steps through and pauses to take his bearings. It's just before dawn, colour staining the horizon and bathing the island in a hazy half-light. It's enough for the Hunter to recognise his current location and begin walking.

He finds it jarring, how little things have changed and yet how different it feels to be back. To walk past a cluster of trees and think 'I'd forgotten those were there'; to find his eyes drawn to one section of the battlements while his mind offered the knowledge that it provided the most expansive view and defensible position; to stare at the distinctive silhouette of archways in the distance and remember all the time spent in the classrooms beneath them. Deja vu, but faint, as if he was recalling someone else's memories. How long had it been now...?

~It is far too early for this bullshit, Davey~ a voice sneers from a corner of his mind. ~Go find some coffee before you start writing poetry and turn into someone even more useless than you currently are.~

"Go back to sleep," Davey grunts. He shakes his head and speeds up. He's grateful for the kick up the pants, truth be told. No sense saying so, though - it'd only be further ammunition for the bitchblade.

~Anyone with the intelligence God gave a rabid flea is asleep right now,~ the weapon in question says.

"You're up."

There's a sense of a thunderstorm brewing in his head. ~My mind is as sharp as my blade, unlike you, who displays less brains than several decomposing bodies I've witnessed. Clearly, I just suffer from brief episodes of insanity - I picked you as my Hunter, after all.~

Davey's lips twitch to hear it. It isn't often Azrael is willing to admit that he made a choice, as opposed to simply being dragged along for the ride.

"You're right," he agrees.

~Of course I'm right,~ comes the breezy assurance. ~ ... Which part, exactly, are you admitting to?~

"Most people won't be up yet. I'll need to kill time before reporting in. Dump my bag, find some coffee like you said."

~You barely own anything!~

"Doesn't mean I want to carry my duffel all day." The bag is so light he can almost forget it's there, especially when he was used to carrying heavier packs all day. But he has to return to his old dorm room some time, so it might as well be now. He veers from the building containing classrooms and offices, aiming now for the dorms with their giant candle-like warding device.

~How can you be such a workaholic and yet so lazy at the same time?~

Davey thinks his weapon almost sounds admiring for a second there. Almost. He shrugs. He sees it as being effective. Devoted to the job, yet not wanting to waste time or effort that could be put towards something useful. "Talent?" he offers.

~Oh, you poor, misguided fool. You have no talent. Honestly, it's a miracle that you're still alive.~

"It's what I do best," Davey says, voice and expression grim. No matter what else has happened, somehow he always lives through it. It makes him well suited to being a Hunter, at least.

Arriving at the dorm entrance, he stares up the building. "Home sweet home, huh?"

~I think I miss the tent.~

Davey steps back when the door opens before he can touch it, bracing for impact. The other Hunter has good reflexes, though, stopping himself before they collide. He's surprised anyone else is up this early - and a little impressed.

"No harm done," Davey says when the other male apologises. It's not like they actually ran into each other.

He notices when the other Hunter's gaze drops to the arm. Davey tenses but the Hunter doesn't give it a second glance, much more preoccupied with trying to see his hood-shadowed face. That plus the lack of open-mouth-insert-foot about the missing arm make Davey pretty certain that this is a Hunter he's met previously.

Inspecting the Sun Hunter in turn, Davey can't bring anyone to mind. There weren't many guys with hair as pale as Davey's - Gale and Bix spring to mind, but they were both... on the slender side. This guy looks like a body builder. The hair could be bleached, he guesses, but that's about as far as a guess will get him. Definitely not Gale, though, there's no trace of an English accent there.

Davey shrugs and removes his hood. He'll just have to trust that the other Hunter can recognise him. (He doesn't think he's changed much, but he does see himself in the mirror regularly though.)

"Have we met?" Davey asks as the Sun Hunter lets Davey enter first. No point beating around the bush. Inside his head, Azrael is snickering which means he might have recognised the Hunter, or he's just enjoying that fact that Davey doesn't, and Davey knows asking the sword will just be opening himself up for more pointed and creative ridicule. He's got no problem with just asking, anyway.

The enthusiastic greeting is, uh, enthusiastic. Proof that whoever this is definitely does know Davey from before. And a little bone-crushing, he has to admit. The muscles aren't just for show.

He gives the Hunter -- Bix, rather -- another look over after hearing the name. "Bix?"

Now that he knows, he can see it in the eyes and facial structure - older but the same. The combination of changes to hair and build were what threw him. Maybe his jaw is a little more defined, too, normal changes to ageing. It suits Bix, makes him seem more settled and confident to Davey's eyes.

"It has," he agrees as Bix claims it's been forever. "I see you found the gym - looks good on you. And you're up early, too."

He hadn't responded to the hug, not knowing who the other Hunter was. Now, though, he claps Bix on his upper arm, squeezing a bit before letting his hand drop.

It's... good to see someone he knows. Surprisingly so; he hadn't realised he'd missed his old friends this much.

Davey is impressed with Bix's routine, and he lets it show. It sounds similar to the one Davey had followed when they were all new and a lot of the younger recruits had yet to settle into their new life. He hopes more of them are taking things as seriously as Bix is.

"Maybe I'll see you out there some mornings. If you're up for company," he adds. Davey used to prefer running and working out alone. Not seeing another human being for over a year is making him reevaluate that choice, though.

Is that a faint scowl on his face when Bix asks where Davey has been?

"Solo mission. They had me guarding a portal in the middle of nowhere." Before Bix can ask, he adds, "No action. Very boring. And yet, somehow lots of paperwork."

Well, electronic paperwork. But still, Davey is well and truly sick of submitting reports. It was probably Doctor H's suggestion - the sadistic teacher loved to point out how Davey wasn't as 'capable' as others, he probably thought Davey would be glad of the almost-vacation.

"Yeah, don't think they'll send me off for another job like that," Davey says. At least he certainly hopes not. He won't be happy if they try. And Azrael is itching for a fight by now - if he can't attack some monsters soon, Davey worries he'll turn on Hunters just for something to do.

"So what have I missed while I was gone?" he asks. He knows he could ask for some sort of official report or update from the staff, but he doesn't trust them not to edit parts out to make Deus look better (or less responsible for 'accidents').

"What caused the blackout?" Davey asked with a frown. Now that he thought about it, there'd been a long period when he received nothing from HQ. At the time he'd just thought that his reports must have been sufficient and there was no need to give him further orders. But he has to wonder now if that was true, or if he was simply unable to receive orders at that time.

The lack of fog was a surprise when he'd walked through the portal. He's about to ask how that finally happened when Bix mentions insanity giants and Davey pauses in the face of a greater threat. "Titan as in giant?" he clarifies. Definitely needs to go check this beach out later. He's intrigued by the idea of supplies in the sand (did someone crash a supply ship offshore?), but mostly worried about insanity monsters.

And then even that pales in the news of Excalibur and Merlin. He rocks back as if the words are a blow. Maybe they are. Davey remembers being taken with the other brand-new trainees to see Merlin, the staff who emanated such strong hatred for them all. He remembers the warnings - do not touch, never successfully wielded. Unlike Excalibur, clearly not on their side. And now that hateful thing is in a body, walking around, escaped.

"In a body?" he repeats. "How did that happen? Once they're weaponised, I didn't think anything could reverse that."

Azrael is just as shocked, a faint reverberation in Davey's head like a struck gong. Underneath that is a laserlike focus. The weapon wants to know how another weapon escaped that fate.

Davey also needs to ask more about scavenging runes. But that can wait.

He shakes his head. "I asked. And I need to know, so better now than when it becomes an emergency. Nothing to be sorry for."