Welcome to Gaia! ::

Dmitri Azarov was not unaccustomed to being alone, including travelling that way. Study at the academy, of course, had exposed him to the concept of frequent company, close quarters with roommates, and classmates of all sorts—a culture shock for him in many ways since, at the time, his experience had been limited to family and fellow residents of Snowgarden. But he still found a certain comfort in peace, and quiet.

The campus of Grendel university was beautiful. Picturesque, almost, from some angles, and—well, ‘unique’ perhaps, was the best way to describe other portions of its structure. He found it fascinating, though, the surrounding landscape warm as he approached, and — once he made it inside — the interior no less intriguing.

What else to expect, though, from a school for the artistically inclined?

His smile was subtle, but lingering as he traversed up the halls in accordance with the directions he’d received to his dorm. The older student who’d provided them, bubbling and clearly eager to help, had scribbled their notes as they’d talked onto a scrap of paper ‘in case he forgot’, but Dmi had been sure to listen as closely as he could at the time, in particular because he was fairly sure he couldn’t make out the chicken scratch of the student’s handwriting if he’d tried. Fortunately, Mnemosyne had blessed him with a decent mind and memory, and when that failed, there was always persistence to fall back upon.

Shifting the strap of his violin case and satchel, he adjusted his suitcase to the opposite hand, and took the next turn down the hall. The fates were, it seemed, on his side after all, as he did find his dorm in due time, and only with minimal wrong turns. The room, when he found it, was empty. Setting down a suitcase just inside the door, he flicked on a light, and glanced about.

Not just the emptiness of being currently uninhabited, it seemed, but the fuller, more lingering emptiness of disuse. While it did not smell bad or look dirty, it had an air of stillness to it, like dust left to linger in spaces forgotten. He flicked the switch several times as though to ritualize stirring the space back to life, and stepped in, shutting the door behind him. It was clean, thankfully, and came equipped with beds, at least, along with two shelves, and two desks. After tucking his instrument case safely by the head of one of the beds — ‘his’ bed, now — he set to work setting up the rest of his space. Unpacking and unfolding his clothes to tuck into drawers and the closet. Setting up his books along his shelf space, and then his other various supplies for his desk.

And assembling his music stand and score sheet.

Since he had no one to share the space with, he had no reason to ‘keep the noise down’, and thus, after he finished his unpacking process, slipped out of his shoes, and into a more comfortable set of clothes, he took out his violin. After tuning and running through several quick warm-ups which his fingers now played by heart, he shifted through his music sheets to the piece he was currently in the process of, and set to work.

There would be other things to do soon, of course — locate his first classes, further explore the campus, figure out whether he did have a roommate who was not in attendance yet or whether he would be having the room to himself this semester, and so on. But for now, this was enough. For now, to unwind, this portion of time could be dedicated just to himself, and to the rise and fall of a building melody.

The best stories after all, in Dmitri’s opinion, opened with song.