Note: Dream sequence. YEY.
Kestrel had gone to bed at the usual late hour after a weekend and Monday of work, collapsing into bed in sheer exhaustion, and she was out before her head hit the pillow, folding into sleep like a chick to it's mother.
And her eyes opened almosat as if hovering - or rather, standing, in Cordoba itself. The edges of the City were in worse shape than the central portions, and yet whole, noting seeming right yet fine in the warped dreamscape. She looked down to find herself powered, and the page began walking through the crystalline city; sometimes on paths well lit by unseen lights travelling up the buildings, sometimes the city dead as ever. Imagination filtered through the dream much as a comforting song - in fact Cordoba could almost hear sounds and song as she walked this city, wondering what dream this was. What she was doing in her sleep, in her Wonder - what dreamscape was this? For the times it was lit was almost cartoonish, a shadow of what was likely, and she drew deeper into Cordoba, slowly stepping around vehicles and stones until it became clearer and less unstable, entering instead to familiar streets, an area she had met Hua Xifen in.
"Xifeng?" Cordoba asked. There was no reply, no quip, no demand to restore the wonder as the spirit was wont to do. Instead there was only cold, awkward silence.
Cordoba pressed onward, walking for the central portion of the city. Here, it seemed her dream hazed, a building likely furnished in the waking world blank and empty bar rooms of nothing, and machines dead to the work. Here, it seemed natural light from above filtered down, caressing the sweet walls in light, soft and warm sunlight which brought a faint blue glow, soft and welcoming but cold, and the page began to pass through the sunbeams, breathing in deep.
Where was this? What was causing her to come here, where was her ancestor? Was it the trick of light it seemed vibrant one moment and dead the next?
Cordoba shook her head and pressed both hands to a large heavy door pressing it open slowly to enter a collossal room.
It was flanked by computers, monitors and a sequence of switches. The pillar supporting the large core was remniscent of the sort one expected wisdom from floating faces from, or perhaps maniacal computer programs, and there was a console by it.
Cordoba had found her way to the core of her City, and blinked, brows raising at what she saw.
The Code
A pulsating orb of energy, about the size of a baseball, hovered around the energy core within the depths of the city. It seemed to have a presence—like it was more than just a light. While it did not share the same mist-like appearance as the Code Piece on Olympus, there was no denying that this orb of light was one in the same. Although smaller, it still seemed powerful.
Cordoba immediately resisted the urge to recoil in disgust at the Code, present even in her home, her Wonder, and wondered - what it had done to Xifeng? Why was Xifeng missing, and why was it here? However instead, with nobody else there, Cordoba decided to ask one thing, almost expecting the small light to infuriate her again. If it was one question....
"What am I supposed to be doing?"
The Code
"Anything would be better than what you're doing now. I have seen many Knights in my time, but so poor an example as you is rare. Are you even trying? Do you feel absolutely no natural drive for what to do? …All Knights should have at least an inkling for direction. If you've got nothing…Perhaps you were never meant to be a Knight at all."
For a moment, Cordoba was silent, before the flat expression on her face appeared, a look of utter lack of impressment as her brow raised, but she didn't dare speak to it again, instead frowning inwardly.
"I see."
She didn't ask any more, instead noting Xifeng was certainly less.... Insulting than this. She had demands - high as they were - and Cordoba wondered if she might find this location in the real world. Could this be key to at least helping Xifeng?
...Admittedly, she was more interested in her Wonder than the war; was that it, or the lack of working on her Wonder?... Based on drawing them to Mars, she suspected the War, and sniffed.
She could focus on Cordoba itself, and likely see if some of the others she spoke to had ideas- though first, she had to-
Kestrel's thought was cut off as she woke, startled and blinking before looking around her bedroom. Sunlight streamed in and she breathed in her room, and Kes breathed a moment, shaking her head.
Too real. Too real to be a dream, yet...
"Ugh. I should visit Xifeng again when I get a chance..."
