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Characters: Yorda and Cain
Date: January 11th, 2017
Location: Northern coast.
Situation: Cain finds a half-drowned girl on the shoreline. Yorda is her weird self.
Warnings/Rating: Dad jokes.

Yorda's first thoughts upon waking were I am dead. He second thoughts upon sitting up, wet sand and seaweed sliding off her, were I can't be dead. Everything hurts.

Pain wasn't entirely unfamiliar to Yorda. She'd taken a few falls and had the wind knocked out of her. But she'd never felt the raw ache of coming back from the brink of death. She flexed her hands, fingers curling and uncurling as feeling gradually returned to her extremities.

"Ico...?" She meant to call out more loudly, but her voice was hoarse and it sounded more like a pathetic squeak. She frowned, gray eyes scanning the foggy shoreline. Something felt off, but what specifically she didn't know.

She pulled herself up to the dry sands where she could rest away from the lapping waves. She needed to rest and recover some of her strength - any greater feats were beyond her.

And then, hopefully, she could find her friend.

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It was an oath on blood and death. Powerful. Binding. Whatever else, Yorda seemed satisfied and gave a small nod, before continuing on her way.

The 'search' went for a good few hours. For someone weak, waterlogged and half-drowned, she had a kind of tenacity that could only be found in the frugal elderly at a BOGO sale.

After about the third 'Maybe the other way', when her pace had slowed to hobbling, she seemed finally willing to listen to Cain's explanations. She was quiet as she let him speak, and her expression fell to such a pitiful, defeated look, one might mistake her for a puppy that had been kicked down a garbage chute.

His explanation wasn't too terribly deep, but he got through it quickly with how more facts led into further despondence. Cain hadn't tried to close the gap between them for quite a while, willing to let her tire herself out and see what would come of it. Perhaps he could take her back to the city to rest even if she would end up back out here again later in denial.

The turtle, different worlds, the Dreaming. Magic. Kedan. How everyone arrived. Time's unmoving state back home. There weren't too many things that needed to be explained. She could form her own questions to expand on her knowledge later. Right now he only wanted to see her calmed a bit before trying to push onward when she obviously wasn't in the best state.

"I think we should take some time and rest," he offered, softer than before. "Let you take everything in. Sit with me?"

Eventually she sank down next to him. Her earlier sense of triumph, her determination had faded in the face of facts. Even if Yorda understood the concept of 'lying' there was no reason for this man to tell outlandish untruths. He didn't know who she was or where she had come from.

She didn't cry. Her tears had dried up years ago. But there was no mistaking how utterly heartbroken she was.

"Where are you from, Jacob?" She asked, her voice barely a whisper now. She'd been hoarse before from her ordeals. Hours spent calling Ico's name had rendered her almost mute. "What is it like?"

Where Jacob was from was something entirely different from where Cain was from. Even if they were the same person, even if Jacob was merely a fake life made to help Cain live in the present, the same world was two vastly different kinds of places between Jacob's life and Cain's experiences. There were easy ways to answer this that Cain considered, but the girl was vulnerable right now and needed honesty. Just maybe not the truth buried inside of it.

"It's an amazing place," he said gently. Not to match her hoarseness, but in respect to it. That exhaustion was well-earned, looking for someone she obviously treasured. "People everywhere. Information whenever you could want it. I didn't grow up anywhere good," he continued. Even if slavery back in his childhood had been completely different from what it had evolved into during the present day, being the spoils of war and old enough to know better made the life incredibly difficult. "But I had my brother, and we made it okay. There's good and bad there just like anywhere else. Like there's good here, too."

Yorda couldn't imagine a place full of people and knowledge. The Castle had a library, but even after her creation it had mostly given way to generations of mold and rot. When her mother found her trying to salvage the musty books, what little had survived was destroyed.

To Yorda, who grew up alone and starved of information, Cain's world sounded like a utopia.

"You said before, your brother's grave." There was worry in her tone as she fidgeted. "Do you miss him?"

That question was only natural. Bringing up his youth and Remus, even obliquely, would get a follow-up to his earlier oath. He wasn't bothered by it because it was simply human to have relationships, for those relationships to come and go whether by parting or passing. His own life back home, with the ghost of his brother fully corporeal and surviving in his own way, was nothing he would bring up here. It didn't change the truth of his answer regardless.

"Yes," he said. Plain, simple, truth. Just thinking about it brought a weight against his chest and with no reason to hide it, his breathing deepened. "He... was the only family I had. My twin, actually. There's no time I don't miss him."

Yorda was afraid. The world had become a much bigger and more dangerous place than she could have imagined, and she was alone in it. But she wasn't heartless. Cain's grief felt old but raw, and she reached up to touch his face.

Despit her ghostly palour and the ethereal way she seemed to repel shadow, she felt very solid.

To her, Cain felt... off. He didn't feel quite like Ico in spite of there being life under his skin. He felt like her mother, or herself. Things that denied mortality, endless but unchanging, standing only partially in time.

"I am sorry," she said, watching him with her pupil-less gray stare. "It sounds like a wound that cannot heal."

He looked at her with a slight, wry smile for her closeness. She wasn't what his world would define as normal, that much was certain, but she was still human enough and young if he had to guess. Physicality had nothing to do with it so much as her demeanor, as detached as it currently was, and he appreciated the kindness.

"It was a long time ago," he said. Ages. Longer than the rise and fall of entire empires. It was still true. "I try to focus on the living now."

"Yes," she agreed, looking out over the water. Cain was right - she was young in appearance and demeanor. But parts of her were old, fragments and relics of things long ago, little puzzle pieces floating in the dark recesses of her mind, full of memories of a past that should have been forgotten.

"the past shapes all things. But it is the past."

She hesitated for a moment. And then - "I am Yorda."

There was no surprise to be found in those wise beyond their years. Such a saying didn't understand that wisdom wasn't simple for the aged, just for the experienced and the world held nothing back. Not for anyone, young or old. Those with years on them simply had more time to roll the die and have something happen from which they could learn.

He smiled for the introduction. There it was. He had been hoping, but realistically not expecting her to give anything she wasn't ready to give. This was a girl with her own past and priorities and he knew better than to barge into someone else's life, except where it now concerned his own. She was here now and beginning to trust that he had only intent to help her.

"It's nice to meet you, Yorda. Thank you," he said with an understanding nod, "for introducing yourself."

Yorda nodded. 'Thank you' was about the extent of her grasp of propriety and she echoed his gratitude back to him. And then, with the slow steadiness of a flower closing for the night, she drew her knees up to her chin and lay her had in the crook of her folded arms.

"I must rest now." It was a matter-of-fact statement. There was no imminent danger and whatever strength she had was completely sapped. She apparantly had no trouble sleeping upright, or on the surface of a rock."I will meet you again...?"

Cain saw her beginning to shut down and hid his frown. This girl was definitely apart from the norm on every conceivable level, so the fact that she needed to rest and yet didn't factor her surroundings into it was only another tick on the list. He didn't move, didn't want to startle her.

"Before we part ways, I'd like to take you into the city first," he said. "You're welcome to rest, but it's safer, warmer and more comfortable there. Someone's even set up a place for newcomers to stay when they get here."

One pale eye opened.

"A place of people...?" There was nothing but hesitation in her tone. Aside from Ico, Cain was the first living soul Yorda had ever encountered. She didn't really have much concept of a 'city'. Once she had stood at the top of the tower that her cage was in, and if she squinted, she could see the crumbling ruins of a city her mother had turned to stone. It looked like a larger version of the Castle in the Mists, with it's decaying walls and tattered spires.

She had pictured people there. Lots of people. But she had no idea what they did in a city, so in her imagination, they were all sort of just milling about. They talked a lot in her imagination, mostly because there's only so much conversation you can have with a wall or pigeons before you just have to admit defeat and retreat into your own head.

"How many?" She asked. It seemed like an important question and she was very apprehensive about other people. She may have believed Cain's explanations but they hadn't assuaged the fear she'd be killed on sight.

He could read the hesitance in her body language. It wasn't hard, and he knew he would have to speak persuasively to convince her it was safe. Whatever experiences she'd had before this hadn't been good, not only from this reaction but the fear for her friend from earlier. She would be safe in the Hotel; the real real trouble was going to be getting there.

"Quite a lot," he answered honestly. "Most people keep to themselves. There's too many people to bother everyone. I would be there too," he added, "so if it got to be too much we could go somewhere quiet. How does that sound?"

There was a long silence as Yorda weighed her options. There really weren't that many - she was sure now if she pressed the issue, Cain would probably let her be. And then what?

She'd be alone again, with little hope of finding her lost friend. And Cain didn't seem cruel.

But then, her mother could be kind too, when the mood took her.

She unfurled, getting slowly, shakily to her feet. And frowned - the latent power that had been poured into her should have taken care of some of the feebleness, but everything still ached. She would have to figure this out later though - for now she couldn't let any more weakness show, in case Cain decided it was better - and safer - to just do away with her.

"Lead," She said softly. "I will follow."

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