[private] courage can be an emotion too.

[Picard]

It's his first time to venture away from his mother. In silence they had lived among the flowers of the Brilliant Pampas, never the ones to make themselves known. For far too long he had wished to be among the others while watching from afar. Two long years had proven to pass by slow when the only company he had was the butterfly mare he called "mother". 

With an overly eager flutter of his white and gold butterfly wings, the young colt made his way towards the common lands. When the trees began to thicken and solid ground became harder to find the boy fluttered towards to the ground with a sort of grace, his long spotted legs reaching for the earth as he came to a soft landing. With delicate steps the colts hooves dug gently into the earth as he made his way through the trees. It was cold here, colder then back home and his thin coat provided less than ample warmth in these winter months.

A shiver runs through him and in response the shadows around him seemed to pulse. The movement draws his attention and for a moment his heart pounds in his chest. He's never understood how the shadows around him always seemed to have a life of their own for he has yet to discover the power that lay mostly dormant within. With uneven breaths his nostrils flare and his ears prick as he stares into the darkness that surrounded him. For a moment he is still and the only sound that surrounds him is the sound of his heartbeat pounding in his ears as he waits.

PICARD

"the road from legitimate suspicion to rampant
paranoia is very much shorter than we think."

@Nereza

[Nereza]

Nereza sighs, closing her eyes; she has been at it for a while now, focusing, concentrating—willing the pebbles she’d collected in a heap in front of her to move, but to no avail. Even now, try as she might, she knows the second she opens her eyes, the pebbles are still going to be in the same spot she left them.  Maybe she had nothing to do with the rocks being launched at Reave, perhaps it had been a joke—a prank played by the Fae. “Yes, that’s—“ she freezes, suddenly all too aware of the world around her.

Holding on to the feeling, she imagines tentacles slithering towards the rocks and gripping them, lifting them up slowly and pulling them gently towards her face. Her eyes snap open when one of them bumps against her nose, breaking her concentration. They fall back down to the mossy ground, their landings muted, and she stares at the forest around her in amazement.

“You did it!” Oop cheers, suddenly popping into existence near her head. He darts around her like a happy hummingbird visiting his most favorite of flowers, his momentarily pauses marked by him doing a happy little jig. “So, so proud of you!”

“I did it,” Nereza whispers, still peering around. “I did it,” she repeats, a little louder now; the excitement builds, growing inside her until she’s hopping excitedly from foot to foot and plodding after Oop—they giggle and shout, blinded by joy, unaware of the darkness springing up around them until the stars and the moon are… cackling down at them?

“What?” The spotted two year-old stops dead in her tracks, causing Oop to fly straight into her forehead. He passes through her, causing a cold chill to run up her spine, but she keeps her eyes locked on the moon and the stars and their faces. They seem so horribly, terribly close, and they just keep laughing… laughing at her?

“Let’s eat them,” suggests the Moon.

“Oh, definitely,” agrees the stars.


Nereza screams.

[tl;dr: Nereza accidentally conjures up a cartoony version of the Moon and Stars that want to eat her. Please help.]

[Picard]

The darkness seems to reach for him. The shadows of the forest seemingly alive as his anxiety begins to increase and for a moment their pulsing matches the beating of his heart. The silence that surrounded him is nothing more than a monster in itself and it thickens, causing the blood to pulse within his ears. For a moment it is nothing but him and the gift that is trying to awaken within him in the forest.

Then it happens. A scream and the a burst of adrenaline breaks him free from deafening pounding within him and without a second thought he is rushing towards the sound rather than away from it. "Hello?," his voice carries through the silence that follows and before he knows it carl is ambling beside him in all his rounded glory, the sound of small snorts of excitement keeping pace with every step. "We should be careful, what if somethings eating them?" Carl's squeaky voice travels up from next to Picard. "I don't want to be eaten," Carl whispers.

Though Picard doesn't respond. Instead he finds himself pushing forward, searching for the one that screamed. It's only when he makes his way around a large ancient elm tree that he comes face to face with a mare that is spotted just like him and for a moment he is confused. Coming to a stop he stares at her, watching as he tries to understand what could have possibly made her scream.

Then he realizes. She's looking up. Hesitatingly slow the golden spotted colt looks towards the sky and suddenly he comes to the realization that nothing is quite normal about this night. The stars and the moon are very much alive. "What the," Picard exclaims and for a moment his breath catches in his throat as his eyes widen in surprise. "They're alive!" The exclamation escapes between his lips as stares into the darkening face of the moon. 

Something deep within him stirs as he stares frozen at the sky. "How..." It's more of a statement than a question. He can't comprehend, not yet. His mother had hidden him from the world for far too long for him to know that there was more magic then he could ever imagine within the lands of Beqanna. Though with every passing moment he feels a growing pull towards the moon and the stars despite their dangerous natures. It's only then that he remembers Carl and with a quick look towards the ground he realizes the creature has fainted, his rounded body laying upside down with it's tiny limbs in the air. "Coward," he whispers, not all too convinced that he wasn't one himself.  

PICARD

"the road from legitimate suspicion to rampant
paranoia is very much shorter than we think."

@Nereza