pleasantries.

Desdemona was diligent in her duty, even moreso now that in a sense, was a new beginning. Day in and day out did she circle the mountain below, carefully navigating the land they so choose to claim so. Even she knew though, Hydra would not simply be satisfied with just a mountain piece, and would eventually expand. Though gathering numbers and a place to call home was essential, especially if it meant gathering those they lost. Her heart twinged, thinking of those she thought dearly, and was now lost from them. The guard could only hope they were alive and well.

In the mean time, did she mark the trees.

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As the days on the Nameless Mountain continued to pass, he slowly had begun to get a sense of the way Hydra wished not only to lay, but to maintain, her claim upon these rocky slopes. Along with that, Element's own desire to help maintain the claim had been sparked - at first nothing more than a caught ember, barely living, but then fueled by the kindle that was safety and security, it was now a flame that wished to continue its spread. He had been so unsure at first - still was about so many things - but not about this. While he had not forgotten his falls entirely, right now, they were... they weren't real, not in the same way this place was. They existed within him, and maybe even they could be found somewhere in this world if he sought them hard enough, but even then...he was not the leader he used to be. He was a lifetime away from those memories, as distant and scattered as they were.

That hurt, and it hurt often, but it was the truth. He was slowly accepting that. For now, he had to focus on the ground beneath his paws and the world in front of his eyes, not the fragmented realities in his head.

That meant adapting. He'd always been good at that... or at least he was pretty sure he had. There was a fine balance to be struck here, between pretending his hurts didn't happen and just trying to move on, and diving deeper into them for answers. Some days he found himself unable to leave the small den he was building for himself, too weighed down by the missing memories of a life he could not recall. Other days, like today, he felt more in the present - and committed to the duties that brought. Element too circled the base of the mountain, having weaved a slow path from his safe nook to one of the boundaries of the territory marked by Hydra's scent. From there he roved eastward, taking in his surroundings as he went and adding his own scent to that of the growing packs.
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She was not alone on this day of marking, but it was to be expected. The pack was quite busy on securing their claim, especially as more and more members started to appear- though she may not have seen them all yet, Desdemona can still smell a few who were recognizable. Though the current one, was someone new. Curiously so did she follow and approach the figure from behind, letting a slight gruff to announce her presence, "I do not recognize you- you have joined recently?" 

Despite perhaps the cold touch within her voice, Desdemona did not hold any hostility, and only asked in curiosity.

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He heard the sound of approaching footfalls before the scent of the other wolf reached his nose, and it was instinct that threatened to raise the darkened hairs along his spine while the distance between them closed. But this was pack lands, even if they were near the borders, and he placed a teeny bit of faith in the hope that it was indeed someone from their own group approaching him and he wasn't in for an unpleasant surprise.

Fortunately, a sound of acknowledgement reached his ears instead of the sharpness of teeth at his haunches, and he felt a small surge of relief. Slowing to a halt, Ele turned and peered over his left shoulder briefly before turning in a slow circle to face the other wolf. He hadn't seen her before, but as he scanned her features there were similarities he could not immediately place, but felt striking nonetheless. "Yes," Element answered, attempting to keep his voice neutral but being unable to help a little bit of timidity tinge his words. "Hydra found me, and offered me a place," he continued after a pause, feeling the need for further elaboration. And a moment after that: "I'm Element."
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"I am Desdemona, a guard of this nameless mountain." Internally there was a nod of approval from her over his wariness. It was always right to be worrisome of intruders, especially if it was someone one does not recognize. Though she was fortunate to swap scents with a few already, and the scent of their pack was clean upon her, just as it was to the other. Though it seemed this was not a wolf that was from Moonspear, but a new one that was from this land.

"Are you from these parts?" She wondered if Elemental also had woke up on the territory, or was a native to the land.

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^^

 Desdemona, a guard of the mountain. The name was not a familiar one to him yet, but then again, the list of those that were at this point was a small one. Really small. Basically it was just Hydra. Element let himself relax a little further, making a mental bookmark of her name, her scent, and the role she had described for herself. "I'm not," he answered, a half-frown creasing the left side of his maw. "I woke up not too far from here a few weeks back, and that was when Hydra led me here," he further clarified. "It was like waking up from... a dream, I guess." He made a pitiful attempt to shift his frown into a crooked, sheepish smile. "All of this has been a bit dreamlike, actually. I don't know what to make of it all." He shrugged; a small, half-hearted gesture. "I don't suppose you would be, would you? From here, I mean. If not from the mountain itself, then somewhere nearby?"

^^
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"It seems we all woke the same." She still vividly remembered the end, and the beginning. How the monster crossed to the lands and the wolves howling to the sky, how she ran into the scene to do her duty; protect and serve. The monster without an aim terrorizing the plain wolves, and look of horror across many faces. How she remembered that Desdemona was the first, her body lefted and crashed to the ground with but a broken neck, and a darkness engulfed.

Though she remembered floating, as ethereal it seemed, and how she didn't want to believe, the guard remembered. She saw through the fog of her brethren carrying her up to be with the stars, the rest of the warriors that served the old pack. It brought a shiver to her pelt, yet Desdemona remained stoic. It all was so vivid to her, but she couldn't believe, because a dead wolf speaks no words, "I had awoken the same, but I knew Hydra from long ago."

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^^

 A shiver seemed to ripple across her, but it came and went so fast that it merely registered to Element as a product of the wind, ruffling the thick outer hairs of her coat as the breeze played across them both. It was unlikely he would have noticed it even without the wind, as Ele was absorbed in his own thoughts in that moment. Desdemona was right - so far, all that he'd encountered had something similar to say about their origins here. It was uncanny, and the depths of the mystery plunged dark and deep. The worst part about it, he thought, was that he had no good idea where to even begin when it came to trying to figure it out. He was hesitant yet to accept Hydra's suggestion - move on, be alive, survive. But with no clues to follow and no leads in sight, there was not much else any of them could do. So he tucked the data away for later. Desdemona, just like himself, just like so many around them, had showed up here the same as he.

Well, maybe not exactly the same - but he didn't know the story of the memories that danced across the screen of her mind. The words she spoke revealed nothing of her inward thoughts. "From, ah," he had to think of the name for a moment, trying to remember who had told it to him. "Moonspear, was it?" he asked curiously, tilting his head to the left as he regarded her. "It seems to be a stroke of fortune that so many found their way here."

^^
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She nodded, perhaps it was well knowledge to those who were new, that majority came from an original place, "It was once our home. This mountain is similar." Though while not revealed, it wasn't her original birth-place, nor' the pack after. As now the third in total, one from her birth-home and to the desolate pack known as Morningside, to now. She counted Empyrean and Moonspear the same, though albeit name change, their origins did not, nor' did the wolves. Just additions, and nothing more.

"Where do you come from before?" Though not sharing the same origin story, she was a bit curious on how he came to be. He awoken the same, but before all the dreams; where was Element?

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^^

 
So simple a question, really. In another time (another lifetime?) it would be the type of question to answer easily, the words requiring no thought or consideration at all. Where were you born, where did you come from, tell me about the life you have lived. The kind of conversation essential for getting to know someone.

Here, it wasn't so easy. "Hmm," he rumbled softly as the question escaped her and filled the space between them. At least, he mused, there was no need to explain his lack of memory or make excuses for these deficits, in a world where so many shared his plight. "I'm still... piecing all of that together" he admitted, pairing the response with a shrug that was meant to be indifferent. But the forced hike of his shoulders and the slow way he diverted his gaze spoke more to melancholy than indifference. "I can remember snippets, like all the rest. I know there was a mountain early on, draped in shadows. I have a sense that that was the first true home I had, outside of where I was born." A pause. "That part I don't remember at all though," he added, his brow crinkling. "After the mountain, things are a little clearer, but still hard to make sense of. I remember a great falls, and know I started a pack there, but eventually something pulled me away. Beyond that... it all gets dim."

A birthplace, a mountain, a falls, and now here.

^^
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"If you do not remember, then a new home can be made." As so Empyrean does, to re-make the legacy they once held under the name 'Moonspear,' but now anew in a land they do not know, with wolves who some, do not remember who they are. Such a mysterious time, but she, held all her memories together. So Desdemona believes, though her homeland of wolves remains blurry, and remembering instances, she could hold names and faces together too much. She couldn't have noticed, for a long time ago did the guard abandon past thoughts, and did not realize how little the memory remained.

"What do you aspire to be?" With now a new life, and a new goal - what was his purpose?

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^^

 
He regarded Desdemona with a gentle smile, touched with melancholy that he could not help but have rise in him as he thought about all the forgotten things in his past. Her words were very similar to Hydras, and Hydra's similar to Dirge's, and so on and so forth throughout the many of Moonspear, now Empyrean, that he'd managed to meet thus far. There was something about the unity in this belief that comforted him - the lack of dwelling in the past and the effort put forth to establishing a strong future. All of the Moonspear wolves seemed to have it, and though he didn't voice it, he wished there was a way he could have gotten to see them all in their other world, and the force they had likely been.

 But they were here now, and he was one of them, and the words she spoke were the truth. And so, that was the reason for his smile.

 "I think I'm still figuring that out too," he sighed, unsatisfied with his own answer as he turned his gaze from her and regarded the peak above them. "I want to be worthy of the chance I've been given - and the trust put in me to provide." He thought for a few moments, letting the silence pass between them along with the breeze. "Part of the reason I want to uncover some of my memories is to be able to use them; to advise, to counsel, to have an answer when an answer is needed." Another stretch of silence, a twitch of an ear. "Right now, just to be useful, in all the ways I can. Until sometime clicks."

^^
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An upmost honor to be compared to the Ostrega Bloodline, though if anyone would mention so, Desdemona would say she is unworthy. In general her words were always from the heart, perhaps blunt and to the point, for she did not understand particular eloquent that came with others. It was brought within her birthright, and such bastardly lineage did not have the honor to learn likewise. She found herself but a simple tool to be used, and even though no longer an Omega, but a Gamma, she could not rid herself of that persona of being a lowly mongrel ; quiet, and on duty.

"That is fair," she nodded at him, finding that is reasonable. Memories unlocked could help new abilities come forth, memories once forgotten and re-earned and instead of re-learning, "have you got any hints to unlocking so?" though curiously, she asked. If he remembered nothing, that was a challenge - even the smallest hint would be of use. She didn't mind helping, if it meant securing more strength to the mountain.

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Wow wow wow, I have been a slug. Thank you for patience! I'm going to close this one out here since it's now ancient, but would love another one with you sometime as I get back into things.

---

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If only he did have any hints. So far, it was all too vague. There were flashes of course - bittersweet moments where something emerged weakly from the depths, grasping upward from his subconscious, trying to make itself known. He tried to reach for memories and they seemed to flee from him, dropping back into the darkness and into the roiling mass that lurked below.

Element swallowed heavily, brows furrowing as the imagery left him feeling unsettled. "Not yet," he admitted, a tinge of disappointment leaking through into his tone. "So far, it's just getting by, I think. It feels like once I can get myself settled, maybe I can spare whats left to start figuring it out". At least that's what he hoped. And for now, that's what he had. It would have to do.

In the meantime, he could try to get used to the type of help being offered to him. The gentle urging, the curiosity expressed by his packmates, and the comfort of knowing that at least, even in his current state, he was accepted.

^^
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