reverielogs | If you could only see the beast you've made of me

» WHO? Garion and you
» WHEN? just after he wakes up near the gym
» WHERE? Around (basically anywhere public is fair game)
» WHAT? There's a wolf walking around the station
» WARNINGS? None so far. Happy to use [ ] for any replies.

There is a wolf wandering around the station. A large wolf. A large white wolf with blue eyes.

Because he woke up in a chamber near the gym, that's where he's likely to be found, but he's wandering now, trying to sniff out something, anything, to tell him what's going on. Now, of course, he's not just a wolf. He's also a man by the name of Garion (or Belgarion, technically) but given that a wolf can cover distances much faster than a human can, that he'll have the advantage of a nose that can sniff out nearly anything on his muzzle, and the fact that between his teeth and his claws, he'll have more a weapon in that form should he encounter anything dangerous...

He's always scouted as a wolf. Really, this is no change. Or he tries to remind himself it's very little change, even though he can't sense his Aunt Pol or his Grandfather or even Durnik anywhere. Even though his wife is nowhere to be found and he can't smell her, not even on his own skin, not on the clothing he woke up in. Neither his wife nor his children and it's upsetting on two legs, but on four, it just gives him a sense of urgency.

So if you happen to see a rather large white wolf near the mess or the bar area or one of the crew quarters or just in the hallways, well...

He's as new to this as you are.

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I woke up a few hours ago. No telling when I was brought here, though. At least I should think.

Well, you weren't there yesterday.

[ Haruto likes to keep a set schedule, so he goes to the fitness center around the same time every day. He would have noticed a sleeping wolf-man there. ]

That doesn't mean I wasn't aboard the ship. I've noticed a few barred doors, after all.

[ That thought makes Haruto pause in his steps. ] You think people are being held somewhere, unconscious, then moved to the parts of the station we have access to?

[ He looks down at himself and then up at Haruto. ]

Possibly. After all, I certainly wasn't wearing this before I came here. They had to change me somewhere.

No, that's a good point.

[ All this talk of the mysterious "they" who brought them here, who changed their clothes... Haruto doesn't like it. He's already paranoid enough. ]

Do you gave any idea who "they" are?

The only idea I have is so unlikely that I doubt it. But I've learned since I was a boy not to discount the improbable too quickly.

[ He's walking and chatting and being amiable, but he doesn't look as if he'd be doing that if he knew exactly who'd done this. ]

Well? [ Haruto turns to him, inquisitive. ] What's your idea?

[ He's seen so many impossible or improbable things since he arrived here, he's liable to agree that the improbable shouldn't be discounted. ]

The Universe herself.

[ He glances over at the other man. ]

But she's usually not this... unsubtle.

[ Setting aside the fact that the universe is a "she," Haruto finds an immediate hole in this logic. ]

That might work, but there are multiple universes represented here. Multiple versions of the same planet, with different histories and circumstances.

Which means that every Universe decided to contribute someone, or a few someones. Or this... Multi-verse decided it needed certain people for something.

"...We tried to save the world." [ He recites, hollowly. Maybe the wolf-man is right. Maybe they're here because they've been chosen for some grand purpose.

Haruto takes a deep breath, as they finally arrive at the mess hall. ]

You would think the Multiverse could at least provide better food.

[ Garion nods. Slowly. ]

When something goes wrong, terribly wrong, the Universe takes steps. Our presence here has a purpose. We just haven't figured out what it is.

[ He shrugs about the food. ]

I might have to see what can be done. I was raised in a kitchen, and good food is important.

[ Haruto fetches two plates and hands one to the wolf-man with a curious expression. ]

What kind of wolf is raised in a kitchen?

[ He takes the plate from Haruto with a dip of his head. Thank you. ]

I'm not a wolf.

[ He pauses as he realizes how that might have looked. ]

I can be a wolf at times. My grandmother was a wolf. But I was born a man and grew up a man.

My family can just do some things other folks can't.

[ Haruto just stares. Then, he does that thing he's had to do so frequently here, where he just decides to pretend that what he's just heard makes complete and total sense. ]

Oh. I thought you might be a yokai. But you're really just... a quarter yokai.

What, exactly, is a yokai. If you don't mind me asking.

[ IT doesn't sound like something bad. But you never know. It sounds sort of... Melcene?]

Oh, well... It's a creature in Japanese folklore. Legend says that if an animal lives long enough, it can turn into a human.

[ That actually has him pausing for a moment. ]

That is actually what happened with my grandmother, from what I've heard, so maybe you have a point. I didn't know it happened often enough for someone to have a word for it.

I didn't know it happened at all. It's only a legend.

Well, I know it's happened at least once. Maybe the legend came from that.

[ Haruto wonders whether he's from the same universe as this wolf-man. His rational mind doubts it, but really, how could he know whether yokai were real or not? They're certainly real in at least one universe. ]

So you're... one quarter wolf. [ He moves to the fabricator and tries, for the seventy-fourth time, to ask for rice. And, for the seventy-fourth time, he receives some kind of grey slop. ] I assume the rest of you is human?

It's probably a bit less than that. She's more of my great great great great great great-

[ He pauses there ]

Suffice to say there's a lot of 'greats'. It's been some centuries. But most of my family lives a very long time.

But I'd assume so. I've always figured I was human.

[ ...he's not, really. ]

Your ancestor, then.

[ Interesting. If most of his family lives "a very long time," maybe he isn't human after all?

Still, that's far too personal a topic to broach. ]

My name is Hideki, by the way. Hideki Matsukawa.

[ That isn't his name, but he has to at least try to stick to the same story he's set up for himself. ]

[ Garion offers a bow of his head to the name.]

I'm generally known as Garion.

[ There were other names and titles, but he usually preferred Garion.]

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