Tove was sprinting. The thing she was following had a decent head start, but it wasn't faster than her, so it couldn't quite elude her. Sometimes it turned a corner suddenly, but she always had time to see where it turned next before it turned again out of sight. And even if she did lose visual, with the fresh layer of snow the tracks it left would've been easy enough to follow.
Tove was sprinting. The thing wasn't a dog, that much was clear by now. For one thing it seemed to be bipedal. It also occasionally glanced back to see if she was still there -- she was, and would be until she caught up -- and she could see it had no muzzle, but a more humanoid face. But it was no human either. Not something that small. It was something else, something weird.
Tove was sprinting. And eventually, she caught up.
~X~
Tove woke up to a migraine of a lifetime. She had them occasionally, when she neglected basic self care -- y'know, like sleeping or eating -- for too long, but it hadn't been this bad in a long time. Not since she was a teenager. She groaned, pressing the heels of her hands to her eyes, willing the world to go away. It didn't, of course. In fact, she became more and more aware of it even through the pain. Finally she realized something. The hands pressed against her face had gloves, and her butt was very cold.
She jolted up, eyes shooting wide open. A mistake on her part, as the sun was shining directly down the alley she was sitting in. And it was an alley. She was sitting on the snowy ground, leaning against a wall in a dead end street. She couldn't do anything but sit there, mouth agape for a while.
What the fuck had happened last night??
She climbed to her unsteady feet, leaning onto the wall for support. It had a pretty big graffiti on it, she noted, a symbol of some kind, but she didn't remember seeing the tag before. Maybe a new kid, but that wasn't important right now. What was important was that she had apparently slept in the ditch last night. Gods, maybe it wasn't a migraine, maybe she was just super hungover. She tried to think, where had she been last night?
She recalled going to see Alaia. She had been ordered a sick leave after her accident, and Tove had wanted to go spend time with her so she wouldn't be lonely. She'd also wanted to talk about the story. Which she had... but Alaia hadn't been convinced it was anything but a coincidence. And then Tove had stormed out, like an idiot. And then... then... something.
She let out another groan and opened up her bag, which thank Hermond no one had stolen during the night. She'd taken her smaller bag with her when she'd gone to Alaia's, so she could have her story notes and to bring Alaia the get-well-soon gifts people at the office had sent. None of that was important at the moment though, since the only thing she needed right now was for the pain to go away. She dug around for a bit before she finally found the aspirin, which she took dry because like a dumbass she didn't have a water bottle with her. She usually did, but she'd just been going over to Alaia's place, she hadn't thought she'd need a water bottle.
She took off while waiting for the medicine to kick in, because she really needed to get home and get some proper sleep. Or, if the medicine really kicked in, go to the office to get some work done. She emerged from the alley into a street that she didn't recognise, but based on the architecture had to be somewhere in Old Town. She glanced around for a street sign and after finally finding it she had to pause for a bit.
She tried to focus. The letters made no sense. Her head started hurting more. She pressed a hand to her face again and took a few deep breaths. Gods, this migraine is worse than I've ever had, she thought and after relaxing for a bit she tried to read the sign again. The letters still made no sense. In fact, they now seemed to be moving ever so slightly up and down. She had to stop looking at them, they were giving her motion sickness.
That's when she noticed the sea at the end of the street. Great! That was a much better landmark than the name of a random street she didn't even recognise. She started towards it, quickly at first but slowing down almost right away, lest her headache get worse.
When she got to the end of the street she was even more confused. There were a lot more... sail boats in the harbour than she had remembered there being. Usually there were only big cargo ships and fishing boats this time of the year, but now there were mostly small, well, sail boats. She tried to read the names of the boats, but the letters were still jumping in her vision, so she stopped. The pain had let out a bit with the crisp air, but her peripheral vision was still fuzzy.
What confused her even more was when she looked around to determine which way to start walking along the coast and she still had no idea where she was. She was pretty sure this was the Old Town harbour area, but for the life of her she couldn't pinpoint where exactly she was. Or how to get home.
She noticed a figure moving towards her. A person! She could ask for directions. It would be a little embarrassing after living in the city for her whole life, but she was cold and sore and tired and she just wanted to go home. So she waved at the person coming towards her to catch his attention.
"Hi, I'm so sorry to bother you, but could you tell me where... Havtoll Street is?" She stopped. There was something off with the way he looked but she couldn't quite put her finger on what. The man didn't answer, he just looked at Tove, his eyes squinted and his brow scrunched. Did he not understand Fjellish? She tried again in Nowenish, since there was a sizeable minority of immigrants from their neighbouring country in the city, but got no response to that either. Esperanto managed to get a reaction out of him, like he understood some of the words, but even then he couldn't answer.
In the end he shook his head and waved his hand and continued on his walk. Tove rubbed her eyes. What kind of person in Embärfjell doesn't speak Fjellish, Nowenish or Esperanto, or at the very least understand one of them? Well, it was no matter, she'd just have to find someone else to ask, there were always plenty of people around Old Town. And with any luck she'd find herself somewhere familiar after wandering around for a bit. She glanced after the useless man walking away and went to leave. She had to do a double take.
The man had a tail.
It was long and thin and ended in a tuft of brown hair and it swayed in sync with the man's gait. That's a fake tail, it has to be, Tove thought and watched as the tail perked up when the man noticed someone in one of the sail boats docked nearby. They started talking and Tove watched as the man's tail swung around excitedly and then she looked over to the boat and the person on it wasn't wearing a hat and those ears were waaaaay too long for a human what the fuck?
She turned quickly and speedwalked in the opposite direction, praying she'd turn corner and find herself back home, that she'd open her eyes and wake up in bed. Because it was a dream, right? It had to be. She started to hear the soft murmur of a crowd, the bustle of people and in the distance she saw a peek of a maket square and she was relieved, at least now she could speak to someone, ask someone help.
And then she stopped, half a block away from the market. She took a step back, her hand grasping to find support and landing on a lamppost. She clung to it for dear life as she watched the crowd she'd come upon. There were big ears and snouts and more tails and wings and fangs and horns. There were creatures easily over two meters as well as tiny things, like gnomes, walking about. It might have been one of those, last night, Tove found herself thinking and then she remembered exactly what had happened last night.
She was not at home anymore.
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Uhhhhhhhhhh so I guess that just happened?? :DD I'm not yet entirely sure what the implications of this are, but! It's a thing now! Yay!!!!!!!!
Next topic is "Value", bye~
Pie out.
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