Welcome to Gaia! ::

(Most likely only I will post, unless a friend of mine finally recieves her acceptance notice to this guild and can join me...if she doesn't then this will be a solitary thread to occupy myself while the guild runs slow.)

Ai sat upon the uneven slabs of foundation, inside the leftover remains of a petty and crumbled house. Barely even able to be considered a house really, with its missing roof and falling walls. It had mold climbing about the fallen support beams, and moss and ivy climbing the battered bricks. The floor had been peeled of its carpets and left a flat surface of concrete. This home was quiet, and lacked the feel that scoundrels or the last dregs of Crosshaven's society were around; this home is desolate.

But it was the only place where Ai felt safe now, the only place that Ai could continue to label as a home. In a corner it kept out the bad weather and it had the most bare resemblance to a home, so she had claimed it as her own. The lack of people, the bareness, it was what kept her safe. For the people have seemed to become monsters, as all peoples tend to do after great tragedy cripples a land. Only those most suited to survival make it, and those usually consist of the ones able to deal with the s**t that hit the fans. They were also the ones that contribute to the s**t and those people would surge upon something that was livable, or perhaps even ritzy, in terms of ruins admist ruins. So she lived in a place that was desolate and isolated, and felt safe.

A scan of the area around her revealed the same, emptiness. It held only one meaning to Ai, and that meaning was the ability to run and escape. To surround oneself with the rubble and concrete buildings, the frameworks of society would only mean becoming trapt in something like Crosshaven's damned doomsday once again. So Ai skirted about the edge of the city with eyes wary and legs ready to spring into a gallop, much like a skittish colt.

But there are days that the ache, sickening and cold, seeped back into her heart that allowed her to wallow in the thoughts that attempt to trick her back to staying. For Ai had begun to run again, had not stopped fleeing it seemed since the day Crosshaven went from haven to hell. How could she face the place that she had first stopped running, had finally decided to steady herself and live; only for her to find that world crushed and upheaved from underneath her. So she ran, and this time found that the running was more desperate and less exhilerating than before. The last time it had been a chase, her running with him chasing in a way that kept her making strides to stay in the lead. It was running with a purpose, but now the chase had ended and she ran without destination. For he was lost to the mess of broken Earth and city, and so she ran alone.

She was running in place too. Running and getting nowhere, and at times like these, it frustrated the young witch like no other. Heathen that she was, she found herself praying to the Goddesses, but never a God. Found herself wanting that comfort that she saw in others, but felt only the empty spot that religion always held for her. So she turned instead to pressing her face in the grass, or hiding against a tree to feel the Earth, rich and living despite what happened, and felt some measure of comfort. Higher power her a**; all there was was the force of will to grow and live that came from within, and that defiant burst gave her some strength; the strength needed to search for food or to fight some vagabond that wanted to break her a little.

Still, days where there was too much silence for too long a span of time made her ill with memories and wantings, and so she would hold in those feelings till she broke much like a ruined dam and began to leak salty tears. Shaking but silent, she pressed her lips tightly and clenched her fists, desperate to fight the ache.

Kyrn was always the one to break it. A sharp yip, almost stern but always concerned, the little dog would cause Ai to start and stare. Puppy brown eyes and ragged fur with a face all scrunched up into an expression that spelt 'stop being angsty. Cry and be done with it, and then let's do something.'

Those moments of time where the dog was much smarter than the person made Ai choke out a laugh, rough and shakey as it was. She would then press the little dog close to her and bury her face into its coarse fur and cry a good span of healthy tears before wiping eyes and getting up. She had claimed her battered red sketchbook from the ruins, the only item she was set on reclaiming, and used it in those moments to live. To stare at the faces of those she used to know and wondered if she could still continue to know them. It caused hurts, but it also caused healing. For to forget would make her empty, and Ai was tired of the emptiness inside of her, she had enough emptiness around her. To remember gave the ability to stay, but also added the fuel to the times neccessary to run. How else had she survived, but by knowing why she had to run...what reason was there to run when the world heaved and tossed and fell around one, but because of the hope that there would be someone waiting at the end, or someone pushing for one to run.

"I won't continue running, not always," Ai promised to the wind and Kyrn. "Kyrn, should we go out? Look for others, and see others...Try again?"

Kyrn seemed to give her a look that said yes, and about time.