cmdrnemo

Chapter 1:

Mellie sylphen remnant of air superiority

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Mellie sucked in a gasp as the light started to fade. As her arms dimmed to red, bones no longer visible under the sheer intensity of that light. Everything, except splotches of random floating colours, dropped to black in an instant. She could hear nothing over the ringing within her own ears. The world seemed distant, soft. For a moment she simply sat, breathing. Trying to recover a grasp on the outside.

Each breath required more effort. With them came focus. What air had come through with her was thinning. This place had little of its own. She still couldn’t see or hear properly. Enough touch returned for the rocks to feel cold and hard, with sharp edges blunted by numbed nerves. She called to the sky. Sluggish response, far away and below. Rocks and air beneath, nothing above, what world had stone above sky? Cautious motion, dizziness remained, slow crawl while calling her medium. The sky called back. Distant unable to climb. Pinned by the weight of the world.

Still half blinded by the afterglow, deaf for the ringing, dizzy from the lack of air, caught in the bite of intense cold. The stones were far colder than ice. Grey and arid as a moon’s surface. She came to grasp her true altitude. Stumbling along, not trusting magic in this strange place just yet, to a sharp drop. The ground rushed away, vertical until it faded into blue.

No mundane options, a wave of the hand. Glass feathers swirled around it. Her expressing still worked. Controlled limited use. Glistenings appeared, wings of glass compressed to folded forms. Which unfurled smoothly to block the sky. She stood for a moment. Poised on precipice edge, wings splayed behind.

Jets within each feather launcher her free. For a moment she hovered fighting to hold steady. Wings trailing behind she dropped, barely controlled.. Her sense of balance refused to return. Interminable confusing minutes later clarity started to return. She lit upon an outcropping a staggering five miles from the peak and at least as many yet from the desert below. The vial in her jacket pocket filled with ground glass and essense of air elemental. A strange sensation, fire and ice in the veins. The ringing finally stops. Vision clears. Feeling returns to fingers and toes numb from the cold. A refreshing sort of pain, pins and needles following numbness.

Mellie waved a pale hand of delicate fingers in front of her face. She still had no food and little water. At least she could trust her body now. Judging by the way she simply hadn’t noticed the extent of the numbness that was a step in the right direction. She could hear the wind. It called to the West. Away from the sun. The howl of a jetstream, a little lower, following the range. So little time to find a way home. Best to search at speed. The West wind was pushed South by the mountains, accelerated to remarkable speeds.

Beyond the mountains, over distant plains, yet less than an hour later, wings rigid to grab the wind, she flew on. Something in the distance. A glittery sapphire object at low altitude. It constantly seemed to bounce around hills then leap up over low lying clouds. Out of the wind into a slow high spiral. Whatever the sapphire thing was its flight pattern looked exhausting and useless. Must be artificial. Someone on this world testing an early aircraft. Fear of height with no understanding of air currents or the use of light to hide. Otherwise it would simply fly above the clouds. That glittery colouring was interesting. High enough it would be a passable camouflage. As low as it was it could, in theory, hide from the blind and deaf.

It was difficult to stay slow enough to follow whatever that was. A favourite trick, follow something by staying above and slightly ahead. It’s very seldom anything looks up and no living thing expects to be followed by someone in front of them. The plan isn’t without flaws. Ideally she would want to be in contact with someone behind. Otherwise the loops to track around corners would be obvious. Here that issue should not arise. In long distance flight few things make sharp corners without an obvious reason. And she was only looking for the nearest sign of civilisation. If this thing wasn’t flying with all the skill and cleverness of a brick she would have made contact.