Tallyho Abell's Story

Maris glanced to the girl and then back to the cat that sat in front of the two. Gulping, Maris slowly nodded. "Ye-yeah, I heard it," she stuttered, "and I don't think you're crazy." Maris, herself, was questioning her sanity, though. She couldn't get over the fact that she possibly heard a man's voice come from the orange cat in front of them. Something wasn't right, not at all.

Dorian pushed himself through the light, only a slight hesitation when he finally stood in front of it. He had no idea where he was going, but anything was better than sitting around, waiting for something to happen in a preschooler's nightmare. It felt almost like walking through a thick fog at first, and then, nothing.
When he woke up and felt grass around him, before he had even opened his eyes, he knew it wasn't Central Park. The grass was too soft and unkempt, much unlike the prickly, freshly mown lawn inside Central Park. He took a deep breath before opening his eyes. The sky was blue, but there was no mistaking this place for New York. For the second time in the past few minutes, he sat up, dragging himself to his feet just in time to hear something about a cat talking. Honestly, from the way this day was going? Yes. Yes the cat had probably talked.

Groggily, Autumn opened her eyes. She was flat on her back for a second time now. Well, at least her cards weren't tossed about this time. Now, what was this about a talking cat? "I think I heard it too." She said with mild curiosity. "It's not all together crazy. I mean, we were brought here by a strange light and some otherworldly creature attacked us. Honestly, this seems to be more normal than anything." She shakily stood up, brushing grass off of her jeans.

Tallyho looked at the cat who was apparently talking. Considering the recent events, it wasn’t quite odd at that point. She caught her breath as an explosion of light shot out from around it.
A full grown man was the remainder. He stood before them with velvet locks sweeping across his forehead like red war paint. His eyes were grey, wise, almost too stale with knowledge and his lips were pressed into a thin, unwelcoming line. His straight black pants gathered into the grass, and his button up shirt fumbled in the wind, heavy with untucked buttons.
He cleared his throat. It was rather awkward for him, he really did try to make their journey as easy as possible. Perhaps turning into a man didn’t help the situation either but by then it was much too late.
“I’m sure you are all probably wondering why you’re here… This is extremely real. So get the idea of dreams out of your heads,” He said.
“Wait, who are you?” Tallyho mumbled. She was a bit careful as to whether she wanted to say it out loud or not.
“You can call me Haru, and as of today I will be your guide.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, accept it or not, this is your destiny. Answer a question for me. Do any of you wear stones…? Accessories with jewels in them?”
Tallyho covered her amethyst under her palm. Was he a thief?
“You see, a long ago there was a group of heroes who brought justice to this world against the empire. As a result, they were trapped in those precious stones of yours.”
“The month warriors,” Tallyho chipped in. She knew that story. It was one that children were told. But as far as she was told it was only a myth.
“And for you earthlings... The creature you saw back there is called a cyclopean. And it came for you because of these stones.”

Ray had arrived through the flash of light just in time to catch the man's supposed explanation, he checked himself from head to toe even though he was sure he didn't have any stones or jewelry whatsoever and was about to raise his hand to protest to the whole " destiny " proclamation and that is when he saw it, a ring with a large red stone set in it's center that he knew he never had before, hell he hadn't even felt it's tight grip on his finger all this time. He then put his hand down and continued to quietly listen to the man speech, until he finished that is.

He marched over to the man and placed a hand on the man's shoulder while shaking his head as if chastising a child " Whoa whoa whoa, you might wanna' slow down there buddy, all this talk of destiny and stones and cyclopes or whatever you called them is starting to sound a little far fetched. And you called us " earthlings " you expect us to believe we where just magically taken to another planet, or did ya beam us Scotty? " he asked as he used his free hand to punch the man playfully, even though the evidence was all around him his mind wouldn't let him accept something as crazy as this, especially with him involved because spectacular things simply did not happen to him, there was absolutely nothing special or heroic about him.

He then looked back at one of the blond chicks and gave her a look that had are you retarded? written all over it " No! This guy is clearly lost one too many marbles because there is no way in hell I'm apart of any destiny, unless you need someone who can screw any and everything up then I'm you're guy "

She seemed speechless, and every ones words seemed to clump together into her head and she almost seemed dead set on not understanding. First, the cat.. or man could turn from the shape, and now he was going on about some warrior trapped inside stones. Stones.. She thought, in almost an eye opener, looking down at her diamond. She was about to speak, until a boy seemed to arrive suddenly and question in almost a bad cop manner, the cat man.

She couldn't believe what any one was saying, the girl from the tree seemed to kind of under stand, the other girl seemed like she was intent on trying her best to understand, and the boy seemed like he was ultimately set on believing none of this was real.

Waiting until the boy stop talking, she cleared her throat a bit and finally asked the strange cat man "Where did these stones come from? I mean, I was found in a basket with mine." Maybe it wasn't her real parents who had left it with her, but now maybe she might find out the mystery of it. She still really didn't believe what any thing that was happening was true, but what else could she really do at this point?

Since everyone seemed dead set on going through the weird light, and by weird Chandler meant a pulsating bright glob of strange that looked more dangerous than anything, he decided to follow. Being alone in the strange cave didn't seem like an option, his chest tightening up just at the thought. No, being around others would be better.

But then those "others" included a cat that could change into a man. Chandler blinked. Well, a monster, a cat, now a story about these stones? Lifting the chain out of his shirt, he glanced down to the light green jewel latched into a silver ring that acted as the charm to his necklace. He had grown up believing it to be a gift from his grandfather, or some sort of obscure relative he had never met. Stories twisted in his child mind for years at the possibility of pirates or stolen royal goods.

Standing here now in a place with a sky, but a place that was not home, Chandler felt okay. At ease even. He had been right after all. This stone meant something.

He grinned and nodded to the blonde girl who seemed to understand what the cat/man was saying. "Seems legit to me," he said, but the others didn't feel the same, another girl questioning where the stones came from. Chandler didn't care much, but was a little curious. More importantly however, he held the Peridot in his fist, it's warmth growing. Sure, a warrior lived inside. He could deal with that.

When his rather widely based question answered by a vague answer and suggestion of what they should do from the same stranger whom had told him that some weird stuff was going on in the park and had then preceded to drag him along behind away from the screeching, hissing danger, Falke remained silent, weary but thoughtful. Alright then, fine... Go where? He pushed himself fully upright from his hands and knees, rolling stiff shoulders. Noting his walking stick wasn't with him anymore either, wonderful. Blearily he scanned his surroundings, ignoring the mild stings from the various cuts on his face, focusing on the general direction the others echoing, then abruptly disappearing footsteps, were heading. This was just weird. He hesitated before following /blindly/. Listening closer, he heard a soft humming sound in the direction the other teenagers had headed, it was bright, high, and an alien sound to his ears. And then someone mentioned light. Right. Sure, walk through the humming light to whatever lay beyond, sounded reasonable. Not. And weren't you often told never to walk toward the light in the first place? Yea... Reluctantly though, he forced himself to move closer, out of the base human nature of preferring not to be left alone in a strange, particularly unwelcome place, after just having their morning's shattered by the screams of a other worldly beast. He frowned, eyes narrowed as he sightlessly tried to size up what was just in front of him. The humming was louder now this close, and he had a feeling of in-between from it rolling around in his gut. "Here goes nothing..." He muttered to himself, now alone and the last to head through. Hesitantly he stepped forward, the light seemingly liquid pressing against tightly against his skin, and then nothing...

The second time he woke up, he'd landed on his back, and slowly he shoved himself into a sitting position with a low, nearly inaudible groan. Okay. He really could deal with a little less of this brain meddling, teleporting, whats' ever you'd call it, nonsense. Blinking, he glanced around. Nostrils flared. He felt soft greenery tickling between his fingers, very overgrown grass. The air seemed cleaner, gentler. Well, where ever they'd ended up this time, it wasn't anywhere close to Central Park, or even New York for that matter. And then there was the matter when his brain finally caught up and was able to process what his ears were hearing from the others talking around him... The gist he got was; a talking cat, turned into a man, so cat-man, Haru, not a dream this is real folks, destiny, special stones in their jewelry, month warriors, and cyclopeans. Okay, okay. Wait, what?! Falke just sat there, not bothering to get up just yet. Trying to process all the information, story, really crazy dream, etc, he was getting with some success. But he continued to stay silent, not jumping to conclusions or trying to call wolf at once. He flicked his eyes toward the general direction the voice of Haru, the cat-man, whatever, had spoken from, quietly and patiently waiting to listen more.

“Well believe it because this is happening. You aren’t on earth anymore. I’m sure your cellphones won’t have signals or anything. Essentially, you all carry the stones and therefore you are the next month warriors. I would tell you more, but I don’t think that this valley is the right place,” Haru huffed. He massaged his wrist. It seemed that he was going to be dealing with colorful characters. Or perhaps not, s lot of the kids seemed a bit bland. He just hoped that they could follow directions.
“Well what are you suggesting?” Tallyho asked.
“I’m suggesting that we head over to the nearest town.”

Haru was just about done when he was being called Mr. Meow. With a controlled sigh he crossed his arms. “Alright… Let me try explaining this again from the beginning. This. Is Aires. Think of it was a sister world to earth. It isn’t exactly a separate planet. The planet known to you as earth can take on various identities at once. Think of it as an empty egg. In relation to earth, that egg has a um.. a chicken! But on the contrary, for Aires that egg has an ostrich. Both worlds technically exist in the same space but in alternate realities.”
The concept really did go over Tallyho’s head. Especially since she had a very limited idea about the little planets she could see next to Aires in the dawn. The concept of alternate realities didn’t quite get through to her, especially since she had no idea about the existence of earthplace.
“Aires is also a lot different from earth. You earthlings will consider Aires a bit… primitive. We have traditional monarchies, and we don’t have digital technologies. While Aires is limited in that respect it does have more fantastical aspects to it. For example, that cyclopean attack you suffered earlier is a common occurrence here. Which is why Tallyho knew what to do to stop it.”
He looked over at the blonde who seemed a bit shocked. How did he know her name?
“As for the month warrior business: Their goal is essentially is to obliterate the cyclopean race. They have a leader called Oblivion who is…” the young man began to chuckle, “essentially is the enemy of humankind. Yes, I am aware that killing any sort of supernatural being seems near to impossible—especially for you. However, because you have been chosen by the stones, you have the capacity to wield the powers of the original warriors who had them before you. Of course you will have to train, which is what I and the other guardians will be here for. The powers are special and should be treated as such. For example January has cleric like capabilities—accelerated body regeneration and healing. February harnesses the power of thunder and lighting. March has the wind, while April is the patron of fresh water. May manipulates the plants and communicates with the animals; June controls the sea and salt water, July is over the fire, August light, and September knowledge, October is the darkness while November is the dead. And finally December is ice. I’m sure that you can figure out which warrior you are based on your birthdays and birthstones.”
Tallyho tilted her head to the side, with her usual dethatched look, “You mentioned guardians. I don’t remember them from the story.”
Haru scoffed. “Well quite frankly you aren’t supposed to. The guardians are the 12 assistants to the warriors, each of us primarily belonging to a respective warrior. We were once normal people but we were assigned to the job. You see each of us committed some dastardly sin and were forbidden paradise by the goddess. In order to redeem ourselves we were given immortality and charged with completing this job with the month warriors. The deal is that once we finish we can finally pass on.”
“And you haven’t moved on yet because the original month warriors did not succeed?”
“Yes and you’re our second chance. The others should come along soon. All of us went onto hiatus while waiting for you to be born. But all of us will be here before its time to fight the king that’s for sure.”
“So who’s guardian are you?” The girl asked. Although she wanted to ask how old Haru really was.
“I’m yours. But look, I’m not crazy about the situation either. So, how about this? I will give all of you a choice: Those of you who want to be a part of this can come to town with me. It is my job to get you properly prepared. For those of you who do not want to be a part of this I’ll just leave you alone. Please know that I only have permission to open the core—the pathway, for earthlings if they are warriors. So if you want to drop out you’re just going to have to find your own way back home, I suppose.”

“Well I’m letting you have the option to go free to roam the fields like a cow. I won’t mind,” Haru hummed., It was obvious that he added a bit of snarky to his remark. “My only question is… who accepts this challenge?”
Tallyho approached Haru. She was hesitant at first, but once she began she didn’t stop. “I’m willing… I mean, I don’t have much else to do.”
“We have one,” Haru announced.

Maris couldn't believe the things that reached her ears, the images that became clear in her eyes. This place, it was... different. All the talking, too, seemed to be different for the young girl. Glancing at the turquoise stone on her wrist, the little ten-year-old tried to make sense of it all. When they reached this inn of sorts, Maris gave a small, teensy, tiny sigh of relief. Perhaps here she can sort out what was happening.

However, that relief was short lived as people started introducing themselves after they were gathered in a room that they were supposed to be sleeping in together. After Tallyho, Dorian, and Autumn introduced themselves, Maris hung to the back of the group. She was quiet, falling into her thoughts as she listened to the conversations going on, hoping to stick to the back and be unnoticed for a while.

Tallyho stared absently as the others began to intermingle. She bit her lip and pressed to the window adjacent to the ongoing conversation to see what exactly was outside. Nothing but merchants with fat wives on their arms, and shop keepers soliciting a stack or two for their products,
It wasn’t that she didn’t trust the man named Haru, because as an Arian a lot of the legend and folklore he spoke of made sense to her so in her mind It was possible. But it was the fact that she had to commit to something for such a lengthy amount of time. She had problems staying in one place. Trying not to be noticed she wandered back towards the stair case and began to climb down.
:

"...Yeah."
Dorian didn't repeat the sentiment because it most certainly was not "wonderful" to meet Autumn Jones or any of them, really. Maybe in a different situation, maybe, like if he'd been lost in the Sahara and they showed up with water and a ride home, but right here and right now? No. Just no.
"Kind of," He answered her question bluntly, shrugging his shoulders, and it wasn't just a sense of humility that kept him from rattling off his dojo, belt, and rank. Simply put, he might have an edge over most of this rag-tag group of people(not that that was very hard considering their was a kid here who was doing her best impression of a toy doll), but he was pretty sure this would be different from a spar at practice or twisting a stupid mugger's wrist.
He only raised an eyebrow when the girl from the tree began to wander off. This was her planet from what he understood, she knew what she was doing and it wasn't his problem right now.

Jackson remained next to the chair by the fireplace and was starting to get uncomfortable. Will Haru ever leave? The boy couldn't stay there all night though, so what would he do if the cat man never left the building? Then one of the blond girls came downstairs, the one who was hiding in a tree. What was she doing? Might she know a way back? Could he get to her and pass Haru without the redhead noticing? He didn't want to announce himself, so he poked out a bit a waved to the girl. Would she answer?

Tallyho was more than a bit shocked when she noticed that one of those earthlings was trying to catch her attention from what he supposed was a hiding spot. She refused to move closer to him, in fact she only watched cautiously from the corner of her eye, with a slight lift of the brow, indicating that she was disturbed.
So what did she do? As much as she wanted to walk away then, the kid looked terribly confused.
“What are you hiding from?” she asked finally. Was he hiding from Haru? She glanced over at the man who was already walking over. He tossed two coin bags her way as he walked towards the stairs.
“Go out shopping. Get things that you think you’ll need for a six day hiking trip. And try not to go out there alone. Oh, and tell the boy to get away from those chairs,” he didn’t dwell on the matter any further. He then marched up to their room and distributed to money to the others, announcing the same thing, save for the part mentioning Jackson.
Tallyho raised a brow. Well that kid wasn’t very good at hiding, was he? Without another word she moved towards the door intent on going it alone. Besides, she already knew what was going to happen. The earthlings were going to band together and she was going to be left to herself, so there was no point in expecting otherwise. Before the boy could say anything else to her she was already a figure on the other side of the window, briskly turning out of sight.

Cursing under his breath, Jackson got out from behind the chair. It's not like there were a lot of hiding spots anyway. Jackson nodded his head toward Haru to answer the girl's question. He grumbled something else as the catman turned his back to head back upstairs. Well, he never did leave the building and they were still stuck.

Jackson actually didn't go upstairs to join the other earthlings, because that's exactly the direction the person he didn't want to see was heading, so grumbling he ran after the girl. He didn't get far before he took a break to catch his breath. "Hey!" he gasped after her. He didn't want to listen to Haru, but he definitely didn't know his way around while she obviously did.

Tallyho stopped. A slight sigh escaped her lips. So he was following? She turned to face him with an indifferent stare. “Hurry, I haven’t got all day,” she mumbled. Her voice was drowned out by the expansive sky. Once she felt he was close enough she turned around and began walking again.
Honey locks curled against her jaw, desperately clinging against her milky skin so that they wouldn’t be carried away by the wind. The bazaar began to pour into her space in a gradient.
It started off with a couple of booths speckling either side of her view, and then her eyes were full of stuff. It was like the walk was a transfer from one world to another. The number of people increased and the blonde was now bumping shoulders with people of all ages, looking to get or give quick money for worldy goods.

Jasmine smiled, pulling up her sleeve a little to produce her moonstone bracelet.
"Apparently I control salt water - Like the sea." She answers, her eyes sparkling at that thought.
Imagine that, controlling water.
She couldn't think of a cooler power although light did sound pretty neat.

"So what does that mean? Like light beams?" She laughed lightly although she really did wonder, light was very powerful after all.
Maybe being friends with this boy was a good idea - it was better than having enemies if you had to fight with him.

She then gets tossed a purse in which held some gold coins.
"Oh," She says a little surprised "We're going shopping?" She questions the almost empty room.
Everyone seems to have disappeared after the girl that seemed to be from here.
Well I suppose that is the wisest idea. she muses and stands up.

"I haven't got all day," she says, and he isn't superman who can fly wherever he's called and still have energy to fight big baddies. Hmmf! Jackson can't even fight little baddies. How the heck was he expected to be some kind of hero? He did catch up to her though, and said as soon as he was close enough, "As long as we're stuck here, how about calling me Jackson. What do you want me to call you?"

In the middle of the crowd he covered his face. Not only was the press of humanity hemming him in, but he could smell other people's sweat and stuff he didn't want to think about. Ugh! He desperately needed fresh air. He reached out to grab the girl's hand and pull them both out of the crowd, before they got lost and separated.