Aurene Glisselda
Legacy Name: Aurene Glisselda

profile template by Lea.

Height / Weight / Wingspan : [REDACTED]

SUBJECT #074 (referred to as "AURENE GLISSELDA" by recovered records) is a galactic lain with powerful energy imbued in her soul that tends to untether her from this plane of reality at spontaneous points in time. Efforts to determine a pattern have so far proven unsuccessful. High energy exposure has shown to affect the magic intake of the effect on the lain, but where that magic is going, or what it's used for is unknown, and there is no noticeable affect on the lain herself.

She was recovered in the Pillar of Heaven incident (see Event Report #5785904-A for further details) and was malnourished and traumatized. Relocation to a recovery center has just been finalized and we will continue to monitor her.

- SAI Agent #5986, over

SAI satellite sensors pick up the initial magi-spacial anomalies first. But nobody misses the brilliant pillar of light that splits the sky and spreads a wave of heat that shorts out every techno-magi device within a thousand miles from the epicenter that appears moments after. Authorities are swift to lock the area down, helicopters hovering, siren wailing, shouting echoing off of the canyon system that surviving equipment and visual accounts identified as where the light came from. Early recon swiftly identifies a massive system of caves that appears as a giant hotspot on magical radars but cold as ice on thermal, and within a few hours, later scouts determine the center of the phenomenon is found in a ritual chamber deep within the seemingly abandoned tunnels.

Even without the sensors going wild and the way light seems to wobble in the way it only does after the ground is superheated to incendiary levels or after major magical fallout, the room would be impossible to miss. The center of the circular room is occupied by a black hole the size of a man, and seems to ripple like water. A walkaround reveals that the portal is 3D in that no matter where one stands in the room, the portal always appears to be facing them, and it also produces the faintest suggestion of light. It's only enough to notice when all lights are off (which is immediately, because the instant the team enters the room, all electronics fail and coms go silent) and many agents quickly back out, reaffirming that it was simply the strange, rewritten laws of light within the room and not them being pulled into a separate pocket dimension.

Spell-workers move to secure and contain the residue of whatever ritual had occurred, and as they slowly worked, the room was revealed as electronics slowly began functioning again. Massive, spiraling spells scrawled onto the wall in special inks that radiated power spiral everywhere, as stone floors stained black with fallout streaks radiate away from the strange portal. Not much can be gleaned, however, until the portal is stabilized and shut down.

Elsewhere, other teams scouting out the interior of the rest of the caves find a secondary, smaller ritual chamber that is perforated with pockets of magic that bounce away from each other like bubbles of oil and water and fizz away when poked. Scientists, trailing the scouts, determine that each bubble was a separate spell or ritual that had been cast in the chamber and whose individual magics had congealed upon massive power overflow from whatever the main ritual had done to produce the pillar of light. Bubbles are quickly trapped in specialized containers to store and reverse-engineer the magic in other labs.

Other finds include a large incubation room with fried incubators and specimen chambers, a long wing of human bedrooms, a library that stretches half a wing and is filled to the brim with documents, journals, and books, and an aerie, ironically enough, with no access to the outdoors but many perches. They are quickly identified as being exclusively for lain, and grooves in most indicate an entire flock that may have been raised underground in the facility.

--~--

Research and investigation have shown that those of whom carried out the ritual was a cult. Was, because it's very quickly apparent that whoever was here was dragged through the portal. A gold mine of information is found in the library. A journal, half personal, half scientific, and possibly written in raving lunatic (scientists agree on different titles, depending on whomever is reading through each account and the level of coherency in use throughout) is used to discover that the former occupants of the cave system had been radicals who idealized a heaven sealed off from the entirety of humanity by the barrier of the species' own sins. Determined to reach their utopia, the cultists kidnapped lain eggs ("...creatures given the diven right of boundless travel", the book writes, "who can travel the boundary between the heaven above and our mortal plane with the slightest whim.") and spelled the hatchlings into the galactic race, of which "...had the closest connections with the holy sky, in which our Great Creators dwell." The journal went on to detail the painstaking rituals that were the trails and errors that the cultists faced while attempting to channel a portal to that holy place through their lain test subjects in a process called Ascension.

They ripped a portal open to somewhere, researchers agree. The strange black hole in the main ritual room and disappearance of all the cultists is certainly evidence to that end. But to where, no one can find. Sensors, scanners, and even a drone thrown through only results in a massive flare of power that wipes out all electronics in the room and the disappearance of said objects. The scientists eventually frown at their clipboards and sigh in defeat. Wherever the cultists are, they're out of reach. The portal, however, is beginning to fluctuate something fierce. It needs to be shut down.

--~--

It takes about a week before the main ritual chamber and the portal is sufficiently stable enough to attempt a shut-down. The first time fails horribly, and they nearly tear open a new rip before restabilizing the portal. It does, however, provide some information. The portal was bound and channeled through a soul during initial creation. Since it's still active, the life inside is still active and possibly, just possibly, retrievable.

It takes them nearly a week more, full of scans, charts, calculators, and coffee before another attempt is made to close the portal without snuffing out the life inside. This time, they're successful. Scientists, mages, and even the Wizard himself watch from scrying bowls, com pads, and even plain old computers as the mass of void in the central chamber slowly, wobbles, wibbles, and shrinks to the size of a bird, and then the outline of a bird, and then finally, the form of one. Upon retrieval, the lain is unconscious. Medical experts say it isn't surprising; being the focus of a spell as volatile and powerful as that one puts extreme mental and physical stress on the individual. Further inspection shows frail and patchy feathers, and a too thin body.

Even from first contact, it's clear that the poor lain has a rough road ahead.

But what? The lain's refusal to go outside negates any kind of integration into an existing flock, and careful observation of her diet has revealed that she's never had any experience with scavenging after being taken care of by the cult for too long. Her antisocial nature and tendency towards snapping at irritants make her unsuitable for general adoption. Debate begins over whether or not she can ever leave the care center, considering so far she has violently rejected any kind of therapy.

It isn't until a wealthy benefactor, who has volunteered to care for multiple Subetans before, steps up and offers his home for her care. As an added bonus, his extensive backyard nests a community of lain, who have agreed to try to help the isolated lain socially. After a week of paperwork and trying to introduce himself to the lain ("Conor Samarin, at your service!") - which ultimately proves unsuccessful, the lain is unwillingly relocated to the benefactor's mansion in Veta, with a massive vista of a lake in the front and a thick forest occupied by the aforementioned lain flock in the back. Had she been not been raised in a cave, where the sky was a huge, grandiose thing that she had seen more times since her retrieval from the portal than in her whole lifetime, it would have been impressive. As it is, it only serves to remind her once again of how she's the stranger in these new places, and everything she knew in the caves is invalid.

As soon as her carrier is opened and she is let out into Conor's house, she nearly forgets to hate the new place. The first thing to see was the massive stretch of books from top to bottom shelved against a far wall, leading to what appeared to be more books. She immediately flies off to investigate, ignoring Conor's exasperated calls after her. She spends a few hours perusing the massive selection before her stomach growls out loudly, and she plans on ignoring it before someone calls out cheerfully, "Oh, hello! Are you the new friend Conor mentioned?" The lain jolts out the book, and halfway to flying away, before spotting the creature that greeted her.

For lack of a better description, the thing looked like a giant snail, like those she would hunt back in the caves, but this one is warned off of with bright yellow and blue. She doesn't get to inspect it further when it continues, "I must say, I've only seen a few lain your color; you must be well bred to have such a rare color. Say, I heard your stomach growl. Would you be disinclined to share a cup of tea with me?"

The lain stares at it blankly, confused on not only what gender the creature was, but also it meant by "colors". She remembers, vaguely, tea being a strange, plant-smelling drink that her former caretakers would drink in the morning, though some would also drink something called coffee. The snail-creature, mistaking her hesitance, follows up with, "Oh no, where are my manors! I am Abbylin, at your service, and, of course, if you would rather some coffee instead, I would gladly oblige. We can discuss the ground rules here at the manor; I'm sure Conor has already given you a few pointers, but I'm sure you must have a few questions. Oh, you must tell me your name!"

The lain shakes herself out her daze at the mention of her name. She wonders, briefly, what kind of classification is "Abbylin" and how on earth the classes in this society worked. It doesn't even have a surname, for goodness sake, though it might be Samarin, considering whose house she is in. Her own name is a methodically paired first and last name that denoted her colors and status, and she's tempted to ask Abbylin about it. But she hasn't refused to speak any individual so far since the Ascendance (and even the thought makes her scan the nearest corridors on instinct, too used to avoiding the humans within earshot ) to break to this...whatever-it-is, and she springs into the air with a burst of feathers, ignoring the startled "Hey!" and flying off elsewhere where, hopefully, she could find a peaceful corner to read.

To her great annoyance, the snail tries several more times with increasing levels of insistence and irritation to talk to her, only for her to leave, unwilling to talk to it.