The Madman"What in the... I..."
He's probably still worth pulling back up, if possible.
The one who you used to see as your nephew, who you can still remember playing with Lyla in the deepshade of Yamimas' planting cavern, doesn't take your hand. Instead he shifts into a more natural sitting position, seeming to ignore you, the stranger creature he's attached to, and the whirling pattern of dust that the Earthbrother makes beside him.
[2] Something streaks above you in the sky, but your reflexes are caught between two worlds: the one in which you've lived here all your days, and the one in which you only came into existence a moment ago.
The Blank I try to shake the headache by sitting down and breathing. While doing so, I observe the alien location I've been ported to, and wave towards those of my "clan", I suppose. I guess they are now, for a moment.
Sand, endless sand. You try to calm your breathing, to steady your pounding heart enough to slip back into the calm place where Hakan, they man you were as of a few moments ago, was so very comfortable. [1] Trying to open up the memories is like trying to remember a dream, every time you approach a detail, the beginning of a thread, it unravels into something that can't possibly be true, an impossible revelation. You
remember things about this place, but you're also absolutely certain that you've never been here before.
From the strict standpoint of what you can see, you're on the top of a low ridge, likely a natural geologic feature that has accumulated a crest of the same red-black sand that covers everything. The Yomimas clan holding is, from the outside, little more than several upthrust spars of tawny stone. You know there are many chambers deeper within, memories of places that don't seem possible, but the outside is desolate. On the horizon you can see mountains in the distance to the west, but in all other directions your vision is interrupted by long dunes. The only notable detail you catch is a glimmer of silver on the northern horizon, a flash of reflected metal that brings out a reflexive urge to spit in Hakan's memory.
You raise a hand, waving to your approaching clansmen. The wave of sand the group is riding does not slow, but one of the group raises a spear, butt up, in acknowledgement. An action of concern, not of hostility.