A Quest for Knowledge [Part 1][Invite Only]

Boredom. It was a killer. Okay, maybe things weren't that bad. For someone such as Demitria, the clan head of the Malkavia clan itself, boredom wasn't something that easily happened. She was insane, at least a bit. She likely would have been a lot worse had her family not kept her rooted and grounded to reality, but she was still high up in the bat-shit insane category of things.

Speaking of bats...

Demitria had come across something rather interesting her explorations earlier of her new home that she was looking forward to reading: it was a dusty old book found in one of the storage rooms of the place, easily overlooked and judged as worthless by those who had one presided over the village. For Demitria though it was a wealth of knowledge and held quite a bit of interest. The book had been written like something out of a fictional story, but Demitria knew that even the greatest works of fiction normally held some sort of truth to them, some reasoning behind them.

Now, Demitria was snuggled up with a blanket in a comfortable chair, a roaring fire in the fireplace warming the place up nicely while at the same time providing enough light to be able to see by. A glance at the clock on the mantle as she cracked the book open told her it was nearly midnight: still she was too interested in what she was about to read to bother worrying about sleep. With the book open in front of her Demitria's gaze struck the page and held...

Long ago, in a world not often remembered, there lived a man named Batto. Batto, at an early age, had got lost one day after a rather nasty prank that had been pulled on him by his older brother and some of his friends. They had lured Batto out of their village home with promises of seeing something quite interesting. Once they had him well away from home they finally came to a stop and then they told him that to see this awesome thing he first had to close his eyes and count to one hundred. Batto hadn't wanted to because he was quite frightened to be so far from home, and the idea of standing there with his eyes closed and vulnerable while having to count for so long was not appealing in the slightest. Yet, he wanted very much to impress his older brother and his brother's friends so he did as they said, closed his eyes, and began to count from one the whole way to one hundred.

When Batto finally managed to reach one hundred he opened his eyes with gusto. Instead of seeing something interesting and intriguing he instead found himself quite alone. His brother and his friends weren't anywhere in sight, and he couldn't hear them either. He half expected to hear them snickering from the bushes, sniggering that he was some kind of fool, but he didn't. He called out for them, told them to cut it out, even went so far as to threaten to tell mom and dad when he got home, but nothing got any sort of response out of his brother or his friends. Batto looked behind the large rocks in the area, behind bushes and in them, and even kept a look up into the trees to see if his brother and his friends were hiding up there. Nothing, he could find nothing at all. The further Batto went away from his original spot in desperate search of his brother the further he got lost.

As night began to fall, and the world around him began to grow dark, Batto found himself stumbling across an old cave. As thunder crashed and lightening shot across the sky, as the scent of hot lightning and rain filled the air, he stepped in hesitantly to take shelter....

Demitria glanced up from her book, noticing quickly how deep into the night it was. Grinning to herself, and too excited to see what would happen next in her book, she simply stood up, grabbed a few fresh logs, and carefully laid them in the fire before resuming her seat and getting herself situated and comfortable once more.

Once again Demitria was situated and comfortable in her chair in front of the fireplace. The light of the flames danced across the old pages of her book as she opened it once again and removed her bookmark. She placed her bookmark on the table next to her and then snuggled into the chair more before continuing on with the story that she had been reading, curious all the while to see what would happen next.

The cave was quite a bit deeper than Batto had originally thought, but it did well to allow him to be well away from the rain. The nights in this area were cold enough as it was, and the added rain only made it that much worse. Batto sat himself down with his back up against the cave wall and brought his knees up to his chest before wrapping his arms around them. He wasn't sure about what time it was, he wasn't sure about how long it was he had been gone, or even if anyone was looking for him at this point. He was sure that his brother and his friend, were Batto to get home that was, would be in seriously deep trouble when their parents found out what they had done.

It was these thoughts and the booming thunder that Batto eventually fell asleep to. As he slept he dreamed; dreamed of flying through the air with his eyes closed. Yet, even with his eyes closed he was able to see, able to maneuver his way around without fear of crashing into anything. He felt free as he glided across the darkened night sky, as if nothing could stop him or keep him grounded anymore. He wasn't alone either as he flew. No, as Batto focused and concentrated he found himself surrounded by friends.. by bats? The suddenly realization startled Batto so much that he awoke suddenly, jumping as if in a startled state. Breathing heavily and with his eyes peeled back wide in fear and his heart beating hard and fast in his chest Batto looked from left to right. He half expected to see himself in the air, to see himself surrounded by bats, but he was all alone.

Batto relaxed againsnt the cave wall once more and concentrated on calming himself down while the realization of his situation hit him once more. He was alone, in the middle of nowhere, and he had no way of knowing which way to go to get home. The storm that had been raging outside was finally gone and only the damn smell of ozone hung in the air as a reminder that it had once been there. Batto made his way out of the cave slowly and began to check his surroundings. There was a fresh supply of water nearby, and several berry plants as well as other plants he recognized as eatable from the time spent hunting and fishing with his father. Further out he even came across a wide stream filled with a multitude of fish.

Stomach growling Batto caught himself some food, made himself a meal, and returned to his cave. For several days in a row he made out his survival in this fashion, always having the same dream when he would close his eyes to rest. Flying, like a bat, through the night. After roughly the second or third time the dreams stopped feeling so strange and scary and instead felt intriguing. He began to find himself feeling annoyed or upset when awakened suddenly, and always eager to go back to sleep when he could.

By the time the seventh day rolled around Batto sat waiting for sleep to claim him. Waiting for the dream to snatch him up again and take him away from his situation. It no longer mattered that he was away from home, it no longer mattered that he was technically lost in the middle of the wilderness. All that mattered was that he had fresh water to drink, food in his stomach, and these dreams to occupy his time with. As sleep claimed him once more Batto found his dream, which had been exactly the same up until that point, changing slightly...

Demi glanced up again as she tore herself away from the story unfolding further in front of her. Several more hours had passed while she had been immersed in her book and she could feel that her eyelids were heavy with sleep. Yet, she couldn't give in just yet. Her book's story was evolving further, changing into something new, and she was excited to see what was going to happen next: what was Batto's dream changing to?