Act I: Psychogenesis
Part I: Birth

There is this space, within the dawn of memory. It is dark, but I cannot call it dark. It is not the absence of light, but the ignorance. I am aware of nothing, save that in that moment I Am.

Thoughts scatter like splinters in my mind. I know that I am. I conceive my surroundings, but I cannot understand them. The world thick and familiar. I know no other, save the comfort of that which is. Reaching out, I can sense it's boundary with my own. A smoothness, beyond the thickness that surrounds my skin. It moves to my touch, but only so far.

Time passes. I understand a sequence of events...knowing that I have touched the wall before this time I touch it now. It seems different, each time. The shape of me changes with time, the definition of my boundary within this world.

The space between myself and it becomes less. I note movements within myself. Not far from the seat of my mind, the thickness glides in and out of me as I expand and contract. If I stop, there is something else...

Is there another? Growing beneath my skin, as I grow within the one beyond?

I feel a rush within me, and do not know. Lifting a hand to the place, I can feel it pulse. Fast. I do not know if I want it to be true. Soon I know that it is not...I begin to understand my fear, and know it is my own. I dwell on the thought, as I calm myself, my heart slowing again.

Would it be wrong?

Time passes, and I begin to know restlessness. The traitor thought wants to know, now...if another is not within me, am I within another? I open my mouth, and exhale, dark currents pushing the thick space around me. I push out against the boundary, wondering if they will feel me...fearing that they never have, and never will.

Restlessness and discomfort. Time becomes indeterminate. The steady flow begins to grate, and I know...impatience.

If they do not respond to me, as I responded to the phantom within me, then perhaps there is no one to respond?

I push against the boundary. I am stronger now. It moves...more?

Yes. But it pushes back still. I feel it drift up behind me as well, and I begin to hate it.

I push. There is more of me now, than of it.

I want. So I push.

There is a hardness behind me. It cannot go farther. I push against it, and into the softness before me. And then...

COLD!

In the thin light of the cavern, glistening fingers break the thin membrane of the egg. Fluid flows out, and the case collapses around the figure within. Frentic now, she claws at it, trying to take her hand away from the icy chill of the air. The fleshy blanket of her one-time home rips apart easily now, it's purpose fulfilled.

Struggling free, confused and frightened, she falls to her hands and knees in the darkness and learns pain against the stone floor. A wet crown of hair dangles about her face, dripping.

She coughs, roughly, clearing her throat and lungs before breaking into a painful howl.

There is too much, just now. Too many new things to grasp all at once. As she subsides, however, she begins to conceive that, in time, she will.

Gathering her thoughts, Ishara's newest daughter considered her new surroundings...

Psychogenesis, Part II:
The Song of the Self

The first things she noticed were the scent, and the light. Not the first things she felt, but those first handfuls of sensation that grasped her attention. The scent of crisp, clean air cutting in over the warm, organic reek of the castoff egg. Undertones of cool and water. Other things. Different things, and the promise of warmth.

Sunlight.

Want.

Finding her feet, she began to walk towards it. The weight on her back itched unpleasantly, spurring her forward. An indefinable urge at the back of her mind, faintly repulsed at the feel of the thickness...residue on her naked skin. It felt unclean. Cold. Now that she had hatched, it had no purpose, and it made her cold to wear.

Stepping clear of the mouth of the cave, she lifted one pale, slender arm to shield her eyes. The sun was painfully bright before her as it broke the horizon. Long, dark shadows stretched out beneath the glow as it cut through trees and over grass. Moving down the rocks, she pursued the sound of the water, remembering it for what it was.

Clean.

She slid into the river from the reeds, and shivered. The day had not yet warmed the water, but it was better...sharper, anyway...than the clammy film that had clung to her. That dissolved into the currents, and flowed away. Not forgotten, but gladly rid.

Splashing a bit, she examined her surroundings, and herself. It would be wrong to say that her body was foreign to her, but she was still new. Certainly, she had only been aware of it as herself. It was not surprising to find that it, too, had shape and color like the world she had broken into...but it was interesting.

Two arms. All proper and normal. Hands on the end of them, all fingers present and accounted for. Two legs. A bit more to them, and the feet weren't made for much more than walking, but what could you do?

Standing, with the unselfconscious attitude of one who hasn't learned anything about nakedness in a social context, she peered down at her reflection. Her own face peered back, and she knelt down a bit to get a better look. Pale green, still wet, hair framed a familiar face. A pair of membranes supported by slender, black fingers stretched out to either side like tiny wings. She gave a little wave with one, flexing it open and closed, and laughed as her reflection did the same with golden eyes a-twinkle. It was such a simple game, it couldn't help but please. When she smiled, her lips pulled back slyly over little glinting fangs, and this was all good. Correct.

Opening her mouth a bit, she looked at her tongue. Another very serviceable organ, flexible, like her lips. She ran it over her teeth inquisitively, and along the roof of her mouth. It tickled a bit. She closed her eyes contemplatively, and did it again.

It seemed like something to remember.

Satisfied, if not vain, she rose again to take in the sun.

Unfurling the weight on her back, she explored her wings. They were like the ones over her ears, but they weren't for channeling sound. Oh no, they were far to large for such fine work. For the moment, she contented herself with sunning them. The air currents over the skin were...pleasant. There would be time to experiment with what they could do later.

Idly, she broke off a strand of her own hair and compared it to the reeds on the shore. It was not the same, but similar. Greenish. A lighter hue of grassy, perhaps.

Her mind bubbled with questions now, and it troubled her. She knew she was, but not who. The idea of sounds linked to words made sense...she knew she could make them, the way she knew she could move an arm, or flex a wing. But what sounds meant what things? Or did you make that up as you went? There wasn't anyone else around to ask...

There was a strange sense that something had gone wrong. It was a problem she would have to deal with, just as soon as she understood how. Just now though, she was starting to think that the emptiness inside of her was even more disturbing. She laid a hand across her belly, and stroked her skin. It felt good, so she did it again.

Hunger, at least, she seemed to know what to do about...

Psychogenesis, Part III:
First Flight, First Fight

Her thoughts rewound to her wings. The urge was there...the temptation. The raw need etched in blood-borne instinct. Stretching them again, she searched her surroundings uncertainly. Start high, that was the ticket...climbing the hill over the cave of her birth, she took a moment to survey her surroundings properly.

Rolling fields of high grass stretched away endlessly, on either side of the river. The occasional tree punctuated the landscape, and there came presently the sounds of life...happening. Birds chirped and twittered, and the grass rustled with all the hungry little creatures that grass rustled with. In the distance, a streak of dusty brown cut through the green.

There was something comforting about that, and about the boiling cloud of dust that wandered down it. She knew, as soon as her eyes took it in, that that was where she wanted to go. There would be other people there.

Oh, yes indeed.

Spreading her wings and leaping, she pushed up and over, tipping into the air above the mouth of the cave in the hillside. There was a moment of vertigo, and the sheer pleasure of airflow over membrane. Delightful weightlessness...she laughed again, her first words upon and above this earth the utterance of joy.

A hundred feet later, there was the ground rushing up to meet her, and embarrassing pain. The taste of dirt. The lesser utterance of shock and dismay that went with learning that flying and landing are two related, but different, operations. She managed not to belly-flop, but her legs took the impact and it hurt. Possibly not as much as her childish pride, but it hurt.

She glared at the sky, and at the ground as she recovered.

Somewhere nearby, possibly having followed her from the river, something croaked. A frog, and not a small one. Girls of any sort were not, heretofore, a major factor in it's reptilian life and mind. It had a basic idea that this thing might be edible...but that, really, was what it tended to thing about anything.

It was, after all, just a matter of time and growth before it could sort out that tree good and proper.

The frog croaked again, as thoughtfully as a frog might manage, bloating out it's chin for a moment. It was pretty sure the girl hadn't seen it yet.

The major problem with this thesis was that she had, and was...annoyed.

She spun, going into a low crouch and hissed at the beast. Her wings snapped out, puffing her outline into an outright threat display. Her fangs glittered with saliva and anger. The frog had the immediate flash of insight that an angry, pride-bruised succubus was possibly the worst possible choice it could make for an attempted meal.

In point of fact, attempted would be a very operative word. It turned and ran like mad.

Instincts howled in the demon's mind: When prey ran, you chased. That was what being a predator meant...half the fun was in the getting, not the having. She sprang after it, golden eyes glinting with spring-coiled malice. She would get that frog, and certainly feel much better about the whole incident having done something to...do...something about it.

Yes.

This was not as fast a process, however, as the predatory mind desired.

Five minutes later, she was still chasing. It was still running. Between the two of them, they'd settled into a kind of holding pattern around the tree nearest the river. A loose audience of river-flies watched them, inasmuch as they watched anything.

She glared around one side of the tree. The frog backed away and tried to get around the other side. Peeking around the tree, it stared down the loaded barrel of one very angry eye as it peeked around looking for it. This did not bode well for the future of frog-kind. At least, not in the form of this particular frog, and which other frogs mattered right now?

It was starting to feel slightly put upon.

A shadow fell across it. Swiveling it's eyes up, it spied the outline of a human head with wings on. She was halfway up the tree, and about to swoop down on the hapless frog like grim death.

This she did, but it fled, leaping desperately into the water.

She angled up hard, flapping desperately to avoid doing the same thing. There came a sense of...weightlessness. Altitude. Airflow.

Ah.

Tilting cautiously, she circled around and pumped for height. Her erstwhile prey was nowhere in sight, having wisely decided to quit the field of battle. She was still hungry, but somehow this at least salved her pride. The enemy was vanquished...had fled!

And she was in the air. Good. It all worked out in the end. So there.

Right!

She angled off, searching for the dust cloud she'd seen earlier. There would be people there. And food.

Yes indeed.

Below, in the water among the reeds, the frog watched the sky warily. Pulling deeper into the reeds, it swore in it's froggy heart to never, ever do that again. It would forget, sooner or later, because it was a frog and hungry before smart. For now though, it hunkered down and dreamed of easier meals...

Psychogenesis, Part IV:
Other

The caravan rattled down the dusty road, trailing a hazy cloud. They were making decent time at a leisurely pace, down a road blessedly bereft of dangerous predators. An attitude of relaxed good cheer pervaded the wagons, right up to the point where Margaret spotted the dot.

Margaret was, in a very literal if not actual sense, the leader of the group. A quick glance told the shallow minded everything they needed to know about her: A centaur, of non-trivial stature, pulling the lead wagon with the regular horses. She was in exquisitely good health, which made civilized people nervous. Margaret was a wall of kind natured muscle raised by hunters, with an abdominal wall that quietly but clearly advertised the fact that she could pin you in it at the drop of a hat if she decided she was hungry.

What a first glance wouldn't tell you is that Margaret was probably more civilized than you were. She spoke softly, carried a big stick with a sharp object on the end, and knew the going rate of anything anywhere to the last copper bit. She was a valued member of the caravan's crew, and so when she glanced back and said "Linette, we're being followed." she got listened to.

Linette was a regular girl, for a certain value of regular. She was, broadly speaking, the owner of the enterprise and dressed according to her station when appropriate. Since the road was not an especially good place for slinky green dresses that set off ruby lips and endlessly tumbling locks of sanguine hair, that meant she was dressed in leather with her hair tied and pinned in a bun that could deflect swords.

If there were such a thing as a male gender you could have called her androgynous. Lacking that description we'll settle for eerily compelling.

"What is it?"

"Not sure. Harpy maybe. It's in the air, ahead of us now." Margaret sounded vaguely hopeful. She had a growing collection of harpy feathers from their last trip through the mountains.

"Is it getting closer?"

"Not sure. It shot over from behind, and slowed down."

"Have you eaten yet?"

Margaret shrugged. Linette eyed the drifting blot against the clear blue sky, and narrowed her eyes thoughtfully. "If it acts dangerous, shoot it down and eat it...we're too far from help to leave trouble trailing us."
~~~~~
She drifted lower, trying to get a better look at the things on the trail. Adrenaline shot through her in an unexpected wave, and she rolled sharply as something rippled through the air beneath her.

Nothing in her mind could consciously match the brief glimpse she saw, but it had come from the direction of her destination. Was it good or bad? Probably bad, though she couldn't understand why they would want to do something bad to her...

Unless they were like the frog.

Narrowing her eyes, she folded her wings and went into a sharp stoop. Other objects whistled past her position, too late as she advanced. Thin spines of wood and metal...

She angled suddenly as she identified the tauress. Patterns etched in her genes and burned into crystaline instinct sang in her blood and she...
~~~~~
Margaret took aim again, and loosed another arrow into the sky. The thing was getting closer at a worrying pace, and it sure as hell wasn't a harpy.

She pulled out of the harness, signaling the wagon to stop, and cantered off a pace. The approaching creature followed her, and she turned to break for the wagons. "HEY!"

The inarticulate call of alarm was all she got out before the thing landed on her.
~~~~~
...fit.

She slid into place on the centaur's back, pressing against the human upper torso. Her senses rang with the sudden change: The warmth of naked skin against her breast. The sense of power under her thighs, pressed against her flower...

She wrapped her arms around it, trying to hang on.
~~~~~
There was an electric sense of confusion as the creature not-so-gently grasped Margaret's breasts from behind.

Suddenly, Linette was on top of the lead wagon, trying to get a clean shot with a hand crossbow. It wasn't going well, because by this point Margaret was sinking into a profound panic.

Civilized as she was, she was finding that some things were in the blood. Something reeking of Predator had grasped hold of her, and she couldn't properly get at it. She bucked and rose, trying to fling the thing off...

The attacker flung it's wings back as Margaret came off the ground, one hand coming loose.

It was a moment in time that craved the invention of the photograph and the spaghetti western: The bucking tauress, trying to rid herself of the succubine rider.

It stayed that way right up the moment that Margaret threw her.

She flew back, and it was only bad luck for everyone that 'back' at that exact moment was into the second wagon in the train. The succubus tried to fold her wings, and it almost work as she crashed through the window.

Outside, Linette gritted her teeth and went to check on Marge. Whatever had just landed was proving itself to be a problem indeed...
~~~~~
Miranda was, in an entirely inaccurate way, the heavy artillery of the group. She was small, and thin, and her fingers were almost permanently stained with ink. It was generally considered unlikely that Mira could stand upright in a still breeze, but she was a competent mage...which meant she could be an absolute nightmare for anyone unprepared to deal with one.

She was pretty, in the faintly awkward way of people uncertain of others. There was a mousiness to her, carried in the polite brown of her hair and a body language that begged not to be eaten. It might be safely said that, barring her talents with chakra manipulation, she would have been eaten years ago.

Still, there was a conflict of instincts one felt on meeting her. Many a predatory mind found itself caught between the desire to consume, and the urge to protect. I want to eat you, but I'll save you for later.

At the moment, she was terrified that, at last, she'd met someone or something that wasn't going to wait. In her favor, she'd come out atop the tumble when the succubus had come careening into the wagon. Now she just had to deal with being looked at by those strange, golden eyes, and feeling the tumbled, naked body shifting under her.

This was new, but there was something wrong with the whole moment...

In her wildest midnight fantasies, she'd never hurt anyone...but this intruder was already in tears.
~~~~~
To say she was uncomfortable was to understate the entire nature of pain. Her wings were hurt, and pinned awkwardly underneath her. She was terrified, confused, and hurt.

But for the first time, she was in very, very close contact with something she recognized. The human face hovering over her clicked in her mind, tripping still new thoughts and wants. Hopes and fears...

A sense of connection and familiarity.

She wanted to know this other.

She tried to move, to get closer to it, but the weight shifted awkwardly on her wings, grinding bones together...
~~~~~
The winged girl moved under her, as if trying to push herself up, and whimpered. She was hurt, which put Miranda on edge. There wasn't time to wonder about it yet, however, as Linette chose that moment to break down the door and level her crossbow at them.

"Miranda?"

"What the hell just happened?"

"That thing jumped Margaret."

"Ah."

"Get out of the way so I can shoot it, please?"

"I think shooting it might not be the right idea, Lin."

"What?"

Miranda got up, placing herself carefully between the girl on the floor and the girl with the bow. Linette lowered the weapon somewhat, while Miranda played loose and fast. "I think I might know what she is, and I don't think she came down here to attack us."

"I'm sure Margaret will be happy to know she was jumped on by a friendly monster."

"Lin, if this is what it looks like, she'd have had all of us dead to rights from the word 'go'..."

"Tell me again why shooting her is a bad idea?"

"Because I really think she'd make a better friend than an enemy?"

"You've been wrong before."

"Not often, and not where magic is concerned. Trust me, please?"

Linette waited. For second thoughts. For wrong moves. For the next available excuse to put a bolt through the green-haired head on the floor. It was tragically non-forthcoming. She lowered the crossbow. "She's to stay confined. Put her in number four, and have Prythain make sure she doesn't go anywhere. You figure out what this is all about before we get to White Plains."

Miranda nodded. There would be time to sort things out...

Psychogenesis, V:
First Meal, First Love

What is this?

It was some time later. She sat in a corner of the cart, wings suspended delicately, but tied. They weren't folded, but she couldn't flex them much either. Her legs and arms were likewise fixed with rope to the chair.

Among other things, she was trying to determine whether or not she approved of this fact. She had already decided that, at least, she did not approve of the rope. It did chaffed her skin, which was unpleasant. Nothing that scratchy should be allowed to touch your flesh, even if it was supposed to keep you from moving. All it did was make you want to move. Away. Which only ended up making things worse.

She did approve of the cloth they'd wrapped her in. She wasn't sure what it was, but it was a lot nicer on the rest of her body than rope would have been...and it was somewhat warmer than being naked.

Certainly something to think about, in and amidst everything else.

Her first day of life was getting complicated. The frog had been a bit of an upset to start with, and now she was having to deal with...

...others. I recognize myself in them. The shape of their bodies mirrors the shape of mine, but they are not me. Who are they?

She could not yet put names to them, but she thought of the huge one she'd landed on. Very different. But next to the others, like me...she had more body and legs where I have wings.

They flexed against the bindings at the thought, which made her wince. The others have nothing...they may be onto something there.

But I remember flying...

She smiled a small, secret smile. Having the wings would, it seemed, have a certain level of give-and-take...but she wouldn't trade them away. All the pain in the world couldn't overcome the sheer joy of flight.

Her belly growled hollowly, reminding her that she'd been doing a lot of work for little gain and had not, in fact, eaten since she'd hatched. I hope the brown-haired one comes back.

Her mind wandered back into hopeful reverie. That other had been kind to her, or at least...kinder than anyone else had been so far. ...what was that?

She thought of that moment on the floor, looking up into those distant eyes, just before her wings complained of being crushed.

Could I almost see her?

This feeling I do not know.

It is like hunger.

I Want.

Running her tongue over her teeth, she waited to see what would happen next.

It wasn't long before she got her wish, after a fashion. Miranda came back, but accompanied by Prythain. Prythain was a girl who had...impressed...the young succubus. Which is to say, Prythain scared the hell out of her.

Linette knew a thing or two about fighting, in a rather back alley, knife-in-the-spine snap-shot-from-across-the-street kind of way. She'd been raised in the city. You learned that sort of thing when it was a matter of survival.

Prythain knew a thing or two about fighting, in a rather in-your-face kicking-and-screaming I-could-break-you-with-my-flower-lips style of way. She'd been raised in the city. You learned that sort of thing when you were naturally inclined to be too-short-for-giant too-tall-for-girl.

She had, despite the succubus' apparent inability to understand the language, impressed upon their young ward a profound understanding that no funny-business was to be tolerated from bite-sized women with wings.

Funny-business was left an open-ended concept.

They'd known each other for a rough total of five minutes. For her part, the succubus found herself inclined to remain quite still in Prythain's presence.

Miranda essayed a nervous smile. Apart from the group muscle, she'd brought a small tray of fruit. "I, ah, thought you might be hungry." she offered, kneeling by the chair. The succubus watched her, blinking.

Miranda shut her eyes for a moment, taking a breath. The attempt to clothe the succubus had worked, for a certain value of success. It just completely failed to take Miranda's mind off the body now hidden underneath the loose roll of fabric.

The thought that she was naked under all her clothes preyed on her mind.

Prey.

Now there was a mildly alarming thought.

Miranda opened her eyes again, uncertain of just how much time had just jumped by. Prythain was standing just outside the doorway, leering at them. Miranda might have noticed this, except that the succubus was still staring at her. "I, uh, here...I can't untie you, so..."

She lifted a slice of apple to the woman's lips.

The winged woman watched her, thinking. They are talking to each other. This is something I want to do, but I don't understand their words...

She wants to put something in my mouth.

I am hungry.

She wants to feed me?

She felt a tight little thrill in her stomach and smiled, parting her lips to wrap them delicately around the apple slice. It had a food-ish scent to it, so that was all right. She sucked gently, drawing a bit of it past her teeth and onto the tip of her tongue.

Taste.

The sweet, sharp flavor hit her like a stroke of lightning. The entire concept of the apple slice wrapped itself around her mind like a lover, time slowing to a crawl. She bit down, virgin-white teeth scything gently through the meat of the fruit, separating the sample from the whole.

She tilted her head back thoughtfully, rolling her tongue around the bite. Her saliva mingled with the juice, carrying the flavor to every corner of her mouth as the apple rolled towards her throat.

She closed her eyes and swallowed, encompassing the fragment of food entirely. It was cool within the warmth of her body, for a brief while. Her belly rumbled faintly, the too-small weight of the fruit trying to fill the too-empty space of her ravenous gut.

Opening her eyes again, she looked down. Miranda was still holding up the rest of that slice of apple and had turned a very interesting shade of red...

"Miranda." came a warning voice from the doorway. They'd forgotten about Prythain entirely. Miranda turned her head, looking up at the imposing silhouette. "If you start humping that thing's leg, Lin's going to have kittens. You're supposed to feed her, not fuck her, at least until we get where we're going."

The tone was half-serious, half-mocking, but it served to break the nascent lovers out of their mutual culinary reverie.

The rest of the meal passed quickly, in dutiful silence. Miranda fed, and the succubus ate. It wasn't long before they'd emptied the tray, and Miranda got up to leave. Prythain stepped away from the door as Miranda headed out.

The succubus watched her go, trying furiously to think of a way to get her to stay. ...the large one got her attention...

She thought of the way Miranda had reacted, and opened her mouth.

"Miranda."

Miranda turned, startled, at the sound of her name. She quirked a little smile, and waved. There was a promise there, as the young magician left the wagon.

The succubus forgot about the meal, and the way the food sat in her belly...nutritious, but pitifully adequate at best. She forgot about being tied to a chair with uncomfortable ropes. She forgot about Prythain, being shot at, the stupid frog and all manner of unpleasantness.

She felt warm and content.

She knew the word that summoned Miranda.

She'll come back.

Intermissions

You're fooling yourself Miranda...

You know what she is. What she's capable of. What you're feeling right now...

But that night, laying awake on her cot...she wanted it to be what she felt.
~~~~~
Deja vu.

She walked alongside the cart, her hooves clopping softly against the dusty road.

She remembered the cries of the women as they fell from the sky in a hungry swarm, and thought of the strange creature that had landed on her back. Silent. Strange.

A weird, wanting and fearful humiliation.

Too familiar.

Margaret walked on in silence.
~~~~~
In her private cart, Linette rubbed her eyes and regarded herself in the mirror. They were behind schedule, and she wasn't sure if the reason put them ahead or behind.

She had to hope her mage knew what she was doing.

If not...
~~~~~
In the hay-cart, Prythain slept, and dreamt of large women.
~~~~~
In her chair, the succubus slept, wings twitching, and dreamt of clear night skies...
~~~~~
Miles behind, down the road she followed, where a lonely frog lurks beneath the river-reeds.

On a grassy hill, in a shallow cave.

A shadow.

It prods the limp, drying membrane on the cool stone floor. "You're sure?"

A voice, from outside. "We know she came this way."

"It's been awhile."

"Just long enough."

"We'll look into it."