Davey left him to go hang out with some girl-- figures. Tide bristled, watching his brother slip off over a rise. There was a weird roll to the landscape here, one he could only guess was natural. It didn't have to do with the buckling beneath his feet, but it sure was fucking strange. Making his way in the opposite direction his brother had gone off (served him right) (asshole), Tide picked up a low, steady jog. It would conserve his energy (they'd done so much walking already today), and he was still quick enough to make it worth.

Finding a rise of his own, he takes the high ground with confidence. Strange scratches opened up the land, running out in every direction. For as far as Tide was able to see, he traced them with a piercing gaze. Strange, but what could have caused them? Did it have to do with the quakes, the ones that had stirred up last night and continued on to now? Was there something else going on? Tide chewed the inside of his cheek, trying to think it through.

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Everyone knows Pythia is blind, but they also don't pity her. At least, they know better than to do that. So when she trots off with a sibling to go south for an adventure, they don't balk. They don't stop her even if its in their best interest to do so. Except, she keeps spouting off about Abraxas and finding her path to godhood that they really can't argue. Blind as bat, but persistent as a fucking border collie and Abraxas was her god damn tennis ball.

Carefully tracing her path across the plains toward the wash of the ocean, she stops, startled by the uneven terrain. This didn't feel normal. Words of others carried by the wind told her that the rivulets made in the ground were not here the day before. Did this correlate with the spires? "Abraxas, I pray that you relay answers to me," she whispers softly under her breath, suddenly caught by a familiar scent.

"Tide?" Pythia raises her ghostly tones, calling out to her tiny brother. What have you found?" She cuts straight to the point. There was nothing nonsensical about the girl, ever.

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Of course they're woven by Abraxas himself, how else would a litter between two moms even happen. It just makes sense, at least to Tide. Was... shit, was this his doing, too? Was he trying to show them something? Whatever it was, it couldn't be good, given the trembling and the strange happenings.

Tide isn't left on his own for long, Pythia appearing seemingly out of nowhere. Her approach quiet, ghostly, catching him by surprise as he'd been so trained on the land around him. Moving to stand by her side, sweeping the horizon once more. He couldn't see out to the sandy shoreline itself from here, they're too far inland. "Just the scratches in the earth, it seems like they're worse where the ground is softer. Can't find any reason for them, other than the shaking."

For as much as he wants to fuck with her, this isn't the time. Another tremor rocking the earth beneath their feet, the boy making sure to stand with knees unlocked so they don't knock him ass over tea kettle. "You see anything interesting?" Ha. See. Still, maybe she'd found something more consequential in her own scouting. "I'm not going down to the water, let Davey get swallowed up. He's off with some girl." A roll of his eyes, salt ringing true in his voice.

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Pythia does not miss Tide's approach and movement to stand closer to her. Though he's been gone for some time, she still braces to expect the worst. Some of her siblings loved to pranks, she didn't mind. It all came from their insecurity. One day they would see their wrongs. When his playfulness doesn't come through and instead, she's met with seriousness, Pythia knows now the situation is more dire than before.

"The tremors are happening everywhere so why are these not happening everywhere?" Pythia questions with a furrow of her brow. A moment's pause of silence falls over them. Tide looking around, Pythia using the rest of her senses to take in the surroundings. Her nose quivering at the salty air, her toes digging into soft earth. His next statement doesn't gain a reaction. She's used to it. Even his jealous comment about Davey. "Perhaps if you used more than your eyes, girls would spend more time with you too," she responds in lithe tones, almost nonchalant as if she's trying to be gentle, but the condescending undertones and implied eye roll is still there hiding just beneath the surface.

"My nose does not smell anything interesting. My toes feel the dirt as it always is. Soft, churned, as if these channels had just been made, but there is no scent as to what made them," that was the part that worried her. The land did not change for no reason.

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A different day would bring more mischief, today? Today is for figuring out what the fuck was going on. Everything is weird, and the local mean dog squad was on high alert. Salt air and an eerie silence spreading around them... shit. It's too quiet. Far too quiet. "There's no bird sounds or nothing." Pointing it out makes it feel real, too real. The birds had gone quiet, and that was always a bad sign.

Her condescending earns a snap, Tide reaching up in an effort to target her ear (though he has difficulty reaching it) in retaliation. "Shit at least I know a pretty girl when I see one." A low grumble, even if they have better things to be focusing on.

"The ground here is softer than most other places, maybe that's why it's weirder here? If there was an animal tearing up the ground, we'd smell it." Scowling at the world around him, Tide was still trying to put it all together. "Sky is still red, that hasn't stopped." Right, he'd left that part out before. Whatever it is, he doesn't fucking like it.

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Tide's comment about the birds has Pythia growing still. Her head lifts, slightly floppy ears going rigid as she listens. On one side, the lull of the water washing up on the shore sends a wave of comfort. The rustle of a gentle breeze that ruffles her coat and carries heavy notes of brine and salt. To the other side, there's much of nothing. Save for the quiet movement of grass giving in to that same breeze and the occasional rumble of the earth from the tremors, there's not much else aside from her and her brother's movements.

Whatever the boy has side, Pythia doesn't hear it. For the first time, she feels disconcerted about the whole ordeal. "Birds should be here," she whispers quietly, her weight shifting back and forth to try and get a better feel for the ground beneath her. The dirt, somehow, feels inviting. "I don't feel the steps of larger prey or predator. No call of the sea bird either." Her head moves back and forth, fur bristling with growing uncertainty. "Whatever made these channels has scared off the animals," Pythia spoke in a warning tone to Tide, an eerie call that would send shivers down anyone's spine.

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It's eerie. Unsettling. For as willing as Tide can be to charge into danger, this is a danger that's brand new to him. With no one in possession of more life experience around to ask, it looks like they're left to themselves to figure it out. Trying to assemble the pieces of a puzzle, when they don't know what the bigger picture is meant to look like.

The churned soil is some sort of clue, at least. As it moves beneath his paws, the boy has an idea. "I'm going to try to dig down, maybe there's something more underneath." Looking to Pythia to gauge her reaction for just a moment before diving headlong into this idea, it's brief. Churning at the soft dirt around one of the cracks in the earth, Tide begins to dig.

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Ouch!

Tide digs and digs, and when the ground finally collapses, they fall down to the winding tunnels below, suffering a sprained paw in the process.

Pythia didn't like this one bit. She could feel her brother disturb the dirt of the channels. It didn't take anyone with sight to know what he was doing. Her ears picked up on the clods of dirt flying behind him, her nose scenting the fresh scent of churned soil. Her toes vibrating more and more until her legs were practically shaking. Uh, that wasn't a good sign...

"T-TIDE!" Pythia shrieks as the sound of the earth giving way rumbles out from around where her brother's scent was. Her breath catches in her throat, heart pattering away as her muscles keep her frozen in place. Well, dammit, what was she to do? He had fallen into a hole? It hadn't reached her where she had stood, but the sudden draft of wind sweeping from behind her toward her front told her it was at least big enough for an adult to fall into.

"Are you alive?" She calls out before realizing how stupid that question is. If he wasn't alive, he wouldn't answer. An annoyed grumble lifts from her chest as she takes a tentative step forward. Without Tide on the surface with her, it was going to take her a minute to find where the hole was so she too didn't fall in.

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The digging. There was so much digging. Moving the earth aside with his paws, and making quite a mistake in the process-- Tide doesn't respect the shaking beneath him. The tremors in the earth, feeling the way they roll through, don't slow him down.

Even if they should.

With a last great tremor, the ground beneath Tide's feet collapses. He's not quick enough to drag himself to the side, the boy going ass over tea kettle at the bottom. While the fall isn't long, his landing is brutal. It knocks the wind from him, and the boy struggles to catch his breath at the bottom of the hole. A long moment passes before he can answer Pythia, whose voice comes from the surface above.

"No, the fall was short but it killed me." Though the response is sarcastic, his tone is relatively light. Going from head to toe trying to stretch-- "Ow." He'd landed wrong. "Think I fucked up one of my back feet." Climbing back to his feet, shaking the dirt from his coat... how the hell was he getting out of this one? "The hole is bigger than you are, it's a decent drop." Sincerity in his words, this time. Tide had to worry at least a little bit, now that he's injured and they're separated.

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