Prologue
If ever a word existed that described –– accurately described –– the exact, yet non-mathematical, middle between a sigh and a gasp, any better than an onomatopoeia like 'oomph' does, that was what the fragile female form released as her back hit the mossy, riddled with vines and semi-decomposed branches, undergrowth. Light filled her gaze, then the dark hit, and it would for a long time to come for both her and her companion. The more fragile form of the two was both vaguely yet certainly, the knowledge fueled by gut and her human-exceeded instincts, aware of the fact that she was not alone.
None of her real-time experiences were enhanced by vision or sound, a semblance of taste or of smell. All that she could rely on was touch and lack thereof and a knowledge of a past she did not even remember having. She knew no way to access the great wisdom she had built over several decades in several settings, nor did she know in any way that she had had such intelligence once upon a time at all, unquestionably released but not truly gone from the form and the world that held her conscious currently. If there was a way to retrieve what one did not even know to be gone or to have had, she was not acquainted with it.