Chapter 5:
"Are we in Winter right now?"
The pixie glanced around. Alexandria tracked the pixie's eyes from a snowdrift, then to a rather large pine cone with what looked like bone shards growing out of it, and upwards for a moment at the growing storm.
"Maybe?" The pixie said, then quickly added, when Alexandria graced her with a long-suffering look, "it's cold?"
"Yes," Alexandria responded dryly, "Is this the state of Winter?"
"Like Philadelphia?" The pixie asked.
"No," Alexandria was about to respond with an explanation, nevermind the fact that Philadelphia was a city, not a state, which she had given multiple times to her Wards about the difference between a state in the United States and state as when it referred to a country but froze as what the pixie said registered, "Philadelphia?"
Alexandria inwardly berated herself. Why hadn't she thought to ask Jenny whether she knew about Earth? Of course, her attempt at contacting Cauldron had failed so it likely wasn't her Earth. Or even one inside the cluster of realities that Scion and by extension the agents could access. She could be on real uncharted ground.
She returned her attention to the pixie, which was nibbling on her finger, or attempting to with its very sharp little teeth.
"Do you know how to get to Philadelphia?"
"No," the pixie said, half distracted, before launching into a very long explanation without pausing for breath, "But I heard from a Malk, who said that a Fetch told him that a younger Gruff said that his cousin's uncle's butterfly's grandfather once spoke to a troll that knew somebody that lived in the state of Philadelphia?"
"I see," Alexandria said, not actually sure how to respond. She actually didn't know what a Malk was but assumed it was possibly a type of fairy based on the context, and also due to the fact that the pixie she was holding talked to it. A Fetch was a psychopomp, according to myth, and would fit in with her theory that the creatures in this land seemed to be based on English or Irish folklore. Gruff… she wasn't speaking about one of the Three Billy Goats Gruff, was she?
"The Billy Goats Gruff?" Alexandria asked, already suspecting the answer. Know she wasn't just in a strange dimension based on folklore, she was in one based on children's tales. You know, she thought to herself, maybe this is a simulation.
"Exactly!" the pixie said then stilled, "But don't say their names, they might notice!"
Alexandria just gave the pixie a look, "They might notice? What are you talking about?"
Of course, as the little pixie launched into a weird little explanation that involved echoing, power and the 'Nevernever' Alexandria was considering this information with her own explanation. So the Billy Goats Gruff were like the Clairvoyant then?
"-and that's when I told the meanie Malk to boil his own tail!"
Alexandria snorted lightly, then lifted the little pixie out of the rain and underneath her suit jacket, ruined as it was.
"If you stay with me a bit," she allowed, "I'll make sure you get some candy."
"Butterscotch?" The pixie asked with huge eyes, "Oh yes!" She clapped her little hands together and when Alexandria let go of her wing she zipped off back to her house. A moment later she was back, this time with a little thimble on her head and a new pine splinter sword.
"Yes, yes," the little pixie screamed flying right at Alexandria's face, who almost instinctively batted the little creature away. After a moment the pixie settled and crawled into Alexandria's front breast pocket, which thankfully wasn't just for show but actually had some uncharacteristic depth. At least for women's formal clothing.
"Do you know what the United States is?" She asked the exuberant little pixie, in between the pixie's attempt at giving a tour of the forest, which mainly consisted of 'that's the Malk's rock' and 'that's where the Malk almost ate me' and 'the Malk likes to hide there.'
"Nope," the pixie replied, barely pausing for breath, and Alexandria could feel her shift, trying to seek some comfort against the increasing winds, which Alexandria suspected were quite biting. Alexandria paused then and thought of another question.
"What about Earth? Earth-Bet?"
"Huh?"
Alexandria rolled her eyes, raising a hand to shelter the pixie as the storm finally reached both of them. A hailstone smashed into the back of her head where it fractured, sending shards of cold ice down her back. This suit is going to be completely unwearable by the time I find civilization, Alexandria thought to herself. Not that she actually needed clothes, protected from the weather as she was. Social constructs still needed to observed after all, for the betterment of most.
"Do you know where any humans are?"
The pixie stilled, "Why would a meanie like you want to know where humans are?"
Alexandria felt a little amused, and allowed it to color her voice when she replied, rhetorically, "I'm human, aren't I? Why wouldn't I want to find other humans."
"Un uh, you're not," the little pixie replied poking at her suit.
Alexandria was tempted to ask just exactly why the pixie seemed to think she was inhuman then just stopped to think about. She was currently flying under her own power, she had clearly demonstrated superhuman durability as well. To this… pixie… she probably didn't appear very human at all. So Alexandria let the comment slide.
"Nevertheless," she said loudly in order to be heard over the roaring winds, "You didn't answer my question, do you know where to find humans?"
The little pixie seemed to dither for a moment, fidgeting before answering haltingly, "I know a trail they travel on, them and the bloody ones?"
"A trail?" Alexandria replied, frowning, "where?"
The pixie looked out into the blizzard, peeking her little head over the rim of Alexandria's pocket, "ah, that way?"
Alexandria turned on a dime and began to float in that direction, careful to keep her hand over the little pixie to protect from the hailstones. More and more of them continued to break against her body, sending razor-sharp shards of ice, which wasn't acting like normal ice, flying everywhere around her. If she was completely normal, most of the stones would've killed her. As it was, it was a mild inconvenience, barely worthy of note.
"Is that it?" Alexandria asked as she spotted a thin column of figures below.
The pixie popped her head up once more, "Ye-yeah."
"Hmm," Alexandria said, they appeared to be a mix of individuals clad in the most eccentric combination of clothing. Not individually but as a group. There were a few in suits with what looked like some kind of short submachine gun that Alexandria was unfamiliar with. There were a few who looked like they were in military fatigues, she spotted the Colombian flag, and then there was one dressed in what looked like an authentic reproduction of an ancient Aztec Jaguar Warrior pelt.
"Those aren't humans, though, they're blood meanies," the pixie offered shrinking back into the pocket.
"What do you-" Alexandria cut herself off as something else came into view or rather something else. Interspersed throughout the people, which Alexandria had somehow managed to mistake for large dogs for a moment were horrific caricatures of humanity.
Large man-sized bats, with fur-covered bodies and skinny, flappy skin covered arms tottered around along the column. Honestly, they reminded Alexandria of some bio-tinkerer's creation, if they were more bio-tinkerers than Blasto or Nilbog. They both looked functional and deadly and worse of all, one of them had taloned hand clenched around a length of chain which led to a young man.
The man was young, maybe mid-twenties, by Alexandria's estimate and had red hair, but a rather tanned complexion. Possibly dye, but rather unlikely since dye was usually discernable to her. Nasty looking metal manacles bound his hands and feet and drove what looked like long nails into his limbs.
Almost detached, Alexandria noted how each time the man stepped and the manacles drew blood, the bat-things twitched towards him before restraining themselves. Blood meanies indeed.
The question was, what was really going on here?