The waking dawn sunlight peeped through the high canopy of the forest. Dove found herself lost in the dense trees. She was certain she had already passed the gnarled bark eye of the ancient tree that loomed over her already. It gazed into her, the lifetime of memories stirred beneath its outer bark shell. She had followed the sound of a bird singing, the sound itself had seemed to shift each time she got closer to it. Slowly but surely the amount of sunlight that was available had dimmed as she was drawn deeper into the treeline. She could hear the creatures above in the canopies, but she never caught even a glimpse of them. She could sense the dampness of the earth, its vitality here. It seemed to resonate inside her, drawing power from her hooves. Water droplets from low hanging branches brushed against her side, invigorating and chilly! They streaked her pale white coat, letting glimpses of the pink beneath show through. There was a rustling ahead of her, she quietly stepped back into the lower bushes and froze. The sounds of the rain forest were overwhelming, they surrounded her. Instinctually; she was aware of her vulnerability. She wasn’t entirely sure when she had begun to exist. She had woken up on the shoreline of a lake alone. The water’s energy had entrenched itself within her body. Restitching what had failed, breathing its liquid into her body. Glinting of green, and a flash of spots, white, black and brown, the movement blurred the colours together. She could tell they had 4 legs and 2 ears, the outline vaguely….looked like her. Was this creature the same as she was? Is this who she was? She watched the direction they moved in and silently tried to creep behind them. There was a flurry of movement, and feathers falling and a squawk. She had chased enough birds to know that this bird was not particularly happy. Looking closer where it had come from, she could see an outline of peculiar shaped rocks. They had eerily straight edges and a very neat pattern that lined up perfectly. It seemed as though it had been there for a very long time. Under a pile of leaves a glinting of colour caught her attention. The colour was contained somehow, something held it together. She wanted to touch it. She wondered what it was? Part of her also wanted to taste the strange surface that contained the strange colour. The bird song whistled along with the Us shaped thing, it seemed to be coming from them? Somewhere in the distance an echo’d song returned. Back and forth they whistled to each other. Her days of being aware of her existence were limited, but she had never heard any other creature make the sound of a bird before. She tried to make a noise in return, but no sound came out. She coughed, and then shrieked in surprise at the sound. The Us shaped creature rapidly changed direction, the green horn on their head pointed in her general direction. Their four legs moved with far more elegance than she had ever managed. Now that they were closer, she could tell just how much bigger they were. How long and beautiful their hair was. “Who is there?” The voice was smooth and elegant, almost a song in itself. Fear and impulse caused her to scoot from her hiding place towards the colour containment thingo scooping it with her mouth. It was hard and cold between her small teeth, it didn’t taste like much of anything. Her small hooves clacked on the pavement as she ran down the path of odd rocks. She dared not look back to see if she was being pursued, she ducked under thick scrubs and tried to hide out of sight in the brambles. Shou watched a small, gangly child rustle in the leaves and then flee into the shrubs. At least they thought it was a child? It was a difficult decision as to what the responsible thing to do was, surely someone was aware that such a youngster was out there on their own. What if the mother was about to return? The foal, if that's even what they were - seemed to have the sense to avoid others. There was no way Shou was going to be able to follow them through the prickly thorns. With a shrug, the illusion song of the bird was once more taken up once more. It was returned with a chorus of singing, and life went on.