TESTRUNNING POST

[standless]

[RYSLIG ARRIVAL - V. 1]

"Kgh...KACK..."

He was coughing.

It didn't quite register right away that this meant he was breathing. Jonathan was too busy coughing salt water from his stinging lungs, his arms and body covered extensively with scratches and cuts. There was sand under his hands though, he realized. The ocean water was lapping against him, and there was sand. How odd though, Jonathan thought. After all, a moment ago...

...

A moment ago he was dead. "...Wasn't I dying?" He thought to no one in particular, eyes blinking away the dust of sleep as he forced himself to his feet. Jonathan looked over his hands, the fog around him swirling about. "I was attacked, and..."

Hands flew to his neck, feeling for wounds that were not there. His eyes wide as he looked around, he felt his breathing- so well controlled, normally- fly from control. That's right. He had been dying. Dio had attacked, striking his throat and crippling his ripple and-

Calm yourself. Jonathan swallowed, and Breathed, steadying his focus. Calm. Calm...bring the breathing back into...

....

His breath was steady, but the sensation of the ripple was still gone.

Though it remained steady, Jonathan's thoughts continued to whirl. Had he somehow healed himself after he blacked out, so certain it would be the last time he closed his eyes? Had he somehow survived both that and the explosion, only to lose that power he had worked to master? Only to float...

Here?

...

Dio's head-

"Mngh- If someone were to find Dio, even in this state...He could easily kill them!" Jonathan realized, rushing along the beach. He couldn't be far...He held that man's head so tightly after all, he couldn't..!

"Where..." But then where was he?! "Where-!"

And Where was this!?

[RYSLIG ARRIVAL - V.2]

When he began to regain consciousness, he could feel fabric. Wrapped tightly around his arms and chest, and then buried under another layer of it. His eyes slowly opened and it was to brilliant, almost blinding light.

It caught him so off guard he almost forgot about what he last remembered. For that short, sweet moment until then he looked over the surroundings and himself. It was almost like a hospital- almost, he thought, because of how brilliant it all seemed. Almost snow white, the walls were- his bed metal, and the table beside it similar. He half expected to be greeted with similar light at the windows- but the curtains were drawn tightly, so tightly that not a drop of light could possibly pass through.

And the bandages! So many! He hadn't seen himself so injured since-

"...DIO-!"

The shout escaped without thought- and mind reeling, his hands went to his throat. He could speak- he could breathe, yet somehow he could not feel the vibrations of the ripple through his being. Had he been permanently injured, in the explosion of the ship? He supposed that in itself would be a miracle, given he had expected to die.

But then where was Dio? And where was this for that matter? No hospital in England could have possibly looked so clean, but how far must he have been carried by the water then? He had been so certain of his death too...the fading sounds of Dio's desperate pleas, the quieter sound of the chest locking shut as Erina and that little infant child locked themselves into safety...

There was someone outside the door he realized. He could see a shadow somehow through the window (and god! Windows, in a hospital door!).
"...nurse?" He questioned politely, keeping his voice steady. "...Is that a nurse? Please, I must ask you a question if I may..!"

...

It somehow feels that might Not be a nurse behind the door.

[INTO THE CITY - RYSLIG SETTING, BAVAN]

The world was Massive.

Bavan City, when he heard the name, was something he expected to liken to London. But instead despite the thick fog that clung to the air and blotted the sun, there were lights aplenty. Brilliant and searing, so much more-so than the gas lamps of London's streets- and that was only the street lights!

The lights above the stores! The lights from the windows! Piercing the fog with their warmth, as if to chase them away with their own hopes and experiences from high above!

And so high they were, he marveled- the buildings towering into the sky, farther than even the highest cathedral. Filled with windows, which were filled with lights, and Jonathan's very neck strained to try and make out the top through the haze. He-

"Ah-"

He nearly crashed into someone. "Oh- I'm so sorry miss- please, allow me to help..." The poor woman's bags- paper he noted, and almost boxy even- had fallen, and he made quick work of regathering them. "Here you are- I hope nothing has been damaged..."

"Oh it's alright...Thank you for that sir- now, where..." Sparing little more time than necessary for the man, the young woman peered around him before breaking into a smile. "Ah! Erik! Casey! There you both are, I've been searching all over...."

The woman's voice faded as Jonathan watched her go- joining with a young man, and a child who seemed little more than a year old, currently held carefully in the man's arms. Was it distance that made the voice fade? The fog?

....his heart..?

Left in silence, the marvel for the city came tumbling down as Jonathan stood in the middle of the walkway, unable to even move.

He wondered...

They would have been alright...right?