Welcome to Gaia! ::

Roanoke has so far been an interesting place. The "main house," as I am told it is called, has a lot more people in it than the apartment did. I thought the apartment was crowded... There are even a lot of guests here, apparently they came to see us arrive?

I have met some interesting people, both here and in the shop. I finally met Ares. She was just amazing as her genetic profile suggests. Her third eye was so interesting. But I had to go before I could take any notes. I should have taken notes, really, but I got nervous.

So far I have not seen many mutations at all. Corvus says they are essential, but why are they so rare? Arturo has a second set of wings on his head, I have horns, and Ares has a third eye. Oh, and Seamus has glowing eyes. His seemed to be the least noticeable mutation and he doesn't seem to be very much the rest of us. His eyes are creepy, though.

I have been thinking a lot about Seamus being unhinged. Is it because of his mutation? Can a mutation drive a person crazy? Corvus says not, but there's very little research into the area, and in humans genetic mutations often cause mental instability. I am worried about that...

Corvus has been having me help him in the backyard and around the neighborhood. He says he's looking for something. He wouldn't explain what. He tried to show me how to sense magc stuff, but I didn't understand, which I think made him angry... He sent me away for now. I wanted to be helpful, really, but I guess my magic isn't as strong.

I have been talking to many of the other people here in this house. There are some very interesting ones. Some of them are aliens, but they look human enough. Apparently they are just humans born on another planet. That would meet the definition of alien. I am not so sure about some of the people form different realms, though. It's all very confusing. Emi's father, Djerod, has been helping me to understand some of it with diagrams. I understand the overall mechanics, but the specifics elude me. When I'm ready, he says he'll explain more of the theories. He thinks I'm smart enough, there's just a lot of learning that must come first. He calls this area of study "dimensional mechanics." And first I need to know physics, quantum mechanics, philosophy, and a lot of theories of time and space and what makes a universe what it is. He says Corvus knows a bit about it, but I don't want to bother him since he's busy.

There are some elves here, too. I spoke to one of them, Orriole, at great length. He is very curious about our kind of fairies. He says elves have fairies, too, a cousin to our kind. Apparently those elves aren't dying out like we are. I asked him about mutations with his fairies, and he said that the elven fairies don't seem to exhibit as many traits as we do. He has never seen one with horns, but their fairies do have markings like ours, a lot of different styles of wings, and many more colors. He told me of one fairy who has rainbow-colored hair.

I have to be going now, I just saw Kasha walk by and we're going to go for a walk in the neighborhood. Maybe I can find whatever Corvus is looking for while I'm out?

Finally, a result.

It was plainly obvious from first arrving here that the place was magical, and I refer to more than just its magical residents, of which there are quite a few. The place was literally seeded with magic, a low-grade sort of magical buzz, the source of which confounded me from day one.

My assessment that a more nature-based element was required was correct. With all the magic around, I was at a loss as to its source, but now... Darkness is, of course, perfectly natural, but not the sort of natural required for my task.

At first I tried with Simon, but despite his sharp brain, his grasp of magic is substandard. I should give him a lesson, assuming he delivers morth worthwhile reports. When Sunil showed up... It was worth a try with someone I know can sense magic. And Sunil is, of course, Air, just as Simon.

The problem was mainly in the air, it turns out. It's spring, with summer on the horizon, and the low-level magical buzz turned out to be due to plant pollen in the air.

Feien plant pollen. As in one of the original fairy plants which has since ceased it blooming.

When I first asked Emi about how she met Juli, she answered that she had met him in her own backyard in the garden there. It was only natural to suspect that a fairy colony of some sort might be in the area. It was not, of course, in her backyard (Juli simply favored the rose bushes and wild growth there) but within several blocks. There was an alley, a dead-end alleyway at that, heavily thicketed and shadowed by trees. And one of the bushes under the shadow of those trees was a feien plant.

Shocked, I knew I had found it, so I quickly fed Sunil a short lie: "So that's what the magic was," and looked disappointed. I doubt she bought it. I did tell her I was looking for an artifact, though, so perhaps she believed my disappointment?

I must get back to that plant. When Arturo is nowhere near the house. He'll be angry if he finds out what I'm doing.

Em, I hope, will be pleased. This could be the very answer she predicted.

I was just informed, rather shortly and in a sudden fashion, that Em is gone. I mean this not in some sort of overall, philosophical, or remorseful sense, but as a statement of fact. I entered into the house to speak with her and was told by Feodor that she had, less then twenty minutes earlier, left with her mother to pick up her brother from his college in Pennsylvania.

This comes as a surprise to me. For four days Em and her mother have been arguing about Em going on this trip. Em, once she found out she would not be doing any driving, did not want to go. I supported that decision; there was and still is too much work around the shop to be done. But then I go into the house and find she’s gone anyway.

With Kancho and Simon. I have absolutely no idea how Simon ended up going with her when I did not. I wasn’t even informed of the decision until after she left, and I have not been given any reasoning behind it. She just up and left. Simon, too, when I had asked him to kindly bring me a report from the shop. I know he went to the shop this morning, now where’s my damn report?

I will be making the most of this time, though. I spent this morning studying the feien plant. Despite quite a bit of investigating, I haven’t found any gems. This is decidedly odd, unless other feien did as Arturo: collecting fellow feien gems and burying them. Perhaps that is why I cannot find them. The pollen situation around the plant is much worse than the neighborhood at large, rendering my magic detection fairly useless in that area, but if the gems were buried...

Unfortunately, that means I will require an earth feien with magic detection. I won’t even think about her; surely there is somebody else.

I have no idea who. Until I know why Simon ducked away instead of giving me a report, I won’t go the shop. But I must have an earth feien to assist me.

I get back, I relax for the evening, and something's missing.

What, pray tell, could be missing?

CORVUS. Where the frell did my feien go!???

Okay, I didn't mean to leave him, but he could have at least left a note this time! What am I supposed to do? I suppose he'll come back. How long do I have to wait this time???