The Academy: to Gecko.

"Come out of the dark where you're safe."
The rose is riotous in red bloom amidst the green of leaf and stem and bush; he is like this, not serene or quiet as the grass that shivers against the wind and the knees of the painted mare that sees in his skewbald patches, kinship to her own patchwork quilt of color. She thinks trickster and clown when she spots him amidst the verdant age of the gardens, and these are not ill thoughts that take shape but thoughts of merriment for it is too quiet and he is loud in color and step and presence - a welcome change from the austerity of the land that shudders and shivers and falls serene, undisturbed.

“Gecko,” she answers, smiling and coming to stand by his side. “You seem to be in good spirits,” she says casually, remarking on the spring in his step that matches the spring of the turf underfoot. She knows his name, knows that he has been waiting and that preceding her as teacher to him, have been two others that have departed on journeys of their own, perhaps. Gently, she touches his shoulder with her slim nose, tracing the shape of one color than another and remarking on how alike it is to her own painted side of buckskin and white. “Tell me about your time here,” she asks him.

Earth II; Ap