Funny that the last time he was here in the Nexus, Rondo was groggy from the celebration of Veth's Night, honoring the earth-serpent his own ancestors once believed in. Now, when he wanders through the Plaza with a book-bag slung over one shoulder, he spies the glitter of what he swears is a snake with wings. It's one of the smaller ones that he sees first, but the sight of an e'tha is enough to take his breath away, and he follows it, keeping a safe distance as he is not interested in harassing it, nor in being bitten by it. So absorbed is he in what is, to him, a long-extinct mystical creature, he doesn't notice its massive companions until he's quite close.

And then, he's not even sure how to process what he's seeing, it's such a shock. When he was a child, he faithfully visited the fossils of winged serpents in museums, talked to them silently in his head and never expected an answer in return, but something told him it was important. Here and now, looking at the glossy crimson-black and the rainbow blaze of feathers, he feels like crying.

He's sitting on the ground before he's aware what's happening, having blacked out for a second. The energy fluctuation around the serpent doesn't help; it's overwhelming. And yet, something in him responds, a tiny, tiny fragment of like calling to like.

"Watching," he says in answer to the question. "I watch for things." And he has absolutely no idea why that's the answer that comes to mind.