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[ The last thing Amanda remembers is having fallen asleep in Clarice's cabin, but there's grass underneath her, not a mattress. She wakes slowly, squints against the sunlight as she pushes herself carefully into a sitting position. She's wearing white, a white dress that doesn't look like anything she ever owned, and the space around

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[no_hometown]

[Sometimes Sephiroth haunts the area where new arrivals appear, as if looking for something. What she seeks, she does not know. She has not found it yet.

When she sees one of the new women, she does not always approach to introduce herself, though sometimes she waits to make sure they have no difficulties. She notices this woman's pained movement, how she leans on the tree for support. She comes forward, quick and quiet.]

Do you need assistance? [Her voice is low and polite.]

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[ Amanda is not expecting anyone to approach her so soon, and she startles, looking up quickly. Sephiroth is not like anyone she has ever seen in her life, with the long silver hair and the glowing green eyes, and so it is that she can't answer the other woman's question right away - one of her own comes sudden and sharp to her lips instead. ]

Who are you?

[ There's an expression in her own wide eyes, confusion and something close to fear. ]

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[no_hometown]

[For a moment, the fear gives her pause, but the woman's words are normal and understandable; she doesn't know who Sephiroth is. Sephiroth does remember when her appearance commonly took people by surprise, before Shinra made her so renowned. She still receives that reaction sometimes--both in Wutai and here.]

My name is Sephiroth. I am a SOLDIER. [Most people don't know of SOLDIER, but the word has meaning nonetheless.]

This may be difficult to accept, but you--like myself, and others here--have been abducted by an entity of unknown origin.

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[ Amanda can almost hear the capital letters in the way Sephiroth says 'SOLDIER', but she doesn't have any context for it, so she only assumes the woman is a soldier, lowercase. It's almost the same meaning. ]

Abducted? [ Her voice goes tense. She almost asks by whom, but at the last minute she remembers Sephiroth said entity of unknown origin. So instead she asks, ] Why? What is this place?

[ She's read the scrolls, but they don't tell her much. ]

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[no_hometown]

[Sephiroth's tone is almost apologetic. She knows full well how ridiculous any explanation of the Gardens sounds. It is most unlike anything in her world: mad, with pretenses of being fanciful.]

We have been brought to another world, what might be called a constructed reality. As you may have read, it is called the Gardens. It is large, but it has its limits.

The entity, which goes by the name "Queen of Hearts", has brought women here from many different worlds and universes and gathered us into this enclosure. She claims to wish us to form bonds with each other. We cannot say why. Perhaps she feeds on emotional energy, but that is only a theory.