Chapter 2: Lost and Found

Trapped in a newborn's body, the glacial atmos invaded his small frame, chilling Jack to his fragile undeveloped bones.

'Cold!' Was all he could think as a visible layer of frost formed on his skin. And as his conscience began to flicker, death wanting to claim him once more, he heard the light sounds of a man humming, and soon drawn into sight, a Jester skipping to his own tune.

"Cicero, Cicero does whatever a Cicero does, can he find the listener, yes he can, yes he can, yes he can, " the strange man hopped to stop.

"The sneaky dark elf didn't lie! No lies! Hahaha!" Cicero chortled with a merry jig. "Ow ow oww, the listener is cold, but have no fear because Cicero is here, " he said, and a beam of light projected out of his hand and wrapped around Jack.

The cold receded, and with that Jack regained a tentative grasp on reality. It didn't take him long to recognise the character that danced before him and putting two (moons) and two together, he figured out exactly where he was.

'Preposterous!'

Cicero swooped in close, staring into Jack's luminescent red eyes, "Hehe, you recognise me! How strange, did the night mother tell you about me, whispers from the void hum?"

Jack felt his tiny heart palpitate with immense fear. If this was real... really real, then this seemingly comical jester was in fact a deadly killer, who had killed tens, if not hundreds... No perhaps even thousands of people.

"You needn't fear dear old Cicero, sweet Cicero. No, no, nooo, Cicero will train you, care for you... kill for you, anything for mother's listener."

The crazy Jester seemed to peer through Jack's very soul, discerning his thoughts from the barest inflexions on his face; or glimmer in his eyes.

But hearing the jester's words and not sensing any immediate threat to his life, Jack calmed down and took stock of his situation: Death. Rebirth. Mother. Clocks. Skyrim. Cicero. Magic. Magic. Magic. Magic...

'Ah, I'm in a world that has magic,' and with that though an overwhelming urge consumed Jack's mind.

Jack had spent a lot of his last life alone, quarantined by his own illness. That Loneliness had bred imagination, and imagination; the longing for the absurd; the fantastic.

Willing it with every fibre of his being he attempted to summon forth magic in his palms, imagining that which humans; what he once was, had a near primordial connection. Fire.

At first, there was nothing, and then the slightest of feelings, as though the blood in Jack's body had congealed in his hands. Then out of nowhere, a spark; cinder crackling the air, setting alight Jack's palms.

It was warm; perhaps a little too warm as it seemed to be slowly cooking Jack's hands, but before panic could set in the flames went out. 'I did It!' Jack screamed internally as he giggled.

"The listener is a genius, as expected of mother's chosen..." the jest said with a small jig and a clap, before leaning in close, "but one mustn't use so much magic so young..."

Jack could feel his consciousness slowly drifting away, the fatigue of his first casting lulling him to sleep, but he resisted, unwilling to sleep just yet, his furore burning away the fatigue. He was no longer that sick boy trapped in a ventilated room; no longer a bird in a glass cage, he was free and no matter what he wasn't going to spend his first hours bloody sleeping.

"Owwieee, as expected of the listener. Such will! Such fortitude! But we must get going now... We can't leave mother waiting. I haven't left her for this long since... since... Ever. Don't worry mother dearest, sweet Cicero is on his way."

Cicero hoisted Jack up rather roughly and stuffed him within the confines of his red outer coat.

The Jester then preceded to skip with purpose in a direction unknown, kicking up small plumes of snow, and for the most part, speaking nought but the raving of a madman; his obsession with the night mother all-consuming. Although from within these mad mutterings Jack managed to glean some useful information.

Cicero seemed to have been told by a dark elf of Jack's location, and he had apparently claimed he would be the next listener. Whether that was true or not remained to be seen, but Jack couldn't help but wonder how this unknown dark elf had managed to convince the mad jester to leave the night mother side.

Another thing to note was that wherever they were, it was somewhere far north. The land was almost entirely blanketed by dunes of snow and ice, and although Jack's sight was still murky; his eyes not yet fully developed, he could make out the visage of the ethereal creatures known as ice wraiths scattered about.

Cicero never came this far north in the game... at least not until his death.

But it was something else he said that caught Jack's intrigue, "Such scary eyes, the listener has... bloody red tinged with black and gold... but no that can't be... that would be... pure madness!" The jester's voice quivered in a momentary bout of hysteria.

Among the races of the elder scrolls series, Jack only knew of one that had red eyes, the Dunmer or dark elves. Perhaps the dark elf Cicero spoke of was his father.

It made sense, after all the Dunmer had an innate connection to fire, 'ancestral fire,' as it was called in the games, and he had summoned that clump of flames so... intuitively. But looking down in reaffirmation, his hand were the tone of bone-white ash. His mother had been... Nord perhaps? It was hard to tell, but she looked the part, tall and pale with blond hair.

And putting that all together; that made him a hybrid.