Oisin

Across a haze of wet, white snow, a matched realm of mystery & uncertainty existed within. In this realm were a few talking animals; one of them was a handsome reindeer called Oisin. Oisin & the other animals in the realm shared some traits, those being things they had nothing in common aside from circumstances granted to them by this realm. The first of those traits was memory loss; he did not know how he ended up where he was. His past was shaved all the way down to his murky, factually questionable childhood. He knew he had a mother; he knew she had granted him this name, yet nothing of her remained. Sometimes a blurry memory stabbed his mind, a sharp pain and bright light, yet nothing could truly be deciphered of it & it was gone as abruptly as it arrived. A second trait he possessed was subconscious awareness of the world he was made to inhabit; it was not the first he was in & not quite as he would expect life from the previous.

Though paranormal concepts hadn't surfaced, something still felt off, as if an invisible being was trying to reach out to him, but like his memory, it was lost in the pain of the haze around him & in him. In line with his traits, he wandered around the world with little clue as to what he was meant to be doing. When he first entered the realm, it was like he had awoken from a painfully long dream; the line between memory & dream was fused, & they both faded rapidly, leaving him confused as to what truly happened & what he imagined. But as he came to, it quickly dawned on him that the circumstances, whether or not invited by his actions, were not philanthropic in nature. That idea was quickly made evident by his state; he awoke nude, half buried in snow, though not cold with his fur, that was still an undignified cashiering for reindeers, second only to losing antlers. He sat up in panic, grasping himself all over; his antlers were intact. On his ankles were bangles he remembered as gifts to him from his mother when he became a buck, copper, beautifully engraved with runes he understood to be his language, but he couldn't read it & he couldn't remember his mother's face. "Why can't I remember?" The short gratitude his mind was about to express to the realm was quickly cut down by a feeling of resentment & defeat. His mind raced to conclusions that this is hell; he was being played with, not stripped of identity but the identity becoming worthless, like a house he's locked out from.

"Why can't..." he muttered, face in hands, "...I remember?" After a while of self-pity, he begrudgingly got up & looked around; nothing but fields of white battered by a snowstorm, behind him was a sparse pine forest, also seeming to go on forever. After a second of consideration, he snorted at how ridiculously hopeless everything seemed & ambled toward the trees.

In this realm, time seemed to not move, though the snow kept painting the terrain; time won't exist if it can't be measured & there was nothing & nobody to do any measuring. No matter how much he wandered, he achieved nothing & nothing changed. He started realising the odd flow of time quite soon; the difference between days & nights seemed completely random, the half-setting Arctic sun sometimes going up & down within what felt like minutes, other times he slept multiple times only for it to still be night. But he never felt tired physically, only mentally; his hooves broke the snow with ease, as if he was designed to go on forever, born into this torture. He never felt hungry either; he didn't know if he was starving to death or truly frozen in time; his only nutrition came from small shoots he found in the cold soil that he ate out of boredom more than desperation.

He trudged through snow for what he guessed was a long time, with a determination like he had a grand goal, but his mind was blank aside from the one repeating question. Like the snow crashing against him, his mind was repeatedly almost reaching explanations or some recollections, only for them to melt away to nothing, real until you reach out. After several nights, travelling granted him a luxury of appeasement. The storm calmed & he laid eyes on a wood cabin in calm seclusion. It was worn by weather & unlit but still giving a sense of comfort; the world was quiet when his eyes were aimed at it. He knew to hold his thanks, but after such a huge change, he let it out involuntarily, cursing at himself right afterwards. The door was unlocked & as it shut behind him, he was engulfed by silence. The monotony of wind, replaced by heartbeats, crunching of snow, by the tap of hooves on a floor, at first he was happy for a new chapter but soon saw this too could be weeks of agony.

He gazed; it was dark, dusty & empty, void of personality like the world outside; a fireplace was ashen. Feeling warranted for being pessimistic but still disappointed, he unenthusiastically flehmened to find a trace of worth. A smell of nutmeg hit, but also a scent that he had a memory of, something deerish. His path to the scent was paused by sight of a feeble tree covered in tinsel; he felt hypnotised by it but snapped away in panic. He resumed & found clothes neatly arranged on a made bed, scented & looking familiar yet seeming unlike something he'd pick. He got dressed & swung a cloak on himself; he trembled, a memory of comfort. With legs like jelly, he sat down & zoned out.

As he sat, he looked out the window & saw vague silhouettes, those faded, sometimes leaving time to run outside before they disappeared like smoke. One day things changed; he heard a crash & a flash. As he came out, he spotted his first living being, lying within twisted metal that cut a scar through trees & soil, clearly not their intended landing. They crawled out without much harm before he could act. He cautiously raised a trembling hand, too nervous to say anything. Knowing he had a lot to say, as he waited for them to react, he hoped this would end his lonely period, time would move now, even if he forgot how to act on it.