"That may be more true for the rest of us than me. I could continue as I have been easily enough. But I agree - the benefits of life in a rich and stable nation don't really outweigh the pressure for your kinds anymore. And I would hate to be alone."

"Easy enough for you to say. My little girl just can't run free, as she's meant to. The coal smoke, the fences and farmland everywhere..."

"No, no, I agree. It's time to leave for you. And probably for me as well, if not so directly."

"Wherever we end up, we'll need to understand what the state of technology is. Knowing what we'd be hunted with could save us."

"That I may have an answer to. I don't suppose any of you met my sister?"

"I did, briefly. We moved in similar circles in Amsterdam for a time."

"A couple of years ago, she left for her Australia with her own son and a number of other kin. Said she was going to try and set up a colony for our kind down in the outback. It's still a wild country. If we establish a foothold there, we might be able to hold our own in the decades to come."

"Like the New World? I heard from a pack that set up out there. They had hundreds of miles to themselves for fifteen years, in this area called Michigan."

"Australia was found a touch more recently. The Empire started sending convicts there after America stopped taking them."

"Well, if we're going to go there, let's not count on using a convict ship," she jokes. "Besides the fact that they tend to get snapped up by kraken once in a while, there's too little control that way. Think your families can pass a Customs inspection?"

"Highly doubtful. None of us except you and Winona have decent amounts of money - joining family overseas is a good excuse, but they can see vampirism if they look close enough, and Rilah and I don't have a convenient excuse to board a ship for some colony."

"I'm afraid our route will have to be a little less...direct."

Janet's gaze sharpens a bit. "Those 'friends' you made in dark alleys?"

"Have any of you ever taken a land-ship?"

"The workshop uses walkers for things sometimes. Never been in a proper landship, though."

"The name is something of a misnomer. They can also cross certain distances underwater."

"Are you angling for putting our children on the same ship as some smugglers?"

"Yes. It's distasteful, I know, but at the very least, our children can defend themselves if need be. And they have us."

"I fail to see the problem if they're experienced smugglers. The other options all seem riskier."

"We should probably actually list out all the options we have for going, how likely a disaster is, weigh it against how bad it is here... But, it's time to go. The winds are bad now. And a smuggler might be the only option."

"I have a route planned out."

She removes a map from her bag. Seems they'll be heading to Australia by way of Scandinavia, Russia, China, and Indonesia. 

"Avoiding the highest concentrations of warfare and technology. Hmm... I'm a little worried about the politics I've been hearing from Russia."

"That is a concern, yes. There are still some kin-enclaves in the mountains that we can lay over in."

"I know I'm being a little harsh... But this whole plan is terribly risky. We can't just rely on our gifts to get us out of trouble. It's a shame we can't just live and let live."

"I'm sure we all do. And maybe, if this works, we can."