A summoning from the council of elders he could have been inclined to ignore - they rarely offered any information he could use anyways - but not a summoning from the master. The master was a constant source of new insights into bettering his martial arts, and even recently incorporating the staff in his ever broadening array of techniques. He wasn't that good with it yet, but was learning to use its longer reach to perform techniques impossible with his feet or hands.
Casually, he tok a better grip on his hardwood staff and whapped the kruss that had stalked up behind him over the sensible nose of the large scavenger. The scavenger whimpered and scampered away in haste, as he had known it would. Cowards, the lot of them, he reflected, before shifting his weight to his other foot. Always looking for a free meal. And didn't even have the sense to stalk him downwind. They weren't even good eating.
The master appeared shortly after the winds had died down. The student hastily gulped down the bite of the tasty sand-lizard he had catched before offering the remaining of the lizard to the master. The yellow Nolisha accepted and sat down, apparently satisfied with the morsel.
While waiting for the master to finish his meal, the student idly scratched lines in the yellow sand, painting the universal picture of boredom. The master watched amused between bites on the student. So young, he thought. Yet so promising. Soon I have no more to teach him. He has even started to develop own techniques with that staff of his. Surely a passing whim, the staff, yet he is even now training precision with it.
The master ate the last of the legs of the sand-lizard, and spat out the blue bone before announcing his pleasure with a hearty belch. After regarding the contrast between the blue, polished lizard bone and the yellow, gritty sand for a moment, he directed his attention to the student sitting before him. The twin red orbs glittered mischievously under the light of the Glittering Belt above them both, which bathed the desert in cold, faint white light, transforming the desert to a strange half-shadow land. The master considered this transformation of the familiar desert, then returned to the spry rustbrown youth sitting before him, watching the bunching and unbunching of those powerful arms whilst the youth idly dragged the crudely fashioned staff back and forth.
"Is my companionship this boring, that you merely sit there wishing you were in the sleeping cots, sleeping together with the clan?" The youth started, obviously lost in his own thoughts, and focused on the master. "Not at all, master. I-i-i was merely thinking, considering, pondering..." "You were bored." The youth looked downcast. "Not exactly bored. More just existing." The cooling fins on the head of the youngster deepened somewhat in colour. He was blushing. The master smiled thinly, vaguely amused. "So you need something to keep you occupied." That was not a question. The youth frowned, seeking to divine the ulterior motives the wily old master so obviously had. "Yes, master. Do you have something particular in mind, master?" The master smiled again, though this time only inside himself. Perceptive as always, the little sand-devil was, he thought.
"Before your training is complete..." the master anticipated the protestations his young student would make, and held up a biding hand "...as I said, before your training is complete, I would like you to make a little walkabout in the desert." Joyed that the master thought his technique so good as to soon make him an instructor at the least, the youth focused on what the master said. "For some days now I have heard strange sounds from the black sands, and sometimes strange lights have streaked through the skies. This is what I wish you to investigate. This is what I deem as a fitting rite of passage for you." The student rose, and bowed to the master. "This is a task I will be happy to perform for you. This is what I accept as a fitting rite of passage for me." With no further ado, he looked towards the belt of black desert perhaps visible as a darker band in the night, perhaps not. A strange feeling filled him. Not so much of fear or consternation, as a feeling of ... longing, perhaps homesickness, for some unfathomable reason.
The master watched the youth walk lightly across the desert, resting his arms on his staff which he had slung across his back. Before long, the youth accelerated into a loping stride he could sustain for quite some time. The master sighed, and felt through some strange connection the same longing, the same homesickness that plagued his protege. The stonebeetle walking through the sand was so startled it didn't even scritch when the master snatched it and cracked its sturdy carapace open with a swift chop of his hardened hands. Good luck, little one, little student, he wished silently while he sucked out the tasty innards of the beetle. For some reason I don't think this old master will see you again. I have a feeling about this.
The master walked over to his relatively solitary sleeping cot, only sharing it with three other masters, and snuggled up to the others, seeking the warmth of many to keep out the cold of the desert. In a strange flash of insight the master felt that the youth could become a great master, yet that his future was hanging in the balance. And that that future was not necessarily on Kass'Jadar. The master wondered at that idea. Not on Kass'Jadar? What a strange idea.
Meanwhile, the student was loping through the yellow sand, towards that invisible band of black sand which the master had directed him towards. He wondered at what he would perhaps find there. Some other plant to fashion a better staff than the one across his shoulders, perhaps? Strange lights and sounds in the desert would perhaps be some strange dream-creature he could talk to, or perhaps be forced to slay. Or perhaps something else, something he could not comprehend. But what could that be, of such prominence he couldn't even comprehend it? Dreamily, he ran on, pacing himself so that he kept warm on this cold desert night. He could always sleep during the hot period of the morrow, if he felt like it.
Soon, bloodred sunrise slashed the horizon, like the markings of a zhar, and the youth stirred out of the trance he had worked himself in. With some surprise he discovered he was running through night-black, sparkly sand. He had arrived at the black sands.
After foraging for some food and kicking a kruss that mistook him for a carcass where he lay half sleeping in the shadow of a dune, he felt much refreshed, and decided that he would press on a little more before he would try to find the strange occurence that the master had spoken of. It was some time later that day he discovered that he was being followed.
He was certain that he was being followed. Exactly by who or what was difficult to say, but he had sensed it for some time now - a warm feeling in his head-ridges, an itchy feel in his neck. He stopped, and allowed some time for the follower to come forward and present himself. He waited for some time more after that. Yet noone came forward, though the Nolisha code stipulated otherwise. He was puzzled, but not really afraid. In all his days of living in the desert he hadn't really met anything that he couldn't handle. Once, he'd even seen the Kass'Nedeir and killed a thing that had flown in the water there. Of course he didn't eat it, but it was a pretty, shiny thing. When he had thrown it inside the water again and shook his hands thoroughly, he had observed many small, shiny things that had darted forward and semmingly eaten the shiny thing he had thrown in. Without dying.
While musing over this little fact of life, he casually shifted his grip on his staff, and stole a glance behind him. The thing hadn't shifted from where he last had seen it. Casually, he flipped his stick end over end above his head and idly waited for it to land. And had his hunch confirmed with a rather undignified, startled cry.
"Ouch! Oops..."
With a little smile on his face, he turned around and watched the place where the sand squirmed a little more than usual - around the place where his staff had landed. "Would you please come forward - and bring my staff with you, if you would be so kind?" he requested, sitting down patiently to wait. Noone answered.
Sifting through the sand, he found a stone somewhat larger than the sand and gravel usual, and marveled at the rough beauty of it. And tossed it at the same spot where he had thrown his staff. Repeating the process an even dozen of times, he was rewarded by some low grumbling, and shifting of the sand. A black Nolisha with small, white spots rose up from the sand, picked up his staff, and came forward while mumbling obscenities under her voice. Because it was quite obviously a female Nolisha, rather young but lovely all the same. Some steps away from him she disgruntedly threw him his staff, and he lazedly performed a somersault while catching it. And overheard a comment of someone being a showoff, and a self-satisfied showoff on top of it all. It didn't bother him.
The girl stood defiantly before him, hands on top of her shapely hips, and demanded why he had thrown his staff at her. To which there was really only one response - "You were there." "So? What right does that give you to throw sticks at me?" "You were following me." "I did not! I was out hunting, and was merely sleeping while you walked past me, trampling the sand like a bloated kruss."
The young student blushed a little then - it was true that he hadn't particularly mastered the art of silent walking, and he was generally so confident in himself that he didn't bother hiding. "Yes, that is true. I am not very good at the art of silent walking, yet I must confess that I sensed you following me for quite some time." The girl cocked her head to one side, and mimicked his voice. Quite a good imitation, actually. "'I sensed you following me' ... so you say you are one of the old Masters, then?" The student blushed again, but couldn't reply with anything but the truth. "No, I am not one of the Masters of old. However, I didn't really see you as much as know you were there - I must have caught a glimpse of you or something." She didn't seem convinced by this, but relented a little.
"So why are you walking through our turf, then?" The young student puzzled at the question. "What is a turf?" She laughed out loud, and the young student blushed at being laughed at by someone younger than he. "So little you know. You're probably from the mostly Yellow clan right up here in the yellow sands, then?" "Yes, I am." "Oh, well, that explains it. I can as well join you - you're going in the direction of the main of my clan, and you scared away any of my hunting anyways." Hunting he could understand, but what connection did that concept have with that strange word ... 'turf'?
He walked along parallel to the edge of the black sands, speaking with this stand-offish girl he had discovered tracking him. And he found that she had much to tell, and that most of her bluster was exactly that - bluster. She confessed that she hadn't excelled much at The Combat, and had been forced to compensate by being good at stealth. This last she said challengingly, but when she discovered he was impressed by her forthrightness and honesty, she mellowed a little.
The young student, at any rate, told that he was looking for the source of the strange sounds and lights that had been here the last few days. The girl said she knew where that was, and asked if the student wanted to go there. He would so very much. Subtly she walked a little in front of him, altering the course a little, and reveled in her leading someone so obviously schooled in taking care of himself. The young student was happy he had found someone to talk to. He had really missed that a little since that strange feeling had crept over him. That sabbatical - the hottest part of the day - when they rested together, both the student and the girl slept soundly. Not even a kruss bothered the two, as they lay there half buried in the sand, in the shadow of a dune, sleeping fitfully intertwined.
The young student woke first, for some reason he couldn't fathom. He really enjoyed the feel of her supple body against his strong one, and was fast slipping towards slumber again when he felt it again. A faint tremor went through the sand, disturbing the sand around them. As he lay there wondering what that tremor might be, he noticed some sand grains hitting the top of his head. He glanced up, and furrowed his brow, alarmed. The dune was falling in over them!
Thinking swiftly, half buried in the sand as he was, he pulled the girl closer, cradling her in the pit of his arm. She woke up, and started to protest when he stifled all her protests with a powerful kiss. He couldn't let her fill her lungs with all that sand that was coming down on them. Besides, he really enjoyed doing it this way. She was a little surprised and tried to pull back, then decided she enjoyed it. And then the world went black as the dune crested lazily down over them.
It was twilight when he had dug himself and the girl out. It wasn't so much that it had taken much time to dig them out - it was more that they had slept longer than they had expected when they had gone to sleep that same day. When he was finished digging, he stretched to get all the kinks out of his body. His robe had been left down in the sand, and the girl was a little embarassed as he stretched and groaned with pleasure as he felt his muscles and spine pop into place.
Swiftly, he dug into the sand again, but didn't find his robe again. He shrugged, and looked towards the girl. She stood there, not daring to look at him, and then she shyly stole a glance of him. He smiled. She smiled. And then she asked him if the kiss really was necessary. He smiled, grateful that she couldn't see he was blushing in the faint light. "No. But I enjoyed it more that way." She laughed, and threw a little sand playfully at him. He dodged it easily, and playfully tackled her into the soft, warm sand. They kissed again. And both was startled when the earth heaved again. The young student rolled into a compact fighting stance while the girl half squirmed down in the sand again, her black bikini blending with her skin and the sand perfectly.
The young student was the first to spot the weird lights some dunes away, and silently motioned the girl towards them. They agreed - through sign language - to split up, so that they could approach this strange phenomenon with a greater chance of one of them getting away if this event was hiding something dangerous. Stealthy as a night-wraith she slipped away in the fast approaching night, while the student looked after her. He wasn't quite sure how he felt about her, but he felt comfortable in her company...
He shaked himself as a vermin-ridden sand crab, and crept as stealthily as he could towards the lights, tremors and clanking noises he more felt than heard. He had other things to think of. The master had asked him to do this thing, and he had agreed. This was his Rite of Passage, after all, not some leisurely walk through the dunes.
The sight that met him as he cautiously crested the last dune wasn't anything he could have prepared himself for. A giant, shiny thing that was similar to a sand-crab yet wasn't, was eating black sand and streaming it out again in its other end with a prodigious speed and power! Sometimes the mound of sand it was eating crashed together as it ate the mound, and the sand trembled powerfully in sympathy. The vibrations were stronger here, much stronger.
Some strange, humanoid thing was sitting on top of the sand crab, holding some kind of stiff ropes while the crab was eating sand, and the student wondered a moment if the humanoid was just some antenna or something that the sand crab sported. When the sand crab stopped making all those noises and the humanoid rose, stretched a little then jumped clumsily down into the sand, the student understood that the humanoid probably controlled the sand crab it was riding. While he was pondering what he was to do now, the humanoid walked over to the side of the thing, and removed a shell from the side of it.
Absent-mindedly the student caught the stonebeetle walking through the sand in front of him, smashed it against his knee, and ate its innards while the humanoid dragged a little, squarish bowl from the innards of the sand crab. The humanoid picked up something sparkling and black from the little box. Seemingly satisfied, the humanoid put the sparkling stone in a pouch of its strangely shaped robe, and started to put the bowl back inside the giant, shiny sand crab. Suddenly, extra lights came on from the dunes opposite the student, and he froze while deciding what to do.
[Ho there, Farban! Now the bounty that's been posted for you'll be ours in a moment or two. 'Dead or alive' it says, but you're worth more to us alive than dead, so please don't resist.]
[Horchan? You lousy bounty hunter swine...]
[Now now, Farban, be polite or I'll just stun you and tie you up real good.]
[Come on, boys, and bring Chelashim with you. No last minute rescue with that souped-up light freighter of yours this time, Farban.]
The student watched in confusion as a humanoid shape appeared over an other dune and cautiously neared the giant crab and the humanoid while pointing a shiny, oddly-shaped stick towards the first humanoid. This other humanoid was clad in bits and pieces of something that looked like hard shell, but was otherwise similar to the first humanoid.
Suddenly, the student noticed that some of the stars over his head moved, and dug even deeper into the sand. What could he trust, now that even the stars moved?
[You see, Farban, my boys are bringing down your light freighter now, so that you can have the luxury of riding home in your own bucket of bolts. And there's someone there who's anxious to meet you, too - Chelashim, that Sluissi of yours, is waiting for you in the cargo hold - and there's plenty of binders to go around for everybody. Heh heh heh heh.]
Slowly, a whine became clear through the clear, silent night, and the student wondered what kind of appearance that whine herolded. A large shadow set down on a level part of the desert some distance away, and some more light was lighted by it. It looked remarkably like one of the flying things he had seen in the water, the student decided, with four stubby legs - one in each corner of the vaguely spheroid shape, and a head thrusting out in the middle forward, with some kind of tail thrusting out back. It was even shiny, like the thing he had seen in the water, but the drawings on the side of the thing didn't look like anything he'd ever seen before. A shell on the bottom of the thing tilted oddly, and four more humanoid shapes came walking out of there, one of them a big, walking humanoid rug.
[Brammacc, tie this guy up. Swatiq, take the rest of the gems in the digger. And Horge and Lortiq gets to check the perimeter.]
The student watched in confusion as the big rug came walking down to the first humanoid and did something to its arms and legs, throwing it roughly over his shoulders. The others pulled out small, oddly-shaped shiny but black sticks and started walking around down in the depression around the sand crab. The second humanoid shape walked to the sand crab, pulled out the little square bowl again, and started pouring the contents of the bowl into one of its robe-pouches.
Suddenly, one of the humanoid shapes lunged, and caught something slim and black and lithe, though it was squirming in his grasp to get free. Laughing, it dragged the girl in front of the others to see.
[See what Swatiq found. A little girly girly. Mabbe someone wants fun?]
[Swatiq has done good. Mabbe Lortiq gets fun?]
[Heh. I must admit she's a well-formed little thing, that one. Makes me wonder if she's physically ... compatible, you know?]
Roughly, the humanoid holding the girl stripped her of her halter and briefs. The student reddened with anger. They were imposing their wills on her! Her squirming and begging was obviously of no use here. Then he would end this torture, here, now!
He rose from the sand, and came walking down into the midst of the startled humanoids. With a loud voice, almost cracking with anger, he demanded that they release her immediately.
[Hey! Where did that one come from?]
[I dunno. Seems like he wants something.]
[Perhaps the girly girly?]
[Yeah. Perhaps. Lortiq, smack the little thing over the head to teach him some manners.]
[Yes, Horchan.]
One of the humanoids put away his shiny stick, and came over to the student, towering over him. The smack came suddenly, and the student, not expecting an attack, tumbled over in the sand. Slowly, he rose while his head fins almost glowed a dull red. This was enough. If this was the way they wanted it, then that would be the way he would play with them.
[It's okay, Brammacc's on the little tough guy's case. Fancy move he used to throw Lortiq with, though. But now he's up against a wook, and that's a whole other ballgame for the little guy. Figure he ain't so tough now.]
After a few preliminary swings which the student easily dodged, the big rug came charging in. The student leaped nimbly to one side, and wondered at the clumsy approach. As an experiment, he blocked the next lumbering blow the rug heaved at him. And was thrown clear across the depression and smacked into the side of a dune.
[Heh. That one ought to take him down. See, he's half buried in the sand. Now, about that girl...]
The student slowly got up. A strange feeling overtook him, just as he distantly sensed that the giant rug came lumbering toward him again. It was a kind of power, a kind of relaxed distress that the girl was in danger, and a knowledge that he could do something about it. With a focusing yell, he jumped! up to the level of the head of the rug, and delivered a devastating kick. Using the shoulders of the struck rug as a springboard, he then vaulted over it, and landed with a double hammerhand strike squarely on the humanoid holding the girl. A strange, cracking sound could be heard, and something gave in the head of the humanoid. The humanoid with the shiny bits of carapace on himself started vaguely fumbling with the oddly shaped stick again, as if in slow motion.
The student felt as if everything he had ever learned came together in this moment. Charging towards the humanoid, he was surprised when the humanoid shot light! towards him, glancing his chest. Stumbling a bit, he then found his pace again, and leaped towards the humanoid with one elbow extended, smashing it into the chest of the humanoid. The largest bit of carapace, the one the student hit, cracked cleanly in two, and fell off the clothing of the humanoid. As the humanoid doubled over, the other elbow of the student hit it in its ugly face. It, too, crumpled, and the student turned around, looking for new targets.
He saw the humanoid he had thrown trying to stand, and the girl sobbing while she tried to put on her ruined bikini again. Contemptously, the student walked over to the humanoid he had thrown, aimed for a moment, and kicked it in the jaw. It fell over. The rug lay where it had fallen, and didn't seem to want to move, that one either. The student walked over to the girl, and tried to comfort her. He helped her make new clothes from the clothes of the humanoids with not too much blood on it. At least she seemed to be a bit consoled. The student then turned his attention to the creature which the rug had been carrying, which had made noise while he comforted the girl.
[At last you notice me, kid. Those moves were awesome! Downing a wookie with one blow and all that... You're sure you're not too good to be true?]
"Why haven't you gotten up if it is so important to you that you have to make so much noise and all? Perhaps these shiny things is the reason."
[I don't know what you're talking about, kid, but I'd be happy to take you anywhere you like if you help old Farban out of this mess. See these binders? Horchan's probably got the keys on himself somewhere... You look bright, kid, go look for the keys. Keys - get it? Keys. Keys.]
"You want me to get you out of these shiny ropes? What do you keep saying
[Keys, yes that's right. Now go over to Horchan and get them, OK?]
"I'll get you out of those ropes. Now hold still."
[You're mad, kid, you can't burst open bonds if you're human strong, you see, and ... Oh the Four Moons of Yavin...]
"{Nngh}. Hey, those ropes were tough! I'd better just stamp the ones holding your feet together like this {Hayah}, and you're free. Though why you'd want those metal ropes around your wrists the first place is beyond me."
The humanoid the student had just freed seemed to be mumbling quite a lot, and ran towards the big thing that had landed a bit away.
[Wonder what good old Chelashim'll say about me promising the boy a trip anywhere in the galaxy in exchange for help. I'd better get Kay Oh up and running too, so that I can speak with the little bugger.]
The girl and the student waited stoically - the girl less stoically - while the humanoid came back, with an extremely shiny and clumsy humanoid with him, and another more reddish colored humanoid which was rubbing its wrists.
[Calm down Farban, what's so important about that kid? He can't possibly be able to do all that you've just told me.]
[I tell you, he downed a wook with one blow! And then he made some strange move, and punched the hell out of the other Weequay holding that black girl over there, and then he...]
"Well, I don't know what you're jabbering on about, but I thought I would leave now, after you've told me what the shiny, giant sand crab is. This is the task I have been tasked with as my Rite of Passage, and it is important for me to complete it." [Well, Kay Oh, can you understand him?]
>Yes, Master, I Think I Can Understand The Young Gentleman<
[Then tell him what I told you to say to him, and get on with it! I want to be long gone from here if Horchan's got some backup with him, not that I think it'll do him any good, but...]
>Yes, Master. Immediately.<
>"Told You Am I To Do, My Master Thank You Wishes To."
"You can speak my language? Sort of at least? Do you come from the golden sands to the green sands of here - your accent's a bit strange."
>"Do That I Do Not, Come Henceforth From There I Mean."
"Oh. Whatever."
[And the gift, Kay Oh, that too!]
>"Told You Am I To Do, My Master Gift Wishes You To Give."
"I give him a gift? What strange notion. What could I have that would interest him?"
>Oh dear, a little mistake there.< >"He Gift Wishes To Give To You, Was What I Meant."
"Oh. That sounds real interesting."
>"Worlds Beyond He Wishes To Show You."
"Worlds beyond?"
... And after a little explaining was done, the student decided to accept the offer from the man he came to know as Farban, to travel the galaxy and see the world. Farban gave him gifts - one staff of "metal", harder and better than the one he had made himself, and one of the sticks that could shoot light. Then there was only thing left to do.
The student faced the girl. "I will leave for the stars, to see other worlds beyond this one, this Kass'Jadar, and to study and learn." "Yes, I understand. Will I ever see you again?" "I do not know. Know this, however, that my name is Lerebuce." "I am Neesha." "Neesha, I task you this if you will do a favor for me." "I will." "Tell the master and the elders what I have done, and that I travel with luck in my heart." "I will." "Tell them that some of these otherworlders are good, and others are bad. Tell them that they must approach with caution, because one cannot tell on the outside which is which." "I will." "Then I leave Kass'Jadar, yet always will carry it with me in my heart." "You will." Lerebuce turned around, and walked to the "ship", up the "ramp", and sat down in the "sofa" which was in the "lounge". He reconsidered, and walked into the "cockpit", to see out through the "hood" when they "lifted off", or started flying as he preferred to think of it.
He couldn't see Neesha, but he knew she was out there. He stood in the cockpit, and saw his world from the high point of "space". Soon, they were in "hyperspace". And he was on his way to the other worlds, other Kass'Jadar, Kass'Jadari - Places of Life?
| Taken from the pages of Jens-Arthur Leirbakk |