What is it? [Seroth]

[Mala]

A report blinked into the Conclave's schedule to be looked at, another call from Arda. The planet seemed to be collecting problems that they could not handle. This one was not life threatening, but it was clearly causing upset in peaceful space. It told of an animal, lurking at the edges of the village, stealing bright objects and skittering off into the forest, not a problem, not until it was cornered for stealing and bitten someone before brandished a lightsaber, something the villagers had learnt to fear.

*~*~*~*~*

The cacophonous noise of the forest burned Mala's ears. Such a contrast to the dark and silent wreckage she had lived on for so long. The people smelt funny, the earth was uncomfortable beneath her feet and the water made her cold. She hadn't meant to stay here, she'd slipped from another ships belly, drawn by the unusual noises and wound up left behind. A bird shouted above her head. "SHUT UP!" she shouted jumping to her feet and sending many of the fluttering beasts fleeing to the skies.

Returning to her haunches she patted the items she had collected. A brightly coloured ball the children had been playing with, a mirror, a small collecting of fishing hooks among other bizarre items. She picked a hook up turning it slowly in her fingers, holding it close to her eye as she tried to understand the point of it. A disruption in the skies above made her jump and somehow the hook ended up through her finger. She howled and shook her hand furiously, trying and failing to dislodge it. Whimpering she looked up to see an angular ship passing overhead.

Torn between the pain in her hand and the call of curiosity from the ship, she howled again, before giving into the latter and moving once more through the jungle forgetting to cover her stash.

@[member="Seroth Ur-Rahn"]

 

[Seydon of Arda]

The set arrangement was very simple: send a missive and in time, someone would come. All that was required were solid details. For quick instance, the name of the tribe in crisis and appointed Kee alongside what they called their island abode. If they could manage, directions, coordinates, were appreciated. Arda, old as she was, old as her children had aged, lacked for comprehensive cartography. Local adventurers relied on directions from village to village, until they eventually arrived at wherever it was they sought.

It was six hours flight-time, then Seroth found the 'Comb Isle', a compact collection of hexagonal coral growths mounted on the bent spine of a larger reef. Trusted Iron Snake, his reconnaissance vessel, poured down overhead on a landing course. Ramjets blared loud as tide-fall, vectored so wide the ship appeared like a suspended eagle in descent. The lad at the helm geared down the landing stanchions; thickly truncated durasteel legs, padded with grip-hooks and shivering fluid-exchange cables, sunk into a sandy flat. It was a small landing zone, overlooking the south beach-heads. Behind the prow-mounted cockpit, a thick-set door swung up and lolled out a debarkation ramp.

A man came down the steps. Cloaked in a wintergreen snow-cloak, as tattered and re-sewn as any vagrants bed. Belted over his hips and chest with thin leather harnesses, fitting with odds and ends pertinent to a ranger's trade. Over his shoulder rested a long vibrosword idling in its recharge scabbard; by his hands rested a sheathe knife and tomahawk, glinting darkly under hot Ardan light. Seroth Ur-Rahn pulled the small holo-slate out from his belt and re-read the missive. ...This was the isle. And this was where the persnickety thief-thing had been seen scurrying around at dawn.

...Something sounded deeper past the tree-line. Seroth cocked an ear; patters of small, clawed feet hooking into soft, moldy earth, jogging along, besides the stark rustle of foliage not belonging to the wind. North on the line of banded soft-wood ball-palm trees and juni-birches, some body was hurrying along. The lad opted to wait a tick. ...And to keep his fingers looped close to his waiting tools.

@[member="Mala"]

 

[Mala]

Mala halted her run suddenly, clawed feet kicking up dirt as she did. Eyes looked thoughtful for a moment, the trees still concealing her from view. She had a dilemma, a shiny object stuck in her finger, and a strange ship with a stranger on it. A whimper escaped her and she paced for a moment. before moving forward again, hiding, so she thought, though she was much more adept at doing this on a ship than in a jungle, amongst the undergrowth so she could look at the stranger.

He smelt different, not of this world, yes somehow familiar to it all the same, like his normal scent was tainted with this world or this world tainted with his scent. She inched out purple ears flattened against her skull as she did, agitated and uncertain, she kept half her body in the undergrowth as if it would offer some protection, patchy filled and dirty clothes visible, a silver cylinder hanging at her waist. Slowly her ears began to lift and she inched further out, curious.

Then she saw them, the tools that he carried ears flattened once more and she was away, fear gripping her as she disappeared back into the undergrowth scampering away so quickly she caught the hook in her finger and let out a yelp and stopped. Whimpering continously. Maybe, maybe her could take it out for her, maybe the shiny tools were not for cutting flesh. She moved back again calling from the undergrowth. "What is it?" Is it friend or foe?

 

[Seydon of Arda]

"What is it?"

...There. Just behind a thicker collection of gently shifting ferns and broad-leaved berry-brambles. He paused, to observe. It was hunkered down, low to the belly, on all fours - wait, it 'limped' in a fashion - and was very busy keeping him squared down its sights. Beyond the general impression, shade and floral shadow obscured the better portions of its frame. It was small, bright eyed, more than likely a sight more agile than any natural man.

'What is it?' Maybe it commands Basic differently, Seroth thought. Or poorly. He tested taking a pace forward on the sand and salty-grass. From the underbrush issued a distrustful, nasally hiss. Pausing, he stepped back to his former spot. His brow furrowed, considering. Obviously, the locals weren't being harassed by some hitherto unknown, unseen beast. Not if it could utter tilted Basic. 'What is it'? What was the referring to, precisely? What was he? What was the vessel behind, idling with ticking engines?

Seroth hesitantly replied. "I am me. I am Seroth. Who are you?"

@[member="Mala"]

 

[Mala]

Fingers that weren't stuck with hooks dug into the earth as it stepped forward and sunk back at the uncontrolled hiss that escaped her. "Seroth." she repeated, the name rung no bells in her head, but then she'd been out of the galaxy for a long time. Tentatively she inched forward wanting to see him without the leaves obscuring her view again. She blinked, momentarily in the light, fixing him with a wary stare before coming to stand properly. She would be away in the bush before he could reach her. She glanced once more at his weapons.

"Mala." she said finally "Mala..." the fur on her body shivered for a moment and she glanced back at the forest behind her. "Mala doesn't like it here. The shiny's hurt and the people smell funny. Seroth...smells different. What is it?"

 

[Seydon of Arda]

"Ranger," He said, tapping at his chest with paired fingers. "I come here, to Arda, whenever folk need me to."

She'd found the gumption to stand and revealed herself to the cowled stranger. He measured the distance between the masking foliage to the bare grass and sand lot by some ninety paces. At a guess, false moves would launch her back into the jungle obscurity, where her diminutive size, quickness, and dexterity would make pursuit difficult, if not exasperating. Maybe dangerous, Seroth considered. 'Mala' was a Squid: rodent-esque with bright eyes that were almost crystalline, just under a meter's height, slight in weight and narrow.

But Squib were fast. Fast enough to foil even Death, went the spacer adage. How exactly had she come to get deposited on Arda? Her people were notoriously savvy for potential business, and save for trade in whale-bone and oil, shark-skin and teeth, and local catches of succulent fish, Arda was unprofitable. By accident, maybe, a mistake? Mala appeared worn for her time stuck in the interior bush, by the tells of slight nicks and scratches caught in her quilt-sewn tunic and ragged pants. There was a bother in one of her hands: she favoured it out of sight. Seroth tensed the olfactory nerves in his nostrils and bent the Force to gather a comprehensive whiff. ...Blood.

"What is Mala?" He asked after her. "Why is Mala here? Why does she steal from the fishers? Brandish her sword at them? Is she hurt? Is Mala lost?"

@[member="Mala"]

 

[Mala]

Ranger.

She processed the word, slowly. Ears twitching this way and that responding to subtle sounds in the forest. A wanderer, someone capable of combat, yet he was not looking to fight, that mush Mala could tell, naive as she may be, she spent the early years of her life around those who did and that thought put her at ease somewhat. that was until he responded to her.

So many questions. She took half a step back eyes closed for a moment and hands clapped over her ears. Still for a moment as she processed them. "Mala is Mala." she said finally, relaxing again "Mala was hiding in the stars, Young in Spirit found Mala, drew Mala out, came here. Wasn't meant to leave Young in Spirit but Mala was nosy, got left behind." she sniffed ears drooping. She should have stayed on her drifting cruiser with all the noises she knew, where shiny things didn't stab her.

"Mala can't help it." she moaned miserably "Mala was scared. They cornered Mala, the shiny scared them back." Her finger throbbed and yellow eyes blinked back tears that came unbidden. "Mala doesn't steal, Mala scavenges. Takes things others don't need." She hesitated again before taking another tentative step forward, ears flat once more against her head, pausing before taking another, before slowly raising the impaled hand "Will Ranger help Mala?"

@[member="Seroth Ur-Rahn"]

 

[Seydon of Arda]

The mandate greyed on what precisely the local village wished done with the presence that had been scouring their kit-boxes and playgrounds. They simply wanted the problem solved. Details fell to his lap on what had to be accomplished alongside the how, and when. Distantly, across to the south-reach of the horizon, seasonal stormheads roiled. Lightning kissed at swollen, bruised clouds barring darkening sky. Seroth glanced, to take a measurement of time. ...Six hours, past midnight, when the storm would roll in and drench the isle. The night would slowly scroll by with cold, wetly scathing misery.

The man leaned forward to rest down on his knee. It brought his line-of-sight more or less even to the Squib still keeping her counsel in the undergrowth. Rosa once told that children took a preference to adults who communicated knelt, eye-to-eye. It was supposedly less imperious and fostered an idea of approachability. Mala was a grown sentient, true. Grown, sounding tired, frightened, homesick. Ardan law was vague on the status of thieves. Theft was a rarity, for most villages kept a share of property that passed from soul to soul. It only became issue when disappearances grew detrimental to maintaining gut-thread fish lines.

For Seroth, it was simple, aquiline pity. "I can help Mala," He called over a flute of wind gusting over the Iron Snake. "But Mala needs to help me too. The tribes-people would like those shines back. Mala doesn't have to give it back personally. I can do that. But they want them back. Otherwise, they wouldn't have asked me to find you. ...And Mala needs to me. I..."

He gestured at his kit, the weaponry. "I wear these to kill monsters. Slay beasts. And bad men. It does not sound like Mala is a monster or a bad person. They aren't for you."

@[member="Mala"]

 

[Mala]

Bad men. That was something she understood, the two words brought back a vivid memory, one that made all her hair stand on end and shrink down to her haunches again. Something in her body language changed, whatever self pity and fear she had it was suddenly gone, replaced with anger and a cold hate. "For pirates." she hissed eyes gleaming with approval. That seemed to seal the deal for her, she scampered forward standing before Seroth, no longer afraid or wary.

"Mala will give the shiny's back." shesaid certainly, her ears suddenly upright, the dropped slightly. "Must Mala give all of them back? Yes yes yes Mala must." she thrust her hand at Seroth "Get it out, its hurts. Then Mala will take Ranger to shiny's."
@[member="Seroth Ur-Rahn"]

 

[Seydon of Arda]

Her finger had been pierced through by a length of polished bone-hook. To the credit of her luck, she'd avoided getting her knuckle entangled on the curled piece, though Seroth winced slightly. This example of local craftsmanship had been detailed for deep-sea blood-tuna angling. An artists scrimshaw described a scene of winding ribbon-snakes wrapped around the hook's straightened haft. By the hard give, it'd been scavenged from a whale-tooth. Notoriously inflexible. He frowned; quarter-inch barbs lined the inner curl. The razor point felt through skin and flesh with fierce ease, then promised a painful return if tugged back through the wound.

"You can bite on this," Seroth fetched a hard length of spare leather-bindings from his waist-belt. He unhooked Seydakin from its sheathe. "Just bear with me, Mala."

The hook would have to be destroyed. Yanking the hook-barbs through the Squib's finger would slice into already compromised tendons, score into the knuckle-bone. Bacta or a little kolto treatment could render some relief, but there was a scare of possible nerve-damage. It wouldn't do to have a healed but inert digit. Carefully, fingers gloved, he took hold of the hook and gently glided it forward through her finger. Blood trickled, oozed down onto his knee. Seroth just needed some clearance. Then he lifted his knife and with a smooth wick, cut the alchemized edge through the upper hook. The barb-head snapped away to land a few feet in amidst the mica-sand and granite particles. What little remained of the aft-haft simply tugged out.

"There...," He muttered, staunching her weeping cut with a length of sterile, adhesive bandage. "That should coagulate. Some kolto will take care of any muscle tears, and maybe nerve damage. Now."

Seroth stood and replaced Seydakin back onto its catch. "The shiny's, Mala."

@[member="Mala"]

 

[Mala]

To her credit, Mala didn't make a sound nor attempt to tug her hand away as Seroth worked the hook forward, she went rigid in his grip as he reached for his knife, terrified for a split second that he would simply remove her finger. She closed her eyes teeth clamping down on the leather bindings he had given her, an involuntary squeak escaping her as the hook was finally tugged free. She spat the leather bindings out and inspected the bandage he had put on her finger.

"Hmm?" she said looking back at him. "Shiny's? Yes yes yes. This way." she bounced towards the forest pausing at its edge to galnce back and make sure he was following before vanishing beneath its canopy. She was noisy enough that he would keep track of where she way and every now and then she would pause and look back for him, a shiver of excitement ran through her as she reached her stash, she froze though. someone had been here, she could smell, taste it in the air. "No!" she shouted scrambling at the bare earth where she had dug her hole.

They were gone. "Nonononono." she paced back and fourth patting herself, she had the lightsaber, but something else was missing. Hands scraped at her neck and let out a mournful howl. She had left her locket with the stash. "Where's it gone?!" she pawed at the earth around looking, smelling for the theif.Then she bolted, the Ranger forgotten as she raced for the village, she spotted the theif close to the village edge and raced after him, barrelling into him knocking everything from his hands. He hit the ground hard, a boy no older than twelve. Mala bounced off him, scrambling through the items he had dropped. No locket.

She looked at him as he got to his feet, terror in his eyes and a silver chain dangling from his fingers. Mala stared at him for a moment. "Give it back!" Alarmed the boy took a step back and Mala leapt at him again, a small ball of fur slamming into his chest claws scraping at his arm as he tried to lift the locket out of reach. The pair toppled to the ground and Mala sunk her teeth into whatever flesh she could find, eyes fixed on the silver chain. A hand closed about her throat pushing her away.

@[member="Seroth Ur-Rahn"]

 

[Seydon of Arda]

Boots beat into the loam, chewing in against soggy dents of earth. The Squib led a panicked trail looping around old basalt columns rising hexagonal from the earth and on through to where the village was propped upon a rocky plateau of volcanic rock and obsidian deposits. Briefly, he saw her hiding patch: a bed thatched together with palm-fronds, lengths of soft plankton-moss, beside some savaged bird and squirrel bodies. Evidence of a raid passed through. Six, nay, seven small feet and one larger; a disgruntled children's band with their teenage caretaker had reclaimed their 'shiny's'. Mala hollered, pained, thin hands scrabbling through the rent up dirt and clam-husks.

She'd then taken a straight bead for the village. Seroth found her on the outskirts behind the thatch-ware huts. Her small, furry body was an explosive force scratching at a young, hollering boy. The lad kept one hand out of her reach, punching at her ribs, trying to muster up more spiteful strength. Locals came at the commotion. Alarmed adults charged in, some bearing a few hefty walking sticks, nonplussed. A frame interposed itself between them and the scene. Seroth waded forwarded to smack aside scrabbling hands trying to lift Mala from the lad. They vented irritation his way, but he gave a stern word.

"Mala, easy, easy!" It was all but impossible to calm her agitation. Grey eyes sparked with idea. With now a compliment of elders amidst the crowd peering in through the hut-alleys, he came to a kneel and snatched the locket up from the boy's unknowing palm. Immediately, he turned about from Mala scratching at his chest, protesting.

"Give that back!" He cried.

"If it's yours, I can," Seroth replied. "Is it yours?"

"Aye-yah, what's it matter? This kadey-say - " Some older folk grunted. " - this 'thing' took from us! And I took back!"


"You took back your hooks and toys and wares, but then stole from her in turn?" The man arched an eyebrow.

"It wasn't stealing!"

"But is this Ardan?" The locket was dangled from its sterling chain-link. "Forgive any arrogance but I've never met an Ardan who had any need for something so easy to misplace and tarnish."

The boy averted his eyes, crawling out from beneath Mala. "...Nah, it's not anything of ours. 'Least I don't think."

"So it's not yours?"

"Nah, no... But that don't mean it gets to square off without a lickin'!" He grunted, and turned to snatch up a length of fallen palm-bough to whip across Mala. Seroth was already moving, snatching the switch away, breaking it with a little snap of his knuckles. "Heyoi!"

"Enough, child," Said one man. He pushed through the bind of locals locked upon the drama. Seroth bowed, made the customary sign of his thumb and forefinger, respecting the appearance of the Kee. He was thickset, heavy at the waist in pants stitched from whale-back leather, the shield of a great sea-turtle shell mounted upon his backside. The Kee peered with small, dark eyes, twinkling with a kind of old, tired wisdom. "Calamity's brought when one oversteps their bounds. You have your toys back, the fishers their hooks, and other baubles. Don't compound this irritation."

"But - !"

"You are not the tide, my lad, that you can't relent."

The boy tsked and stole his arms in over his chest akimbo, noticeably sour. Seroth nodded to the Kee, who busily dispersed the crowd. They had sixteen dugouts and nine rafts worth of arrohra fishmeat to ready for the trade on Wedya Atoll. Work was needed and required moving hands to be completed. Eventually, even the boy sauntered off. But not before he stuck Mala with a dark stink-eye. The beast-hunter came to Mala and offered up the locket dangling from his gloved fingers.

@[member="Mala"]

 

[Mala]

The crowd that gathered had made Mala rigid, feet frozen to the ground she was unable to move. She wanted to run, but her desire, her need for the locket overrode that instinct, eyes were fixed on the locket in the rangers hand as he exchanged words with the boy, a strangled whine coming from her throat as she battled tears. "Please." she whispered though the plea was so soft it was lost in the wind. When Seroth came before her offering her the locket she took it gently from his hands and slumped to the floor sobbing uncontrollably.

"Mala is sorry!" she wailed "Di-di-didn't m-mean too." Trembling fingers opened the locket to activate a small holoimage of her parents, geared up for a scavenge. "Mala is sorry. Won't lose you again. Not now, not ever." She whispered to them before snapping it shut and slipping it over her head. For a moment or two she simply sat there trying to regain control of herself, brushing away her tears, exhausted, confused and utterly fed up of this place.

"Take Mala somewhere else Ranger." she pleaded suddenly grabbing for Seroth's pant leg. "Mala will be good, Mala can fix things and...and Mala can slice. Please."

@[member="Seroth Ur-Rahn"]

 

[Seydon of Arda]

Tears had run smoothed rivulets down the facial fur-tufts below her puffed eyes, though he saw her trying powerfully to scruff the wetness dry. Seroth said nothing. The locket within her paws, briefly, scattered silvertine light, shaking just lightly from the tremor in her fingerpads. Distantly, the slow giant of summer storm briefly glowered on the horizon. Just loud enough to beat thunder over the wave-swell tumbling in south and east that cooling winds buffeted. He could smell the difference in the saline of her tears and the brine scent. The village Kee strolled back and leaned against the hardy brackets reinforcing a salting hut.

"What's the way for thieves here?" Seroth asked lowly. Mala was still stuck around his calve and knee.

The Kee shrugged. "You know us. What's a Kee's boat to that of a child's? Does it float? Does it float well? Then the Kee can sit in the child's dugout and she in mine, and we can both fish for those rare scor-crab."

"No punishments?" He ventured.

"How exactly would you punish something that's punishes itself enough?" The Kee chuckled, rising up to return to his mahda-house. "Just take her somewhere. Before those fingers find a way to take my favourite shell-cup, yah?"

Seroth looked to Mala. "Come on," He said and began leading the way back through the undergrowth. Wet lashes of wind came coursing up the bramble and bush, spritzing their faces with whiskers of tiny droplets. Faehda. The Storm's Sigh, surest clue that the night would be lightning-lit and basked in the bellicose thunder roars. He looked to the Squib at his hip, contemplating. "So do you have someplace preferable you'd like to return to? Home, a hideout?"

@[member="Mala"]

 

[Mala]

Mala sniffed and shook her head in response. "Ships have been Mala's home forever, drifting among the stars..." her eyes became distant "No home now. Pirates drove Mala out, killed Mala's family." She fingered the locket instinctively. She wanted a new home, she wanted to remember what it was like to be around people again. To have busy hands that had no idle time to claim glittering objects that did not belong to her.

"Mala will find a new home." she said firmly, furry face set with determination, appearing almost fearless. Then the sky rumbled and Mala's face filled with fear as she slid closer to Seroth. "Why is the sky angry?" she asked quietly, afraid it might hear her.
@[member="Seroth Ur-Rahn"]

 

[Seydon of Arda]

"It is Su-enae," He said.

The Iron Snake idled broodingly at her temporary birth. Already loose drapes of spine-kelp, lengths of seaweed grass, and even crusts of loosened barnacles, had attached and strewn across her wings and tri-wheel landing struts. It was a black shape of hard, predatory lines with a hooked prow. Drizzles of slowly hardening rain were spattering across the hard-locked wings and atmospheric stern-fins. Seroth led Mala on to their waiting vessel. Mud had tracked thick on their boots, the hunter noting it smaller globs were sticking frustratingly to the Squib's felt hair.

Ahead, over the plateau mound, thunder raised their voice. Seroth turned a moment to watch; bars of cloud had plumed into gaining smokey columns that dwarfed mountains. They were blacker than the Snake, feverish, writhing under roiling weight and moisture. Skeins of lightning lit up the coming storm, so that some clouds growled like back-lit ogres.

"Su-enae," Seroth explained, walking to the guncutter. His hand slapped an unseen palm-recognizer and lowered a boarding stair. "Is the Ardan word for 'birthing pain'. A very long time ago, there was a witch who lived here. She was with the child of a demon and when their spawn demanded to leave her flesh, her pangs were terrible. So terrifying that they changed the tides of the isles forever. Now her pain plagues the islanders: storms, whirlpools, waterspouts. They tell that 'child' still lurks where the waters cloud the light darkest and waits to rise and devour the islands.

"...Then there is the Calabed," He corrected. The hunter was stepping up the stair-rungs, gesturing at Mala to come aboard. "The Calabed is different."

@[member="Mala"]