Lsis was on her way home, back from Madam Kyjuviti’s place helping the old lady with chores. Kyjuviti was a veteran, lost her two legs during an encounter with Iota’s notorious Monarchist terrorist organization CACA some thirty years ago, now working as the toddler carer of the company. Lsis had promised the femme a visit every time she came back from school; she almost broke that promise this month from just how busy life had become. Every child in Iota above the age of three had to attend primary education school, living and studying alongside their peers for at least five weeks out of the six in a month; the one week left would be spent with their family or home company.
Lsis would be returning to school tomorrow, and if she were lucky, five weeks later she would graduate into the Church’s clerical academy; if not, she would go to university and join the army. Arky, I really, really do not want to bear guns, and the deployment… if they deployed me to some backwater village down south, or worse, in the east…
Even from afar, Lsis could tell something unusual had happened to her house. A car was parked right at the front door. A car, not a truck, but a car, an extremely inefficient vehicle designed only to hold a few persons at once, usually only reserved for ceremonial purposes. Not since the Church of Falsehood first united mankind under the banner of the Iota Empire had this village ever received figures of any importance that warranted a car of their own.
Lsis entered the house and found her parents and her little brother gathered around the dinner table, looking at her with solemn eyes; even Smooch didn’t squeal in excitement in light of her returning home. The air was warmer indoors, yet it still felt frozen solid, crystalized with quietude.
A middle-aged woman with her back straight wearing a black and golden gown stood tall in the middle of the room. The embroidered golden sigil of Scientism shimmered under the pale white light; an Arkydian spiral made of progressively shrinking circles, the most famous and arguably most integral step of Arkydis’ mathematical proof for π. The woman was tall and lanky, her eyes sunk deep inside her sockets, cheekbones, and forehead protruding outward giving off this air of aggression, and the glasses she wore had no frames. This was a clerk from the Church.
“Umm… good health, your holiness…” Lsis felt her hands shaking. Unlike the doctors in her school, these clergymen from the Church exhumed unfriendliness from their every pore, and they usually would not bother individual families’ homes unless some drastic action was sanctioned by the Church. The thought of her somehow being committed into the wards crossed Lsis’ mind; that couldn’t be, she hadn’t done anything illegal or unhealthy, as far as she could tell.
“Good health.” The clerk sloppily gave a scientific salutation, “Are you Lsis of Sixth Division, Fourth Battalion, Company 56, daughter of Flla of Sixth Division, Third Battalion, Company 16, and Iltan of Sixth Division, First Battalion, Company 2?”
“Yes,” should I return the salutation? No, I haven't graduated from school yet, I am technically not serving..
“A shaman from the Klausian Church wanted to see you,” the clerk muttered as she looked through the cartridge folder in her hand, “I’m just here to arbitrate. Note that I would have to report everything that is said between you and the shaman back to the Deacon…” she situated herself on the window sill, “alright, your grace, you can do your thing with the girl now.”
A figure entered the living room from the back room. A Klausian shaman. Lsis had come across some Klausians during her days at school and at the capital, and yet till this very day, these Northern people living amongst the volcanoes still seemed utterly alien to her. They talked different, they dressed different, and they looked different.
The shaman before her was no exception. Lsis’ brown skin was already on the dark side, yet it couldn’t hold a candle before the charcoal black skin tone prototypical of all Klausians; living beside the volcanos for more than forty generations certainly gave Klausian people a distinctive look. A slightly chubby man in his mid-twenties wearing an all-white gown with an earthly brown toga wrapped around his torso, the shaman’s facial features were rotund yet well-defined. Every inch of his skin was tattooed with Klausian patterns, and piercings and rings made of good iron and bronze were all over him; his left eye had been entirely replaced by an artificial compound lens, and his right hand was covered in a steel plate. A good-mannered smile hung on his face, contrasted sharply with the rest of the room.
“Good health, sister,” said the shaman, offering a handshake, “I do apologize for not noticing your family of this meeting beforehand, our camel teams arrived at Iota much later than I had planned for. Hope I didn’t catch you at an awkward time.”
The Klausian accented common tongue was thick, and a lot more tonal than the standard Republic common tongue. Each word the shaman pronounced seemed to perform their own rituals, climbing ups and downs on a never-ending slope.
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“No, no at all,” Lsis took the handshake, “and how shall I address your holiness…”
“I’m not your holiness,” the man chuckled lightly, “I’m sure as the top history student in your entire battalion, you would not be ignorant of the fact that the Volcanist Church of Klause split from Falsehood nearly two hundred years ago. My name is Oupyrsa Utaqi,” Klausian names were always long, and came in two parts; they called the second part their “last name.”
“Sir Oupyrsa…”
“Neither am I your commander,” the affable smile on the man’s face made him extremely likable, appealing to Lsis’ eyes, “you can just address me as your comrade. I’m a practicing shaman from Kunkunite University. Have you heard of it, by any chance?”
Of course she had. Kunkunite University was one of the most reputable and prestigious academic institutions on Terra. Founded by Klause the Bold’s original sixteen disciples, almost all Klausian dictators since Klause’s separation from Iota were alumni of Kunkunite, as were several prominent figures of the Republic, including two of the current sitting directors.
“We are doing an exchange program with Baufast and Arky, looking for exceptional students in the Republic willing to head Insula for a higher education in history and Klausian philosophy,” Belfast and Arky were both top universities in the Republic, “obviously we have more than enough personnel in the field of Industry and surgical operation, but our department of history has been… lacking in protege for quite some time.”
The clerk, who had been writing down notes this entire time, let out a small sniffle, “I’m sorry, never mind me. No offense intended.”
Oupyrsa simply chuckled, “none taken. We Klausians aren’t humanists, it is only natural that less of our students will be interested in Anthropology related subjects. At any rate, I have been looking in the sixth division for students gifted in the subject of history, and I will be completely honest with you, Lsis, there are several students ahead of you that I would like to exchange for. However, all of them had rejected the idea of studying abroad. Most found the idea of crossing the Bhgau desert… daunting.”
And Lsis found that idea daunting as well. The Bhgau was the largest tundra desert on front Stripea, separating the Insula volcanic cluster and the Klausian states from the Insula mainland. Measured at almost 8000 kms (5000 miles) from West to East and 2000 kms (1200 miles) from South to North, its vastness defied all manner of transportations other than wooly camel caravan.
The man noticed Lsis’ concerned expression, “I totally understand the apprehension. I will be offering you a spot in Kunkunite University, sister Lsis. Four years of education in Klause will open the eyes of any democratic person. I sincerely hope for your attendance. I have to leave for Company Pente by the eighth, and we have a lot of paperwork to do before we can embark, so… be haste.”
Later that day, Lsis’ parents gathered everyone for a family meeting; called a family meeting, in actuality it was more like a village meeting. Their house was cramped from the front door to the backyard with people of all ages, chiming in on this girl’s great prospect. In their living room, In their living room, Lsis sat awkwardly in the center of a ring of blabbering adults. Her parents, mainly her mother, were having a fierce debate with the village’s elders,
“Lsis is only twelve!” She had never seen her mother emoting so much while speaking, “She is only twelve and we are sending her across the Bhgau? One of you lot has got to done that trip before, I’m sure. Sir Ttrst, Madam Cawlin, y’all know how dangerous that expedition is! Heck, comrade Ou has worked in Company Pente before he was reassigned here, how many corpses have you seen them caravans carrying with them every trip?”
“Not zero, that’s for sure,” Ou replied with a forlorn expression; the man was always a close friend of their family.
“It’s too early! I am Lsis’ mother. I want her to receive the best education more than anyone else in the room! But we are not talking about the capital, not talking about Baufast, we are talking about Insula! The Klausians! Those people eat in public! They have no freedom to work, they have no gender, they are not humanists! She will be shunned!”
“Flla, my dear Flla,” snuggled comfortably in a wheelchair, the respected crone Kyjuviti uttered in a slow and soft voice, and the vociferous room immediately quieted down, “Lsis wouldn’t be the first to study in Klause, and the Klausian Church Kunkunite is an opportunity of a lifetime. It wouldn’t be right turning it down for Lsis… whatever adversity, I have faith that our Lsis will overcome…”
“She is twelve!”
“Flla…” Lsis’ father, who had been silent for the last few hours, finally let out a trembling voice that sounded like a whimper, “I think it would be best… if we let Lsis decide if she is willing to go.”
And all eyes were on her now; her mother was not happy with how the meeting had turned out, but Lsis knew that she would respect her decision, no matter the outcome. After all, it wouldn’t be democratic if parents ignored the will of their children.
And Lsis’ will was perfectly clear the moment that Klausian shaman showed up in their living room: she didn’t know this before, but she had wanted this her entire life, to see this grand wild world for its own sake. She wanted to live amongst the volcanoes, to probe the esoteric nature of the Klausian culture, to learn a new language, to be taught medicine, science, and history from perspectives never imagined before, adversity and fear notwithstanding.