----------------------------------------
Kale
----------------------------------------
Chapter Two: Adar Ulic Bekara
Galactic Quadrant: Darna Quadrant
Ruling Government: Republic of Hekat
Solar System: D-447
Planet: Ora
Location: Above the sands of the desert
----------------------------------------
I awaken to the groaning of the wind. My dislocated arm pains me greatly, it pulls my mind back to the moment. Taking control of my breathing now, to focus through it—like the elders taught. Darkness swells around me, the ship is leaning to one side, and I am on the bottom of the leaning side, in its shadow. I reach out but can’t touch it, I look down and see no one.
Nekam will have told everyone to leave, the tribe will not wait for me, not with the storm coming. Not even Arrum, he will obey his uncle and leave me for dead, because I am dead, my body just does not know it yet.
The pain in my arm is throbbing, I feel dried blood on my forehead and a bump accompanying the wound. I try to shift my weight, letting out a groan from the pain. I am ten meters from the hull of the ship. I try to climb up the cords, but they are thin, and I can’t find a grip on them. Looking around the dead ship, I see a long gash in it leading up to my chute. It is what stopped my fall, denying fate my corpse.
Taking a deep breath, I say a prayer to the gods I had forsaken, pumping my legs back and forth to gain momentum, so I can swing to the ship. After a minute I can almost touch it, I reach out towards it, making one final pump with my legs, until I grasp it as firmly as I can. Now curling my legs around the exposed metal. A feeling of relief washes over me, but it is short lived, the howling of the winds growing louder brings me back to reality. I grit my teeth and look skyward. I am not dead yet. There is work to be done.
My eyes squint as I see a figure far above me, leaning over the edge of the curled metal. Thinking it’s a trick of the light, I blink my eyes again and again. The figure is still there. I see a makeshift rope fall down, swinging towards me, I am so stunned the rope hits me and I do not grab it.
“Sekat! Grab it!” I hear the voice curse over the howling winds.
It is Arrum’s voice I realize. I feel a smile rip across my face, hope fills my heart.
“You are a fool!” I yell upwards.
“Never claimed to be wise! Grab it this time!” He yells back, I can barely make out the smile on his face, the shadow of the ship obscuring him. He tosses the rope again swinging it to me.
I grasp it tightly this time, looping it into my belt, and tying it as best I can with one arm.
The crawl upwards is grueling, each time I advance, I wrap another loop of the chute’s cords around me, so if I fall I won’t pull Arrum to the grave. I slip twice on my climb up since I only have one useful arm.
“You don’t give up! We are Ulima! Death must earn us!” Arrum yells to encourage me.
“Adar Ulic Bekara!” I yell back, in the old tongue, pounding my chest. Translated it means roughly - While there is life, there is the will to keep it.
After some time, I finally reach the top of the chute and rest on the metal. Too tired to think, I lie down on the curled outer shell of the hull. I am exhausted, my arm is numb.
I feel tears forming in my eyes as I thank the forsaken gods that I made it. I know they do not listen, but I thank them that my one true friend did not abandon me. I push tears back, not letting them fall. The Kuwathi do not cry. This is not the time to rejoice, the storm grows louder still. Focus fills my mind again, pressing past the pain.
“Can you stand?” Arrum asks me. He traces his hand over my mangled shoulder, cursing under his breath.
“I can.”
“Good. We need to move—the storm is upon us.” He says, looking out at the howling winds.
The suns have set now, night is upon us. The glow from the three moons the only light in the sky now.
With his help, I stand. Closing my eyes I take a deep breath, refocusing myself, and open them looking around the torn metal for a way inside. The hull of the ship is thick and layered, the little light disappears into a small hole in the third layer of plating. Too small for a big man, but for us we might be able to fit through.
I untangle myself from my chute with Arrum’s help and fold it with one arm as best I can. I make my way to the hole now, putting my head and arm through, and peer around. Using my cutter on the lowest setting, I illuminate the space inside. It looks like a small maintenance room, or something akin to it, the consoles have not been scavenged yet, which makes my heart sink. It must be encased in thick metals with no way into the main ship if no one scrapped it.
“We need to shelter the storm in here,” I say.
Arrum nods and shuffles over to the hole with me.
I fight back the despair and climb through slowly, my shoulders almost too wide to fit. My dislocated arm makes it hard to shift through. Barely managing after a few minutes of struggling I fall to the floor, landing on my injured arm. I howl in pain nursing it, clenching my teeth. I pound my other hand on the floor in frustration, and then like the elders of the tribe taught me, I breathe through the pain and focus myself. When it falls back and the calm washes over me, I look around the room, beginning to sort through the refuse around me. I see a door partially opened across from me, I look for a piece of metal and try to pry it open but it is stuck, the gears must have been bent when the ship crashed.
“Sekat…” I curse in the old tongue, slumping to the floor and trying to collect myself again. My arm is throbbing, the numbness gone once more.
“We need to set it, or you will lose it,” Arrum says looking at my mangled arm.
I grit my teeth and begin to try to control my breathing until I am calm and the pain is distant from my mind. Looking around the room again, I take stock of what I see. Using the red light of my cutter to illuminate the area once more. There are four panels and strewn about tools, I sift through them now looking for anything I can use. I know that getting down will be only one step to our getting home, we will need to fix my arm first if there is hope to climb down. I am lucky to be alive still, I am luckier still that my arm did not break, but it is frustrating to have it hang uselessly to my side.
I line up my arm as best I can and slam my shoulder into the wall howling in pain as it sets. The pain is overwhelming as I fall to the floor gasping for breath with eyes wide. I can feel it has not set right, I know I will have to pull it out again and try once more.
“You say I am a fool,” Arrum mumbles ripping the cloth from my shoulder and inspecting the injury.
“How bad?” I ask through clenched teeth.
This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.
He looks at me and shrugs saying “It could be worse. We need to reset it.”
Steeling my resolve I begin opening the chute and cutting the cords, lashing them to my injured arm. Arrum helps me tie it off to a piece of metal sticking out from the wall.
“Steady pull and I will guide it back in,” Arrum says, nodding to me and placing his hands around my shoulder.
I slowly bring it taunt - the pain in my arm increasing as it pulls straight, I throw my weight against it and hear my arm dislocate with a sickening pop once more. As the tension releases Arrum pushes it back in.
There is a relief through the pain, I think it has set properly, or at least well enough that I might use it to escape this place. I test my hand and it moves again, my joints sore but useful once more.
“Thank you,” I say embracing his arm.
“You would have done the same.” He says as he begins to take stock of the room.
My mind begins to think more clearly again now that the pain is subsiding, a dull throb and ache the only reminder of my injury. I pause for a moment and realize that if Arrum got up here, there must be a way down.
“How did you manage to get up here?” I ask him.
“I rode the storm's wind to the top of the ship with my chute.” He says with a grin “Like we did when we were kids.”
I clap him on the shoulder, he has always been brave. As an Ulima, he must be. This act was beyond bravery though, I will not soon forget it.
“Your chute?” I ask him. He turns and shows me the cords have been cut.
“The wind was too strong, I had to cut them or I would have missed the ship.” He says with a shrug.
Then it hits me, as I recall what has happened. My parachute's release cord was already cut, I am sure they were intact when we left in the morning. Neeba was the only person who checked it after me. Did he mean for this? Did he try to kill me? Will Nekam believe me? Will he take Neeba’s side? I feel the anger rising, and I try to regain my composure. I must focus on survival, it is not just my life at stake now.
“Can we get down the way you got up?” I ask him now thinking clearer again. He shakes his head
“I had to leave the rope tied up top. I don’t think either of us could make the climb.” He raises his hands up in the light. They are covered in blood and blisters where the rope burned through his gloves.
I tear some cloth from my cloak and bandage them. How do we both get down without climbing? His hands and my shoulder are too weak now. His chute is gone and mine is severely torn, it will not hold us both even if we could mend it.
“There are a lot of scraps in this room,” Arrum says.
He is not wrong, it looks untouched. I think about it and an idea sweeps over me.
“Help me cut the chute into bags.”
We begin cutting the torn chute into bags. When we finish, we start cutting the panels in the room, an Ulima must always take what they can, when they can. When we fill ten bags with the most valuable things they can carry, I begin pushing them through the hole and tying the cords of the chute. Nekam will not be pleased I have destroyed the chute more than it already was, nor will he be pleased Arrum left a rope, but we have little choice.
When I have finished tying the cords together, making them double-stranded to hold our weight, I squeeze back through the hole in the side of the ship and I know we must be quick, there is a break in the storm, but it will not last forever. I tie a few of the bags to one side of the cord.
I tie the other side of the cord around me and Arrum hooking it around our belts.
“You sure it’s long enough?” He asks me eying the ground.
Not wasting time I push them off the edge and we each grab one bag pushing the others to the ground.
“Let’s find out.”
We jump off the other side of the curled metal and begin falling quickly. It is not long until we feel the twang and our descent slows as the bags on the other end of the cord move upwards acting as a counterbalance.
“Sekat…” Arrum curses looking at the bags flying past us.
We are barely five meters above the ground when our descent suddenly stops. He looks over to me with an eyebrow raised. I shrug and cut the cord, we land with a thud on the ground, but the sands embrace is more forgiving that solid ground.
“Move back,” I say, pulling Arrum as the bags above smash into the ground moments later.
“Nekam is right, you have a demon’s luck.” He says slapping my shoulder.
I recoil from the pain but brush it off. We are not safe yet, we must be vigilant. I look out in the distance and my eyes hollow as I see a glow on the horizon, a craft approaching, a craft that I have seen many times. It glides a meter above the sand racing towards the ship.
“Carvers,” I say.
Arrum’s eyes begin to glow lightly, he is afraid. I can see his eyes widen.
“Calm yourself,” I say quietly placing a hand on his shoulder.
We race to the bags and begin burying them in the sand, greedy for our prize. I bury myself and Arrum quickly as I can see the beams of light from their craft looming over the dune, illuminating the side of the ship.
We would have tried to run, but we know better, the Carvers always come for my people in the night, killing us Kuwathi for sport. The only safe place is our city of metal, that’s why we dare not venture out in the moonlight, it is their time, their domain. It is why my tribe left me for dead, and why I do not blame them for it.
The glider arrives now blowing sand around it as it reverses thrusters and stops, hovering a few feet above the ground using a gravity engine to sit motionless. The engines power down and it rests upon the sands, the bay door in the rear of the craft opens. Three men come from the door holding plasma rifles. I can’t make out what they are saying, they are more than thirty meters from me, one of them howls with a laugh that makes my blood run cold. They head towards the ship, activating Gravboots and soaring upwards into the ship to inspect our work, and see if the ship is ready to be carved no doubt.
We take the opportunity to leave, as we pull two of our bags from the sands and throw them over our shoulders. We cannot take the rest so we leave them, remembering where they are, so we can come back later for them. We will need them in the days to come, there is no telling when we will get another ship.
We move swiftly, keeping low to the ground until we are on the trail my people carved in the sand, a trail that is being erased by the storm. We must hurry. I see bodies of people who were crushed underfoot by the mob running to the ship for the quota, their bodies already picked clean by those who didn’t meet theirs. Still moving quickly I see a man with charred flesh and take pause to examine him. His eyes are wide in horror when I look upon his lifeless face, looking at the wounds I see it was made by a plasma weapon, probably from the Carvers. I clench my jaw and keep moving, seeing more and more along the trail.
We walk for hours until in the distance I see the city of my people, it is a large beast of metal with mismatched pieces welded to fit. Function over form. It is safety, and it is danger. Around the entrance is a large gate. Lights push out into the night from it, keeping the Carvers at bay.
As I get within a hundred meters of our walled city, I see scores of people lying dead, some cut down by the Carvers for no reason other than they could, while others are slain by their own people to get their quota. I try not to look upon them, their cold lifeless eyes pull from the souls of the living.
There are a few scraps of materials upon the sands – left by those fleeing the carvers. I grab them up and put them into my clothes between the folds, it is all I can carry back to my tribe. The gate has sentries on top, two guards wearing metal armor and helmets covering their faces.
“Halt!” one of them yells to me while pointing a weapon “Identify yourself!”
We drop our bags and raise our hands, going to our knees as they instruct us to do when we speak to them.
“I am C7447, requesting entry to the city Lord,” I say. It is the number I have been assigned.
“I am C7562 also requesting entry into the city.” Arrum says, I nudge him and he finishes with “Lord.”
The guard sends a small drone the size of my head to scan me, it is black with a red light near its optical lens, the Kuwathi call them ‘Bikpi’ which means demon eye in the old tongue. The drone scans the back of our necks for my credentials, the red light flickering green as it returns to its master.
“Why are you so late?” he asks as he punches in our credentials, comparing my face to the holo of me that appears over his wrist device.
“Avoiding the Carvers, Lord,” I say, he is not a Lord, he is just a grunt of the tribe that owns my city, but they make us call them that.
They like to act superior to everyone else, as though they are not also trapped by their birth in these sands. Their mannerisms are even different, often they speak like the merchants who come for market, acting as though they are not Kuwathi. There are few who respect them, but none say anything, because they carry the masters old weapons and armors. Making them feel like gods among men. They are not.
“You have your quota?” he asks, eying our bags.
“Yes, Lord.”
“Alright bring it over.” He says opening the gates. We drag them through the gates and wait for him to walk down.
He motions for me to dump the bags and I do, he nods and then tosses me a ration of food and water. I put the contents back in the bag, placing one in the depot bin, and dragging the other one behind me.
“Oi, I’ll take that one.” He says grabbing the bag from me.
“I gave my quota Lord.” I object, he smacks me across the face with his metal gauntlet, knocking me to the ground, the taste of blood in my mouth.
“What was that?” he growls at me.
Arrum moves forward, one hand on cutter, one on blade. I shake my head at him with sternness in my eyes.
“Thank you, Lord,” I say bowing deeply and stumbling to my knees, placing my hands above me, palms to the sky to show my submission. It is what they want, so it is what I pretend to give.
“That’s more like it.” He says, retracting his helmet spitting on me, continuing with “Piss off.”
He takes my bag and brings it over to his station, more bags just like it. Arrum and I move with purpose away from him towards our tribe now.
“Bastard will probably sell it in the city on the market day—instead of giving it to the tribe he belongs to,” Arrum says spitting on the ground.
This would not surprise me, but we are lucky he gave us rations, lucky he did not frisk me for the scraps in my clothes. Lucky that he let Arrum keep his extra bag, and luckier still to be alive this night. I make my way through the flickering streetlights wiping away the blood from my lip, a smile forming on my bleeding mouth.