Brutoin stomped toward his canoe, which was tied to the rocks of the north beach of Molil Island. He was in the middle of another failed attempt, another waste of time. Yu slithered toward him, out from his hiding spot under the shadow of the cliff.
“Leaving?” Yu asked.
“Yeah,” Brutoin barked in frustration. The great project of repairing the fabric of the world was turning out to be a series of frustrations, of worthless nothings. He’d expected more of a hero’s journey, more adventure, more speedy success.
Although Brutoin and Yu had finally figured out how to explore Molil unwatched, they’d had no success in finding any pixies. First of all, it was a challenge to find the island empty of visitors, so that they could look around freely. The island seemed to be inhabited and to have a boat or two at the dock almost every weekend. Even on some week days, there might occasionally be a small canoe tied up. Secondly, these waters were not so remote, so it would be noticed if Brutoin hung around too much. This was why Brutoins’s group docked their motorized boat at a larger, tourist island. From there, Brutoin and Yu would canoe over. Luckily, since their boat was a tour boat, it was perfectly fine to have it seen among the islands, but even so it left some limitations in travel. Thirdly, there were two islands relatively nearby Molil. There was too much chance of being noticed and suspected by neighbors. They had even seen the deer-hu children, from the island to the west, swimming in the cold water unnervingly close to Molil. Lastly, and most frustratingly, when they did manage to get a good look around, there was nothing here. There were cliffs, and rocks, and earth, but nothing special.
Yu spoke again. “Did you find anything else in the trees?”
Despite not finding any pixies, Brutoin had found little stashes of childrens’ things in little hiding spots around the island. “Yeah. More junk. A sling shot, but it doesn’t even work really. – These kids must have free reign of the place, hiding their garbage all around, marking their territory like little rodents.”
“Lucky them,” Yu thought aloud.
Brutoin only grunted roughly in reply. After thinking a little, he said, “Let’s get out of here. – We need to figure out what we’re looking for. What do these pixies look like?”
If Brutoin were a more reasonable man, he might have considered that there were no pixies, since pixies were fictional. He might have considered that this was an absurd search. He could have felt defeated and have given up, gone back to re-think and then pursue more traditional goals. He considered none of these thing. His certainty in his idea of the world was undisturbed.
He and Yu took the canoe back to the their friends on the distant, larger island.
The group needed to figure out exactly what they were looking for, regroup, and then recommence their search. Brutoin was burned out though, so grew distracted. His group painted the new name of their vessel onto its side. They painted a sort of simple seesaw, tilted too far to its right, with the word ‘Defender’ written above, at the same slant as the seesaw. After this useful act was completed, they began to act on Lilah’s more destructive instincts. She enjoyed stealing form the wealthy people who she’d been rubbing shoulders with all her life.
Brutoin stood aboard The Defender, looking out at the docks. Lilah had led them out here. They were looking out at the beautifully manicured beaches with gazebos which stood right in front of large and beautiful mansions. These mansions were the places where influential people stayed a few weeks per sol, even though they blocked nature’s beautiful views from the locals all sol round.
Lilah had used her connections to gain access to some of these beautiful homes. She and her group were spending their time going into the homes and looking for anything valuable. They had some success in collecting special items from the houses: jewelry with one-of-a-kind gems, very old artifacts, culturally significant works of art. These rabble-rousers weren’t common thieves though. They didn’t just want to ransack the place for money. They wanted what should have never belonged to those other people in the first place. They wanted it to take a while for the owners to realize that the most special item in the house was gone.
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One of the houses had a most interesting thing in it. In the newly cleaned foyer there were some boxes. The place didn’t have the same abandoned feel as others did, so it would be best to clear out and avoid getting caught by anyone who happened to be around. Just as they were on their way out of the house though, they heard the barking of a tiny dog. Upon investigation, they found two animal carriers, one with a small dog, and one with a sleeping cat. On the top of each carrier was a neon colored tag that said “certified service animal – medical companion”.
“What is this?” Brutoin questioned his crew.
Mara knew the answer. “Animals can be trained to help with medical conditions. The colors and symbols on the tags will tell you what they are trained to do. The owner of the house must be following their animals here soon. – Today, probably.”
“Really?” Yu asked in wonder. “What can they help with? Lick your tears or something? They’re too small to support a grown person.”
“No. Like, detect allergens or sense a seizure coming on. Stuff like that,” Mara explained further.
“Wow,” Yu admitted.
High on the adventure of the morning, Brutoin said, “That’s a sort of modern magic, isn’t it? – Let’s take them.”
His companions looked at him in surprise.
Lilah quickly shook her surprise off and spoke in agreement, “If they really need the animal, they’ll just buy a new one anyway. You know… I’m really curious what these guys can do. We can look up the meaning of the tags when we get back home.”
So, as well as the valuable objects, the cat and dog were also stolen.
Brutoin and Yu continued to take canoe trips to Molil occasionally, to find out something/anything of use. They also tried to track down any physical description of the pixies from various legends. Though there were many legends loosely related to the pixies, only two of them had a specific physical description of the creatures. There was one story that described an island very like Molil, and it had little, evil pixies living on it. The pixies were described as tiny men who lived inside trees. They came out and jumped at strangers, poked them in the eyes, scratched up their arms and faces, and did some magic that made humanus sleepy. Another story, which didn’t actually specify that it took place on an island, described little sky spirits. They were little lights that came from the sky, like orbs of sky light that separated themselves from the sky and moved on their own. They floated down singing and curing the ills of those who heard their songs.
Armed with only these descriptions, Brutoin searched around the ground, the trees, and even the rocky areas. All he found were more stashes of child junk.
As a last resort, Brutoin had tried to search the least navigable part of the island, the southeast forest area, where the trees were extremely densely packed and the cliff edge was too high up for a boat to access. Besides seeing a higher quantity of small furry animals and birds, they’d found nothing. They’d also had a very tiring time trying to get through the trees, and they hadn’t made it more than a quarter of the way into the tiny forest.
“If this were my place, I’d clear those trees,” Brutoin announced at Yu, when they had gone back to the west hill to sit in the shade and rest.
“Are we really going to push our way through those trees? I mean, if there are pixies in there, there would be no legend about them, because no one can get in there,” Yu said.
This explanation suited Brutoin. None the less, he answered aggressively, “If we have to, we will.”
Then, they both went quiet and thoughtful. Even though the fruitless searches were irritating, spending time here was nice. Brutoins decided to take advantage of the fine weather and isolation to think. He laid on his back (balling his shirt up and shoving it under his back to support the weight of his strange shape against the earth). He closed his eyes and considered. His anger was mounting. In a short time, it would overcome him. He must do something. Soon. He felt though that the universe was always just about to provide. With this peaceful expectation, he opened his eyes. The birds were flying overhead in formations. This was too common to be magical, but it was still amazing. The way that birds danced around each other in perfect step. If it could be captured, the world would be different. Then, he noticed, the way the sun light glowed through their wings. As one descended, it looked like a piece of the sky itself was dropping down at him, and their song, it was calming. He could go to sleep. He watched their dance for a few more moments, getting his thoughts together. Then, he slowly sat up and quietly got Yu’s attention.
Yu was drowsy. But he looked up where Brutoin pointed. “yeah?” Yu asked.
“Like pieces of the sky falling at you, singing.”
“Yeah,” Yu said with possibility in his voice. “But they don’t look like spirits. They don’t look special at all.”
“Do you know this species of bird? I don’t.” Brutoin made his case stronger.
“Well, no, but I don’t know many species of birds.”
“We’ll catch one next time… bring equipment to get one of them. Then we can bring it home with us, see if it is special,” Brutoin decided aloud. Feeling better, he was able to rest again, knowing that he was one step closer to having his first true artifact.