It took a while, but Enyeto and I finally made it to the other side of the lake. When we finally stepped onto land again, I let out a sigh of relief. We were so close to our goal now. I just need to take that final step. I looked into the “transitional forest” that lies between the two sections of the Holian people’s amusement park. Ridiculous. Our people were here for centuries and they have the nerve to tear it all down and build a place to manufacture artificial happiness?
“I’ll lead the way, Danny.” Enyeto said as he stepped forward and began his walk into the forest. I followed right behind him. As we traversed this forest of artificial trees and imported flora, I struck up some conversation with him.
“Hey Enyeto, do you think that a world without conflict could exist?”
“No. As long as there is more than one person on this planet, they will find something to hold over the other. Mix in factors like race, religion and so on, and it becomes easier for one to indulge in discrimination. We like to think we’re better than the animals, but we’re just as ravenous as them.”
“I figured.”
It was a brief exchange that I already knew the answer to. I’ve seen it firsthand. I’ve seen exactly what compliance and an attempt to coexist will do to people that have way more to lose.
===
“Can I help you?” The owner of the stagecoach raised an eyebrow as I approached him on his smoke break. I presented the correct amount of Dol for a ride and asked if he could drop me off at the House of Parlay. When I noticed that he was still on the fence about letting me on, I presented 10 more Dol for him. He let out a heavy sigh, flicked his cigarette, and pointed to the door. “Get in.”
As soon as I opened the door, I noticed the red cushions of the carriage as well as the space. Six people could easily fit in here. I noticed a Holian girl sitting next to the window right after. As we exchanged looks, she clutched her purse and scooted closer to the wall. That look that she gave me was one that my people and I became all too familiar with. I just did what my elders told me to do and minded my business. I sat at the exact opposite side of the carriage and looked out the window for the entire trip.
I guess the girl had her stop before I did, because when I noticed that we stopped and I wasn’t at the House of Parlay, she immediately got up and rushed out of the carriage. Once she left, I let out a sigh of relief. It’s crazy how intense a carriage ride could be!
Despite the uncomfortable interaction, the ride continued until I was dropped off at the House of Parlay. Here, was where my father told me a battle was going to take place. I rushed over to the front of the building where my father, little brother, and all the other chiefs waited for me. I ran up to hug him and when I did, he asked me how school was.
“It was great! But I’m more excited for this battle, Dad!” I pumped my fist in the air in excitement. Chief Enyeto chuckled in response.
“It’s gonna be worlds different than what you hear when we tell stories, kid.”
“How so?” I asked.
My father rubbed the heads of my brother and I motioned for us to follow him. He was a good man. That’s what made him such a malleable man as well.
“Watch carefully kids. When you become chiefs of the village, you’ll have to participate in these talks as well. This is how we Rosarians do battle in this day and age. Rather than exchanging bullets and swords, we trade words.”
“You usually make us do most of the talking though Ahanu!”
“Could you at least let me look a bit cooler in front of my kids? Haha…”
Most members of the council of six were here for this important meeting with the Holians:
Chief Wennot was one of the first chiefs to embrace Holian culture and follow their customs. He wore a black suit with a vintage tailcoat jacket. And to top it all off, a tophat rested snugly on his shaven head.
Chief Enyeto's appearance reminded me of a lion’s. His hair flowed down his shoulders and back and his muscles gave an overwhelming presence. To top it all off, he always had an intimidating look. He would soften it when talking to Jack, me, or any of the other kids, but it wouldn’t make him look any kinder. He had the soul of a warrior in an era of peace.
Chief Chogan wore multiple piercings on his ears and nose. He also had a constant look of exhaustion on him. Everything about his aesthetic screamed don’t approach me, but he always had a smile on his face and the voice of a jokester. People took to calling him “Chogan the Hyena.”
And finally, there’s Chief Atina. But everyone calls her Lady Atina. She’s the oldest person in the village. Therefore, she’s also the wisest person in the village.
My father decided to take my brother Jack and I to a conference between him along with the other present members of the Rosarian council of six, and three representatives of the Holian people. When we followed the chiefs into the room, we looked across the oval wooden table to see those three representatives. When one of them made eye contact with me they let out a heavy sigh.
“I thought we agreed on no kids.”
“They’re not just any children. They’re my kids. They’ll be in these same seats of ours someday, so it’s important that they see the process.” My father stood up for us.
“You have some nerve, given the situation you’re in—” The representative was about to lay into my dad, but another representative stopped him. One of our chiefs, specifically Enyeto, said in response “I don’t recognize your face, but I’ll advise that you watch your tone if you wish to speak at this table. Hostile words can easily devolve into hostile actions, after all…” Today, his most fierce of faces was being put on full display.
“N-Now everyone! Let’s get started with the meeting! After all, we don’t have problems with each other! We just have problems with the issue at hand.” Chief Chogan moved his hands around frantically. He tended to do that when he was nervous.
“Well put, Chogan.” My father said as he laid out the topic of this particular meeting. “We’ve come to discuss the rising issue of terrorism. We’re not new to these people coming and trying to make a ruckus of things, but something changed lately that’s giving them more confidence.”
“You’re referring to stematas. It’s a new discovery by the head of our department of science.” One of the Holian representatives said.
“Yes…somehow, after immediately announcing to the public about stematas, the terrorist underworld got a hold of the concept and started to create their own.” Another representative added.
“There are talks of equipping each police department with these stematas, but Taramos only knows how long that’ll take. Besides, you guys will be the last ones to receive such a thing. You understand, right? We have to look after our own.” The third one said as he picked the dirt under his nails.
“Would it be too difficult to ask you guys to prioritize us? After all, we’re practically sitting ducks in these changing conditions…” My father said.
“And whose fault is that? When we tried to move our police force in, you guys chased them off.” He gave a sigh of annoyance.
“It’s because you instilled the most corrupt people possible.” Lady Atina chimed in. “Before we could even blink, our people were getting imprisoned left and right! Almost a quarter of our funds were used getting our people out of a position they were wrongfully put in!”
“Our concern is simply the lack of trust here…” My father said. “The Rosarians have obeyed every order of the Holians to maintain peace for generations. We relocated to less favorable lands, we’ve taken up your customs, we’ve even assimilated our children into your culture. When I was growing up, I never would have imagined I’d name my children Jack and Daniel.” Dad chuckled a bit as he rubbed the backs of my brother and I.
“And I never thought I’d shave my head and don such an outfit! After all, my full head of hair made me quite the looker!” Chief Wennot chimed in.
If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.
“With all this being said, we just feel like this trust isn’t being reciprocated. If we didn’t know any better, we would assume that you guys wanted us gone.” As soon as dad said that, a heavy silence filled the room. I didn’t know it at the time, but at that moment, dad asked a question he already knew the answer to. It was the lingering question of what to do with a group of people that you wanted gone, but didn’t want to look like monsters in the process of doing so. What was most important to them was keeping the image of a utopian country. For whatever reason, our people were not part of that idea of utopia.
“If you won’t help us, we’ll have to look into other means of defending ourselves…” Chief Enyeto broke the ice with a sigh. “We’ve had several attacks within the last month alone. They seem to be from different groups, so we’ll find out who the supplier is and—”
“Stop! You mean to tell us that you’re siding with the terrorists?! You realize you’ll become an enemy of the country if you do that! The king himself said that anyone associating with terrorists will be sentenced to death with no trial!”
“Forgive my language…but what the hell do you expect us to do? Wait for these bandits to loot and steal from us? To kill us and burn our homes down? I see it in the manner you walk and talk. You hope and pray that one day, we’ll disappear like the Haustorians, but I have news. A people’s way of life doesn’t go up in smoke and get eradicated. What’s left of those Haustorians is still living on with their ideals and traditions and we’ll do the same. So you better hope your games cause every single one of us to perish, because if not, we’ll come back from it in no time.” The chief stood up and walked out of the room. One of the Holian representatives pointed at the leaving Chief and let all of his pent up rage.
“Where the hell do you think you’re going, you savage! We’re not done here!”
The faces of the chiefs that were still sitting all fell upon hearing this. The word “savage” developed in a period of time where both the Rosarian tribe and the Holians were mingling more and more with each other. As the two groups learned more and more about each other, something changed within the Holians. They began to see the Rosarians as a cultural foil to them. Because of the difference in tradition and culture, it caused the Holians to belittle their practices at any chance they got. The one word that rose the most in conversations like that was “savage.”
“I see that we’ll need to come back to this matter some other time. Tensions seem to be too hot right now, after all.” Dad rose from his seat and motioned everyone else to do the same. When they did, we began to walk off. As we did, Chief Chogan broke the ice with us kids.
“Soooooooo…how did you like the meeting? Haha…”
“Nothing happened! Everyone just sat around arguing with no action being taken!” I said as I looked to the floor.
“And I think they still hate us!” Jack said.
“That’s the price of peace, kids. It’ll take some time, and it might not even happen in your generation, but we have to keep reaching out that hand! Until they take it.” Dad said, being ever the optimist.
Once we left the bolstering city of Holia’s first zone, we walked deep into the forest until we saw the faint lights of our village and Chief Aiyanna helping the other women prepare food.
Chief Aiyanna was the most beautiful woman in our village. She had long, silky red hair that was wrapped into twin tails that flowed down her back. Jack asked her for her hand in marriage several times and she rejected each instance with a smile on her face.
“Chief Aiyanna!” Jack ran towards her and embraced her. “Marry me!”
“You know I can’t do that, kiddo! You’re a tad bit too young! But how was the meeting?”
“Terrible. I’m taking a bath.” Enyeto said as he walked past everyone and entered his house.
“Why didn’t you come with us, Chief Aiyanna?” Jack looked up.
“I’m not really good at debates and stuff…I leave things like that to the other chiefs. We all have our strengths and weaknesses, after all.” Chief Aiyanna gave a weak smile.
“You should join next time! Enyeto’s weakness is definitely talking, but he did the most chatting this entire meeting!” Chief Chogan chuckled.
“Well, I’m good at cooking nice meals anyway! Speaking of nice meals, it’s time for supper!” She gave that usual contagious smile she always gave when she wanted to cheer us up. Even though I knew what she was doing, I always fell for it.
Every day when the sun begins to set, everyone in the village gathers around the center and holds a feast with music, dancing, singing, and of course: eating. Rows and rows of wooden tables are at the center of the village for whenever we’re ready to have our dusk feast. Everyone is on equal footing, so even the Chiefs join in the festivities. Today was no different. The eating and drinking was coupled with the banging of drums and vocals from our best singers. While everyone was chatting, Chief Enyeto came back from his bath to sit with Jack, me, and the other kids.
Chief Aiyanna asked “So how are you kids enjoying…school? Is that what it’s called?”
“It’s fun! Though I wish we saw more Holians…” Jack looked down.
As dad mentioned in the meeting, all of the kids in the village were told to go to Holian schools. The issue was that we weren’t even allowed to go to the same classes as the Holian kids. They want to keep us at length at all times…
“What do you think is so special about them, anyway?” I asked.
“I don't think they're special. It’s just that they’re different. I want to learn a bunch of stuff about their people and culture! Maybe then, they’ll see how much we care and they’ll…want to at least eat with us.” Jack said, his face brimming with hope. He was always like that. Like a black sheep that would desperately cling to the pack, he would do everything in his power to get people that didn’t like him to like him. Back then I never worked up the courage to say it, but I always wanted to tell him: Why struggle to befriend a pack that doesn’t want you…when you could lead your very own. Speaking of which…
I finished my bowl of soup and looked over to Enyeto in anticipation. He looked back at me for a moment and began to walk off. He then paused. “You’re coming, aren’t you? To train, that is?”
My expression grew with excitement as Enyeto motioned for me to follow him. I waved goodbye to everyone as I followed him into the training area of the village. There, he and I would train together. All for the purpose of us getting strong enough to defend ourselves. To be strong enough so that even if the world were crashing down on us, we’d be able to protect the village. The Holians wouldn’t be able to ignore us in that scenario. Hours at a time, we would train together. Today was no different.
“Faster!” He yelled at me as he punished each of my missteps with an attack. “You’re just thinking about what’s in front of you! You have to think at least four steps ahead of the enemy.”
“Right!” I backed up and analyzed Enyeto. He was almost three times my size, so I should swing low with my attacks.
As I charged him, I went for a tackle at his legs and was quickly countered. He simply stepped to the side and kicked me in the stomach, sending me flying.
“Also, don’t make your attacks so obvious. I get it…you’re angry…but you can’t let it show. If you do, the enemy will easily read you. The key is to always be in control, Daniel.”
“Got it…” I said as I got back up.
“Now we train with swords.” Enyote walked over to the sword rack he had. A plethora of wooden swords of different shapes and sizes laid on that rack. Out of all of them, he picked up a wooden dagger and threw it into a nearby bush with no warning.
“Owwwwwwww!” I heard the dagger make contact with the sound of my little brother’s cry following soon after.
“And I think we have another person interested in our lesson today.”
“Jack, what are you doing here?!”
“Dad wanted to know when you were coming home tonight.” Jack rubbed the part of his forehead that was still ringing out in pain, it looks like.
“I’m not coming home. I’m spending the night training here again.”
“You’ve been doing that for the past week…”
“And I might be gone for another!” I crossed my arms and looked down on him.
“Can I watch you train?”
“I thought you were more interested in diplomatic nonsense!”
“Now now…” Enyeto came between the both of us. “You both have the same idea: peace with the Holians. You just have different methods of going about it. You’re brothers. Regardless of your qualms or beliefs, don’t let anything change that.” He then grabbed both of our shoulders and pulled us in for a group hug. Jack returned the embrace. I sighed in defeat and did the same thing.
After that, Jack quietly watched the both of us train with wooden swords until he fell asleep. Enyeto and I were getting tired of trading blows, so we stopped and laid on the ground. My chest was heaving up and down while I tried to catch my breath while Enyeto calmly turned to his side and instantly started snoring. His snores were always so loud. It’s partially why he’s out here so often. He doesn’t want to bother the rest of the village, so he trains and sleeps out here most nights. I’ve gotten used to them though since I’ve been training with him. Anyone that isn’t used to it though…
“GROHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” Enyeto let out another loud snore. I looked over to Jack and saw that he was wide awake now. It made me smirk. I went through the same thing when I started training with him.
I got up and motioned for Jack to get on my back. “Let’s go home.”
My little brother hopped onto my back and the two of us began walking off toward the village. The fireflies were out now and they illuminated the forest with a green light. Every so often, I could feel Jack’s head nodding forward before jerking right back up. Does he want to chat with me or something?
“Something on your mind, Jack?”
“Hm? Yeah…wouldn’t it be nice…to have a big feast like we always do? But with some Holian friends?”
His question hung in the air as I thought of a response. Why was he so insistent on this validation from those people? I wonder…
“Wouldn’t that get lonely? Being the only Rosarian around?” I laughed off the comment.
“Well I’ll always come back to you guys…” His head nodded forward in exhaustion before continuing. “But I think it’ll be more fun than anything. After all, it’s an entirely different side of people. Things that we’ve never even thought of. Food we’ve never tried.”
“In that case, don’t let school fool you! Holians aren’t the only people out there! To the south there’s the Trianians with the music and cuisine! There’s the Acuposians to the north with their fashion prepared for any type of weather! And then there’s the Haustorians…who used to rival even this country…”
To think that people like that existed out there. I wonder what our lives would’ve been like if we fought back against all of these rules these Holians oppressed us with.
“So make a lot of friends! All with different cultures and beliefs and views, so you never get bored Jack!” I looked back and gave him a toothy grin. He returned the favor with a soft smile. I always loved seeing Jack’s smile. It reminded me of mom’s.
“Alright! That’s enough mushy brother stuff! Let’s get you back—” As soon as I turned around, I noticed the faint green lights in the distance enveloped by a growing red glow…exactly where the village was.
And that's when I realized everything we built was falling to the ground...