The Black Garden
"Name's Selik, scout clan native." I introduce myself. My right hand is up at a salute. I wear two sashes of black and silver feathers to make my clan obvious to him, but I announce myself out of habit for my New Marshal. I'm a Native, not a Rabenite. I could implant in, but the survival rate on Raben implants are not very promising. The feather's aren't my own but just symbol for other clans to identify me.
"Selik, welcome to your new squad for the coming weeks." My Marshal says.
"Yes Sir." His body armor gives him away. Most Marshals wear black but scouts wear grey and dull colors if we can. My own attire consists of a black Raben helmet, painted a drab grey, a belt with a revo, a knife, ammo, and binoculars.
"Selik, I have your partner, your sister Sarra. You two are due for your feathering in the coming weeks so don't be out and about. The two of you will need to be at the southern bramble tribe ceremony. Am I clear?"
"Yes sir, should I tell my sister this as well?"
"No, I informed her already. Your father and mother will be waiting for you in two weeks. Raben is public now so try not to shoot anyone, unless you have no choice, no matter the insult or danger. It sends a bad message."
He issues me out and I move to the armory. Grey, drab, and camouflage, perfect. Long messers, I grab two with the metal rods they fire. Sarra is leaning back with a sword in a scabbard and twin talon designs.
We can read each other with glances.
One eye half open, I'm bored.
I pound my hand down like a hammer on my palm. Let's go.
"Twins and your dumb codes. Just get to the southern border." Our Marshal says from annoyance.
"What do you think of finally leaving this tribe of glorified stalkers?" Sarra says in a semi shout to annoy our Marshal further.
"I don't actually know..."
"You killed it Selik-"
"Thank you Selik," says the Marshal.
Double squint, You suck.
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Natives don't go after targets. We secure escape routes, we observe quiet zones, and we are handed over to Tribe Talon for studies. Mom was a Robin, dad was from Bedded, we're Raben Natives heading on to other areas of life.
Our feet move along the tree paths at a walk. Mom loves to wind her way through the pine walls. Of course without the cloth and the helmets, branches like this can tear you up. Sarra is just behind me fiddling with pieces of pine needles with her claws. While twins, we're not identical obviously. But mom had two, Sarra is a bit more detail oriented than me but I'm better at keeping calm and relaxing. It helps me see the big picture.
Mom says that's just because I'm a guy and dad agrees. We're not biologists and most science isn't covered in our lessons until we enter our new tribe after our ceremony.
After a bland hour we're at the beach. Southern border.
"you here about the snakes?"
"Yeah, first sighting was... Raben civil war, Mazan. Spotted a snake, then later all bodies on the outskirts were stripped of feathers."
"That would have hurt. Mom said she pulled out a feather once and it hurt, to think they had their feathers removed."
"Sarra, no, they were dead first, they didn't feel a thing." I correct.
"I know that Selik, I was just wondering."
Mangroves cover one side of the cove and a rock face has the other. We hop off the trail through the tops of the trees and sit down on two chairs facing the cove. Waves, water, mist, tides, a beach is a beach. Except this beach has sentient life.
They're like people only odd.
"See that one." I point out from our post overlooking the waters. "It's on a hunt. I found something."
Sarra is starting to groan. "I've seen the fish faces hunt a thousand times."
"Well what are we supposed to do?" I ask. "No that wasn't safe." Her brows are lifted very high.
Yes
"Sarra, what if there was a snake there? We don't mess with mutants, animal or man, they're dangerous. Even if it's just foreigners, you can start a war with the wrong greeting."
Double squint.
"Fine, but you tell no one." I pick up my Messer and fix a knife to it. Mine fires smaller darts but quicker and it doesn't hit the shoulder so hard. It still shoots through a Fiend's skull though.
We leave the post in the hillside and forsake the beach as the sun leaves it's morning position. An old path flows from a chasm. The crevice has a stair pattern but we stopped there. We told our Marshal and a few Rabenites checked it out. Nothing of note.
Sarra's claws guide her hands along the walls as she explores the beach cave. Sarra and I stop.
"You know they already looked through here. They said they found nothing." Sarra says.
"Should we believe that?"
" Because they lie, it was our tribe's job to lie, but I guess old habits die hard. They had to go public."
The tunnel heads down at a slant steep enough to roll a wheel and rough enough to slow down the flow of water. Which explains the nearly stair step shape of the descent. Sarra and I keep going down, the path stops and light is going dark this far down. Our masks can adjust to low light but there's an issue. The path breaks off into four other tunnels.
"Water might have made this hole but I have my doubts," I rub my hand along a strange chip in the side of the tunnel. The dark has decided to cuddle or grapple, I can't tell. I've been comfortable in the dark. But the tunnel doesn't feel like it flows directly down, some steps have been starting to feel uphill now.
"Irrelevant Selik, claw marks, non-Raben. It's a snake hole."
"Great, are we going to leave now?"
She nods no, you don't have to have a code to just nod yes or no. Sarra is frozen now.
"Black feathers... Selic, they dragged a body down here." Sarra whispers in terror, a tone that takes ahold of my core and violently strangles it. A Rabeness went missing weeks ago, I keep my claws extended and my weapon loaded anyways. We'd lost contact with Adeline, a new recruit that wondered off.
Something coils on the edge of my sight. It's gone again and returns ass quickly in a blur from my visor. "Sarra it's here."
A whip snaps her off her feet. A hiss echoes and slithers through the tunnel. It sounds like it's behind me but it's not. The dark of the tunnel has me shaking.
I fire a dart as a warning. The blast has me dizzy, hammer after hammer into my head. Then a following blast. My hands drop the weapon and my hands fly to my ears.
The echo from the tunnel...
Sarra screams out quick but winces and we try to compose our stance to retreat. It's on the wall. It has her! Its arms have claws like three fingered pinchers. Scales in the dark, an eye in my helmet's scanner, and its hand is large enough to grab my sister and bat me aside.
I take a metallic disk from my everyday pack. All natives have one in a squad. Inside is a circle of flares. I scratch the fse and throw it out of the cave with a spin and it drifts out of the hole before landing and detonating several times. Eight flares fire off, on every thirty seconds
As I raise my weapon the claws for a fist and beat me down as it twists and it's two free arms batter me. I'm down and out.
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Verloren Raben Kind
"Marshal Verloren, come quickly, we have an emergency." A lookout shouts. "Flares, southern border."
"No!" I rush from my post to the tree top. I flash a red blinker into the sky and a rush of wind passes me. Hex is circling. She banks low and with a lurch I've caught on to her saddle and I'm airborne.
In the saddle of my mount I'm accelerating over the main fields toward the southern border.
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Selik
My eyes are adjusting to the light. No, it's not my eyes, I'm regaining vision in my helmet.
"Ray Ben! Where are your feathers?" A voice shouts at me in the dark.
"No, who are you?" A tongue slithers out and hisses before poking my helmet with its forked ends. Sweat runs down my temple and I'm freezing up.
It's one of the snakes. Its claws are around my helmet now. prying.
I hear Sarra, "We don't have feathers! Listen, No feathers on Raben."
"No feathers?" The creature asks back to us.
I show the snake creature my wrists. Bare skin and without feathers.
"Come we have surprise birds." The I snake swings and scratches at rocks in the dark, I'm seeing an outline until the brightness grows. Its three-fingered hand is folding onto a burning cloth. I see what has been trying to communicate and our captor. A female snake and a male snake of colossal size have been observing us. The one which spoke was the male, which was smaller. The female, larger, was coiled in the corner. The male wears a skull of bone as a helmet and has a pair of Raben talons on his hands. Two scale covered human arms have sprouted from their sides. The females are slender while the male's arms are bonier.
I glace at Sarra, She has her knife at the ready and is out of her bonds. My claws have already shred the binds they used to hold us.
We leap to formation. I take point and my claw hands. You will move to the corner now!" I shout, unsure if my demands can be understood.
The female uncoils herself revealing a black helmet on a neck restrained in coils. You are going to kill your bird to kill us. Take hand teeth off!" the female shouts.
They remind me of parrots, no lips, but they emit a parody of words. Except they do have a grasp of our language.