[Fanfiction] Lies

[White]

Chapter 1: Someone who'd taught her much

I killed a warrior, once; a person dear to me.

…

Loroi were telepathic.

They could speak, too, and the Loroi on Perrein had a particular faculty for language that their sisters from other worlds found peculiar.

Still, even underneath the shaded canopies of Perrein, amidst the mad screeches of a thousand day-dark insects, silent telepathy weaved together strings of thought that made up the bulk of the tapestry of conversation which defined the Loroi world.

The speech of minds was pure, unfiltered, and hard to describe.

To aliens and outsiders – ‘Mutes’ as the Loroi called them – it was easiest to say that the Loroi all spoke with the same voice. Certain philosophical sects were of the mind to say that the telepathy wasn’t created, but merely called upon whenever they wanted to reach out and make contact with another mind.

Still, whether they spoke with the same voice or not, it was clear that every Loroi was at least capable of imparting their own style upon their mental messages.

Some Loroi were very adept at furnishing their thoughts with character, and sometimes confused this talent with a personality, much to the chagrin of their neighbors and acquaintances.

All Loroi, even the least talented, however, did – by necessity – leave at least some imprint of themselves in whatever messages they sent.

This imprint was referred to by the Loroi as ‘charachter’.

Every Loroi had their own unique ‘character’. Every conversation, therefore, was tagged with at least two, and among large and well connected groups of Loroi, a sort of group ‘ethos’ was readily notable.

Upland Perrein was quite happy to be happy underneath Imperial governance. Most of the Spaceports and nice vacation spots for high-rank administration were up there.

Low-land Perrein, however, in the eternal twilight-zone that hid beneath the canopy of the world-wide jungle, where few off-worlders elected to venture and fewer still had the fortitude to stay, a biome-wide ethos quite free of imperial administrators had been allowed to flourish.

The jungle, seen from orbit, was a massive, homogenous sea of black tree-tops and parasitic vines that sprung up like antenna-sets. This apparent unity was an illusion. The Loroi which lived in the jungle had their own boundaries and alliances.

Of course, land borders were nothing new to them. However, more important in the creation of a nation was the ethos that bound its constituent peoples together.

And, among the varied and fragmentary provinces of Perrein, none held as independent a spirit as Tizna.

In Tizna, in the capital city of the same name, two and a half million Loroi formed among themselves a conglomeration of thoughts that raced past one another and mixed and exploded into a kaleidoscope of meaning and implication.

Each Loroi had her own ‘character’, but – much like the jovial atmosphere of Nairobe, or the bustle of Tokyo, or the rudeness of Boston – it could also be said that the city had a character of its own, which was represented by, and in turn affected, the living tapestry of thought that bubbled around it.

And in this tapestry, there was the neighborhood near the central tree called Beia Hill, which had a bourgeoisie character of distinct pride and genteel discretion that made it a spike of anti-imperial opinions in the hot-spot that was Tizna.

Still, not every conversation can be about politics.

Accordingly, underneath the central tree, inside the metal Schoolhouse that always grew too-hot during mid-day, instructor Earth Tide was once again washing her students in the sardonic humor that characterized her opinion of Perrein habits and outlooks.

She was the only off-worlder in the city, and her character was an alien one.

Aside from her less ambitious opinions regarding imperial hegemony, the very flavor of Earth Tide’s thoughts had a nature that betrayed its alien origins. Outwardly, Earth Tide was like any other Loroi you might find on Perrein. Sure, she was a little darker and a bit taller than her compatriots, but she could be confused for a local if spotted from a distance, at least, until one spoke to her.

Her character was unlike any of the other adults. It was wide and calm and uncaring for the less important things in life: things like decorum and social niceties and even honor to a degree. Her most panicked moments were like gentle waves, and she always had a sense of a greater perspective that was sometimes expressed as unperturbably jovial and other times as steely and uncaring.

In all, speaking to her made one almost believe the stories she told... of those things on Taben called ‘Oceans’.

Even her angriest and most intense moments, it always seemed as if nothing could ever unbalance her... it was as if the world was a storm roiling above an uncaring sea.

Of course, the factual contents of Telepathy were always truthful, so the existence of Oceans wasn’t in question.

Ticky, in fact, often spent her days day-dreaming about the endless expanses of water she’d been told about, and the videos she’d seen of the forever undulating field of blue that lapped up at the sand-covered shores of Taben.

Still, Earth Tide’s assertion about the sea, that it had a character and that merely living in it could change a Loroi… well, her manner of speaking was at least one point of evidence to support that assertion, even if it wasn’t quite enough to excuse her general haughtiness towards the ‘dirt huggers’ she now found herself among.

That same haughtiness, today, reached a new peak of annoyance as Earth Tide drew Ticky from her day-dreams with a call.

Earth Tide had a particular way of calling people out when she was angry, and Ticky had a particular telepathic name.

It was like a clock being drowned.

The sensation shocked Ticky out of her reverie, and the disapproving glare of the orbital mechanics professor drew chitters of amusement from the rest of the class.

Another wave crashed against the timepiece, annoyance tinging the waters as she, once again, called Ticky by name.

The clock reverberated against the waters as the young Loroi answered, sitting up in a polite fashion to demonstrate how she was returning her attention to the board.

A simple diagram lit up the screen. A ship was in orbit, and it needed to get higher.

How?

Ticky answered by means of an image.

Thrusters lit up in a brief blink. Of course, the ‘blink’ here lasted minutes, but the time of the scene was sped up, and the ship sped forward through space, slinging away from the gentle tether that bound it to the planet. Another thrust sped the ship again just as it climbed to the top of its apogee, turning the orbit into a circle, and ensuring it didn’t return to its first and lowest point.

…

A curious pause as the teacher stopped the lesson.

Uh, oh.

It was clear that Earth Tide didn’t believe I got that answer by myself.

Granted, she was right to be suspicious, and to tell by the angle of her gaze, she’d correctly picked out my best friend, Fire, who sat in the far back, ready to lob answers into my head whenever I looked to be struggling or bored.

Perhaps I had answered with too much certainty, but that didn’t matter much now that I’d been caught.

Telepathy being what it was, all the teacher had to do was ask and I’d be all but forced to admit to the class that I was a good-for-nothing cheater.

Granted, half the class fell into that category, but I had a reputation to uphold as the second daughter of the Hill Tree clan, and as the type of cheater that didn’t make rookie mistakes like getting caught.

Getting caught out like this would be humiliating at best.

Certainly not how I wanted to leave my school reputation before the diral.

Thankfully, the teacher was content to let the incident pass with only a disappointed look in my direction.

It was almost enough to make me feel guilty, but this was an elective junior class and, frankly, I was certain the teacher was getting as bored of it as the students.

…


Classes rarely stretched past noon.

After the final lesson, the adults made themselves scarce and – excepting a single nurse that sat disinterestedly in a far corner office of the creche, the kids were left to their own devices.

“Hey, Ash…” The smaller girl smiled a sharp grin, her hapless victim grinding face first into the dirt from a harsh shove.

It was a well regarded tradition among Taben Loroi, that children should be left to themselves to learn what classrooms couldn’t teach.

A weight like a two-ton press smushed against Fire, grinding her into the dirt, bending her spine and her knees at nearly dangerous angles, cool blood soaking into the soil of the playground. “Well, Ash, still nothing to say? Or did you think I couldn’t hear that useless voice of yours?”

Fire whimpered.

Leadership was a complicated skill. It required intelligence, wit, wisdom, consensus and politicking.

Another ton of pressure and this one drew a cry much to the shorter girl’s amusement, her curving bob bouncing as she squatted down to get a better look at the Loroi she was grinding into the dust.

Those were all the finer details of leadership, however.

A flash of sadistic glee and a curious nudge forward scraped Fire along the ground, drawing an audible scream from Fire.

For children 6 and under, it was considered sufficient to learn that somebody had to be in-charge.

Ticky Toc, gifted with a quick mind for detail, had spent the past two years refining her understanding of who was ‘in charge’.

By her understanding, it was a matter of building alliances, excluding enemies, and just generally guiding consensus wherever she wanted it, all the while letting everyone else believe that everything was going according to their plans.

Of course, there was more to it than that. Sometimes, that bratty little kid you’d shut down two years ago discovers she has telekinetic powers and turns the playground upside down.

For those not in the know, Telekinesis was kind of like Telepathy, except that instead of trading ideas it slapped people around from a distance.

‘The pen is mighter indeed,’ Ticky Toc let the private thought go sardonically as she came upon the scene.

“Ghnn!” A short, choked sob came from Fire, pinned beneath an invisible force as Wallflower and her newly organized clique stood over her.

“Hgh!” Another, short, breath of pain caused Fire’s ember-yellow hair to bounce. It was the questioning, incurious sort of exclamation from someone who was in too-much pain to think.

“Well, Ash?” Wallflower said, turning her talent for language into another, grating source of agony as she pointed the annoying phrase down at Fire. “Had enough? Apologies are free, you know, and I’ll be happy to let you crawl away if you kiss my boots and apologize again for you Padoin mother.”

As she spoke the words, Wallflower directed a proud flash of telepathic reasoning across the playground.

Telepathy, of course, was truthful, so the reasoning for her behaviour was actually something to be attended to.

...

After all, Fire was a weak telepath, her telepathic distress could hardly be sensed outside of a few meteres, and it was only Ticky Toc’s sensitivity that allowed her to sense her friends distress from across the creche. In addition, she wasn’t particularly popular, either, having fewer friends than even Ticky.

The fact that Earth Tide was her mother made for a particularly vulnerable point of contention, and led to many easy accusations of favoritism.

And if this wasn't enough, she was half Tabenoin by blood, and – to tell by the rock-dark shade of blue her skin took, her father was probably an upland Perrein Loroi.

That, and the fact was Fire had slighted Wallflower a few years ago, and the sudden upsurge of power the small girl developed was a good enough reason as any to get even.

...

Of course, honesty didn’t ensure nobler reasons for barbarism.

So, here Ticky Toc was, in a standoff.

Wallflower, true to her nickname, didn’t look like much. In fact, she hadn’t been much more than annoying for as long as Ticky had known her. She was short, thin, and pale even by lowland standards, looking almost ghostly whenever the shade hit her just right.

“Well?” she spoke, challenging.

“Let her go,” Ticky Toc responded clearly, red eyes glaring into her opponent’s own.

Speech was a last resort among Loroi.

Really, there were only three reasons for a Loroi to speak.

One, to be recorded.

Two, to transmit words over radio beyond the reach of her telepathy.

And, finally, the third was to communicate with an enemy, lest any telepathic contact aid them in breaking into your mind.

“Or else what?” Wallflower asked, pressing a foot down onto Fire’s back, and levitating several small rocks in orbit beside her head.

Ticky, as she answered, was working assiduously to break into Wallflower’s mind, spearing forward a thought so generic it could have been Wallflower’s own, and using it as a pry bar to access the smaller girl’s subconscious.

She could sense a certain amount of trepidation in the girl, even as her words portrayed an unbreakable bravado.

Good… it seemed that a little telekinetic power hadn’t blinded her to the obvious: Ticky Toc was unassuming and nominally not ‘in charge’. But telepathy was honest, and there was only so much one could do to hide the fact that, for whatever reason, Ticky was not a Loroi to be messed with.

As long as Wallflower realized that, perhaps they could still settle this.

Ticky stepped forward, letting the weight of her presence settle heavily on Wallflower’s mind.

Wallflower took a subtle step back, embarrassed at the involuntary retreat, and attempting to claw back some dignity as she increased the pressure on Fire.

Fire let out a sob, scrunched eyes opening to give a defiant glare amidst withheld tears.

Ticky… grew angrier. She made the mistake of being too forward in her rage, as she took two long steps forward and answered the smaller girl. “Let her go, or I’m going to kill you.”

That had truly scared Wallflower, to tell by Ticky’s tap into her enemy’s mind.

It also caused her to panic.

Panic caused people to do things that surprised themselves. It caused them to do things they never considered conscionable. It caused Wallflower to send a telekinetic attack at Ticky Toc.

Ticky, with a fine mental wire ready to be sprung, knew before even Wallflower herself that the attack was coming.



She knew in great detail, she could see coming with ponderous foresight, all the conflagrations of the coming attack.

Wallflower was uncoordinated, readying to send a desperate, blind slash of telekinetic force through Ticky’s head.

Ticky could see all of this coming all too quickly, and she panicked.


…


All among the Loroi were telepaths, but Ticky was the best of them all.

She had the greatest range and sensitivity among all the Loroi her age on Perrein. Although, one hardly needed records to prove that. Every Loroi could sense minds, and Ticky’s mind was much like everyone else's, though it was shrouded in an intensity that she had to actively hold back from disturbing people.

Well, panic was an antidote to self restraint, in a way.

At the very least, she’d been able to direct her energy towards Wallflower's direction alone.

Wallflower's two friends, standing too closely beside her, had passed out.

Ticky was certain that Wallflower had died.

The nurse showed up just as the third set of seizures hit the fallen girl.

Thankfully, nothing irreparable had been done.

With regards to Ticky's punishment, the truth had set her free.

Wallflower was the aggressor, after all, and her survival had only ensured that she’d spend her last four months in the creche on Latrine duty.

Ticky Toc, for her part, had been temporarily removed from the creche, all for her convenience, of course. Their class only had four months left until their Diral assignments, and the maximum time a child could be removed from the creche was six months, so of course the creche administration took the easy way out and gave her an effectively early graduation.

“You will of course be free to take your final examinations at an alternate facility,” the creche administrator had said with mute words and a pained smile.

The adults had stopped using telepathy for a week after the altercation.

Telepathy being what it was, it was impossible to hide the fact that they had broken a lot of rules when they ‘delayed’ Wallflower's transfer to a Teidar training creche.

As a rule, telekinetics like Wallflower were isolated amongst themselves once their talents were discovered, and almost invariably sent to the Teidar Caste for further trainingg.

However, Wallflower had discovered her powers late, and she was also the first niece of the Lake Clan, who had a much influence and few daughters in the Soroin caste.

So of course, the creche did the clan a favor in keeping the would-be Teidar on a Soroin caste path.

In turn, everyone did the creche the favor of not asking about such discrepancies. If it was impossible to lie, sometimes it could be arranged such that uncomfortable questions weren’t brought up.

Still, the near-death of a clan daughter was a disaster, and naturally, such disasters drew questions.

The Lake Clan, being the aggrieved party, was therefore quick to end the investigation, and the Creche, being the corrupt accomplices that they were, were eager to agree.

And so, Ticky Toc managed to skate by unpunished.

…

In all, this could have been a small and forgettable part of my childhood.

In most ways, it was.

I was sent to live the remainder of my childhood with my mother. Such a thing was routine to me – being the pride of the Hill Tree Clan, I was doted upon by my mother, who often ordered me out of the creche to spend time with her.

The Hill Tree clan was fiercely independent and low on cash, so it was only begrudgingly that I was sent to a city creche.

I was often called back to ensure that my education was up to the standards set forward by the clan. This latest recall was almost routine except for its cause.

Mother greeted me with a proud note, inquiring about how I’d almost killed the Wallflower girl.

I answered, beaming, with a rendition of how her eyes went blank just before she fell.

Atta girl…

And then mother left, she had business to attend to.

Of course, I didn’t know how strange such a reaction was, all I knew was that Clan business stayed in the clan, and it was easy enough to keep that precept. No one cared enough to ask, in any case.

Still, as loyal as I remained. I was always curious, and eager to refine my understanding of things, so I snooped.


...

Among telepathic messages, there are two types: public and private.

A Loroi could send a message to broadcast and fill out every inch of her natural range, or she could pin-point a secret whisper to a particular person across a crowded room.

Range and sensitivity were dependent on the power of a telepath, and naturally I had superlative marks in both categories.

Still, I was perhaps better than I had anticipated, because, on a lazy afternoon, in a bright spot in the yard where sun-light poked through the canopy, I suddenly realized that a distant part of my mind had always been reaching for something, and that today it had found its mark.

<It’s getting annoying, fixing that hole,> a house servant spoke strangely. They were looking up at the perfectly circular hole that had been cut through the canopy, sending the image of it back to their supervisor.

They noticed details I hadn’t, like the rapidly growing vines and branches that ravenously grew back to weave over the open canopy, turning the perfect circle that had been cut out wavy.

<It’s meant to be annoying,> came back the annoyed response. <If it was easy to maintain, every second bit clan would have a sky circle in their yard>.

At first I was confused why the two house care-takers were being so rude as to broadcast their banter throughout the household, but then I realized they weren’t.

Among Loroi, there were public and private statements, and talented and untalented telepaths, and I -- the best among them -- had discovered the ability to tap into private ones.

Naturally, I spent the rest of the day peeking.

Of course I knew it was wrong, but I was sure I would be forgiven the rudeness once the clan realized I’d mastered such an ability by myself!

So, of course, I scanned about the house, listening to inane gossip and chattering conversations, straining the new limits of my ability as I went door to door, waiting with baited breath for every new word.

Despite my fluttering heart, however, the conversations were quite boring, made interesting to a young girl simply because of their intended privacy.

So, I kept eaves dropping and breaking rules.

Eventually, I came finally to my family house.

My sister had arrived a few weeks ago.

I’d never met her, and naturally I’d been curious, but I hadn’t gathered up enough nerve to talk to her. The family shuttle had descended like a black shadow through the sky circle to drop her off, and the dust it had kicked up, and the fluttering of my mother’s robes as I peeked out behind her legs obscured so much of her that I hardly got a good look.

I had sensed her, though.

She seemed beautiful to me. There was a certain part of her that was… subdued, and which drew my interest towards her all the more.

She was quiet, subtle, sublime even, to my mind.

She was also, however... she was...

a pitiful telepath. A liability.

Worse than this, she was weak, a disgrace who couldn’t even pass the Diral, the first in the family line to fail in generations. Worse than failing, however, she had failed the Diral by quitting… she had failed the trials it took to be a warrior and was standing here crying now simply because her horrid dreams of a civilian life were exposed for the unnatural disturbance they were.

Better she’d never been born.

These were the opinions, the honest truths that mother had sent to sister over a private channel.

Sister didn’t reply, though the heaving of her breath was loud enough to be heard through the door, indicating tears and a disturbed mind.

A mind that quickly grew to panic and acceptance and bubbled over into a broil as Mother, finally at the tail end of her anger, continued:

<I’m recommending that you be killed for this disgrace. Given your spectacular uselessness, I expect not to receive any push-back on this. If you can do little else, accept your death with some dignity. You’re not to leave your room until I call for you again.>

Again, sister didn’t answer, though her growing sobs did subside.

Still... I had tapped her mind.

I don't know what inspired me to do it, or what I expected to find.

It felt like… the calm sadness of an ocean, where the storm clouds didn’t bother the waves.

I… never met my sister face to face, not really. But… I knew something about her no one else in my family did, not even mother.

I knew she’d experienced hardship on her diral, and I knew that she’d had, among her friends, someone from Taben who taught her much.

[Urist]

Hmm... Perreinid, strong mind-powers, red eyes, with a time-related name like 'Ticky Toc'... So, is this a cousin of Tempo's, or is she a *young* Tempo?

A neat story; I'm looking forwards to seeing where it goes!

[Snoofman]

Ticky Toc is quite unique name. Strikes me as a child's name before she receives her proper warrior name. Ticky's mother is also quite the bitch. Not sure if the Outsider lore agrees that some Loroi subcultures practice honor killings. But it's still an interesting new take on the inner affairs of a Loroi family.

[White]

Chapter 2: Aunties.

The sagas were schizophrenic about death.

Those weary and ancient tales had a thousand things to say about the topic, and it seemed strange to Ticky how so many vaunted heroes could treat the matter of death so variedly. Here, death was an honor, there it was a tragedy, and every warrior was wont to give their opinion on the matter at least once in their story.

Warrior Cloud was fatalistic about the subject, and Tempest – shortly before her revival – even allowed herself to muse at length if life was truly worth living.

Ticky wasn’t sure. Maybe those warriors of old just didn’t know what they were talking about, or maybe it was just life that they were all confused over.

Still, at times like these, the girl found Tempest’s outlook very apropos reality.

Because, right now, with no embellishment, Ticky wanted to die.

Well, not die, precisely.

It was just that she was in a depressive mood, and therefore introspective. Ticky always strived to live an examined life, and the sharp clarity of her suffering gave her a lot to look over. Firstly, what even was the big deal about life? Why did Ticky ever even want to live? What, because of instinct? Because she was born?


It wasn’t even as if she’d chosen to be born in the first place. Everyone just told her her, without pause, about the 'gift' of life itself, as if merely living justified itself.

Still… recent hardships had bolstered Ticky’s outlook somewhat.

She was confident now in herself, and in her ability to face whatever challenges came forward. Because Ticky now knew that she could never suffer any fate worse than death, because she was ready on a hair trigger to kill herself the instant life stopped seeming – in her estimation – ‘worth it’.

It was the second week of her Diral, and never had time seemed slower than in those brief realizations that she had two years left to go.

<Rise and shine! Only sixty-six weeks left to go!>

Wallflower blared out the psychic message at the break of dawn, greeting the new morning the exact way she had for the past two weeks.

Wallflower’s aunties had to strain on the puppet strings to get the girl into a Soroin (Ship-Board) Caste Diral -- a monumental task after the ruckus she had made in the creche. Apparently, they had impressed upon her the great trouble her recklessness had cost them, to tell by how differential and shell shocked she had seemed at the Diral entrance ceremony.

<Ahh, two days until religious ceremonies am-I-rite ladies? >

That did not, however, spare her from being annoying.

Ticky remembered, suddenly, what exactly it was that had marked the girl as a mark two years ago. Wallflower had always been the loser-type; telekinesis hardly changed that.

Ticky sat up from the hole in the ground she’d been sleeping in, spine slumping underneath the immense weight of Perrein’s gravity.

<Shut up,> Ticky commanded.

<🫥> Wallflower replied, mortified.

Ticky Toc had been quick to smooth over relations with Wallflower. It had been easy enough to accomplish. Ticky had enough practice with handling the loner types.

Granted, her usual tactic was to get them to leave her alone, but she made an exception for Wallflower. After all, bad blood was a bad thing to have at the start of a Diral. Moreover, Ticky saw a lot of potential in having a Telekinetic nearby. It certainly came in handy when digging out their sleeping pits, anyhow.

Sleeping pits were a necessity during the first two weeks of a Diral.

At least… Ticky thought they were necessary. Every other sub Diral had dug sleeping pits on the first day, and Ticky and her group were quick to follow.

Granted, on further speculation, Ticky was beginning to wonder if following the lead of a bunch of other eight year old’s was wise.

Because, to tell by the history of their diral band so far, no one here knew what they were doing.

Their first day had started off with vertigo as the cargo ship dropped down through a freshly lasered sky circle and opened the doors with a hiss, revealing a virgin pasture of jungle where all one hundred of them were marched off the shuttle, supplied with ten information pads, given one knife to share, and allowed – as a gracious move – to keep the clothes on their backs before the shuttle door slammed in their faces and took off.

All one hundred pairs of eyes looked up at the shuttle silhouette as it diminished through the sky circle, perhaps a common sense of nostalgia drawing their attention to that last vestige of home before they were abandoned.

That was their first mistake.

Perrein was a dangerous world. And, though they’d lived on it for the whole of their lives, the city dwellers had yet to fully internalize that lesson which all who ventured into the deep jungle must eventually learn: never travel alone, and when in a group, never divert your attention to the same spot, for the creatures always strike when you’re distracted.

So it was that their first minute in the deep jungle was marked by the surprise, squiggling leap of a tree-octopus which had just moments ago been a dark shade of green and was now suddenly a fluorescent, pulsating yellow.

As it changed color, it also changed locations, making a new home on the horrified, screaming face of a Loroi that had made the mistake of standing too near the perimeter of their group.

---

The next two weeks were a slog.

For some reason, everyone had decided to dig sleeping holes, those without the help of Wallflower struggling against root-packed earth with whatever make-shift shovels they could fashion out of fallen branches.

Twelve Loroi had been bitten or stung that first day, laid low by the myriad of creatures that hid beneath, crawled over, or pretended to be nice looking branches.

The second day, a harried Diral leader was faced with caring for twelve incapacitated Loroi, all in various stages of fever and shock, all the while the construction of sleeping holes had become bottlenecked by the fact that there were only thirty good digging-sticks to be passed out among the hundred-strong group, and no one wanted to go looking for more.

The third day brought a fractured arm and another snake-bite when a girl tripped into a sleeping pit during a night-time bathroom break.

A sudden rainstorm flooded their sleeping holes on the fifth day, causing the recovering bug-bite victims to relapse into a second and worse fever… Ticky was incidentally, among this group, and was perhaps thankfully spared the next three days of lucidity, where she would have otherwise had to contend with the panic as the Diral leader lost their only blade, as well as the only flint sparker which had been attached to the handle.

Thankfully, the blade was found safe in an abandoned sleeping pit, and fire was rediscovered quickly enough to temper the growing fever that was spreading through the Diral.

By the second week, the ravenous upper canopies had regrown, covering over the sky circle just for it to be lasered open again, causing a figurative ton of clutter, branches and other assorted plant matter to rain down with a cacophonous clutter of wood and shushing of shrubbery. It was a chaotic noise that briefly peaked over the ever present calls of the wildlife.

The shuttle descended again through the newly refreshed sky circle, side door opening and a disinterested older girl stepping out anticlimactically, tired eyes scanning boredly over the assorted children before leaning against the hull of her craft and directing a thumb into the open cabin.

<Injured, quitters> were the only concepts she transmitted, the words unvarnished by anything except perhaps an undercurrent of contempt.

The past two weeks had been disastrous, and those injured beyond immediate repair were quickly boarded on makeshift stretchers. The injured made up twelve in total, and twenty five others slunk quietly along.

The shuttle pilot raised an eyebrow. <That’s it? This is the last and only visit from me, you know? I won’t be coming back unless it’s to pick up a body? Once I take off…”> a whoosh of finality hit them deep in the heart, and that caused another thirteen to break.

The shuttle wings ruffled against the edge of the sky circle as it ascended, dropping a pile of branches which were immediately treated with suspicion by all those present.

It was a smaller group that remained: fifty survivors were left.

---

Also, it was raining again.

Rain on Perrein was a well forecasted thing. You could hear the thunderous clatter of droplets against the canopy for minutes – in some places even hours – before the water managed to reach the lower level.

This trickle down never fell through the air, except sporadically in large droplets. Rather, most of the water mass – that which wasn’t greedily soaked up by the tree branch-tips and antenna-vines – ran down the ever-present tree trunks.

As a result, one never got wet during Perrein Rains in the jungle, at least not directly.

However, in the same vein, one also never got dry. Every surface was damp, and every footstep drew out a rotten squelch from the black dirt, and their sleeping holes were filled to the brim with muddy water, and starting any new fires had become steadily more and more impossible.

Whenever they did manage to start a fire, it was hardly ever satisfying, the heat simply causing a steam-up that clouded the immediate vicinity in a hot, clammy atmosphere which did little to relieve them from the chills.

Still, despite this, despite her newfound paranoia for branches, and general anxiety whenever they sensed even the most minute of lizard-minds drawing near, despite the fact that Wallflower had continued to be herself, Ticky was… well, not happy, but rather focused.

The first two weeks were always the worst.

That was the only piece of wisdom her aunts had deemed important to tell her before the diral began.

Ticky didn’t take to mean that things would get easier, but it did give her a timeline to plan.

The current Diral leader was one Feather Notch.

Everyone had loyal aunts, but hers’ were among the most powerful. Naturally, she was selected as leader of the Diral.


Tricky didn’t bother making alliances in the first two weeks. Such an environment full of washouts and learning curves was hardly the best time. Now, however, she had a more stable set of circumstances she could plan around, and she was keeping eyes and ears out.

Loroi often underestimated the importance of body language. It told a lot whenever a Loroi wasn’t speaking.

Fire and Wallflower were standing behind her, stretching vine-hammocks between two trees.

The rest of the Diral quickly followed suit.

It was so easy to influence things when you had good ideas. She’d have to thank Fire for her wit, sometime. Still, more important than that was the way everyone followed suit in making their hammocks.

Weaving vines was a dexterous task, and sharp finger movements revealed a lot about the state of a Loroi. Everyone was nervous, of course, but there was – in the shakiness of some wrists and clench of fists – a sense of regret. There were some Loroi here who had wanted to leave in that shuttle, and some who even now wanted nothing to do with this place and looked over at their compatriots more often than was necessary to follow the weave patten, looking across as if searching for guidance, for someone else to take over responsibility.

And, across all these nervous and stony-lipped faces, none held so much desperation and concealed fear than one Feather Notch.

Ticky smiled.

An old Taben phrase recalled itself to her, because, right now… she could smell blood in the water.

[White]

Ticky Toc is quite unique name. Strikes me as a child's name before she receives her proper warrior name. Ticky's mother is also quite the bitch. Not sure if the Outsider lore agrees that some Loroi subcultures practice honor killings. But it's still an interesting new take on the inner affairs of a Loroi family.

Hmm... Perreinid, strong mind-powers, red eyes, with a time-related name like 'Ticky Toc'... So, is this a cousin of Tempo's, or is she a *young* Tempo?

A neat story; I'm looking forwards to seeing where it goes!

You're on the nose with the 'pre-warrior' name theory.

The names present in the book are meant to be 'nickanmes' the children give each other for speaking purposes.

As regards honor killings. Arioch has mentioned such things in the forums before.

What could be considered a crime in a Loroi Nation (for example, Zaral ) that would not be considered a crime in a Human Nation (United States) ? And/or vice versa ?

The Loroi have a lot of rules, so there are plenty of examples of the first case. The easy example is that in Zaral (and many Loroi nations) it's illegal for male and female adults to have sex without permission.

In Zaral (and many Loroi nations) it is legal for a parent or guardian to have her child who is still a minor put to death. A reason is not required, but without a really good one the parent will usually not be allowed the opportunity to have another child.

[Urist]

Hell yeah, go kid!Tempo!

Also, between this story and Snoofman's Greywind-diral-memories, I think the entire Outsider community evidently agrees that growing up on Perrein *sucks*. That seems to be quite accurate from Arioch's descriptions, but /oh boy/ does the Australia-and-the-Amazon-had-a-lovechild world sound unpleasant.

[Snoofman]

I like this take on a diral; wet behind the ears and off to a rocky start. Or should I say damp and depressed. Reminds me of a depressing scene from the novel Dances with Wolves, when the soldiers in the beginning decide to bail on their outpost.

[Cthulhu]

That's a fascinating and immersive description of a diral. Looking forward for more!