Kajin
Part 1
It was a unpleasantly cool morning as Ryesh emerged from her parents cave. It was early, and there was a light mist in the air. Ryesh moved to a sunny spot on a nearby rock that she liked, and spread out to enjoy the warm rays. She gathered some dew off of a leaf with her claw and tasted it, savoring the semi-sweet water. Then, a deafening sound like thunder echoed through the valley.
Moments later, she was joined by her father Dagnir.
Dagnir was a fully grow Kajin male, nearly three meters in height. Like all Kajin, he had a reptilian build, with a scaly muzzle, sharp teeth, claws, tail, and fanned ears. The strong, large wings of a adult protruded from his back, and the pointed horns of a Kajin male from his head. He grabbed Ryesh by the ridge on the back of her neck and hefted the young Kajin into the air so they were face to face.
" What have I told you about leaving the cave without us? You know you are too young to be our by yourself!" Ryesh knew that her father was angry, and she squeamishly replied.
" The cave gets cold in the morning, dad. And its boring sitting there waiting for you and mom to wake up. And.." A angry glance from her father cut her off there. With a sad, difficult tone , Dagnir spoke.
" Ryesh, know that I love you. But also know that I want to protect you from the bad creatures of our world. In six months, you will be two years old. Then, you will have more freedom, because you will be bigger and stronger. But for now, you have to stay with us. I hate to do this, but you cannot see your friends for a week." Dagnir gently put Ryesh down as Meril, Ryesh's mother, exited the cave.
" What happened? What was that sound?" Ryesh was nervous, because while her dad would only scold her for a moment, mom would talk for hours. Dagnir turned his head towards her. " Ryesh was outside without us again. She can't see any friends for a week. I'm going to check with the watchers about that sound." He kissed her on her nose and flew off above the trees, heading down in the valley. Ryesh turned towards her mother, and saw that the orange scales on her face had turned a deep red.
" Your father may have only grounded you for a week, but I promise you that it will be a hard week of chores! What were you thinking, coming outside without us! You could have been attacked by a Coris beetle and poisoned, or fell off of a cliff! I promise.." Ryesh tuned her mother out. She had learned, as all children do, how to nod and react at the correct places while her mother talked. A week in the cave with her mom while Urid and Gorin were playing in the sulfur pools. She didn't know how she was going to stand it. Meril stopped her rant for a moment to take her inside and put her to work making breakfast.
" Dagnir is going to be hungry when he gets back. Some eggs and fish will do, they are his favorites. Another thing, what would you have done if a Eben had come along?" Ryesh focused on not dropping the eggs. Her mother continued to talk as she gathered sticks for the fire. Ryesh thought about what her dad was going to find. Dagnir was a warrior and kept the valley safe from creatures and bad Kajin. He was one of the strongest, and was greatly respected in the valley. Ryesh wanted to grow up to be strong like him and guard the valley. She was broken from her thoughts when her mother finished piling the sticks and lit them on fire with her breath. She started putting the fish on a stick so she cold cook them. Ryesh put the eggs close to the fire and watched them.
She couldn't wait until she could breath fire. It was the Kajin's greatest weapon, and it seemed really fun. Ryesh would go around lighting things on fire all the time. She had started to daydream when a voice called from the entrance to the cave. It wisent her dads voice.
" Meril, come quick! Dagnir is hurt!" Cevith, a friend of Dagnir's and a fellow warrior, came into the cave. Meril looked at Cevith with panic in her eyes.
" What! What happened! Is he going to live!?" Ryesh was becoming scared as well. Her mom usually worried, but not this much. Cevith motioned with his tail for them to follow him. Ryesh was picked up by his mother and they were soon flying over the valley. Ryesh liked flying, but she was too distracted by her mom and Cevith.
" I arrived at the source of that noise about the same time as Dagnir and several others. We found a huge burn mark in the forest floor. It was huge, I have never seen anything like it. We had started to look around where there was a smaller noise, not like the first one. Dagnir fell to the ground, and when I got there, he had several bleeding wounds in his chest. He wasn't doing good, but said that he saw something go running off into the forest. Some went to search, but I knew I had to get you."
They flew on into the valley, and soon could see a pillar of smoke rising from being a small hill. They flew over it, and Ryesh and Melin gasped in disbelief as it came into view.
The burnt section of the forest was huge, almost a kilometer in width. The blasted remnants of trees, dried ponds, and charred boulders littered the valley floor. There was a small group of Kajin located near the edge of the blast mark and the forest. Cevith and Meril landed nearby, and all three rushed over to the group.
" Back up! Its Meril, let her get through!" Meril and Ryesh bused through the crowd and found Dagnir laying on the ground. There were three small holes in his chest, but they were bleeding badly. Someone was cleaning the wounds with some cloth, but it didn't appear to be helping mush. Dagnir smiled as Meril leaned over to embrace him, but she had to back away when he started to cough. He sat up a little and embraced Meril. They were arm in arm for several seconds, but then Dagnir had to lay back down, as the pain was too great. He grabbed Ryesh's claw with his, and they sat there, crying softly for several minutes. Suddenly, there was a roar and three Kajin landed.
Ryesh saw that one was carrying a strange looking creature in one arm. She had seen many creatures, like the birdlike Ari and the amphibian Romun, but never anything like this. It was not very tall, with strange, baggy skin. Its legs were blue and its chest and arms white, but it had strange pink hands and a pink face. Mostly, though, its head was covered with what looked like feathers. Ryesh looked closer and saw they were not feathers, but actually looked like a brown grass. Murmurs ran through the crowd, which had become quite large. Finally, the Kajin holding it threw it forward. It collapsed onto its knees. Another Kajin threw down a small, shiny object. It looked like metal, but was too strangely shaped.
Cevith grabbed its head and drug it over to Dagnir. " Look at him. He has a family. Why did you kill him? Tell me! Why!" He shoved the creatures head down, next to one of the bleeding holes. The creature spoke in a strange, almost musical voice. " How can I understand you?"
Cevith spun the creature around to face him. " What do you mean by that?" Confusion ran through the crowd.
" I didn't expect you to be able to talk, and I don't know how I can understand what you are saying. It dos.." Cevith threw him a short distance.
" Just shut up. You killed Dagnir, and if his daughter wasn't here now I'd kill you. Why did you attack him?" Cevith was screaming now, and the small creature seemed afraid.
Cevith walked over to it and placed his foot claw over its neck. Cevith yelled again. " ANSWER THE QUESTION! WHY DID YOU ATTACK HIM!"
" I thought that he would kill me. I found myself here, and then suddenly you things were everywhere! What else would you expect me to do!" The creature seemed angry now, but Cevith lowered his neck down to its face. He spoke in a dangerous whisper. " You should have expected us to be here, considering this is our home. Not expecting to find someone in their home is stupid." He screamed now. " WHY DID YOU ATTACK HIM! THE TRUTH!"
The creature cringed, screaming " Don't kill me! I might be able to make him better!" Meril grabbed Ceviths shoulder. " Stop! Don't hurt it! If it can make Dagnir better, we should let it! We can't save him, maybe it can!" Cevith looked at her skeptically. Almost pleading, she pulled him back. "What have we got to lose?"
Cevith looked at the creature, and it scampered over to Dagnir. It drew several shiny object out of a fold in its skin, and inserted one into one of the wounds. Cevith flung it back. " What are you doing!?" he angrily bellowed.
" I have to remove the bullets! Otherwise, there is no point to trying to save him!" It moved back next to Dagnir. It grabbed the object again, and stuck it into the wound. Dagnir screamed in pain, but the creature withdrew a small rock from the wound. A murmur of amazement traveled through the crowd, and the creature continued working. From the other two holes it removed two more rocks, and then grabbed two of the other objects and inserted them into the wounds. Ryesh looked on in amazement as the creature sewed the wounds together, one by one, and tore off some of its skin and bound the wounds. But underneath there was more of the pinkish skin, and what Ryesh had thought was skin looked like cloth now. It turned towards Cevith.
" I don't know if its gonna work, but I stopped the bleeding and fixed the holes as best I could. He'll need to rest a few weeks while his body heals it, but he should be fine." Many of the Kajin looked on in amazement at the creature. Cevith grabbed it again, and motioned to two others. They came over and took it away, heading for the cave where they would imprison it until they knew what to do with it.
Dagnir slowly sat up and looked at Meril and Ryesh. He smiled, and they both embraced him. Ryesh felt several tears on her shoulders, and saw that her parents were crying. After a long hug, Meril picked up Ryesh and took her back to their cave. They fixed a bed of soft leaves and moss, and later Dagnir was carried in by his friends. They placed him on the bed, and he fell fast asleep.
Cevith took Meril aside. " I'll check back in the morning to see if you need anything. When Dagnir is good enough to fly, we will have him come and decide what to do with the creature." Meril thanked him, and Cevith and the others left.
It had gotten dark outside, so Ryesh curled up near the fire and went to sleep. Meril lay down next to her injured mate and kissed him, and slowly fell asleep.
End of Part 1
A story by Ben Gowen