CrystalBorn

[Flare]

The earth, disconnected broken apart, the water of the oceans pour into the core. The molten center now a solid mass where we were forced to live for so many years. I, the leader of the rebellion, have decided to take back the surface... and even further to find the few that made it out to the surrounding Land masses.. I can't exactly call them countries anymore since they've been broken up in so many different ways. Earth’s gravity is screwed, the land masses actually started floating up into the air, or so I can see from down here... Ever since I have started this rebellion we have had high hopes of seeing them all, for as long as I can remember. I've wanted to soar out of here and feel the wind we have all heard so many stories about. Well I think this is going to be my last entry in this boring old notebook of mine, I'm going to leave it here so when children find it they can see it and be inspired to rise up out of that hell hole, Oh and for whoever reads this next, the name's Blank, i'll see on the surface,


Good luck.

 

[Flare]

Blank's eyes were dusty, and dry. Unable to produce tears to clear the residue away, he laid there blind, hungry, broken in tatters. He heard the shuffling of steps, and felt the vibrations of what seemed like a stomp next to his head. "Boy! You've stumbled into a place that no outsider should venture to. Are you asking for us to kill you where you lay?" Blank wanted to answer, but he couldn't muster the words, and with what might he may of had left he picked up his head with a slight cough and reached to where he thought the man was standing. "Pinchas, the boy is blinded and on the verge of death.." A feminine voice said softly, as a slight whimper came from where the woman was standing. "Papa.. Will the man die?" A young girl began to choke up. Blank's eyes began to open, when suddenly water was splashed onto his face. "He'll rest, then we will question him!" The obvious leader echoed over, what Blank could only assume were guards, or maybe an entire settlement.


He was laid down on a fur bed roll, a pillow propped up his head as he remained near death. A cold wet item was pressed up against his lips, "You can't have water right away, but we can try to ease you into it" a new voice blank hadn't heard before. "Tha...nk y..ou" Blank forced out of his dry throat.

 

[MisfortunateDreams]

It hadn't happened slowly like the tribesmen had said it would. They had always claimed that when the evils that plagued the West Islands finally reached across the Sky bridge it would appear slowly. First with the rot of their food and the sickness of their people. Then many would die and eventually the Isa tribes would be no more, just as the curse form the other tribes had said. Atiya had expected it to be just as they said, or not at all. However, to see a form laying in the dirt on the path toward the Sky bridge and the West Islands.


It unnerved her.


Not that she believed the boy was the physical form of the evils, but because he was a type of person she had never seen before. Atiya had seen many peoples, but none like him. Not in the Northern cape, or the Cloudless Meadows. She had been to all those places when her father was alive, she had seen and talked to the people there. He was different though, foreign and strange. It was for this reason Pinchas acted so horribly.


The boy had been found by a girl collecting berries in the forest. When she had spotted him she had run back to the village as quickly as she could to retrieve the Headsman and his warriors. Atiya had gone along to ensure that they weren't to hostile with someone that may not have been a spirit of evil.


"He is no more evil then I am!" Atiya stated, pointing at the pale face sleeping on the furs. "He is no spirit."


"The Spirits of the Goddess would look down on you with shame." Pinchas hissed, nearly spitting out the words as he pushed back the door flap to exit the hut. Atiya followed, brushing past her sister so that she could follow after the proud Headsman.


"He is injured, unable to see properly let alone fight. He is no harm to us." She said, evenly. It was no use though. Talking reasonably with someone who disliked you only made them feel angrier. Her logic enraged Pinchas, as it always did.


"You take care of him then." He snapped, pointing toward the hut. "But when a plague befalls us and that evil asks a sacrifice in return for salvation I will turn you over to him." With that he stormed away, Rayen following after like the obedient child she was. Atiya let out a string of curses under her breathe and turned toward the hut. Inside an elderly women was speaking soothingly to the boy, who was now awake.


"Let him drink." Atiya stated, "If his body reacts badly he will know it his own fault. He will be wiser afterward."

 

[Flare]

A water skin was pressed to his lips, and the water slowly began to flow into his mouth. His reaction wasn't instantaneous, but he gulped slowly, and harshly. After about three gulps he gasped for air.


Seemingly aware of his surroundings now he looked around still slightly blind, but he moved as if his injuries were gone. he moved his hand around looking for the water skin, once in his hand he poured water onto his eyes and rubbed his eyes.


"Water... This is all I needed.." He said lowering his arms down into the furs sitting up and breathing normally for the first time in two days. The boy looked up his eyes now fully open, and made direct eye contact with Atiya. The look she received was one not only of gratitude, but admiration, his cheeks flushed a slight red and he looked away.


"M...My bag! I need it!" He distract himself, the bag was slightly to his left, and once in hand he dove into the bag looking for his items. "Okay... that's there and that... the book! Oh thank the sky..." He said taking his arm out of the bag and laying back into the furs again. He closed his eyes and drifted into sleep again, his body just shut down, and he fell completely unconscious.


As he laid back his shirt had come up and Atiya could see the blood and dirt covering his stomach and chest.

 

[MisfortunateDreams]

The desperate gulps made Atiya wonder just what this lad had been through. Not that she was curious enough to find out at that very moment. She knew that if the boy didn't speak about his past then Pinchas and his Warriors certainly would. It would only be a matter of time before they stormed into the hut with spears to demand the newcomer's intentions. The thought made her sigh grumpily, giving the elderly women in the hut a small look as they shared the same thought. This boy was in no shape to deal with Pinchas. It was clear from the blood.


"You must not speak down to him, youngling." The elderly women said, patting the mat in front of her as a sign for Atiya to sit. The girl did as the women wanted, taking the place across from her grandmother so that she could listen to her advice. "Pinchas is the Chief, if you continue to act as you do it will not be good." Atiya made a face.


"I only speak the way he should be spoken to, Basira." She stated, "He has no High Tribesmen blood in him, he should be a Warrior not our Chief. Mother should have been the one to take on the tit-"


"Hush. Now." Her grandmother snapped, "Blood or not, he is our Chief and you must respect that."


"I cannot." The air was heavy after Atiya had spoken, Basira studying her in silence. Atiya didn't look away, evenly meeting the older women's eyes.


"I see." Basira grumbled, "Do not tell that to anyone but me. You will be exiled at once if they find you a threat. Which you certainly are, Atiya." Atiya nodded. "Clean him up," She said, motioning to the blood. "I'll talk to Pinchas."

 

[Flare]

As Basira walked from he seat next to Atiya, Blank opened his eye for a moment to see how close she was to the entrance and then played dead yet agin.


"This girl, I need to talk to her alone. Maybe she will be level headed. I surly don't want thirty or forty spears in my face." He thought to himself trying to make his breath regular, and without winces of pain.


The older woman had finally walked out of the tent, and he could hear the drops of water from the cloth the younger girl had in her hand. As she rung out the cloth, Blank sighed and coughed slightly. "Atiya, thats a pretty name." he said looking into her eyes from the ground.


"You seem to be on tense terms with the chief. Maybe that's something we have in common?"

 

[MisfortunateDreams]

She watched silently as Basira exited the tent, knowing what the elder had said was true. Pinchas dealt with her simply because she was his wife's daughter, a half-sister to his own child. There was no doubt Atiya would have been exiled long ago had she been the daughter of another women. He was looking for reasons to cast her out.


It might have been that the goddess were telling her it was soon time to leave. By bringing the reason that Pinchas needed into her life, dropping a boy of unknown name to the Isa Tribes. They had placed him in Atiya's path for a reason. When his voice sounded, she did her best to remain calm as she spoke.


"It's an ancient name." She answered, "Passed down from the wisewomen of Old." Atiya turned to look over the blood-covered person before her. He looked better, the color in his face had returned and his breath coming out even. He possessed magic then. Perhaps he was a mage or shaman from a neighboring tribe.


"Here." She passed him the rag before settling on the mat just beside his furs. "The Chief is a wise man and my mother's husband. I wouldn't fight against him." The words were hard to squeeze out, but eventually they escaped her lips and she gave the boy an even-eyed glance.

 

[Flare]

"Well that is quite the predicament. I need to start my travels again, I wish to be rid of the threatening aura of your tribe and this wise man." Blank said looking up to Atiya still. putting his hand out, he retrieved the cloth from her hand. Lifting up his shirt, Blank based away the blood and dirt exposing scars covering his chest. A red gleam gleamed for a moment in the presence of Atiya, and Blank quickly pulled his shirt back down and averted his eyes from the young woman.


Maybe it was the way that she spoke, or how Pinchas first greeted him, as he laid on the ground, but there was an overwhelming distrust towards the village's chief. This girl, had she seen the pendent, she might know he was being cured by it's magical properties. The way it shined now was it's protective attributes taking care of him.


"An ancient, beautiful name is better than a name at all. I've lost mine, haven't known the name my parents gave me, so I have always gone by Blank. It's a pleasure to meet you, Atiya." Blank set down the blood stained cloth and extended his hand to the girl before him. "I'm surprised you aren't nervous by my recovery, do the people on the surface heal this fast as well?"

 

[MisfortunateDreams]

"Pinchas won't let you leave, not when you might be a threat to the way we live." Atiya state, ignoring the boy's discomfort as she took the cloth from him and dipped it into the water beside her. The water drained red from it's fabric as she rung it out and hung it on a small rack by the doorway. He was different, and for that reason they would all have to be careful.


"Blank is a strange name for a xenon." She continued, looking over his grungy clothing. "We have mages that deal with healing magic, if that's what you mean." Atiya rummaged through a bin of freshly washed clothes and removed what appeared to be the right size. She then handed it to him and sat back.


"You'll have to change into this." She said, "So I can wash... you're clothing." Her eyes roamed the strange fabric he wore. Everything about him spoke a tale of difference. He was not from around there. She wished she just knew where it was he had come from. Perhaps he was of the sky people, or a soul lost on it's way to the Flat Waters. She wasn't sure.

 

[Flare]

"So I am stuck here.. " He thought to himself as she took the rag, and rung it out. She spoke of his strange name for a xenon, and his attention was taken from his crystal and put on this familiar word. Their word for human maybe? Perhaps it wasn't familiar at all, but then again.


In midst of his thought, cloths from their tribe were thrusted into his arms. Asked to change, his face became red and flustered. Atiya averted her gaze, but still looked up at him, seemingly examining his being in its entirety. "I..I..." he stuttered, but started to take off his coat wincing from the pain.


As he took his coat off a small electronic device fell from the his pocket and tumbled to Atiya. In bold letters it read "THE WESTERN BOARDER" and below was a small sub heading "Enter The Surface At Your Own Risk" Blank looked down at the device and tilted his head, "My description log?"

 

[MisfortunateDreams]

Atiya was about to turn, planning on heading out of the hut so that the xenon could change. It was a good time to talk to Pinchas, tell him that the boy was in no shape for a hard interrogation. Instead her attention was drawn to the object that fell from the boy's clothes onto the floor. Bending down, she lifted it up and examined the device.


"You come from a far away place." She said, eyes not moving from the object in her hands. "I don't know how your world works but mine is not a kind one." Slowly she straightened, passing him the object.


"I caution you to speak only of what must be said and to not cross Pinchas." Atiya looked over the boy, "The Headman is not a trusting man and he will easily tear apart anything that's in his way."

 

[Flare]

"You all have something to protect here, I on the other hand have nothing to gain at all from taking any of it. Never the less I am being held here, and I am able to do naught about it? Atiya, if you understand what it is to have a single life's wish, then help me escape here. We both know what happens when they don't like what I have to say.." Blank entire being became quiet, thinking of how he may be tortured, beaten, killed, or even discovered of whom he is.


Blank was lucky enough in the first village. He came across someone willing to make him a false digital ID, but if anyone knew he was from below, they would treat him as a beast. Men born below were never meant to step foot above, and now that I have found others, I can't be killed or forced back down there. Blanks feelings were whirling in a cataclysmic catastrophe, in which he wanted to run from, but his inability to move made him feel as though he was trapped in his own body.


You've been touched by the crystals, your powers are vast, you could go anywhere you wanted, that is what Blank was told, but now everything he had hoped and dreamed of seemed to be dashed in his heart.


"Are they going to kill me Atiya? Am I really a failure?"