Tobias

The machine was broken. I had been sent 1,500 years into the past with my two new worst enemies and a psychotic bug, and the only way home was broken.

The King tickled my cheeks with it’s antennae, more caught up by my state of mind than our new location. I didn’t move. I only stared transfixed at the mortified looks on Rukis and Loki’s fluffy faces. Even Rukis, with his strange calm and bliss, looked rattled. His tawny whiskers twitched as he looked over the broken machine. Loki’s silver eyes seemed to be frozen in place, only he was staring at nothing. “Rukis... what have you done?” I was slightly pleased to hear the telltale tremor and squeak of fear in his voice, though his stony face didn’t show it.

“I held my hand out, and you made me press the button.” Silence. A bird called somewhere deep in the forest, a sound that I couldn’t identify with any bird I’d ever heard. Assuming that’s what it was. “What year is it? 1222?” Loki and I nodded in quiet assurance. The calm and bliss had now returned to Rukis’s brown and spotted face. “Oh, I know all about this year! I learned it in my history class. The Great Holy War begins in a year. Saikro persecution and mage burnings begin two months before that.” I could feel the blood leaving my face and entering my blue quills.

“Rukis? You’re very smart, but please keep all knowledge of my impending doom to yourself.”

“Oh, sorry. I forgot you were a Saikro...” He seemed sincere. I wanted to change the subject. I wanted very, very badly to change the subject. A little white insect landed on Loki’s nose, causing the mighty ice vorlos to sneeze unimpressively and bat the thing away. His gaze at nothing had been broken, and he now glared coldly at the time-travel device.

“Drop it. It’s nothing more than cursed slag now.” Smooth, toneless growl. Even if he wasn’t commanding me with his abnormal powers, I felt obliged to do so. Pursing my lips, I spread my fingers and tilted them forward. The two halves of the little generator slipped lightly off, one at a time. One landed unharmed on a circular green mushroom with blue protrusions (rather phallic ones, really) and the other landed on a rock, snapping in half.

A colorless sunbeam managed to escape the forest canopy and illuminate my empty hands, but only for a moment. That white sun was Yohai. Black Vayor was nowhere to be seen, though for all my visibility, it could be overhead as well. The bird cried again. The King, having stopped with his tickling, began to shuffle around and feel over a nearby tree. He suddenly seemed to understand that we had gone somewhere.

“What now?” I asked into the emptiness. As if my voice had broken some stifling spell, the other two began to move. Rukis sat on a log. Not in any normal human position- his long front arms sank low for support, and his slightly short legs folded with ease into a very feline pose of restful awareness. Loki folded his arms, a gesture that seemed somewhat unfamiliar to his doglike limbs. Stress was written all over his face.

“Our plan is simple, really. We all cooperate for the amount of time required to find a way home. Then, once we’ve safely maneuvered our way to year 2722, we impale you and roast you over a cozy fire along with some tender tayvu meat.”

Rukis suggested mildly that we all get along instantly and find some proper food. The gurgling noises from his abdomen made no secret of his id. I didn’t want to admit this, but I was getting quite hungry as well. What with not eating anything, nor drinking, for two days. I have a low metabolism for a Sodian rodent, but two days was a bit much for me. We acruceps starve after about a week.

“You’d better not intend to eat me, because I’ll blast you with a billion years of unholy Saikro vengeance.” Loki gave me an odd look that certainly wasn’t hunger.

“Of course we won’t eat you. We’d poison ourselves if we ate you raw, and neither of us are fire casters.”

Damned carnivores.

We proceeded to converse peacefully about our political and dietary views. This was a subject that invoked a lot of anger, what with the time travel and bombs and terrorism and hunger and enemy alliances. The King wisely avoided our nonviolent discussion, due to the small explosions and swordplay. The worst injuries were a large cut across my shoulder and Loki’s heavily singed whiskers. Like I said, it was debated rather civilly. For us.

Thanks to Rukis’ constant insistence that we get along (how was I supposed to know he could use daggers and cast barriers?!) the conversation became verbal instead of physical. Rukis and Loki, being the murderous predatory terrorists that they were, wanted to go off hunting and seek out local villages to victimize. I, being a hungry young wizard, wanted to go off picking berries and looking under rocks for choice grubs. I wouldn’t mind finding a town to stay in, but with the Saikro persecution and burnings beginning in less than a year, that didn’t sound like a good risk. Not until I thought up good ways to cover my own religion without infuriating the god Karoesk.

And I assure you, Karoesk is VERY easy to infuriate.

We discussed civilly (and actually civilly by now, no sarcasm) which ways we would take. The Seth would go northwest, traveling around the roots of the Bayuko mountains that bordered Crater Inlet. I would head east, towards the center of the continent. There was no mention of meeting again, obviously because we didn’t intend to ever do so. I hoped that if we absolutely HAD to cross paths again, they wouldn’t be wearing Ripper clothes.

We finally got up, dusted off, healed up, and generally got set to get ready to go. They left first, not giving me a second glance. Well, Loki didn’t look back. Rukis did for a second. Those orange eyes and that slightly sharp lip curled into sweet smile before he kept going.

I walked away from them for about a minute before it dawned on me that the King might be a useful companion. While I turned to call him over, I saw with extreme dismay that he was following the predatory Seth- clicking happily and being pet by Rukis, who was no longer smiling at me. “Traitor,” I muttered darkly before setting off alone.

I found with more dismay and slight fear that I couldn’t recognize any of the plants and bugs. Perhaps the machine had read off the wrong time? I didn’t think evolution was this rapid, unless of course this forest possessed only it’s own specialized species and they were all wiped out... a year from now. So rich a forest, from what I had previously known, only existed on Tendahn. I no longer trusted my old lessons. The last day had proven me wrong about so many things it wasn’t even funny. Either way, some of the undergrowth here could have made Loki seem short. Patches of thorny bushes loomed toward me, effectively pissing me off by displaying berries the size of my head that appeared very luscious yet may be poisonous.

When Yohai had set and Zyn also began to sink low on the horizon, my belly finally surrendered to it’s emptiness and stopped grumbling. That wasn’t a good thing, because although it didn’t hurt anymore, I would feel sick once I ate again. I know my body. I had only gone ten or so miles mainland, constantly checking my location in comparison to the Bayuko mountains. So far I had only seen impressive trees, drool worthy berries that I dared not eat, and a little tayvu-mouse. They’re very cute, tayvus, but they couldn’t speak. The fact that they had fluffy wings and two legs made them look like brown ducklings with buck teeth, but they were cute anyway. They’re not bats, they just had fluffy wings that served no purpose. There was no use in asking a tayvu for directions.

Eventually I sunk into a soft pile of moss, heaving a heavy sigh. I was tired, hungry, confused, a mass murderer, and lost 1,500 years in the past- right before the most bloody religious war in the history of my home planet! Zyn was setting slowly in his grace. I had no idea what monsters lurked in the evening shadows, waiting to prey upon the innocent. That may sound exaggerated to you, but I’ve been to many places where that was a reasonable concern. I considered prayer, but it was too early.

Yes, too early to pray to Karoesk.

Perhaps I should explain a few short things about the Saikro religion and ways. In the relatively short years since Saikro became a true religion (now that I think of it, the whole “Karo’s Cult” thing started around this time...) there was still little known about our God. He created the universe from the darkness, and in the darkness of Vayor he remains, watching us with his cold (and sadistically amused!) eyes. Hence why prayer to him is only done during the night hours, or when Vayor’s shining, and there are VERY few Saikro who fear the dark. That’s also why a Norkro custom is to always have a candle lit in your room.

What I’m trying to get at is, Karoesk is 200% nocturnal. To pray during the day is like waking up your parents at four in the morning because you wanted candy. Only, when Karoesk spanks you, you DIE and BURN.

Back to the current situation.

I couldn’t pray, I couldn’t eat, and I’d just allowed my only ‘companion’ to walk away. There was only one sensible thing left to do.

I sat on my miniature blue ass and cried.