Lightship Chronicles
Book 1 : Sacred Warriors
copyright©2015
Florin Nicoara
From the Author
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Chapter 3 : The Fruity Dance
Lightship Chronicles
Book 1 : Sacred Warriors
copyright©2015 Florin Nicoara
In his dizzied state Andee suddenly finds himself moving a bit sideways. To regain his balance he flashes his eyes down to his right foot and quickly finds his intended flow. A fraction of a moment later, when he looks back up... nothing's changed. Everyone is exactly where they should be... except him. The man in blue... is not there.
Nayaa, speeding through the market, is now doing the dance with the crowd as she spins, leaps, and twirls around people to gain ground on the skinny guy. She's on his heels, only three meters behind. The man suddenly turns right, heading towards a clothing stall with a canvas roof atop metal poles. Around the stall there is smaller alley. It looks like that's where the skinny guy is heading. Anticipating his intention, Nayaa takes a hard right, but there's a large fat man pulling a small hand cart between her and the stall. Without a moment's hesitation she runs up the hand cart scuttling up onto the man's shoulders, all in a flash, then dives forward startling the bejeebers out of the poor guy.
"Aheey! What the hell..." The man yells shocked looking up at Nayaa flying over his head away from him. Her arms land on the metal post holding the far corner of the canvas roof, and as the skinny guy rounds the corner towards the alley, Nayaa's feet come spinning round the pole right at his face. His eyes ogle out, but it's too late. Nayaa kicks him in the face knocking him backwards. His feet fly out from under him as he drops hard to the ground on his back, already out cold from the kick. Nayaa lands next to him in a squat. She immediately starts rifling through his thigh satchels and finds Andee's credit fold. The people around have stopped and look at her with suspicious glares. The fat guy pushes through the crowd reaching the edge and stares at her with murder in his eyes. His lips are churning like he is struggling to speak but too confused and angry to string a cohesive sentence.
Nayaa suddenly feels his stare, and the rest of the glares, and looks up. "Hey, he stole this from me first!" She lifts the credit fold up in the air. "I'm just stealing back what's mine!" And jumps to her feet. Everyone is gawking at her with accusatory eyes, especially the big guy. She lifts up the credit fold and dangles it teasingly at the fat man. "You want to steal my stuff? Huh?" Then looks at the rest of the crowd sweeping the area, dangling the credit fold, "Wan'na steal my stuff? Any of you?" She challenges them all with her own strong glare. The fat man shakes his head with disapproval and turns away, as does most the crowd. A handful still linger. Nayaa looks down at the unconscious man. She squats next to his face and gives him a hardy slap.
"Hey genius, wake up!" But there is no movement, not even a reaction to the smack. "Actually please wake up. I'm too young to be a murderer." She pleads genuinely concerned. A few of the lingerers approach and one spills water on the unconscious man's face. The skinny guy snaps awake startled. He dizzily scrambles to his feet and runs off stumbling and falling a few times on the way. Nayaa casually watches just as Andee comes to a hard stop, finally catching up.
"What the hell was that back there?" Nayaa confronts him with real anger.
"I'm sorry, are you OK?"
"Yeah I'm OK, but you're not. You haven't stumbled like that since you were a kid. What happened?"
"Nothing. I thought I saw something, but..."
"But what?"
"It was nothing."
"So you knocked me down for nothing? Really?" Nayaa retorts still angry and now suspicious. "If you're going to knock me down, at least do it for something."
"I guess you got the credits?" Andee changes the subject, his tone nervous and uncomfortable.
"Of course I got the credits. In fact, I got you these credits twice. Maybe I should keep them all for myself." Holding the credit fold up in his face.
Andee nods in agreement, eyes lost in some other place, staring right through the credit fold and right through Nayaa. She squints her eyes as she studies him for a moment.
"OK, now I know for sure... something. It's something. Not nothing. What's wrong?"
Andee looks away. Looks around for a moment. He seems indecisive. Struggling. "Ok, fine. Did you see a guy in a blue hood?" He suddenly blurts out looking her hard in the eyes.
"What? Where? What are you talking about?" Nayaa reacts with exaggerated confusion.
"Back there? Did you see a guy in a blue hood? Before I bumped into you?"
"No. Did you?" This time she responds incredulous.
"Have you ever seen a guy in a blue hood? Anywhere?"
"Ever? Hello, I don't remember the fashion sense of everyone I've ever meet. What kind of question is that?" She stops and thinks for a moment. "Although... a fashion fumble like a blue robe, that I would remember."
"Never mind." Shaking his head. Andee is in no mood for Nayaa's clowning and changes the subject. "Can we get some food, I'm starved."
"Yeah for sure, but what the hell is wrong with you? Blue robes? Are you going jovial on me for real? Cuz you sure are being weird."
"Maybe I'm just hungry. I didn't eat anything today."
"Yeah you did. You ate two berryfruit right in front of me, you weirdo."
"I meant a more substantial meal. Real food." Andee snaps at her.
"So you're saying you're suffering from hunger madness?"
"If such a thing exists, than yes."
"OK, I'll buy it." Lifting up the credit fold. "Cuz I have credits." She winks and takes off. "Come on jovial-A, keep up with me."
The giant red sun is approaching last horizon. There is no moon in sight but with the four hour long twilight on Carpatia light will be plentiful. Andee and Nayaa are in an industrial area full of warehouses. Like many of the buildings in the Carpati Township most are made from orange adobe, especially the newest ones. Older buildings are larger and made from metals and modern polymers, but most are run down. The two friends look lost as they wonder down a broad dirt alley, one of many that crisscross the area. Ahead, a caravan of loaded alcamas is approaching. Ten beasts tethered together, loaded with sacks and boxes twice as big as their bodies. Andee stares at the poor animals and is struck by a pang of sadness for them.
His mind wonders back in time to Toni, the alcama owned by his dad when Andee was around five years old. He can remember it clearly. There used to be a shed by the west wall where Toni the alcama slept, but during the day it roamed around their top terrace in front of their house. He remembers how it had to be tied to the wall with a metal wire since it ate everything, even rope. If made from what was once organic, such as rope, cloth, paper, whatever, an alcama will eat it. They are loyal beasts if well trained and cared for, but with an aggressive and violent temper if frightened, abused, or feral. A large beast, it is taller than the average man, with a long neck and floppy ears that hang and flap in the wind helping the animal cool off in the heat of the day. It has a long snout that is essentially a foot long trunk and very dexterous. It can easily grab and handle things, and are known to steal, but most of the time the trunk retracts flat on t
he snout and rests there when not in use. It's a vegetarian with a large wide mouth filled with broad flat teeth that will chew anything to powder, even fresh moist wood.
They are beautiful creatures. All alcama have a draping mane of hair starting at the chin and flowing down the neck to their chest. It hangs loose like a curtain with the longest part just before the front legs where it hangs close to a meter, nearly touching the ground The mane has vertical stripes, usually of three alternating colors from the top of the neck down. The stripes vary between light yellow-white-brown, brown-black-orange, and yellow-red-white. There is also a long stripe down the center of their back that is usually the same color as the darker of the three mane stripes, and is connected to them along the back of the neck. The rest of their very short fur varies in color from dark brown to light sandy yellow, with the occasional white and orange, and variations in between. On its shoulders,