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Fiction Fanfic - Deep Patrol - (In Tlac'natai the Observer's Dust Bowl)

Discussion in 'Fluff and Stories' started by spawning of Bob, Feb 16, 2016.

  1. spawning of Bob
    Skar-Veteran

    spawning of Bob Well-Known Member

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    Preface
    I have just dumped all other projects (and there are many) because I think that the most exciting thing out is @Tlac'Natai the Observer 's private universe.

    The thing that grabbed me from story one was that the physical environment (based on the most hostile bits of Arizona) is a character in just about every scene. It also helps that his political setting and character backgrounds are very original and well thought out.

    A week ago, I had a story idea I couldn't expunge. Ten hours later this emerged. The following week was spent furiously modifying it to fit with Tlac's greater narrative - and I thank him for his generosity in letting me play in his sand pit.

    Please enjoy my fanfic homage to all things thirsty (if you don't like it, complain to Tlac - it is his universe - don't blame me).



    Deep Patrol


    General Ahtunowhiho had no use for Poneextlan’s newest priest. The skink chief didn’t even acknowledge Ezhno’s priestly status because the failed-warrior-cum-minor-celebrity had not endured the Trials, which were the normal path to priesthood. By Slann-Lord Tlac’natai’s command, Ezhno had been deemed a priest regardless of process or aptitude. Since then, the only hint that he had any latent magical ability at all was from one occasion that he had entered the Chamber of Winds. The thin column of incense smoke that rose from the central altar had deviated slightly away from the Portal of Aqshy. After an extended debate, the high priests concluded that they had no idea of the portent’s meaning, and it never happened again.

    For his own part, Ezhno had not really found what he was useful for either. The Old Ones had seen fit to impart him with the blessing of second sight through his gecko familiar. This paralleled the link shared between Lord Tlac’natai and the phoenix-like Poneexcuatl, but neither the slann, nor the gods had given the slightest indication of the purpose of the gift.

    Ezhno was adopted by the priestly classes and was loosely mentored by Priest Narcada who had given him the basics of a priestly education. He had taken to his lessons well, just as he had learned the potter’s art from his old friend Nayavu, but his attempts to channel the winds of Ghur and Azyr to cast even the rudiments of battle magic had failed. Narcada assured him that his focus would improve with meditation and practice, but the cycles of the city ground inexorably onwards without giving him time for either.

    By tradition and decree of the ruling Senate, the minor priests were all on a rota to support the military operations of the city. Ezhno could not avoid serving in this way, and General Ahtunowhiho, much to his disgust, could not reject Ezhno’s unwelcome aid without causing a ruckus with the Senate.

    It was certainly not the general’s intent, but his solution to the useless-priest problem turned out to be quite agreeable to Ezhno – he was attached to one of the deep patrols and sent as far away from Poneextlan as possible.

    -----​

    “The cactus water would stay cooler in clay vessels. These skins keep it hot. And they smell.

    “Is that the wise priest talking? Or the potter?” Peradi laughed. “Why not bring a vase with you next time and see if it survives the climb up a mesa - or a skirmish like this morning’s, for that matter.”

    “I was just saying. Maybe Nayavu knows how to make a flask tough enough.”

    “Whatever. I think the sun has melted your brain, Ezhno. You are meant to be scouting the other side of this mesa.”

    Peradi was the leader of the dozen skinks of the deep patrol. He was seasons younger than Ezhno, but had risen rapidly to the rank of patrol leader while the priestling was still tripping over his spear and being quietly moved out of military duties. Peradi’s patrol had been out for a week, skirting the edge of the Sands, and in another day they would reach the Rim. After that they would turn back to the city with their report and a string of Apisi ears.

    The Senate had imposed two firm restrictions on the patrol and, indeed, all lizardmen of Poneextlan. They were not to cross the Rim, which loomed over the northern edge of their arid realm, and they were not to cross the Sands which ringed them to the south and west.

    Ezhno’s basic instruction as a priest had included some geography and history. He understood that beyond The Rim was a wasteland, supposedly infested with Apisi. The coyote-headed beastmen certainly came from that direction in their seasonal raids. Beyond those wastes was a place named, ‘Naggaroth’ which was occupied by fierce humanoids.

    Over The Sands, which were surely even more impenetrable, was something called an ‘ocean’ which was filled with poisoned water. Beyond that, there was a hint that other Temple Cities might exist, but there had been no contact with them in living memory.

    At this moment the patrol was about as close to both forbidden areas as any foot borne lizard was likely to get. Ezhno’s friend, Tadi the terradon rider, had doubtless seen beyond the Rim and possibly the Sands on his many flights, but he was always tight lipped about these things, particularly when General Ahtunowhiho pressed him for information.

    The consensus, gleaned from all of Ezhno's sources, was that beyond the sun baked basin which cradled the temple city of Poneextlan was great peril, although it boggled his mind that any place could be more hostile than the wilderness of razor sharp ridges and thirsty salt flats that he called home. Perhaps only Lord Tlac’natai really knew what was beyond, but the slann was not telling anyone.

    “Well? Are you suffering heatstroke? What do your other eyes show you?” Peradi’s voice brought Ezhno back to the present.

    Ezhno’s other eyes were contained in the tiny skull of his gecko which was, of course, quite immune to the desert heat. Lord Tlac’natai had indicated that the little sprite would follow the same life cycle as his own phoenix, and Ezhno and Nayavo had laboured to create a little crucible so that the gecko could safely renew itself in flames when it’s time came. The crystal lidded fire chamber had not yet seen use after six months, but when the gecko travelled on Ezhno’s shoulder he could detect a spark of warmth in its tiny body and a quiver of agitation which seemed to be increasing gradually each day.

    “My other eyes are currently looking at the top of your head from halfway up the cliff, and I am imagining how a terradon must enjoy emptying its bowels on the unsuspecting world below. Deep patrol is a job for Tadi and his wing riders.”

    “Not everything can be seen from the skies. Tell me what is in the next arroyo.” Peradi moved along the line of skinks who were cowering in the narrow strip of shade afforded by the mesa. He checked the welfare of each, with particular attention paid to the level of their water skins.

    -----
    Deep patrols were a microcosm of the struggle of the lizardman city of Poneextlan to endure in the harsh desert basin. Patrols survived with little by way of food and water, at all times vulnerable to the more numerous foes around them. The desert was their enemy and their weapon at the same time. During the last monsoon, Ahtunowhiho had snatched victory from a huge Apisi warband by luring the coyote-beasts into a flooding wash. Similarly, patrols would occasionally employ rockfalls or brushfires to secure victories which were smaller, but no less important to the Great Plan.

    This very morning the patrol had discovered and silently encircled an Apisi pack. The effectiveness of their dawn attack and the accuracy of their javelins was evidenced by thirty bristly ears which were threaded onto a cord which Peradi wore proudly around his neck. His troop had all come through with barely a scratch between them, thanks in no small part to Ezhno and his “other eyes”.

    The gecko was on top of the mesa now. Rather than let it proceed, Ezhno made it stop and scan the sky. The skink-priest had no idea if a kiln-fired clay reptile would make a nutritious snack for a circling buzzard, but he was keen to avoid any such incidents. As it happened, there were buzzards circling, but they were to the south, over the site of the dawn ambush of the Apisi pack. Ezhno, ruefully took note – the patrol had inadvertently highlighted its trail. Next time he would suggest that Peradi bury any bodies before his patrol moved on.

    When the gecko crossed to the far side of the plateau, Ezhno saw something unusual and something worrying. Carpeting the arroyo below was a fair sized Apisi war band. It spread across the valley floor and spread up the slopes on the far side. In itself that was not strange – this was the kind of thing his patrol was meant to detect and report back about. The unusual aspect was that there were rough tents and shelters across the depression. The Apisi encampment had an air of permanency that Ezhno had never seen before. Usually the war bands spilled over the Rim to raid and harass the lizardmen of the basin. This time it looked as though they were planning to stay.

    This was a valuable piece of intelligence. It would have suited Ezhno to leave his other eyes in place for longer to do an accurate count, and to see if there were any other clues to explain the coyotes’ unusual behaviour. But the other, more worrying observation was that some of the beasts on the far hillside were pointing south at the circling buzzards, and others looked to be preparing to move out. Even if the buzzards were only circling a bull-head carcass, the Apisi would be sure to crash the party and join the feast. When they arrived they would find thirty of their dead pack-mates, each missing a left ear.

    “Peradi, we need to get out of here.” Ezhno explained the predicament even as the gecko scurried back to rejoin him.

    The patrol leader swore. “We should’ve turned back after we hit the pack. Now we will have coyote scouts between us and the city, a full war band behind and The Sands to our side. Our only path back to Poneextlan will be back into the badlands, with patrols crawling around us as if we had stirred a blister-ant nest.”

    Another patrol-skink clearly had no appetite for a panicked flight through some of the harshest terrain on the continent. “Why don’t we just lay low here until they move on? We’ve got enough supplies for two days.”

    “Don’t be an idiot, Benoa,” Peradi snapped. “We’ll be a feast for buzzards in two days. There is no shelter here, and we have been lax. Our trail is easy to follow. They will find us before dusk.”

    Ezhno shuddered. He had been in a battle against a numerically superior enemy before, but he had been part of a significant force under the command of a master tactician. As the gecko returned to his shoulder, he wished that General Ahtunowhiho was here to guide them out of this disaster.

    Actually, a far more welcome addition would be Tadi and his wing of terradons. A swift flight back to Poneextlan would be an enjoyable alternative to near certain death.

    Peradi may not have been a general, but he was a decisive leader and he was no fool. “We move east, and I will be the last in line. Every step must be on stone, and if one of you bends a salt-grass blade or leaves a footprint on sand, I will tear you a new cloaca. Do you understand? We will not be safe until nightfall. Benoa, you take point and keep your crest low.”

    Benoa seemed to have little appetite for scouting ahead either. “Why doesn’t Ezhno’s pet lead?”

    “Because we don’t have time, cactus-licker. Move out!”

    Ezhno fell into position, one third of the way back in the tense line. The patrol-skinks scurried from cliff shadow to gnarled mesquite bush and crept on their bellies over each ridge. After a time they could hear the yips and howls of the Apisi and realised they were being pursued in earnest. As the hours wore on, the shadows lengthened and they were able to move less furtively - up to a point.

    A short time before full night, Peradi hissed and called the patrol together. “What is this? Who writes our death warrants?” He was pointing at a clear skink footprint in a patch of sand.

    Benoa didn’t attempt to avoid blame. “It's too dark to be stealthy and fast. You ask too much.”

    Peradi was beyond anger. “I ask that you don’t doom us all. Get behind me and pray to the gods that I don’t slit your throat and leave your body as a diversion.”

    At first, full dark was welcome. Ezhno relaxed a little, assuming that any trail the patrol left behind would go unseen. After two hours it was clear that the Apisi were closer than ever. The skinks stopped for a brief rest.

    “This is crazy. How can they follow our trail? There isn’t even any moonlight to see by.” Ezhno wrinkled his snout as he raise his smelly water skin to drink a little of his precious water.

    “Yet they still track us,” Peradi growled. “It is no small party that pursues us, and you must return to the city, to report what you saw to General Ahtunowhiho.”

    “Well that stinks,” Benoa was proving to be a spawned-for-purpose pessimist, “because the coyotes will have our heads before dawn.”

    “Stinks?” Ezhno had a sudden realisation. “They must be tracking us by scent.”

    “What?” The response came out of Peradi and Benoa’s mouths so close together that it wasn’t clear who spoke first.

    “Scent? I don’t smell.” Benoa folded his arms. “Warm-bloods smell.”

    “Then what…”

    “ ‘Then what,’ what?”

    Ezhno suspiciously prodded his water skin. “I can smell this. And I don’t have a coyote’s nose.”

    “Ah.” Peradi lapsed into silence as he did some calculations. “We drink our fill and dump the skins here. We can travel for two days without them.”

    “No.” Ezhno did his own calculations. “You can travel two nights which would get you to the Alkali Soak. If you travel under the sun for two days without water, the heat will shrivel your hides. And if you don’t get clear tonight, there is no second night for travel.”

    “ ‘You could travel’? Not ‘we’? What are you saying, Ezhno?” Peradi couldn’t read the priest’s expression in the gloom, but he had a suspicion.

    “Give me the skins, Peradi. You get back to the city with your report and I will lead the coyotes away.”

    “You saw the camp. It is your report, not mine.”

    Ezhno grimaced and shook his head. “Ahtunowhiho will not receive any report from me. I am not a priest or a warrior, as far as he is concerned.”

    “And you won’t be able to do this alone.”

    “I won’t be alone.”

    “Ezhno, there have been many times that I have thought that a gecko mascot is useless, but none more than now. And the only direction you can lead the hunters away from us is into the Sands, and there is nowhere to hide there.”

    There was a sudden chorus of howls from not far away.

    “So drink up.”

    The patrol skinks guzzled cactus water as much as their bellies would hold, then Peradi collected their empty water skins and tied them together with a sisal cord. “Gods protect,” he said as he handed the bundle over.

    “And those.” Ezhno wasn’t going anywhere, yet.

    “We earnt them. They belong in our patrol’s barracks.” Peradi clenched his hand around his necklace of coyote ears.

    “They have been in the sun all day, and they have started to rot. I can smell them from here.”

    Peradi grumbled as he handed them over. “What is your plan?”

    Ezhno shrugged, almost dislodging his passenger. “I cross the ridge and lead them back towards the Sands.”

    “And then?”

    “You get to the city and send a terradon rider to collect me. Please don’t waste any more time.”

    Peradi nodded slowly and gestured his troop to move out. When the others were far enough away he said quietly, “I thought there would be more for you in the Great Plan.”

    “So did I, but only the gods know.”

    They clenched forearms, then Peradi disappeared as silently as smoke.
    -----​

    Even with the burden of the empty skins, Ezhno could make better time than before. This was because he did not need to cover his trail. In fact he was being deliberately sloppy, even the extent of dropping the occasional water skin behind him. When his pursuers got too close for comfort, he darted into a box canyon, dumped the remainder and darted out again. He needed to buy some time. Dawn was close, and the Sands were closer still.

    The transition from badlands to Sands was not sudden. The rocky buttes and tortuous arroyos gradually sank beneath larger and larger sand ridges which swept over them like waves. Even after the stones had succumbed to drowning there were small patches of parched vegetation in the troughs between the dunes.

    Ezhno had reasoned that if the Sands were a place of fear for the lizardmen, perhaps they were for the Apisi as well. As it happened, the first of the coyotes burst out onto the first large sand patch with no hesitation whatsoever. The skink’s lead was down to a half mile.

    There was enough grey light in the east for Ezhno to realise that a blind sand-troll would be able to follow his footprints come the dawn. If he was to elude his pursuers he would need to change his plan. The first thing to do was drop the string of rotting coyote ears which he had been dragging behind. Being a reptile and devoid of sweat glands and fur, the priest had very little natural odour, and thus he could hope to travel across bare stone without leaving a scent trail. The problem was that here, in the last trough before the Sands proper, there was no stone and scarcely any other cover to hide his footprints.

    He could drag a creosote bush branch behind him to obscure his trail, but that would buy him only a few minutes if the increasing glow in the sky was any guide. Really, this hollow between dunes was the place he would stand, or the place he would fall - his remains to be hidden from sight, swallowed by the voracious sand.

    Swallowed by sand. Hidden from sight…

    Ezhno estimated that he had less than five minutes left before the coyotes crested the rise behind him. He spent the first minute scooping out a trench under a larger creosote bush. It looked depressingly like a shallow grave. The next two minutes he spent pulling the sand back over himself as smoothly as he could. His gecko objected to the premature burial and skittered up into the bush to observe.

    Ezhno had learned from his priestly teachers that skinks were a semi aquatic species - although he had never been fully immersed anywhere other than his spawning pool and the Poneextlan baths. By dint of his anatomy he was able to cover himself in sand with what he hoped were only his nostrils and eyes uncovered.

    His gecko had a better view and was far more critical of the camouflage. Through its eyes, Ezhno could see that a dark patch of his tail was exposed, and the area around him showed the rough marks of desperate excavation. But then the little lizard’s perspective shifted. It plopped down onto the sand, grabbed a tiny frond in its mouth and strutted on a random path that wove out and back to the obvious tail tip.

    Ezhno’s tail was still visible, but obscured enough that it might be mistaken for a dead branch in the half light. The sand was still disturbed, but now it looked like it was covered by the kind of trails that radiate out from the burrow of some desert reptile or rodent. The gecko turned one eye, and then the other to inspect its work. Then it clambered across Ezhno’s nose and clung to the low trunk of the gnarled chaparral.

    A dozen heart beats later the depression was filled with yipping beast men. When they found the string of ears they went crazy, snarling and slavering and beating the sands with their crude weapons. One of the bigger ones snapped at the others and they fell into line. A moment later, they were gone, bounding up the dune which marked the border of the Sands.

    Ezhno didn’t have long to enjoy his unexpected survival before he heard more howls from his pursuers. These ceased abruptly, and the priest was astonished when one of the coyotes reappeared at the brow of the dune and tumbled down to rest only a few paces from where he was hidden.

    The pack leader was quite dead. It had landed, lying on its back, with its sightless eyes glaring at the brightening sky. Protruding from its chest was an arrow which was fletched with buzzard feathers.

    Ezhno’s first impulse was to burst out of the sand and run back the way he had come, but he calmed himself and sent his familiar out in gradually widening circles to check for other threats. When it seemed that there was no immediate danger, the priest rose from his grave like a revenant and fled from the deadly sands.

    The rest of that day was spent heading back into the Badlands in furtive bursts. It was not until nightfall that he found a barrel cactus and stopped to slake his thirst. Afterwards, he spoke his thoughts towards the emerging stars.

    “Four days for Peradi to get back to Poneextlan to send a wing rider. If I can’t avoid the coyotes and find enough water to survive, then my part in the Great Plan ends.”

    The gecko chirruped in what it probably thought was an encouraging way.

    Ezhno eyed his companion appraisingly. “Did you consider that your part in the Great Plan might be to provide me with a snack if I get hungry?”

    The gecko scampered to the top of the tall cactus and refused to come down.
     
  2. Bowser
    Slann

    Bowser Third Spawning

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    Lovingly put together and with great respect to the source this was a really entertaining! You were able to match the world, and the humour and style pretty well. And here I thought you would give us a coyote and roadrunner cartoon! :D
     
  3. Crowsfoot
    Slann

    Crowsfoot Guardian of Paints Staff Member

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    There is time for that yet!
     
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  4. thedarkfourth
    Kroxigor

    thedarkfourth Well-Known Member

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    Great story. Gripping.
     
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  5. Otzi'mandias
    Ripperdactil

    Otzi'mandias Well-Known Member

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    Nicely written, relatable characters - I like it. Is there any chance of a part 2?
     
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  6. spawning of Bob
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    spawning of Bob Well-Known Member

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    Well, official Part 1 Is Monsoon Season here

    Part 2 is a Change of Pace

    Deep Patrol fits somewhere after that - you will notice that nothing important actually happens in this part. I've just written a little bit of texture which reinforces the setting and some relationships. Draft one did have a road runner - but cast in a villainous role. I can't release that section until Tlac advances his story a bit more because it will contradict canon.

    Part 5 is a well advanced WIP.

    You will need to put pressure on @Tlac'Natai the Observer to produce Part 4 - there is some future defining stuff that needs to happen soon.
     
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  7. Scalenex
    Slann

    Scalenex Keeper of the Indexes Staff Member

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    I wish I got around to reading this sooner. It's a good amalgam between Bob's and Tlac'Natai's style. Mostly Tlac'Natai since Bob is pretty good at writing outside his comfort zone when he wants but Bob's dialog all tends to have his signature stamped on it whether he wants it there or not.
     
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  8. spawning of Bob
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    spawning of Bob Well-Known Member

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    For the first quarter of the first draft I made an effort to change top what I perceived as Tlac's style. Then I decided I was doing a homage not an imitation and relaxed.

    I'm not too bothered about matching anything - except for getting the character voices right. This is easier because all bar one of the characters are new, plus I've told Tlac I will rewrite anything to his specs if needed.

    Anyhow, that was last week's project. I have spent this weekend working on a collaboration with @discomute . Do you think I should tell him now, or wait till it's pretty much finished like I did with Tlac?

    Now go and read @Warden 's detailed army fluff to see somewhere else that my imagination would like to visit.
     
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