Arid Dreams

[Percival]

(This is going to be a relatively short scene set in Perry's head. He'll be flashing back to formative events in his life, during his time as a child soldier. If anyone wants to interject with any NPC activity or wierdness feel free. It is a dream, it doesn't have to make total sense)

Behind closed eyelids worlds can be made. Worlds not usually of our choosing but most definitely created by us. Worlds that can reflect who and what we are, that can enthrall, entertain or terrify.

Perry was sinking into such a world this night. It was built from memories freshly unearthed due to recent experiences on a job. It was suffused with refreshed waves of old emotions. But as things usually do it started vaguely.

He was warm, too warm, wrapped in familiar arms. She smelled so nice. Like cinammon and vanilla. He buried his cheek against the arm, even as it trembled, or perhaps it was he that was shaking. There were noises outside, muffled shouts and sharp ringing steel. It was so hot here. He hated the heat, and it was even worse in the embrace. Mother. It was his mother who was holding him.

He blinked, looking up at her face. She seemed huge, unstoppable. He loved her so much. Father too. He'd complained he had to leave his friends behind, but Father had said that he'd make new friends. He'd complained that the sandy place was too hot. But Father had promised he'd get used to it. Father, as it turned out, had been right.

A sudden yank, a spinning sensation, everything was whirling black and orange. Which way was up? He could only smell smoke now. Where was his Mother? He wailed "Mama! Mamaaaa!" and heard muffled reply, high and sweet and full of terror. And then her face came to him and he reached for it. His arm seem to stretch. He could reach her! This time he would reach her! But she sank back into the whirling black and orange, and his hand chased her, lengthening and lengthening.

Then another jerk and his arm dissolved, blowing away like sand, and all was blackness again.

[Percival]

The blackness faded to new sights. Food. A plate of meat stew and rice. Spicy. He'd hated it the first few times he'd tried it but now he wolfed it down without second thought. Boss said boys needed to eat to get their strength. He always felt so much better after he ate. If he and the other boys did well they ate, if they did not they did not eat.

The "Magic Curry" the boys called it. All you needed to do is eat a plate and you'd feel so much better. Your body wouldn't hurt. Your head wouldn't be sore. You wouldn't feel sad. He ached to eat the magic curry every day, needing it not just to stave off the hunger but to drown out the hurts.

He used to hate Boss. He'd thought he'd smelled bad and he'd been rough with them, herding them into caravans. Every time he'd asked for his parents he'd been told they'd left left him for the army. He was in the army now. He was a soldier. And if he was a good soldier he'd be happy. Perry hadn't believed Boss at that time. But as the delicious curry hit his belly and he felt the tingles run through him he felt so happy. Nothing else mattered except being fed and being happy.

He'd do anything to get that food. He'd do anything to make Boss happy.

[Percival]

The curry used to make colours so bright. Make the dusty air smell sweet. The tingles felt great. His twelve year old mind didn't quite comprehend what arousal was but the curry made him feel it. He'd grin and giggle at the other boys after a good meal. Him and Tookie, his friend. Tookie didn't remember his parents. Perry was having trouble remembering his own, but it didn't matter when he felt this good.

The colours swirled and span and formed back into things he could see. He was holding a bow. He was shooting and he was good at it. He didn't feel as happy now, but knew that if he was good, and he kept shooting that he'd get his reward. He took his eye off the target for a moment and spotted Boss. The big man crossed his scarred arms in front of him, smiling. Boss was happy! That was great! He might get more good things if he kept Boss smiling.

The target kept moving. It was annoying, but then again it took a lot of arrows to kill a tied down pig if you weren't aiming for the right spots. But Boss seemed to like it when the boys made the pigs howl and squeal. Perry knew just where to shoot the arrows to make the pig squeal, knew just where to shoot to make it squeal without making it die. He'd figured it out all by himself. He was proud of that.

[Percival]

The squeals were just a buzz in his mind now. The scenery changing, shifting. That damn annoying squealing. He tried to block it out. It was just an annoyance.

There weren't as many faces around as he remembered, and they all seemed fuzzy. All but Tookie. Tookie looked so plain, a raggedy, gangly boy, all arms and legs. They'd been scared together, but that was in the past.

"If we finish quickly we'll get something even better, Boss said." Tookie had been smiling ear to ear. Perry smiled back, but he couldn't concentrate with all the damned squealing. He decided it was a good idea to end it, as much fun as it was to make the pig squeal. It had been a bad pig. It had tried to run away. Bad things happened if you tried to run away.

The short sword had felt light as a feather in his hands. He'd not blinked, not looked away. The first time he'd killed a runaway it had made him feel sick, but now it just made him feel warm, like the curry used to. And finally the squealing stopped, the continual squeals of "I'm sorry!"

Perry couldn't remember the face, just the eyes growing dim, and how it felt good. Kill and be happy. It was simple really, though it took a long time for those dim eyes to fade back into the black.

[Percival]

Red heat. It hurt so much. The march, all the training. His arms burned, they were red from sandy wind. He could see the skin peeling. He could see it falling away in chunks. He was sure he could see the bones underneath. He needed to take the hurt away again. He was too old, Boss said, for magic curry. Now it was time for him to earn what the older boys had.

He hadn't liked the look of those long pipes, but Boss said that they were so much better than food. They'd get rid of all the pain, the sickness. And he did feel sick, so terribly sick. Squeals and screams came back to him all the time now. He felt like eyes were always on him. Perry had trembled, or maybe the whole world had shaken around him.

Hands reached out. The pipe was put to his lips and when he breathed in it felt like fire. It was horrid. He wanted to cry. It tasted so bad. But Tookie was watching and if there was one person he wanted to keep happy more than Boss, more than himself, it was Tookie. He'd already earned the pipe, sat there happy. Happy as ever. Perry wanted to be happy, so he breathed again.

The world became bright again! Another breath. The pain was going. He was whole again! Breathe out and it seemed to billow in sweet gouts of purple fire that danced and sparkled. He was special! He was better than all the other boys! And then Boss said they could go play in the village.

He and Tookie had fun that night. He'd walked up, and the guard at the gate had asked him if he was alright. He'd just smiled and nodded and laughed to himself at the silly look on the man's face after he pushed the knife into his throat. He'd tagged more sentries with his bow than anyone else that night. Most of the women and children tried to run or hide but when they started the fires they all came scurrying out. By the end he was hooting with joy. It was so much fun! He dimly remembered being afraid, but that was in the past. And Tookie had found a girl. He didn't remember much of that, the blackness swirling inward again.

At that moment all he could think was that it had been a good dream.

[Percival]

A final image came to him. His friend, Tookie, smiling but blank eyed. When they'd come for the camp everything seemed to turn grey. Boss was gone, everyone but the boys were gone, and most had immediately sprung to fight as was their orders. As he saw his friend fall the world split and shattered.

Dreamlike pleasure became harsh memory. The icy night of the desert, the troops rounding up who they could. The looks of horror on their faces to see the children grinning up at them. It had been a few days since the adults had left, taking the pipes and the food. He'd not cared at the time. He cared now. Everything hurt, he felt sick to his soul. When a woman, a healer of some kind, came toward him he saw in her face the horror of what he was.

He felt that horror too. He'd run screaming.

He woke, still screaming.

[Percival]

The chill, it turned out, was not the icy wind of a desert midnight. It was sweat on the skin of his back. His blankets were soaked. The small part of his mind that wasn't retching and writhing hoped idly that they were soaked only with sweat. He was hyperventilating, not able to pull enough air into his lungs.

He could still taste the smoke of the pipe, the sweet spice of the pipe. Blood. He tasted blood. Slowly coming back to himself Perry lifted a shaking hand to his mouth and dabbed at it. The tip of his finger looked black in the moonlight. The rational part of him felt bad, hoping he'd not woken Ely, who'd graciously let him stay even now.

Those memories. He thought he'd shoved them down a long time ago. He always knew, if he was honest, that they'd never truly leave.

[Percival]

The adrenaline was starting to fade. Perry tried to control his breathing, shuddering. But he wasn't shuddering with cold, or with fear. The memories, the dreams, they kept leaping up like salmon from a river and he was not repulsed by them.

The old excitement, the joy of being good at what he did. The joy of killing. He could rationalize that those feelings were somehow artifical. He'd found out what they'd put in the curry and the pipes. He'd even been present when some people much like those who'd taken him were hunted down and the details of their crimes were laid out.

In Dari it was common for travellers to be attacked, caravans looted, but the warlords did not simply kill and steal goods. They stole people. Children mainly, boys and girls. Any who were strong enough to fight were moulded, drugged, beaten and forced to kill until they liked it. Any who weren't suitable for that were simply sold, like meat. What happened to them barely bore thinking of.

He'd been taken, at eleven years old. For five years he'd been through that, sent on raids to kill civilians, children. They were the perfect troops, innocent looking and utterly vicious. The warlords knew that children could be cruel and that, taken young enough, they could be made inhumanly so.

[Percival]

Perry had seen all this, as a rational being, and feel the remorse. Feel guilt so wide and black it seemed to swallow him up. He could forgive himself for what he did, to a point, compartmentalize those thoughts, to a point. It wasn't his fault, he could tell himself.

But if it wasn't his fault, if he were just a victim, why did he still enjoy those feelings. To this day he gloried in combat not for the test of skill, not for the thrill of danger, not for the want of glory. He gloried in combat because he might get to kill someone. To take everything they had because he was better and it just felt so right.

Before he'd returned to Wistvale this time he'd gone with a mercenary band back to Dari. Just an escort mission, at first, but it turned into something much different when his employers heard tell of an enemy encampment. They'd fallen upon it just as dusk had fallen. The defenders had not stood a chance and Perry had been a boy again, grining and laughing and revelling in the slaughter.

His brain was now dimly aware of vomit hitting a chamberpot. Disgust with himself so potent it made him literally sick.

[Percival]

His eyes fell to his sword. Naked, Perry swung from his bed and shambled over to the weapon, drawing it from the sheath. It gleamed in the dim light, razor sharp and double edged. He sat on the bed, inspecting it, looking for any imperfection or nick. Boss had always said to take good care of your weapons and your weapons would take good care of you.

His throat burned, he could taste only bile, then his cheeks felt wet and his vision blurred. He didn't remember starting to cry, but he supposed it was appropriate. He just felt numb now. He'd gone through every peak and trough of emotion in such a short span.

He laid the blade across his left wrist. A quick couple of motions and he'd be shot of it all, he told himself. He'd contemplated such things before. His hand tightened on the grip of the sword, eyes hot and shimmering in the dark. He could put himself out of the world's misery, before he simply gave in completely to the creature they'd made him.

His rational side chimed in on the side of making that cut for a moment. Telling him he was a dangerous animal, broken in a fundamental way, and he could no more stop feeling the thrill of killing than he could stop his preference for a certain food. His hand was trembling.

The other thing about what had been done to him, though, perhaps the cruellest was the ingraining of survival. He wanted to do it, sorely wanted to, but just as strong was the urge to survive. If you didn't learn that trait as a boy in the desert you didn't last long.

The blade clattered to the floor and he slumped sideways to the bed. He wouldn't sleep, but perhaps the sunrise would bring something to distract him. Something better. He could only hope.

[Kiko]

Like Daisy you have always been able to make me see the world you've built with your words. The pipe sequence was especially wondrous.

+5 Acclaim.

[Kiko]

The voice was strong, deep and came from all over the room. The tone was like that of a thick iron bell and Perry did not recognize it, at all.

"Are you going to leave it on the floor?"

The room was dark, but Perry had been in darker places. A quick survey of the room proved that no one beside himself occupied it. Did he imagine the voice? Had his dreams gained sound as well as images?

[Percival]

Perry moved quick as a snake. As was clear, survival was primary among his traits and his blade was in his hand in a flash, his form crouched and ready like a coiled spring. Adrenaline surged back in, along with the thrill that came with it. He looked awful, face red and puffy with tears, mouth red from biting and the acid of his own stomach, hair mussed wildly.

Crouched, sweaty, dishevelled, eyes too wide and bright, naked. He was every inch the fierce animal. His eyes swept left and right to find the source of the voice, ears pricked. His own voice crept into the room, oddly calm.

"Show yourself."

[Kiko]

The voice came again with the same bell-like tone. Had Perry been on a battlefield the words would have cut through any amount of screams or cries.

"Who do you think to command, boy?"

There was no one in the room, as big as it was Perry's second sweep had made certain of it.

[Percival]

Perry did not flinch for an instant. Some assassin come for retribution? Someone playing a trick? Just another fracture in his mind. He was in absolutely no mood for games, contemplating death only a few moments ago. Someone or something was out there and it either meant him harm or it didn't. If it meant him harm he could kill it or he couldn't. Either way he couldn't bring himself to care.

Standing slowly he reached for the sheath for his sword and with a flick of his wrist he snapped the blade back into its place, though did not relinquish the weapon. So he couldn't see whatever was speaking, there was no point in casting his eyes about. So he just stood, still and ready. And since he found himself so numb as to be devoid of cares to give he cocked half a grin.

"I've just woken from something I couldn't tell was a fantasy or a nightmare, left my supper in my chamberpot and very nearly opened my arm to put an end to it all, which has left me in no mood to suffer fools. Which brings us back to you, the fool. What do you want?"

Survival was one thing, but parts of him still screamed to cut something.