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Darkling
Dawn
Merxes awoke, his head throbbing
and one of his ankles echoing the sound in his head. He opened his eyes
and squinted as he looked at the unfamiliar clear sky. This couldn't be
right. Earth didn't look at all like this.
Suddenly he remembered he had teleported without set coordinates. He could
be anywhere! Merxes almost jumped up at this sudden realisation. He fell
back down when he put weight on his injured ankle and lost consciousness
again for a few seconds.
When he awoke the second time he was calmer. The Telp had obviously done
his work. This planet was fit for human inhabitation. Merxes looked up at
the cliffs he was laying under and shuddered... How those cliffs reminded
him of the place he had just vacated. Merxes felt for his Telp, he found
it in his left pocket, but it was broken.
His stomach grumbled making him painfully aware that he hadn't eaten since
the start of the mission. Since he couldn't spot anything remotely edible
Merxes started wandering. He kept to the base of the mountain where he was
sheltered from the sun and any eyes that might be watching him. Merxes was
painfully aware of the fact that he was in bad shape. He had apparently
fallen on entry, or maybe he had been hit by a few boulders when the
mountain face came down on SH-189, whatever it had been it hadn't done any good to
his ankle. His head was already clearing up for which he could at least be
thankful.
Merxes stopped and rested behind a big block of stone. He massaged his
foot and took a closer look at it. Swollen, but not broken. The best remedy
for a sprained ankle was walking, he told himself and started
again.
Not much later he heard voices. Humans! The language they spoke resembled
English, though with a strange accent. Merxes ducked behind a boulder,
cursing himself when he came down on his ankles.
Two young boys came through. Merxes had nothing to fear from them, but his
instinct told him it would be better to follow them unseen. That wasn't
hard for two reasons. One, the boulders kept riddling the path all the way
to the town that was their destiny and two, the boys talked so loud Merxes
could have turned on a boombox with loud rock music without them noticing
him.
The town they entered wasn't big, but it was busy. Merxes snuck around the
town until he found some clothes that looked more like what the boys were
wearing, somehow he got the feeling that these folks had never seen a
polyester bodysuit before.
Feeling a whole lot better, Merxes went into town to gather information. He adjusted easily to
the new accent and listened in on conversations. He learned that they were
a village under the protection of a Weyr. The word Weyr took him by
surprise, he hadn't a clue what he was headed for.
Suddenly his ears heard a more normal accent.
"Kirsten! Wait up!" a young man screamed.
"Hurry up! You know the eggs are going to hatch, I don't want to miss
that!" the girl yelled back. Merxes saw her passing by and immediately
fell for her. Ok, there weren't many girls he didn't fall for the first
time he saw them, but this one sure deserved a stare. The man ran by and
Merxes decided to follow them.
Running up the hills and through some fields he suddenly realised where
the two were going. The Weyr. The land arched up and Merxes could
already see the mountain high above.
Large forms were floating around it.
"Look Hyster! The dragons are flying out!" the girl screamed.
Dragons? Was he to take this serious? Merxes wondered.
The two quickened their pace and so did Merxes feeling every thud in his
ankle. It had gotten better with walking, but this kind of action wasn't
good for it. Luckily they didn't need to go far anymore. He followed the
two up large winding stairs and finally they reached an inner court.
The girl suddenly turned around and asked: "Are you a candidate too?
I've never seen you."
"Merxes shrugged: "I only came in recently."
"Oh... ok, come along then."
Hatching
Lantessama
Isle
Cy
DragonStake - Darkling
Dawn
Credits:
Backgrounds compiled with images found on Google
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