Part II

  4 – Veli and the Vision

  This was the story we were taught at an early age, when we learned of our origins. I live in a felile village. We began our existence in a laboratory, on a world called Mars. My grandparents, and anyone part of the first generation, were once human. They escaped and found this blue world, Earth. We must live in fear of humans, but we do not attack them, because if we do, they will come back to destroy us.

  These were the lessons passed down, though my own grandparents died long ago, and I never met them. Few of us have surviving members of our people’s first generation, and those that do rarely get to see them.

  In appearance, we are similar to the beasts outside of our village, though we lack tails. The beasts do not speak to us, nor are they civilized. Many of them we hunt for food, but recently, their numbers have diminished. Sharp claws protrude from our fingertips, but are not used as weapons, as our pikes are much more lethal.

  The pike is our lifeline, our most trusted tool. Every adult in my village is proficient with one, and we all begin training early on. When a child is three, he or she gets a practice pike. Some become warriors, and others seek work in the pike production factory, the only building that has electricity. I’m not quite sure what electricity is—I simply know that it comes from something called a generator under the factory.

  It is made of concrete and metal, unlike the wood and beast hides of our houses. It once belonged to humans, but was found here vacant when we arrived in the valley. Most of the other buildings in our village of two hundred or so are created from trees or are little more than caves, so the factory stood out. Underneath it, we found more human artifacts from long ago, strange things and odd trinkets that we’ve turned into useful tools.

  We are taught to be wary of humans, but not to hate; hatred is a negative influence on our ability to concentrate and rationalize. But there will always be a degree of spite with the race of near-hairless people. Often, as in children’s stories, they are depicted as mindless, two-legged beasts; no more civilized than what we hunt. All we know for sure about them is that they want to destroy us, and they would do so if they found our village.

  The elders say that there are villages like ours scattered all across the world, and that some are very large. They have told us that human villages are unbelievably massive, and have towers of steel that break the sky. They have also seen the destructive weapons that the humans have created, and tell us how they have reorganized governments time and time again, until there was only one. All of what we know comes from the stories passed down through events and teachings over a century’s time.

  Our people cannot have a developed government because we were always moving, and scattered too far from one another. We have lived in this area for five years, but the elders say that our time is limited. Soon, a third migration will begin. When the humans come too close, no matter who they are, we take everything and leave. But we were lucky to find the old factory that let us create weapons much more quickly, and the valley had given us natural protection, nestled under the foothills of mountains.

  There is also the story of the Unearthly Foe, heard of in the recent tales of travelers. Monsters in flying craft, launching attacks upon human settlements, resulting in some of their villages being lost forever. Little is known about this war, as we are so remote from the rest of the world, and the rare visitor is our only source of knowledge of the outside.

  I’ve never traveled far from my village, but I have seen humans.

  They were brutal creatures dressed in black armor, carrying weapons that unleashed fire upon other living things. I once saw them murder a group of our scouts, for seemingly no reason at all. And yet there were rumors that some of us work with them—how can this be? How could any of us support them? We only seek peace, and we never attack first. We guard our village and if the time comes, we move. But they follow us, and kill us. There is so much I do not understand, but perhaps that is because I am only a child of sixty-four seasons, or sixteen years.

  And that is the culmination of all that I knew, and all that mattered.

  I awoke in the early morning, ready to start my hunt for the village, something that was required of me five days a week. These days, the chiefs sent out almost everyone my age that was able-bodied to hunt even if they had little training, as we were catching less and less.

  I slid out of my small bed, strapped on the leg and arm loops of my under cloak, and then threw on my gray hunting robe. I then picked up my pike and my spinel—a bracelet that went around the wrist and fired out discs of electrified pellets. I lived alone, like most children my age. But no one was ever really alone, as we were all so close to one another. My parents were already working at the plasma pike factory for the day, where it took about that long to create a single weapon.

  I also had two brothers… One of which was a scout in the group of three that were murdered. He was the oldest in the group, and was leading the other two. Many said he had the potential of being the greatest hunter in the village, or if it ever came to it, a soldier that might’ve defended us against a human attack. It was a terrible loss.

  And my other, Kepper, has been missing for several years and feared dead. As far as I knew, he could have been working with humans now. Maybe even the same humans that killed Peytro.

  My feet touched snow—fresh snow. It had been weeks since our last fall. Children were outside, playing in the fluff. Smoke was puffing from many of the chimneys of the houses lined up along the hills and cliffs. A calm breeze swept over my face. I sniffed the air and found, to much relief, that it was clean. If the weather doesn’t change for a few days, the snow turned to slush and the very atmosphere began to irritate. Eventually, it may even begin to sting. Today was a good day, or so it seemed on the outset.

  Gazing out to the hills, the only trees I saw were those that lined the very tops of the mountains. Elsewhere, there were only stumps. If a tree began to die, we had to cut it down and use it right away to keep a deadly infection from spreading to the others nearby. We didn’t know where the disease was coming from. It was as if the landscape itself was slowly dying.

  “Veli? Are you hunting today?” asked the small girl who was tugging at my cloak.

  I looked down, gave her a smile, and answered, “I’ll at least try to.”

  Kesha, like most other young females, wore a brilliant blue cloak and usually a decorative bracelet of some kind. She was only six years old, but was very active for her age, wanting to do everything. Her grandmother was one of the remaining five elders of our village.

  “Can I see your pike again? It’s pretty.”

  “Pretty? Heh. Yeah, sure.”

  I took out the weapon from my side pack and activated it. A soft blue glow of aqua surrounded the ends as hot plasma flowed from inside. I twirled it in the air a few times, making it emit a sound similar to that of moving flame. After Kesha smiled with delight, I put it away.

  “Just one more year until I get one. I want to be as good as you.”

  “That shouldn’t be hard—I’m not even that good myself.”

  “Veli, you’re a fine pike artist! And I already got my practice pike. I’m one of the best in my class.”

  “That’s good to hear.”

  “I don’t want to hunt, but I do like sparring. Is that weird?”

  “I don’t think so. There’s plenty of other ways you can help the village. I never wanted to hunt, either.”

  “Veli!” one of the members of my hunting group of four yelled out from a few dozen meters away.

  I looked up, and Kesha ran off back to her friends.

  “Yeah, I’m coming,” I replied as I began to walk over to the group, each of them covered with dark gray hunting cloaks.

  “Wait, wait. We gotta stop by the elders’ place first, they want to see us about something,” Malahej said when he was closer.

  My pace slowed. It was a rare event to be summoned by an elder, whether it was alone or in a party.

  “The elders—why?” I asked.

  “Not sure. Must be important,” Jeg, a childhood friend, answered.

  “We’d better hurry. Don’t want to keep them waiting.”

  So instead of heading into the forest, we went to the center of the village, down in the valley. The center circle was comprised of a small moat surrounding a smaller building, the only other old human structure in the area, right past the meeting and festival grounds. One meager bridge led to the elders’ residence, but it was guarded by warriors ready to strike at a moment’s notice. It wasn’t as if any of us would attack the elders, but they asked for the protection themselves, maybe in case of a sudden invasion by the humans. We stopped in front of the bridge and surrendered our pikes.

  “You’re Jeg and his hunters, right?” a young guard, no older than myself, asked us.

  “Yes. Here to see the elders,” Jeg replied.

  “Right then, go on. I don’t suppose you’ve ever been inside this place, have you?”

  “No, we haven’t.”

  “Go in, and you’ll see a small button. Press it and wait. That’s all.”

  Jeg looked at me, a little confused, and then back at the guards

  “Understood…”

  “Go on. They’re busy enough today.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  We walked silently across the bridge and the frozen makeshift moat to enter the building through an open entryway. The structure had no door, and as a result the antechamber was covered in rust and frost. The four of us stuck close together and upon entering, our bare feet touched cold grating—only the chief hunters or elderly were awarded a pair of boots.

  Below us was a dark shaft. I noticed a glowing green button on the wall, and went ahead and pressed it. Right afterwards, a device with a glass shell came out of the walls and moved around, as if examining us.

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  “Looks like a camera—they have them at the factory, too,” Jeg whispered. “Someone’s watching us.”

  The camera thing slid back into the wall, and a pair of previously unseen doors behind us shut close. The floor began to rumble with a loud clattering before moving downwards.

  “Amazing, the elders use an old human, um… mine shaft, I think,” Jeg added.

  “Tch. Hate it how we’re always relying on them in some way,” Ornue grunted. “The old village didn’t have any of these human leftovers.”

  “Like it or not, we wouldn’t be able to survive if we didn’t adapt and use what our creators constructed.”

  “Why do you believe that stuff?” Malahej wondered. “I mean, I can’t even see how they created us like the elders say.”

  The elevator stopped with a jolt before there was an answer, and a door behind us opened. Light flooded into the shaft, and we turned to see a small cave that was lit and warmed by torches. Hidden in the walls of rock was a door that the four of us approached. A young female attendant slid it open once we walked up, bringing into view the room beyond.

  The elder chamber was lavishly detailed with engravings and vibrant patterns on hanging tapestry. And it had a solid concrete floor that the guards, dressed in helmets and red robes, stood upon. Surprisingly, the cave was far warmer than the antechamber.

  The underground living space was a very different place than the common village house. In front of us were five large chairs, in which the five remaining elders presided. These were the last original felile—the ones that supposedly shared a direct bloodline with the humans. They exuded poise and wisdom, but their clothing was hardly different from our own, although they wore several additional layers along with varied jewelry.

  “Ah, and here are our hunters,” the female elder in the center—Kesha’s great-grandmother, I believed—announced to the others.

  “Thank you for joining us. You are probably wondering why we have called you here,” another female elder said.

  Jeg replied, “Honored, but wondering, yes. Ma’am.”

  “So let us see… We have Jeg, young Veli, Ornue, and Malahedge,” the oldest male elder observed, wincing his eyes.

  At this, Malahej suppressed a laugh.

  “Ah, I believe the ‘J’ is silent,” Tyu, the youngest of the elders, chuckled. “Yes, the boy who is always causing a fuss.”

  “Not that I try to…” Mala sighed and shot a curious glance at me, as if privately scoffing at the old felile.

  “Let us not waste time. It is very uncommon for us to summon anyone outside of the village inner circle, but we feel that you four are currently this village’s greatest hunting group.”

  This really surprised all of us. Even Jeg, who usually remained stoic and sometimes broody, had a glimmer of pride in his eyes.

  “We would like you to be on a greeting committee when our guests arrive. They have traveled a long distance to get here,” an elder explained.

  “We have visitors from a faraway land?” Jeg questioned.

  “Yes, from a place called Chicago.”

  “Chicago? Is that a felile village?” Malahej asked.

  “No, my child. Chicago is an old human city. We have seven human visitors arriving.”

  Jeg stepped backwards as a look of surprise and befuddlement spread over his face. I think we all felt the same way he did. Humans? Here? There had to be an explanation. We awaited one.

  “Now,” the elder in the center raised her hand, “I can assure you that these people mean no harm. They are not with the same people that murdered your brother, Veli. They have been working with us and keeping in contact for some while. They left their city months ago and are supposed to arrive today. And I believe they have information concerning Kepper.”

  Normally one not to talk, I managed to blurt out, “Kepper?”

  “Yes, they had to leave their city because it has been ‘converted,’ or so they’ve told us. We lack full knowledge of this ordeal, but I’m sure they’ll explain it in full. There is no need to say more now, however. You must hunt for the day, and mentally prepare for the arrival. Will you accept?”

  We hesitated, but only for a moment.

  Jeg, assertive as always, stood back up and replied, “Yes, we do. We will trust your decision and judgment. Where should we go after our hunt?”

  “To the entrance of the village. There will be a small crowd of our warriors waiting there. Tyunishi, our most able-bodied elder, will also be joining you. Be at your best for him.”

  Tyunishi waved his hand up and smiled. He was a small felile and outgoing for his age. He was without a doubt the most active of the elders, and had a sense of humor and general warmness as well. He would usually orchestrate performances, lead village meetings, and share stories with the children. His large, gray eyebrows covered most of his wide, brown eyes.

  “Then we are off to hunt,” Jeg finished. “Thank you for having called us here, and it has certainly been an honor.”

  Each elder nodded, and we left towards the elevator.

  “The villagers won’t like this,” I thought aloud. “Humans, here? And this is all so sudden.”

  “Yeah, but… they did say that we were the most respected hunting group,” Ornue added. “Can’t really refuse an offer when they go and say something like that about us.”

  “Well, I don’t approve of it, either, but I suppose we should give them a chance,” Malahej said. “What if they have those big, black plates of armor, though? They could kill us easily.”

  “I believe that those ones are their warriors—the humans can’t all be like that,” I replied. “I have a feeling that if these are members of the Resistance, they wouldn’t be like them… They wouldn’t have armor.”

  “I wonder what they look like under it,” Ornue mused.

  “Ugly, probably. I just hope there are enough guards around,” Jeg added. “After what happened to your brother, Veli, it’s going to take a lot for me to trust any of them.”

  Understanding his feelings, I said nothing else until we were out of the compound and onto the hunting fields.

  Jeg was the shortest of our group, though the most agile and cunning. He was also the only one among us to have light blue coats; the rest of us had the more common gray or gray-blue, so this made him stand out even more. Being our leader, he wore a more esteemed silky dark blue cloak with a yellow collar. He was also the only member of our group that could properly wield a red pike.

  Ornue was a burly felile who rarely used any sort of thought-out tactic to catch a beast, instead relying on his stamina to clumsily wear out whatever he was chasing down. He was Jeg’s opposite, and wore a feather on his head as some sort of vague symbol of his hunting style.

  Malahej was the thin and tall one who practiced patience. He was known to linger in place for hours in a few spots, waiting to strike at the right moment. But somehow, he also seemed to get in trouble around the village often, whether intentionally or otherwise.

  As for me, I was still the newest of the group, taking over for my brother. I wasn’t a very good hunter, honestly. I knew I had disappointed everyone else, though they’ve never mentioned it. My general lousiness must’ve averaged out the talents of the other three.

  Jeg, Ornue, and Mala were originally with Peytro’s hunting party. They were split in two groups of three that day, and one of the teams went out too far. Since then, the hunting troop was reduced to four instead of six, in case something like that ever happened again.

  “Okay boys. Ornue and Mala, got something easy for you today. Take the river and net up some fish. Veli and I will go into the woods. Meet you back here when the sun hits the top of the sky.”

  “Got it, Jeg. Good luck with it,” Ornue answered as the two began to travel down the cliffs and towards the quiet river.

  Jeg and I proceeded to the forest, the only sounds being the crunching of snow beneath our feet and the light, frigid wind. Halfway up the steep hill, Jeg spoke to me quietly.

  “You okay, Veli?”

  “Yeah… I just have a lot on my mind.”

  “Like maybe seeing Kepper again?”

  “That, and… humans in general.”

  “Humans, huh.”

  “Why do you think they created us? I mean, if they did.”

  “How do we really know? Only the elders remember such times.”

  “They’re the old ones, Jeg. They’re all-wise and everything.”

  “Yeah.” Jeg laughed. “It’s just, sometimes… the things they say seem to be farfetched. I can’t always believe it all, like the stories at festivals. Legends about a magnificent city that touched the stars and all of that.”

  “Remember when we were kids, back in that little school in the first village—remember all the stories and fables everyone made up about humans? That they could breathe fire and could be hiding anywhere?”

  “Yeah, I remember.”

  “Thinking back… We were idiots for making light of them.”

  “Your brother’s death had nothing to do with us just being kids.”

  “I know. I’ve known that for a long time, that none of it was our fault… Even though you took the blame yourself.”

  “I felt like someone had to. It’s just hard to believe that we’re letting humans into the village after that happened.”

  I tried to change the subject. “Jeg, I’m sorry… I’ve been a burden.”

  “There’s nothing to be sorry for; you’re improving.”

  The truth was, I was decent with a pike and was said to have promise, but most hunting required only skills with a spinel, patience, and stealthiness. I wasn’t well off in the latter two at all.

  The wind was much stronger at the mountaintop. It blew through the trees at high force, sending out echoes of crackling bark. We slowed our pace to keep ourselves from scaring any beasts that might be nearby. As we drove deeper into the forest, Jeg signaled for me to stop.

  “Veli, I think I see something in the distance. Stay here for a moment and keep your eyes open.”

  I nodded as he went off to the left, disappearing through the woods. I kept alert, trying to spot anything that was out and active.

  Suddenly, I saw the snow move in front of me. It was a rabbit, and I was sure I could get it. I steadied myself, raised my spinel, and took aim at the foolish animal. But right before I would’ve fired, a lump of snow fell from a tree and hit the ground, startling it.

  Desperate to tag it, I shot a pellet—but just missed. The electric disk hit the tree by the rabbit where it vanished in a puff of smoke, and the animal jolted off. I took off after it.

  It avoided every tree ahead, springing from left to right. I couldn’t hold still long enough to get a good shot, so I took out my pike and began a chase with my weapon burning. We weren’t allowed to damage the trees, so I took precaution to not let the pike cut into any of the few we still had.

  I soon lost track of the rabbit after finding myself by a steep cliff. I stopped right before I fell and panted heavily. I could’ve gone straight off had I reacted a moment later. I quickly decided that I might as well go back and wait for Jeg—something that only fed two wasn’t worth such trouble.

  But then something happened. As I turned around to go back into the forest, an image suddenly flashed in front of me. It was a horrible scene. The village was burning, there were slain felile sprawled all over the ground, and the snow was soaked red from blood. A single human soldier stood triumphantly over the burning chaos, his eyes yellow and menacing.

  The blast of lurid, sharp imagery only lasted for a second, but I could clearly make it all out before it was replaced with the serenity of the forest again. Startled, I jumped backwards. I could feel my feet skid off the ice, and then myself fall right off the cliffside. It was as if the world had turned seconds into hours as I dropped clumsily to the bottom.

  In the summer, we often swam in such rivers. In the winter, however, it was bitterly cold, and could kill us within minutes. I hit a thin layer of ice and broke through. Shocked and paralyzed, I began to sink into the bone-chilling water, where I quickly blacked out and lost sense of time.

  Something forced me out of slumber, and I awoke to feel my body surrounded by swirling heat. I was fully aware of what was going on around me, but it felt as if I were dreaming at the same time. The bottom of the river had been replaced by an endless void of darkness, and above me was a sky of water. I couldn’t see the ice where I had broken through. I also couldn’t breathe, yet air seemed to come to me.

  Then, right ahead, appeared a massive demon. Shrouded in blackness, it ensnared me with two of its many tentacle-like arms. The being must have had dozens of eyes; many white circles glowed in the darkness and seemed to stare straight through me. I couldn’t move at all.

  And then it spoke in a deep, deranged voice that could be heard clearly even in the world of water.

  “Veli Norhey… I’ve found you…”

  I tried to say, “What are you?” But no sound came out.

  “Veli Norhey, shadow of the felile race, I seek Valice. Tell me where I can find Valice! I exist only to find Valice!”

  I still couldn’t speak. I wouldn’t know what to say if I could.

  “Veli, you will tell me about Valice… Or you will die…”

  “I don’t know of any Valice!” I somehow managed to shout.

  The being’s eyes grew narrow in thought. A moment later, the entire creature exploded into a puff of black smoke so thick that I became surrounded by blackness. When it dissipated, I found myself gasping for breath and freezing in the water. I swam towards the surface desperately.

  When I finally surfaced where the ice had been broken, I inhaled all the surrounding air and gasped for life.

  “Ornue! Malahej! I’m in the river! Help!” I screamed at the top of my lungs before sinking again, having been drained of almost all my energy.

  I resurfaced and yelled once more, but I quickly went down again. This time I couldn’t swim back up. I closed my eyes and began sinking to the bottom, my last thought being that I had truly failed everyone in a very pathetic manner.

  But as I lost hope, a pair of hands grabbed me and pulled me onto solid ground.

  “Veli! Veli, are you okay?!”

  “Veli, wake up!”

  “Come on, Veli. Stay with us. Breathe.”

  I could barely make out Ornue and Malahej’s voices, and I was too tired to simply open my eyes as I shook my head and coughed up water.

  “We’ve got to get him to the village, he’s in trouble. Damn, he’s lucky to be alive. He must have fallen from the cliff!”

  My ears began to fail me, and I slipped into unconsciousness as the two kept up their efforts to revive me.

  When I eventually awoke, I was in a warm bed, but I still felt cold all over. I had no idea where I was. I could only conclude that it wasn’t the elders’ chamber, and it also wasn’t my home. What all had happened?

  I turned my head and saw a group of felile talking to a gathering of mostly hairless people. Unable to make out what they were saying, and my eyes feeling as if they were being crushed by ice, I returned to my slumber.