The SSSS Scriptorium

[Lallicat]

Heey, I'm back! And with a new chapter.

Spoiler: Kitty Part 8: Dreamworld, Part II • show

Reynir couldn't believe his eyes. He had been right! Kitty was a mage! But something was off. Her image kept flickering, like a candle. It flipped from a girl, to a small cat.

"You helped me with the ghosts." Lalli told her. It was a statement, not a question.

"Yes!" She exclaimed delightedly. "But you started screaming. It woke me up." She frowned. "Sorry." Lalli seemed to take no notice of the apology.

"What else can you do?" he asked. Kitty shrugged.

"I don't know." She paused for a moment. "Hey, how come I can understand you now?" "In the dreamworld, there are no languages. We are asleep, so we can't speak. That's why you understand me." Lalli told her. Reynir was mulling over Kitty's words.

"Wait. Can you understand me when we're awake?" Kitty nodded. "Who else do you understand?" She thought for a moment.

"Emil. Sigrun. Sometimes Tuuri. Mikkel too, a little bit." Reynir tallied up the languages in his head. Icelandic, Norwegian, Swedish. "Are the others here too?" she asked, looking around as if expecting Sigrun to appear out of thin air yelling, "Surprise!" Lalli shook his head.

"Only mages can access the dreamspace. That's what you are. A mage." Kitty looked at him, confused.

"What's a mage?" she asked. Lalli bit his lip.

"A mage is a person who the gods gift special abilities." Kitty still looked confused.

"What's a god?" she asked. Reynir decided to tackle that question.

"They're... powerful beings. They watch over us, and help us sometimes. You can try to ask them for help, that's called praying. They watch over and kind of control the whole world." Kitty seemed to understand.

"Like the Tree Lady," she told Reynir.

"The... tree lady?" he asked her, confused.

"She came and visited me here once. She told me something. It was important." She frowned. "I- I can't remember. I can't remember anything from before you rescued me." The flickering intensified.

"Why is she doing that?" Reynir whispered to Lalli. "The flickering thing." Lalli shrugged.

"It must be because she's young. She can't properly control her energy. I'm guessing that the cat is a form of her luonto. We need to get her to Onni. He'll help her control and stabilize it." Reynir  nodded.

"We need to do that sooner than later. It's making me dizzy."

[Mirasol]

Welcome back Lallicat!

I have another chapter too:

Spoiler: part 10 • show

“What?”
“Remember those spirits? At the place? Well they´re here now and I dreamt that they were going to kill us and you need to drive us away from here! To somewhere else!”
Tuuri looked confused. “Umm… calm down. First of all, the sun is setting, it´s not like we can go anywhere. But we might relocate tomorrow, so just…”
Dammit, she said she believed him earlier!
“No no no, not tomorrow! They´re coming to eat us right now!
“We-“
“We´ve got to go now! Tell Sigrun!”
The Finn looked like she was questioning his sanity, but at least she did say something to the captain. But Tuuri didn´t seem to have gotten the urgency of the problem across. If Reynir interpreted Sigrun´s expression correctly, there was little hope she would listen.
“Sorry. Try to get them off your mind, they´re really probably not dangerous. Sigrun said we´re not going, no matter what.”
He had been hoping she wouldn´t say that. If only Lalli was awake. Or Kisa could talk. If there were three of them, Sigrun would have to pay attention. But actually, Kisa looked completely calm. A bit bewildered that he was panicking, if anything. Maybe it really was just a dream- No! It was more, the dog had been there and he only came in his magic-dreams. Maybe Tuuri had just been right and the girl wasn´t a mage. Yes, that had to be it. Reynir wouldn´t sit here and wait for all of them to die.
“Drive anyway, who cares what Sigrun says!?” He tried to pull Tuuri to the driver’s seat. “You´re fine with breaking orders!”
Now Tuuri looked angry. She started to fight back.
“Quit that! I think you should go to bed.”
They were doomed. Reynir didn´t know what to do, couldn´t do anything. If only he could drive a car.
Suddenly some alarmed screams in Swedish came from the back of the tank, accompanied by choking sounds coming from Lalli. They were here. But for some reason Kisa still didn´t seem scared. At least not because of the ghosts. She came running into the office and grabbed Mikkel´s hand, dragging him to help Lalli. Before the two of them had reached him though, the scout started to let out a deafening screech. For a moment everyone was startled.
Sigrun was the first to break out of it and yelled something, but stopped mid-sentence with a puzzled look. The next moment, she and Mikkel fell to the ground and fainted.
Kisa was standing between the two superiors, staring at them as if she didn´t understand the world anymore. Then her gaze wandered upwards. Her eyes became big in horror, her hair began to fluff up like she had touched a plug socket and she pointed at a spot on the ceiling.
“Mi- MriiIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!”
Tuuri and Reynir looked at where the girl´s finger was aiming. What was up there looked like a troll, or not… just it´s shadow?  But still way too real. It´s maw was open, as if it was sucking life and air itself out of the tank and its inhabitants. The spider-like legs extended to the walls and seemingly flowed down like some deadly rills. They ended in long, skinny fingers. Two of these hands were holding the faces of Sigrun and Mikkel like the bars of a cage. The other arms creeped over the floor, searching for prey. Lalli, who was still screaming as if someone had stabbed him, was caught in one of the arms´ shadow-cages too. Kisa tried to sidestep the other limbs´ grab.
Finally Tuuri seemed to realize the danger of the situation. She ran to the driver´s seat with a scared “Eee! We´re all going to die!” and stepped on the gas pedal.
The wheels started turning so fast that the tank lurched for a while; before it started moving with greater speed then Reynir had thought it was capable of. He fell to his knees. He couldn´t tell whether because of the shaking car or the troll-ghost.
But it was too late. They wouldn´t be able to escape anyway. The threat was already inside.
Kisa´s “Mriiih!” ceased. Her eyes rolled upwards and she fell down in the middle of the others. The spider-fingers started crawling over her face.
Reynir had to do something. He was a mage. There had to be something he could do. He had to stop being frozen in fear now! He didn´t know any spells, but he just had to try. Giving up wouldn´t get him anywhere.
“G-go away! Please go away! How-”
He had probably fainted too, because the next time he opened his eyes he was in his dreamplace. Or some dark caricature of it. The grass on the hill was dry and grey, the sheep were fleeing and instead of sunshine a gigantic black cloud was darkening the sky. Or so he thought. When he looked up the cloud turned out to be a much larger, puffed up version of the ghost-troll.
At least the dog was at his side to help him fight off the intruder. But he couldn´t do much more than growl at it. Reynir had to continue his attempt at a spell.
“How can I make you go away?!”
A pale rune appeared under Reynir´s feet, and some kind of shield formed around him. But it didn´t look strong. If that was the extent of his abilities, he wouldn´t save anyone.
“I need help!”
It was just a whisper. But something had heard it. A small figure appeared among the running sheep. Instead of away, it was running towards him. It was the small orange and white cat with the heart-shape on its head. He had noticed it before. It was usually sleeping on a fence in his dreamplace when he´d wake up there. The Icelander had never really paid attention to it; he had just assumed it was a part of the place, like the sheep. No real being, just a prop. But now it looked fierce, and brave, and the danger right in the eye. With its somehow very familiar, big, blue eyes. The little cat stepped into Reynir´s shield without being hindered.
The ghost started to attack. He shot his dark arms down like arrows and hit the shield. It made sounds like cracking glass upon impact. The spider-fingers on the limbs´ ends started to crawl around again, this time searching for a weak spot to get into the shield. They would find one, no doubt. Reynir and the dog made themselves as small as possible. The Icelander put his arms around his dream-friend in a last effort to protect him. So this was the end.
But the little cat still focused on the enemy. For a short time it looked back at Reynir, as if it was saying "Don´t be scared. I know what to do."
It inhaled and let out a monstrous yell that threw the punching and creeping arms off of the shield and a few meters away. It was imitating one word, in the same tone of voice as the Icelander had said it.
“HELP!”
It was a child´s voice, sounding like it was not used to talking. But it made his prayer heard. The next thing Reynir knew a large owl flew over his head and started attacking the shadow.

[Lallicat]

Mirasol, I love the way your story is going! And I also have yet a new chapter to post:

Spoiler: Kitty Part 9: Interlude • show

The estimate had been a couple days. The days had turned into weeks, and it seemed that they would never arrive at their destination. Mikkel absentmindedly stirred the gloop that served as their food, briefly wondering if the scout had snuck another squirrel in the pot. Little Kitten had been playing a game of "hiss-and-seek" (Emil's name, not his) with Emil, Tuuri, and Reynir. The rules seemed to be similar to hide-and-seek, but with a lot more hissing when Kitten was "seeking." Now she was just running around, chasing something that only she could see. He had turned his attention back to "dinner" when he felt something brush against his leg. It was Kitten. She was watching him with interest, and had started to reach a hand toward the pot. With a deft movement, he picked her up and swung her away from it.
"Don't touch that!" he told her sternly. "It's hot, you have to be careful." She gave him a reprochful look.
"I know," her eyes seemed to tell him. "I was only looking."
"Well how was I supposed to know that?" he grumbled. "It looked like you were going to touch it." She just stared at him some more, then ran off. She came back moments later with a handful of bugs, and moved to drop them in the pot. Once again, Mikkel snatched her back. "No, we don't eat bugs. If you want to help, you can stir the food with me." He placed his hands over hers on the wooden spoon and began to stir. When he felt that she understood, he let go. She stared at the pot with intense concentration, stirring fervently, a small frown on her face. When it looked like the food was cooked, he offered some of it to her off the top of the spoon. She took a lick, scrunched up her face in concentration, then nodded in approval. The food had passed the Kitten Edible Food Test. He then ladled the stuff in their bowls, and handed them to Kitty to carry out to the rest of the crew, which she did with a very pompous and self-satisfied expression. Mikkel couldn't hold back the smile that stretched across his face.

***

It had snowed over night. Kitty tugged at Emil's hand, pulling him towards the door. The meaning couldn't have been more clear. He pulled on some boots, then followed Kitty outside.
"It's snow, Kitty," he told her. "Can you say snow?" She threw a handful of the stuff in his face in response. "Oh, so that's how you want to play it, huh?" he told her. "Well then, try to avoid this!" He aimed a snowball at her shirt, but she ducked down and rolled. Lying down, with her white hair and clothes covered in snow, she was difficult to see. That's her strategy! Emil realized. She's used to living in the Silent World, so she must be used to hiding! Emil suddenly realized he might have picked a fight with the wrong person. Thump! A snowball hit him in the back of his head. "Turri!" Emil yelled with a grin. "I need back up!"
"Coming!" was the muffled reply. Now where did the scoundrel go? wondered Emil. A soft giggle came from a tree branch above his head. He scrambled out of the way just in time for a mini avalanche to be dumped where he had been standing seconds ago. He managed to hit one if her legs before she shimmied down the tree. Dang she's fast! What resulted was a full blown out battle. Kitty, Reynir and Sigrun on one side, him, Mikkel, and Tuuri on the other. Lalli was a sort of neutral player, mostly observing, but landed good shots occasionally on the back of Emil and Tuuri's head.
"Snow!" Giggled Kitty. "Snow!"
"That's right Kitty!" exclaimed Emil, "It's snow!"

***

Slowly but surely, Kitty started speaking more and more often, in longer and longer phrases. It turned out that she was a curious thing. She loved sitting next to Tuuri while she drove, wanting to know how the Cat Tank worked and what everything did. Tuuri had to revise her estimate of Kitty's age yet again. She was most likely around nine or ten. Kitty herself didn't know her exact age or birthday, but seemed to agree with Tuuri's guess.
"Nine is a nice number," she told her. "I like the number nine." It turned out Kitty loved to learn as well. She had asked Tuuri to teach her Danish, and followed along with Emil as he tried to teach himself Finnish. Mikkel soon found himself an apprentice cook and Sigrun delighted in trying to gift Kitty the knowledge of military tactics. Tuuri doubted the usefulness of learning to cook sludge, and was pretty sure Kitty didn't understand a thing about Sigrun's tactics, but she seemed to be enjoying herself anyway. She would occasionally follow Lalli when he went scouting, which surprised Tuuri most of all. Lalli definitely wouldn't let anyone else follow him like that. When she questioned him about it, he responded with an annoyed sigh and a "Stupid kid." Another surprise came when her cousin told her that Kitty was a mage. She hadn't believed Reynir when he told her, and why would she? He thought he was a mage. It was theoretically possible, but she would be surprised if he hadn't figured it out by now. The newfound knowledge that Kitty could detect trolls made her an invaluable asset to every party that left the Cat Tank. Tuuri couldn't help but be a bit jealous that a nine-year-old child was allowed to join the expeditions while she had to stay inside. Still, when she felt Kitty's reassuring weight on her feet at night, listening to the rain hitting the Cat Tank's roof, it was impossible to feel anything but love for small Kitty of the Silent World.

[Mirasol]

Thanks, Lallicat! And aww, what adorable Kitty scenes!

[LooNEY_DAC]

Soooooo...
I, uh, seem to have dropped another part of my dark!fic.

[Buteo]

*lunging forward just in time to catch it*
*setting it down before fingers start to ignite*
Yessss! Hooray!

[Grade E cat]

I'm trying to produce a chapter per week after having started this on a whim. So far, so good.

Spoiler: show

Silent Child 3

Kastellet fort turned out to have been colonized by small populations of various animals that Reynir found himself needing to keep Katja from trying to catch. Mikkel eventually entered a place that was the hospital building according to Tuuri. Tuuri fist seemed like she was going to follow him in, but elected to stay in the doorway for some reason. Soon after this, she turned in Reynir’s direction as he was trying to keep Katja from climbing up a tree to get to a couple birds who were sitting on a branch:
-Come over here, the two of you! Mikkel told you not to stray.
Reynir managed to drag Katja closer to the building, but, at the mid-way point between the tree with the birds and the building, Katja pointed at the ground. Looking at it, Reynir realized that there was an area of a few meters around the hospital building’s entrance where the only tracks on the ground had to belong to Mikkel and Tuuri, while the snow on the rest of the fort’s non-sheltered ground was saturated with overlapping animal tracks of all sizes. Reynir couldn’t start pondering the significance of this as Tuuri authoritatively asked Reynir and Katja to join her in the doorway a second time. As soon as they reached their destination, Katja found something else to point to on the room’s walls: Reynir immediately recognized the “bad shadow from home” things from the dream. Unfortunately, Mikkel refused to leave before he had found what he had come from, yet managed to find it before Reynir could come up with a good way to explain the situation to Tuuri.

Reynir didn’t quite understand what was said when they ran into Sigrun and Emil carrying books on the way back to the camp, but Sigrun definitely wasn’t happy. It looked like the book-salvaging party had had some interesting time of its own, considering that Sigrun’s left sleeve was soaked with blood and Emil seemed to be limping a little.

xxxx

The first radio contact since the expedition’s organizers got back to their headquarters – it had apparently taken this long because they had only one of those night trains and it had needed repairs – was full of surprises for both sides. First, Tuuri’s brother had turned out to have traveled to Sweden to join the organizers. Second, it turned out that the organizers were boarding the train when Tuuri had left the update including the fact they had found Katja to the Danish military base’s radio attendant, making the little girl news to them. Third, Mikkel’s finding in Kastellet had revealed that a hospital that could be reached within the time allotted for the expedition had possibly been working on a cure for the Rash. Apparently, going to that place was worth it despite the fact that Emil’s aunt’s own workplace had been researching a cure for longer than Reynir’s own parents had been alive. According to Tuuri, Sigrun had decided they would go the former research hospital.

Lalli had been asleep for more than twenty-four hours when dinner was served. Reynir and Tuuri ended up both eating in the driver’s cabin. Katja was eating with Mikkel and Sigrun in the office. Between the little girl sticking close to Mikkel and the fact that she honestly looked like she could be a not-so-distant younger relative to Sigrun, the three of them honestly looked a little like a family. That made Reynir wonder if she had any relatives back in the Known World who would be able to take her in. He, at least, knew he had a family to go back to. Because of the variety of positions everyone had ended up facing while eating their meal, Reynir was the only one to notice Katja stooping to eat, putting her bowl down on the floor and getting up from her seat and point at the windshield. Mikkel promptly picked up the bowl:
-Please don’t leave things here.
Reynir, meanwhile, started to see what Katja had been pointing at through the windshield. The “bad shadows from home”, as they had appeared in the previous night’s dream. Reynir realized what needed to happen. Fortunately, Tuuri was already in the driver’s seat:
-We need to go.
He tried explaining the reason to Tuuri, but she looked at him like he had grown a second head and said that they would probably relocate the next day. No. They needed to leave now. He had Tuuri share what he knew with Sigrun, hoping she’d understand. Considering Sigrun’s reaction and Tuuri’s response, either something had gotten lost in translation, or Tuuri didn’t entirely believe him. Probably both. In panic, he tried forcing Tuuri’s hands onto the wheel:
-Drive anyway, who cares what Sigrun says? You’re fine with breaking orders!
Mikkel had ordered her to stay in the tank during his own most certainly unauthorized escapade. It hadn’t stopped her from hatching the plan that had given them an excuse to follow him. Tuuri angrily yanked her forearm out of his hand, and told him to go to bed. Almost as soon as she finished speaking, Lalli started making choking noises, then screamed. Sigrun and Mikkel both collapsed, while Katja was on her knees and loudly crying while the lower part of her outfit suddenly seemed to have become wetter. Reynir found his own legs unable to support him as the shadows invaded the office. Tuuri’s response was to finally do what Reynir had wanted her to do mere minutes earlier, though he could have done without the words she pronounced while doing so:
-We’re all going to die!
Meanwhile, all Reynir found to do was to ask the spirits to go away. He soon realized he was going to need help. But from whom? Lalli didn’t seem to be able to do much, and Katja seemed even more clueless than he was. Reynir remembered there was someone else. He dedicated half of his attention in trying to reach that person, the other half in trying to protect himself from the shadows, that now seemed to be in the place he went when he dreamed as well as in the tank. After what seemed like forever, he glimpsed an owl that somehow felt like Onni in some way, then heard it chant something that apparently made the shadows go away.

[Lallicat]

Blah. This chapter didn't want to get written. And now I also have more ideas for fan fiction, argh! You know I can't work on more than one project at a time brain!

Spoiler:  Kitty part 10: Speculations • show

All 7 of the crew members trailed out of the Cat Tank towards a town supposedly filled with immeasurable numbers of books. The weather was sunny and warm, and Sigrun was vaguely reminded of the family outings she went on when she was a kid. The scout guy has come their way a few minutes before.
"No danger," he had told her quietly.
"Great!" she had responded. Lalli had walked a couple steps ahead and stopped to point at a building. It was filled with books. "We'll need reinforcements to carry all that junk," she told Emil "Good find, twigs, if you understand what I'm saying." He probably didn't, but that was none of Sigrun's concern.

Back at the Cat Tank, Sigrun was bantering with Mikkel to come and help out with carrying the books. That and because she was still keeping an eye on him. He was still on her mutinist list after all. Braidy interrupted to hand Mikkel a scrap of paper. He was talking very fast in Icelandic and Sigrun didn't understand a thing. She inspected the paper he had handed to her. It appeared to be some sort of protection rune. She doubted if it would really do anything, but it never hurt to try. "I like the effort," she told him, "but as far as I know, stuff like this works way better when drawn in blood, the gods love blood. Just saying, I'm no expert or anything." With that bit of useful knowledge, she leapt inside the shop, with Kitty at her heels. She high fived Mikkel. The place had shelves and shelves of books. Even Kitty was looking around, wide eyed. It was going to be a good haul.

***

"Hey! How do I say 'good job' in Finnish again?" Tuuri raised an eyebrow. Emil was really bad at this language-learning stuff.
"I can write it on your hand if You have trouble remembering," she told him, slightly exasperated and bemused.
"It's hyvää työtä," Kitty piped from the windowsill she was exploring. Tuuri raised an eyebrow yet again. Even a possibly-nine-year-old kid who was living in the Silent World for most of her life has better memory skills than you, Tuuri thought. At this rate, he would get nowhere. Emil huffed.
"I'll remember," he grumbled. Tuuri took pity on the Swede and walked over to Lalli.
"Emil is trying to let you know that he thinks you've been doing a good job," she told him.
"I know. What's this?" Her cousin asked her, pointing at a globe.
"It's a map, of the whole old world." She told him. Lalli crinkled his nose.
"Why is it round?" Tuuri faltered.
"Um... The world is round." she told her cousin.
"... I see. Makes sense. I can feel it." Tuuri was a bit skeptical about that, but didn't question the mage. "Then why are all our other maps flat?" Tuuri didn't honestly know. It was a valid question.
"I think it's just easier that way," she told him.
"It's misleading and should be changed" was Lalli's answer.

The crew worked quickly and efficiently, every one marveling over the treasures of the old world. Kitty had had climbed onto a pile of boxes and was looking at a book she had found thay contained pictures in boxes with writing in strange balloons while singing a battle song Sigrun had taught her. She had sung it 3 times in a row already and it was starting to get on everybody's nerves. The workflow was interrupted as Reynir suddenly found a strange book.
"These are some really odd runes. I don't think I can use them."
"Do not touch anything, Reynir," called Mikkel from across the room, his arms full of books. Reynir obeyed and moved away from the book, but Emil took a look.
"I know what language that is," he said. "It's called 'Kung Fu'!" Tuuri rolled her eyes.
"Actually it's called 'Chinalandic.' Gosh." Mikkel disagreed with both of the youngsters.
"Mandarin, most likely," he assured them.
"No it isn't, mandarin is a fruit," Sigrun scoffed.
"The word can refer to that too. I'm impressed you'd know such a thing," Mikkel replied.
"Oh yeah, we get a ton of fruit sent over from the greenhouses in Iceland. I know all the fruits," Sigrun informed him. "A mandarin tastes like a lemon that killed itself."
"Do you ever think that there might be other people like us out there, far, far, away? And maybe they've found a book in one of our languages, and they're now thinking 'huh, what a weird language. I wonder if the people who spoke of are still out there?' Wouldn't that be cool?!" Tuuri speculized, wide-eyed with excitement.
"Yep, would be cool, but that's way unlikely." Tuuri turned to face Sigrun.
"How so?" she asked.
"Simple. The poor sods didn't have anywhere to go, they didn't have big forests, islands and mountains to hide in like the rest of we do. They had big cities and fields." Tuuri wasn't convinced.
"I'm pretty sure there's mountains elsewhere too..." Sigrun wasn't convinced either.
"Dunno about that..." Tuuri just pointed at a big picture hanging on the wall. It depicted mountains, that were clearly not from around here. Sigrun leaned toward Mikkel. "Hey, do you think that's a picture of a place that actually exists or..."
"I have no reason to believe otherwise," replied Mikkel.
"Let's go check it out then! If there might be a whole other nation out there we've got to at least go say hello! We're on a detour anyway, how long will it take us to get there?" Sigrun was overflowing with enthusiasm, ready to go answer the age-old debate: "are we alone?"
"We'll, assuming we're able to keep this pace... a decade." Mikkel's answer deflated Sigrun's sails.
"Okay, let's not do that right now then. What is it, the other side of the world or something?"
"Figuratively speaking, yes." They didn't talk for a while after that, focusing on bringing back as many books as possible. "I believe that is all we are able to carry for today," Mikkel announced. Reynir approached him.
"Mikkel, what's this?" he asked. Mikkel glanced down. "It's- pieces of broken glass! What did I tell you earlier?!"
"Everyone ready to head back?" asked Sigrun. Every one was, so they headed out.
"I think we can agree that with the collection we have managed to accumulate we may all be proud to return to our civilization," Mikkel remarked.
"Mm-hm," agreed Sigrun. "Good vacation. I'll miss this."

[Grade E cat]

Somehow squeezed a chapter out in a single afternoon in spite of the new neighbors' construction work, so here's the one that had been cooling off:

Spoiler: show

 

Silent Child 4

Sigrun and Mikkel woke up. Reynir wasn’t sure whether Emil had ever lost consciousness or not. Lalli seemed to have calmed down, but was apparently still unconscious. It turned out that Katja had indeed wet herself. By the time she was cleaned up and in her other set of clothes, she was already pointing to the front of the tank, that was still in a mad dash to leave the city, only this time on one permitted by Sigrun. Soon, the tank was physically stopped by a large obstacle that had definitely grown from a troll at some point. Mikkel, Sigrun and Emil all went out to clear it out. When it turned that not all of the material was part of dead specimens, Tuuri was asked to get herself, Reynir, Katja and Lalli out of the city while the others dealt with trolls. Tuuri ended up stopping before they were quite out of the city. It turned out to be a good call, as Sigrun had apparently both fallen in the water and re-opened her arm wounds from earlier, requiring Mikkel to tend to them as fast as possible. After that evening, sleep came to Reynir much faster than he expected.

Reynir had a strange dream that night. He was sitting on the edge some sort of wood bench, the dog from his dream sleeping on the floor beside him. He heard a voice coming from nowhere in particular:
-Hello? Is somebody there?
Katja’s voice made Reynir realize that she was sitting on the same bench, a little further down, holding her kitten:
-Nice home.
Reynir looked around him, and agreed that while the place seemed to be in ruins, it indeed looked like it would have been a nice building back in the Old World days. The examination also told him that a lit candle some distance from the front of the bench was the only sign anyone besides he and Katja could be in the building. Not far from the lit candle, there was what seemed to be an ornate stone block. One of the decorations was a cross that looked like a plus sign, except that the lower branch was twice, if not thrice, as long as the three others. Almost as soon as he noticed it, he woke up.

xxxx

Between the whimpering Reynir had heard during the night and the sounds she had made during the last evening’s incident, it has been established that Katja was able to emit some sounds. Thanks to instructions from Mikkel that she was now following a little too diligently, she was now repeating every sound that was addressed to her as best she could. While Mikkel was making a breakfast that they were all agreeing was actually lunch due to how late into the morning they had all slept, Reynir and Tuuri had improvised a game that could be called “which is the most complex sound from your language that Katja can repeat”. At the beginning, Reynir had been able to tell that Tuuri had been throwing both Swedish and Finnish at her, leaving anything from Icelandic to Reynir himself. However, Emil had heard what they were doing from the still-asleep Lalli’s bedside, and joined them to replace Tuuri for Swedish. All four of them got so involved in the game that they didn’t notice, until Mikkel pointed it out, that Lalli had woken up, dressed, and gone to lean against a tree in sight of the campsite, but a few meters away from it. Emil went to bring him food, and came back covered both with his own food and Lalli’s, which prompted Tuuri to go have a talk with Lalli.

As the crew was preparing to head for the hospital, a radio session was happening with the organizers. Reynir at some point realized that Mikkel was keeping Onni busy while Tuuri was doing something with Lalli, and asked to speak with him instead due to actually having a few things to tell him and ask him about. After thanking Onni for his help the previous evening, clearing up a misunderstanding about how much training he’d gotten so far, being told what to do about the ghosts and finding out that Onni couldn’t reach him due to differences in their gods, Reynir was asked about “the third mage that was with them”. Reynir explained she was the little girl Emil and Sigrun had found.
-This is going to complicate things. If she turns out to have family in the Known World, chances are that those people are in Denmark.
Reynir didn’t need Onni to continue speaking to make a connection he hadn’t made so far due to there already being plenty of things going on with Katja grabbing his attention: Denmark didn’t have mages, and that meant that handing her over to whichever relatives offered to take her in might not be a good idea. Unfortunately, that also meant that the relatives in question might not even understand why it was a bad idea.
-The people heralding this expedition are Swedish, so they might as well be Danes when it comes to magic. But there’s a Norwegian in the team and it looks like he’s the one who brought in the Norwegian you’re traveling with, so it may be some use to tell him about the girl.
Just at that moment, Tuuri and Lalli showed up, both clearly ready to speak with Onni. Reynir gave Tuuri the headphones and went outside, where Mikkel was treating Sigrun’s wounded arm. Following Onni’s suggestion, he decided to pray to his gods in hope to get some kind of blessing… and somehow manage to completely fumble it. He panicked, and apologized, hoping he wouldn’t punished. To his own surprise, he ended up tacking an extra request at the end of his apology:
-If it’s not too much to ask, could you make it so that there are proper caretakers ready for Katja when we bring her back to civilization?

[thegreyarea]

So many great things! I must find time to read it all!

Meanwhile I did a little story for the August 2020 chapter break / Forum Sixth Anniversary, and I thought that it should probably be here too.
So here's the link for "The Remembering Man" on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26235748

I hope you like it!

(BTW I'm hoping to have the third part of "A Beginning" ready soon. Sorry for the delay).

[Jitter]

The Remebering Man is great!

[Mirasol]

Taking a little break from Kitty-chapters to post this other thing I wrote: Blood Moon

Grey suggested I should repost it here. While not explicently written for it, I originally posted it as one of the "guess-which-info-page-I´m-refering-to"-works for this chapter break (Adventure 2, chapter 10/11) in the thread dedicated to it. But I kinda already announced that I was writing it on the fic-ideas-thread way back, so I sort of spoiled the riddle... Not that it was hard to guess to begin with.
But I think not really knowing what´s coming makes the story actually better, so I´m not going to say here what exactly it is about. But this is the summary I settled on for Ao3:

A group of cleansers listens to some scary stories whose subject might not be as far away from them as they thought it was.

[Grade E cat]

Managed to produce a new Silent Child chapter, so here's the one that has been waiting in the wings:

Spoiler: show

Silent Child 5

The radio call from Trond came after the two days Sigrun had hoped for had turned into ten:
-Long story sort, I managed to root out anyone who may not be able to care for her properly by making sure they were informed that she was mute, and convince those who could that it was best for her to go to the academy in Iceland, then live in Norway. Many people in Denmark understand mage powers as some complex coping mechanism that became more prominent everywhere but Denmark and Sweden for just-as-complex reasons. From there, it was easy to make them see why a child would have developed it living in the Silent World and might be happier in a place that values it rather than act like it doesn’t really exist.
Sigrun looked at the little girl:
-Well, looks like you’re coming home with me.
It wasn’t all bad. She was starting to consider bringing Mikkel back home, as well, anyway. Not having the girl separated from him would be a nice bonus. All that was left was to make it home.
Reynir was happy to find out the news. He couldn’t help but wonder how much of it had been his prayer, and how much of it had been Sigrun’s uncle just being that good. He was getting attached enough to her to hope he would be allowed to keep in contact with her once they were both out of training. A crazy idea crossed his mind… and motivated him even more in trying to figure out a rune that could protect the other from the ghosts.

xxxx

Lalli had found a store full of books that required all hands they had to sort out and carry back to the tank. Reynir and Katja ended up coming so the others weren’t leaving them alone in the tank, but weren’t allowed to touch anything. However, once they were actually in the store, Reynir couldn’t help looking at the various items the store contained besides books. Out of nowhere, Katja pointed at one of the items, letting out one of her grunts that somehow sounded like the noise a frustrated cat would make. Reynir recognized the item as a picture of the strange variation on the plus sign he had seen on their shared dream, alongside various items that were either just the cross or decorated with it. To Reynir’s own surprise, Katja ended up being the one who kept him from actually picking up the picture that, upon closer examination, was apparently painted on glass. Instead, she pulled on Mikkel’s coat and showed him the items. He apparently told her something about them in Danish, but that didn’t help Reynir much. However, Mikkel gave the display a look, picked up a solid metal cross with a lower part that could fit in Katja’s hand, and gave it to her. Reynir could have sworn that the little girl had stuck her tongue at him for a brief moment. Was it a coincidence, or had she learned the significance of the gesture from her parents?

That evening, Reynir fell asleep right after finishing his dinner, his bowl still on his lap. He saw his dog for the first time in a while. There seemed to be a new vision, but his dream-dog was reluctant to go inside it with him for some reason. Reynir entered it to find a building’s door. Behind the door, he found a well-kept interior that felt vaguely familiar, but also like he didn’t want to go further in alone. Neither Katja nor Lalli seemed to be in their respective safe space. Reynir realized there was a third person he could reach. Onni took a little pushing, some of it more literal than the rest, but he ended up coming. When they came back to the place with the building, Katja was near the door, without her kitten. Had her dream-animal walked out on her also? He quickly realized that there was something more important to do:
-Onni, this is Katja. Katja, this is Onni, Lalli’s…
He was about to say cousin, but realized he wasn’t quite sure Katja even knew what a sibling, let alone a cousin, even was. Realizing he was the only one who really cared about proper introductions, he had everyone go inside the building:
-What is this place?
The question was addressed to Onni, but Katja was the one who answered the question:
-Nice home.
Reynir looked around, and realize the benches that occupied most of the room in which they were could very well have been the bench on which they had been sitting in that dream. And sure enough, there was a stone block with the cross in it. Could it be the same building, back when it was better-kept? Onni, meanwhile, started an explanation about the place being the temple to one of the Old World gods. When Onni’s explanation ended, Reynir was still intrigued:
-But… why is it here?
-I don’t know, it holds no meaning to me. We should leave. It’s not a vision, I see no benefit in lingering.
Suddenly, Katja pointed at a door to the right of the one all three of them had entered. Onni noticed at the same time as Reynir:
-What is she doing?
-She does this when there are trolls around. Sometimes when she wants to show us something.
Soon enough, the door opened, revealing the presence of old lady with short black hair, wearing glasses, a black dress with a strange white collar and a pendant shaped like the strange cross. Onni promptly put his hand in front of Reynir’s eyes:
-Don’t look in the eyes. You’re not enough to shield yourself. This goes for both of you.
The old lady mostly seemed to wonder who they were. After some discussion with Onni involving her being dead and not being ready to pass onto the afterlife quite yet, all three of them ended up being invited into the room she had been coming out of to have conversation. Katja happily followed Onni and Reynir in:
-Nice mommy.

[Mirasol]

Oh, I completely forgot that I haven´t posted the next chapter of the Kitty-story yet, it´s been done for a while now. Well, better late then never.

Spoiler: part 11 (Interlude) • show

They had really all escaped! From the… “ghosts”? Well, probably not spirits, these ones had definitely been attacking.
There had been some complications on the way to this safe spot that none of the fighting-members of the team really wished to talk about, so Tuuri figured that they probably hadn´t ended all that glorious. At least no one had gotten severely hurt.
She had been a bit worried about Reynir though, who had stayed unconscious for longer than everyone else, but the Icelander woke up grinning with a loud “Onni saved us! And Kisa! I was right, Kisa is a mage!”
Tuuri had decided to not argue with him about that again. Right now they were in a nice forest with a little snow and the sun was shining. Life was good again.

***

Mikkel was cooking breakfast while Sigrun made every effort to annoy him. She wasn´t even trying to hide how much fun she was having.
“You are probably immune to your poisonous food!”
“Perhaps.”
“Maybe we should hire a food-tester. Any volunteers?”
She looked at the youngsters who were sitting on the tank´s wheels. Those of them who understood Sigrun were suddenly very busy looking at the trees or the ground. The captain grinned smugly. Mikkel rolled his eyes.
“I vote for the two extras. They still need official jobs.”
Reynir leaned in closer to Tuuri.
“I have the weird feeling that Sigrun is talking about me and I´m about to get the short end of the stick. Could that be?”
Mikkel could see Tuuri wasn´t sure whether she should give up the benefit of the Icelander not understanding what was going on. Before she could answer though, Emil joined into the food-discussion that was going on.
“Don´t choose the Cat-girl, she likes the sludge!”
“Good point, the Braid-guy then. Tuuri, tell him of his luck!”
Mikkel suddenly had the indistinct urge to save Reynir from Sigrun and the others shamelessly taking advantage of the language barrier. He had to change the subject.
“Emil, her name isn´t “Cat-girl”.”
The Swede looked lost.
“He said Kitten isn´t called Cat-girl”, Sigrun translated.
“Neither is her name “Kitten”. Especially as she is a person with very little experience in verbal communication, we should settle for one name. All those nicknames you are giving her are confusing.”
“A little late for that, isn´t it?”, Sigrun pointed out.
“Well, it is a problem I haven´t been aware of before yesterday. Apparently Reynir´s habit to call her “Kisa” has led her to believe that his name is Kisa. Most likely something similar happened with you.”
“Maybe we should have told her our names before then. “
“I did. I don´t know what you´ve been doing. “
The captain opened her mouth to respond, but closed it again before saying anything.
“So, what do you suggest we call her instead?”, she changed the subject. She didn´t seem to enjoy the conversation anymore. Mikkel´s goal was met.
“I think we should let her herself have a say in that.”
The girl was sitting on Tuuri´s lap today, but was holding onto Reynir´s braid as usual. She looked a little dozy. But when he called her, her expression changed to being attentive.
Mikkel tried to explain the situation. “You have been with us for a while now.”
The child nodded.
“We are a bit confused about your name, or, what to call you.”
She looked around, then back at Mikkel, surprised. She pointed first at him, then the Icelander and Tuuri.
 “You, “Misse”. Rey-nir and grey person “Kisa”. Others no name?”
 “No, I mean, one that is your main name. Not just a nickname. You don´t really have one, do you?”
She thought for a bit. “Maybe… not.”
“You already know that I am Mikkel, and this is Reynir. And these are Sigrun, Tuuri, Emil and the one sleeping inside is called Lalli. We all have names to tell who we are. If you want, you can pick one too. But you don´t have to-“
“Yes want to! Want to be like you!”
He chuckled. “Do you have an idea for a name?
The girl concentrated, for quite a while. But it appeared she couldn´t really come to a conclusion. In the end, she just shrugged.
“Should we call you Misse?”, Mikkel suggested. “You said that is what your mother used.”
She answered much faster this time.
“No! Maybe. You can. But was mom´s name. Maybe… different? For new family?”
“So? What is she saying? Her accent sounds like her mouth is full of rocks!” Sigrun was becoming impatient.
“She wants us to come up with a new name for her. Since we are her new family”, Mikkel summed up.
“Aww!”, Tuuri exclaimed.
“Okay, then we need a really good one!”, Emil decided. He and Tuuri immediately started discussing.
“And now we have to do all the brain-work?” The captain acted angry, but Mikkel saw that she looked a little proud. She joined the discussion quickly and with strong opinions.
“Most of our nicknames so far have been somewhere in the field of “cat”, maybe we should go with that theme!”, suggested Tuuri.
“And she is brave, and good at surviving. We should include that!”, Reynir assisted as soon as he was filled in.
The Finn agreed and switched back to Swedish. “So she needs a name that´s cute, but also great. And a bit intimidating too, maybe?”
The girl watched the crew nervously as they decided over her fate. Mikkel stirred in his pot.
At that moment, Lalli silently walked out of the tank and looked down at the food.
“Oh, you´re awake.”
The scout sniffed at it and made a displeased face, then he walked away without a word.
“Don´t wander too far, the food is almost ready.”
If Lalli had caught the gist of what he was saying, he didn´t react. Well, not everyone enjoyed conversation. Mikkel started listening to the others again.
“This whole discussion is dumb”, Sigrun currently declared. “We all call her Kitty, let´s just continue with that. We tell her all the words and she decides.”
“What a clever way to shift the “brain-work” back to the child…” Mikkel murmured.
“Ya bet it is! Okay, tell her!”
Mikkel explained the captain’s plan to the girl as best as he could. She seemed intrigued.
 “So, different name?”
“Yes, but the word means the same.”
“Same but different.” She smiled. “I like.”
Mikkel nodded to the others.
“And so the real contest begins…” Sigrun, Tuuri and Emil smiled in a way that made him already regret approving of the captain´s idea. At least Reynir didn´t seem to want to be involved in the competition. Or maybe it was just him not understanding Sigrun.
“Pusekatt.”
“Kisa.”    
“Kisu.”
“Kissekatt.”
“Missekat.”
“I think we broke her…” Sigrun chipped in. The girl stared at them with her tongue peeking out and a highly concentrated look on her face.
“Let her think. Choosing a name is an important decision to make.”
The child looked up for a moment.
“Allowed to pick… more than one?”
“… Sure.”
“Allowed to pick… all? I like meaning.”
“If you can remember them…”
“remind me!”
“Alright…” He turned to the others. “She says she likes all of them.”
“That´s dumb, now everything is basically like it was.”, Sigrun crabbed.
“I´m afraid it is. As long as she is happy.  Time for lunch.”
Kitty got up and jumped through the snow, cheerfully murmuring her new names.
“Wait, did you just start this conversation just so we stop making fun of your cooking?”, Sigrun demanded to know.
“Surely I would never.”

[Jitter]

Surely Mikkel would never!