Place: Kigaeno's Mountain Hideout
Date: 23 January 1800 then 11 February 1800
Rating: suitable for anyone
Characters:
Cleyra, High Priest
Kigaeno Moondancer
Mogu, Kigaeno's apprentice
Sharon, Flower Maiden
Wylan, Tree Oracle

Kigaeno slipped to consciousness as he was placed on the bed and listened to the voices. Were they the voices in his head again? No, these were real voices. Who were they?

"Why would he? Why would he have anything to do with this only to nearly die trying to save us afterwards?"

"He would do anything, just to seem right! He was the one that knew how to stop the sandstorm! Who else could have figured it out!" the High Priest, Kigaeno needed no effort to place this voice.

A third older female voice, "Silence all of you. There are more important things at stake, like survival."

He felt himself passing out once again.

"I won't hear any more of this! We need a place to sleep!" Wylan tried not to sound angry, she had to keep her composure for the sake of the others, "Where is the mole thing that seems to live here too?"

"Cut the mole crap, you don't hear me calling you rats do you?" Mogu shook his head from where he stood at the front door and waved his overly large claws over his short stature as if to emphasize.

"Of course. I apologize. You live here with Kigaeno?" Wylan looked slightly self conscious. She wasn't use to dealing with 'outsiders'.

"I'm his apprentice, and very proud to be so. And I will not listen to your insane accusations against the man that just saved your culture from extinction." his yellow eyes glared at the High Priest, and he turned to walk outside, "Follow. Now."

Wylan did, and he led her outside of the house where the others had taken. As there attention turned to him he sighed. It wasn't his intention to be in charge, and Kigaeno had only had time to briefly go over things with him before he hurriedly left for Cleyra to find potential 'refugees'.

"Ahem, well." he raised a claw up to point another structure, and stopped to sigh as it made one of the children cringe, "That structure is food storage, but it won't last too long. I can show you where we can get vegetation further down the mountain, and I can hunt for some meat. I don't think we should venture far until Master awakens, we don't know if the villages on the outskirts are safe or not."

"LISTEN!" he was frustrated by how easily the maidens were distracted. He supposed they weren't use to being in an ordered environment, "I'm going to show everyone around, you can sleep in the house if you want but don't touch any of the experiments. Otherwise I'll help make you tends and if you want help you dig out some cave places." this was going to get annoying fast, he hoped his master would awaken.

Kigaeno blinked awake. How long had it been? Days? Weeks? His blurry vision cleared slowly, trying to recall the time since he had left Cleyra once again. It was all a blur, flashes of being taken care of. It was shameful to him; here he was, the saviour of his people, being taken care of like a wounded animal.

"You're awake." it was one of the cleyran oracles who he had rescued, sitting silently beside him as if to watch over him, "You've been awake more, you seem to be recovering."

"I am.. I will never.. who are you?" he put his hands on his face as if to check if he still had feeling. Immediately the rage returned. That horrible person. She would die. She would meet with a fate worse than anything she could imagine; he would make sure of it. But no, he had to worry about these people first, "and how many?"

"I am the oracle Wylan, please be still. There are 11 of us here including yourself and your apprentice that was already here when we arrived."

"How is food holding up?"

"We have been living off of plants that grow down the mountain and Mogu and the King go out to hunt. I apologize but most of your food store is now gone."

"Is it crowded? We need more structures. What about little Claire, did she make it?" he knew Claire wouldn't be little any more, but he had desperately wanted to find her and get her out, and he didn't know if she was one of the maidens that had came through or not.

"Please stop worrying Kigaeno."

"You remember my name... I am..." Kigaeno knew that it was likely for his infamy, not because they liked him.

"Many of us do." Wylan didn't seem especially opposed to him, perhaps they would soften towards him now that he had proven himself, but he wished he hadn't had to.

As he faded back into his rest, Wylan rose from her seat, passing her watch over him to Sharon and stepping outside of the room, into the main area of Kigaeno's study. Most of those rescued had been sleeping in make shift tents outside, as even those who had respect for Kigaeno didn't feel comfortable in most of his house. There were too many experiments and such that looked as if they might be dangerous if disturbed. Only Mogu would venture too deeply into the structure and never talked about what he was doing there.

"He's holding up, he'll be out of bed within the next few days." she spoke to Mogu, who she almost tripped over where he was standing with his arms folded.

"As soon as he's up we need to check out the base of the mountain and go into the Vube desert. We need to go see what the damage was." he secretly hoped they'd meet resistance. He hadn't gotten a chance to show his stuff against sentient opponents. Somehow a grin spread across his muzzle, and he walked off to check on the others.