TOTU: The Territory of Tribe Two

Swamp Birds are my Favourite Animals

Day 1

Milo sat with his back against the mesh wall fence of the cage, in the shade of the two huge trees reaching over the cell. It was the front of the cell, where there was a crude flap that served as a door, which locked with a few latches made out of a weird grey material.

"It's made of someone's horns," Oreo had said, when Milo had asked about the latches.

"It's weird." Carter, who had been leaning against a low building made out of mud bricks, laughed at Milo's expression.

"Yours are next," Oreo retorted, grabbing one of Carter's horns and shaking it affectionately.

They had been searched, and their packs had been taken away. They'd lost their phones, radios, water bottles and packaged food, as well as Milo's earphones, which his dad had given him. Lochie hadn't said a word since they'd been put there, and the others were leaving him alone.

Arrakis, Ari, Lochie and Tom were on the opposite side of the cell, huddled around the hole in the mud-brick wall that looked out on the camp's main social place. They'd been there for a while. Milo guessed it had been a few hours of being in the cell. He had already looked through the window; knew that what they were staring at was a long gap in two lines of the tribe's huts that resembled a road, and most of the Tribe were there. It was something like Tribe 2's 'main street'.

The rest of Milo's team were mostly watching the Tribe-members. It was startling, like entering any other culture, to learn about a people and hear about them, and then to actually be with them. One minute a man with a lion's tail would walk past, and the next a woman with black-and-white-striped hair like a zebra's would go by brushing down cuffs of electric-blue feathers on her wrists.

Milo turned his head to look out the mesh wall, where the 'camp 'square' was. The Tribe was a little smaller than they'd expected, with only about eighty people, and the camp was made accordingly, fairly small and perched on the hill, made up mostly of canvas tents or small huts made out of mud bricks and collected wood and metal. The tallest building was a watch tower that Milo had seen on the way to the cell, with pegs on the side that served as a ladder; a Tribe-member looking out from a tiny suspended room sheltered by a thatched roof. 

Milo could hear splashes, and saw a few people go by holding fish and lines, and remembered that there was a river close by. Lochie had always pointed it out on the map as protection of that side of the camp.

"Hey."

Milo tilted his head back, to look up through the mesh. Carter stood over him, one of his hands against the mesh.

"Hoi," said Milo. Carter cocked his head at him with a puzzled expression, and Milo realised he'd accidentally spoken in English.

"Hi," he amended, in Joju. "What are you doing?"

"What did you say, just then?"

"'Hoi'? It's... um, a weird way of saying 'hello' in my language."

Carter looked amused.

"Good. Because 'hoi' sounds something like 'swamp bird' in Joju."

"Swamp birds are my favourite animals."

Carter smiled.

"Anyway," he said. "Chief told me to tell you, you get two drinks and feeds a day. And a walk every three days."

"I'll get FAT," said Milo.

"And there's a guard here all the time. Because you're extremely dangerous." Carter cast a disapproving look over Milo.

"Your sarcasm cuts me," replied Milo. Carter nodded acceptingly.

"Lucky for you, Chief always puts me on guard duty a lot. Because I have wings to fly up to the watch tower, and obviously not because all the adults are too lazy."

"Mm."

"Mm." Carter rustled his wings.

"Carter!" A little girl waved at Carter from the other side of the square. Milo recognised her as the girl who had been with Erri. "Come ON! You promised!"

"Alright, I'm coming--" Carter said a guttural word in Joju that Milo didn't recognise.

"What's that mean?" he asked. Carter looked down at him.

"Eihri? It's short for eihrionze."

"Sister?" Milo asked, surprised.

"Yes."

"Oh, I see." Milo looked at where the girl had disappeared around the corner. "The hooves."

"Family gene," Carter admitted.

"So where are you off to?"

"River," Carter replied. "Eihri wants to--"

"Carter!" A man glared at Carter irritably from where he was lifting a hammer to bring it down on a malformed mud-brick. "Get AWAY from the humans."

"Alright, alright!" Carter wrinkled his nose in distaste. Milo grinned, expecting him to start walking away, but instead Carter suddenly spread his wings, the feathers stretching out in a second until one wing was squashed a little against Milo's mesh wall. And then Carter flapped down, hard, and Milo reeled back away from the wall as Carter's wings sent dust rolling out from beneath him. Flinging his head back, Milo could see Carter, already fairly high above, wings spread out so long that Milo couldn't believe they'd folded so neatly on Carter's back.

The picture is another Wingtalia, just because they're so beautiful.

Dedicated to penguin_turtles because they followed me for some reason :D