Sticks and stones
A oneshot set during The Gardener, about a year after Arig and his brothers are created. It's fun to write from Krevel's perspective for a change.
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“You have a bone to pick?!”
Arig startled beside me. He looked around hastily, searching where the exclamation had come from. We had climbed on top of the Central Wall to have dinner above the Lake, in peace and quiet. There was, sadly, no peace and quiet on the Neverhood.
“Come at me, bro! Sticks and stones!”
Behind our backs and below, at the far end of the North Plane, Kamzik and Kabriel were flailing their arms at each other. A circle of onlookers had already crystallised. Someone was having a disagreement.
“Sticks and stones?” Arig murmured, twisted at the waist to watch.
“It’s a kind of saying,” I said. “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will hurt you longer. It means either we can fight verbally and then be angry at each other for days, or – oh, there it goes. Or we can just fling our fists and be done with it.”
I turned away from the brawl. I would not spoil my dinner with their manners. I tried to ignore the sounds; whooping, yells, taunts.
“Four!”
“Four?” Arig echoed.
“That’s the fighting scale,” I said, resolutely looking out over the quiet Lake. “One for a playfight, ten for a deathmatch. Either Kamzik’s trying to prevent fouls…”
“Five!”
“…or he’s escalating.” So much for a quiet dinner outside. I should have insisted on eating in my room. Something like this was bound to happen. Something always happened. “Five means you can go after the chest compartment.”
Arig was still observing the fistfight. The sandwich I had made him lay forgotten in his lap. I took a few bites of my own and decided to tell him not to mind them. This was nothing out of the ordinary. They were out of options and hungry for attention.
I stopped when I saw his face.
“You want to go and break them up, huh?”
He nodded stiffly. His eyes were wide and he was barely breathing. He wasn’t even involved…
“It’s alright. This is the fastest way to work it out. Give it a few minutes and they’ll shake hands and make friends. They can’t even use weapons until they go to six. There’s no way they can actually hurt each other.” There was a crack and a yelp that carried. Ack. “Whatever that was, I’m sure it won’t stick.”
Arig was going pale.
“Ah,” he said suddenly. He pointed to the Fast Door. His brother Usha was marching from it and glaring murder. He didn’t really do anything. He just stood above Kamzik and Kabriel, hands on his hips and glowering. Arig relaxed. He turned away from the fight and back to his sandwich. He slowly took it up again.
“You don’t have to eat it all,” I said. “If you’ve lost appetite.”
He gave me a smile, brown-eyed and pained. “There will be worse.”
Damn that Guardian. It was he who had insisted on climbing up here. “Otherwise I’ll never get used to eating under the sky.” Why did he have to be as open as a book? Why did he make me feel guilty over a fight that had nothing to do with me, but that was happening within the culture I was easing him into? Was it wrong to let fists speak where words had failed? Had I once, long ago, also watched a fight with chills on my back, wondering why no one was doing anything to stop it?
“Tonight,” Arig said, “I’m going to check that Willie’s house isn’t getting wobbly. Is there anything I should look out for?”
“First and foremost, does Willie know you’re coming?”
Off I went. It’s so nice when someone asks and you know the answer. It makes you feel like you’re making a difference. It’s like that one-day-old who once stumbled into his new homeland with thousands of questions wouldn’t have to feel ashamed today for not knowing anything.
Still, I could see he was forcing himself to finish the meal. And I had but one thing to tell ourselves. It would get better in time. Probably. Hopefully.
