Trial and Tribulation Copyright 1997 by Renee a.k.a. Alethea All "NiGHTS" characters and related indica mentioned herein are copyright and TM by one or more of the following: Sega Enterprises, and/or Sega of America. Used without permission Etienne or "Eti" and related characters and indica, copyright Jeanette Merrell. Used without permission Dunamis, Alethea, Frost, Aldwyn, Nettle, Tarragon, Salpinx, Rhian, Talitha, and related characters and indica, copyright Renee. This document may be freely distributed as long as it is not modified in any way. Trial and Tribulation (Part twelve) Frost did not like huge crowds, and Nights did not need to be disturbed by visitors, so Frost decided that he might as well go for a walk. He strolled through the tall trees and headed to one of his favorite spots. Snow was falling but that did not really make much difference to a Snip, they liked cold weather. The sound of a river was audible. Frost strolled out of the trees and onto a riverbank. The water here rarely froze. Frost hopped across several stones and landed on the opposite riverbank. He glanced over toward several large boulders and started. A snow drenched 'maren, the same species as Nights and Reala, was slumped against a boulder. Frost walked up to her. She was either sleeping or unconscious, and Frost could not imagine a 'maren of this particular species sleeping out in the cold. Most human like 'maren were too frail for such cold weather and became ill if they stayed in it for long periods of time. She was covered in a thin blanket of snow. Frost noticed she was pale and very bruised. He raced toward the base. *** Alethea was very glad that she had insisted on having the infirmary expanded. She wanted to have an infirmary designed like the one in the castle of Nightmare that had enough room for several pactients to stay. She glanced through the nearby doorway. Nights was fast asleep for the moment. He had come to briefly, but had gone to sleep very quickly. She noted sympathetically how worn out he looked. It had been exhausting for Dunamis and herself, but she knew it had been particularly hard on Nights. Alethea looked across the room where Dunamis was sleeping on a bench. He had tried to stay awake but since he had nothing to do, that had proved difficult. She hated to wake him up, but they need to go after Salpinx. The remembrance of what Salpinx had done was still fresh in her mind, and she had no idea where he was now or if he was even alive. They needed to go back now to get him; the chance that he would be alive was diminishing rapidly. None of the other troops that had gone with them had been captured, which meant a very, very irate wizeman was going to take his frustration out on the one rebel he did have. Hopefully, he had not found out about Nights or the other rebels until after he had interrogated Salpinx. Otherwise, Salpinx would probably be dead. That thought disturbed her. " You know you really should let another group go after Salpinx. Dunamis, I don't care what he says, is exhausted. You really don't need to go either. You should stay here." Alethea shook her head and Talitha frowned. " You're being ridiculous; look at yourself! You'll be caught the minute you fly over the border." " If I had been careful he never would have been caught." " You can't stop accidents from happening. It was his choice to help you; no one made him do it." " The others are no better off than we are. Everyone's tired." Something pecked frantically on the door and Alethea opened it. Frost stood there wide-eyed and panting. " What is it?" " I found a 'maren by the river side, and she's hurt." Alethea headed out the door, and Talitha put her hand on Alethea's shoulder. " You are going to stay here and get things ready; I'll go get the 'maren. Don't argue with me." Alethea sighed and walked back inside. Frost glanced at the 'maren cat. " Well? What are you waiting for?" *** Jackle was obviously irate; he had rarely seen Jackle so enraged. Clawz stayed out of Jackle's way. The troops tagged along wearily hear and there. Puffy was busy fussing about a ring she lost (Clawz noted that she seemed more concerned about that, than the fact that they did not catch the rebel.), and grumbling about the falling snow. Clawz wondered anxiously if he could blame Jackle for their hasty actions. wizeman would want an answer, and it had better be a good one, unless of course, you could put all the blame on someone else, which is just what Clawz wanted to do. Jackle's seething reaction still distracted Clawz from thinking about answering wizeman as much as he ought to think. He could not figure out why Jackle had tried to kill his own spy. Had the spy defected? What could he have done to get Jackle this angry? He glanced at Jackle, and from the expression on his face, he could tell that Jackle was not sulking any more; he was trying to decide what he was going to tell wizeman. Clawz decided he had about a fifty- percent chance of successfully dumping this whole incident on Jackle. Gulpo peered out of trees at the weary, rebel-less troops and grinned. He came, crashing through the trees, and scoffed at them. " Now that you're finished with that little diversion, let's get back to what wizeman ordered us to do. You do remember what that is, right?" Clawz snorted at Gulpo, piqued. " Oh yes, let's all follow the over grown piranha; after all he's a Brigadier General and has experience in these things, so let's all pull out lawn chairs and wait for Nights to come to us." Gulpo bristled. " At least I'm not going to have my head knocked off for disobeying orders when I get back to Nightmare." " That's would be no big loss for you, though it's large enough that it would be a good target for wizeman." Clawz knew it was usually not a good idea to tease, literally or otherwise, but he loved Gulpo's reaction. Electricity sizzled up Gulpo's spines. He shot daggers at Clawz with his eyes. (For all of you who have not figured this out already, some types of 'maren fish, and few other creatures too, are like electric eels, or other fish that can generate there own electricity. Just think about how many volts something that size can generate! OUCH!) Puffy frowned as the troops cringed and moved away from the two 'maren who looked like they were going to kill each other. " Enough you children! Let's find Nights." Clawz and Gulpo just glared at each other; then Clawz grinned. " Well if the master of stealth over here keeps on being soooo inconspicuous, Nights might fly right by us, and we can catch him. Oh wait, catching him would involve speed, Oh well." *** Talitha and the other Nightopian troops stood around the 'maren. She was wet, very bruised, and slightly muddy. The 'maren shifted a little and whimpered, then opened her eyes, took one look at the troops around her, and shrieked. She scrambled backwards, and tried to stand up. One of the troops grabbed her arm and she started wailing. " LET ME GO!" " Whoa! Get a grip on yourself! We're not going to hurt you." The 'maren jerked backwards and slipped on the snow with a shrill of pain. The soldier picked her up, and Rhian let out a sharp cry of agony. " Carefully, with all those bruises she may have broken bones. Get her out of here." " HEY, over here!" Talitha and the others turned around. " Where is he? Is that you Frost?" " Yes! I'm down here." The others walked to the edge of the waterfall and glanced down. Frost was standing along the side of the river. There was another 'maren lying face down on the shore, but this 'maren Talitha recognized. " Aldwyn!" The others were next to Frost in a few seconds. Talitha knelt beside him. " It doesn't look like he has any broken bones, though he has a large knot on his head." She picked picked him up, and they headed back to the base. *** Reala flew down the hall and landed in a remote part of the castle. He pushed against part of the wall and it slid back. Reala limped through it into a small hallway before pushing the wall back in place. As far as Reala knew, no one else knew about these passages; at least no one alive. They had been built into the castle from the start, but he had no idea who had designed them or why, though he could certainly guess. He had found them long ago through circumstances he did not wish to think about. Reala winced at a sharp pain in his chest that the memory of that event always brought. It was not real, but he could still remember far too vividly the shock of seeing the point of a long dagger sticking through the front of his chest. It had not really hurt as much he would have thought. It was more of a warm tingling sensation. He pushed it out of his mind forcefully. He refused to think about it again. The passages had proved very useful for avoiding certain persons or spying on someone. Reala flew through a maze of passages. He finally stopped at one and pushed ever so slightly. The wall slid barely out of the way. Someone was talking and Reala listened. For several minutes he did not move, then carefully he pull it back into place. This particular passageway lead to a favorite meeting place of most of Reala's own spies. Reala did not trust anyone, especially spies. Their whole job was to do things under handedly, at least in Nightmare. He had heard that the rebels only sent spies to listen in on things, not to infiltrate, nor to monitor each other. " Fools," He thought contemptuously " they're far too trusting."