[Veltzeh]: 39.The Heritage of Humankind.Tales from Kyerrion.16

Krezagon woke up somewhat late in the morning. Ey had not been disturbed and the bed was comfortable. Ey was hurting a lot, though, and did not want to move. Ey slumbered for one more hour and when ey next regained a relatively conscious state, ey smelled food. Ey painfully turned in the bed and saw a very decent portion of breakfast sitting on the chair. Krezagon smiled somewhat weakly and got up, setting the breakfast on the table. Ey spent a while taking care of the small wounds the medic had not been able to bandage and finally removed the small piece of cloth from eir mouth. The place where the tooth had been was not an open wound anymore, but the cloth pulled a scab out of eir cheek, making it bleed a little. Ey did not care about that and instead sat down to eat.

After having eaten, Krezagon went outside and slowly walked around a bit. The fresh air made em feel better and ey went to inspect eir tent. First ey wondered who had been there, but then recalled that the medic told to have cleaned it a bit. Krezagon was happy and rearranged eir stuff back the way it should be. Ey got eir shoes, went to get eir new blanket from the infirmary tent and took it to eir own tent.

Krezagon walked some more and ended up lying on the ground, relaxing. However, once ey was immobile, the events of last night started getting to em and ey became rather sad. Ey tried to keep the tears down, but did not really succeed.

People started doing work in the camp—it seemed like they were building rudimentary houses now. Krezagon probably should have gone there and helped, but ey was not really in a condition to do anything, so ey just rested. The noise of the working blocked out many sounds and when Krezagon noticed that someone was standing next to em, ey startled fairly badly and sat up. The one who had sneaked up to em was the captain.

Before Krezagon could really do or say anything, the captain crouched next to em and said: "Krezagon, right?"

Krezagon was slightly surprised. "...Yes, sogewa." Ey did not look at the captain.

"Are you alright?"

Krezagon was even more confounded. "Uh... um, I will heal, sogewa."

"Are you hurting badly?"

"Well... yes, yes I am." Krezagon turned eir face away and a few tears dropped down. The captain did not do anything for a short moment, but then put eir hand on Krezagon's shoulder. Ey also took eir other hand to Krezagon's chin and gently turned the ancod's teary face toward eir own. Krezagon eventually lifted eir gaze as well and actually looked at the captain. The gewacod was not exactly formally dressed—eir shirt was open and eir captain's headpiece was missing. The captain looked somewhat sad and let go of Krezagon's chin.

"The medic told me about last night. I'm amazed that you didn't kill Derekl."

Krezagon turned eir face away again and was quiet. Ey did not really know what to think of this discussion. Just when the captain was about to say something, ey said: "I suppose even a fairly miserable life is better than death or a life in prison where torture is expected, sogewa..."

The captain rubbed Krezagon's shoulder a little bit. "Yes, I suppose so. When Derekl hurt you after you had defended your friend, I saw that you almost took your knife. You had a lot of chances to restrain em."

"Yes, I did."

"Did ey... You know, Fronel said something that Derekl had ...raped you. Ey didn't tell me... uh..."

"How Derekl did it?" Krezagon sniffed. "Everyone has a crevice there where a goninjin will fit... or would fit..."

The captain was fairly shocked. Ey did not say anything for a while. "I'm... I'm amazed." Ey fingered Krezagon's shoulder for a while and then got up. Ey said very decisively: "Derekl will be punished for this and everything else ey's done to you. Would you like to be there when I tell em that?" Ey offered eir hand to Krezagon.

Krezagon was now amazed as well. Finally there was some sense of justice in the world. "Y-yes, captain." Krezagon took the captain's hand and the gewacod pulled em up. They walked to the captain's tent, where the captain told one of the guards to get Derekl.

The captain closed eir shirt, got eir headpiece and had one of eir assistants dig up contracts, but Krezagon did not pay too much attention to that. Krezagon waited eagerly to see Derekl's face when ey would be told ey would be punished for what ey had done. It took a few minutes for Derekl and the guard to get there. The captain had Krezagon stand on the side and said: "Do you have to be told to stand to attention, Derekl?"

Derekl quickly produced the attention stance and greeted the captain. "What is the ancod doing here?"

"Do not ask questions. You will be quiet unless I explicitly ask for you to answer." After an ominous pause, the captain continued: "You have tortured soldier Krezagon for your own sick amusement. That is a punishable deed and as of now, you are stripped of your sergeant status and subject to imprisonment. If you resist, you will be brought before a court and sentenced to serve a fitting time in prison for your crimes. If you do not resist, you will be punished and demoted to the rank of a regular soldier."

Krezagon grinned with happiness. Derekl's face was worth the pain that still ran through eir body.

"...This is madness! You can't value that useless prosht's word over mi—"

"Silence, prisoner! You speak when asked to! Guards!"

At that point, Derekl jumped right at Krezagon. As soon as the captain saw it, ey said: "Restrain the prisoner, soldier." The whole thing was over in two seconds, with Krezagon having the nicod face down in a wristlock and sitting on top of em. The captain smiled surprisedly. "Excellent work, soldier." The guards arrived. "Guards, take prisoner Derekl, strip em and tie em to a log. You will stay with em to guard em. Punish em if ey speaks even one word." Krezagon got off of the nicod and the guards took em away. Derekl was completely furious.

Krezagon smiled widely, and the captain obviously noticed it. "Your and eir faces were brilliant. Say, would you like to come up with some punishments for Derekl? I thought that would be only fitting."

"Oh... yes I would, captain."

"Come present your thoughts by tomorrow at the last then. Preferably today, though."

"Understood, captain." Krezagon was about to turn and leave, but seeing the light outside as well as the mention of tomorrow made em think of Tegafel. Ey went nervous. "May I ask about one thing?"

"Yes?"

"What is the situation with Tegafel Darrelter, sogewa?"

"Oh, yes. Actually, it went a bit weird... the homehans sent a message early in the morning, saying that ey had escaped from the prison cell. The homehans are thinking that a galanfetzcan helped em escape. They have no idea how, but they don't know about far-walkers anyway." Krezagon looked fairly astonished. "At least that means ey won't be executed so soon. I didn't really believe ey had murdered that homehan anyway. But why would a galanfetzcan help em?" The two looked somewhat confused. "Well, it's not that immediate problem anymore. If you have no further questions, you may leave."

"Yes, captain."

Krezagon went outside and walked around happily. It seemed like Tegafel was at least somewhat safe, Derekl had just been disgraced and imprisoned and Krezagon had some new, decent equipment. Krezagon eventually ended up watching Derekl at the place where ey was tied down. Derekl attempted to insult Krezagon, but was struck silent by the guards. Krezagon just smiled. While ey was there, ey started thinking about punishments and came up with the best idea ever. Ey was unsure of whether the captain would approve of it, but figured that it would be worth a try.



At some point, the medic came to the place where Krezagon was sitting and smiled at seeing Derekl restrained. Ey touched Krezagon lightly on the shoulder and Krezagon turned toward em. "Are you feeling better now?"

Krezagon managed a small smile. "Yes. I'm still hurting, but my spirit is feeling good now." While saying that, Krezagon turned back to watch Derekl.

Fronel smiled. "Yes, I can see." Ey was quiet for a while. "Come find me when you want your bandages changed. Some of your wounds were bleeding rather badly, so the bandages might need change more often than once in a day."

"Yes, sonige."

The medic left and Krezagon sat still for some more time before ey thought that ey was content with the punishments ey had come up with. Ey got up and went to the captain. The captain was arranging some papers with an assistant. Krezagon greeted em.

"I have come up with some punishments for Derekl."

The captain flashed half a grin. "Let's hear them, then."

"Since ey was so gleefully making me feel bad about not being able to reproduce, I thought it would be only fitting to have em suffer the same fate. You know my so-called family name, captain? I got it from the squad I was born in. They had suffered some torture in the hands of garandals and nacrans..."

"You know, that is disgusting, but a delightfully fitting punishment for Derekl." The captain grinned. "Quite novel, I must say. Anything else?"

"Well, other than that I thought a thorough whipping and some wounds on eir face and hands would be fine."

"No amputation?"

"Uhm, I don't really like that. And I figured ey would still be useful as a soldier one day. Or then a slave. Though maybe ey could use to lose a finger or a toe..."

The captain seemed quite content. "Sounds fine. You know, I thought you'd come to me with a huge list of atrocities but instead you had a great new idea and a little of the usual stuff. You're decent and..." The captain stopped that short. "Anyway, the team that you're a part of, you people from Ailanihi, you're without a sergeant now and you need a new one. I could have one of my sergeants to take charge but I think you'd be better off with your own. I thought I'd promote the gewacod, but ey's too young for that. Actually most of them are a bit too young for it except that square-faced nicod, but I don't really think ey'd be a good sergeant. I've seen em glaring at the homehan eicods and ey always asks for border guard duty." Krezagon made an amused grin. "The main point is that I don't know the squad. So I'm asking you: which one of you would be a good sergeant?" The captain smiled. Krezagon thought for a while, but the captain spoke again before ey could say anything. "How about YOU?"

Krezagon was quite surprised. "...Me? Captain?"

"Yes, you. Do you think you would be up to leading a squad? Or one third of it, in this case."

Krezagon thought about it for a while. Ey was either the oldest or second oldest of the squad and had seen much action during eir life. No one had ever even considered that ey could be promoted. Maybe the captain suggested it because the others were fairly clearly unfitting sergeants, but then again ey could have just given the job to someone ey knew would do a good job, even if that particular person would not know the other soldiers. Krezagon shook the thoughts off for the moment. Ey knew ey was able to do it and wanted the chance. "Yes, captain, I'd be happy to take on the job. I believe I will do fine. Better than Derekl at the least."

The captain smirked. "Good, sergeant Krezagon!" The captain walked to eir desk and took out a paper. Eir assistant was pretty much staring at Krezagon with an open mouth. "Yrtel, I appreciate you catching flies in your mouth." The assistant shook a bit and closed eir mouth. The captain modified Krezagon's contract to indicate that the ancod was now a sergeant. "Hmh... your signature is missing."

"Yes... the contract was made shortly after I was born."

The captain looked at the contract some more. "And this is not a proper name for a person, either." The captain pointed at Krezagon's so-called family name. "As long as I'm making changes, I might as well authorize a name change. You don't have any other documents of yourself, do you?"

Krezagon was speechless for a moment. "Uh, no... no I don't, captain."

"Well then, let's change this name of yours! Do you need some time to think up a fitting one?"

Krezagon thought for a moment. When ey was younger, ey had often dreamed of having eir name changed and had come up with some alternatives that ey would have wanted. However, that had been a long time ago and Krezagon had since tried to get used to the idea that eir name was not going to change. Ey did remember some of the criteria ey had had for eir name back then, however. "No, captain. I used to think about it when I was younger, I should remember one..." The captain approved and instead started copying the current contract, leaving the name field empty for now. Krezagon tried to recall eir thoughts and eventually said: "Korielter."

The captain smiled a bit and wrote Krezagon's name on the contracts. "You should sign them."

"Yes, captain." Krezagon stepped toward the desk and was about to grab the pen when ey suddenly stopped. Ey seemed hesitant.

"Hm? Can't you write? That—"

"Uh, I... It's... uh..." Krezagon glanced at the assistant.

The captain figured that Krezagon wanted the assistant gone. "Could you step out for a moment, Yrtel?" The assistant left and the captain turned to look at Krezagon, curiously.

"I can write, captain. I can write well... but only with my... my left hand."

"You're... left-handed?"

"I... I can do almost anything else with my right hand as well, but writing... I can't."

The captain was quiet for a moment. Ey obviously doubted emself and eir decisions now. "You know, I watched you cut down those trees yesterday and didn't realize it. But you do use your left hand more." The captain looked a bit troubled. "But whatever. I didn't really believe those tales about left-handed people being proshts or crippled anyway. You are smart to hide it, too." Ey offered the pen at Krezagon's left hand.^[#1]

"Thank you, captain." Krezagon took the pen and wrote eir names on the contracts, quite neatly. Ey also saw the name of eir place of birth: Erionteh, in the county of Ragesh, in the nation of Geckyila. Ey stared at the piece of text for a while—Krezagon had not even been born in Kervanela.

"You do have quite decent handwriting."

"T-thank you." Krezagon was quiet for a moment, while the captain put down something in a book. What Krezagon saw, it seemed to be a listing of things that had been accomplished in the camp. When ey was done, Krezagon started: "Captain, I'm... I'm really grateful for all this stuff... everything that you've done for me here. I thought I would never make it even this far. Thank you so much."

The captain smiled and got up after having arranged eir papers into a pile. "You're welcome. People have told me that I'm great at reading other people. You're smart, loyal to your friends and superiors, obey commands and you have great self control. I saw no reason why I shouldn't reward that or take advantage of it. And well, it's not hard to guess that you've been through some serious groshje. Being compensated feels fairly nice, doesn't it?"

Krezagon smiled fairly widely. "Yes, it does. Thank you, captain." Ey made a honoring genuflection one rarely saw used in the army—it was much more common among royalty and the likes.

The captain was a little flattered. "Great manners as well." Ey grinned and gave Krezagon's shoulder a single light pat. "Let's go get you sergeant bracers. And some shoes," the captain added as ey glanced down and saw what rags Krezagon had on eir feet. They left the tent.

Krezagon walked after the captain, smiling very widely and having a great mood. Ey was a person who lived in the present and only gave thought to the future or past when explicitly thinking about them, so ey was happy and did not think that this would probably be the best thing that ey would ever experience with respect to the army.

The person responsible for the inventory looked at the captain and Krezagon fairly curiously. The captain just went: "A pair of sergeant bracers for em. And shoes." The nigecod stared at the captain for a while, then seemed to forget what ey was supposed to do, turned at the shelves of stuff, and finally turned back at Krezagon and went: "Um... show me your old shoes." Krezagon took eir shoes off and put them on the counter. The nigecod stared ay, it was about time. Heh..." Ey picked out sergeant bracers from a small box and then shoes from a row. "Try those on..."

Krezagon put the shoes on. "These are a bit too snug..." Ey gave them back to the nigecod.

The captain eyed the shoes and went: "Give em a bit better shoes."

The nigecod looked at the captain for a few seconds before putting the first shoes back and taking out another pair, which was slightly different—they were better quality than normal shoes.

Meanwhile, Krezagon had put on the bracers and grinned widely at seeing them around eir wrists. Ey then put on the next pair of shoes, and they fitted. "These are good."

The nigecod nodded.

The captain looked toward the working soldiers. "Hm. I don't know where the rest of your squad is, but I suspect they will come for dinner at some point. Tell the cook and eir guard to inform them where to meet after it so you can disclose the news. Tell me the time as well, I want to see their faces, and it might be a good idea in case they have some mutinous thoughts." The captain flashed half a grin. "And if the cook won't believe you, just brandish those bracers and make em call you... um... soan?"

"It's a strange-sounding word. It's used so rarely. Or never."

"About time it was used more often then. Dismissed," said the captain with a farewell gesture. Krezagon responded and the captain walked away.

The inventory caretaker was fairly astonished. "Well, this whole thing's some blessing in disguise for you..."

Krezagon glanced at the nigecod. "Yeah," ey went, remembering that now ey did not have to use the titles of people of lesser or equal rank. Ey figured ey would do it anyway—it was nice when someone displayed respect, and if it was someone with a higher rank, it felt fairly tingly. "Thank you for the equipment, sonige." The nigecod smiled with some confusion and Krezagon walked away.



Krezagon walked around a bit and got some disbelieving looks as well as comments about eir sergeant bracers. Ey even explained the reasons to one of the soldiers who had held em yesterday and told that the nicod should go and watch what kind of punishment Derekl would receive for eir crime. Some time later one of the two other soldiers hurried toward Krezagon and apologized, almost panicking. Krezagon enjoyed the pleading and finally said that ey would hold no grudge.

The ancod walked to the place where ey had been whipped and found the spot where ey had stood. There was still a little blood on the ground as well as the long strands of hair. Krezagon looked at the hair for a moment and then picked it up. Ey moved away from the place and started twining the hair together until it formed a thick string of some sort. Ey was happy with it and hung it around eir neck.

Ey went to talk to the cook, telling em to give the instructions to the rest of Krezagon's squad to meet at a specified time and place. Having done that, Krezagon walked around a bit more and lied on the ground.

Not too long after ey had lain down on the ground, Krezagon remembered that ey should get the bandages changed, so ey did just that. The medic was fairly astonished at seeing sergeant bracers on Krezagon. Krezagon just grinned.

"This is the best day of my life."

"Except what with the wounds," grinned the medic and started unwrapping the bandages. "Your back has bled a lot... It'll probably hurt to pull these off."

"I don't mind."

The medic took off the bandages, cleaned the wounds and rebandaged them. After that, Krezagon wandered around, had dinner and when it was time to inform eir squad of the change of leader, ey went to get the captain, talked with em and eventually the two left for the meeting place.

The five soldiers were gathered together, and when they saw Krezagon and the captain walking toward them, they eyed the pair a bit before lining up. Krezagon hid eir arms behind eir back.

The captain spoke: "Attention!" Everyone, including Krezagon, stood to attention. Krezagon, however, kept eir arms behind eir back. "Now, you may already know that Derekl was imprisoned. That left your squad without a leader, so you need a new one." At that point, the nigecod glanced at the older nicod while all the nicods glanced at the gewacod. The gewacod, then again, looked somewhat astonished and glared at Krezagon. "Smart one," said the captain with a grin and pointed briefly at the gewacod. "Krezagon Korielter is your new sergeant." The captain paused for a moment to look at the faces of the rest of the squad and was very amused. The faces of the others ranged from shocked to aggravated and disappointed, save for the young gewacod, who half grinned with schadenfreude. All of them were quite dumbfounded, however. The tall nicod was about to speak, but the captain made it first: "Mutiny is punishable by torture and imprisonment. Disrespecting your superior is punishable by demotion and whipping. Refer to your superior by eir appropriate title." The captain smiled smugly and finally added: "Don't do anything stupid. Dismissed." Ey walked away.

The squad stood there, fairly stupefied, for a longish moment after the captain had left. Krezagon brought eir hands to eir hips and looked at the others, grinning. The gewacod started fidgeting a little, and after noticing it, the tall nicod said, disbelievingly but not hostilely: "Um... this is a joke, right? A really big joke."

Krezagon shook eir head and eir grin widened. "No, it isn't."

"But... why... why not em?" The nicod pointed at the gewacod.

"The captain said ey's too young."

"Why not em then?" said the nigecod and pointed at the older nicod.

"Hey, yeah," commented the tall nicod.

"The captain said something about not being fit for the job of a leader..." They all stared at the older nicod for a while. Everyone knew ey was not the leader type.

"So ey chose... you? Instead of any other sergeant from Adenelihe?"

"Better get used to it. Come to think of it, I haven't heard you using a title there while speaking to me."

The tall nicod went slightly pale and was quiet, not knowing what to say. The gewacod noticed it and whispered: "Say 'I'm sorry, soan'."

The nicod took a longish moment, but ey finally said: "I'm sorry, so— soan."

The youngest nicod looked somewhat curious. "Was your name changed or something, soan?"

"Yeah, the captain authorized it."

"Why was Derekl imprisoned anyway?" asked the older nicod.

Krezagon glanced at em a bit dismissively. "Because ey beat me, that's why. In case you hadn't noticed," ey went and pointed at eir cheek. "Anything more?" The others were quiet. "Dismissed, then." Krezagon smiled and walked away.