[shaman]

This thread is stomach churningly short. Its just somthing to brige the whole thing together.


6 the caravan
A crowd of sligs were now appearing from behind the storm circle, carrying boxes of loot no doubt raided from the mudokon camp above. By the time they had all crawled from their hiding places about thirty sligs were stood training their rifles on Marty and Sid.
“Well well”. One of them smirked. “Looks like the place wasn’t empty after all ... YOU”. He pointed at Marty. “ where’s the rest of your tribe”.
Marty was just as likely to attack a slig who spoke to him like that, but instead he just replied: “we’re not from this tribe”.
Sid was terrified. It was only by chance they hadn’t bumped into sligs from the camp they attacked. In fact it was preferable to be caught here than face a “fair” trial for terrorism.
“You two shaman yeah”?
“Yeah” Marty replied.
The slig smirked again, so did some of his fellows. “Well if that’s the case wise –man ... you must know exactly what happens to you now”...

Fortunately no other members of the tribe on the hill had been captured. They all seem to have had the right idea and moved as soon as they had saw the sligs marching across the plains towards their home, and so had escaped the caravans.This (obviously) was not the case for Sid and Marty. They were taken at gun point to a small clearing back in the woods, where a large threatening looking truck was waiting.
There was no telling what would happen now. Sid was trying not to shake as it was obvious that these sligs could spot a weak minded mud a mile off, having probably done this a million times.
It was a surprisingly nice day for this to happen, in fact one of the most beautiful oddworld days Sid had ever seen. “How did it come to this”? Sid whispered under his breath. One day he was a normal mud the next he and Marty had been banished from their tribe and walked right into a slave caravan.
Life didn’t get much worse.
Sid and Marty were shoved into the caravan by the guard at the door, it would have been futile to resist since al the sligs were armed, and you never knew when a big-bro might show up.
The caravan was cold and there was very little sitting space usually because of the dozens of muds packed in at once, but since this caravan had been very unsuccessful, it was full of boxes of various junk.
Marty sulked in a corner without saying anything, Sid could feel his pain. Not knowing what happened to his cousin must have been excruciating. It was about five minutes before Marty’s head turned and Sid saw a shadow move on the opposite wall. From behind a pile of junk boxes a middle aged mudokon rose up, he was a dark green and his head was perfectly shaved. He was also wearing a bright yellow loincloth and was adorned in several decorative scars on his hands, back and chest.
He turned.
“AH”! He shouted. “New guys”!
“Huh”? Marty replied.
“Your new here”! The mudokon said. He produced a small box from his loincloth and pulled out a roll of paper filled with a substance unknown to Sid, which he lit with a small match and began to smoke.
Sid stared in disbelief.
“Wan one”? The mudokon asked.
“Erm no i don’t” Sid replied.
“Suit yourself ... names Archie”.
“Sid”.
Archie turned to Marty, who was still sat in at his wall. After a long silence, he spoke again.
“You’re a fine old conversationalist aren’t you”?
Marty glared and returned to staring into space.
“Hell i gotta tell you guys this brings back old memories” Archie rambled on. And Sid was still trying to figure out what exactly this mud was smoking.
“Used to be in this tribe y’know” Archie continued. “Still the scenery has certainly improved since i been gone but you know... got to see as much of oddworld as I can while I’m still young”
Marty was now staring at him.
“wanna hear somthin-“?
“Wait wait, you were IN this tribe”? Asked Marty.
Archie grinned revealing a row of yellowing teeth. “Yeah i was in this tribe, shaman ... mind you i never cared much for those tomahawks, so y’know ... uncivilised”
“My cousin was in the tribe up there” Marty yelled smiling. “Jerry, you know him”?
Archie rolled back his head as Marty looked impatient.
“Yeah i know I’m’” Archie said finally. “Good kid, he was one of the last to take off when they thought the slig caravan was coming our way”. He smiled, “smart kid”.
Marty Sid back down the wall looking like a thousand years of pressure had been relieved.
“Thanks so much”. He said finally .Archie nodded and began blowing rings of smoke into the air.
“SO” shouted Archie making Sid and Marty jump. “How did you guys get into what i like to call our social club”?
Marty looked at Sid for the first time in a while.
“We got banished”. Sid muttered, as thinking of it was painful to think of it. “For life I think”
“Damn that sucks” Archie replied with a mock sense of sympathy. “What ya do”?
Marty looked alarmed. He didn’t want this subject talked about. Sid on the other hand could find no hurt in it.
“Terrorism”. Sid replied blankly. Archie looked at him looking surprised.
“Terrorism”?! He laughed “what the hell did you do”?!
Marty, who had obviously given up hope of concealing the crime he and Sid had committed, spoke up.
“You remember any news about the glukkon camp a few miles away”?
Archie rolled his eyes “Well yeah course I do but-“
He froze, and then looked from Sid to Marty. It was impossible to tell what was going on in Archie’s mind. However Sid knew what was coming next.
Archie grinned. “It was you two”. He said flatly “hah! Well well what can I say?” he was being rather loud about this for Sid’s liking. “That was one hell of a stunt you guys pulled, explosives an all wasn’t it”?
“Yeah” Sid mumbled.
Suddenly they all felt a huge jolt. The caravan was beginning to move; obviously their captors had given up hope of ever finding any more hostages today. There was a small window at the back wall of the caravan, and Sid could only watch as the hills and forest became tiny specks on the horizon as the caravan trudged into the vastest of oddworld’s many moors.
When there was nothing more to see Sid just slid down the wall and sat on the floor.
“Home sick already”? Archie chuckled insensitively.
Sid just nodded and laid his head in his hands.
“Listen, it aint all that bad”. Archie said
Sid could have said a million things to contradict this. But instead he just nodded again and tried to sleep.

Days past, and life in a slave caravan was no picnic. Days of nothing but travel, poor food and constant brutality from sligs had earned Sid a very short temper (not to mention several scars across his back) and a torturing urge to get out of this place. A couple of times he had thought of running for it, but there were only three of them on board and they were all very easily spotted. In only a few days, they all must have seen a hundred horizons. But still they had conversation to cope with the eternal boredom and slay the fear they were all facing. During the night one time when they were on the borders of scrabania, Archie was telling them about himself.
“See this”? He indicated to a scrab scar on his left hand, “Got that on the monsaic; lines, hurt like hell”.
“You’ve been here before”? Marty cut in.
Archie got up and strolled over to look through the only window in their prison, Sid could see why he obviously liked the place. The sky over scrabania was a burnt pink as evening was rolling in. In front of them stretched a rolling wasteland scorched by the centuries of pounding heat from oddworld’s sun and the air smelt pleasantly of dusk.
“Where do you think we’ll end up”?
“Doesn’t matter” Archie replied calmly. “It only matters what we do when we get there”.
Sid nodded at Marty. They both knew this guy was up to something.
Suddenly the caravan ground to a halt, and the sound of grinding gears filled the room for a moment.
There was something going on here, everyone one of them felt the same without even having to speak, Sid’s earlier question was clearly about to be answered fully. The door clicked and unlocked, then swung open revealing a slig outside their caravan. A sandstorm had recently started and Sid was immediately jealous of the slig for wearing a mask.
“Get out”. The slig commanded, and Sid, Marty and Archie descended the steps onto scrabanian soil.
It was surprisingly cold for a desert and very windy due to the imminent sand storm.
A slig grabbed the back of Sid’s head and forced him to look into the distance.
“Welcome home” he chuckled.
Sid couldn’t believe he had been so stupid, he should have made a dash for it and now it was too late...
There in the distance, easily recognisable by its threatening looking barbed fences and smokey train depots, was an mine.

The only thing waiting for them here was slavery.