|| -------- -- -----  A E R I E   O B L I V I A N A . singular book of text wandertainment by Frank Edward Nora ------------------- ----------- WEAVER--CUP 1--"A NICE PLACE TO BE NAKED" --------  ||  Severe Repair  ||  Weaver  ||  -------> (Cup SRwv001, Created v2 (6/7/99), Copyright 1999) = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = Water dripped onto Prince Ferrajalt's face. Water. It felt good. He smiled. Then he opened his eyes. Standing above him was a totally drenched Treyess Arcomany. "Hey stranger." she said. "Hey." "We're alive." Treyess said. "And we're alone." "What do you mean?" Ferrajalt said, sitting up. "Well," she said, sitting down on the ground next to the Prince, "I managed to crash in the water. Thought I was gonna drown. But--I didn't." Ferrajalt nodded. "I'm pretty sure this is an island." she said, looking around. "An island with lots of rocks and pine trees." Ferrajalt nodded again. "And," Treyess continued, "there's no sign of the others." Ferrajalt sighed. "Yeah, y'know--" he said, "I don't know about you--but I was in the vacuum and absolute cold of space for a good while. Only my hangs saved me." "Me too. That was so horrible, wasn't it? Just before it all just..." "Yeah. I saw that dog again." "Me too. He was taking the rabbit somewhere." "Yeah." Looking up, Ferrajalt saw that there were several ultrabright light sources in the sky, not just one. There seemed to be two main ones and about a dozen minor ones. "Interesting sky." he said. "Yeah I know--I've never seen anything like it before." "This isn't Timber Serious. Not by a long shot." "Nope." "Your plane get destroyed, I guess?" Ferrajalt asked. "Yeah--coral. Pretty nasty." "Hmm." "I see that yours--well, there may be some identifiable wreckage over there. Uh, maybe." "Yeah. I hit hard... You know--some of the others--there's no way they could have survived all that." "You mean that girl, Sleap?" "Yeah. That outer space would kill an unprotected human in a few seconds." "Maybe the others were luckier--they were quite a bit ahead of us." "Hopefully." Treyess looked at her haggard Prince. His clothes were nearly torn to shreds. Treyess' were too. Ferrajalt smiled and looked down at himself. "May as well get rid of these, huh?" he said. "Sounds like a good idea. And you know if we start running around here naked, the others are bound to show up. It's just got to happen." "True." Ferrajalt said, ripping at what was left of his shirt. It tore away like tissue paper." "Freeze dried in the vacuum, maybe." Treyess said as she ripped her clothes off as well, which were also extremely fragile, except for her shimmering silver cloak, which seemed no worse for wear. Ferrajalt continued undressing, placing some things he had in his pants pockets in a little pile on the ground. And as he ripped his jacket off, he felt something in one of its pockets. Tearing the fabric away, he saw the little book from the Warhome library he had taken. "The Aleche Degrasion". Apparently, it was a classic of adventure and intrigue back on Timber Serious. He figured if he didn't take it along, chances were he'd never get another chance to read it. He examined the book--it seemed to be in pretty good shape. The pages weren't made of normal paper--maybe it was some kind of plastic? He pondered this as he added the book to his pile and continued undressing. Soon, they were both naked. "You know," Ferrajalt said, "this is kind of a nice place to be naked." "Yeah." Treyess said with a smile. Ferrajalt walked over to Treyess and they hugged. "I don't know where we are," the Prince said, "or what we're going to do--but I promise--I will take care of you--protect you--never abandon you." Treyess cringed a little. Wasn't she more able than Ferrajalt to take care of herself? She always had. But somewhere in her heart, her pride was warmed and melted away by a feeling of security, by the joy of being able to depend on another person. "Thank you." was all she said. And they both sat down on the pink and blue sand. Ferrajalt looked at the sand and realized something--there were large patches of pink and blue--but when he ran his hand between two sections, the colors mixed together to form a bluish-purple color. How could the areas have become so perfectly divided? It just wasn't natural. "So we need fresh water and food." Ferrajalt said after a long silence. "If we don't find both, we're kind of in trouble." Treyess laughed a little. "Yeah. I'd say so." she said. "But I have a feeling we'll find what we need here. Something about the smell in the air..." "A beautiful smell..." Treyess said. "Yeah." the Prince said, closing his eyes and lying back. -------> ------------------- ----------- -------- -- -----