Watching Yute (16 page)

Jim would have loved a chance for a
quiet talk with Karl before. But now it was just depressing. “Hey,
Karl.” Stay cool, don’t be a freak.

“
Oh! Hey Jim.” Karl turned
around, chomping down on a cookie. “Say, there’s something I’ve
been meaning to ask you when I got a chance away from the
others…”

Jim’s mind went wild. Something Karl
wanted to talk about alone? Analyze the way he said it! It was
casual, so it can’t be bad. Stop thinking and say
something.

Jim attempted to speak in a tone that
would fit ‘calm-casual’ or ‘take me now’. “Oh…? Ask
away.”

Karl smirked. “I finally found out it
was you or your little buddy Cass, who’s to blame for me reliving
my high-school nightmare.”

“
High-school n…” Jim sighed,
hung his head in shame, and muttered, “Hot Karl.”

“
Hot Karl!! Yes indeed. I
get dumb jokes made at me at least three times a week now, and I
finally traced it back to you two.”

“
Aw, shit man, I’m
sorry.”

Karl signed. “Please don’t say
'shit'.”

“
It was Cass. She described
you as ‘hot’ in the sexy way, and she accidentally stumbled on ‘hot
Karl’ without knowing what it was, and then things… well, alright,
it was both our fault, I guess. Yay teamwork.”

“
Wait a second, Cassidy said
I was hot? She’s gay! Well, I guess that doesn’t mean she can’t
have an opinion on a guy’s hot-ness…”

Jim sighed, and leaned against the
fridge, staring at the floor. “It’s pointless now, but… I may as
well come clean.”

“
This better not be leading
to a shit joke, Jim.”

Jim let out a tired sigh, and slid down
until he was sitting on the floor. “Dude, seriously. This isn’t
easy, I…”

“
Dude!” Karl interrupted to
stop Jim. He smirked sadly and shook his head. “Jim, I know. I’ve
known for a long time.”

“
Really?” Jim chuckled at
himself. “Am I that transparent?”

“
I guess so.”

“
And you’re
not…?”

Karl started walking into the hall.
“Not even slightly. Women. Yum.”

“
Hrm.” Jim sighed, “So…
what… are we cool?”

Unseen down the hall, Karl’s voice came
back. “Hey man, we’re bros!”

Jim leaned against the fridge, looking
at the ground again. He swallowed hard, whispered, “Jerk.” and
loved Karl all the more.

~~~

Cheryl was grinning like a child.
Marcus has led the first tour a couple days ago, but now it was her
turn, and the excitement was threatening to turn her outright
giddy.

The large civilian grade passenger
helicopter was settling onto the pad. “Cheryl, you’re bouncing.”
Cassidy said just loud enough to be heard over the
chopper.

“
Am not!” She said, bouncing
slightly. Only then did she realize that Cassidy was right, so she
stopped and turned to look at Cassidy. “Like I said, I am
not.”

“
Mmhm.”

The thirty member tour group was known
to be mostly children, between the ages of five and ten.
Apparently, that was Cheryl’s idea of a party.

The chopper powered down. Adults might
not mind being blown around by the chopper’s wake turbulence, but
the little ones might not do so well, especially in the strong wake
of such a big, dual-rotor chopper. As it was, Cassidy and Cheryl
had to stand further back than they normally would.

A little face pressed up against one of
the windows, and the little boy waved. That was too much for Cheryl
to contain. She hopped a few times, waving back. Moments later,
most of the windows were filled with little faces.

Cassidy had been standing there with
her spear, but she couldn’t just ignore all the little ones. She
cracked a bit of a smile and waved with her free hand.

The turbulence was almost gone; the
rotors were considerably slowed. Cassidy waved at the pilot and
gave a thumbs up. Soon, the door opened, and an adult member of the
group began herding out the kids, and a few other adults came out
as well. The head of the group was evidently the class teacher, and
lined the kids up for a headcount. Cassidy wondered what kind of
rich school sent a class on a field trip that involved a huge
chopper. Despite the turbulence being all but gone, everyone got a
light dusting of sand anyway. It seemed to be an inescapable part
of arrival.

“
Now you all listen to what
your guides tell you, alright?” The teacher turned to Cheryl and
Cassidy, and gestured that it was their turn.

Cheryl popped into action. “Hey kids!”
She waved again, getting a battery of little return waves. “Was the
helicopter ride fun?”

“
Yeah!” was the general gist
of the shouts that came back.

“
Were you being good for
your teacher?” Cheryl asked.

“
Yeaaah.”

“
I was!”

“
Frankie picked his nose and
w-“

“
Did not!”

“
Okay, Okay, is it safe to
say you were good enough?”

“
Yup!”

“
Yeah.”

“
Mostly.”

“
-wiped it on the
seat.”

“
Well, you mostly good kids,
first let me welcome you to the Yute desert! My name is Cheryl, and
my friend with the spear here is Cassidy.”

“
Hey.” Cassidy said with an
obligatory but minimalistic wave.

“
Alright gang, lets head for
our first stop, and we’re going to end up at the big temple you can
see over there. If there’s any questions, feel free to ask!” Cheryl
headed down the path, and Cassidy waved everyone along. “After
you... after you…”

One little boy with dark sunken eyes,
like you see in little boys sometimes, walked up to Cassidy and
looked her up and down. “You kill people with that
stick?”

“
Wha?” Cassidy looked up at
the spear head. “Heh, no. It would be possible though, it’s plenty
sharp.”

“
Can I see?”

“
Cody…!” One of the adults
stepped in. “I’m sorry about him, miss. Curiosity and all
that.”

“
Nah, nah,” Cassidy said,
“curiosity’s a good thing.” She looked back towards Cody. “But I
probably shouldn’t let you play with it. Like I said, it is
sharp.”

“
What if I just-“

“
Codyyy….”

“
Oh, ok, fine.” Cody and the
adult tagged onto the tail of the group, and Cassidy took up the
rear guard. Maybe Cheryl had it right, this could be fun after all.
Up ahead, she could hear Cheryl laughing and talking with a couple
kids.

As they walked, Cassidy got almost as
many comments and questions as Cheryl.

“
I saw an aeki! Are you sure
they don’t bite?”

“
I’ve held them in my hand
many times, I’ve never been bitten.”

“
Hm. An iguana bit me
once.”

“
Well, aeki aren’t
iguanas.”

“
I think an iguana could
beat up an aeki.”

“
Maybe, but the aeki could
run up a wall and get away.”

“
Really?”

“
Yup.”

“
Can iguanas run up
walls?”

“
I think they’re a bit heavy
for that. I dunno for sure, kid.”

“
I’ll look it up
later.”

“
Good idea.”

“
Then I’ll email you so you
know too.”

“
Good.”

“
And if they can, then you
can warn the aeki.”

“
Right.”

“
These rocks used to be a
building?”

“
Yep, a long, long time
ago.”

“
Like before I was
born?!”

“
Like before I was born!
Hundreds, and hundreds, and hundreds of years ago!”

“
Oh my god, how old ARE
you?!”

Yup, this was officially fun. Cassidy
hoped all the tour groups to come would be as
entertaining.

The Aeki bulletin sign was interesting
to them, and there was an actual aeki sighting as well, but the
ruins themselves weren’t too interesting to the kids on the whole.
Then they came to the stump.

“
What do you think he eats?”
Cheryl asked the group after reading the standard notes.

The kids mumbled among themselves, and
one piped up. “It used to be a tree. It eats dirt and sunlight.”
Smart alec.

Another child who was more
in the spirit Cheryl intended stood as close as she could without
stepping onto the rock border. She peered at the two metre wide
beast’s head. “I think…I could be wrong.. but I think I could fit
in its mouth. Does it eat kids?”

Cheryl widened her eyes, and looked at
the stump. “Eek! I don’t know! I hope not! Well, we’re just lucky
this one is just a carving, huh?”

“
Yeah.”

Cody spoke up. “What kind of animal is
it supposed to be? It looks like a big dog, but it’s got those
funny horns.”

“
Maybe it’s a dog with a
funny hat.” A younger child suggested.

“
It’s a myth of some kind,
like the Greek stuff!”

“
Yeah okay, I know that, but
what’s it’s name? All those Greek things have names.”

“
Nobody knows,” Cheryl
answered, “but the man that carved this stump just called it the
Yute Beast.”

That seemed to satisfy the kids, but
before she continued the trek, Cheryl added one more thing. “Those
of you with cameras might want to make sure you get a couple good
shots of the stump. Later on when you’re not allowed to use your
cameras, you might wish you had!”

After that, they continued on, stopping
at ruins here and there which were somewhat interesting to the
adults, but mostly boring to the kids. They all could plainly see
that the main attraction was getting close.

They reached the first staircase, and
the teacher had to call out to a few who wanted ever-so-badly to
run up them. Once on the landing, everyone could see the gap in the
floor which led down to the bare ground and sand below.

“
And that’s an example of
why you don’t go running everywhere. Look where you leap, et
cetera.” The teacher preached.

One of the would-be-runners chirped up.
“I woulda seen it in time.” Probably true. The landing was large
enough that unless the kid was totally out of control, things would
have been fine. Still, a dark corner of Cassidy’s sense of humour
wondered what it would have looked like to see the kid dash up the
steps, then drop out of view with a yelp.

A quiet snicker from Cody suggested he
had a similar thought.

Cheryl made a few points about the
guards at the side door they went though, and the group ambled
through.

The slowpokes of the group were two
boys; Cody, and some younger boy who made a cunning observation
about the stairs. “Wow, those are a lot of steps. These are old.”
Cassidy couldn’t shake the feeling that they were straggling at the
back to hang around her.

As Cassidy and her two junior escorts
made it to the door, Cody stopped. He looked at the guards, one of
which was Wanda, and looked at Cassidy.

“
Hey.” He said to Cassidy,
“You guys all have the same spear things. What’s up with those?” If
he had been listening, the spears had been explained by Cheryl long
ago, but kids are (as they tend to be) kids.

Cassidy was about to answer, when Wanda
chimed in.

“
These are replicas of the
spear used by my ancestor, thousands of years ago, to defeat the
Yute beast. If the beast awakens again, the sight of this spear
will frighten the beast long enough for me to lead the others in
the ceremonial dance that will seal the beast’s powers once again.”
Wanda wielded her voice well, resounding with respect and
depth.

Cody wasn’t fooled for a second, but
the younger boy was wide-eyed. “Woah…really?”

Wanda smiled playfully.
“Nope.”

“
Let’s go,” Cassidy said,
“the group is getting away from us.”

Chatter was all but silenced as the
group came into the main hall. The statue gazed forward as always.
It was only now that Cassidy considered how this giant must look to
a child.

Some child in the group whispered. “I
bet this one eats elephants!”

“
Yeah.. in one bite.”
another added.

Cheryl gave them some time simply to
look, and absorb the immensity of it. “Anyone want a closer
look?”

She was met only with mumblings of
uncertainty. She thought up a way to put the kids at ease. “No one
really knows what this guy’s all about, or what his name is, but I
call him … Rupert. Hi, Rupert!” She waved to the statue. “Everyone
else, say hi!” She waved again as a cue.

It was only a few at first, but just to
play along, even the older hold-outs like Cody at least gave a
“Hey, Rupert.”

“
Who wants to feel his fur?”
Cheryl chirped, “It’s stone, so it’s not like a real dog, but you
can at least check out all the work it took to make all his
shaggies!” Cheryl ran to the statue’s front paw, and took a grab.
The kids followed in suit at varying speeds.