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The sun dipped low in the cloudless sky, casting long shadows across the sand. The temperature was quickly dropping and it was sure to be frigid soon, but in the late afternoon, it was nearly perfect.
A gentle, chilly breeze brushed across the desert, coaxing animals out from their hiding places, causing the normally vacant landscape to briefly surge to life. Lizards scurried across dunes, foxes snuck silently out of their dens, hares dashed from the safety of rock to rock, and a single bulette was chasing its dinner.
Shit. Shit, shit, shit shit! Kore thought desperately from where he was sitting on the back of the sand sailor. He gripped the chain of his meteor glaive firmly in his hands, with the head of the weapon being whipped around by the fierce wind, making it impossible to get a good shot on the beast hunting them.
Kore began reeling back in his weapon, turning around halfway to yell at the small genie at the front of the boat, squinting as sand whipped in his eyes.
“Can’t you make this thing go any faster?!”
“Jesika’s trying her best!” Rooster yelled back. He held onto the sand sailors main—and only— mast with both hands.
Kore grunted in frustration, turning his head to face the large lump of sand that was following quickly behind the speeding sand sailor. Only briefly did the true monster underneath pop its head out to snap wildly at them.
Suddenly, the bulette surged forward, opening its mouth wide, catching Kore’s meteor glaive in its jaws, before falling back into the sand. Despite Kore’s best efforts, the chain was ripped from his grasp, and the weapon disappeared.
“Fuck!” Kore yelled, barely stopping himself from diving after the weapon— the one that nearly literally cost him an arm and a leg.
Rooster glanced over his shoulder briefly, looking at the demon who was half leaned over the back of the sand sailor. “You can do magic, right? Don’t you have like— spells or-or something?!” He yelled. “Magic! Do something magic!”
“I don’t have one that can help right now!” Kore replied, mentally going through his spell book as he glanced back at the bulette. Sticking out of the lump in the sand that was the creature was a chain, too far for Kore to grasp it, but still there nonetheless. His glaive must’ve gotten stuck in its mouth, Kore guessed.
“It’s got my weapon!” Kore yelled.
“What?!”
“It’s got my glaive! We are going to have to—” Kore’s sentence was cut off by sudden, frantic screaming that reminded him an awful lot like the squawking of a chicken.
“Shit! Cliff cliff cliff cliff cliff cliff!”
“WHAT?!”
Rooster shifted his weight, hands still holding Jesika’s mast, turning Jesika just in time so that they didn’t hurdle off the edge of the cliff they were approaching, instead just traveling alongside the sudden drop.
Kore was knocked off balance, falling to the floor with a loud grunt. The maneuver seemed to have greatly reduced their speed, as Kore could feel the rumbling underneath them worsen as the bulette got closer.
As the demon hurriedly got to his feet, Rooster called to him.
“Kore, shake the bag! Shake the bagshakethebag!!” Without taking his hands off Jesika’s mass, he frantically nodded towards the breeze stones that laid on the floor.
Without hesitation, Kore picked up the small bag and balled his fist large around it, shaking it violently before opening it up right into Jessika’s sail. They shot forward just in time, as the bulette made a dive for the end of Jesika.
Rooster made another turn, this one gentler, back into the bulette’s territory.
“Kore!” He called out agian.
“What?!”
Rooster turned back to him, the wind whipping around his bright red mohawk. He met Kore's eyes through his yellow goggles, and seemed more serious than the demon had ever seen him before—though that wasn’t saying a lot. “Do you trust me?”
Kore paused, staring at him for a moment. They hadn’t been traveling very long together, but so far Rooster had done what he had promised to do; he allowed Kore to travel quicker so he could get to Kikoma.
“Yes.” Kore answered, albeit hesitant, and a bit confused.
A wide grin split Rooster's face in half, and he turned forward without another word. After a while of continuing in the same direction, Rooster turned sharply again.
“Rooster?” Kore asked. “Rooster— what are you—”
“You just gotta trust me!” He yelled, still wearing a smile as he pulled on a rope that lowered Jesika’s sail just as they approached the edge of the cliff again. This time, he didn’t seem to have any intentions of slowing.
Kore opened his mouth to say something, but found himself breathless as they hurled full speed off the edge. Still though, the bulette gave chase, bursting out of the sand and it lunging after its meal.
“aaaAAAAAA-“ Kore screamed, unable to hear, or even think about the beast as they soared through the air. “WHAT THE HELL?!”
“DON’T WORRY I'VE DONE SOMETHING LIKE THIS BEFORE!!”
Kore felt a shift go through the sand sailor, and realized with a sinking feeling that Rooster had suddenly brought Jesika into a nose dive. He braced himself for what he knew was about to come.
“This is probably about to hurt!” Rooster shouted, just before Kore felt pain shoot up from his ankles as they hit the ground, and he stumbled, falling with an oof!
Kore’s head popped up just in time to see the bulette hit the ground, kicking up a large dust cloud. He blinked, half out of surprise and half to try and get the sand out of his eyes.
He sat himself up—fighting against the wind to do so—and realized they were on slanted ground, racing downhill, going nearly twice the speed they had been before.
“Rooster?!” Kore hollered, turning to see the genie somehow still standing.
Rooster didn’t answer. His hands still on Jesika’s mass, he was leaning back slightly, and the tip of tongue stuck out of the side of his mouth, his face twisted in something akin to a look of concentration.
Kore grunted in slight annoyance, but didn’t want to distract his guide so instead he just looked back at the sand cloud the bulette kicked up, which was quickly retreating from view as they continued to speed downwards.
Rooster suddenly yanked on the rope again, and Jesika’s sail flew back up into place. He braced his feet flat against her deck and leaned himself farther backwards, greatly slowing them.
They continued for a few hundred yards before Rooster pushed against Jesika's mast, abruptly turning her to the side, and bringing them to an eventual stop.
Kore stayed where he was, panting, adrenaline still rushing through his veins.
Rooster, on the other hand, immediately jumped out. He circled Jesika, bending down, even picking her up at times to look underneath her.
“You did just fine, baby.” He said to her, taking another once over, making sure there were no cracks in her wood or scratches he didn’t already recognize. He patted her side, grinning widely.
Kore shot the genie an odd look, but got up with a grunt.
“That was…” He started, dusting himself off.
“AWESOME! Right?” Rooster spun to face him, eyes shining.
Kore hesitated, snout pinched up slightly. “..Maybe. But dangerous, too.”
Rooster waved his hand through the air. “Agh, but we’re fine!” He turned around towards Jesika again, giving her another reassuring pat. “Actually, I’m surprised that I pulled that off.”
“I thought you said you’ve done that before?”
“Eh…” Rooster shrugged. “Nothing like that.. But I’ve had my fair share of flying off cliffs!”
“You could’ve gotten us killed.” Kore said, annoyance in his tone as he stepped out of the sand sailor.
Seeing the look on the demon's face, Rooster faltered a bit, and his hands fell from where they were on his hips. He kicked the sand, a hangdog look on his face.
Kore ignored the genie, instead looking up, seeing the first stars beginning to appear in the quickly darkening sky. He could already feel the temperature dropping, and though he found the cold nice, he knew enough about surface people to know that most needed warmth to survive. Though, so far he found Rooster to be exceedingly odd. Perhaps he didn’t even need to stay warm. But still, Kore preferred to not travel in the dark.
“I need to find that bulette. It’s still got my glaive.” He said aloud, mostly to himself. He grumbled in annoyance. “Then we need to find a place to set up camp, find wood for a fire…”
“I could find your weapon for you?” Rooster quickly offered, hopeful.
“Mmm..” Kore hummed, looking at the genie skeptically.
“I can see in the dark real well!” He continued. “Plus, I can take Jesika, I can travel faster that way. Then that gives you time to find a place to set camp.”
Kore hesitated for a moment longer, but eventually relented, and Rooster gave him a big grin.
“It dived after us when we went off the cliff.” Kore explained, turning behind him. Looking at the ‘hill’ they had been on, he found it was actually a huge sand dune, one probably about the size of a small mountain. “It landed somewhere near the top.” He said, pointing to where he vaguely remembered seeing it land.
Rooster just nodded enthusiastically, hopping onto Jesika before saluting.
Kore grumbled, only slightly beginning to regret his decision. “I’ll set a fire when I find a good spot. Look for the smoke to find me.”
Rooster just nodded again before shaking the bag of breeze stones, opening it, and launching forward.
Kore let out a breath, watching as the sand sailor slowly started to climb back up the dune.
Kore trudged across the desert for a while, before finding a large boulder that was half buried in the sand. It wasn’t the best place, but it at least blocked wind coming from one direction, which was good enough for him.
It took him about an hour to set up his tent, and to find enough dead bushes and tumble weeds to get a small fire started. Then, while Rooster was still gone, he did his nightly prayer to Abrith, making sure to take his time as an apology for having to make so many brief prayers in the past few nights.
He was just putting up his lantern when he spotted Jesika heading towards him. A silhouette of something large sat her on her deck, which he immediately recognized as the body of the bulette that had been chasing them.
As Rooster grew nearer, Kore stood from where he was sitting next to the fire, looking inquisitively at the genie as he parked Jesika next to the boulder.
“I thought we could eat it.” Rooster said, motioning to the bulette as the demon approached.
“Oh,” Kore said, blinking dumbly. He hadn’t even thought about that. “I suppose.. I suppose we could.” He nodded approvingly, and Rooster smile widened.
Kore went up the beast's mouth, where a chain still hung out from. He quickly pried open its jaws and began digging out the glaive's axe head from the side of its cheek.
While the demon was preoccupied with getting back his weapon, Rooster went around to the bulette’s side, one of his sword drawn, running an hand across its tough hide.
Kore grunted as he finally retrieved his weapon back, smiling to himself triumphantly. In the same moment, the bulettes body shifted, causing the demon to jump in surprise.
“Got it!” Rooster called out.
“Huh?” Kore looked over the bullet's large body, finding the genie on the other side, his sword snuggly wedged between a gap in the bulettes exoskeleton.
“I found a weak spot.” He clarified, pushing his sword into the beast's body, all the way until the hilt. He then wiggled it around slightly.
Kore circled back around the bulette’s body, joining Rooster on the other side. He watched as the genie continued to push and move his sword around in its flesh.
“Boris said these guys are pure evil.” Rooster said, retracting his sword and beginning to pull at the bulettes exoskeleton. “All they really do is eat stuff. Sometimes they were used in sand races—like the one we met at!—as obstacles. Oh man, those ones were the best!” He pulled at the exoskeleton, and part of it peeled off with a sickening ripping noise.
Kore just hummed, eyes scanning across the bulettes body, looking for a weak spot of his own so that he could begin tearing at it as well. When he found one, that’s just what he did.
With the sound of Rooster talking as background noise, the two travelers ripped and tore at the bulettes tough exoskeleton until there was a large exposed part on its side. Kore cut off large chunks of meat from it, while Rooster fetched more fire wood.
They cooked the chunks of bulette using Roosters swords as skewers. Juice dripped down the weapons as the meat sizzled, but the genie didn’t seem to care about potential stains.
Surprisingly, quiet settled over the two travelers. It was the first silence Kore had gotten since he had first encountered his guide. It almost felt foreign.
“What you did was impressive.” Kore found himself breaking the silence, despite his better judgment. “With Jesika, I mean. You are skilled when it comes to sand sailing.”
Rooster turned his gaze from the fire to Kore, blinking. “Ah, that was all Jesika.” He said. “But y'know, me ‘n her been together a real long time!”
Kore nodded, continuing to spin the meat over the fire. “Boris said he built her for you.”
“Yup!”
“And you’ve known him for ten years?”
“About that, I guess?” He brought the meat away from the fire, blowing on it only once before chomping down, ripping it off the end of his sword and chewing it. “If that’s what he says!”
Kore scrunched up face as bits of food spewed from the genie's mouth. He finally brought down his own bit of meat, blowing on it.
“How long have you lived at Teeck?”
“Aaaah.. I dunno.” Rooster leaned back, thinking. “Two.. three.. months? Basically as long as I’ve known Boris!”
Kore looked at Rooster bemused, before chomping down on the chunk of meat and pulling it off of the end of the sword. It wasn’t bad, nowhere near Ameilas cooking, but better than what Kore could’ve gotten on his own.
“It was a good idea to cook the bulette.” Kore said, swallowing, before glancing back at the large beast still lying atop of Jesika. “Though, I do not know how we’re going to carry it…”
“Mmm..” Rooster hummed. “We could just leave it here?” He looked back to Kore. “Maybe someone else will find it and appreciate it!”
Kore looked at Rooster uncertainly. “I doubt that.” He said, before looking back at his tent. “I could use some strips of cloth from my tent to wrap some chunks of it up, that way we can bring at least a bit with us.”
“Fine with me!”
Even after both eating their share, over half of the bulette’s body was left. Kore ripped some cloth off his tent—it did little to protect from the cold, or heat, anyway— while Rooster cut more meat from the bulette’s body. Kore wrapped up the pieces of meat, and Rooster let him tuck them away into his satchel.
When all was said and done, there was still about half the bulettes body left, and the moon was high in the sky. Without saying much more than goodnight, Kore retreated into his tent, which now only had a slight breeze blowing through it.
Rooster plopped himself onto Jesika's deck, next to the bulette that he had yet to remove. He stared at the stars for a while, watching the moon travel across the night sky, until boredom eventually overtook him, and he fell asleep to the smell of blood, and the sound of Kore snoring.