Luke stepped through the iris doorway, feeling the sand crunch under his boots. It was a familiar sound, one from when he was a young boy, and he stomped a couple times before proceeding across to where Sheeana was sitting, her strange sandworms around and on top of her.
"I thought I'd find you here," he said, smiling a little. Sheeana was something of an enigma to him and always had been.
The worms turned, hissed a pathetic, squeaking remnant of their mighty roar, attracted by the rythm of his feet. "Hush." She commanded them. "He's a friend." It was nothing personal. Sandworms of her time were far more territorial than they had ever been.
They crept to him, circling suspiciously around his legs.
He looked down, unsure of the sandworms but sure of the Force and his ability to get out of the way. "Hello there," he said, projecting toward them that he was, indeed, a friend; nonthreatening, calm. "You're all looking well."
Luke looked up at Sheeana, keeping himself from dancing from foot to foot in an effort not to step on one of the things. "You too. What are you doing hiding down here? Everyone else is relaxing."
They seemed alright with that and rolled (though really each side was the same, so one might wonder at the point of the motion), showing plates they wished scratched and stroked. One of the most powerful minds in any universe they may have contained but they were still animals most of the time.
She turned to face him. "Aye. I should be up there monitoring the social dynamics, as is my duty. But I am disquieted by the sense of easy triumph."
It was Shai-Hulud that pulled her steps this time, and the buzz of worry she knew was Sheeana. She had not much been celebratory and had wandered aimlessly for a time. Aimlessly until she realized where she was wandering, then it had simply become a direction with an end point.
Sheeana.
"My Sister," Arha murmured and her smile as always lit up her features like the sun coming out from behind the clouds. She step-slid across the sand, the habit ingrained, and sank down next to Sheeana. My desert, she thought as she buried her fingertips into the sand. Warm sand.
"How do they fare today?" The worms, Sheeana's own thoughts, all applied and were asked after in a sentence.
For a moment, Arha considered Sheeana's words and then carefully lowered herself to sit down among the little sandworms, brimming with joy at being among them. They were pieces of her desert and pieces of the future all at once and she loved them the way she loved all things.
"Then we shall have to soothe them into calm," Arha said, tipping her head up to glance at Sheeana as she let the sandworms inspect her as fully as they wished.
The Leto-worms decided that this was indeed the same person they'd met before after Sheeana bade them to greet her.
"Sister, my training tells me to be calm. But my Fremen nature tells me there is danger in every crack, every shadow. I understand that the social organism needs Bacchanalian excess after a successful task. But I don't like it, and judging from you being here, neither do you."
Oh, sand. Her favorite thing. Of course that was when Motoko noticed the sand-worms clustered around Sheeana and realized what her new 'favorite' was. Then there was the woman herself- one could swear she was frustrating on purpose, in fact, she probably was. Motoko didn't enjoy being reminded of how very far she'd come from what she still sometimes thought of herself as: human.
"Not unless they decide to try and take a chunk out of my shell," she returned. Motoko could be dry about this, with Sheeana making jokes and flirting her eyelashes as if it didn't matter.
Her footsteps on the sand were heavier than a normal humans because she was heavier than one. She could walk lighter, endeavor not to make any noise and in many cases she would succeed. But that took effort, and time, and it made her look like she was stalking someone with the intent to kill. To be fair, at times like that, she usually was.
"I think, of all beings, they could empathize with that." An enigmatic statement, but a true one if one knew the history of the beings crawling about on the sand now. The Major's footsteps were as loud as a thumper to them.
"I am a desert creature. My mothers-within counsel me about adaption, but I have my weaknesses." Now where had that come from? Yes, she had noticed that Motoko was a very attractive woman, in an outfreyn way. However...As easily the man who would become these worms noticed Hwi Noree's beauty; Because she was built that way.
Comments 42
"I thought I'd find you here," he said, smiling a little. Sheeana was something of an enigma to him and always had been.
Reply
They crept to him, circling suspiciously around his legs.
Reply
Luke looked up at Sheeana, keeping himself from dancing from foot to foot in an effort not to step on one of the things. "You too. What are you doing hiding down here? Everyone else is relaxing."
Reply
She turned to face him. "Aye. I should be up there monitoring the social dynamics, as is my duty. But I am disquieted by the sense of easy triumph."
Reply
Sheeana.
"My Sister," Arha murmured and her smile as always lit up her features like the sun coming out from behind the clouds. She step-slid across the sand, the habit ingrained, and sank down next to Sheeana. My desert, she thought as she buried her fingertips into the sand. Warm sand.
"How do they fare today?" The worms, Sheeana's own thoughts, all applied and were asked after in a sentence.
Reply
"They are disturbed and I do not know why." A multipart answer to a multipart question. The small worms came up to inspect her.
Reply
"Then we shall have to soothe them into calm," Arha said, tipping her head up to glance at Sheeana as she let the sandworms inspect her as fully as they wished.
Reply
"Sister, my training tells me to be calm. But my Fremen nature tells me there is danger in every crack, every shadow. I understand that the social organism needs Bacchanalian excess after a successful task. But I don't like it, and judging from you being here, neither do you."
Reply
So much for sightseeing.
Reply
Suddenly they turned to the intruder and hissed. Machine!
"Stop that. She means us no harm...Isn't that right?" It was a coquettish entreaty.
Reply
Her footsteps on the sand were heavier than a normal humans because she was heavier than one. She could walk lighter, endeavor not to make any noise and in many cases she would succeed. But that took effort, and time, and it made her look like she was stalking someone with the intent to kill. To be fair, at times like that, she usually was.
"This is where you've set up, then?"
Reply
"I am a desert creature. My mothers-within counsel me about adaption, but I have my weaknesses." Now where had that come from? Yes, she had noticed that Motoko was a very attractive woman, in an outfreyn way. However...As easily the man who would become these worms noticed Hwi Noree's beauty; Because she was built that way.
Reply
Leave a comment