Day II
The boy.
Around mid morning, the keaton's situation worsened; a sand stormed started to blow. The winds were sharp and hostile, and the sand blew across his already aching body, and seemingly endless pain flew through his muscles. The wind was warm, and made the sand hot. So hot that it started to burn the little keaton's paws. And as the wind flew over the endless dunes of sand, it made an eerie howling noise. Yet again morning turned to day, and day turned to afternoon, and still the young keaton went on. At a time the ground almost seemed unstable beneath his feet, because of the shifting sands. He stopped, and tiredly looked down at his two from paws. Blood ran from them. The sand had ripped away at the padding of his feet, and behind him were red footprints, that were slowly being buried by the storm. The keaton moaned a little, and slowly looked back to his own feet, matching in red color, but his eyes started to focus past them. '...Moving?' He thought of the ground. His thin eyes grew a little wider; the ground was moving. The keaton stumbled and fell as two levers rose from the ground behind him! One charged at him, and the other followed, both unaffected by and used to the hostile environment. Kaysho quickly stumbled to his feet, but not fast enough to avoid the first predator. It rammed itself into him, gashing the keaton's left hind leg. The keaton yipped in pain and jumped away clumsily, looking pleadingly at his bloody hip. The leever sunk back into the sand, pleased with the damage it had caused, but the second had not yet had its fill. The keaton knew better than to wait, and started to run away, as fast as he could. But it was not fast enough, because the sand slowed him, and so did his wounds. The second leever started to gain on him, growing angrier by the second because of the sand that the keaton was kicking into its face.
"Hissssssa!" It hissed, spinning crazily at the keaton. It finally caught up with him, right beside the frightened animal, and grazed its' side with the spikes upon it's 'head.' A leever was some sort of overgrown sand worm; it didn't truly have a head.
The keaton whimpered again, looking back to the cut on it's back while it was running. It wasn't too big, but it was deep. Not a good sign. His leg felt horrible, how he even found the energy to keep from falling over, the keaton did not know. The leever, banged up against him again, pushing all it's weight into him. The keaton cried out in pain yet again, and was flung to the ground and started to tumble down through the sand. At the top of that particular dune, the monster seemed proud of itself and sunk into the sand, burrowing far away to join its brother. The keaton landed at the bottom of the hill with a thud, and lay there. He slowly looked down at al four of his own feet; they were just lying there, lifelessly. 'Get up...get up!' The keaton told his legs, but they did not do so. In fact, the only thing they could and were doing was bleed. 'Get up...' He told himself, but at the same time his head started to fall and his eyes droop. 'please...just get......'
Later in the evening of that same day, in the same desert...was a boy. A young man, still a teenager, and yet considered an adult. The lad was quite tall for his age, which was sixteen. He was thought to be an attractive young man, with dark sun-tanned skin, and burning-orange hair that stuck up and out in any and every plausible direction, like a wildfire that cannot be subdued. The lad held the reins of his horse, whom he was leading through the desert before night fell. He was already late, but he figured that if he hurried the sands wouldn't be too unbearable. "Come on." He said, partly annoyed by his steed, and continued to guide the horse through the desert. He was starting to wonder why it was so quiet, when he saw the blood stained keaton, half buried in the sand.
"What the...?" He whispered to no one in particular, as he bent down to look at the little animal below him. The boy sat on his knees, and with disbelieving hands, started to brush some of the sand off of the keaton. It was wounded badly, especially on it's hind left leg. The creature had a broken leg and a bloodied heel, cut on it's back, and feet too sore and scorched to even walk on. The boy looked down at the keaton, looked at it's innocence and misfortune. The little animal would surely die, if he did not help it. But what was a keaton doing in the desert, of all place anyway? As far as the boy knew, he could be a spy from the Hylians, or perhaps even a leper. But the lad looked down at him again, and saw that he was shivering. "Should I..." He thought aloud, then had another thought. "Keaton's are supposed to have hidden powers..."
That hardened boy, with the expectations of a man, and a heart trained to be cold and final...showed mercy upon the poor keaton, and gently picked it up and held it in his arms. 'I wonder...how the heck did this thing make it this far?' He thought as he brushed the rest of the sand off the little keaton, and walked back to his horse. 'Or what was it even doing here in the first place?' The lad reached for his cape. 'Strange little creature,' the lad took his own cloak, died blood red, and wrapped it around the wounded creature. '...keaton.' The young man tied his horse's reins to his belt, and carried the shivering little animal home with him, holding the keaton gingerly in his arms. Home to the Spirit Temple.