Writing in the computer lab again… O, woe is me, without my poor laptop charger! I cannot nom and write at the same time… A travesty, I tell you! A travesty! At least I had a made-to-order BLT croissant earlier… With a banana and a bottle of water.. Mm, that was a good lunch…
Edit: Damn, really missing that kiosk now.
Teen Titans aren't mine, blah blah blah, I'm hungry…
BeastBoy didn't say anything when they walked into the village, and neither did Robin. It was cool, yeah, like something out of one of those Indiana Jones movies. The green-skinned boy was sure he could hear tribal drums and flutes playing in the background, swooping and dancing with the swaying of the river reeds that were visible a few hundred yards off.
Naturally, the village had been built next to water. The huts were advanced, not like mud houses or tepees, but made of mud-brick and enforced with the dark heartwood of the local trees. This was only noted because a new building was being made, one that looked to have two floors. BeastBoy's eyebrows rose a little when he noticed that some of the mud-houses did have two floors. He didn't know that could be done. There were even blocks on some of the doors; it looked like people weren't home. Locks'n'Blocks, he mused.
The men laid the cart to rest in front of a big, round hut in the center of the town. When the cart handles thudded on the dust, it clouded up in a thin red powder. The old man led the boys into the giant hut, but the two tall helper-men left, and before the door, weaved from thick fibers of a yucca-like plant, shut, he saw one of them grab the bowl off a woman's head, playfully. She laughed, and tried to get it back, but he picked her up, too, and then, it was dark. BeastBoy's head whipped around.
The old man lit what might have been a primitive candle, and led them into a big room, where the roof had been cut out and replaced with the thin film of a giant leaf. The room was bright, and glowed in the warm amber light. He talked to Robin again in the weird language. A woman came out, with a wooden tray that had hand-carved wooden cups on it. It was full of a steaming, purple liquid. Robin took one when it was offered, and said something in the weird language, then bent at the waist to her. BeastBoy followed suit, save talking in the weird language. He bit his tongue from a humorous joke about the language.
He figured he shouldn't tease. These people were letting outsiders into their world, if only for a bit, and they were helping them, even if it didn't seem like it. BeastBoy frowned internally. He doubted that all this prayer mumbo jumbo would really help, but… Robin seemed to tolerate it, and the boy guessed that the first step of getting somewhere you wanted to be was stepping in the footsteps of someone who was.
The priest took a cup, bowed to the woman, and drank the stuff. Hesitantly, so did the young superheroes. And so begun the ritual of luck.
"Shuh!" BeastBoy exorted, flopping onto the bed he'd forged from sleeping bags, pillows, and the straw-pat that had been provided by the Vestige. He felt sick to his stomach, and had been, ever since yesterday. The bad blood in his system had only felt antagonized by the cleansing, harmonious ritual that had been given. He felt even dirtier having taken the good will of an innocent people.
"That's exhausting…"
Robin laid across the room, on a similar straw-pat, with only his sleeping bag. "They are a rigorous kind of people," he said, obviously tired, "But, it's kind of them, and we can finally set out tomorrow."
"That's good."
There was an awkward silence. It grated against the boys' nerves like aluminum being ground between teeth.
"Do you think Miasma would mind if I left most of that junk here? I mean, you know, so it will be easier on us to travel," BeastBoy offered, thinking of the useless electronics he'd meant to leave on the T-Jet.
"Nah," Robin said, not scolding the teen for getting the elder's name wrong, "I actually was going to mention that. They went through our things and compacted our gear… All the "bikna shi"- useless things - Were put in a storage house on the side of town. So… Not too big a deal."
BeastBoy snuggled into his blanket, and moonlight filtered through the leaf-wax that served as a window. "Aight," he said, yawning, "Sounds good to me."
Robin was silent, and turned over in the sleeping pad. There was another awkward silence. Robin broke the tension by wishing the younger man a good rest, and the silence wasn't so unbearable then. BeastBoy returned the good will, and then waited silently, until he heard the soft, even breathing of his team's leader as he slept. The changeling felt like puking, because he felt black and grey all over.
Silently, he morphed into a small bird, and struggled out from under the covers. He'd waited long enough to get rid of his impurity. It gave him a headache to think about it, and so he needed to purge this illness from his system, desperately. He flew soundlessly across the room, and switched to a fly, so he could get through the dried-grass that covered the doorway silently. He exited the house, and flew upwards, a great condor, into the sky, then towards the river.
He changed back into a human, his feet thudding quietly on the soft ground as he landed. He found a sharp rock in the river, and fled into the bushes to do his work. He didn't want to taint the water.
Hm.. This just didn't seem like enough. Still kind of hungry, but…
Edit: This looks a whole lot better if you've been drinking. I hope it's improved, honestly, though.