Light, Glorious Light

The Yellow Sun

The center of Pride Home was surrounded by its own tall wall, a second bulwark between their inner village and attack. The similarities to Phalanx were in design if not in scale. Three women stood sentry in front of the gates armed with shotguns and axes. They stepped aside as the hunting party approached, sliding the gate open on a metal track. The gate slid closed behind them.

Against the wall clustered a collection of cages. Inside were collared men and women, slaves and merchandise of The Yellow Sun. Around the cages wrestled a dozen naked children. Three women watched over their rough games. All three chaperones were middle aged, and covered in scars. Their skin baked to leather by long harsh seasons in the waste.

Akiva knew a bit about The Reavers of The Yellow Sun, a side effect of scavenging where most feared to travel. Of the nine reaver clans The Yellow Sun was the third largest and the only one with any simulacrum of culture. Modesty was paramount when dealing with the outside world. Killing was reserved for their enemies, but they taught with pain. The naked children and the uncovered women were proof she was in their inner sanctum. Inside their inner sanctum was where The Yellow Sun were their most dangerous.

A girl ran up to the party, her body already making the transition into womanhood though her face was still pubescent. She wore a leather skirt secured by a cloth belt and a loose fitting shirt. There was cruelty in her eyes and arrogance to her stance. She glared at Latisha and her bandaged companion, but averted her eyes when she spoke.

"The sentries say my mother isn't with you. Is she dead?"

"Yes, we lost her to the squids," the woman in red responded. "Feel your grief quickly, child."

"I'm nearly a woman, Anya!" snapped the girl in a bratty outburst. "And I don't grieve for the old woman. She was miserable."

"That she was," remarked another reaver.

"Latisha, I want her place in your hunting party," the girl declared. "If... if you would have me."

"Can you handle a blade?"

"Yes, but the old woman trained us in the rifle."

"I have no use for another shooter, I need a cutter. You can be this, yes?"

"Yes, Latisha. Yes!"

Latisha gestured for the girl to leave and the child responded with gleeful exuberance. Akiva watched the girl leave with thoughts of her own teen years. The Mothers required everyone attend schools of science, maths, and histories, but Akiva lived alone and needed to work in order to support herself. Both she and the girl lost their mothers, yet she didn't feel any kinship for the brutal child.

A screaming child ran towards them, completely nude for all to see. His flopping little penis was more disturbing than the ridiculous noise he was making. He ran around the women, punching each in the rear as he passed them. He locked his eyes on Maira and she jumped back frantically, maneuvering to avoid the child. He giggled, and May shouted to shoo him away.

"They touched us," she cried. It took a moment for Akiva to understand what she meant, but when she did Akiva became just as frantic.

"We have infected blood on us!" Akiva shouted from May's back.

The bandaged woman snatched the boy back with lightning fast reflexes. She threw him into the dirt and glared. He shrieked, and ran away as fast as his little legs would take him. The other women all took a reflexive step back.

"It is good you warned us. We would have had to kill the boy, yes?" Latisha shook her head, and again gestured for the group to follow.

Just outside the central building was a row of pikes. Five corpses were suspended on display for all to see. Three were little more than bones lashed together by dry sinew and skin, another had once been a Red Rock Reaver. The sight of the last corpse made Akiva cling more tightly to Maira. The Valkyrie stopped in front of the body. The sight of one of her sisters impaled and left for the elements made her vibrate with rage. There were no identifying features left on the corpse's face, but her tattered combat suit and Armpad were enough to identify her as a daughter of Phalanx.

The red reaver nudged Maira forward, and she whirled around. The shock of finding a fellow valkyrie put on display was too much for her. Pain lanced up through Akiva's feet and legs as May dropped her to assume a fighter's form. The reaver widened her stance and drew a pair of punching daggers with equal speed. Someone vocalized The Yellow Sun battle cry and people from both outer village and inner village rushed to watch the spectacle. Latisha gestured toward Akiva and her bandage wrapped companion pulled the scavenger out of harm's way.

"I'm going to cut that sun speckled face of yours," promised the red woman called Anya.

"Come then, waster."

Anya flinched at the insult.

All around Akiva, women placed bets and hurled their own insults at the combatants. Latisha laughed at the spectacle, but was careful to keep onlookers away from the smallish scavenger. Akiva wasn't sure whether she was being protected or quarantined. Both were likely. She watched Maira and Anya circle each other, but kept the reaver huntress in her line of sight. Latisha had been quite cordial since their meeting at the bridge, very uncharacteristic for the woman that threatened her life the last time they'd met.

"You know the steps, girl, but can you dance?" Anya rushed forward, punching for Maira's face and side. May grabbed her wrists and pulled the reaver in close for a brutal headbutt.

"I don't need to dance to beat a man child like you," May said as she circled away from the stumbling reaver.

The crowd roared in excitement and bets were adjusted. Akiva watched May fight with her heart in her throat. She was unarmed, unarmored, and yet to recover from the crash a day earlier. Maira used her reach and strength to her advantage, but Anya's less disciplined attacks were fast and unpredictable. The two fell into a quick rhythm of attack and retreat, and it wasn't long before blood stained the dirt. Maira bled from two gashes in her forearm, dark splotches covered Anya's niqab. The crowd was whipping into a frenzy, Akiva's gut twisted in knots.

Beside her Latisha whispered to her bandaged shadow and a pale woman with short cut hair and clan tattoos across her bare chest. Anya feigned an attack and, when May drove an elbow into her shoulder, slashed a cruel line down the valkyrie's ribs. Maira clutched her wounded side to staunch the flow of blood and the reaver vocalized in triumph. The crowd joined her oral celebration.

Akiva maneuvered through the crowd before she'd made a conscious decision to move. Latisha shouted after her, but it was too late. She broke through the group of onlookers and caught Anya by surprise. Mother Gwyneth had never been impressed with Akiva's skill within the fighting circle so she'd focused on teaching the scavenger how to quickly incapacitate an unsuspecting opponent. Akiva's hands reached for the right points, her feet following the dance to the best of her ability.

Anya dropped like a rock and the crowd went silent. Angry women drew cruel weapons, maddened more by the interruption of their gambling than the assault on their own. One woman spit on Akiva and howled about a wager being rigged. Another insulted Akiva's lineage before punching the woman beside her and running away with a handful of unearned winnings. An older reaver, covered in tattoos and scars, took a handful of Maira's red hair and put a blade to her throat.

"Stop!" Akiva shouted. "She is mine!"

The old reaver and many in the crowd laughed at her declaration. Latisha made her way into the circle flanked by her constant companion of the bandages, and the woman of the short hair and tattooed bosom. Akiva took note of how quickly the other reavers stepped out of her way. Latisha raised her wide brimmed hat enough to reveal her smirking mouth. She ran her finger across her throat in the universal gesture for death.

"No! I said she is mine!" Akiva dropped her pants revealing the tattoo on her inner thigh. Flames beneath a risen sun, Reaver of The Yellow Sun Wildcat, mark of a Yellow Sun agent. The smirk on Latisha's face fell away, replaced by a dangerous sneer.

The old reaver dropped her blade away from Maira's throat and raised her hands. She backed away as did many of the other women. The situation was no longer a spectacle of a prisoner being chastised. A reaver made a claim on a prisoner, and another had damaged her property. Wars had been fought for less within the nine reaver clans. Things had taken on a new tone, and Akiva knew it.