Fragile Skins

Chaper two: Fey

The next day When Kai went out he looked around for Sachiel. Something about the boy was interesting to him and he wanted to know exactly what.  He wasn't in the marketplace or the housing district so Kai tried the beach. Surprisingly Sachiel was in the same place Kai left him the other day.
"Hey!" he called and Sachiel turned his head. "Have you not moved since yesterday?"
"Oh, I guess I haven't." he spoke in the same somber voice he spoke in yesterday.
"Hey you ok man?"
"Ah yes I'm fine." Kai sat beside Sachiel on the sand.
"I haven't know you more than a day, but I can tell something's up man."
"Mind your own business, land dwel..." He cut himself off before he finished his sentence.
"Oh shit! I'm sorry, guess I over stepped my bonds. Forgot we're only strangers to each other." Sachiel sighed.
"It's ok. Guess I should be glad you care so much about me when you don't know me."
"let's get to know each other then!" Sachiel's somber mood cleared a bit as he actually laughed. "What's so funny?" Kai asked defensively.
"Nothing, It's just...nothing."
"Hey if we're going to get to know each other you should stop avoiding questions."
"oh yeah, I just think it's kind of cute how you're so interested in a stranger like me."
"Oh I'm cute am I?" Kai asked jokingly, "How could I not be interested you literally crashed into me at 100 miles per hour then sat on a beach a full day without moving." Sachiel chuckled.
"Ok it was not 100 miles per hour." Sachiel seemed to be in a better mood now and the two boys talked almost all day about their favorite cartoons and music, they had similar tastes.
"Oh gosh it's getting late." Kai says looking down at his watch, "Want me to take you home."  
"Oh um it's ok you can just leave me here."  He sounded nervous.
"Nope, I'm not going to let you sit on a beach all night again, there's snow in the forecast."
    "I just...I can't... you don't understand."
    "Understand what?"
    "I...I don't..." Sachiel stuttered over every word, "don't have a home."
    "Oh, that's ok you can come to my house." Kai took the handles of Sachiel's wheel chair and started pushing him up the beach.
    "You trust people too much." Sachiel said.
    "What? I'm just being nice." Kai said defensively.
"Yeah, alright."
Kai's house wasn't far from the beach so they got there fast.
"Mom," Kai spoke in a gentle voice to his mother, "I brought a friend."
"Yeah o-ok." Kai's mom said without turning from her knitting.
"Ok there's a spare bedroom right up the oh..." Kai said.
"Up the stairs?" Sachiel asked.
"Yeah but we don't have anything that would get you up there. I mean I could carry you."
"NO!" Sachiel bust out, "I'll just sleep down here. You've already been so kind I couldn't ask you to do that."
"It's really no big deal, I'm quite strong."
"No I'll sleep down here on my chair it's comfortable enough."
"Alright man if you insist. Although I guess you could use the couch."
"No really I'm fine." Sachiel spoke in a hash tone.
"Geez, ok. I'll just take the couch then."
"Oh no you can sleep in your be..."
"I'm done having this argument! Let's go to sleep." Kai effectively ended the argument.
    The couch wasn't comfortable and Kai had a pretty sleepless night, but he didn't want Sachiel to be alone downstairs, as usually everyone in the house sleeps on the second story, and felt that it was impolite for a houseguest to be left alone. The usual alarm went off in the house but at 9 o'clock instead of 10 o'clock, this could mean one of two things, either A: the trade goods came in early or B: Mom was about to go onto the streets and protest fey rights. Fey come in many different shapes and forms, typical examples include: centaurs, faun, elves, and merfolk. A few years ago a political movement started to give these fey human rights. Although many disagreed, especially southerners like Vermillion citizens, laws were currently being past to bring humans and fey closer together. Today was unfortunately today was the latter of the two things previously mentioned.
"The fey are not humans, are not equal to humanity, and do not deserve the privilege the government has given them!" Kai's mom could be heard inside the house from the streets. "While humans have industrialized and progressed as a species they have done nothing but sit in their caves twiddling their thumbs, if they even have them!" No one stopped to listen she was preaching to a choir, at least she appeared for most of her speech. Toward the end of the rant another figure approached mom.
"Lady! The fey have done so much more than ignorant idiots like you know." It was a young lady with deer antlers and legs. She was a faun, a half deer half human creature.
"Ah ha! A disgusting sub-human stands before me now!" mom said pointing at the faun, "Why would you think you know more than me, a human of superior intellect!"
"Um, excuse you but humans and fey have been proven to have almost identical brains and knowledge capacity!"
"Yeah almost, but even then it's not more than a theory!"
    "You dipshit, it's a scientific fact!"
"Ugh! You little shit!" mom yelled grabbing the faun by an antler and throwing her to the ground.
"Mom!" Kai ran outside after watching most of the ordeal from the window, "Stop it!" he grabbed his mother around the arms and pulled her frail body back inside. Sachiel rolled his chair back to the farthest wall from where Kai and his mom entered the house. He looked rather terrified. "Mom, you know you can't just attack somebody on the streets even if they have a disagreement with you."
"That stupid bitch was asking for it. Thinking it knows more about fey then me."
"Whatever mom." He looked her straight in the eyes, "You need to stop these rants. They accomplish nothing."
"No, I'll tell you what they accomplish. It spreads my message, the message of the gods far and wide."
"Mom you're standing on a street corner."
"Whatever Kai just... fuck off!" she runs up the stairs and out of sight. " Sorry about that." Kai turns to Sachiel.
"Oh... it's ok I guess." Sachiel stutters, "Wow, has she always been so passionate about the topic?"  Kai sighed.
"No if fact she used to support fey rights."
"Woah really? What happened?" Sachiel asked in astonishment, "I'm sorry. Ugh I've always been way to curious."
"No it's fine. It all happen 8 or 9 years ago when my mom and da went to pick up a shipment of rare purple crabs. From what mom has told me, although she may not be a very reliable narrator, it was their second day at sea they were heading off route because they had detected a large storm coming their way. They passed a singing group of sirens and da was seduced into jumping into the ocean."
"oh man. I'm sorry."
"Yeah... I just don't understand why the sirens would do that, i mean aren't they usually peaceful."
"for the most part they are but, some tribes can tend be territorial."
"wow! How do you know all these things?"
"Just umm... research." There was something off about Kai, even while talking about his dead father he kept a calm and collected tone.
"Oh that's cool!" his calm demeanor switched to excitement. "I've always been interested about learning more about fey culture, but there haven't been many books written about it. What did you learn from?"
"I just umm, I can't tell you. Sorry."
"oh... that's ok man, there's nothing wrong with having secrets." Sachiel felt bad for disappointing Kai but as he said there's nothing wrong with keeping secrets. "so umm what now?"
"huh?"
"like I would take you home but i can't so umm you can just stay here if you like."
"oh no it's quite alright you can take me back to the beach."
"oh no no no! You can't live on that beach."
"heh." Sachiel laughed under his breath.
"Hey! What are you laughing at!"
"nothing it's just that i really can't understand why you seem to care about me, i mean we met two days ago."
"it's my personal motto."Kai said confidently, "Care about someone until they give you a reason to not. That's what my father used to tell me!"
"I like that motto."

A/N chapter two: fey aka the exposition dump