Cloud Shifters

“As you may know, it is the policy for all Commons Schools in the Calvarian System to offer several Games specific to Path choice in your third and fourth years. They are highly competitive and offer huge advantages such as scholarships to the winners. As you must declare your Path at the end of your first year, it is advantageous to start some initial training in your first two years. That is why we encourage you to build teams of four with other students that you are comfortable with who share your interests.” Instructor Kade said to the gathering of all first years.

“Don’t worry, nothing is permanent, especially this early in your schooling. Path choices can be changed throughout high school if you meet the minimum requirements to graduate. Team members will come and go, but the earlier you understand your own abilities and desires, the sooner you can focus and train them.

“Today we get to run through three mini challenges, one from each Path.”

“Sweet!” Cadin wasn’t sure who said it, but the sentiment seemed unanimous. Everyone started whispering and squirming in their seats, ready to get started.

Instructor Kade smiled and held up an old bag. “Today is about getting you familiar with the types of challenges you may find for each Path. I don’t want to waste time with everyone picking their own groups.” A few girls close by started a fake whimper. Cadin hated when girls acted like that. Apparently so did Sun as she gave them a look somewhere between sad and disgusted. Cadin started to laugh, but Lep nudged him hard in the ribs.

Instructor Kade waived the bulky bag in the air. “Your first challenge and team assignments are here. There will be nine teams of five. Reach into the bag to pull out one piece to your engineering project inspired by the Trade Path.”

Cadin reached in, feeling for a piece to grasp. Gur used his arm as a bridge, ran into the bag and back out just as quickly, grasping a blue rod with four wheels attached to it. “Oh, sorry about that. Bad dragon.”

“Team blue it is,” Instructor Kade said as he handed the bag to Lep. Lep pulled out a flat orange piece and waived to Cadin as they made their way over to their teams.

Cadin’s team consisted of two hyper boys from Instructor Nightan’s group, one of the whimpering girls from Instructor Zephran’s group, and Hydra from the Dire Dragons. He knew Hydra well since they apprenticed at Lynn’s Dragon Ranch together a few years back. She was quiet and smart.

“Let’s get this over with,” the whimpering girl said with a huff. “I hate putting stuff together. The Trade Path is so pedestrian.”

“We love it,” both boys said together, already taking everyone else’s pieces and fitting them together.

“Your first challenge is a timed engineering and robotics challenge!” Instructor Nightan called out to the groups. “Each team has the same five starting pieces. You have thirty minutes to build a robot that will make it from Point A to Point B the fastest.” Cadin glanced at the Points and noticed a few distinct obstacles. “You must use all five of your colored pieces in your design, and each team has a box of optional parts. You may use as many or as few as you need to give your robot the greatest advantages. Good luck. Time starts now!”

Cadin watched as their pathetic robot crawled across the finish line.

“Uh, sixth place!” Whiner girl cried next to him.

“It could be worse,” Cadin said pointing to the green team’s monstrosity. “I don’t think their’s will even cross the finish line.” Green was hardly visible under all the extra parts they had attached to their dragging robot. “Well, on to the next challenge.”

Even though his team did not work well together, personally he found something truly enjoyable in each Path Challenge. He was shocked by how many students dismissed an entire Path when the challenges ended.

Lep stumbled over to him after the grappling challenge for Warrior Path. “Now that was fun! After that stupid lake ecology challenge, I needed something to perk me up.” Lep sat down with a huff. Sun and Xeno sprawled out next to them. Gur made his way over to Sun to get rubbed behind the wings.

“How’d it go for you guys?” Cadin asked.

“We were on the green team,” Xeno replied sadly, as if that were a complete answer. Sun nodded.

Lep turned towards them with a grin. “Wait, the team with the merchant robot?”

“Merchant robot?”

“Yeah, the one that looked like it had a pack on its back the size of Mist Mountain.” Lep gestured with his arms over his head. Both Sun and Cadin punched him at the same time.

“Ouch!”

“We worked really hard on Orvo!”

“You named it?” Lep looked shocked and ready to break down laughing at any moment. However, he was still rubbing his arm and kept himself in check.

“Well, Orvo may not have been a success, but what about the other challenges?” Cadin’s team had not been in the same rotation to face the green team for second and third challenges.

“We did okay with the water eco quiz, Xeno helped a lot with that,” Sun answered. Xeno stayed sprawled on the ground but gave a little wave to Sun. She smiled and continued. “We could have won at Cloud Chess, but I lost my archers early and Vincent pinned my king with his queen and wrath. The grappling was a disaster. I’m pretty sure our team consisted of the four least confrontational Gladers in school plus myself. And angels from Lance are just a bit smaller in general.”

“We are a big breed!” Cadin said, standing up and flexing his wiry muscles.

Everyone busted out laughing.

When Sun recovered, she waived him down. “Well you are more compact and lithe than most others here. The Gladers we had to go against were brutes, honest.”

“Maybe you are just not cut out for the Warrior Path,” Lep chimed in and received another punch. “Okay, okay. I take it back!”

“I do love the idea of becoming a Warrior Angel. However, there are some amazing choices along the Academic Path as well. I don’t think the Trade Path holds anything for me. I’ve worked alongside my dad enough to know the challenges that the Trades hold, and I don’t think I’m cut out for them. I don’t know enough about the Guardian Path to know if I will like it or not yet. Today’s challenge didn’t really help much—I mean how is identifying Earth flowers supposed to help us know if we want to be Guardians?”

Cadin wasn’t sure if it was a rhetorical question, so he just shrugged. He felt lost. He had not narrowed down his Path Choice options at all. If anything, it increased his interest in each. Oh, well. It’s still early. He smiled and turned to Sun. “You could always make a living naming robots and such!” He was quicker than Lep and avoided the punch.

The bell rang in the distant school, signaling the end to the day. “I gotta go! See ya later,” Cadin called as he ran across the field to grab his belongings.

“What’s the hurry?” Lep called from behind.

Cadin turned briefly to answer, “My apprenticeship!”

“You are late,” Master Emilio said as Cadin ran through the door.

“I’m so sorry,” Cadin said between breaths. Gur was excited from the run and decided to continue running even after Cadin had stopped, pacing from one shoulder to another and occasionally crawling over Cadin’s head.

“I see that your dragon is feeling better and has become quite attached to you.”

Cadin put his hand over Gur to stop his pacing.

“Esperanza will be so pleased and mortified. She does not approve of domestication; but then again,” he said with a smile, “she does tend to be overly dramatic.”

Cadin felt relieved that Master Emilio didn’t share Miss Esperanza’s views and seemed to approve of Gur.

“She was once my apprentice,” Master Emilio continued. “She didn’t last long with me, partially because this was not her true calling, and she did not approve of my lifestyle, as I was the first angel in the Calvarian System to domesticate a sylph.”

“Wow—an air elemental cloud-creature, really?” Cadin looking around the room expecting to see it magically appear. “Where is he?”

“Actually, it was a she, and I had her for many years. She is no longer with me, but that is story for another day. Let’s get started on the lesson of the day.”

Cadin wanted to learn more about the sylph, but was excited to find out what the lesson entailed.

“Today, we will start working with your gins.”

“Yes!” Cadin exclaimed. “I wonder if my gins could have helped me in the challenges I just did at school. Will they only be helpful to me if I choose a certain Path?” Cadin fingered the badge on his school arm-guard. He had been in too much of a hurry to take it off. He held up his arm for Master Emilio to see. Gur raced down his arm and attacked the badge.

“I see,” Master Emilio said after inspecting it. “I think the gins will help you no matter your Path; and I checked with Headmaster Tripharian to see if they are a recognized tool or weapon that you can use in school.”

“Weapon?” Cadin asked, confused. “They don’t look like they can do much damage.” He pulled out the white pouch and dumped them onto the desk. Master Emilio flinched. Gur crawled down Cadin’s arm, circling around the gins that were still settling on the surface of the desk.

“Be careful with your dragon and the gins. Until you have full control of them, they could hurt him.”

Cadin quickly picked up Gur and placed him back on his shoulder, still wondering how little marbles could be dangerous weapons.

“Let’s start by reviewing what type of gins you have fused,” Master Emilio said as he separated them by using a strange looking stick.

“Why the stick?”

“Because they are your gins, and they may not react well to me.”

There were seven of them and the first four Master Emilio lined up to Cadin’s left. They were spherical, and he noticed for the first time that their colors seemed to move like liquid metal under the surface.

“They did not look like that when I took them out at home,” Cadin said as he watched the waves of color move around.

“That is because they are now primed—your energy is telling them that you intend to use them, and they have responded. You may still be able to tell them apart; they each have distinct properties—personalities if you will, and it is your job to learn about them. The more you know and understand of each of them, the more helpful and powerful your gins are to you. Pick them up, feel them, and let them communicate their strengths.”

Cadin smiled and looked back at the beautiful gins. The spherical one that was originally an opaque solid blue now swirled with many dark blues, purples, and greens. The gin sitting next to the dark one originally looked very like the first, only in a lighter shade of blue. Now that they were activated, Cadin could see, or rather feel that its ‘personality’ was quite different from the dark blue gin. This gin still had the light blue tones swirling around, but was accompanied by platinum and white—this gin felt happy and safe to Cadin.

The next one was bright yellow in color, and instead of swirls, it had green points shifting around its surface. It reminded Cadin of Sun, strong and true, the green points like her arrows. The last spherical gin was completely translucent with only the slightest ripple of iridescent color like a rainbow cast across a cirrus cloud.

There were two that were mostly flattened disks in shape; the first was black with white veins like lightning moving around the edges. Cadin picked this gin up and felt power that was not easily stopped. The second was white with black lightning, the opposite of the first. This one felt less stubborn than the black. The last gin that Cadin picked up was the thimble-shaped one which had an earthy tone and feel to it.

“What are your observations?”

Cadin explained what he had felt for each of them when he picked them up, and paused when it came to the last gin. “This little cup feels very grounded… and well, practical?” He looked up at Master Emilio expectantly and was a little surprised at his outburst of laughter.

“Yes, I guess that is one of the best ways to describe a tang-type gin though I have never heard it put quite that way. Now let me inform you about the types and history of gins.”

Cadin sat forward in his chair, alert and ready to learn.

“Gins are ancient angel tools that are incredibly practical, powerful and versatile. Yes, question?”

“If they are all of that, then why have I not heard about them before?”

“Yes, yes,” Master Emilio said nodding his head though Cadin did not know what he was nodding about. “You see that is the question about gins. Today they are quite obsolete for many reasons though few modern tools or weapons can match them.” Cadin looked at the small, benign looking marbles, and even though he thought that they were cool, he did not understand how they could be better than modern anything.

“One of the reasons that gins are so rare is that they are completely personal and must be fused by the individual that is going to use them. This takes a great deal of energy and advanced concentration and training—for most,” he said the last part with an inward grin and sidelong glance at Cadin. “Many things can and have gone wrong when a Gin-Master loses concentration while using them. It became easier for angels to use forged tools made by masters of the trade such as your father, rather than spend the energy both fusing and learning how to control gins. When the demand for gins lowered, harvesters moved to other—more lucrative cloud-stone mines.”

“I’m sorry, but I don’t understand how these can be more useful than a sword and shield in battle.”

“I think it is time for a demonstration,” he said as he opened a small container on his belt that Cadin hadn’t noticed before. Master Emilio waved his hands, and from the pouch, many small gins glided through the air and gracefully landed on the desk.

“Wow, how did you do that?” Cadin asked.

“Gins, like all things have their own energy. As angels, we have natural abilities to sense and understand these energies, but our abilities can be honed beyond what we are born with. Gins are objects that have a more responsive energy than most inanimate objects—more like living creatures. You should have felt this already if you’ve been doing your homework. Gins are a rare type of cloud-stone. Raw gins develop in the core of angel cloud-lands and naturally polarize. To activate, the raw halves must be fused together with angel energy. The angel who fuses the stones are permanently connected to them for life. The gins will only respond positively to that angel’s energy. Each fusion will produce unique gins though there are only three main types.

“The first type is the general-type gins which are the spherically shaped ones like these,” he said as he lifted his hand over six of his gins, which Cadin noticed were quite a bit smaller than his though there were more of them. A bright red gin lifted off the desk and followed his hand. “Once you truly connect with the energy of a gin, similar to cloud-shifting, you can have it do your bidding, and change its shape. Understand that all shape changing with gins is only temporary, and they should be released back into their natural shape as soon as you are finished with them. The general-type gins are the most malleable and can be shaped in almost any way.”

Putting his hands on either side of the red gin, Master Emilio closed his eyes for a split second and then pulled his hands further apart. The gin mysteriously grew and took on whatever shape that his hands molded it into. Cadin was amazed that such a small gin could spread to be so large, as Master Emilio pulled it into a long, pointed cylinder the size of his arm. His eyes then narrowed, and he made a gesture with his hands that shot the gin across the room. It hit the door, splitting it in two. Master Emilio then made a quick motion with his hand, and the gin returned to its normal shape and flew back into his hand.

“Awesome!” Cadin said.

“Indeed,” Master Emilio said with a smile.

“How did it get to be so much bigger?”

“Gins are novel items, and the cloud-stone that they are made of is not found in anything else. The best way I know how to describe it is that it is a very compact and strong material in its resting state. When it is activated and shaped, the fibers spread out and align in a supported, but less dense manner. There are limits to how big a gin can be shaped, and the larger the shape you ask of it, the less reinforced it is. Your gins are quite big in their resting state.

“The next type of gin is the slice-type, which are these flatter ones. Check yours out and tell me what you think of your two slice-gins.”

Cadin picked up one in each hand, the mostly black one in his right hand, and the mostly white one in his left hand.

“The energy from the black one is very intense—almost like it would never give up. And the white one is more calm, protective and…clever.”

“Interesting,” Master Emilio said as he picked up one of his own slice-gins. “These gins are very useful as sharp weapons and flat shields,” he said as he quickly expanded his gin into a large, translucent circular shield. Cadin noticed that he had part of the inside wrapped around his forearm, leaving his shielding hand free. Cadin saw that he grabbed another slice-type gin that was black and enlarged it about the size of his hands and was shocked when little points grew out at the edges.

“Slice-gins are also excellent for long distance weapons, and you can even turn them in mid-flight to hit objects around corners and obstacles.”

Master Emilio threw the spiked gin at the hole in the doorway. Cadin was surprised that instead of flying horizontally, it flew vertically and once through the hole, turned sharply to the right. Cadin heard a deep thud and hoped that it had not hit someone.

“You can look,” Master Emilio said.

Cadin jumped up from his chair and out the door. The gin had landed dead center on a target that was hanging on one of the atrium pillars.

“I hung that up this morning for our demonstration. Some people don’t appreciate me leaving marks on their grand pillars” He pulled the gin out and returned it to its resting state.

“Let’s finish talking about gins so that you can try yours.”

“Can I ask a question?” Cadin asked as he picked his way through the broken door.

“Of course.”

“What if you had hit someone by accident?”

“I have become accustomed to feeling for people’s vibrations and energies, and no longer need to reach inside of clouds to accomplish that. I felt you curious about my room that first day and tried to make it seem unappealing to repel you. I do it often because I have little tolerance for many of my co-workers and prefer to be left alone to do my work. You were not deterred and I was intrigued and shocked to see that you were not a fully realized adult. I could feel that there was no one in the near vicinity when I sent this gin.”

That answered some of Cadin’s questions.

“Now, for the last one,” Master Emilio said as he settled back in his chair. “As you can see, I don’t have the last type of gin.”

Cadin looked at his little brown cup-shaped gin.

“The tang-type gin is quite rare. The only angel that I personally knew that had one was my master. So, I can tell you a little bit about it, but, for the most part, you must feel this one out on your own. My master explained the tang-gins as the practical ones. It can expand and hold objects for you, including liquids, and it will be happy to hold its extended shape longer than the other gins. My master liked to use his tang-gin to carry her most valuable objects in it at her waist because it would not open for anyone but her; and as with all gins, it was nearly indestructible.”

Cadin looked at the little tang-gin with new found appreciation.

“Now it is time for you to try your gins out,” Master Emilio said. “Perhaps it is best to start with the general-gins. Go ahead and pick one up and feel it as it feels you.”

Cadin wasn’t quite sure what he meant by that, but he was excited to try. He looked at the four spherical gins in front of him and picked up the dark blue one with the greens and purples swirling around because it looked as excited as he felt. He felt it warm in his hands and could sense that it was ready and willing to take on a different shape if he asked it to.

“How do I ask?”

“With your hands and your thoughts. Though in the beginning it may be easier to say what you want out loud. Try to make it bigger.”

“How big is too big for a gin?” Cadin wondered.

“That depends on the gin, but you will feel that it is not as strong as it grows larger. Try it and see.”

Cadin concentrated on the gin between his fingers and felt a tingle run up his arms. Gur perked up. Cadin pulled his hands apart and whispered, “Bigger, please” to the gin. Instantly it grew—a little too big at first, and Cadin tried to physically restrain it.

“Gins work off your energy, not your muscles,” Master Emilio said. Cadin released his hold until he was just barely touching it with his fingers. He decided to try and pull his hands away as he said, “float.” Hanging in midair was Cadin’s blue gin, roughly the size of his head. From the side and without touching it, Cadin decided to see if he could command it from afar like he saw Master Emilio do. Concentrating on the gin, he motioned his hands bigger, and nothing happened.

“Focus,” Master Emilio said intensely.

Cadin focused on the tingle he felt when he first touched the gin and tried again. This time, he asked aloud as well.

“Bigger, please.” The gin instantly grew, and Cadin could feel the flow of the particles within the gin rearrange and reinforce differently as it expanded. It kept getting bigger and bigger until it filled most of the empty space, knocking things off the desk and shelves.

“Stop!” Cadin yelled when it started to push him back into the door.

He glanced at Master Emilio through the now partially translucent gin, the colors still swirling around. “Oh, how do I return it to norm…?” Just before he finished, the gin soared at him quickly and knocked him down. It was spinning quickly above one of his open hands and Gur was hissing at it.

“Ask it to retreat!” Master Emilio said quickly.

“Retreat, retreat!” Cadin said in a hurry. The gin quickly retreated to its normal form and landed in Cadin’s hand.

“Sorry about that,” Master Emilio said as he helped Cadin up. “I should have guessed how quickly your gins would respond to you. The word or thought ’return’ in general means you want the gin to return to you in the state that you have changed it to. This is handy if you use one as a shield and it gets knocked away, or you have thrown one. The word retreat means that you are finished with it and you are allowing it to retreat back to its original form.

“That was amazing,” Cadin said with bright eyes. “I actually used a gin!”

“Yes. I think that you have an innate ability to connect with cloud-nature,” Master Emilio said seriously. “You have a mother with a blue Aura, correct?” Cadin nodded. “And you have a father who was born in a blue land, but developed a green Aura?” Again, Cadin nodded though he was not quite sure where Master Emilio was going with all this Aura talk. “Hmm, and you were raised on Glade, I wonder what color your Aura is,” he said this time more to himself than to Cadin.

“What does Aura color have to do with gins?” Cadin asked.

“Each person has an innate set of skills pertaining to many different angel aspects, which are reflected in one’s Aura. These are areas where skills are naturally enhanced by one’s Aura, and can be built upon very quickly and much more easily than other skills. That is not to say that an angel with a blue Aura cannot be accurate and skillful with a bow and arrow—weapons more commonly associated with yellow Auras. However, the blue angel will not have the same natural edge with the weapon and will have to focus and work harder to bring their skill up to the same level as most yellow angels. In the Calvarian System at least, angels are most comfortable enhancing the skill sets that they are naturally best at and do not vary their skills much.

“You seem to have a very natural inclination towards connecting with cloud-nature such as with your dragon and the gins, which is more of a green Aura innate ability. However, you also link quickly to natural clouds; yes, I talked to our mutual friend, Kade about your Cloud Park trip, and that skill along with your natural resistance to persuasion are innate blue Aura skills.”

Cadin left his apprenticeship with the promise that he would practice with each of his gins safely in an open field before their meeting the next week. Master Emilio explained that the pouch that he gave Cadin to put the gins in was leather from a rare albino dire dragon to that would keep the gins calm until they were needed.

Cadin got home and told his parents about training with Master Emilio.

“I didn’t know that anyone still used gins,” Talvarian said as he looked over Cadin’s set. “There were a few old-timers that had them when I was a kid, but I can’t say that I ever saw any in action.”

“I saw them being used in Air,” Sara said. “It was amazing. There was a band of traveling merchants, and among them was a Gin Master that did demonstrations as he sold them. He talked to my dad but he was unable to fuse the set. The Gin Master said that was going to be his last trip, because the main mine for the raw gins had collapsed. So, few angels were interested in using them anymore that it was not worth it to dig it out again. I wonder where Master Emilio got your raw set.”

“I’m supposed to practice with them a bit every day. Is it okay if I take them to the little valley before dinner?”

“Yes, but you don’t have long before it gets dark. And be careful,” Sara said as she kissed him on the head as he ran through the back tunnel.

Cadin felt the white dragon bag vibrating as he reached in and pulled out the tang-gin. He expanded it to a regular cup size and smiled. Looking around he found his dad’s water bucket from his workshop and dipped the tang-gin into it. It held the water with no leaks. He closed the top of the cup shape and turned it upside down. A small drop rolled down his arm before he righted it.

He brought it back to a general cup shape, still with the water in it, and asked it to expand again. Gur was leaning forward to watch, nearly falling off Cadin’s shoulder. The cup expanded, but the water stayed the same. Cadin added more water just as Gur jumped in.

Cadin was horrified, remembering Master Emilio’s warning about not knowing how his gins would react to Gur. He imagined the gin swallowing Gur whole the second he touched the surface of the water. Gur thrashed about. Imagining that he was in horrible pain, Cadin quickly reached to grab him out, before he realized that Gur was enjoying himself.

“Hmm. I guess at least this gin likes you, Gur.”

“Dinner is ready,” Cadin’s mom said from behind him. “How is it going?” she asked.

“Great until I had to stop to let Gur take a bath,” Cadin said while looking at Gur rolling under the water.

His mom looked in the gin and giggled at Gur’s antics. “Finish up and come eat.”

He grabbed Gur out before he could protest, and dried him off with his shirt while the dragon struggled to get back into the water.

“Retreat and return!” Cadin shouted, trying to finish up while struggling with the dragon. Gur got out of Cadin’s grip just as the gin shrank and soared towards them. The water splashed everywhere and hit Gur’s face mid jump. By the time Gur landed on the gin, it was the size of a marble and back in Cadin’s hand. Gur looked confused, and Cadin laughed as he dried him off again and set him back on his shoulder.