For KTDA, we had to answer all those questions for ourselves. What brings a tribe together? How does it happen? And how in heck do you find a tribe name? All of our game-tribes have their own story. Here follows one--how the River Rats came to be.
River Rats
*At the meeting place, more than 30 kids sit or lie on the ground.*
Chyna: Now that both Stormriver and the El Diablos are gone, how many have somewhere you can go? Where you'll be safe?
*Some of the kids protest that their tribes are NOT gone. Others argue back, reminding them of the funeral fire and how many are lost. Finally about half raise their hands to answer the question.*
Chyna: OK, what will the rest of you do? What do you want to do?
Stormriver Girl-1: This is...was...our home, since the virus. Where else can we go?
Stormriver Boy-1: Benji and Sassie took a bunch of kids and headed for the Nature Preserve. I guess we could follow them?
Diablo Boy-1: What about us Diablos? I doubt we have anything to go back to. Tribes were always tryin' to overrun us, take what we had fought to get...it's probably all gone now.
Diablo Girl-1: I'm tired of fighting. Isn't there some place we don't have to fight every day?
Chyna: What about this place? *motions at the airport spread around them* The fire destroyed some of it, but not all. Water will never be a problem, and the river helps protect the camp. The garden is still there, and we're still checking what other supplies are left. I doubt you'll find any place there won't be fighting--since the virus, you know that's been the way. It doesn't have to be YOUR way, though. *looks from face to face* After all that's happened, can you put your differences behind you? Stormriver and Diablo leaders are gone... it was their rule that set the fighting... the killing... You don't have to do it anymore. There's enough of you. Why not start a new tribe? Right here?
*Several guys immediately shout in protest.* "I'm not workin' with a stinkin' Diablo!" "Stormriver started all this craziness!" "Damn slavers!" *One of the smallest of the Stormriver kids, a girl of about 8, bursts into tears and throws herself into Chyna's arms, crying,* "Don't let them kill me. Please! *Chyna sees Hawk ready to send Shep in to keep order and signals her to stand down.*
Chyna: Is this what you want? Beating each other senseless? Scaring the little ones? What if she was your sister?
Diablo Girl-2: I don't want to go back to what we were. As for Stormriver, their tribe is as shattered as ours is. What's wrong with maybe trying to build something out of this mess?
Diablo Boy-1: But-- !
Diablo Girl-2: But what? Did you leave something valuable back there, Jason? Something you can't live without? Or did you just like the power you felt every time you hit another kid over the head? *faces Chyna* I want to stay here. If something can be built, I want to build it. *reaches out to the little girl in Chyna's arms* None of these bullies will hurt you, honey. I promise.
Stormriver Conor: *softly* Could we do it? Are there enough of us even to try?
Chyna: Let's find out. All of you who don't have any place else to go... if you're willing to work together and build a new tribe... stand up.
*One by one...some hesitantly...some looking to their friends for approval... After 10 minutes, a group of 15 guys and girls are clustered around Chyna and Hawk, some injured and holding onto a friend, some hugging or shaking hands with Stormriver and Diablo alike. The remaining kids had said they had places to go.*
Chyna: *looking at the kids around her, of all ages and all markings* You just made a choice. There'll be others, but I don't think they can be any harder than this. So... you're not Stormriver anymore. And you're not Diablo. Who are you?
*Suddenly suggestions are fired in from enthusiastic voices, laughed at or shouted down by others. Chyna looks up into Conor's thoughtful expression.*
Conor: This is really just Mark Twain, you know?
Chyna: *shaking head* Mark Twain?
Conor: I used to read his books, him and Robert Louis Stevenson... about adventures and river pirates and buried treasure. This bunch? We're just river rats, aren't we?
Chyna: *grins* River rats?
Diablo Girl-2: *nods to Conor* Not bad.
Stormriver Boy-1: The river's a big part of what's good about this place, if we're going to be a tribe.
Diablo Boy-1: River Rats?
Stormriver Little Girl: River Rats.
*Soon they all take up the chant, laughing with each other, celebrating their decision--no one's order, but their own decision--to become a tribe together.*
Chyna: *laughs* OK, OK, so you're the River Rats. But you still look like someone else. How about a new tribe mark, so you'll know each other?
*Chyna pulls a cloth-wrapped bundle from her coat pocket and peels the cloth away to show some twigs, ends crushed, oozing a white fluid. She dips the cloth in a pot of water and turns to the little Stormriver girl.*
Chyna: Will you be the first?
*The girl nods eagerly. Chyna uses the cloth to wipe off the Stormriver thunderbolt and raindrops, then uses the twig to put a single white mark parallel out from the girl's right eye. Then Chyna does the same to her own face, above the blue-and-white blaze that she will never remove.*
Chyna: This sap will stain your skin white, so it won't wash off. And this twig is a secret, so no one else will know to use it. You'll always know who is a River Rat. So, who's next?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-Chyna
Photo source: copyright Cloud-9 "The Tribe"
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