Ghost Dancer's history is clouded but it may have begun as he reached adulthood in the year 2024, somewhere in the Black Hills of South Dakota. There, embroiled in the secession of the American Indian Nation from the United States of America (a revolt lead by A.I.M. - The American Indian Movement), a young man was approached by a prophet known to many tribes as The Raven. The Raven (later to be revealed as Shane, returned from finding his history) introduced the young Lakota Sioux warrior to another shaman named Many Spirits Caller. Together, they tapped the youth's mana and brought forth his spiritual power... as Ghost Dancer.
There is darkness. Light begins to wrestle its way to the surface of reality, casting a pale, washed-out grayness over the surrounding landscape. A lone visage atop the highest point stands silent, hands stretched out, beckoning. The sweet aromas of smoldering onion and sage surround the figure. Below, women and children sing softly, their quiet voices soon accompanied by the beat of a drum and the mournful song of the Indian flute. Shayhanae raises his head to pray and, as he does, those below pause, looking up to Him.
"Grandfather. Great Mysterious One... You have been, always. You are older than all need. Older than pain and prayer. Look upon your children with children in their arms. That they may face the winds and walk the Good Road to the Day of Quiet. Teach us to walk on the soft earth. A relative to all that live. Help us for without you we are nothing."
The people enter softly into song. The rising beauty in the west casts long heavy shadows on the world. In a voice of wry humor, He speaks.
"I wait for yesterday. But all that will come again is what a young man can remember. If this were only my life, I would not speak of it. What is one man that he should make much of his winters? It is the story of all life that is holy and good to tell and of us two-leggeds sharing in it with the four-leggeds and the wings on the air and all green things; for these are the children of one mother which is the earth and their father which is the sky. Words to a song in a foreign tongue can sound a little peculiar. But of course we were not singing in a foreign tongue. The only foreign tongue here... is English."
The songs of the people climax and end abruptly. With features young yet etched by the seasons, He turns from the sky to his people. Mournfully, He speaks.
"We are no more than names whispered by a wind rustling through a field of corn on a summer night... people who lived in happiness and sorrow to become grass on these hills, and a few names on the map. Sioux City, Pontiac, Miami, Lake Huron, Omaha. Before the road signs were erected to our memory, these were people, see them with me."
The scene shrinks below, the sense of ascension new and giddying. Below, the sprawling plains. On them the people of all nations. He speaks:
"See the great horse nations of the Sioux ride out across the unfenced prairie... free men with weapons in their hands, eagle feather bonnets in the wind. Bone whistles pierce the air. Women send the tremolo. And if you have the ears to listen you will hear the ghost of Chief Tecumseh cry out a warning that still haunts us:
'Sleep not longer, O my brothers! Think not you can remain passive to the common danger and escape the common fate... or we will vanish before the avarice and oppression of the white man as snow before the summer sun. Shall we give up our homes, our country bequeathed to us by the Great Spirit, the graves of our dead and everything that is clear and sacred to us? I know you will cry with me... NEVER! Behold this day is ours to make. You shall stand upon the center of the world!
I saw the sacred hoop of my people was one of many hoops that made one circle, and being endless, it was holy... with all powers becoming one power in the People without end. Soon I shall be under the grass and the vision lost, unless... you were sent to save it. If you are to understand the ending in the blizzard, you should know the beginning in warm summer."
Blinding whiteness, song's end.
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