“Daniel, I’m scared,” Triska whimpered. “I don’t… feel right. Please don’t let me go. I don’t care if it hurts, don’t let me go.”
“I’m never letting you go, Triska,” Daniel promised giving her head a kiss. “None of us are. We’re here for you, always.”
“Don’t leave us again,” Pip whined as she quickly flew over and hugged Triska’s head. “Please don’t scare us either. We don’t like it when you do that.”
“Sore or not, I’m not waiting for this,” Alyssa said before she hugged Triska’s other side. Specca and Luna quickly raced over and held their co-mate, with Triska holding in her screams of pain as she wanted them as close to her as possible despite how much it was hurting her.
“Thank goodness she’s okay,” Falla sighed as she held Squeak’s arm for support to keep from falling with wobbling knees. The ant girl nodded with a relieved smile at her co-mate while Doku wiped away a tear with her wing. Star meowed softly and watched Triska with a gentle gaze while Cindy was looking at Snapper with a frown as the youngling was coughing out sand once again.
“I hope Kitten is okay too,” Cindy sadly said. “I’m glad Triska is awake again. And that she’s not screaming anymore. I just hope Kitten comes back also. I want to play with her again.”
“Triska,” Daniel said, leaning back from his hug while the girls backed up as well. “What happened to you? What hurt you out there? What did you find?”
Triska slowly caught her breath, both from the news that now she apparently was further from being human than before and also from her body screaming at her not to let anyone hold her again like that for at least another day. She then breathed out and looked around at her family before resting her worried eyes on Daniel as another concern she had from the night before grew again within her.
“We didn’t find Kroanette out there. Not a trace of where she went or might be going. But we did find something else. Something… rather unsettling.”
*****
Deep underground within the red ant girls’ expansive nest dozens of the tireless workers were scurrying about through their tunnels, both on the ground, along the walls, and even the ceilings as they kept busy with their never-ending digging. Carrying large pickaxes, heavy sledgehammers, excavated rocks and debris, or satchels filled with highly destructive bombs, the many workers moved about through their tunnels as their workdays never stopped. However these ant girls were busier than most as they had a very large nest and network to maintain and expand, and as such they had created other tools besides bombs to help with their work.
Inside one of the larger chambers in their nest ant girls were rushing about while others were gathered around a central railway hub that had three long cargo cars being loaded. At the front of the convoy workers were standing ready on the driving cart and squeaking at their fellow sisters to hurry up. Other ant girls were holding ramps in place leading up to the flatcars while more were carrying heavy crates onto the cars in long lines. Around the convoy ant girls were squeaking to one another while watching their sisters preparing the ride with supplies and what appeared to be weapons such as swords, spears, axes, and other tools not used for digging.
Standing near the front of the convoy Saffron was watching her sisters at work with a keen eye, being made more visible after she gave a small puff to blow her bangs aside. Next to her Daemon and Hollia were observing the ant girls’ speedy work as they quickly filled the back two cars with crates, carrying bags, and ant girls who were ready to ride into battle with them.
“Your people are indeed very organized,” Hollia complimented. “I haven’t seen a single ant girl even trip or stumble with her steps all day while working non-stop it seems. The productivity you ant girls have is amazing.”
Saffron nodded with a squeak as she continued watching her sisters. She glanced around at the convoy then looked to a parchment she had, eyeing it over carefully before squeaking a few times at Daemon. He took the parchment and looked it over just as Hollia did while Saffron stood closer to the swordsman’s side while taking another moment to eye him over as she had been doing every chance she got that day.
“That looks to be a map of the surrounding area of Green Haven,” Hollia realized. “What are those other circled areas to the south and east of it?”
“Outposts for Saffron’s nest,” Daemon explained. “Each of them are shipping bombs to the underground digging site below Green Haven. They should have them moved there by now.”
“There are five of them,” Hollia mused with a growing smile. “My word, how many bombs are you planting below the feet of those demons, Saffron?”
Saffron squeaked with a slick grin on her face.
“Enough,” Daemon relayed with a nod. “We’ll be joining the last transport to the digging site. Saffron and her workers will finish rigging up the explosives before we strike.”
“Sounds like it’ll be a wondrous show for those wretches,” Hollia snickered. She blinked then looked at Daemon with concern. “Um, my knight? What of the elves? I do wish to exact revenge for my family and people against The Sisterhood, but I don’t want to kill those who have no part with them in the process.”
“Green Haven isn’t being dropped into Eden,” Daemon said shaking his head. He pointed around the marker for the forest while Saffron nodded in agreement. “The ant girls are planting the bombs behind the village under the surrounding forest. The majority of The Sisterhood are camping behind and around Green Haven, not in it.”
“I see,” Hollia said with her smile returning. “We’re scattering their forces into disarray and separating the main army from Green Haven itself. And from their two leaders I presume.”
“Jovian and Jacqueline will likely be in Green Haven, probably in the former priestess’ temple. I doubt they’d bother sleeping in the woods after they murdered the priestess and left her home empty.”
“My mother, our empress,” Hollia mourned. “The elven priestess. Saffron’s queen. Forrus’ pack. These abominations need to be put down for good after all they’ve done.”
“They will be,” Forrus agreed. They turned to see the lycan approaching along with Tabitha and Scay. “We’re going to make them pay for everything they’ve done and then some.”
“Shame there’s no bounty on their heads,” Tabitha mentioned with a shrug. “That would have made this even better.”
“All I want is those two monsters to die,” Forrus growled. “I don’t ask of anything more. They need to die, slowly and painfully. They need to suffer for taking my family from me.”
“I shall stab them happily!” Scay announced before waving her dagger around in the air with maniacal laughter, with nearby ant girls slowly backing away with troubled grimaces.
“With their grunts running around scared it should be a piece of cake,” Tabitha smirked. “We’ll cut their heads off before they know what’s happening.”
“Don’t underestimate them,” Sasha warned, herself and Rulo approaching the group from the nearby crowd of ant girls. The reptile girl held her sword in hand again, the repaired blade appearing as good as new with a sleek finish on its steel. Rulo had her trusty hammer held over her shoulder as the two girls came to Daemon’s side before Sasha glanced to the neko and shook her head.
“Chopping off their heads probably won’t be enough. If we’re lucky and they’re not actually gemini they may be able to be killed, but not as easily as you would like to think.”
“We destroyed them ten times over last time we met,” Rulo added. “The bitches just kept getting back up and laughing at us. Whatever they are they don’t go down easily.”
“So what’s the plan for actually dealing with them?” Tabitha asked. “If murdering them isn’t enough to put them down then what else can we do?”
“Oh, I know!” Scay said hopping about with her hand held up. She giggled excitedly before showing a deranged smile and twitching eye. “We stab them over and over again, and chop their bodies up into tiny pieces, and then bur
n all the pieces, and- nrrghmmm STAB THEM SOME MORE! HAHAHAHAHA! And then we piss on their remains before- nrrghmmm STABBING THEM AGAIN! HAHAHA! I want to do it! I want to wear them on my body! I want to stab their flesh SO BAD! Wear their skin! Rip apart their innards! Lick their bones! HAHAHAHA! STAB! STAB! I WANT IT ALL! SO HOT! SO GOOD! STAB!”
Surrounding ant girls stared at the laughing naga in silence with disturbed expressions while Daemon and his group merely watched with blank stares as their companion struggled to breathe and cackled maniacally while she swung her dagger around in the air.
“Minus the last part, that’s not such a bad idea,” Forrus admitted with a shrug.
“Has she always been like this?” Hollia asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Ever since I met her,” Tabitha answered with a nod.
“And yet you continued to travel in her company?” Sasha questioned.
“Better to have her as your friend than your enemy.”
“You sure about that?” Rulo asked tilting her head to the side.
Scay laughed wildly with her left eye rolling back into her head before she quickly slithered over to Daemon and hopped about excitedly.
“Can we go? I wanna stab them! I do! Pretty please! Let me do it! Please!”
“Well, since you’re so insistent,” Daemon replied before looking to their ride. “Looks like they’re finishing up with loading the last of the supplies. It’s time to put an end to The Sisterhood and their two bloodthirsty leaders.”
“Yay!” Scay cheered with arms held high. She quickly slithered past them, up the ramp, onto the front wagon where she dropped into with a thump, then peeked over the side with a wiggling tail behind her.
“I’m ready! Let’s go! Stab!”
“She may be crazy,” Tabitha mused with a shrug. “But I think she’ll come in handy for this.”
“Yes,” Hollia carefully said while watching Scay laughing and grunting in the ride. “Let’s just be careful not to get in that one’s way. That could prove to be a… painful misstep.”
Tabitha headed towards the convoy, glancing back to her swords that she slid out briefly to eye over before pushing them back in with a click. Forrus followed along with Hollia, the lycan patting her bolas at her hip while the centaur held her spear upright against her shoulder. Saffron waved her hand around with a loud whistle to signal the ant girls to get ready then followed after, with one worker passing by and handing her a black satchel that she took and holstered over her shoulder.
“Alright, let’s get this over with,” Rulo snorted as she made her way towards the ride with a daring smile. Sasha watched her board the wagon with the others then glanced to Daemon as he was distantly looking at the tunnel before them.
“Master?” she softly asked. “If those two are not gemini we should be able to defeat them this time. But… what if they are?”
“Then we won’t defeat them,” he answered before turning his cold blue eyes over to her. Sasha remained silent then lowered her head while trying to keep her concerns from overtly showing. After a pause she nodded then looked to him with a firm expression while holding her sword level at her side.
“Either way, I’m ready to stand with you in combat, master.”
“I always can count on you, Sasha,” Daemon said with a nod before heading towards the convoy. Sasha smiled with a small blush forming before she shook her head and gathered her thoughts that had begun to drift. She followed her swordsman onto the ride with a proud stride before the ramps were rolled away and surrounding ant girls cleared the platform. Sitting in the front car Daemon and his girls looked over the two wagons behind them that contained numerous digging supplies and weapons along with a dozen ant girls who were ready to put them to good use. Saffron whistled and squeaked at the ant girls up front, the workers giving a thumbs-up before they started to crank the levers with rhythmic squeaks. The train began to slowly move with screeching wheels before picking up speed and rolling into the tunnel ahead, the ant girls in the station waving and squeaking in support as the group ventured off on their mission.
“By the way,” Hollia spoke up as she looked ahead. “What’s to become of Mika? Are we just going to let her rot in the ant girls’ prison down here?”
“Again, not a bad idea,” Forrus muttered.
“She’s not our problem anymore, thank god,” Tabitha said with a roll of her eyes. “Let the ant girls do whatever they want to her. Anything she gets, she deserves.”
Saffron squeaked something and shook her head as she kept watching where the convoy was heading.
“She’ll serve a month’s sentence in prison down here,” Daemon relayed. “After that she’ll be taken to the surface for her to do what she wishes with her life.”
“She deserves more than that after what she did,” Rulo grunted.
“She’ll live with the guilt forever,” Sasha solemnly said. “Knowing her it’ll eat her up inside. I doubt she’ll be able to face her brother ever again without hating herself.”
“Poor Mika,” Scay frowned. “And I never went to hug her or stab her before we left either.”
“You can stab her when we get back,” Tabitha said with a shrug. “I honestly don’t care.”
“Thank you, Tabitha!” Scay cheered with a twisted smile quickly coming over her along with strained giggling.
Saffron shook her head at the deranged naga then looked back to where the ant girls in the wagon behind them were suddenly squeaking loudly. Daemon and the girls turned to see three of the crates shaking about with a few ant girls struggling to hold them down. The boxes rumbled and hopped with great force before finally bursting open to the sides, knocking the ant girls back into their sisters while three familiar monsters rolled out of the broken containers.
“Tara? Lara? Sara?” Hollia exclaimed as everyone saw the three desuwraith sisters lying on the floor of the wagon with confused expressions.
“What the hell are they doing here?” Tabitha asked.
“What were they doing in those boxes?” Scay wondered.
“How did they get in those boxes?” Hollia questioned.
The desuwraiths sat up and looked around before noticing Daemon and his group watching them from the front car.
“Hey, is this the way to the surface?”
“Wait, where are we?”
“We’re here, stupid. That’s where.”
“But where is here?”
“Looks like here is moving. Now we’re over there.”
“Now we’re over there again.”
“Where is here going?”
“It’s going over there, stupid.”
“Yeah, what are you, stupid?”
“You two are the stupid ones!”
“We know you are but what are we?” the other two childishly retorted.
“Stupid!”
“We know you are but what are we?” the two barked back while the ant girls looked to each other in bewilderment.
“Stupid!”
“Hey!” Rulo shouted, with the desuwraiths halting and turning to her curiously. “What the hell are you bitches doing here?”
“We’re trying to get to the surface,” the first answered.
“Yeah, what does it look like we’re doing?”
“How is that not obvious?”
“Why were you girls in those crates?” Hollia asked. The desuwraiths looked to each other for a moment then back to the centaur with shrugs while their hair fluttered behind them in the wind.
“How did you girls get in those crates anyway?” Forrus questioned, with the sisters again turning to each other in silence then back to her with simple shrugs.
“Why aren’t you back with your guardian?” Sasha asked. “Isn’t that where you wanted to stay?”
“Nuci isn’t there anymore, she left,” the first desuwraith replied. “We didn’t have any other reason to stay there now.”
“Yeah, she left.”
“So now we’re trying to leave too.”
; “What do you mean she left?” Daemon questioned.
“She left. Just like I said.”
“She buried the Dark Queen and then the whole cave before she left.”
“She said she wanted to go find another purpose in life so she left.”
“She buried the Dark Queen and then the cave?” Forrus repeated. “Why would she do that?”
“I guess she didn’t have any other reason to stay down here,” Hollia mused with a shrug. “Her charge is dead after all, her job as a guardian is done.”
“Were you aware of this?” Daemon asked Saffron. The ant girl shook her head and squeaked a few times before squeaking at her sisters in the other car. The workers shook their heads before Saffron turned to Daemon and squeaked a few more times. Daemon looked at her for a moment then glanced to the desuwraiths who were watching the passing tunnel walls with eyes of wonder.
“And after Hollia was so kind as to praise your sisters for being organized in your nest,” he said shaking his head. “Looks like that little bit of information slipped between the cracks with them.”
Saffron rolled her eyes with a huff then turned to her sisters with a stern look, all of them cringing and slowly slumping back as their lieutenant showed obvious discontent at their lack of communication within their nest.
“So where are we?” the first desuwraith asked.
“Where are we going?”
“And who are you?” the third said looking to a random ant girl in the car with them.
“We’re on our way to Green Haven to attack The Sisterhood,” Hollia answered, getting silent stares from the three girls.
“We’re on an important mission and you shouldn’t be here,” Forrus snapped, again only getting blank looks from the desuwraiths.
“We’re going to stab them!” Scay laughed with her right eye rolling a few times. “Stab! Stab! So much fun! Nrrghmmm STAB!”
The desuwraiths looked at her for a while without saying anything then turned to Daemon as he saw nothing at all was getting through to them.
Chronicles of Eden - Act XI Page 52