Chronicles of The Omniverse Archived Borean Forest

[Tiko]

as written by Tiko

The large caravan trundled its way northward trailing refugees from the Midlands as they journeyed into the Northlands.

Unfortunately rumor had reached them that the Northlands too had been suffering under the growing anomalies that had people flocking out of the Midlands, and that strange shadow beasts plagued its countryside. It filled them with dread and unease that their forseen sanctuary might prove no better off than the land they were fleeing from.

Other rumors too had reached their ears though, rumors that gave them hope. The Elysian Vanguard stirred within their mountain Rest, drawing together those who would stand strong in these troubling times. Among the caravan even were several who aspired to journey to the mountain temple, Nasazura's rest. There they too would become champions...

Others simply sought the safety of distance from the ravaged Midlands, and were destined to arrive upon the streets of Windcrest to make a new start for themselves. Whatever their reason for heading north though, they were here now, brought together by misfortune and circumstance.

Accompanying the large caravan were several mages from Academias Celestia and Everia that had been tasked with seeing the group of refugees from the town of Hearthsgrove to the mighty pass that split the Icy Peaks; the figurative gate into the Northlands. There they were to meet with the Ghrigorians who would see the caravan the rest of the way north to Windcrest.

 

[Tiko]

as written by Tiko and Script

Far overhead, Zahira and Aeryn had overtaken their quarry, but the strangely vacant woman had made no move to engage the caravan yet. Her eyes scanned the area with the intensity of a hawk as the infernal construct she and Aeryn were seated upon came to circle lazily. The creature bore the likeness of a massive hawk, but its form was metalic and an inner fire burned within its joints. She kept its circling at a wide birth, so as to not cast its shadow upon those below, and thus draw attention to herself, but she seemed to be waiting for something...

Like ants, the trail of refugees exited the cover of the Borean Forest and drew closer to a small encampment at the base of the mountains. Beyond the encampment spread a wide pass that cut all the way through the Icy Peaks and into the Northlands, but it was the encampment itself that she scanned intently. The tents were huge - much larger than was needed to accomodate a human - and she was warry of moving to engage those below without calculating in all of the variables soon to be at play.

Her hesitation was rewarded as three Ghrigorian giants exited from a large tent to meet the approaching refugees. The one at their forefront was emblazened with runes of fire, and he carried himself with the air of a commander. An unexpected, but potentially valuable acquisition for their Master, Krycis...

Her eyes shifted to the refugees next as she took in the location of the mage escorts. They were her intended target. Skilled combatants, but vulnerable to her influence out here and so far from outside assistance. They would be the third escort party intercepted by Zahira and Aeryn in the past month. The last two ambushes had proven successful enough, but with the potential of a pattern forming, the Academies it would seem had begun bolstering the sizes of their escorts.

____

"Music to my ears," Aeryn grinned, pushing himself upright and standing atop the beast. The wind rushing past threatened to toss him from it, but he retained his balance long enough to step to the edge of the hawk's back. "See you down there!"

With that, he jumped. As he plummetted towards the ground, the bracers upon his arms lit up, gathering wind to propel him through the sky towards the caravan like a cannonball. Scarcely audible over the rush of the air, Aeryn whooped like a child on a rollercoaster. By the time he drew close to the targets, some of them had started to cry out and point, but he was moving at such speeds that there was scarcely time for a spell to be launched.

He slammed into the side of one of the caravans, splintering wood explosively with the impact as the entire vehicle caved in around him in a cloud of dust and the ground at the site was compacted into a crater. At the centre of the dust cloud, Aeryn rose to his feet and flexed his fingers. "Heeellooo, useless trash! Everybody ready for a culling? Because I sure am!"

____

In an unexpected and perhaps comical moment, a flurry of white feathers exploded from the dust cloud around Aeryn. As the wind cleared the crater at his feet, dozens of mangled chickens lay flopping haphazardly upon the ground. Aeryn, slayer of chickens.

"Get to the encampment!" a Celestian mage shouted as they tried to direct panicked people towards the cover of the Ghrigorian encampment.

The others moved to close on Aeryn.

"Ka'ma Ora'kaza!" someone shouted in an arcane tongue.

Beneath Aeryn, ancient roots tore their way up from the earth in a writhing mass to entangle him.

____

The roots were met by gouts of fire, bursting forth from Aeryn's palms towards the roots and incinerating the closest before they could gain purchase on him. Before the fire overtook them all, however, a wave of frost magic rose at the command of another mage to counteract the heat. For a few moments, the vines took on the appearance of a cage of solid ice, trapping Aeryn within. Then, the ice was shattered as he propelled himself forwards and slammed into it, striking through the cage with a single punch before carrying on to charge straight for the mage responsible.

____

Aeryn's momentum left him closing on his target with break-neck speed only for it to be halted just as abruptly by a shimmering barrier that was swiftly projected by yet another mage among the group. The unexpected shield intercepted Aeryn only paces from connecting with his victim.

The mage Aeryn had charged maintained a resolve of steel and he hadn't even so much as blinked in hesitation as Aeryn had barreled towards him. The mages were fast recovering from the shock of the initial attack and were swiftly coordinating their efforts to bring him down.

---

Meanwhile overhead Zahira watched on impassively at Aeryn's destructive and utterly unfocused display of rampant violence before she withdrew a small sphere to drop down into the fray. It hit the ground with a muted plunk before it began to move. The strange metallic sphere pulsed with a coalescing red energy and it emitted a series of chinking noises as it began to disassemble in an almost armadillo fashion. The infernal flames it unleashed from between the jointed plates were hot enough to scorch flesh from bone and it left the earth beneath it blackened. The armored plates shifted rapidly and locked into place to form the skeletal framework of an infernal hound.

The beast wheeled about to face off against the three Ghrigorians who had begun to recover from the shock of the attack and were now running to join the mages in their battle against Aeryn.

The infernal construct barring their path drew them up short.

"Flank it," barked their leader as he moved to take it head-on with a massive trident etched in fire.

---

With Aeryn and the infernal hound drawing the attention of those on the battle field, Zahira made her own move. The construct she road upon furled its wings and dropped towards the ground, its taloned feet poised for impact as it collided with a fleeing woman.

The woman's death came swiftly as Zahira slipped from the beast's back to move towards the mages engaged with Aeryn.

The winged construct's violent attack upon those fleeing the fight served its purpose in drawing the attention of several of the mages. It wheeled about and let out a defiant shriek that sent people scattering away from the bloody carnage gripped in its talons. Zahira herself strode towards the mages, pausing only to raise a hand towards an elderly man that staggered into her path.

She hadn't Aeryn's fighting prowess, or the sheer destructive power of him or the infernal constructs, but she was far from incapable.

An arc of power jolted its way down her spinal column as the implants in her arm released a pulse of energy that simply exploded the man into unidentified bits of flesh and bone that peppered the ground with meaty thuds.

As eyes turned from Aeryn towards her, her violet gaze fell upon the mage who had errected a barrier moments ago.

____

Aeryn struck against the shimmering barrier with a grunt, his fist wreathed with silvery power. The force of the impact was staggering, and out of the corner of his eye he spotted the mage responsible flinch visibly. The wall of force held, but barely.

Rebounding off of the barrier, Aeryn hopped backwards, but when his feet hit the ground, they kept going. With a grin, he allowed himself to be swallowed by the ground entirely, leaving nothing but a patch of upturned soil behind him.

____

As Aeryn vanished, all around him writhing roots grasped and tore at his clothes. Though the extensions above ground had been effectively frozen, the ones underground remained quite animated. The power of Aeryn's elemental bracers combatted against the mage's spell, and gnarled roots snapped and ripped free from the earth as he went.

Then, with a spray of dirt and scattered plantlife, he burst from the earth behind the mage. The roots continued to pursue him even as he shot a few feet into the air, but he answered them with a jet of flame, scarcely pausing. Still trailing a severed tendril from his arm, he swung his fist towards the woman's head with the aim of knocking her out cold.

The woman crumpled wordlessly to the ground and it would seem Zahira was fairing equally as well with the rest of the mages.

No words had transpired in the moment of eye contact, and yet everything had changed. A shimmering barrier formed in front of Zahira as several of the mages unleashed a volley of spells upon her. She didn't move as the barrier weathered the onslaught, and before the mages could realize its source their comrad struck them from behind. A sticky blue web flew from his fingertips to entangle three of his former allies. Its draining property left them struggling on the ground in vain as their strength was rapidly sapped from their bodies.

"Why?!" one of them growled as they looked upon the traitor in their midst.

"Aeryn, subdue the giants. I'll see to these ones..." Zahira said.

The turncoat maintained the thick web as Zahira approached the felled mages and knelt down to look into their eyes...

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

Elsewhere...

It had been just over a week since they had set out from the lake, leaving their temporary sanctuary behind and setting forth for Terra's newest nation in pursuit of a memory. A cool autumn breeze stirred Nairi's hair as they made their way down a quiet country lane, far from the nearest town. The great trees of the Borean Forest rose around them, but the road only skirted the edges of the woodland, leaving the afternoon sun to shine through unhindered by the canopy.

The peaceful trail formed a stark contrast to Westeria and its surroundings. The last town they'd passed through had shown images of some form of gigantic monster doing battle with a military force there. Nairi was distinctly glad that they'd left it behind, although their trip hadn't been without its own hazards. Anomalies dotted the landscape, even if not so densely as in Westeria. Thus far they'd skirted past a colony of bizarre and apparently predatory animated scarecrows, and come just short of walking into a field apparently now inhabited by landsharks of some nature.

Still, at least it kept things interesting, never being sure if the laws of physics were going to work quite the same way around the next corner.

As they continued to walk, they came upon a small intersection, and Nairi sniffed the air with a frown. "Smells like gas," he remarked, glancing over his shoulder to Robin. "Someone drove past here not long ago."

Robin looked up at Nairi and raised his eyebrows. "Is that surprising?" he asked. He looked both ways across the intersection, looking for any sign of the aforementioned vehicle.

"Not especially," Nairi shook his head. "But the roads have been quiet since the evacuations. Just thought it was noteworthy."

He shrugged, turning to face forwards again and continue walking. It had been days since they'd seen anyone else. There were still people around in the towns and villages, but the further away from Westeria they got and the closer to this newborn land, the less in the way of travellers and cars there were.

Robin thought on that for a moment and nodded. He was right; the road had been sparse. The young man was sure he would have seen a few more people passing them, away from Westeria.

How many people didn't have the chance to escape? How many had died? Horrible things happened in Westeria every day, but not at that level. He had to shake his head and push it out of his mind. That was behind them now. There wasn't anything that could be done at this point. They had their own mission.

"Do you know where it is we're going?" Robin asked as he caught up to the catboy.

Nairi nodded. "Northwest," he answered. "Towards Nuon and Ostwyr." The two cities that the werecat named - and the surrounding towns, villages and terrain - had purportedly been entirely erased by the appearance of this new land, along with everyone in them. Whether they'd been transported to another realm much as their replacement had, or if they were simply gone, nobody was sure.

Of course, the road signage had yet to be updated, and so the cities served well enough as landmarks to navigate by, even if they no longer existed.

Robin grinned. It was such a welcome change from the hectic madness of the city. Other than the anomaly here and there, it was incredible. "You know, I don't think I've ever gone this long," he said to Nairi.

"Huh?" Nairi glanced back around again. "Gone this long ... what?" he prompted.

"You know," Robin grinned. "Without... without dying. I've not been alive this long." And it showed. There was a hint of peach fuzz on his face that took a bit of squinting to see. There was a vibrance in his cheeks that wasn't there before, as well. "Why do you think that is? Enough has happened. By all means..."

The werecat smiled, pausing to take in the changes he'd been observing in his friend over the last few weeks. "Well, there was all that time tucked safely away in Teo's temple," he noted. "And ... I've not been dragging you into danger every five minutes, lately." He frowned, folding his arms and looking away. He'd hated how many times he'd had to watch Robin die during their attempts to thwart Sarka.

If anything, it had reinforced his belief that he'd been right not to make any other friends over the years. Most people didn't come back when you failed to protect them.

Robin's laugh was hearty. Those moments in the labyrinth, of fighting Sarka and her abominations, they had become foggy memories. Dreams, really. "I'm guessing that's going to change, soon," he murmered. "It can't be this quiet forever."

Even if the words were forlorn, he hardly sounded disappointed. He looked ahead brightly and challenged what the future held for them.

Nairi looked up sharply, arms still folded, and fixed Robin with a glare. "Maybe. But you're not allowed to be reckless," he stated. "Told you before, just because you'll come back, doesn't mean you should throw yourself at death. It's obvious being alive longer is better for you, if that wasn't already a given. No letting yourself die when you could avoid it."

He huffed, looking away again moodily. Talking about Robin's habit of being so careless with his own life always riled him.

Robin blew a raspberry at the back of Nairi's head. He snickered right after. Still, the werecat was right. The longer he lived, the more he felt alive. What a funny thought.

"Do you know the whole path by memory? Er, other memories? Have you been around here before?" he inquired incessantly, like a child kicking the back of the car seat. "What kind of things have you seen so far? We really haven't spoken that much."

Nairi blinked, looking back somewhat bashfully. "I'm... actually mostly following road signs," he confessed. "And the map. Not using my magic, as I don't have anyone to follow, particularly. And I haven't been out here before." It seemed that even the meticulous planner of the pair occasionally had to just wing it and hope for the best. He'd plotted out a route, but... there was no clear indication as to where this strange new place began and the map would become invalid.

And Robin was right, they hadn't spoken that much. The nights at their campsites had been almost awkward, and it was probably his fault. Since the night before they left, when he'd all-but fallen asleep propped up against his friend, Nairi had been making a point of avoiding being 'clingy', as he perceived it. He'd probably taken it too far in the opposite direction.

"Sorry," he added on to his explanation, frowning. "That I haven't been so talkative."

Robin's smile was smaller. "I guess we haven't actually spend that much time alone like this. We're either running away from something or sharing a room with two other refugees. And, well, Teo." People who were easier to speak to.

He knew that wasn't the real reason. Nairi had a lot to think about. "How much do we really know about... you know, each other? I know you can see memories and turn into a cat. You know I can't die."

For a moment, Nairi looked surprised by Robin's words, then he nodded and looked down forlornly. "You ... know more than anyone else," he muttered.

"What. Really? Even more than the two mages we met?" Robin asked. "You seemed close to them."

Nairi nodded, shrugging. "They ... are good people, but I never let them close. Was easier that way. Or, that's how I saw it back then. For some reason they still cared, looked out for me. They knew I was looking for the symbol they contacted me about. Not why."

He smiled faintly, almost sadly. "You're the only one that knows ... I was a slave. Never talked about my past with anyone else."

"Oh," Robin whispered. That was right. Much of Nairi's life had been stuck in a cage. Even Elaina had told him that by now, Robin had more knowledge of the werecat than anyone else. "Is that embarassing for you?"

The question took Nairi off guard. Embarrassed? Was he? It was true that he was often flustered by the way that none of his normal barriers remained wholly intact with respect to Robin, but he wasn't sure if embarrassment was the term he'd use to describe it. It was more confusing than anything. Keeping people at arm's length was simple, and habitual. He still found himself regularly at a loss as to how to handle someone being closer.

"No... don't think so," he answered finally, shrugging his shoulders noncommitally. "And you?"

Robin blinked. "And me... what?"

"Is it embarrassing for you to be the only one who knows so much?" Nairi shifted uncomfortably, folding his arms. "There's no reason you should have to carry my burdens. You might be uncomfortable, embarrassed, but too nice to say so. So are you?"

The immortal boy squinted at Nairi. He snorted and smirked. "I'd say it's the exact opposite. I'd almost say it's selfish, that I get a bit of joy at the thought."

It was Nairi's turn to be surprised, his eyebrows rising sharply. "What?"

"That... that I'm the one you chose to tell about everything. I'm happy that you did," he repeated.

"Oh." Nairi blinked, clearly not sure what to say. "Well..." he averted his eyes, looking away in an attempt to disguise the slight blush forming on his face. "You were persistent, is all," he mumbled dismissively. "But ... I'm glad you don't regret it, at least."

Robin put his hand atop his hat and drew it down over his face. It hid all but his grin. He was persistent. He tried not to laugh.

"Well, now we're stuck like this for a while. Want to take bets on what's up ahead?"

Glad of the change of subject, Nairi turned back to the road before them. It wound around to the right ahead, disappearing from view behind a ridge. Once more, he sniffed the air. "Nothing close. Maybe further on. We're still a week or so out from where I think the new place starts."

The werecat started walking again, and after Robin fell in step behind him, he carried on. "I know you made a deal with a witch." He paused, hesitating before continuing. "And... that you have no home. That's about all... Guess you know more about me than I know about you."

Now wasn't that a role reversal? Nairi wasn't sure how he felt about it. Why did he trust Robin so much, when he knew so little? It wasn't logical. It was foolish, even.

"I think you know just enough about me as I do," said Robin, pursing his lips as he looked ahead. "Sometimes I lost memories when I die. I think... I think there was a time when I died so much, I forgot everything that came before it. I'm not sure I want to try and remember, though. Something about it makes me uncomfortable."

Nairi smiled a small smile, unseen as he remained facing forwards. "Hypocrite."

Robin's face paled. "N-no, that's not...!" He shook his hands in panic. "I..." And promptly deflated.

He was right. Here Robin was, cheering Nairi on to face his past, when he so boldly stated he didn't want to face his own.

"... don't... let me live that one down," Robin groaned.

"Don't intend to," Nairi replied flatly. He was silent for several more steps, then went on. "After this, it's your turn. In case it's something you're supposed to remember, or things that need to be dug up."

He glanced over his shoulder with a smile that managed to be at once genuine and teasing. "Even if it's bad, you can still move forward, right?"

Robin's face puffed in a pout. He picked up a small, rotten twig and tossed it over at Nairi. "Yeah, but only if you're behind me the whole time!"

The werecat ducked, snorting and shaking his head. "As if," he retorted. "I'll stay in front, or else we'll just get lost a lot."

Nairi's companion stuck his tongue out. He didn't retort; this was all too true.

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

The day wore on as the pair settled back into a steady walking pace. They passed a number of strange sights, as they had on every day beforehand. A waterfall flowing horizontally over the road like an arch, the spray forming a tiny rainbow in the air. A grove of statues posed like the trees they replaced, arms splayed like branches and hair standing on end like canopies.

By now, Nairi was starting to no longer be surprised. The anomalies were widespread, and at times extreme. He could only hope that they'd continue to run into the 'scenic' variety rather than the 'deadly'.

It was approaching evening, when Nairi stopped, holding up a hand. "Hear that?" he prompted, eyes squinting forwards into the distance. "Engine, up ahead."

The sound was too distant for ears of normal sensitivity to detect, but after they started moving again, it wouldn't be long before Robin could pick up on it. It was most definitely a car engine, revving and spluttering aggressively. The werecat sniffed the air as they grew closer. "Might be the one from earlier. Hard to tell. Cars smell mostly the same on the outside."

"... what do they smell like on the inside?" Robin inquired curiously. He pushed on ahead behind the werecat and listened intently on the vehicle that, no doubt, they would be seeing soon.

Was it dying? It most definitely sounded as though there was something wrong with the car. Robin wondered if it was someone who was trying to escape from Westeria.

"... like the people that use them," Nairi replied, as though it should have been obvious. Because really, it should have been.

Robin wasn't sure what else he was expecting. "That... makes sense," he murmured. But... what did people smell like?

He decided to save the question for another time. They were coming up on the car. Robin could almost see it.

The vehicle - a family-sized SUV - stood motionless in the centre of the road, despite the angry noises that continued to blare from its engine. Nairi frowned, holding up a hand to slow Robin as he warily approached.

The road around the car was littered with broken glass, torn rope and randomly scattered miscellania. He picked out a dented saucepan lying off in a ditch, a cracked laptop, and any number of other random belongings. The car's windows were broken, and the hood flung open. A roof-rack hung lamely off one side, the straps keeping it in place having been pulled free.

Nairi sniffed the air again, and pulled out his pistol, eyes narrowed. "Lots of somethings were here. Don't recognise the smell. Some humans, too. Four, I think."

"They're gone?" Robin asked, approaching the car as warily as Nairi was. He cantered around it, at a larger distance than his companion. "What happened here..."

Nodding his head silently, Nairi drew closer to the car. The engine was still roaring, but the driver's seat looked empty. The werecat reached the door and peered inside.

His eyes widened as they met the similarly startled stare of a small creature lurking beneath the steering wheel. With a wide face, wrinkled blue skin and enormous eyes, the tiny critter looked like nothing so much as it did a gremlin. A tuft of vibrant yellow hair stuck up from its disproportionately large, melon-like head. The creature had been jumping up and down on the accelerator pedal with glee.

Upon spotting Nairi, the creature let out a panicked shriek and scrambled onto the seat, making a break for the opposite window.

Robin sprinted forward and reached out to grab the creature before it could skitter away. "Hey, hold on!" he cried. "We've got questions!"

The creature had leaped from the window and straight into Robin's grasp, and it let out an ear-splitting wail, flailing in the boy's hands whilst continuing to babble angrily and entirely incoherently. If the noises it was making were words, they weren't any language that Nairi recognised.

The werecat made his way around the car to where Robin held the creature, tilting his head to one side and examining it. After a long moment, he shook his head.

"Nope. No idea what it is."

"I guess it doesn't even speak," said the boy, making a face. The creature was subtly disturbing, wriggling around in his hand. He tossed the creature away and wiped his hand on his jacket. What a waste of effort. "Wasn't sure what I expected."

A shrill yelp escaped the thing as it flew through the air, bouncing comically on the tarmac and landing on its rear. It shook itself down, scrabbling to its feet and pausing to babble angrily in their direction for a few moments, before bolting into the brush at the side of the road and disappearing from sight.

Nairi shook his head, bewildered. "Not sure I even want to know."

He glanced reluctantly at the car. "Suppose I should find out what happened, though."

Robin nodded and gazed into the car. He placed a hand on the door and looked around, waiting as Nairi searched the past of whoever had the misfortune of coming here.

The werecat stepped over to the vehicle, reaching out to touch it and closing his eyes. Images began to flash through his vision as he sifted back through the car's memories, until he found the point at which it had stopped. A family sat inside - a man, a woman and two young boys, the eldest in his early teens and the youngest a toddler.

The parents were arguing over a map, gesturing at the road and clearly disagreeing over where exactly they were. Neither noticed that their car wasn't alone until the first creature jumped up to the window. It looked much like the one that had run off just now, except that its hair was red instead of yellow, and its face was slightly more compressed. It pressed itself against the glass with wide eyes, staring at the occupants.

As Nairi watched, more and more of the creatures began to pour from the bushes, swarming the car. The people inside panicked, and the driver tried to floor it to escape, but the creatures had already started to dismantle parts of the car. The axel at the back was snapped, and they'd pried the hood off and were starting to gleefully pull apart the engine.

The windows were smashed and the creatures swarmed inside, and in short order they had the occupants bound in crude rope formed of vines, and were dragging them back into the forest. More remained behind to loot the bags on the roof, and pry anything remotely shiny or interesting from the vehicle itself.

Having seen enough, Nairi pulled back, shaking his head to clear his mind and grimacing. "A horde of those things attacked the car," he growled, "carried off the family. Went that way." He pointed into the bushes where the straggler had vanished, and sure enough, much of the foliage was flattened down from the passage of footsteps in that direction.

The immortal stared off at Nairi for a long moment. "Alive?" he asked. "Because you know, if they are..."

Nairi nodded. "At least they were an hour ago," he murmured, already shrugging his pack off and stuffing it into a nearby bush to hide it. They could come back for their bags, but while tracking dangerous creatures, it was best to be able to move freely without being hindered by the hefty packs. "Let's go."

With that, he started off into the forest, leaving the road behind. A carpet of fallen needles covered the ground off of the trail, the evergreen foliage thick even at this time of year. Thankfully the trees weren't too thick this far out, on the edge of the woodland, and they were able to make relatively quick progress.

"Stay on guard," he warned. "Some of them had little spear-things. Small, but deadly."

"I'll be the judge of that," joked Robin, grinning. He kept his eyes peeled and did his best not to make a racket. He had been the lovable, clumsy idiot far too many times. He couldn't screw up every misadventure.

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

They didn't have to travel long before they heard the telling babbing of their quarry coming from up ahead. Nairi held up a hand to stop Robin, and swiftly stepped back towards him. "Hold still," he hissed quietly. "And don't make any noise."

With that, he swept his cloak out and over the other boy, covering them both in its enchantment to meld them with the shadows of the trees. It wasn't exactly comfortable, crammed underneath, but it was functional.

A few moments later, a small group of the vibrantly coloured creatures burst into view onto the trail, clasping tiny spears whittled from tree branches. Amidst them was the one that they had found in the car, pointing animatedly off in the direction of the road. There were about a dozen of them in all.

Robin held his breath when he saw the little creatures. One was mildly unnerving, but he could imagine the damage a whole group could cause. He kept in step with Nairi as they continued down the trail, glancing back every once in a while to take in their surroundings.

The little horde dashed off past them, not stopping to so much as check the bushes. Nairi wondered if they'd even really needed his cloak, the creatures were so seemingly careless. Once they were out of sight, he stepped away from Robin and lowered his cloak, letting the enchantment fade. "We should be quick," he noted. "Once they see we're gone, they'll probably come back. Might even check for tracks, you never know."

"I'm not so sure..." spoke Robin. Either way, he didn't want to stay there long. "Either way... you're right. What do we do when we find the family? There's bound to be more there."

"Improvise," was the werecat's only response as they started moving again.

The immortal boy flushed. That wasn't something he heard Nairi say often. "That's how I function best," he told the werecat.

"Wish I could say the same," Nairi answered. "But no time for planning. Not enough information, either. Going to just have to work with what we've got."

Nodding, Robin pushed on, only expecting the worst.

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

A few minutes later, Nairi stopped dead, sniffing the air a few times. His face paled. In the distance, the faint sound of revelry and crude musical instruments was just about audible. "You ... should wait here," the werecat said, not turning. "Wait with my cloak, and warn me if that group comes back." He started to unfasten the cloak to pass it over.

Robin's face hardened. He could only imagine that the camp was just ahead, but why did he have to wait here?

"Alright," he told Nairi. "I'll whistle. Hurry!"

Nairi handed off the cloak, nodding once before hurrying off. His face had been fixed in a grimace, but he'd looked relieved that Robin had agreed to wait.

That scent on the wind had been warning enough that they weren't going to like what they found.

It didn't take long for him to reach the source. The sounds of singing and music were clearer this close, as he left the trail behind and crept through the undergrowth. Up ahead was a clearing, cut from the bushes by tools to create an open area for the sight before him.

Dozens of the tiny creatures were gathered, with crudely fashioned drums and chimes from animal skin and bones. They danced merrily around a large central fire, and several other firepits surrounded the area.

Nairi tightened his grip on his pistol as his eyes took in what he'd been dreading, his stomach churning. Spinning over the fires were a number of readily identifiable human body parts. A bloody rock littered with torn and discarded clothes marked the spot where the family had been dismembered by their captors.

He was too late.

The werecat was about to turn and leave, when something stopped him in his tracks. A sob.

Wheeling around to find the source, he spotted a small figure bound against one of the trees at the edge of the clearing. One of the children from the car, the elder, was still alive. It seemed the creatures were saving him for later.

Not wanting to give them any chance to change their minds, Nairi skirted around the camp with haste. Reaching the child would require him to break from cover, but the creatures weren't watching him carefully, so distracted were they by their dancing and their main course.

He slunk forwards from the undergrowth, drawing up behind the tree and reaching around to cover the boy's mouth. "Shhh," he warned as the boy's eyes widened. "Going to get you free. Don't make noise."

Once the boy had nodded in terrified acknowledgement, Nairi drew out a knife from his belt and started to saw away at the ropes. He made short work of them, and quickly unravelled the bindings to allow the child to scramble back around to the far side of the tree with him.

Which of course, would be the moment that the little hunting party came back into Robin's view.

There was a harsh, loud whistle that went out towards Nairi's location. Robin retreated a small ways to avoid the advance of the hunting party. He wasn't being subtle. The only thing saving him was the cloak.

Come on, come on! Nairi, run! he screamed in his mind.

The returning creatures had looked decidedly dejected as they approached, occasionally prodding the one that had been found in the car with their spears as though to punish it for disappointing them. At the sound of the whistle, though, they jumped to attention, staring around with wide eyes to try and find the source and shaking their weapons aggressively as they started to babble.

After it became apparent that there was nothing there to have made the noise, one of the creatures babbled out what sounded like orders, and the party began to fan out, poking their heads into bushes and jabbing at foliage with their spears, clearly thinking that whatever had whistled was hiding somewhere conventional.

In the meantime, the whistle had prompted some of the revelers to look up from their revelry. Most of them looked towards the trail with idle curiosity, a few snatching up spears and scurrying in that direction. But it was when one creature turned to go back to his meal and spotted the severed bindings that all hell broke loose.

It let out a shrill cry, jumping up and down and pointing at the now childless tree. A collective wail of despair went up from its fellows, and they began to swarm towards the spot. Nairi didn't waste a moment. He hissed for the boy to jump onto his back, hefting him up before breaking into a sprint back towards the trail. He was spotted immediately as he broke cover, and the wailing turned into angry cries as the horde of critters gave chase.

Well, this wasn't good. As the creatures started to spread around and search for him, Robin had to think fast. One came uncomfortably close, prompting a response the immortal didn't realize he could muster up.

He kicked it.

The little monster soared through the air like a golf ball and splattered into a tree. Robin paled. Now everything was worse. Much worse. After watching their companion take off like a soaring eagle, they turned their heads in unison to eye where its perpetrator should have been- where its perpetrator still was, trying not to scream.

As they converged on Robin, mimicking a hungry school of tuna, the boy sprinted, hanging tightly onto the cloak. His steps were too loud and his movements too clumsy to evade his miniature assailants. One snapped at his heels, and with a cry from the young man, met with the same fate as his friend.

Oh, this was the absolute worst it could get.

Except that it very much wasn't. That fact was made abundantly clear as Nairi broke from the trees ahead with a child clinging to his back, skidding to a halt in the dirt at the line of angry creatures ahead. He swore, changing direction and starting to run again, breaking off of the path once more. "If you're there, follow!" he yelled to Robin.

Their progress would be impeded by the thicker foliage, but not excessively. Better that than to try and wade through the returning hunters.

Robin rheeled around on his heel, then began to spring in Nairi's direction. Looking ahead, he caught sight of the boy that was thrown over the werecat's shoulder.

"What happend!?" the immortal asked, falling into step next to his friend. He pulled off the cloak and stuffed it into his shirt. "Where... where's the rest..."

Nairi just shook his head. "Focus on running," he hissed. The angrily screeching creatures were hot on their heels, although slowly falling behind. A wooden spear flew past them and embedded itself in a tree trunk. The werecat cursed, reaching for his pistol and wheeling around to face their pursuers. He took aim and fired, unloading a clip into the creatures' ranks.

Each bullet found its mark in one of them, dropping them in sprays of dark blue blood. It was enough to incite panic in the rest as they scattered away from the deadly weapon that they didn't understand, and Nairi turned to run once more. "Hopefully that puts them off chasing," he muttered.

Doing as he was told, Robin pushed forward. He didn't even look back to watch the creatures explode with Nairi's gunshots. He didn't press, didn't speak, didn't stop until they came to the road they had been traveling, where the immortal lurched forward and heaved for breath. What kind of life did he live that he couldn't run half a mile without wanting to heave?

"Nairi... hold on..."

They'd broken out onto the road some way forwards from the car, due to the angle that Nairi had picked for them. The gibbering of the monsters had long since faded, but it was only at Robin's behest that Nairi came to a halt, turning back to him. His breathing had quickened, but it was clear he was far from winded.

"You okay?" he asked.

"Yeah, just... need a moment..." Robin answered, holding up a hand. He rolled his head back and pressed his palm against his chest. "I'm not as impressive as you just yet!" he breathily laughed. He looked behind them, checking for any signs of the gremlins that Robin could still feel biting at his legs. "Are... are we good?"

Nairi smiled faintly, nodding. "Think so," he murmured.

His attention shifted to the boy on his back, and he bent at the knee to let him down. "Hey," he said as the child clambered down and to his feet. "Are you hurt?"

The boy was dressed in a torn and muddy blue jumper over a white tee, and a pair of similarly ripped jeans. His black hair was thick and tangled, hanging down just shy of his eyes. In response to Nairi's question, he quickly shook his head, then after a moment's pause, nodded. He pointed to draw Nairi's attention to a small hole in his jumper just below his collar bone, stained red where a spear had evidently poked through it.

Nairi grimaced, before turning to look at Robin. "Going to go back to the car to grab our bags. Have some medical supplies in mine. Stay here, look after him."

Without waiting for a response, Nairi started off at a run down the road, back towards the way they'd come from.

Nodding, Robin returned to the younger boy's side. He knelt down beside him and looked carefully at the wound. "You're... gonna be alright," he told him.

The boy stared back at Robin with red-rimmed, harrowed blue eyes. His expression was a mask of numb despair, and his only response was to slowly shake his head.

Robin couldn't look him in the face long. He averted his gaze down to the ground. Nairi hadn't said a word, but he could only guess what had happened at the camp. He placed a hand on the young boy's shoulder.

The child stood in silence for the minutes it took Nairi to return with his and Robin's bags. The werecat took in the solemn sight without comment, setting down his bag and rummaging around in it for a few minutes until he produced a smaller bag filled with medical supplies. "Off," he gestured at the boy's jumper, as he was soaking a small cloth with a cleaning solution.

Within a few minutes, the injury had been cleaned and dressed, with a bandage wrapped around to cover it. Nairi discarded the used cloth and packed away the supplies, before hesitantly glancing back at the boy.

"I'm Nairi, and this is Robin," he said, taking a breath. "Your name?"

At first, it seemed as though the boy wasn't going to answer, but after a long hesitation he spoke. "Cameron," he answered, his voice low and his eyes downcast.

Nairi nodded his head. "Right. Cameron. I ... am sorry," he mumbled awkwardly. "For ... for your family. But we should keep going, in case the creatures come back."

Robin stood up and offered his hand to Cameron. "Let's go," he told him. His face was unreadable.

The boy stared at the offered hand for a few moments. "Go where?" he asked quietly, screwing his hands into fists. "I don't ... what am I supposed to do now?" his voice cracked, and tears started to run down his face. "I... I..." whatever words he was trying to form devolved into sobs, the forced mask of composure falling away now that the adrenaline was gone.

Nairi stood back helplessly, looking across at Robin in an unspoken plea. He had no idea how to deal with children, much less crying ones.

The immortal's expression broke. He bit his lips and looked away from them both for a moment. His fists clenched before he knelt down in front of the younger boy.

"We... we have to go forward. I get this is all really sudden. A lot of awful things just happened. What you really need to understand is that you're alive, and that's what matters right now. Once we're out of danger, we can figure out what to do after. Okay?" He offered his hand out again. "So let's go."

Cameron sniffed, wiping at his eyes as he fought to bring his outburst under control. "Can... can I get some of my ... of my stuff from the car?" he mumbled.

Nairi looked up at that, about to instantly refuse, but he bit his tongue. Maybe this way he could do something to help. "Like what? A bag?"

The boy nodded.

"What does it look like? I'll go back and get it. You two start walking."

"It's... a rucksack, it's blue and has a ... a dragon on it." Cameron answered. "Thanks..."

Nairi just nodded his acknowledgement, looking to Robin. "Go, I'll catch up," he instructed, before setting off back towards the car for a second time.

"Nairi, wait!" Robin called out to the werecat. He slid the cloak from under his shirt and tossed it at him. "Don't forget this!"

The werecat spun around, catching the cloak with a nod before continuing on his way.

Robin turned back to Cameron and kept his hand stretched out. "You coming?"

After a moment, Cameron reached out and let Robin help him to his feet, nodding and falling into step alongside him, hands stuffed in his pockets and eyes downcast.

Robin lead the way and kept his eyes on the edge of the forest. He felt that any second now, the gremlins would be upon them in a horde of snapping teeth and wobbly little legs. Not having Nairi there felt... frightening, even though he was close behind.

There was nothing more he could do for the boy. Not right now. That, in itself, weighed on Robin's shoulders more than anything else. When he thought about it, dying wasn't so bad, especially when you knew you'd come back again. What was losing someone else like?

In his mind, he saw Sarka drop with Nairi into the ravine below. He felt his stomach churn. But no, that wasn't it. He'd thrusted himself after them before he could process what had happened. The immortal didn't know, after all.

He peered at Cameron, trying to read his expression. It looked empty.

It wasn't long before Nairi rejoined them. Cameron hadn't spoken for the entire time, nor lifted his eyes from staring at the ground. The werecat took in the stony silence with a sombre grimace.

"Here," he said, holding out the requested bag to the boy, who took it with a mumbled thanks. "Also ... found this," Nairi held forth a plush lamb, worn looking and clearly well loved. "Thought it might be ... sentimental, don't know."

Cameron blinked at the stuffed animal, and bit his lip, clearly fighting back tears again. "Lamby was... was Harry's," he whispered, taking it from Nairi and clasping it to his chest, sniffing.

"Harry was your brother?" Nairi asked quietly. Cameron nodded, not trusting himself to speak without bursting into sobs again. The werecat sighed, crouching down and putting his hands on the boy's shoulders. "Look. I know ... it hurts. But we're going to get you to the next town, and find someone to take care of you. Till then, need you to be strong. Just enough to get there. Can you do that?"

Cameron hesitated, still clinging to the plush lamb like it was a lifeline, then finally nodded again.

Nairi straightened, taking a deep breath. "Let's go, then," he said, starting off walking. Cameron turned and followed on behind him.

Robin was last in line, making sure Cameron wouldn't fall behind. He looked back towards the car and took off his hat, pressing it to his chest. He hoped there wouldn't be any more tragedies along the road. If he and Nairi ever passed by there again, they would have to mark it.

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

The sun swam below the horizon swiftly, and soon Robin had trouble seeing the road. He jogged up towards the werecat and poked his chin in the direction of the woods. "Can you ever tell it's getting darker unless you look at the sun?" he asked him.

Nairi looked back with a raised eyebrow. "Of course," he answered. "Just because I can see well in the dark doesn't mean I can't tell between light levels."

"I mean, I feel like it always looks like day to you." He grabbed his eyelids and raised them wide with his fingers.

"No..." Nairi frowned. "Definitely not. You can tell the difference between a dimly lit room and standing under a floodlight, can't you? Same concept. Both still 'light', but you can tell them apart."

Robin thought about this a moment, then nodded. "Yeah... yeah that makes sense. But I was hinting at... we should make camp."

"Could just ask," Nairi rolled his eyes. "Simpler."

He glanced across at Cameron, who had been starting to drag his feet. The boy looked like he was practically sleep walking.

"But yes. Let's."

A few minutes later, and a makeshift camp had quickly been erected. A small firepit smouldered away at the center of the clearing where Nairi had led them; a short way off the road, though still within eyesight of it. It was to be another mealtime of canned meals cooked over the fire - far from gourmet, but not repulsive either.

While the soup bubbled away in a pot over the fire, Nairi was sat cross legged beside it. Cameron had sat down against one of the trees and tucked his knees up to his chest, still clutching to the stuffed lamb. A heavy silence hung in the air.

Robin stirred the soup nervously. A traumatized child and an antisocial werecat weren't the best conversationalists, this was a fact. Knowing they weren't going to try and make buddies anytime soon, he took it upon himself to be the ice breaker.

He moved past Nairi and sat next to Cameron against the tree. After a moment passed, he looked at him from the side of his vision. "Are you from Westeria?" he asked him.

Cameron shook his head. "Arandel," he answered. "Westeria's close by, but not too close. We didn't go there very often."

Arandel was a moderately sized town to the west of the former capital, far enough away to be spared most of the chaos that the city produced. Until now, evidently.

"What was it like?" Robin pressed.

"I dunno..." Cameron shrugged. "It was okay, I guess... There wasn't much to do, aside from hang out at the park and the Orchards... that's the shopping centre. There's a pool, but it doesn't have any slides or anything."

"Sounds nice and quiet," replied the immortal. "Where... where were you going?"

"Dad said that 'cause all the refugees were going east, we should go west to get a ship somewhere, where we could take all our stuff." The boy bit his lip, steeling himself against crying again. "Wish we'd just ... just gone with the other refugees. Mom ... mom said we should."

"What were they like?" Robin asked. "Your parents. Were they nice?"

"Y-yeah..." Cameron nodded, his voice giving out again into a sob. He wiped furiously at his eyes, sniffling.

Robin wondered if he should stop. He hesitated, but pushed on. "Your brother?"

"Mhm," the boy nodded again, tightening his grip on the lamb. "I ... I got mad at him a lot but he... he just wanted to hang out... with me and..." That did it, he was crying again, words lost to sobbing.

Nairi looked up from the fire to glance back at the two of them, frowning, but he said nothing.

This is what the child needed, Robin thought. They hadn't given him enough time to grieve back on the road. He exchanged glances with Nairi.

Once Cameron calmed down, Robin stood up and patted his shoulder softly. He moved over to Nairi and sat beside him.

"I need to tell you something," he said quietly.

It took a good several minutes for Cameron to calm enough to quiet himself, long enough for the soup to finish cooking. The boy was sat with one of the bowls, quietly eating.

Robin stood up and patted Cameron's shoulder softly. He moved over to Nairi and sat beside him.

"I need to tell you something," he said quietly.

Nairi looked over at Robin when he spoke, blinking. "What?" he asked.

"Back when I was waiting for you to come back?" Robin started. His face was made into a grimace. "One of them got close. I got nervous and... and I kicked one. I think I killed it."

At first the werecat looked confused, but then he frowned sympathetically. "Barbaric little thing deserved it," he said. "You ..." he lowered his voice "... you didn't see what they did to the kid's family. They got off easy."

Robin's eyes grew wide. "What... happened?"

Nairi grimaced. "Ate them. Chopped up and ate them," he said quietly, glancing back at Cameron. "In front of him."

Robin glanced back at Cameron for a moment, eyes strained open. "They were completely gone when you found him?"

"In pieces. Cooking," Nairi shuddered at the memory. "That's what I smelled when I told you to wait. Knew what I was going to find. I'm just glad we could save one of them. Wish we could have saved more."

The immortal clasped a hand over his mouth. That was going to haunt the boy for the rest of his life. "What do you think he'll do now?" he asked Nairi.

Nairi shook his head and shrugged. "No clue. Don't know what he's going through. I don't remember my family. And have only ever lost the witch that used me. Nothing like this."

So neither of them could really relate. Somehow, that made Robin feel a lot worse. They'd faced terrible atrocities, didn't have any memories of their past, but were never close enough to someone to mourn their death.

"He's got a hard road in front of him," whispered Robin. "I hope he doesn't do something desperate. If... you know what I mean."

The werecat nodded, looking down and sighing. "Hope not," he murmured, shifting uncomfortably. Suicide and depression were things he had very little personal understanding of. But then, so were a lot of things that normal people went through.

There wasn't much more to say. Robin laid himself down onto the ground with a huff. "I'll take first watch," he told the werecat. "You've done quite a bit more than I have, today."

"Alright." Nairi shrugged. "Told you before I don't sleep as long as you though. Catnaps are more efficient."

He rose to his feet and closed his eyes, before shiting, his body shrinking into shadows that shrunk into his clothes. As he did, a small yelp of surprise came from the edge of the camp, where Cameron had still been watching them. The werecat poked his head out from the bundle of clothing, glancing back at him.

"Oh. Yeah. I'm a werecat, by the way," he noted awkwardly.

"Oh. Uhm..." the boy hesitated, before nodding slowly. "O... okay, I guess."

Robin's smile was tiny, but warm. "You'll get used to it soon enough," he told Cameron. He got up and walked to the edge of the camp, looking out into the dark, creaking woods. Every single noise stirred his attention, though on the surface he seemed pensive.

If he could help it, he wouldn't allow those things to hurt Cameron or Nairi. Not on any of his lives.

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

A couple of hours into Robin's watch, Cameron stirred in his sleep. The boy had eventually settled down close to the fire in Robin's sleeping bag, not long after their last conversation. Evidently exhausted from the day's events, he had dropped off almost immediately.

Now, however, clearly his dreams were not pleasant. He was shifting and murmuring to himself with increasing distress.

Nairi lifted his head from where he'd been resting close by, just as Cameron's eyes jolted open with a gasp. The boy stared at his surroundings in confusion and distress for several long moments, as his waking mind worked through distinguishing the nightmare from reality, and found neither one to be especially pleasant.

He whimpered and curled up, starting to cry again.

Silently, Nairi got to his feet and padded across to the boy, hesitating for a moment before poking at him with his nose. Cameron opened his eyes, blinking at the cat, before he tentatively reached out to brush a hand through his fur.

Nairi resisted the urge to flinch away, instead padding around to settle down beside the boy, allowing Cameron to use his feline form as a source of comfort, although to Robin it would be clear he wasn't exactly pleased about it. Though Cameron didn't immediately stop crying, the warmth and perceived affection of his furry companion certainly helped calm him.

The immortal boy looked over his shoulder at the two and almost smirked at Nairi. He never throught he'd see the day when the werecat chose to be petted. Even if he wasn't enjoying it, at least it helped Cameron.

Robin leaned his cheek on his hand and let go a big sigh. He hadn't been ready for all of this to happen so quickly. It almost felt like the adventure had yet to start, but it was already going downhill. There was supposed to be more acts of heroism and less...

He peeked back at the crying Cameron and frowned. It was supposed to be less heartbreaking than this.

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

They rose shortly after dawn the next day, and after a breakfast of cereal bars and (in Nairi's case) an unfortunate songbird, set off once more on the road. A light fog filled the morning air, adding to the wintry chill and dampening both their clothes and their spirits. The sunlight scarcely pierced pierced the clouds.

Robin tried to wipe the dew from his hair and only succeeded in making his bangs stick upward. He snorted loudly and flipped his hat atop the mess as they walked. He glanced at Cameron from the corner of his eye and tried to be inconspicuous, however, the clumsy immortal wasn't practiced in that area.

"... very, uh, quiet," he said to his company. "Can you believe it's getting cold already?"

Nairi looked back at Robin and raised an eyebrow. "It's nearly November," he noted. "Not that unusual. Bit colder than normal, but not unnatural." The werecat shrugged.

"Um, yeah," said Robin. "I guess. It'll, um, be nice without all the bugs, right?"

The werecat snorted at the attempt to spur conversation, shaking his head at Robin's need to break the silence. "Sure," Nairi remarked, slowing his pace slightly to draw level with him. Cameron continued to walk silently just behind them, though he had looked up at the exchange of words.

"So what did you do before we met?" he asked after a moment, tilting his head towards the human boy. "Not talking about distant past that you can't remember. But before we ran into each other in that warehouse."

He paused.

"And I guess before you got eaten by the eel lady the first time."

Robin tilted his head back and scrunched his lips to the side. "What I did... before we met. Wandering, actually. It was my first time in Westeria. Everyone talked about how dangerous it was, but that drew me there. I'd been on a farm with some nice folks before. Creatures kept crawling out of the woods, though. Eventually took over the farm. We had to leave." He scratched his cheek and frowned. "That's where my memories start."

"What happened to them?" Nairi asked, frowning. "The people from the farm."

The young man's brow knitted. "Went off somewhere else. I think... somewhere oversea. Said Midlands was too hectic." He shrugged. "I hope they're okay, but they were folks who knew how to take care of themselves."

Nairi nodded, taking mental note of the information. These people sounded like they'd be a good place to start if and when Robin wanted to look into his own past. "They're probably fine," he said. "Doubt anywhere's more dangerous than Westeria, statistically speaking."

Robn nodded and smiled. "It'd be nice to believe. They're raising fire-breathing demon goats right now and living the good life."

Snorting, the werecat rolled his eyes. "Not sure both of those things can be true," he remarked. "Can't imagine demon goats would make life easy..."

Robin chuckled. "Well, you s-" He paused, looking to the right. He was sure he'd seen something. Though it came faintly to Robin, but to Nairi, there were dozens of chirrups and tiny footsteps within the forest. They were familiar, but larger in number than before.

"Nairi?" Robin rasped. He looked back at Cameron and backed up towards the boy.

The werecat's eyes narrowed. "Get close," he hissed, gesturing for Cameron to catch up. He promptly did so, scurrying forwards to all-but cling to Robin. Nairi unholstered his pistol with one hand, and drew his sword with the other.

"Little shits don't know when to give up," he snarled, golden eyes scanning the treeline where he heard the approaching footsteps.

Robin gripped Cameron's arm and got ready to bolt if they needed to. He could see them now, if just barely. The foliage bounced and rustled and revealed the same little critters they had encountered the day before. However, now, there was something slightly odd: among the tiny little footsteps, there were slower ones. Bigger ones.

In the brush, all things took a pause. The dismal rays of sunlight above hit the eyes of the creatures and reflected back at them from the shade. Robin felt his heart flutter in fear.

With his weapons drawn and ready, his claws out and his fangs bared in a snarl, Nairi resembled nothing so much as ... well, a cat backed into a corner. He brandished his pistol towards the closest of the little creatures, prompting fearful reactions - it was clear that those that had chased them before had passed on word of the metal stick that went 'bang' and killed their fellows.

"Remember this?" he growled. "Good."

His eyes slid across to Robin and Cameron. "You can outrun them," he stated. "If they go for us. Will stick around to try and put them off chasing again, then follow."

The tension in the air kept Robin frozen. he couldn't even manage a nod in fear of prompting the gremlins.

As the larger footsteps approached, the creatures began to part, and all manner of foliage broke and began to move aside. A ghastly, deep groaning shook Robin to the bone. It sounded like the creaking of a giant tree in a windstorm, all its parts straining against its roots, roaring in defiance.

Its outline, alone, was frightening. Robin splurted one word out before thinking:

"Goulash!?"

The gremlins screeched in excitement, dancing around their beast. It fell forth from the shadows and revealed itself, squirming against the ropes that hardly kept it contained. It wasn't Goulash, but it wasn't any more pleasant, either. It was a gargantuan, balloon of a man who splurted and oozed from numerous stab wounds that the gremlins had poked in him with their spears.

They had blinded him horribly, leaving his face a slab of meat. The corners of his mouth extended itself into his neck with an array of flat, gnashing teeth. Whenever he opened his maw, whenever he moved, whenever his wounds oozed, dozens of insects leaked outward.

One critter caught a centipede from the ground and chucked it at the kids. When it landed in front of them, the tank of a man mobilized, charging for them.

"Run!" Nairi barked, giving Robin a shove to snap him out of his frozen fear and get him clear of the monster's charge. "Keep the kid safe!"

And then he was running forwards, sword raised. As he and the monstrosity met in the middle, he ducked low, nimbly weaving his way between the creature's legs and slashing out to hamstring it as he did so. He emerged from beneath the beast with his pistol raised, and loosed several shots into the mass of gremlin-things to ward them off and scatter the more cowardly amongst them.

The creatures flew in all directions, letting the ropes fly out of their tiny hands. Insects scattered in all directions, crawling onto the gremlins, reaching for Nairi, some flying towards Robin and Cameron, who had taken off in a sprint.

The sword cut deep into the man's leg, only to bleed a squirming nest of roaches. For a moment, the large man seemed confused. He looked in all directions, between the gremlins, Robin, Cameron, and at Nairi, until he zoomed in on the werecat.

Nairi swerved around, turning back to face the giant and levelling his pistol at its face. He pulled the trigger, unloading the remaining bullets in his clip between the remnants of the man's eyes. He held out little hope of it ending the thing - would that more of his enemies responded to a bullet as they ought - but hopefully it would at least keep the thing focused on him, rather than Robin and Cameron.

As it turned out, outrunning a swarm of insects wasn't easy, and the small cloud of bugs was harrying the others' retreat. Cameron let fly a series of expletives that were entirely inappropriate for someone so young, flailing at the buzzing critters as he ran, and doing his best to shield his face from them.

When bullet holes made swiss cheese of the man's head, he stopped. His body lumbered left and right.

Thenm after a low humming that seemed removed from the rest of the bedlam surrounding them, the monster's head exploded in a black smoke. It buzzed and flickered angrily at Nairi and zoomed toward the werecat. The smoke was made up of bigger bits and pieces up close. They had large, clumsy bodies and gnawing, gnashing mouths. Their wings were so stiff they left paper cuts flying by.

Robin cried out as he and Cameron ran. "Nairi!"

Nairi swore, taking a step back as the cloud of locusts descended on him. He flailed out with his blade, but it was about as effective as one might expect trying to fight a swarm of bugs with a sword would be. Hissing as their bites and viciously sharp wings left a score of small cuts, he broke away, sprinting not after his companions, but instead straight into the midst of the watching gremlins.

With any luck, the smaller creatures would prove more appealing prey than him, and serve to distract the swarm that continued to buzz around him.

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

The insects surrounding Nairi expanded their radius to include the smaller creatures, but hardly let up their assault on the werecat. Still, there was a little more breathing room now.

Someone approached Robin and Cameron from down the road, running towards them with a large object slung over their back. The figure in the distance lifted a hand and waved. Robin squinted his eyes and hesitated, almost stopping Cameron in their panic. There was no telling what they were about to run into. Even so, the bugs that had been following them were crawling into their collars, scratching and bititng at them like live meat.

"Keep running!" Robin squeaked. It was either face what was forwards, or backwards. The encounter up ahead was a mystery.

As they neared the stranger, the image of a slight, chestnut-skinned woman who was mostly made of hair. Before the boys got too close, she knelt down and retrieved the shotgun that had been slung over her back.

"Wait righ' there," she snapped. "The hell's goin' on here?"

Cameron was too busy batting and scratching at the bugs crawling on him to really register the threat of the gun. "Nooo!" he wailed, "get off, get off!"

Every passing second meant more bites, and it was starting to feel like his skin was on fire.

Back down the road, Nairi wasn't faring much better. Rather than leading the larger bugs after the others, however, he sprinted off into the trees. They'd passed a small river not far back, and if he could find a stream leading into it, or anything of that nature, he might be able to shake the swarm.

Meanwhile, the woman cantered around the two boys in front of her. Robin was scratching his neck, but kept his eyes on the shotgun pointed at his face. "Stop! We're being chased! There's-" He paused to wince as something bit down hard on his shoulder. "Help. Help!"

The stranger narrowed her eyes and pulled a hand back on her shotgun, the barrels propped onto her knee. She muttered under her breath and flipped a small switch on the weapon that Robin hadn't noticed before. In the moment the switch flipped, an explosion lit up around her, igniting the weapon with foreign blue lettering. She pulled the trigger. Robin didn't have time to scream. He just closed his eyes.

The only time death was ever this cold or this slow was when he'd fallen into a lake during winter. He was confused. A shot to the chest should have killed him almost instantly.

Robin opened his eyes tentatively, put a hand to his chest, tried to find any sign of a wound. He found himself staring back at the woman, who had lowered her gun. He looked behind him, at Cameron, who didn't seem to be injured, either. Additionally, all bitting and scratching had stopped.

"What did... you do?" he whimpered.

"What you asked me to do. Tell me what's happenin'."

"Um. We have- tthere's a thing! And bugs are coming out of it and little creatures tried to kill us and ohmyGodNAIRIIII!"

Before she could stop him, Robin sprinted off in the other direction. The stranger made a face. "Your friend always this stupid?" she asked Cameron.

Cameron blinked, watching Robin run back the way they'd come. After a moment, he shrugged. "Dunno," he mumbled, turning back to eye the stranger warily. "The other guy ... he stayed behind to buy us time. Please, can you help him, too? Whatever you did..."

He looked down, shaking off the charred remains of the bugs that had been clinging to his clothes. A few fell out of his sleeves. He grimaced. "There's a lot more of them, back there."

She nodded, setting off at a jog. She put two fingers in her mouth and whistled hard. There was a rustle in the woods, following her.

"Stay here, kid!" she yelled back at Cameron.

____

The swarm did a number on the surrounding woods as it followed the werecat. No leaf or twig was safe when the locusts flew by. Corpses of the gremlins scattered the forest, their skin crawling with their assailants. Nairi's advance through the woods kept a scarce amount away, but those that could find the werecat were merciless.

Robin had barrelled through the woods as soon as he'd found the corpse, still disturbingly infested. He covered his ears tightly as the shotgun was fired again, hitting the hive. He didn't look back to see it burn away. "Nairi!" he called. "Nairiii!"

The werecat hadn't gone far. The cacophonous buzzing of the swarm as it swirled around Nairi made any attempt at thinking clearly all but impossible. It felt like near every inch of his body was being savaged by tiny cuts and bites. No matter how quickly he healed, the insects were relentless. He was being slowly torn apart, and there was nothing he could do about it. His foot caught on a tree root as he blindly staggered forwards, his eyes screwed shut to protect them from the onslaught, and he fell to the forest floor with a hiss.

He flailed, because that was the only option he had left. That, or lie still and wait for the swarm to devour him. A strangled scream erupted from his throat as more and more of the things descended on his fallen form, leaving him almost wholly obscured by the blanket of buzzing monstrosities. One thought pierced through the pain and the clamour. Is this how I die, after everything? Eaten alive by bugs? Fuck me.'

Finding Nairi wasn't difficult. The long trail of blood and carnage ahead of him was enough. He whipped through the woods so recklessly that he smashed into the swarm, flailed, and tripped headfirst into the ground. He put his hands over his head and screamed. He felt the biting already. Off all the ways he'd died, this wasn't his favorite way to go.

He felt someone next to him. Turning his head, hand shielding his eyes, he saw the only thing he was really happy about seeing at that moment.

"Why are you heeere?!"

The scream cut through the swarm's buzzing, and Nairi's heart caught in his throat. No! He'd led the bugs away specifically to avoid the others getting hurt. And now the idiot had the gall to ask why he was here?

Gathering up every ounce of willpower he had left, the werecat shoved himself up onto his hands and knees with a pained snarl. Blood dripped from his wounds, but he forced himself to crawl the few feet towards Robin, swearing under his breath with every movement. "Idiot!" he hissed. He had a few more choice words for the other boy, but no breath left to waste on them. He'd made a promise to himself.

With a final grunt of effort, he threw himself on top of Robin, bodily shielding him from the swarm. His cloak draped over them both, the magically resilient fabric providing some small measure of protection from the bugs that failed to crawl beneath it. Between gritted teeth, he managed to force out a few final words before slumping down once more. "Not going to let you die again."

"You're supposed to run so they focus me!" Robin argued. "Because you won't come back!"

The weight of the bugs on their backs and the skittering on the edges of the cloak made Robin feel as though they hadn't even briefly escaped. He bled from various cuts all over his body, and they all stung. "What're we gonna do?!"

Nairi shook his head slowly. "Can't outpace them. Tried, and look where it got me..." he groaned - every word had to be forced out through the pain of the swarm's continuous biting and cutting. "Losing ... a lot of blood, anyway. Won't be long before running isn't an option."

He clenched his fists, grabbing handfuls of Robin's jacket and grimacing. "Sorry. I should've run with you. Made things worse when I shot it..."

"No. No, we would have killed Cameron..." Robin replied. He put his face in the dirt. "He... he's staying behind. He... wait! Na-"

Bumf

Something terribly heavy landed on their back. It squished the breath out of them. Robin ate a mouthful of soil. A dreadful noise shook the air. It wasn't certain if it was a howl or a scream. It sounded like both.

There was a fwoosh, then crackling. Whatever had been atop them pushed on its legs and leaped off. Everything around them grew hot, hot, hotter. Robin felt his sweat stinging into his cuts.

Nairi let out a pathetic gasp at the initial impact, the cuts on his back flaring up with the pressure. He braced himself for the worst.

But then the heat came, and with it, the biting stopped. It took Nairi several long moments to realise that the horrifying sensation of hundreds of tiny feet crawling on him had stopped. That the stinging pain on his skin was no longer being refreshed every second with new bites on top of the old.

He cracked open his eyes, blinking as he registered the charred corpses of the bugs scattered on the ground in front of them. Relief flooded over him, and he slumped to one side, rolling off of Robin and curling up on the ground beside him. He was still covered in blood, and his clothing was in tatters aside from the cloak, but the cuts were slowly starting to close now that they had a chance to.

Nairi teetered on the edge of consciousness, but resisted the temptation to let exhaustion claim him. There was no guarantee they were out of danger. He should be on his feet by now, but that was proving to be a little challenging. His limbs weren't exactly cooperating, after being subject to several minutes of 'light' evisceration.

He groaned, and cursed. "Fuck."

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

Robin reached for the top of the cloak and peeled it back, only to come face-to-face with a row of teeth. He yelped and crawled backwards on his hands next to Nairi.

He had seen something like this before. Hellhounds weren't a rare commodity in Westeria, though Robin wasn't expecting to be seeing one in front of him in the country.

Through its black flesh, cracks of blue light glowed softly like dying coals. It was just about as tall as he was, ears spiked and body lean. Robin aimed his eyes upward to gaze upon the woman he'd met on the road sitting upon the beast. "You!" he cried. The woman pointed her chin to the werecat.

"He alive?" she rasped.

In a panic, Robin grabbed his face and paled. "Nairi! Are you okay?" he wailed.

"Define 'okay'," the werecat mumbled, blinking his eyes open and tilting his head to look up at Robin. "I'm half naked, covered in blood and dead bugs, and feel like I've just been through a paper shredder."

He groaned a second time, flopping his head back onto the ground. "Other than that? Fine."

Robin reached an arm under Nairi's. He tried to support him, but as his adrenaline slowed, he felt exhaustion take him, as well. He stooped, but strained himself to lift the werecat.

The woman sneered at the display, hopping down from the hound. She held a hand out and whistled at the beast behind her. It lowered itself to the ground.

"Get on. Gods damn. How'd a couple of kids gets yerselves in so much trouble? It's a blessin' you ain't dead."

It took some strain, but with Robin's help Nairi eventually found his feet, and the two were able to stagger over to the hellhound. As they did, he cast his eyes around the clearing with a frown.

"Where's Cameron?" he asked, momentarily struck by the fear that he wasn't going to like the answer.

"The third kid is stayin' back on the road. Get on so we can find 'im," the stranger answered, helping them up onto the beast. Unlike before, the coals of the beast's skin felt cool, not at all like the inferno when they were beneath the cloak. The beast rose onto his feet once they were stable.

The woman ran ahead, and the beast followed at a trot. Once out onto the road, the woman slowed into a walk.

"So what're you doin' out here, anyway? Refugees?" she asked, looking for Cameron in the distance.

Only about halfway back to the road had Nairi thought to question where Robin had found a woman with a pet hellhound, but after some deliberation he decided that it was no less likely than anything else they'd run into since they began travelling. It proved task enough to keep himself upright, even with Robin's support, thanks to a combination of exhaustion and inexperience when it came to riding giant dogs.

"Not refugees," he murmured. "Travelling."

Cameron was waiting where he'd been left, sat at the side of the road. He looked significantly paler, splattered with a mix of blood and blue ichor, and his hands were trembling slightly as he nursed a few fresh punctures on his arms. It became quickly apparent why: sprawled out on the ground a few feet away was the body of one of the vibrantly coloured gremlin creatures. Its own makeshift spear had been jammed into its skull.

Robin was speechless upon arriving at the scene. He had been too concerned for Nairi that he didn't realize he'd left behind the only one of them who wasn't immortal, who didn't have powers. He'd left behind a boy.

The woman rushed forward and knelt before him. She glanced at the dead gremlin and then gazed at Cameron.

"You did that all by yerself? Can you stand, kid?"

Cameron looked up, nodding silently and scrambling to his feet. After a moment, he spoke quietly, a cold stare fixed on the corpse. "They're not so strong when there's only one of them..."

From his perch, Nairi grimaced. It had probably been the first time the kid had killed anything bigger than a bug, and all things considered, he didn't seem all that shaken by it. He could hardly blame the kid, after what the tribe had done to his family. Some small measure of violent vengeance might even be therapeutic, for all Nairi knew. Gods only knew he had no idea what was best for the kid. He didn't exactly have much experience with children.

The woman chewed on her thoughts and stood up. "I got a place down a lil' ways. If you ain't in a hurry, I can patch you up there." She beckoned them to follow.

Robin frowned and held out a hand to stop her. "Wait. Um... this is all really sudden. We met five minutes ago. Who are you?"

Nairi nodded wordlessly at Robin's question. Admittedly, upon the back of the woman's hellhound wasn't the best position to start having second thoughts, but it would be prudent to at least establish who they'd been saved by before going off to their home.

In case their home was... hell, or something. Stranger things had happened.

Turning around, the stranger crossed her arms and jutted out her hip. It was the first good look at the woman that Robin had since briefly meeting her on the road. The blouse she had on showed hints that it had been white before. Now, it was stained with blood and soot.

"M'name's Charlie. I live here. I raise helldogs for a livin' and I'm a ragin' alcoholic. Any more questions?"

Robin hesitated, taken aback by her answer. "Um. I'm... Robin. And this is Nairi and Cameron."

"Nice makin' yer aquaintance. Now, are there any more problems that need addressin'?"

Nairi sighed. "No. Don't see that we have any other options," he glanced back at Robin, then down at Cameron. "You two need medical attention. And my gear is scattered in a pile of dead insects, since they shredded my bag."

Charlie frowned. "You ain't hurt?" she asked the werecat. "Looks like you didn't fare any better'n yer friend."

"Lots of blood, but just need rest now," Nairi shook his head, lifting up his arm and wiping away some of the blood to demonstrate that despite the mess, his wounds had already largely closed. "I heal fast."

"Hmph. And you were the ones concerned." She looked between Nairi and Cameron, who were the most suspicious of the three, then continued to walk. "Well, let's get goin'."

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

Charile's house was barely five minutes down the road. It was a simple, but pleasant two-story building made of wood. It had a wide veranda and double hung windows on every wall. The door was squeaky, the floor groaned where they stepped, and termites had taken to a few spots here and there. Robin found it charming.

Inside was filled with old furniture and shelves filled with tiny figurines. It smelled strongly of burning wood, dog, and bleach.

"Y'all take a seat. Try not to stain the couches. I'll be right back," said Charlie, trotting up a twisting staircase.

Nairi let out a heavy sigh, sinking down onto a wicker chair. His eyelids were heavy with exhaustion. In his head, he'd been replaying the encounter - counting the mistakes he'd made that would have cost him his life if it weren't for the timely intervention of this stranger. He'd engaged a dangerous creature without any idea of its capabilities. He'd thrown himself into the line of fire without a solid escape plan.

He covered his face with his hands and huffed into his palms. He'd been an idiot. It was as simple as that.

Robin had seated himself next to Nairi. He nudged him lightly with his elbow. "Are you... are you... okay?"

The werecat lowered his hands and turned towards Robin briefly, nodding before looking away again. "Thanks ... for coming back."

On the far side of the room, Cameron had settled down against the wall. He watched the pair impassively, saying nothing.

So badly, the young immortal wanted to tell Nairi that, of course, of course he'd keep coming back. Another part of him kept in mind that he'd left Cameron behind to deal with the creature. Robin turned to look at him, but dropped his gaze, too. He tried to choke out a few words, and managed a mumbled "Sorry" that was hardly audible.

The boy shrugged. "If you hadn't gone, Charlie might not have found him," he answered. "Besides... he's your..." a beat passed "...friend, so..." Cameron trailed off, letting the sentence hang, and shrugged a second time.

Before Robin could answer, Charlie came clattering down the steps with an armful of medical supplies. "A'ight, who's hurt most?" she asked. Robin pointed to Cameron. The immortal was injured, but that kind of thing didn't worry him at all.

The helldog owner strode over to Cameron and beckoned him toward a chair. "Take a proper seat, please. I ain't stoopin' over to wrap you up."

Cameron wordlessly got to his feet and walked over to a chair, sitting down and holding out his arms. His sleeves were already rolled up, revealing several stab injuries in his forearms and palms - no doubt from fending off the gremlin-thing's spear before he managed to wrestle it off of it. Thankfully, they were relatively shallow - a small spear left small injuries. Still, it spoke a lot of the kid's state of mind that he wasn't letting his pain show, despite his age.

Charlie took Cameron's hands in her own and turned his arms over to look at the full extent of the damage. "Y'all lucky you weren't eaten. I got an electric fence out back to keep the shitters out. Ol' Smokes takes care of the ones in front." She picked up a washcloth from the pile and soaked it in warm water from the sink.

"I'd of taken care of 'em but Smokes burns forests down if he's not careful. Why are you boys travelin' down this way, anyhow? I can't imagine kids comin' this way alone unless they was runnin'." She hooked her boot onto a stool and pulled it over to her. Planting herself onto it, she worked on cleaning Cameron's wounds.

"We got caught off guard. Normally it's... better than that," said Robin.

"I'd hope. That was a damn train wreck."

"My fault," Nairi muttered. "Should've figured that putting holes in the giant that leaked bugs wasn't a good plan. Should've just tried to outrun it, lead it away. Wasn't expecting killer locusts."

"Yeah, well, that surprised me, too," replied Charlie. "Hey, kid. Was it Cameron? Cam? Come over to the sink real quick."

Robin kicked his feet. "We're not really... running from anything," he admitted. "We're on our way somewhere. Far from here. I think... Nairi said once... there was a place called Ost-wor. Ost-queer. Ost..."

"Ostwyr." Nairi interjected. "The place that's replaced that region."

"What? Why the hell you goin' over there? That damn place is a wreck." Charlie exclaimed.

"Um... for... reasons," Robin stammered.

"Personal reasons," Nairi added, his tone making it clear that it wasn't a topic of conversation to pursue.

Charlie rolled her eyes. "I guess it ain't none of my business," As she spoke, she poured peroxide over Cameron's injuries. She watched his face for a reaction as the punctures fizzed.

The boy hissed a sharp breath in through gritted teeth, wincing with the pain, but he didn't jerk his arm away.

After sitting him back down in the chair, Charlie finished dressing Cameron's arms with a thick ointment and gauze. "Alright, kid. All done."

She turned to Robin, who shrank. "I'm actually fine."

"Yer covered in blood."

"I mean... yeah."

Charlie gave him a pointed glare. With a frown, Robin removed his tattered jacket and rolled up his sleeves. She beckoned him over to the sink to do the same as she did for Cameron.

"I dunno if y'all are gonna take off today, but road ain't safe. Smokes can escort you a ways but that's all I can do for you."

Nairi hesitated. On the one hand, spending a night in a stranger's home wasn't exactly appealing. But Charlie'd had ample opportunity to do them harm if she'd wanted to already. It was probably safe to assume she was genuine. And he really needed time to recover from all that healing.

"... if you're offering, we could ... use a safe place to stay, after that. Don't think we're going to make much progress today." He grimaced, loathe to the idea that he was relying on a stranger, but to stubbornly push on would just be more idiocy. "Need to go back and salvage what's left of our gear at some point, too..."

Charlie's fingers drummed on the kitchen counter. "I got a barn out back. It's well inside the fence, and I got a few young hounds that stay back there. I'll... let you stay the night."

Robin tried to smile through the pain of peroxide running over paper cuts. It was the worst feeling!

"We appreciate that," he told her. "We really do."

Nairi nodded his agreement. A barn was a significant improvement on the floor in the forest. Especially given that the remnants of that tribe of tiny barbarians was probably still in the area.

"Alrighty, then. Get yer asses movin'. Yer smellin' up my house."

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

Upon entering the barn, the kids were nearly squished beneath a trampling of young helldogs. Charlie ushered them away screaming and barking, as though she were fending off completely normal, not flaming puppies. Before Robin even tried, Charlie spat at him, too. "Don't you try pettin' them. You'll be losin' a hand."

She set down a ladder for the boys and told them not to worry: most of the barn wasn't flammable. "The loft's got a few mice, but that won't bother you none, I'm sure." She spoke at Nairi particularly. "There should be some conforters up there already. Didn't bother taking 'em down since the last guy left. Make yerselves at home for the night."

The barn was old, but well maintained. There were scorch marks up the walls but no visible damage to the structure. The loft was roomey and warm, a likely cause of the yipping fires beneath them. There were a few buckets lined up against the wall filled with jerky. Beside them sat a fire extinguisher.

"Are we sure this would actually work?" mused Robin once the boys were alone.

Nairi shrugged. "You'd hope so. Poor choice of decoration, if not," he murmured. A short retrieval mission back to the site of the fighting had allowed him to salvage some clothes that weren't torn to shreds, along with more of their gear than he'd feared. The insects had, apparently, had little interest in the contents of the bags when living prey was nearby.

The werecat slumped down next to a pile of hay with a sigh. Across from him, Cameron had settled down with a book retrieved from his own bag.

Robin settled down, exhausted, but content that things had turned out the way they had. It put a dent in their plans, but alive was alive.

After a moment of utter silence from his companions, he grew bored. He scooted to the edge of the loft and looked down at the hellpups, all wagging their tails as they gazed upward at him.

"Think she was serious?" he asked hopefully.

"Don't risk it," Nairi fixed him with a warning glare. "They're called hellhounds for a reason. Probably as likely to set you on fire as nip." Not that he was fond of dogs at the best of times, but this was just ridiculous.

"They don't look like they're from hell..." complained Robin. "I mean, other than being made of burning coals."

He sat up poutily and shuffled, once again, over to the other two boys. His hands planted on his knees. "What are you reading?" he asked Cameron.

Cameron looked up sharply, as though surprised to be addressed. The boy's eyes lingered on Robin only for a moment before going back down. "Spring's Warning," he answered, angling the book so that its cover was visible. It was decorated with a symbol that resembled a sunrise. The author was apparently one 'A. Andrews'.

"What's it about?" Robin inquired further.

The boy shrugged. "It's fantasy. There's some sorta war coming, and nobody believes it except the main characters."

"Weird. I guess... it makes a lot of sense, though," Robin looked up at Nairi. "That kinda happened once."

Nairi raised a questioning eyebrow. He wasn't exactly up to snuff on his history.

"Really?" Cameron asked, frowning. "It seems dumb. I dunno why none of the people in charge believe them in the book..."

"Are they kids?" Robin inquired.

"No, they're like ..." Cameron frowned in thought. "I can't remember exactly, but they're like... twenty or something."

Robin grinned. "I guess when you're a teenager, twenty somethings don't seem like kids."

Nairi snorted, rolling his eyes, whilst Cameron just looked confused. "Speak for yourself," the werecat remarked dryly. "You're probably more of a kid than he is."

Robin stuck out his tongue. "Say all you want, Nairi. You may be sitting next to Valore's youngest thirty year old. How's that for the tabloids!"

"Youngest of body and mind..." Nairi retorted, smirking. "Just look at you. Sticking your tongue out. Even if you're technically thirty, you're probably mentally ten."

"I probably had an amazing childhood I didn't want to leave behi-" he paused. "I mean, well, you know what they say about a young mind! If you keep acting like an old man you're going to look like it!"

Nairi rolled his eyes again. "You must know some weird old men."

Robin scooted next to Nairi and fif his best impression of the werecat hunched next to a wall, scowling. He closed one eye and wrinkled his face for effect.

"Stop it!" Nairi shoved lightly at the other boy, huffing. "I do not do that."

"You're doing it right now!" he howled. "Look, Cameron! Isn't he?!"

Cameron covered his mouth, laughing slightly into his hand. "Kinda..." he murmured.

The werecat groaned, folding his arms before realising he was only making himself look more grumpy. With a frustrated sigh, he flopped back onto the hay with his arms spread. "You're impossible," he grumbled. "Don't know what you want from me, if I can't sit normally without it being like an old man."

"You're the one who said it," joked Robin. He kicked at Nairi's foot lightly. "I'm fine with the old man."

Nairi huffed, shrugging his shoulders dismissively. "Whatever. How are your cuts doing?"

"They sting, but I'll be fine. I have to learn to live with being injured sooner or later, right?"

"Better than dying," Nairi agreed solemnly, frowning to himself.

"Well, usually it's faster..." Robin snickered. "Kind of weird to explain to people who haven't... you know." He swept his hands forward.

With a sigh, the immortal placed his palms on the ground and huffed. It wasn't even close to night, but he was sure they were already exhausted. "How are we gonna survive the rest of this trip?" he groaned. "Every three steps is dangerous."

Nairi grunted none-committally, rolling onto his side to face away and drawing his arms back in to his chest.

"What I'm saying is... I don't think we can continue the way we have been. You lost a lot of your gear, I'm useless, and-" He glanced at Cam, then fell silent.

"Just have to be more careful, " the werecat muttered. Cameron glanced up from his book again, looking between the two of them nervously, but said nothing.

"But how? You can't be the only one being careful for us, Nairi. Which is a tough thing to realize! Now that I'm not supposed to be a meat shield, I don't know what else I can do for us."

"I can start being careful again though," Nairi snapped, clenching his fists. "Not charging headlong at everything and expecting to be able to beat it, like an idiot. Not assuming we wouldn't get followed and so not bothering to cover our tracks. Everything that happened today was my fault."

"No, it wasn't! Stop blaming yourself! You've been alone all up until recently, and it's harder to figure out how to take care of two people who can't help themselves. Am I right?"

The werecat visibly flinched, shaking his head. "Never been able to take care of people," he mumbled. "Always fail them. Only reason you're still here is because when I do... you come back."

He folded his arms, sighing. "But every time you do, it just proves me right for not letting anyone else close. People that rely on me suffer for it."

"Maybe it's because you tried too hard by yourself even though you had someone with you," Robin rebutted. "You always try to do things by yourself."

"And what could you have done?!" Nairi growled, sitting upright to face Robin again. "If you hadn't run, would have just had to have been keeping an eye on you the whole fight! Shouldn't have had to fight in the first place, that was stupid, but letting you try and fight too would have been more stupid!"

"Well, maybe that needs to be fixed next time! I... I need to learn to do these things, too!"

Nairi shook his head with a stubborn scowl. "Too dangerous! Learn when you can learn safely, not in life or death situations in the middle of nowhere!"

Robin huffed. "Then what are we going to do when being careful isn't good enough?"

The werecat gave an exasperated sigh. "As if trying to learn to fight now would change that? It wouldn't! You can't learn to defend yourself overnight, and at the end of the day, you're still just human! I just have to do better."

"I didn't say overnight..." grumbled Robin. "Just... eventually. It's none of your fault any of this even happened."

"It is. Don't pretend it's not." Nairi fixed Robin with a stare. "I fucked up. Was reckless. If we hadn't lucked out and found help, I would have died because of it. Doesn't help anyone to pretend I did nothing wrong, didn't make any mistakes."

Robin grit his teeth. "You're not my babysitter, Nairi. I can't rely on only you to make the right decision. We're friends but I have to grow up sometime."

"Maybe so, but that still doesn't change what I said." Nairi replied. "I still fucked up, and nearly got myself killed. Stop trying to wave that away." He folded his arms, shaking his head and leaning back onto the hay. "Lucky enough to be alive to learn from it, so shouldn't ignore it in favour of happy feel-good reassurances."

Robin huffed. A lot of what Nairi said was right, but at the same time, Robin thought it wasn't right at all. "I'm... gonna take a small walk," he grumped, starting towards the ladder.

The werecat looked up, hesitatiing on the cusp of saying something, before nodding. "Alright. Will... be here," he said, with a small and quickly hidden frown.

Robin said nothing as he climbed down the ladder, strode past the eager helldogs, and exited the barn. Once outside, he crossed his arms and scowled as much as he could, which didn't look fitting for the young man, who normally had a bright smile. He stomped off with his jaw set.

He traveled away from both the barn and the house, looking out over the fence as he strode by it. The fence was as tall as he was, looked like it belonged around a prison for metahumans, and hummed reassuringly.

For a moment, Robin imagined touching it. The curiousity was there.

"You probably know what it feels like," he told himself, snorting. "And you'd die and Nairi would be a jerk to you forever."

He kept alongside it, no more thoughts of touching the fence crossing his mind. Instead, he rubbed at his arms and the back of his neck, where the insects had dug into his skin. This level of consistent pain and discomfort was alien to him. For a moment, just a moment, he found himself hoping to die, just to get rid of it all.

Making a face, Robin kept walking. "Don't think of that!" he crowed. "That's not... gonna help him. Gotta help Nairi. This whole trip is for him. Come on. What can you do? If you can't kill people what can you do..."

Their trip had been so riddled in danger, Robin could hardly imagine a way to help the werecat without fighting. Even when he did, he couldn't imagine a way to do it without severely harming someone at some point. He put his hand over his eyes.

"Why'd I even make that deal?!" he moaned. He felt all his energy leave him all at once and plopped down onto the ground on his backside. He drew his knees into his chest. Nairi was blaming himself, but Robin knew it was his fault. If he had a competant partner beside him, the trip would have gone much more smoothly. "Think, Robin. Just... think."

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

Nairi had been asleep within a minute of Robin leaving the barn, exhausted from the day's exertions and the healing he was making up for. Thanks to that fatigue, for once his sleep was undisturbed by troubling dreams, and he didn't stir until several hours had passed, and the evening had faded into night.

The werecat's eyes flickered open, briefly confused as to his surroundings before he recalled how they had come to be sleeping in a barn. He stretched, grimacing at the aching in his limbs from sleeping on a thin layer of hay, and mentally cursing that he'd not transformed in order to sleep as he normally did. He had little trouble getting comfy anywhere in his cat form, and certainly never suffered from cramps.

Sighing, Nairi rolled onto his back, rubbing a few stray strands of hay from his face and staring up at the ceiling. He could hear Cameron's steady breathing across the loft, and...

...he frowned, sitting up sharply and casting his eyes around in the dim light. Robin was nowhere to be seen. Cursing at the other boy's carelessness, he got to his feet and went for the ladder, dextrously sliding down it to the barn floor below. Maybe he was sleeping with the hellhounds? He had been enamoured with the fiery pups earlier on, and it would be just like Robin to ignore both his and their host's warnings about the creatures.

A quick circuit of the barn, treading with careful steps so as not to disturb the sleeping beasts, proved that theory incorrect. Nairi wasn't sure if he was relieved or not. On the one hand, at least Robin hadn't been burned with hellfire. On the other, that meant he was somewhere else entirely.

Thankfully, if there was one thing he was good at, it was tracking. Wrapping his cloak around himself to fend off the cold, Nairi stepped out into the night. The sky was clear, bright with stars and a luminous half moon that shone down to provide enough light for the werecat to see by with relative ease. He paused for a moment to sniff, picking up Robin's scent. and set off in the direction it led him.

He didn't have to go far. He found the other boy at the edge of the expansive yard, beside the fence, sprawled on the grass. The unpleasant scent of charred flesh hung in the air, and for a moment Nairi feared the worst. His eyes widened and he ran the remaining distance, only to find Robin snoozing peacefully. The burning smell came from the far side of the fence, where several gremins had attempted to reach him, and suffered for it.

"Idiot," Nairi murmured, looking down at the immortal with a soft sigh. "It's almost winter. Sleeping out without any covering is just asking for hypothermia."

The werecat flopped down to sit beside Robin, draping his cloak over the other boy to provide some measure of protection from the cold. "Didn't mean to make you feel useless... Just because you can't fight. Fighting's not everything." Turning his eyes skyward, Nairi fell silent for the better part of a minute before continuing. "Wouldn't even be here if not for you. Even if I'd decided to go, probably would have given up. Found an excuse to turn back. But because you're here..."

He trailed off, burying his face in his knees. "This is stupid. Talking to you while you're asleep. What good does that do? Would never have done anything so stupid before I met you, your stupid must be rubbing off on me." He tightened his grip on his cloak. "Stupid like feeling this way about the first person to put up- no, survive me long enough to be my friend. Couldn't just be happy with that, nooo."

Letting out a heavy sigh, Nairi looked up again, resting his chin on his knees. "Whatever. Doesn't matter. Not going to fuck this up. Just won't tell you, and ... ignore it. Better that than ruining everything."

One eye had been open watching Nairi for a while, though at the slightest hint of movement from the werecat, it snapped shut. He'd been awake since he heard Nairi's footsteps, but he hadn't been inclined to move.

Trying very hard to seem natural, he fluttered his eyelids and curled up.

Nairi's eyes widened and his heart skipped a beat, when it looked as though Robin was waking up. His face went red, and he held his breath, staring at his ostensibly still-sleeping friend. Was he awake? If he was awake, how long had he been awake?

For the first time, he paused to actually listen closely to Robin's breathing.

Oh.

"A... are you awake?" he stammered, mortification painted on his face.

Robin groaned and lifted his head groggily. It wasn't a difficult task when one was still tired.

"... hi," he mumbled, blinking at Nairi.

"H-hi," the werecat responded hesitantly, still panicked that Robin might have heard him talking. Would he have said anything by now? Had his breathing been like that the whole time?

He couldn't remember. He hadn't checked.

So he did the first thing that sprung to mind, and reached out to place his hand on his cloak, closing his eyes.

The last few minutes rushed past in a blur, until his divination reached the moment he'd set the cloak down upon Robin. He let the memory play, listening for the boy's breathing...

...back in the present, he pulled his hand back and opened his eyes. It was hard to tell if it was just a trick of the dim light, but it almost looked like he was trembling.

"...you heard everything," he murmured, his voice little more than a whisper. Before Robin had a chance to respond, he was climbing to his feet and taking a step back, shaking his head. "Sorry. Sorry. I..."

Trailing off, he spun around and started to stride hurriedly away.

"... dammit. Nairi!"

Robin got onto his feet as quickly as he could. He stumbled, teetering to the left before he caught his footing and sprinted off toward the werecat. "Nairi, wait!"

Nairi didn't stop, but neither was he moving all that fast. His mind abuzz with panic and overflowing with conflicting emotions, he barely knew where he was fleeing to.

He wasn't quite sure how he was catching up, but somehow, he did it. His hand reached out for Nairi's shoulder and grabbed it firmly. He tried to turn him around, to look into his eyes.

"Why are you so embarassed about that!?" he yelped. "Why are you running?"

The werecat hardly put up much resistance, and was spun around to face Robin. He avoided eye contact, looking down and away from him. Despite his efforts to hide it, it was clear that his eyes were glistening with barely restrained tears. He said nothing, but shook his head.

"What's wrong? Why won't you tell me?" Robin pressed. "Why... why are you... scared?"

Nairi continued to shake his head. "Y-you weren't supposed to hear..." he mumbled pathetically, as though that explained everything.

"Well... why? Why wouldn't you want me to know those things..." Robin countered. "You know, I was so angry at you before that. I just... felt useless. You'd get hurt and then I couldn't do anything, you know?"

"Because..." Nairi clenched his fists at his sides, mumbling something incomprehensible at the floor.

"Because? Because what?" Robin rasped. "Nairi, you can tell me. You can let me know these things. You know, 'cuz you were right. Talking to me in my sleep, what good was it gonna do?"

The werecat finally looked up, meeting Robin's gaze with his own. His eyes held a vulnerability and fear to them that was entirely foreign to the normally stoic boy's face. It wasn't the same fear that he'd displayed when imprisoned by Martin. That had been terrified panic, whereas now he just seemed ... fragile. "Just ... didn't want to risk ... to risk losing you," he croaked. "Was afraid you might ... be angry, or ... or disgusted, or weirded out."

Grimacing, he looked away again, lifting a hand to rub at his eyes. "Fuck. I'm a mess."

Robin bit his lip and his brow creased into waves. "Why... would I be any of those things... after I died all those times just trying to get us out of that place? After... a couple of nice words. Man, Nairi, you thought I was dumb."

Nairi blinked, looking up with a slightly confused frown and a shake of his head. A couple of nice words? What did he mean? "Wh..?" he started, but couldn't find any words to express his confusion that he was willing to voice.

The immortal nodded stiffly. "That's right. There's nothing to be embarassed about. It... it might not be your thing, but it's not a reason why someone would walk away. I mean, we've already established we're friends."

Something clicked in Nairi's mind, then, and he realised that Robin was completely oblivious as to the meaning behind his words. A strange mixture of relief and disappointment washed over him, and his demeanour changed almost on a dime as he closed up and hid any hint of the vulnerability from a moment before. He pursed his lips and nodded, regathering his composure. "Right. Obviously. Guess ... I was just tired," he muttered, still avoiding eye contact. "We should get back to the barn and rest."

Robin dropped his hand from Nairi's shoulder, looking after the werecat as he looked down. He closed his fist, suddenly feeling a distance widen between them that he hadn't noticed had closed. A curious thing, but the immortal couldn't understand it. He put his hand on his chest with a frown.

"Yeah... that would be a good idea," he replied.

Silently, Nairi nodded and turned to walk back towards the barn, forcing himself to ignore the ache in his chest. It was better this way. He hadn't accidentally ruined their friendship.

But knowing that didn't mean it didn't hurt, all the same.

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

The next morning came, and with it, an awkward tension that belied the seeming non-event of the previous night's conversation. Nairi had slipped out after rising with the dawn, and was perched on the barn's roof, watching the horizon with his knees tucked up to his chest.

He continued to replay the night's events in his head repeatedly, trying to piece together the chaos of emotions and assumptions into something understandable. Had Robin genuinely had no idea what he'd meant, or was he faking it to spare his feelings? Had what he said been that ambiguous, or was the thought simply so unlikely that it had never even occurred to the other boy to suspect it?

He'd spent most of the morning overthinking the entire affair, and sleep had come fitfully at best, despite his fatigue.

Below, Cameron stirred as a shaft of light his his face, yawning and stretching. He shuffled upright, glancing across at where the others had been sleeping and noting Nairi's absence with a frown. With Robin yet to stir, the boy clambered to his feet, set to climb down and seek out the missing werecat when he noticed that the window in the roof was open where it hadn't been before.

The night's activity hadn't gone unnoticed by Cameron. He'd always been a relatively light sleeper. Now, every time he closed his eyes he saw Harry screaming as dozens of tiny hands dragged him towards the bloodstained slab where their parents had been slaughtered like livestock. Felt the burn of rope on his wrists, helplessly struggling, almost pulling his arms out of their sockets in desperation. Saw the cleavers fall.

He shuddered, fighting back the images. His grip tightened on Lamby, the plush hanging limply at his side. No, sleep was far from easy.

And so he'd noticed the boys rise during the night, one at a time, then return together. He'd heard Robin fall asleep, and Nairi...

He'd not believed his hearing at first. Nairi had saved him from the creatures, and taken on every threat they'd encountered since without flinching. And so to hear the stoic, confident teenager quietly trying not to cry whilst he thought the others were both asleep had been ... startling. He still wasn't sure what to make of it, though he had his suspicions. He was a kid, but he wasn't stupid. He'd seen the way the werecat looked at his 'friend' when he thought nobody was watching. Nairi might have been stealthy, but in that, he'd been anything but subtle.

The morning sunlight was warm on his skin as he reached the window, setting Lamby down gently to one side so that both his hands were free. Carefully, he edged out of the window and onto the slope of the roof, spotting Nairi - as he'd expected - sat a short way up. The werecat had turned to look at him with a blink of surprise as he scrambled towards him. Thankfully, the roof was neither too steep nor too slippery, and he was able to plant himself next to Nairi without too much difficulty.

"What're you doing?" Nairi asked him, and Cameron shrugged.

"Why're you sad?" He figured he might as well skip straight to the point. From what he'd seen Nairi wasn't the type to respond to anything that wasn't blunt, and Cam wasn't exactly a fan of small talk anyway. If he was relying on these two to get him... wherever it was he was going to end up now, he didn't want them to be caught up on whatever it was that had happened.

It took the werecat a moment to react, staring at him with startled golden eyes that were altogether so catlike that Cameron wondered how he'd ever been surprised that his saviour had been in some way feline. "Don't know what you mean," was the eventual reply, accompanied by a shrug.

"I heard you last night," Cameron pushed, staring at the older boy. "I've not been sleeping well, so... I was awake."

Nairi flinched, grimacing at he realised that deflecting him wasn't going to be as easy as he'd evidently hoped. He didn't seem poised to offer anything else, though, so Cameron kept going. "Did Robin say something? Or do something?"

"No," Nairi snapped back, a little too quickly. So it was something to do with the two of them, rather than something else beyond Cam's knowledge. Hopefully nothing too bad.

"Did you?" He asked. "Why were you ... y'know?"

"Don't see that it's any of your business, kid," Nairi muttered, scowling like a thundercloud.

"If you don't tell me, I'll go and ask Robin why he thinks you might have been." That got the reaction he'd been hoping for. Nairi's eyes widened and he shook his head hurriedly.

"No! Don't..." He let out a frustrated groan, putting his head in his hands. "Why do you even care?"

Cameron thought for a moment. Why did he? Sure, there was a chance that it might mean that his protectors weren't as focused as they could be, but in the grand scheme of things he doubted that would make a difference. They might even leave him with this Charlie person, since she probably had a better way to get to the nearest town than walking. No, he wasn't that mercenary, not really.

So he shrugged. "I dunno. I guess I thought ... you've been nice to me. I wanted to see if there was anything I could do." He'd always helped Harry with things like that, and all his schoolfriends. And he was starting to suspect that despite being a fair bit older than him, Nairi didn't have a lot of experience with ... talking to people. As if his speech patterns weren't clue enough, the conversations he'd overheard between him and Robin had hinted at it.

Nairi's irritated glare turned softer for a moment, and he sighed. "It's nothing you can help with. Thanks, but..."

"You like him, don't you?" Cameron interrupted, taking a gamble. He immediately knew that he was right, when the werecat's eyes widened and his pale cheeks went red. Cam was almost proud with himself, before he remembered how obvious it had been. The real surprise was that Robin seemed to be oblivious to it. "Did he... turn you down?"

"Wh- No-" It was all Cam could do to avoid an amused smile at the way Nairi stumbled in an attempt to answer without giving himself away. "Don't know what you're talking about, kid, you've got it wrong. I..."

"Aw, don't lie to me..." Cam folded his arms. "I'm not stupid, you know. You stare at him the same way my friends stare at the girls they like. And you were willing to die for him even though he doesn't die permanently, right? Dunno anything but love that'd make someone do something that stupid."

Nairi was just staring at him, utterly speechless, and Cam grinned. "Betcha thought you were being subtle, right?"

The werecat groaned again, but instead of frustrated, he sounded almost despairing. Cam's grin turned to a frown. "He's probably known the entire time, hasn't he? I'm such an-"

"Actually..." Cameron interrupted. "I dunno about that." He'd noticed that Robin wasn't exactly the sharpest tool in the shed in some matters, and was almost as socially clumsy as Nairi, albeit he made up for it more with enthusiasm. "He seems kind of ..."

"An idiot?" Nairi proffered dryly. Cam snorted, nodding.

"Yeah, kinda. I don't think he's noticed." He shrugged. It wasn't certain, but given how oblivious the older of the two acted, Cam wouldn't have been surprised if Nairi's attachment had gone entirely over his head.

"Probably because it's something that'd never occur to him." Nairi muttered, shaking his head. "It doesn't matter anyway. Better that he doesn't know."

"Why?" Cam tilted his head, frowning. He'd picked up enough from last night's argument before Robin stormed off to guess at the answer. The werecat didn't like letting people close, because he was afraid of losing them. But given what Robin had been saying during that same argument, Cam could hardly see him abandoning his friend just because of some misplaced romantic feelings.

"Would only make things weird, at best." Nairi stared off at the horizon wistfully. "Whatever."

"I think you're being stupid," Cam stated matter-of-factly. "You take loads of risks with everything else, but you're not willing to risk making things kinda weird for a little bit? C'mon, I asked one of my best friends out, and she was so not into me... like, she turned out to be into girls, but anyway... it was awkward for a while, but not because of her. I just took a while to get over her. And I could only do that 'cause I actually told her. It wasn't so bad, in the end."

"Can't believe I'm getting love advice from a ..." Nairi glanced at him, hesitating for a moment in what Cam figured was an attempt to guess his age.

"Fourteen year old," he interjected helpfully. Nairi'd probably have been off the mark without help. He looked fairly young for his age.

"...yeah."

"I mean, at a guess, I've probably had more-" He started, wondering just how innocent in this regard Nairi actually was.

"Don't want to hear about it!" Nairi interrupted, his grimace making Cam snicker. He supposed that was fair. He probably wouldn't want to either, if their roles were reversed.

"Anyway, I think you should just tell him." If for no other reason that otherwise the blatant romantic tension was going to drive him up the wall for the next however many days they were together. He supposed it was at least distracting.

There was a loud bang from inside the barn, followed by a groan of discomfort.

Robin had fallen into one of the many cans lined up against the walls in his sleepy stupor. He rolled onto his feet and looked around, rubbing his eyes.

Nairi's eyes flicked down towards the window, and Cameron sighed. "Well, whatever. He's gonna find out sooner or later. " He leaned back onto the rooftop, watching the sunrise in the distance. The werecat said nothing, but his brow was furrowed in thought.

Ambling towards the open spot on the ceiling, Robin pursed his lips and furrowed his brow crankily.

"Hello?" he called. "Why're you guys up there?"

Cam shuffled down into view of the window, looking down at the older boy. "Just watching the sunrise. And talking," he said, shrugging.

"Going to go see if Charlie is awake," Nairi said, drawing Cam's attention back to him as he rose to his feet. "Need to ask her some things about the next town, and when she wants us gone by."

Without waiting for a reply, the werecat had stepped down to the edge of the roof and nimbly hopped off. Cam's heart skipped a beat, before he remembered how acrobatic Nairi was. The saying about cats landing on their feet probably applied to him too.

"Wait, hold on-" Robin called, trying to climb up onto the roof. He saw the werecat depart as he landed. "Darnit," he grumbled. "He didn't even say good morning."

He looked toward Cam and sleepily grinned. "But you're here! Good morning."

"Morning," Cam replied with a little less enthusiasm, though he managed to muster a smile. He paused, biting his lip and frowning. Should he ask Robin about what had happened? Nairi wouldn't want him to, but Nairi had all the social maneuvering skills of ... well, a cat.

"What exactly happened last night? After you guys argued."

Robin scratched his cheek and rolled his eyes to the top of his head in thought. "Last night? I remember I fell asleep... then... Nairi..." The boy seemed genuinely confused about the events that had passed.

He did remember that there was a rock in his gut that he hadn't been able to get rid of. The young immortal frowned. "I tried to talk to him, and let him know that I wasn't leaving. I don't think he believes me."

Cam looked down at his lap. It didn't make much sense to him. Why would Nairi think that way? "Did you say anything else?" He looked up, hesitating. "He seemed pretty upset about something. After you both got back, and you'd gone to sleep."

"Um... he said... that I couldn't be happy with..." He narrowed his eyes and wrinkled his forehead. "With... just surviving long enough to be his friend. I think he was saying that I didn't need to bother about being useless."

"Kind of a weird thing to say," Cam tilted his head. "Sorta ... I dunno, self-centred, out of context. Like you don't need to be anything else and should just be his friend, and that's it. Is he normally that... controlling?"

"Mmm. I don't... think so. Is that bad?" Robin asked Cam. "I'm using you as reference. Haven't really had a normal life with someone else, you know?"

The teenager sighed, drooping his forehead onto his knees. "Gods, you're both as bad as each other..." he muttered under his breath, before looking up again. "Sort of. But that's only if you didn't misinterpret him. He seems like, super protective, but not like he wouldn't want you to do your own thing. I dunno." He'd only known these guys for a few days. What was he doing trying to give them advice?

Keeping his head busy, he supposed. Better than the alternative.

"I don't know. I actually don't know Nairi as much as I'd like to. We've been together forever but I only know that he's grumpy most of the time and he never had a friend that stuck around. This trip has been a bit... eye opening for us."

Maybe he would be seeing sides of Nairi that he never expected to see. Last night was certainly a surprise.

Cam drummed his fingers on the rooftop. "Eye opening how?" he prompted.

"Well, we've been friends for months. Saved each other's lives. I died to help him and... I can't remember ever staying behind for someone else like that before. And after all that, when we were walking here, we find out we don't even know each other. Not really."

"Don't you?" Cam frowned. "You don't need to know every little thing about someone to know them, y'know. I couldn't tell you anything about most of my friends' childhoods, except the like ... two who I know from elementary. Some things just never really come up, I guess."

"But you're a teenager," Robin pointed out. "There's really not a lot of important things by that time. Well, for a normal teenager. It's... different when you're older."

"Don't see how," Cam answered, shrugging. "Sure, knowing more about someone helps you understand them, but the person you know is just... them, isn't it? How they are now. You know that, right?"

Robin took off his cap and scratched the top of his head. "Hmm. I guess I haven't had much time to think of it. Maybe I did, at some point." He frowned. "Nairi was right. I have the maturity of a twelve year old!"

"Well I'm not gonna disagree with you..." Cameron snorted. "Look, uhm. We got a little sidetracked there. What I was trying to get at is... maybe if you don't understand why he would be upset about what you think he is, try thinking of other things he could be upset about..?" He almost winced. That hadn't made much sense, and it'd been clumsy at that.

"I..." Robin paused. There was any amount of things that could upset Nairi. He was naturally grumpy. That wasn't grumpy, though. Last night was... difficult for the werecat for a different reason. "I... can't imagine why."

Cameron sighed. "Well, I dunno. Think about it, some. Maybe you'll have a revelation eventually." Unlikely, he thought. If he'd known the pair of them better, he'd have just spilled the beans already. But that probably wasn't the best idea, since he didn't really know how it would go. "Think we should go see if there's breakfast?"

Robin's chin sunk into his knees. None of it was sitting right with him, but nothing was sitting right in his stomach, either, and that was important for milling over serious matters.

"Of course," he mumbled.

"Cool!" Cam pushed himself forwards to slide down the roof until he was level with the window, stopping himself precariously close to the edge before shuffling across to climb back past Robin through the window. "I hope there are sausages... and eggs." The thought of a proper breakfast, after several days of travel food, was making Cam's mouth water already.

"Probably demon goat sausages..." Robin remarked. "Or hellchickens. I hope you like spicy food!"

"Anything's gotta be better than more jerky or packet food," Cam wrinkled his nose. "Come on, they're probably waiting for us already."

With that, he started down the ladder, and the two made their way towards the farmhouse itself.

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

The house was filled with the smell of sizzling animal fat, grits, and spices. Charlie had set everything up on a table in the center of the kitchen, along with five plates.

Charlie took one of them, but took her time before loading anything on her plate. She let her head roll over the backrest. Her eyes were sunken in and dark. She was wearing the same clothes as the day before.

Robin was already helping himself as he took a seat, warily eyeing Charlie.

"Are you okay, miss?" It was Cameron that piped up, watching their host with concern. Nairi was sat in solemn silence, continuing to avoid eye contact with Robin, who glanced at him briefly.

Charlie waved her hand dismissively. "Ain't nothin'. Dog been yippin' all night. Can't get a damn wink of sleep."

"Does he normally do that?" Cameron frowned. When their dog had developed a barking problem, they'd taken her to classes until she stopped. He couldn't imagine just living with it. It had been bad enough for a few weeks.

"Well, no, but given yesterday's incident, it only makes sense. Found critters stuck to the fence this mornin'. They actin' up an awful lot. You done somethin' to royally piss 'em off, I reckon'."

Cameron grimaced at that, and looked down at his plate, refocusing his attention on eating.

"Certainly killed enough of them," Nairi muttered. "You'd think they'd take a hint." Who would have thought that they'd be being chased through the countryside by gremlins of all things? It was somewhat embarrassing.

"Cantankerous lil' buggers," complained Charlie. "I'd set the pups out there but they'd take the forest and everyone in it."

"It's almost not a bad idea," mused Robin. "I doubt there's very many people who'd go in there and survive anyway."

Charlie opened one eye to stare at the immortal. Robin ducked his head and took a spoonful of grits into his mouth.

"Lots of wildlife, though. Not to mention any people we don't know about. Could be dryads, fey, hermits. Anything, really." Nairi shook his head. He doubted Robin had been being serious, but one could never be sure with him.

"How far do you think they'll chase us?" Cameron asked quietly, concern evident on his face. "Do you think they have any more of those... insect things?"

"Couldn't say with certainty." Nairi grimaced. "But unlikely. Looked like it was a captive. Probably the result of an anomaly. Midlands are fucked up, even out of Westeria."

"Ain't always been this bad," said Charlie. "But I guess that ain't much reassurance, comin' from a demon farmer."

Charlie leaned forward to sit up in her chair and scoop food into the plate at her left, where the empty seat lay, before serving herself. "As for them chasin' you, I've got that somewhat covered. Smokes will follow ya some time down the road. He's more than a handful for them critters."

Robin looked doe-eyed at the woman, food dribbling from his lip. The woman raised a brow.

"No."

The immortal's eyes drooped immediately in disappointment.

Nairi nodded his head. "Appreciate it. According to my map, we should reach the next town by dusk if we set a decent pace. Hopefully it's still intact. Can get you help getting to somewhere safe," he looked to Cameron, who nodded mutely. He didn't look altogether enthusiastic about the idea.

As far as Cameron was concerned, there wasn't exactly anything waiting for him in 'safety'. Was he expected to just go back to normality, now that everyone was... gone? He didn't even know where his friends had gone, when they'd evacuated with the masses. Maybe if he could go to stay with one of them, he'd be okay. Maybe.

Charlie stared at the youngest of the three boys for a good, solid moment. She looked away before he could speak about it, and let out a loud whistle.

Smokes barelled down the stairs with the grace of a panicked goose. Ashes scattered on the floor as he flipped onto his feet and leaped over Nairi into the empty chair that was far too small for him.

"I'm barely aquainted with that town, so I haven't been there in a good minute. I ain't got a car, so I can't take a quick round trip. Wish I could tell you more, sorry I can't."

"It's fine. You've done more than enough," Nairi mumbled, readjusting himself on his seat after having almost fallen off in instinctive panic when the oversized mutt had bounded straight at him. He coughed, doing his best to regain his composure.

Across from him, Cam suppressed a giggle, which didn't help. Charlie snorted, and Robin's cheeks inflated.

"Well, if you come by this place again, let me know what it's like down the road. Radio don't work, and everyone that left ain't come back. Dogs're good company, but they ain't good talkers," said Charlie.

Smokes dabbed a foot in his plate and pressed his paw against Charlie's face with a defiant "woof."

"Aw, c'mon!" she complained, rubbing her cheek in her shirt.

"Will do. But we should probably get going sooner rather than later," Nairi said, looking out the window. "It's already mid-morning. If we want to get to town by nightfall, we need to make a move."

Cameron sighed heavily. At least once they got to safety, whatever else happened, there would be a lot less walking.

"Good thinkin'. Take a lil' somethin' for the road if you want. I ain't usin' much," said Charlie, getting up from her chair. She took up her plate and began to scarf its contents down as she walked out back. "Don't die out there."

"Well, you can certainly count on me for that," snorted Robin.

That managed to steal a brief snort of laughter from Nairi, much to the detriment of his sulk. He shook his head, shooting Robin a dry look. "Not for lack of trying, I'm sure."

Robin turned his eyes upward and whistled innocently. "I've been good so far! Sort of."

The smallest smile lit up on Charlie's face. She lifted her bowl to hide it. "Y'all weird as hell. Ain't you supposed to git?" she teased.

"We're ... gitting," Nairi replied, smirking as he stood from the table. "Thanks again, for everything."

"See ya," Cam flashed Charlie a brief smile, moving to follow as Nairi headed out towards the door.

As Robin followed his party, he turned and waved.

"Don't mention it," replied Charlie with a wink. "Take care." She looked at the hellhound and pointed her chin out. "Smokes, take a walk."

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script and Sentry

The trees were thinning out by the time Smokes left them to wander back towards Charlie's ranch. Though Nairi had spotted the occasional pair of beady eyes watching them from the undergrowth, the presence of the hulking hellhound had been more than enough deterrant for the gremlin-things to try anything.

Now, with the canopy largely left behind, the mid-afternoon sun was free to shine down on them unhindered. The air was still cold, but the sunlight took the edge off. It was almost pleasant.

The walk had been quiet. Nairi had made a point of staying at the front of their little group, rather than falling back to walk alongside Robin. He'd been careful to cast an occasional glance backwards, though, to make sure he wasn't setting a pace too taxing for Cameron. After his talkative morning, the boy had settled back into his former silence, focused on putting one foot in front of the other. Nairi wasn't even sure if he'd noticed that they'd left the trees, since he didn't seem to have looked up since.

Though they were past the forest, the werecat was careful not to let his guard down. Out in the open, with only a barrier of hedges and fences separating them from farmland, danger had little in the way of places to hide. But if there was anything that the Midlands had in abundance these days, it was surprises. He wasn't going to let himself get caught out by whatever bizarre threat they next ran into.

Most of the trip had been spent leering att he forest until the creatures could be seen no more. Having Smokes there was comforting, but Robin felt strongly about having one permanently.

Robin had been watching Nairi as they walked. Though the silence was nothing new, there was something about the werecat's distance that set him on edge. Several times he tried to reach out and speak to the other boys, but something would happen to set him off, whether it be Smokes' alarm or movement in the woods.

After they passed the forest, Robin couldn't handle it anymore. He quickened his pace to try and catch up to Nairi. "So... are we there yet?" he said with a grin.

Nairi had heard Robin approaching before the other boy spoke, and took a breath in, mentally readying himself for a conversation - whatever it ended up being about. He shot the immortal a sidelong glance, raising one eyebrow. "Does it look like we are?"

"Hnn... um, well-" Robin bit his lip and splayed his hands out, searching for a witty response. He dropped his arms and sighed heavily. "... no. But I did want to talk, you know? About where we're going. About why we're going there. I mean, it's not something we can ignore."

Nairi looked back at the road ahead with an uncomfortable frown. "It's called Hearthsgrove," he answered after a moment. "Going there to restock and ... " he sighed, shaking his head. There wasn't any point in trying to deflect the question by deliberately misinterpreting it. "Nevermind. What... what do you mean? Specifically."

Robin stuck out his jaw at the werecat. "I saw what you were trying to do there," he mumbled. He took in a deep breath and looked ahead as he spoke. "About why this ties in with your past, Nairi. What we're going to achieve at the end of this trip, and not just the next town, or the clue after that, or the one after that. Do you think... your family is still alive?"

Nairi flinched, his frown deepening. That was a question and a half. What was he supposed to think, when he had nothing to go on? "I don't know," he answered, looking down at his feet. "I don't remember them. Nothing more than ... remembering I had one. If we find these slavers, they might have answers. Might be able to tell me that."

He looked across at Robin, his eyes accusatory. "We're doing this because you ... you pushed me to." Because you gave me the courage, he wanted to say, but he balked at how foolish it sounded in his head. His mind went back to their conversation on the shore of the island on Lake Aranai, and he turned away with a grimace. He'd been an idiot, getting caught in that moment.

"And you were convinced because you wanted to know," countered Robin. His cheeks dimpled with his smile. "Because, more than anything, you want to know where they are, right? If there's even a sliver of a chance, it would be good to know!"

The werecat was silent for a long moment, to the point where it wasn't clear if he was going to answer at all. Eventually, though, he looked up again. He didnt turn back to Robin, his eyes resting on the horizon as he spoke. "Yeah. I ... I don't remember them, like I said. But... sometimes I get glimpses. Not proper memories. No faces, no names. Not even numbers. Just ... feelings."

His expression darkened. "One of the strongest is feeling like ... like I failed them, somehow. Like there was something I was supposed to do. Or someone to protect. And I didn't. I don't even remember why, or what I failed at. And that feels like a failure too."

Hearing this, Robin frowned. "I... I'm sure there's a good explanation," he blurted. "I'm sure that it wasn't your fault, if it was that long ago. Only so much a kid can do."

Nairi shrugged noncommittally. "Don't know. Just remember that feeling," he said, shaking his head. "That's the closest thing to a memory I have of them."

He snorted. "Kind of pathetic. But whatever."

"Th-that's not true!" blurted Robin. "None of it sounded like a good situation. We're on this trip so you can have more than that, at least."

Nairi gave a weak smile, nodding half-heartedly. "Yeah. Hopefully."

His eyes drifted down from the skyline, and he walked on in silence for a time before speaking again. "Sorry. For ... acting weird. This morning, and last night. Shouldn't forget that you're going through all this shit for me. You deserve better than ... sulking."

Robin gently thudded his fist into the werecat's arm. "It hasn't been an easy trip, and you're not really the smiley type. It's gotta be stressful. It... took me a while to notice that. It shouldn't have."

"Yeah, well," Nairi folded his arms behind his head, shrugging. "Keeping you alive is stressful at the best of times, so..." He smirked, although there wasn't a great deal of humour to his eyes. Sure - stress was probably at least partly to blame. So they could go with that. It saved him any expectation of an explanation, at least.

The immortal blew air through his nose. "That should be my job, too!" he whined. "And keeping you alive, too."

"Suppose I'm not dead yet, so you can't be doing too badly at it," Nairi noted, snorting. "Anyway, not starting this argument again. We can both keep each other alive. And ourselves."

The immortal nodded. "I can agree with that one."

 

[Tiko]

3 months ago...

The mercenary band that Elie traveled in the company of had been staking out roads between the Midlands and the Northlands for a good three weeks now where they preyed openly upon travelers seeking passage into the Northlands and away from the ever tumultuous Midlands. Though the events that would tear the Midlands asunder and throw it into pure anarchy were not to pass for another three months yet, rumors of the growing anomalies and a decline in regional stability had left the numbers of people departing growing greater by the day. It was almost as if they sensed the proverbial storm on the horizon and were looking to distance themselves from it.

These individuals proved easy targets for Elie's mercenary company, who often resorted to marauding and extortion when jobs were thin. Many a traveler had found their passage barred as they were relieved of any valuables in their possession before being sent on their way. 'Taxes' for keeping the roads safe for them. The entire operation was highly illegal, but this far north left them well beyond the immediate concern of the TNG authorities who had more pressing crises at hand.

Opportunistic as ever, Elie's company would milk the misfortune of others for every penny they could before moving on to avoid drawing distant authorities down upon them.

Elie himself was left to wonder if this was all there was left for him in life, a thought that no doubt had been plaguing him as his company fell to more and more amoral means of acquiring wealth. This past week in particular his sleep had been plagued by a reoccurring dream calling him back north, to his homeland.

Within the dream, Elie always found himself standing atop an icy ridge surveying the far reaches of the land that stretched for miles upon miles. At his back a regal temple stood sentinel, both tall and proud with its banner flying high. The banner was unmistakable to a child of the Northlands. It was the banner of the Elysian Vanguard, legendary heroes and champions that watched over the lands of Valore.

As he stood there atop the mountain in his dreams, the cold chill of the wind would bite at his skin with unrelenting fury, but strength always hardened his heart for the coming storm. The realm cried out for champions, for those who could weather the perils they will face in the days to come.

Each dream had ended the same way, with the same voice that reached him upon the wind carrying the strength of the mountains in its resonating words.

'The Champions gather.'

---​

Tonight though, the dream had changed. Instead of standing atop the mountain Elie found himself standing at the bottom of the mountain staring into the fury of an unrelenting snowstorm. Around him the snow was stained crimson with blood, and the bodies of men and women lay broken and motionless in the snow, barely visible through the blinding snow. In his hand he held a sword with a shattered blade.

Ahead of him a figure approached through the snow, but it wasn't until the figure was all but upon him that he could make out her draconic visage. Though humanoid in stature, there was no mistaken the figure as anything but a draconian, native to the lands of Caldonia far to the south. She was an imposing individual, standing at about six-foot-eight with a bony snout and a mouth full of vicious looking fangs. Her startling visage did little to abate the sense of divinity that permeated her body though. Armored head to foot, she had the look of a warrior, a champion.

"This is no place to be lost," she growled, her voice rough and gravely. "The storm is upon you. Tell me, what is it that you seek here?"

 

[Lord_Deathstalker]

3 Months ago...
Elie looked at what to him was a god. He took a deep breath the icy air burning his lungs. His hands started to feel tacky looking down he saw they were covered in blood to the elbow. In horror, he began rubbing. Revealing more layers of dried blood. Falling to his knees Elie grabbed handfuls of the icy snow and began scrubbing. All but forgetting the presence as he removed layer after layer. Tell he found what was beneath the blood. And it was not human. The fingers ended in black talons. The skin was inky black and oily covered in hellish glowing symbols.
In that light, he saw all of his murders. The most resent a man on the road who had fought the company stabbing a close friend of Elie's he had beheaded him. Then it was the woman archer in the squirmish to the south. Next, the farmer who had tried to stab Elie when he road through his village. Murder after murder and Elie knew he could not hide what the light was showing him from what was standing over him. Tears began coursing down his cheeks to freeze in the storm. Then it was his tribe. This unlike the others was seen from above. As a nine-year-old Elie laid out the ritual to talk to Valic Surespear to get advice on his spear work. The summoning started out normal the blue light crossing into Elie than Hellfire and the smell of sulfur as something took control of the spell. There was no long prolonged fight over Elie's body like in the tales his elder had told him. Elie was just gone. Elie's eye's turned black filled with two points of fire. His body changed his hands looking like they had been dipped in pitch. It moved from his talons to the back of his hands. Then up his arms to bite into his cheeks.
Elie set out to his village. At first, they did not know what was happening. Soon they found out and get spears and swords. Coming after what was once Elie. They could have been sleeping for all the good the weapons in their hands helped them. He cut them down like a synth at the harvest.
Then he was standing above Elder Jereck his hand holding a few his innards. "Enough I will give my body when I die if you just stop this!" Elie shouted unheard.
Then a voice like rotting flesh and rolling rocks spoke. "a Bargain struck." The Hellish light faded and Elie looked up tears frozen on his cheeks.
"I want... I want peace" Elie said threw a horse voice. His arms wrapped around like they were the only thing keeping him together. His eyes not seeing anything, his breath clouding in the storm.

 

[Tiko]

"You who have ripped peace from so many others?" the draconian woman asked harshly. "You stand now before the resting place of champions. Heroes who have laid down their lives to defend that peace that you have torn from those they sought to protect. Here upon this hallowed ground you would now seek peace for yourself?"

The draconian's voice was harsh as she cast judgement upon Elie, seemingly unshaken by his grief and regret.