Travlack slept with his shield strapped to his arm. His weapons lay on either side of him just within reach, sparsely illuminated from the cracks in the caved in wall. He lay completely still, save for his ears which twitched softly.
Something was moving.
Behind closed eyes, Travlack had already woken up. Whatever was moving, he was well aware of it.
More twitching from his ears. More information.
He exhaled, slowly opening his eyes. Hunched over him was Chrissy, staring back at him. Neither of them moved from their spots on the floor. Travlack remained unfazed while blinking back at her. Finally, Chrissy spoke first.
As always.
"I don't know how to tell you this, so I'll just say it-the way you blink is weird. Not in a bad way! But, wow. Vertical eyelids. Can you do it again?"
Travlack rolled over and got up without a word. He gathered his weapons and secured them back onto his belt before walking towards the rubble blocking the entrance.
"I don't mean to make it weird!" Chrissy pleaded. "It's just so…"
Travlack turned his head and met her eyes with a completely neutral expression. After Chrissy had read his face, she pursed her lips and looked away. Travlack turned back towards the rubble and took the handle extension from his belt. Attaching it to his mace, he wound up a strike and let it fly.
With one strike he had made considerable progress. Travlack put his palm into the small crater and felt it over, satisfied with the first attempt. He twisted the extended mace in his hand and reaffirmed his grip before winding another strike.
A hand pulled back at the apex of his wind up. Travlack twitched his ears once, looking back to see Chrissy's hand on his mace. She was looking into the dark of the cave with a worried expression.
Chrissy spoke after a moment.
"Three things. One, we're missing Neville. Two, great swing. And three, something else felt it too."
Travlack's ears flicked together as he pulled his mace from her hand. He deconstructed the mace and its extension before strapping it back onto his belt. Travlack opted to manually remove the rubble with his bare hands, prying whatever loose rock he could find and tossing it to the side. He could feel Chrissy staring at him while he continued his task.
"What?", he asked, still moving the rubble.
"Did you not hear me?" sighed Chrissy. "We're not leaving Neville here!"
Travlack loosened another boulder, nudging it to the side. He exhaled as he scanned the wall of rubble. It was twice his size, maybe three. Travlack turned back to Chrissy, who had her hands on her hips. Travlack glanced over at the wall of rubble, assessing his options.
One one hand, stubborn debris.
On the other, a stubborn ranger.
Travlack closed his eyes, this had become a difficult decision.
"We find bat," he started, "Then we leave. No more research. No more ranger duty."
Chrissy sucked her teeth at that last part.
"Just a little bit of ranger duty? A modest amount?"
"None," growled Travlack through his tusks.
He walked past Chrissy with his hand on the side of the cave, acting as his guide. The eyes had not yet adjusted to the darkness, and every three or so steps was met with a bump or crack in the cave floor. His rigid toes simply registered the information without pain and moved on. Chrissy swore every three or so steps, hitting the same bumps and cracks. A hand landed onto Travlack's shoulder, halting him. The tips of his ears touched together as he turned to see Chrissy, speaking through gritted teeth.
"I would REALLY appreciate it if you let me know when I'm going to stub my toe for the tenth time. Unlike you, I don't have stumps for legs and feet."
"Where's light?" he responded. He made a gesture similar to the one she used to brighten the forest earlier.
"Trust me, I want to, but I can't. Too bright of a light could bring more problems I don't need."
"Now you think. Before, not at all. But now, you think."
"For the record, I always think," Chrissy snapped. "I just prefer to do more. Let's go."
Even through the dark, Travlack could make out a vein popping from her forehead. Chrissy's hand remained on Travlack's shoulder as he led her through the cave, calling out where potential hazards would be.
The elevation inside the cave declined slowly. The deeper they ventured, the more they found themselves relying on the speckles of light coming from the ceiling. The silhouette of the stalactites became increasingly visible the further they went.
The next section of the cave they came to had puddles of glowing slime decorating the floor. Coming into full view of the cavern, several glow grubs were squirming on the ground in their own bioluminescent ooze. One fell from the ceiling and splattered next to another.
A wet impact was heard from behind, followed by a groan from Chrissy.
Travlack turned to see a plump glow grub had fallen onto her head. Its bioluminescent slime caused her face to glow. Chrissy had closed her eyes to avoid the goo from entering them. Travlack watched Chrissy remove the grub with rigid shoulders and place it onto the ground. While she attempted to scoop the slime from her hair, Travlack reached for the grub.
It was plump, glowing, and squirming in his hand. He had also not had breakfast yet. If it was to fall from the roof of the cave, so be it. Travlack notched the grub over a tusk and twisted it violently, breaking the body in half. The taste of the grub relaxed his ears, drooping softly as he chewed and swallowed. The ooze of the grub dribbled down his beard, softly illuminating his face. He flicked a tongue to collect what nutrients he could before Chrissy interrupted the meal.
"Did you just-"
Chrissy's hair was still glowing, allowing Travlack to see her disgust. She flicked her eyes from the mess on his beard back to his stare as she recoiled slightly. Travlack extended the other half of the grub, causing her to lean back further.
"Eat."
He extended the grub further. Chrissy used both hands to push it back towards him.
"You seem to be enjoying it more than I could. I'll get the next one."
Travlack heard another wet splat behind him. Turning around, he gestured to the fallen grub.
Chrissy rolled her eyes and coated her hand in the mucus of where she initially threw the first grub. Travlack continued eating, observing Chrissy stand and focus on her hand. Shortly after her next exhale the hand glowed softly, showing the path forward.
"Now that my toes aren't in danger of being stubbed every other step," she said in a sardonic tone, "We can up the pace."
Travlack watched Chrissy maneuver around the uneven ground, her hair also casting a soft glow. He polished off the rest of his grub, then followed behind her. Where Chrissy was careful not to disturb the puddles of glowing ooze on the ground. She froze upon hearing Travlack's foot splash right in the middle of one.
They met eyes. Chrissy glanced down to see Travlack's bare feet now covered in bioluminescence. Travlack stared back at Chrissy, flicking his ears together as they stood in the silence of the cave. She spoke first.
As always.
"Does that not…do you not…care?"
Travlack blinked. Then he spoke.
"You a ranger? Afraid of dirt?"
"I don't care about dirt," Chrissy scoffed. "I'm the first to get my hands dirty, as a matter of fact. But that's only when I need to! You just…walk right through it. I like being clean, I can also mind not being dirty on purpose."
Travlack picked up another glow grub and broke it off with his tusk. Not breaking eye contact, he chewed with his mouth open and swallowed audibly. He continued to chew loudly with the other half of the grub before setting his hands at rest in front of him.
"Ranger afraid of dirt. Ranger afraid of dark. Watch."
Travlack focused. His skin started to ripple and bump. The muffled sound of something shifting beneath his skin uneased Chrissy. It was over as quick as he had started. With a grunt, Travlack's skin illuminated the entire room with a controlled glow. Chrissy wiped the slime from her hand on a stalagmite before inspecting Travlack.
"Kero viscer…", she marveled. "You can do that?."
"Igosi trick," Travlack said, marching on. "Bug eaters."Travlack moved on to the other end of the cave with Chrissy in tow. Periodically, another
glow grub would splatter down from the ceiling. Each time another grub fell his ears twitched to identify where it had fallen. In between the sounds of a grub meeting the floor he would search for any indication of Neville.
The next section of the cave opened up to a massive river with a natural walkway beside it. Though Travlack could glow, the path ahead was only revealed by a couple of steps. He put a hand against the wall and started to move his ears, eyes closed.
The sounds of water.
The rumblings of the cave.
The ambience of the grubs.
Nothing of Neville.
Travlack opened his eyes and steadied himself against the wall. Though he had heard nothing pertaining to the task at hand, the cost of focus had been dutifully paid.
As always.
Chrissy had appeared looming over him, gazing out at the water. Though Travlack had not heard anything from Neville,
"Now we're getting somewhere," she smiled. "And with a pond…"
Chrissy turned and grabbed a glow grub from the ground. It wriggled in her hand before being impaled on the end of one of her hooks.
"Comes fish! Seeing as you got to choose your breakfast, I'm going to go get mine."
Travlack and Chrissy made their way down to the lake cavern walkway. They rounded the arc of the wall to find a small alcove, it was here Chrissy stopped him. With a sneer on her face, she held her hook in the water and dangled the bait. The bioluminescent ooze dimly lit the surrounding water, allowing for some vision in the darkened pool.
"And," she continued, "we can bring some back to camp. I'm sure Nathaniel will forgive us for sneaking off if we bring back rations."
Travlack raised a heavy brow.
"Us?"
Chrissy looked back at Travlack, her hook still dangling in the water.
"Yeah, us. You and me. The both of us," she said.
"You left. I followed. No us. Only you."
Travlack could see a small spot of dark in the water. Chrissy kept speaking.
"While technically true, I was just doing my job. So you left camp when I went to do my job, making this an us thing. See how that works?"
"I do not see," growled Travlack. "And-"
The dark spot had grown larger. Bubbles appeared in sparse amounts under her hook.
"And you brought the rubble down behind us," Chrissy interrupted. "Scaring Neville off, so-"
Travlack had tuned her out. His ears were moving on their own as he put all of his focus onto the water.
Travlack could see the maw of a large fish open.
"Move!"
Travlack had given the warning too late. A gaping mouth disrupted the water and snapped shut, pulling Chrissy over the small ledge.
Travlack barely had time to grab a foot before the rest of her disappeared into the water. He dug his feet into the ground, fighting for any sort of control in the situation. In between resurfacing briefly, Chrissy was yelling instructions.
"I got it! Just-
-it's huge! Keep-
-arm's tired! I'm-"
Travlack was slowly losing ground. His feet were dragging towards the edge of the water slowly, but surely. Whatever was surging below had renewed its efforts, with its next pull launching Travlack over the edge.
Everything after that moved in slow motion for Travlack.
He barely managed to see his reflection over the water. All he had heard was loud buzzing moving faster than he could perceive it with his eyes. Travlack blinked once and realized he was back onto the alcove. He turned to see Chrissy beside him with her catch flopping frantically. Travlack then swiveled to see a man at the back of the alcove holding his hands up in a defensive posture. Chrissy remained oblivious to the new company as she spoke.
"HA! Breakfast! Travlack, whatever those bugs did to you is awesome because for a second there I was-"
Finally, she saw what Travlack saw.
A man, sparsely covered in feathers from head to toe. Short, fine feathers of verdant green shivered off of him as he panted. He had no clothes, save for the pants which had large holes in the knees.
Travlack studied the unknown man. From his stance, it was clear that he was no aggressor. From his actions, it was clear he had helped. Whether or not he would continue to do so was undetermined.
Travlack turned to Chrissy, attempting to read a reaction from her. She was more concerned about protecting her newest catch, a fish as large as a child squirming in her arms. Nothing but the wet sounds of a fish's struggle was heard for the next couple of seconds. Chrissy momentarily loosened her grip to find her pocket knife, and stabbed it into the head of the fish. With her breakfast secured, all had truly gone quiet.
Then the feathered man spoke.
"I'm Lanon. I h-heard the noise and came to see w-what it was. Then I saw you almost land in the w-water, and my body just moved. I promise I'm n-no threat."
Travlack kept scanning Lanon. This man indeed presented no threat, but why wouldn't Travlack's ears come down from alert? His examination was cut short by the sounds of a fish slamming onto the ground.
"I'm Chrissy, and that glowing man is Travlack," she gestured. "Thanks for the assist. Also, have you seen a fruit bat? Quite large? Answers to Neville?"
Travlack nudged Chrissy. She smacked her teeth, meeting his eyes.
"Too much info. Unnecessary words."
Just as Chrissy went to respond, Lanon spoke.
"N-nice to meet you. And yes. I've s-seen a bat."
Chrissy and Travlack turned to Lanon. He was still holding a defensive stance against the wall. Travlack felt a finger poke against the tip of his ear. He whipped back towards Chrissy, twitching his ears rapidly. She was eye level with Travlack as she whispered.
"He probably knows where the exit is. We have breakfast, we ask poultry man how to get out of here, find Neville, and get out of here. Simple. Let me do the talking."
Travlack rolled his eyes and kept scanning the feathered man.
"Lanon, right, are you hungry? As thanks for saving Travlack, you can have breakfast with us! You have any place in this cave where we can cook this?"
Travlack kept staring. Lanon averted his gaze and started to nervously pick at his arm feathers.
A finger flicked Travlack's ear.
He slowly turned to Chrissy.
"It's rude to stare," she chided. "You're making him nervous."
"I promise I n-not a threat. I just live in the c-cave. Right o-over the water there."
"See? He's right over there. Lead the way, Lonan!"
"L-Lanon."
"Sorry, Lanon!" Chrissy grunted. She was struggling to get the bleeding fish over her shoulder.
"If I m-may…,"
Travlack witnessed Lanon effortlessly sling the fish over his thin frame. This man could weigh no more than Travlack, and yet Travlack could feel strong vibrations from his steps.
"I'll b-be right back."
That same roaring buzzing sound Travlack that saved Travlack now signaled his departure. Dust flew in the air as Lanon escorted Chrissy over the lake, disappearing from sight. Just seconds later, Lanon was back.
Now he reached for Travlack's hand.
Travlack slowly extended his palm to Lanon. His ears braced for the departure, folding flat onto the back of his head. Lanon wrinkled a brow, getting low to the ground so that he was eye level with Travlack.
"R-ready?"
The deafening buzz was all he heard as Lanon flew him into the darkness across the water.
___
Language Translation:
Kero viscer = How interesting