Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The sun was at its highest spot on the sky, everyone was awake. Especially the mutes. A girl with dark brown hair and brown skin was hiding in the shadows. Her wavy hair was in a loose braid, hanging over her torn shirt. It had used to be a light purple shirt - her favorite from her home, but ever since the portal sent her and her friends to this... Strange world... It had been torn and was now colored grey and brown from dirt. The girl was hungry. She hadn't eaten in a while. After hours of walking, she finally found a store.

A brown bag had been left on the floor together with lots of other items. The young girl picked the bag up, deciding that she could carry food in it. She thought that most of the food would be expired, and it sure was, but she could still find some things that could be eaten without making her belly feel funny. She put all of those things in the backpack, also grabbing band-aids and other things in case she got hurt or started bleeding. She was just about to grab a box of bandages when she could hear two voices getting closer to her. It was two female voices and they sounded young. Hope filled the girl, but she then realized that she didn't recognize those voices. They could mean danger.

As fast as she could, she hid together with a bunch of expired food which smelled awful, but she would do everything to not get caught.

The owners of the voices entered the store and the girl held her breath, hoping that they wouldn’t walk past her, because then she sure would get noticed. As she tried her best to calm herself down from having a panic attack, she could hear them start to talk. They seemed to be searching after something. They were rumaging through the aisles.

"Anything that looks useful, take." a younger girl said, crawling through one of the shelves with first aid-kits.

The shelf broke from her weight, but the young human didn't seem to care as she crawled out on the other side. She was wearing the skin of a dead wolf as a cape, as well as a normal black t-shirt and grey jeans. She wasn't wearing any shoes, and the girl hiding with expired food cringed.

That must hurt a lot.

She noticed another girl a bit away. She had purple skin and seemed less scary than the wolf-girl. She looked normal except for her... Weird skincolor and haircolor... And eyecolor...

She wondered if that was normal in this world to be purple, and it was sad that she soon would have to find out since the chance wasn't big that she would be able to go back home very soon. The purple girl picked up a milk carton and looked at the expiration date with a frown as she read it out loud.

"October 23rd, 2020."

"Yeah, it's expired. By about 200 years." the wolf-girl said in a nonchalant tone as she looked at her purple friend from the other side of the shelf before walking away to search elsewhere for whatever they needed to find.

The purple girl didn't answer her friend, but instead ripped open the top of the carton before turning it upside down. What before would have been runny milk, was now just a ball of rock hard milk which shattered like glass as it fell down to the ground. The purple girl just stared at it before her wolf-dressed friend held up another item.

"Found it!" she called out as she stood on a shelf that had long ago fallen together with a bit of the roof.

"Spot remover? That is for getting out shirt stains." the purple girl said with a raised eyebrow. "No offense, but yours may need a full spin cycle."

The wolf-girl glared at her purple friend with narrowed eyes as she spun the spot remover before putting it in one of her pockets. The third girl in the room who was still hiding together with other expired food couldn't help but giggle at the comment, the purple girl seemed to have ar least a bit of humor. She reminded her of Destiny.

Suddenly, something hit the ground from nearby. A Mega Mute was getting closer to them, the seconds between each step was at least 2 seconds. The wolf-girl looked upwards, listening to the steps before quickly jumping down from the shelf.

"Mega Bunny. It's a good thing we're inside-" she started but was interrupted when the roof suddenly fell down right where she stood, forcing her to fall forwards beside her purple friend with a yell as the two sat on the ground.

The wolf-girl wasn't the only one who fell out, the other girl who had been hiding in the store also fell out, revealing her hiding spot. The wolf-girl glared at the other girl before looking upwards towards the head of an enormous white bunny.

"Whoa!" the purple girl called out with her mouth hanging in curiousity, she had just gotten away from that thing.

"Definitely a Mega Bunny." the wolf-girl noted as the bunny started sniffing around, clearly searching for something.

"I saw that Mega Bunny earlier. I named her Rabbecka. The little ones are so cuddly!" the purple girl said, looking over at her wolf-dressed friend with a nervous smile as she lightly chuckled.

"You touched the babies!?" the wolf-girl said, narrowing her eyes before she had to throw herself and her purple friend away from the spot they sat on as the Mega Bunny's foot trampled straight down on the spot.

The third girl immediately followed the other humans as she didn't want to be left alone with an enormous might-be-dangerous bunny. The wolf-girl narrowed her eyes at the new girl before yelling at her own friend for being so stupid to touch a mute's babies.

"Why did you touch the babies? Don't you know you can't touch the babies!?" she yelled as the two friends panicked, trying to not bet stomped by enormous feet as they ran through the aisles.

"But they were so cute!" the purple girl said with a groan as another foot came towards them, though they managed to get away from it in time.

The wolf-girl looked over the stranger who ran along with them, she had just showed up from nowhere. She glared at her as the three girls kept running through the store.

"And who the heck are you?" the wolf-girl called out, looking through the aisles to find something that was important if they wanted to survive the bunny.

"I'm sorry, I was just searching for food!" the other girl called out back and the wolf-girl rolled her eyes at the answer as she instead started focusing on her new mission.

"Aisle six, baking good. Aisle seven, drinks. Aisle eight..." the wolf-girl noted out loud before she stopped at aisle eight as she found something of interest. "Bingo!" she smirked as she ran to grab a can of some kind of perfume.

When she had the can in her hand, she quickly grabbed the purple girl's arm and dragged her out of the store as the third girl just followed them, not wanting to get squished by a Mega Bunny.

The second they got out, the wolf-girl started spraying her friend with the can. The smell was really strong, and the newcomer in the group sneezed loudly. The purple girl was coughing as she got the spray into her face and nose.

The third girl looked behind her and saw how the Mega Bunny stopped destroying the store as it sniffed the air. The scent from her babies was no longer there, so she started leaving as the three girls walked away from the store.

"I'm pretty sure you got the baby scent off me." the purple girl coughed as her friend sprayed her all over.

"You can't be too careful." the wolf-girl answered just as the can stopped spraying. "Huh?" she looked at the can with a raised eyebrow as she shook it to keep spraying, but nothing came out. "Oh, all out."

"Oh, thank goodness!" the purple girl groaned as she could finally breathe normally.

"It's a good thing I found this second bottle." the wolf-girl muttered as she picked up another bottle and shook it before spraying her friend again.

"You've gotta be kidding me!" she groaned as she coughed again, but her friend didn't let her go.

"This one's Summer Rain." the wolf-girl read from the can before she suddenly realized that another human stood behind her.

She turned around to look at the newcomer, she had never seen her before. She was pretty dark, but not dark enough to be black like herself. She looked hispanic. Her hair was dark-brown and wavy and her eyes matched her hair. Her clothes were ripped and it seemed like they had been new before they were ruined.

"Who are you? Why are you following us?" the wolf-girl said with a growl as she grabbed her staff that had a scorpion stinger on it.

"M-my name's Amrar. I'm sorry for following you, I was searching for food in the store when you came and I thought you meant danger!" the girl said, trying to explain herself.

"Yeah, I do mean danger, so watch yourself!" the wolf-girl said, scorpion staff in hand as she directed it towards Amrar.

Her purple friend put a hand on her shoulder and the wolf-girl retreated, though she didn't take her eyes off of Amrar.

"She's just a girl, just like me! Can't we take her with us?" she begged but the wolf-girl shook her head as she crossed her arms.

"No. It's dangerous enough to bring one burrow girl with me, I don't need another one." the wolf-girl muttered, twirling her straff a few times before stopping.

"I'm sorry, but what's a burrow girl?" Amrar asked and the other two looked at her in confusion.

She was clearly not from the surface, but not either from a burrow, so where did she come from?

"I'm from a burrow, it's basically like a city but underground." the purple girl explained and Amrar gasped in excitement.

"So... It's like this place, but under the ground?" she confirmed and the purple girl nodded.

"Yeah! But if you're not from either of those places, where do you come from?" she asked and Amrar quietened as she tried to decide if she was going to tell these strangers or not.

"Uhhh... It's a little bit complicated... But I'm not from this place. Me and my friends were fighting some monsters but we were somehow sent here instead. We were sent to different directions and I have been trying to find them for a while now." she explained and the purple girl teared up.

"I got away from my dad yesterday, and me and Wolf are trying to find him and the rest of my people! You can come with us and we'll help you find your friends!" the purple girl said with a welcoming smile while the wolf-girl sighed.

"Are you sure?" Amrar asked and the purple girl nodded in excitement as she hugged her as a welcoming gesture.

"Also, my name's Kipo Oak, and this is my friend Wolf." the purple girl said and Amrar smiled.

She finally had some hope to find her friends and her sister.

"Whatever. Let's just go. If we want to find your burrow, we'll have to hurry." Wolf said and Kipo nodded as she took Amrar's hand as they followed Wolf towards a building with a waterfall.

Kipo thought that it was beautiful and so did Amrar. She and her sister had always loved water and she wished that she could have been there with her sister and all of her friends. But hopefully that would soon happen.

The three girls entered the building, they would have to swim all the way up as it was covered in water. Amrar was a great swimmer, she had been taking classes since she was at least 8. She was the first one up and she managed to get out of the water just as Kipo and Wolf came up too. Amrar reached out a hand for Kipo to take, which she did. She tried to help Wolf out too, but the smaller girl just slapped Amrar's hand away from her before she got up from the water herself, standing on all four as she breathed heavily. Amrar looked over at Kipo who just shrugged, Wolf was a whole mood after all.

"Woah, that was way better than taking the stairs!" Kipo commented to get the mood up.

Amrar giggled but Wolf just ignored Kipo and rolled her eyes before standing up again. A big water lily leaf was floating on the water that looked like a water canal. The three girls stood on it and it could hold their weight. Wolf used her straff to push them forward slowly while Kipo tried to press the water out of her clothes. Amrar sat down behind them, just waiting for them to get to their destination as she really had nothing else to do. 

"If you run into anything, act like you're from the surface." Wolf said, looking forward with a frown on her face.

"From the surface. Got it!" Kipo answered witt a smile. 

Kipo stood beside her and bent down to her height as she tried to have the same look as Wolf on her face. Wolf looked at Kipo with a raised eyebrow, that burrow girl was really getting on her nerves.

"Uhhh... What are you doing?" Wolf asked in confusion as she kept pushing the leaf forward with her staff.

"I'm from the surface where life is hard. You gotta be tough as nails, iron and fire... Wearing dead animals." Kipo said in a deep voice as she tried to copy Wolf, which had Amrar chuckling from the back.

"Good. You're catching on." Wolf said, rolling her eyes as she finally managed to get the water lily leaf inside a big room where the water fall came from.

"This is my angry surface face." Kipo said, her mouth turning into the shape of a rainbow as she narrowed her eyes with a low growl while Amrar smiled like crazy behind her.

Suddenly, Kipo's eyes caught sight of a small telescope. Since she was a nerd, it was very interesting to her and she immediately perked up.

"Ooh, what's that?" she said and jumped off the leaf and into a floating chair that was just chilling in the water.

The light stream from the water fall brought Kipo to the telescope. She grabbed it and looked through it. She could see so many places in Las Vistas.

"There's so much to see when you're not in a cave!" Kipo said excitedly with a big smile as Wolf and Amrar came up behind her.

"Focus Kipo." Wolf muttered, turning the telescope towards a bundle of roads that was formed like a clover.

Kipo gasped loudly and got even more excited as she moved away from, the telescope to let Amrar look through it too in case there was something she wanted to see too. 

"That must be it! It looks just like the clover in our emblem. Wow, so that's my home!" Kipo smiled and looked at Wolf who stood beside her.

"It's half a day's walk from here, but we'll have to get over Skyscraper Ridge." Wolf said and Kipo moved closer to Amrar to look through the telescope once again to see what place Wolf was talking about.

When she looked through the telescope, all she saw was ruined buildings all gathered up on the same spot. She guessed that it was Skyscraper Ridge, and she knew that it wouldn't be easy to get over it.

"That looks dangerous." Kipo commented, but she would do anything she could to get back to her home, to her dad.

"It is." Wolf answered. "I'm really sticking my neck out for you. And for what?" Wolf sighed and looked away, downwards to the ground.

Kipo looked over at Amrar who frowned before they both stood up and walked up to Wolf.

"Well, I'm really thankful that you're willing to help me and Kipo find our families, I understand that it's hard and you're very nice for helping us!" Amrar said with a comforting smile and Wolf had to hold back a smile as well, she wasn't often called nice.

"And... When all of this is done, I'd like to offer you a place to stay in my burrow! It's really hard to live out here and I want you to be safe. We could live together!" Kipo said happily but Wolf frowned at that before looking Kipo up and down.

"And go all soft and mushy like the rest of you mole-people? No thanks." Wolf muttered before turning her back to Kipo.

Kipo was just about to protest against Wolf when she noticed something from the corner of her eye. Something was coming towards her really fast. Kipo let out a yelp as whatever that thing was threw itself towards her. It missed and was sent into a wall instead, but the three girls fell into the water. When they turned around, a green frog in a black, fancy suit was standing a bit away from them by the entrance to the waterfall room.

The frog licked away some spit around his mouth before fixing his tie as he glared at the girls with narrowed eyes.

"Humans." he growled before running towards them, hoping to catch them and get a fine prize for it.

Kipo and Amrar didn't have any certain abilities that could help them fight, but Wolf did. She was quick in acting and started fighting against the frog before he could get to the other two girls. They were a lot more special than herself on the surface. The frog hit Wolf with his tongue and Kipo and Amrar cringed. That seemed to hurt and the tongue looked disgusting. Wolf didn't back away, though. She continued to fight in the end before she laid her eyes on an ink pot. She hit it with her staff and sent it flying towards the frog.

She had just knocked him down into the water, and as fast as he stood up and was about to attack Wolf again, the ink hit his white shirt and stained it with black ink. The frog gasped loudly and horrified as his shirt was destroyed. He used his spot to try and wipe it away, but it was to no use. The stain wasn't going away.

"My shirt!" he exclaimed as he rubbed his spit into the stain as quick as he could. "It won't come out! It's setting!" he screamed horrified as his breath caught up, he was panicking.

Wolf floated back to her friends on a water lily pad, slowly getting away from the frog.

"Careful, that's one of the Mod Frogs. You do not wanna mess with them." Wolf groaned as she rolled her eyes annoyed, not leaving the panicking frog out of her eyesight.

Kipo was fascinated by the frog. She let out a loud gasp and pointed over to the frog. Amrar didn't have the same reaction, she had seen those frogs before and it was no big deal to her anymore. But for Kipo, it was.

"You're a talking frog!" Kipo exclaimed loudly and everyone in the room tensed up.

The Mod Frog stopped rubbing the shirt, instead looking at Kipo with a raised eyebrow. Wolf cleared her throat and Amrar was quick to cover Kipo's mouth with her hand to keep the purple girl from saying anything else. When Kipo noticed everyone's reactions, she realized that she had forgot to act like she came from the surface. She had totally messed up.

"Uhhh... I mean-... I've seen tons of talking frogs... Who wear suits... No- no biggie.." Kipo said as she chuckled nervously.

Wolf face palmed and sighed quietly as she decided that it was time for the next time for her plan. She wasn't going to die anytime soon, and she wouldn't let Kipo die either. She had to save the situation.

"What my friend means to say is..." Wolf started as her hand went behind her back to grab the spot remover from her pocket. "We have this!"

The next second, Wolf pulled the item out and held it out for the Mod Frog to see. He gasped loudly and glared at the girl angrily as he was determined to get the ink stain off his shirt, he needed that spot remover now!

"Spot remover!? Give it to me!" he ordered as he reached an arm out for Wolf to hand it over to him.

"If... You let us go!" Wolf said, as she held the spot remover towards the edge of the building where the waterfall was.

The Mod Frog gasped horrified as he pictured Wolf throwing it down the edge. He took a few frantic steps towards her before realizing that he had to keep it cool so that she wouldn't throw his dear spot remover away. He sighed loudly.

"Look, this is my private office. Was there an 'enjoy the view' sign on my door? I think not!" he growled at Wolf angrily and she looked at Kipo and Amrar to get an idea for another lie.

"We're Mega Bunny hunters!" Amrar suddenly spoke up and everyone's attention was on her as she smiled nervously.

Wolf grinned as she decided to keep up with that lie to get the Mod Frog to let them go without her having to fight again. She didn't see any other ink pot in the room, so she would probably not be as lucky to win.

"Yeah, we were just scouting." Wolf continued the lie, trying to not reveal herself to be lying as that would definitely get them in more trouble.

The Mod Frog groaned annoyed and rolled his eyes. The girl was really not giving up, he just wanted to get rid of the stain on his shirt! And maybe capture the three girls while he were at it...

"Just give me the spot remover, and then I'll decide what to do with you." he said, hoping to win them over if he managed to let them think that they had a chance in escaping.

Wolf did as he asked, she threw the spot remove, but not towards him.

"Oops." She muttered, rolling her eyes as the item was sent a bit away from the frog, out of the window on his side of the room. 

He panicked and immediately threw his tongue out to grab the spot remover. He managed to get it, but he was too late as the human girls already had ran away. He sighed as he started spraying his shirt to get the stain out, rubbing it in quickly.

"Mega Bunny hunters, yeah right! Looked more like a burrow girl to me..." he mumbled to himself as he remembered how weird Kipo had acted when she saw him.

As he said that, a thought came to him. What made him think that the weird girl wasn't from a burrow? She was most likely one! Especially by the way she seemed so clueless about everything. He had noticed how she cringed when he fought that short girl, as if she had never fought a mute before. Every surface human fought mutes, at least once a day!

"Huh." he said to himself as he realized that he had just let a burrow girl out of his office, he had to catch her!

~~~

The three girls was walking outside in the city. Wolf was her usual quiet and angry self while Kipo and Amrar was fashinated by the sky. There was so many stars, a lot more than the place where Amrar came from. This sky was so much more beautiful.

"This does not get old." Kipo sighed as she looked up at the stars with a big smile on her lips.

"Yeah, the sky where I come from has never been this beautiful." Amrar agreed and Wolf sighed as she spun her staff and gave both the girls a small hit on their head, making them both wince and look down.

"Lesson 5 on the surface; Looking up gets you killed." Wolf muttered and Amrar chuckled at the smaller girl, she really was a whole mood.

Kipo smiled nervously at her friend before looking in front of her to see where they were going. She stopped in her tracks when she saw a big tree sticking up from a building. It didn't have any leaves, instead there was bicycles hanging from the branches.

"Woah." Kipo said and walked towards it, she had never seen a bicycle tree before and neither had Amrar, but Wolf didn't see anything weird about it, she had grown up on the surface after all.

As the girls walked towards the tree to continue getting to Kipo's burrow, a branch was twisted behind them. Wolf let out a fighting growl as she spun her staff and turned around towards whoever had followed them. She then stood eye to eye to a blue pig. Kipo gasped happily.

"Mandu! You came back!" she cheered before patting her thighs with her palms. "Here girl!" Kipo said, trying to get the pig to walk up to her.

"Oh my gosh, that's the cutest pig I have ever seen!" Amrar beamed and Mandu seemed to perk up at that before she suddenly took a step back and looked down to the ground in fear.

"Something's wrong." Wolf commented with a frown as she read Mandu's body language.

"Yeah, you're pointing a nightmare stick at a tiny pig! How did you expect the poor thing to react?" Kipo growled a little annoyed, but then Mandu looked behind her and let out a scared squeal before she ran off into the bushes.

Wolf looked at the spot Mandu had looked at before running away, and she narrowed her eyes.

"I'm not the one who spooked her." Wolf muttered and Kipo noticed a black car driving in their direction with the help of a few big flies.

Wolf grabbed Kipo and Amrar's arms and dragged them into the bushes to hide as the car drove towards them. On the roof of the car sat three Mod Frogs, one of them were the same frog they had met by the waterfall building.

"Oh, burrow girl!" he called out in a sing-song voice, looking around in case the humans were around. "I figured out where you're from."

The car stopped and the frog jumped off of it and landed beside it. His arms were placed on his sides as he glared at the bushes.

"Shocker... A burrow!" he called out loudly. "You could lead us to the mother lode of humans."

Suddenly, he could see movement in the bushes from the corners of his eyes. His tongue was sent flying towards it as he managed to grab something. The something was a certain blue pig who squealed in fear as she was grabbed by the frog.

"Ah, just a pig. Eh, at least now we have a snack." the frog shrugged and carried the pig under his arms as he started walking back to the car as the humans didn't seem to be around any longer.

Behind the bushes was the three girls hiding together. Kipo gasped as she saw Mandu being taken by the frog, she couldn't let her turn into a snack, that was just horrible!

"I won't let them take her!" Kipo whispered as she started to stand up to get out of the bushes and protect her friend, but Wolf and Amrar stopped her by putting a hand on her shoulder and pushing her back down. 

"Kipo, no! It's too dangerous!" Amrar whispered in fear as Kipo tried to get Wolf's hand off of her.

"Amrar is right. If you go out there, you'll risk our necks for some random mute!" Wolf muttered with narrowed eyes. "This is why I work alone!"

That was the last drawn stick for Kipo. She slapped Wolf's hands away from her as she narrowed her eyes and stood up.

"If you like to be alone so bad, maybe you should be!" she muttered and walked out of the bushes as a quick flash of old memorris flashed before Wolf's eyes.

She made eye contact with Amrar who looked at the back of Kipo who was currently getting out of the bushes to save her friend. Amrar sighed and stood up too to follow her, and Wolf frowned at her.

"You too!?" Wolf growled angrily as she looked up at Amrar who had a clear sad feeling shown in her eyes.

"I can't leave her. I'm sorry, Wolf." Amrar said and walked away from the shorter girl who sighed to herself as she looked down to the ground, all alone now.

She stood up to leave the girls behind when she suddenly saw a bicycle leaned onto the wall of the bicycle store. It wasn't broken like all of the other ones and she smirked to herself as she got an idea. She looked behind her where Kipo was trying to confront the frogs before she ran towards the bicycle.

~~~

Kipo looked behind her to see Wolf running off. She had a slight feeling of betrayal but decided to ignore it for now. If Wolf didn't want to stick around with her and Amrar, then Kipo was not going to be forcing her to stay. But she still had a problem. The three frogs in front of her had weapons in their hands, Kipo and Amrar had nothing. Kipo came up with a lie, hoping that it would be enough to make the Mod Frogs let Mandu go.

"That pig is a blood thirsty killer. She'll year you limb from limb!" Kipo said in a shaky voice, but the Mod Frogs just laughed at her.

"Mmm, yeah. I'll take my chances." the Mod Frog from the office earlier said as he took a step forward.

Mandu growled and managed to bite his hand when he didn't notice, and the frog immediately screamed out from pain and dropped her. Kipo was quick to act and caught her friend before grabbing Amrar's hand as the two girls ran off with the pig. The frogs looked angry before getting into the car as they drove after them.

Kipo and Amrar ran as fast as they could, but the Mod Frogs was quick enough right behind them. They started to lose hope when suddenly Wolf came up beside them on a bicycle. Amrar gasped as she got tears in her eyes in happiness and Kipo smiled big.

"Wolf! You came back!" she cheered as Wolf grabbed the girls with her staff, leaving them hanging just above the ground.

"Yep." Wolf sighed before throwing Kipo and Amrar up in the air as she made a rapid turn to lose her tail, the Mod Frogs.

Kipo and Amrar screamed as they were sent into the air, but eventually they landed right on the bicycle as Wolf tried to get away from the frogs who had managed to get too close again. Eventually, they came to the staircase that led downwards to the deeper part of the city. Wolf got an idea and bicycled down the stairs and Kipo and Amrar tried to hold onto each other to not fall off.

Wolf noticed a lamppost that had been bent and was leaning over the end of the stairs. She got an idea and bicycled faster as the car behind them had stopped, though a certain Mod Frog followed them by swinging with his tongue. As Wolf bicycled right under the lamppost, she threw herself up, holding her staff in one hand as she grabbed the lamppost with it and made a backflip. She landed on the Mod Frog's back and stabbed him in the head, sending scorpion poison into his body as he fell unconcious and landed right in front of Amrar and Kipo who still hugged each other with their eyes shut tightly.

When everything got quiet, they opened their eyes and saw Wolf with her staff, the dangerous point stabbed right into the Frog's head. His tongue was hanging loosely out of his mouth and his mouth was hanging open as he laid on his belly on the ground, face turned towards them. Kipo gasped horrified as she realized what Wolf might have done. She gulped and hugged Amrar a bit tighter, which Amrar did the same with Mandu.

"Is he... dead?" Kipo asked as Wolf put the stinger out of the Mod Frog's head and walked towards the two girls.

"No, but when he wakes up he'll have a bad headache." she said nonchalant as she sat down on the bicycle to get them away from there. "And possibly some memory loss." she shrugged, and then bicycled away with the two girls behind her as they left the frog on the ground.

It took a while, but eventually they found a safe place to stay at for the night. Or at least they could hope it was safe. It was an old house, it seemed to be empty. Wolf drove the bicycle up the porch and right into the house as she didn't want to give away the hiding spot to the frogs who surely was searching after them by now.

"We'll hole up here." Wolf said as the three girls started gathering furniture to cover up the door with in case anybody tried to get in.

As a table was put in front of the door, the three girls sat down by it and took a break as they breathed heavily. They were all tired, but it wasn't safe to fall asleep.

"Do you have to go through this every day?" Amrar panted as she looked up at Wolf who clearly was the expert on the surface.

"Basically, yeah. This was just one of those lucky days, it's usually way worse." Wolf said and Amrar just groaned as she didn't feel like going through anything worse than what they already had gone through.

"Normally, at night, I'd be at home, doing my homework." Kipo sighed as she realized how easy her life had been compared to Wolf's. "Maybe eating a muffin, but not running away from homicidal frogs!" Kipo exclaimed a bit too loud.

Wolf suddenly heard something getting close. She immediately shushed at Kipo to stay quiet as she slapped her hand on Kipo's mouth in case she would say something. Wolf looked up towards a window beside a door. Curtains were luckily covering the windows, making sure that Wolf and her friends would not be seen, but she could still see the shadows of someone going right outside.

"Ouch! Oh, my head!" someone growled, and the three girls quickly realized that it was the Mod Frogs again.

Amrar roled her eyes, trying not to groan loudly in annoyance as she had had enough of those frogs now. She wanted them to leave her and her friends alone, but she knew that it wasn't an option she got to make.

"I... Wait a minute, why are you following me?" the frog continued as he looked back at his companions who he didn't seem to remember after what Wolf had done to him.

"Uhhh... Jamack, we're looking for those humans together, remember?" his friend said from behind as they continued walking past the house.

"Uh, yeah, right! Right, just.... Duh! Let's... Let's get back to that then." he said, trying to act like he remembered anything before everything went quiet as the frogs walked somewhere else.

The three girls let out the breath none of them knew they they had been holding. Amrar looked over at Wolf who was looking away into the wall as she crossed her arms, her knees up to her chest as she sat in a fetal position. Amrar frowned a bit as she remembered the fight before all of this. 

"Ummm.. Hey, Wolf? I'm sorry for leaving you back there, you were really nice for saving us anyway! Thank you." Amrar said with a smile on her lips as Wolf finally made eye contact with her. 

Something in Wolf's eyes told Amrar that there was something that happened back there had given Wolf deja vu of some kind. Either way, it wasn't something good and Amrar didn't want Wolf to be sad. 

"It's fine." Wolf muttered. 

Kipo decided to try and stay positive to not worry her friends as the risk of them getting found was still quite big.

"Since we've had our first fight and makeup, that makes us officially sisters!" Kipo said, putting a hand on Wolf's and Amrar's shoulder as she smiled.

Amrar just chuckled lightly at that, but Wolf narrowed her eyes in annoyance. It was clear that those words were upsetting to her, but Amrar didn't want to walk into Wolf's space like that and demand an explanation. Wolf could tell her about herself when she was ready for it, not before.

"Don't." Wolf muttered and Kipo immediately retreated her hand and apologized, but Wolf didn't seem to get happier by that.

Suddenly, the cries of a baby could be heard. It was coming from upstairs. The girls looked towards the door the cries came from and got up from their spot by the door. They gave each other a nod before walking up the stairs.

Wolf slammed the door open and Amrar and Kipo walked inside the room. There was nothing in there except for a broken window, a nightstand and a crib.

"There's a baby here! Why's there a baby here!?" Kipo said frantically as she walked up to the crib to see if the baby was okay.

Downstairs, someone was trying to push the door open, but the furniture was covering it pretty good. Sadly, it wasn't good enough and the door was pushed open. 

"We have to shut that thing up!" Wolf whispered as she hid by the door, her staff in her hand as she readied herself to have to fight the frogs once again. 

Mandu, who had stayed outside the room the whole time, quickly rushed inside and quietly closed the door since the stairs led right to the door she and her friends were in.

Kipo had picked the baby up and was now rocking it in her arms as she begged it to stop crying as it was going to reveal their hiding place.

"Okay, we really need you to hush, little baby!" Kipo whispered frantically as she rocked the baby, it was wrapped up into a bundle, so she couldn't see anything of it.

Wolf put her staff in front of Kipo's face as the stinger pointed towards the bundle.

"I can put him to sleep, there's a slight chance this'll kill 'em." Wolf said and Kipo immediately gasp and held the baby away from Wolf so she couldn't hurt it.

"Don't you dare!" Kipo growled before moving whatever the baby was wrapped up in away so that she could see it's face.

When she did, she gasped and held the baby away from her. Wolf frowned and did the same Kipo had done, and she saw the face of a baby mute bug.

"A mute? You gotta be kidding me!" Wolf growled as her hands turned into fists as she barred her teeth angrily.

"It's still a baby!" Kipo said, trying to defend the baby as she knew that Wolf wasn't really a big fan of mutes.

Amrar had been quiet until now, staring at the door to the room in horror. She could hear how the Mod Frogs were searching through the house at the ground floor.

"Uhhh... Guys?" Amrar whispered in fear as Jamack told his companions to check every room in the house.

Wolf looked over at her, standing in a fighting pose as she held her staff in her hand, ready to strike whoever opened that door. Kipo was frantically rocking the baby mute as she shushed at the mute. She looked over at her friends as the baby continued to cry. 

"Does anybody know any grub nursery rhymes?" Kipo whispered and Wolf jsut glared at her, rolling her eyes before looking back towards the door as steps could be heard getting closer to them.

The baby suddenly went all quiet and Kipo smiled to herself as she thought it had calmed down. Oh, so wrong she was. The baby took a deep breath before screaming out as it cried harder than ever, squirming in Kipo's arms.

The three girls, even Mandu, gasped as they realized that there was no way the frogs hadn't heard that. They were doomed. 

Chapter Text

"He took his ass back to the crack shack, with his long johns on, singing that old song" a teenager sang as they walked behind a boy who was beat boxing to the song.

The teenager was a human who had dark brown hair up to their shoulders, it was a bit messy, but nobody really cared about that on the surface. They had an oversized hoodie with the picture of a few guys in a band. It had the text "The Score" on it. They were wearing grey jeans and they had their hands in their pockets as they walked beside the boy. They had black sneakers with green lines on them. They had a cap on their head which was turned backwards, matching the hoodie that had the same colors.

The boy walking beside them was a teenage human with dark skin, short spiky black hair which was covered with a pale-green baseball cap. He had brown eyes and he was wearing a lilac button-up shirt layered under an off-white sweater with a graphic of a cat head on the chest and a slight tear near the collar, light brown pants, and black, cyan, and white sneakers.  On his back hung a magenta robot backpack.

The two teenagers were humming and singing on random songs from the old world as they walked on a road that had been destroyed for so long. Old cars was placed on random places as the teens walked past them. Suddenly, the boy noticed something in one of the cars. He smirked and ran up to it as his friend quickly followed him. He grabbed a cassette that was inside of the car.

"Come to papa." he cooed and put the cassette in his player and pressed 'on'.

He usually had his headphones connected to it, but since he now had another companion who loved the same music as him, he decided to let his friend hear the music.

As he was just about to start the music, he saw a soda truck hanging from the top of a communication tower, lighted up by a big, pink colored moon.

"Whoa!" he gasped as he realized how thirsty he was, and his friend probably was too. "You coming with me?" he therefore asked and they nodded with a smile, following him towards the tower.

"I'll wait down here, you're deadly dangerous at high places." they joked with a chuckle, and the boy just rolled his eyes jokingly before climbing the tower.

It seemed so easy to just climb the tower, at least for a surface kid. After a while, he was half way up. The moon was enormous, right in front of him. With music on and headphones once again connected to the cassette player, he hung upside down from the tower, just relaxing as he forgot about his problems for a while. It seemed like it was only him and the moon, at least until his friend beneath him spoke up.

"Are you gonna climb and get a damn soda, or are you gonna hang like a bat all day?" they shouted and the boy laughed out loud before getting back up and climbing up the rest of the communication tower.

He managed to get into the truck, it was full of soda in at least twenty packages. He licked his lips, nearly drooling as he was so thirsty.

"Nice." he grinned before opening a random package as he opened his backpack, filling it up with soda cans.

Beneath the tower, his friend was still standing by themselves. Suddenly, they noticed an enormous tortoise walking towards the tower. It seemed to be the same one who used to sleep by the water. Every human on the surface knew about it, it was mostly used as some kind of boat to take people to the other side of the city. The teen realized that it was walking right into the communication tower.

"Benson!" they yelled, but the boy didn't seem to hear them as he was having a full blast of music in that truck.

The boy could soon hear the foot steps of the tortoise, but since it was right on time for his music, he just guessed that it was the beat. Either way, if he knew or not he wouldn't even care. He started nodding his head to the beat as he finished filling up his backpack. Suddenly, the tortoise knocked it's foot right into the truck, making it spin around several times as Benson was sent flying into the wall. He screamed loudly, but he was luckily not thrown out of the truck.

When it finally stopped spinning, he fell down on the floor and picked up his headphones that had fallen off. The truck was hanging sideways now and was about to fall, but he was ready for that.

"Woah, that beat is fire!" He smirked before running towards the opening of the truck as he jumped out of it and held onto the tower as the truck fell down, crashing into the ground.

The teen standing beneath the tower gasped and ran up to the truck just to find it empty.

"Benson!?" they yelled, hoping to get an answer, and just as they were about to start panicking, he came sliding down the edge of the tower.

"Missed me?" he smirked and his friend hit him lightly on his chest as he laughed at their reaction.

"You scared the hell out of me!" they said and Benson put a comforting hand on their shoulder, smiling at them as they walked up to the truck to get his backpack that he had left in there.

"We're drinking bubbly tonight!" Benson cheered, opening one of the soda cans to drink.

Unfortunately, it had extremely much carbonic acid after all the spinning. The soda just sprayed right in his face as he opened the can, but at least he got something in his mouth. He smiled a bit and sighed happily at the taste before giving another can to his friend. They had better luck than him and just let the soda spray directly into their mouth. They had done this challenge before back home with their friends, so it wasn't that hard.

When they had finished drinking, crying could soon be heard a bit away. They both recognized the cry and sighed as they rolled their eyes. Benson picked up his backpack and his friend threw their soda cans away into the bushes.

"Hang on, Dave." Benson sighed as the two started walking towards the cries to get their friend. "We're coming, ya big baby."

~~~

Back at the house, the frogs were still looking through the house, trying to find the humans who surely was hiding somewhere in that house. Jamack, the main Mod Frog, was still acting like a drunk fool as the poison from Wolf's death stalker was still in his system. He noticed a closet and glared at it.

"Maybe they're in here!" He exclaimed and opening the door, only to find it empty. "Huh, not in this closet." he sighed before closing it again.

He looked back at his companions to say something before noticing the very same closet as if he had never seen it before.

"But maybe they're in here!" he exclaimed again and opened the closet once again finding it empty.

A sharp pain ripped through his head and he put his hand on the big bump that had been made from the stinger, feeling bad for himself for getting treated so horrible by those humanscums.

"Man, what was in that poison?" he groaned in pain before closing the door to the closet just to notice it again, repeating his words over and over again as his companions just watched.

"Uhhh, Jamack? You've checked that closet like six times." his one friend said, and Jamack looked confused at the comment.

"I did?" Jamack confirmed and his friends nodded as he shrugged. "Huh."

His eyes noticed the same closet again, and he opened it, yelling "maybe they're in here!"

Suddenly, a baby's cries echoed through the house, gathering all, of the three Mod Frogs' attention as they looked up the stairs at the very where three human girls and a baby bug mute was currently hiding.

"Huh, wait. There was a baby here?" Jamack asked, but his companions were just as confused as him, so they decided to check it out.

In the room, Kipo was frantically trying to calm the baby. She was making funny faces at him to try and make him get happy, but the bug just frowned at her and pouted as new tears gathered in his eyes. He was at least quiet now in confusion, but that wouldn't last long.

Mandu suddenly started to squeal in panic as she could hear the Mod Frogs walking up the stairs. It was soon time to fight and run.

"Wolf, the lock!" Kipo whispered and Wolf nodded before doing a quick somersault to quickly get to the door.

Wolf locked the door just as Jamack had walked up to the door and was going to open it. Wolf felt a little relief when he couldn't open the door, but that was until a slimy, pink tongue slipped under the door crack and tried to open the door from the other side. Wolf cringed but stayed still on her spot, not wanting to make a move that could alert their existance in the room. Suddenly, the door downstairs opened and two human teenagers walked in.

"Dave, we're home!" Benson said loudly before gasping as he saw the three Mod Frogs trying to break in into the room where Dave was sleeping.

The three frogs turned around when they heard the boy's voice, glaring at him angrily. More humans? The day was just getting better and better. Jamack turned around, his tongue still on the other side of the door.

"Humans?" he said, tripping over his own tongue as he tried to get down the stairs to the two humans.

He choked on himself and immediately let go of the door handle as he retreated his tongue, walking down the stairs. Benson and his friend cringed as they looked at the frogs. They had to come up with a plan now before it was too late. Suddenly, Benson got an idea. He looked over at his friend and gave them a look. Then he slipped a hand through the opening of his backpack to grab a soda can before tucking it in inside his long sleeved shirt. The other teen quickly got the clue and did the same as Benson started speaking.

"I'm so glad you frogs are here! You've gotta help us." Benson started, acting scared as he took a few steps inside the house. "Me and my friend fell into this whole bush of uhhh... Uh, explosion berries!"

The girls upstairs started to realize that there were other humans in the house. Kipo and Wolf opened the door to look through the crack. Amrar stood behind them, holding the baby bug in her arms as she tried to keep it quiet.

"Hmm... Explosion berries?" Jamack said since he didn't recognize the name. "I guess that could be a thing. I can't remember..." he groaned as he rubbed the red bump on his head as he could still feel the pain from the stinger.

"Oh, it is definitely a real thing. And it's contagious!" Benson said, getting ready with the soda can as his friend did the same. "If only one drop of their juice gets on your skin..." Benson started, looking over at his friend.

"Boom!" they continued, flailing their arms around frantically to give the frogs a picture of a big explosion.

"Okay, have you guys heard of this?" Jamack said, looking back at his companions as he started to get a little bit nervous of this dangerous fruit.

"Boom, boom!" Benson interrupted to make sure that the other two frogs, who seemed to be feeling better than Jamack, wouldn't say anything about the berries.

Then the real scene started. Benson fell down on his knees on the floor and his friend did the same, acting as if they were weak and hurting. They both groaned in pain, cluthing their hearts.

"Oh, I feel a warmth!" they said in a tired voice, acting as if they were scared for their lives.

"We don't have much... Time..." Benson added before pressing down on the soda can as it sprayed all over the place, his friend doing the same which just added to the mess.

The teens screamed in panic as the frogs rushed out of the building to not get any explosion berry juice on them.

"Ah, it's happening! Oh, the horror! The horror!" Benson screamed dramatically as the frogs escaped the house.

"Explosion berries are real!" Jamack screamed as the three frogs jumped into their car and drove away in panic.

"Wait! Don't leave us!" Benson cried dramatically, reaching out a hand for the frogs though they didn't even look back.

With a sigh, the two fell down on the floor with a grin on their faces, knowing that they had won once again. As the world went quiet, the girls from upstairs rushed out to check on the teens. Kipo was the one who was scared the most.

"Oh no, are you okay?" she asked frantically, kneeling down beside the boy as she held the bug baby in her arms.

Benson started chuckling as he turned around and sat back up, his friend doing the same. They were grinning like idiots before revealing the soda cans tucked in in their sleeves.

"Haha, yeah." Benson chuckled as he drank the remaining soda from the can before showing it to Kipo. "Explosion berries?" He offered and she gasped as she realized that everything had just been an act.

"That was impressive, I fully believed that explosion berries were a thing!" Kipo said excitedly before looking behind her where Wolf was standing together with Amrar.

"Well, Benson is a really good actor." the other teenager said as they bumped their elbow into Benson's arm playfully as he chuckled at them.

Suddenly, Amrar gasped. She knew that voice anywhere. She pushed Wolf and Kipo aside, and her mouth dropped as she realized who Benson was teamed up with.

"O-Onyx? Onyx, is that you?" Amrar said and the teen gasped before smiling bigger than ever, recognising their friend.

"Amrar!" Onyx exclaimed happily before getting up on their feet as they threw themselves at Amrar in a tight hug.

Amrar felt tears build up as she finally got to see a face she knew very well. She hugged Onyx back and the two grinned like crazy.

"I have been looking for you, Am. I thought everyone had been sent to different worlds or something!" Onyx said and Amrar sniffled, wiping away the happy tears from her eyes.

"I thought the same! But now when you're here, there might be a chance that the others are here too! Have you seen any clues from them or anything?" Amrar asked, but Onyx shook their head as their smile disappeared.

"Well, we only got here a few days ago, they are probably okay and trying to find us." Amrar promised and Onyx smiled at their friend before going in for another hug.

Wolf cleared her throat, interrupting the happy moment between the two friends.

"I know those frogs. We need to keep moving, if we don't wanna die." Wolf said, gripping her staff tightly.

Benson grinned at the younger girl, still not getting up from the ground as he didn't believe that the frogs would come back that soon. He chuckled lightly, shrugging as he grabbed his soda can, realizing that there was a bit left.

"Well, she seems like a lot of fun." Benson said sarcastically, drinking the last few drops of soda with a slurp before throwing the can away as the gang got ready to move from the house before another threat would show up.

Now when Amrar and Onyx were reunited, the both of them had a bit more hope to find their friends very soon. They could just hope that it wasn't too late.

Chapter Text

The group was walking through the city. Amrar and Onyx were telling each other about what had happened to them when they got separated in Las Vistas. The other three humans were walking in silence before Benson suddenly spoke up.

"Hey, thanks for watching my buddy." Benson thanked as he shook a soda can before opening it and pressing the opening to Dave's mouth to give him his food. "He just needed his formula." he continued, opening another can to feed Dave before throwing it away behind him into a random direction.

"So, he's your grub baby?" Kipo asked as she raised an eyebrow at the boy as she was leading the bicycle after her.

"Dave? Oh, no. We go way back!" Benson said before stopping to search after more soda cans in his backpack, finding it empty.

He threw Dave over to Kipo who let out a yelp as the bug was thrown into her arms. She nearly dropped him, but managed to catch him. Benson took off his backpack to be able to open it better, but it was still empty from any more soda. 

"Kinda look out for each other." he said before stopping as he looked back at Wolf and noticed the small girl's weapon. "Woah, is that a deathstalker tail? I have never actually seen one in person, can I touch it?"

Benson reached out a hand to get to touch the Deathstalker Tail, but Wolf frowned at the older boy before twirling her staff, sending the top of her weapon right above his face, warning him of what would happen if he did try to touch it.

"Be my guest." she muttered, holding the weapon above Benson's face as the boy slowly backed away, holding his hands up in defeat.

"On second thought, I'm- I'm good..." Benson chuckled nervously as he backed off until he was in a safe distance from the wolf-girl.

Wolf retreated her weapon and held it close to herself, making sure that it was safe as she glared at Benson before she looked over to Kipo who was watching Dave sleeping. Amrar and Onyx were behind Kipo, still talking about what they had been through before pausing when Kipo spoke up.

"Wait a minute... How can you go way back when he's just a-" Kipo started when suddenly, something weird happened.

A new layer of whatever Dave was wrapped up in started wrapping around him, even his face. He looked like a tiny, green cocoon. Kipo gasped and Wolf raised an eyebrow at the scene, this was not something she saw everyday. Kipo and Wolf made eyecontact in confusion and Kipo silently asked Wolf if she had ever seen something like that before, but Wolf just shrugged and continued watching Dave. Amrar was also not familiar with the scene, but Onyx was and they were smiling, wanting to see everyone's reaction.

After a few seconds, the cocoon started breaking before it opened and a new-looking Dave popped out. This one was bigger and looked more like a toddler bug than a newborn bug. He started babbling as he reached up for Kipo, but Kipo was horrified. She gasped loudly before she droppe Dave on the ground, but the bug was safe and didn't get hurt. Wolf and Amrar just stared at the bug in confusion.

"I did not see that coming." Kipo said, looking down at Dave who had started waddling away when Benson grabbed him and picked him up before setting him back down on his feet to make sure that he could keep an eye on his friend.

"Sit tight, there's more." Benson chuckled, putting his hands on his hips as he watched Dave. 

Dave continued babbling has he waddled before he was wrapped up in another green cocoon. The same thing happened this time too, except that the new Dave who showed up was a teenager bug with acne.

"What IS that!?" Kipo said, watching the bug in horror since she had never seen something that weird in her entire life.

Amrar had seen things much worse than a mute bug changing version of himself, but she was still feeling slightly grossed out by it, though it was interesting to see how everything worked in Las Vistas.

"That thing is weird." Amrar said, hiding behind Onyx who burst out laughing, nearly falling down to the ground.

They loved seeing their friend's reaction to Dave, it was hilarious.

"His body is going through some changes, it's completely natural." Benson said nonchalantly as he shrugged, but the teenager bug Dave seemed to get offended by his comment as he frowned.

"Hey! Quit talking about me in front of strangers." Dave growled angrily as he pushed away what was remained of his cocoon, glaring at Benson.

"Raging hormones." Benson sighed to the three girls who obviously needed an explanation of Dave's sudden angry behavior.

Kipo, Amrar and Wolf was cringing over the mute bug. It was really weird, though Kayo was starting to get slightly fascinated. Dave growled angrily again as he glared at Benson.

"Why are you embarrassing me!?" he roared before letting out a shocked shriek as the cacoon process started again.

When it opened back up, an adult looking Dave stood up before pushing away the cocoon with a happy sigh. Kipo gasped but Wolf just rolled her eyes in annoyance. She didn't have time for this!

"Who-hoo! I'm out of my awkward stage. It doesn't do me any favors." Dave said, looking up at the group of humans with a bright smile.

"Uhhh..." Kipo mumbled, staring at Dave as if in a trance as the mute bug seemed to have finished with all of his weird stages.

Wolf looked over at Kipo and her weird expression, rolling her eyes. She slammed her elbow into Kipo's arm and Kipo was back to reality, rubbing the hurting arm. Onyx gave Wolf a small glance, that girl needed to take a chill pill for a while. The group was interrupted when Dave suddenly got upset for another reason.

"Hey! My arm grew in short. Did someone here mess with my cocoon?" Dave asked angrily as he looked at his arms on his right side that was half as long as they were supposed to be.

He looked up at the group, watching everyone's faces. He knew that his pal Benson never would do something like that, not Onyx either. He recognized the other girls from his other stages, but he didn't know if he could trust them. Onyx's friend Amrar seemed trustworthy enough since she was Onyx's friend. The weird purple girl seemed too horrified to even dare to do something like that. His eyes finally landed on Wolf, the angry, short girl with a deathstalker tail as a weapon. She gave off bad vibes for Dave and he grew suspicious. He pointed at the short girl with a growl.

"Was it you!? You give off a vibe!" Dave said angrily and the wolf-girl immediately grabbed her weapon and held it towards Dave in a fighting position, showing that she was ready for any danger any time.

"I can make your other arms match the stubs if you want." she threatened, glaring at the bug in anger.

Kipo gulped, knowing what Wolf was capable of doing. Amrar did the same, cringing at the two as she knew that it would be a badass fight if Dave decided to start a fight with Wolf for his arms. Onyx was rolling their eyes at the both of them, not thinking that a fight would be worth it since Dave could simply grow back his arms. Luckily, Benson got control of the situation before it got too far.

"Hey~" He chuckled, walking up to Wolf as he had her lower her staff instead of pointing it at Dave.

The smaller girl glared at Benson but did retreat her staff as Benson continued trying to get some peace in the group.

"We're all fellow travelers here, all right?" Benson said, holding his arms up in peace. "I'm Benson, you've already met Dave." He gestured to the bug who threw the rest of his cocoon off of his head.

"Charmed." the bug muttered, rolling his eyes before he glared at Wolf, he didn't trust that girl.

Wolf glared back at the bug though she stayed on her spot. Kipo repeated Benson's words in her head and realized something. A smile grew on her lips as she got excited.

"Travelers? So, you're from the surface too?" Kipo asked excitedly, looking down at her angry, short friend before she returned her gaze on Benson who was smiling awkwardly. "Second human I've met on top. Mind blown!"

Benson and Dave glanced at each other in silence, both knowing what Kipo's words meant. That gave them an idea. Wolf was smarter, though, and she was not on key to become friends with a mute and a mute lover. The young child held her arm out in front of Kipo to stop her from doing anything stupid like joining the new group. 

"Kipo, don't say anything more. He's a mute, and he's a friend of a mute." Wolf muttered, glaring at the two boys who looked totally innocent.

"Calm down, wolf-girl. I've been with those two since I came here, they're fine." Onyx tried to defend their friends, not wanting to get into a fight.

"It's not like I can trust you either." Wolf said, glancing over at Amrar who didn't know what to say.

She didn't know Benson or Dave, but she did know Onyx. If they trusted the two boys, then they had to be safe to go with. But Amrar wasn't sure if it was worth leaving Wolf and Kipo when they could all stay together as one group.

Benson interrupted Wolf before she could say anything rude to anyone else. He cleared his throat and pointed his finger towards Kipo.

"Are you from one of those hole cities?" the boy asked before looking down to Dave. "Dave, what are they called?"

"Burrows. You a burrow girl?" the bug asked with a smile on his face and Kipo beamed and put a hand on her chest.

"I am from a burrow!" she said happily and Wolf face-palmed her face and groaned in annoyance.

"What did I just say?" she muttered, but nobody seemed to listen to her anymore.

Benson walked up to Kipo and wrapped an arm around her, a smug grin on his face.

"Wild guess, top of my head, I don't know. You're lost and need to get home." Benson said and Kipo gasped out loud, feeling amazed by the boy.

"How'd you know? You're good!" Kipo praised as she let Benson walk a few metres away with her as Wolf watched the two between her fingers as her hand still stayed across her face. "Wolf and Kayo's helping me. We have to get over a mountain of skyscrapers first." Kipo explained.

Wolf groaned even louder, getting annoyed of how trusting Kipo was. It would get her killed someday, she was sure of it.

"Sure, just tell complete strangers everything!" Wolf muttered, throwing her arms to her side in anger.

Onyx rolled their eyes. They were used to Amrar's little sister acting just the same. They never really seemed to get away from the short, angry people.

"Tag down, kiddo. Benson hasn't done anything to you." Onyx said and Wolf had to keep herself from attacking the older human.

"Shut up, I wasn't talking to you!" The smaller girl growled between gritted teeth and Amrar had to move between her two friends.

"Just stop, alright. If Onyx says that Benson and Dave are trustworthy, then they are! If we're going to survive up here, we have to trust one another." Amrar said and Wolf rolled her eyes, turning her back on the two as she watched Kipo and Benson carefully.

As they had an argument, Benson and Dave tried to talk to Kipo who was up to tell anything about everything it seemed. Wolf didn't hear everything, but she did get to hear the final plot.

"We've been over the ridge... What is it, Dave, ten times now?" Benson said, looking over at Dave who had climbed up a rock as big as Benson to get away from Mandu who also felt suspicious around the boys.

"More like twelve." Dave grinned and Kipo looked behind herself to Wolf with an amazed face, though Wolf just huffed under her breath and looked away, her arms crossed firmly.

"Tell you what." Benson continued. "We'll take you over the ridge in exchange for... I don't know... Dave, what should we do it for?" Benson looked over at his friend with a smug grin.

"The Deathstalker Tail." Dave finished, gesturing to Wolf's weapon which she gripped extra tight at his words.

"Yeah, the Deathstalker Tail." Benson agreed and Wolf immediately grabbed Kipo and walked away with her to talk in private away from everyone else who seemed to be on the boys' side.

"Not a chance. They're trying to hustle us." Wolf muttered angrily, glaring at Onyx who stood with the boys and Amrar, waiting for Kipo and Wolf to make up their mind.

Kipo looked behind her at the gang and sighed. She didn't know much about the surface, but she did know everything her dad had taught her about trust. She really did want to trust the new group of strangers, that was how friendships started after all, but she didn't want to upset Wolf since the young girl seemed to like her weapon so much. She pinched her chin and hummed.

"Oh, what do you think, Mandu?" Kipo asked, looking down to the blue pig  who immediately moved over to Wolf and sat down beside her feet.

Wolf didn't let herself smile at the pig, but she felt thankful that someone who Kipo adored were on her side and understood that the boys was just tricking them.

"That makes the result." Wolf said, but Kipo stopped her before she could tell the other gang to leave.

"What about Amrar and Onyx? They're with us too! Shouldn't they get to vote?" Kipo asked and Wolf sighed.

"Onyx isn't in our group. And Amrar doesn't need us if she is with another group. We don't need her either." Wolf said and Kipo sighed in defeat, knowing that Wolf was right.

"Okay, it's settled." Wolf called out to the other group. "You guys need to leave."

"What!?" Amrar said, feeling upset that Wolf and Kipo would just ditch her like that.

"Why should we?" Dave asked, rolling his eyes nonchalantly while Benson just stared and Onyx muttered something rude about the wolf-dressed girl under her breath.

"Because you're not the ones holding the Deathstalker." Wolf said with a smug grin, twirling her weapon as she put one hand on her hip.

"Wait a minute, are you just gonna leave us?" Amrar asked, hurt showing in her eyes.

"If you want to go with the liars, then go. I'm not going to go with them." Wolf shrugged, resting her weapon over her shoulder.

"But I thought we were friends! We were supposed to help each other get home!" Amrar said, looking over at Kipo who was at a loss of words.

"Then you will have to leave them." Wolf said, gesturing towards the boys and Onyx who was waiting for Amrar to join them.

Amrar sighed. She knew that she would be safe with Kipo and Wolf since they had traveled together for a day now and she knew what they were capable of doing together, but she trusted the boys too since they had kept Onyx alive too. She didn't want to ditch Kipo either, which helped her make up her mind.

"Fine, I'll come with you." She sighed and Onyx immediately joined the conversation.

"What!? But what about me? You can't just leave when we've finally found each other!" Onyx said and Amrar placed her hands on their shoulders.

"Then come with me." She said but Onyx just wiggled away from Amrar's hold.

"I can't leave Benson and Dave, they're my friends." Onyx said, feeling a lot of pressure to choose who they would go with since Amrar obviously wasn't changing her mind.

"Kipo and Wolf are my friends too. I need to help Kipo get back home, I promised." Amrar said, begging Onyx to go with her.

"Onyx, Amrar, are you coming or not?" Benson called over, still waiting by the rock with Dave, they were both getting impatient.

Onyx turned around to look at the boys before they turned to look at Amrar and her friends too. Sighing in defeat, Onyx walked over to Amrar, holding her hand tightly before they turned to look at Benson and Dave who just stared at the group of girls. Benson sighed but nodded, turning around to go away with Dave.

"All right, we can take a hint." Benson called over his shoulder as he and Dave left and walked towards the towards side of the city as Onyx just watched them, feeling sad for leaving their friends after a week of being together.

Wolf couldn't care less though as she turned to walk the opposite way of where Benson and Dave had gone. The others stayed in their spot, watching the boys disappear behind the buildings.

"You coming?" Wolf called out over her shoulder as she and Mandu continued walking away.

Kipo frowned but was the first to leave as she once again grabbed the bicycle and dragged it with her since the group needed a way to travel. Amrar put a comforting hand on Onyx's shoulder as she had a gentle smile on her lips.

"I don't feel good about this." Onyx sighed, letting Amrar take them to the other girls.

"I know." Amrar said.

Eventually, the group found a place to sleep at. It had a logo 'Boa Beds' on the wall. The store had indeed a lot of beds, though most of them were broken after 200 years of just standing in ruins. The mattresses were still working, though, and they made some really comfortable beds after the group had put all of them in one room where they would sleep.

~~~

Wolf woke up with a big yawn. She stretched out a hand beside her where she always put her weapon, only for her hand to be placed on the soft mattress. Her eyes flew open and she got up faster than flash.

"Stalky!" she yelled, looking around the room for her beloved weapon, though it was nowhere to be found.

"It's too early..." Onyx muttered tiredly, turning around to fall back to sleep.

Amrar was a light sleeper, so she sat up and looked at the distressed Wolf who tried to hide her panicking. Amrar had noticed how much Wolf relied on her weapon and how much she loved it. It was almost like a young child and her stuffie.

"Is your deathstalker gone?" Amrar asked with symphathy in her voice, knowing how it was with Shasta when she lost something important.

"Yes!" Wolf nearly yelled, searching under the mattresses to see if her weapon was still in the store, but it wasn't there.

Kipo groaned as she opened her eyes enough to look at Wolf, though she was too tired to even register what had happened.

"Didn't you say shouting was bad? Ringing the dinnerbell..." Kipo groaned before she closed her eyes and went back to sleep, drool flowing from her open mouth as she started snoring. 

Wolf was pacing back and forth, knowing who had taken her Stalkie. She was raging mad and she didn't know what she would do when she eventually found the thieves, but she wouldn't let them go that easily this time. "They got our bike too!?" 

She groaned angrily as she face-palmed herself. She would most definitely kill the boys when she found them.

"Easy, Wolf. We'll find them and take our stuff back." Amrar said calmly, though the short girl was anything but calm at the moment. 

"I just don't understand how those two con artists got past my tra-" Wolf never got to finish her sentence as her foot got stuck in Benson's very own trap which had her hanging up and down in the air, swinging back and forth as soda cans sprayed her face and her clothes.

She was screaming at first, though she eventually just groaned angrily whenever a can sprayed her face with pink soda. She sure hated the guys more than ever.

Amrar watched as Wolf hung upside down, her face showing no emotions as her eyes stared right in front of her. Rage was surely building up inside of her and she would use all of that to kill the boys. Kipo and Onyx didn't wake up even by Wolf's yelling. Kipo simply turned her back on Wolf as she was half-awake.

"Five more minutes, dad..." Kipo groaned tiredly.

~~~

Amrar managed to eventually cut the ropes that held Wolf above ground. The two woke their companions up too before they searched for another bike. The only bike they found that was still usable was a pink  tricycle with training wheel, meant for young children. It was embarrassing to admit, but Wolf was the only one who could still use it, though she had to stand up slightly to not hit her knees on the steering wheel.

She took the bike up a hill where she hoped to be able to see Benson and Dave if they passed by. Since the bike wasn't that big, Kipo had to sit in the front basket together with Mandu who used all of her four eyes to check for the boys. Onyx sat on the luggage rack with Amrar on their lap who had to wrap her arms around Wolf's waist to stay in the bike without falling off.

"They seemed nice!" Kipo sighed, settling on talking instead of helping Wolf look for the boys. "And they were so helpful. Ugh, I can't believe I fell for it!"

Kipo sighed. Onyx wasn't in the mood of looking for her old friend either, knowing what Wolf would do if she saw them. As Kipo continued to talk, Wolf eventually managed to see the two boys down the hill. They were riding on the stolen bike and Benson had Wolf's staff in his hold. They were both laughing in victory as they got further and further away. Wolf growled between gritted teeth.

"If you want, you can say 'I told you so.'" Kipo continued, but was interrupted as Wolf sent the gang down the hill in full speed, riding the bike as fast as she could to get to the boys.

The others screamed as they got down the hill, it was as if they rode a rollercoaster. Wolf didn't slow down or take it easy on any of them even once. She rode the bike right through a wall of bricks before she made a rapid turn. The boys were right in front of her, singing.

"Day by day, we're reaching higher and higher." they sang just as Wolf cycled right into them with a growl, nearly forcing the boys off their bike though they quickly got their balance back, continuing.

Benson looked behind him and saw Wolf. She was furious. He cycled down a small hill while Wolf just flew over it. She growled between gritted teeth, staying right behind her goal.

"Look, it was nothing personal. It's a Deathstalker!" Benson said, smiling awkwardly.

"Just give it back to her Benson. She's gonna get us all killed just for that thing!" Onyx begged, nearly falling off the bike.

"She shoulda guarded it better." Dave muttered, resting on top of Benson's backpack.

"Here, have it back." Benson said, reaching out the weapon for Wolf to take.

She grabbed her beloved weapon but immediately got up from her seat and jumped into the air. Her feet landed on the steering wheel of her bike and the tail of the stalker hit Dave. He grabbed onto her weapon as she lifted it.

"Look, we can really help you get over Skyscraper Ridge. We weren't lying! And this time, we'll do it on the hou-" Dave didn't get to finish his sentence as Wolf started to angrily shake her weapon to get the bug off of it as he screamed, trying to hold on. 

As Wolf was busy fighting the boys, Kipo had managed to move out of the basket and sit down on the seat. Since Wolf stood on the steering wheel, Kipo had to step on the pedals to keep the bike moving.

"Wolf, are you seeing this? I'm totally riding a bike!" Kipo said, amazed by herself since she had never used a bike before.

Wolf looked down at her friend though she continued to torture Dave at the same time. Benson couldn't help his friend since he would have to let go of the bike, which he couldn't do. Suddenly, Onyx heard something behind them. From the corners of their eyes, they saw something long, pink and slimy threw itself towards the bike they and their sat on. It was trying to get to Kipo.

"Kipo, look out!" Onyx shouted, but it was too late as the thing wrapped itself around Kipo and pulled her away from the bike.

Onyx tried to grab Kipo but was caught too. Apparently, the weird slimy thing belonged to the Mod Frogs who had somehow followed the gang to catch them. It was their tongue. Wolf gasped and stopped trying to throw Dave off of her staff. Amrar moved to sit on the seat so that she could still bike and not get caught too.

"Hang on, I got you!" Benson shouted, driving his bike backwards to get to the frogs as Dave jumped off of Wolf's staff and landed on Benson's backpack.

Kipo and Onyx was tied together by the tongue, getting closer to the frogs. Jamack tried to pull back his tongue to get the kids, but Benson was faster. He slowed down his bike when he got to the kids. The tongue was firmly wrapped around the two and Onyx was struggling to get out. Their legs were kicking while Kipo was still as a tree, knowing that thrashing wouldn't help Benson save them.

"I can't... Get it..." He groaned, tearing on the tongue to pull it away from his friends, but it didn't seem to be possible.

With a sigh, he opened his mouth and bit the tongue. Jamack whined in pain before he finally let go. Sadly, he caught Benson and Dave instead. They were sent flying towards the Mod Frogs but Dave managed to hold onto the bike with his legs while his arms held onto Benson's feet. 

"Benson!" Onyx screamed in horror as Kipo pulled the two of them on Benson's stolen bike to keep going forward, she didn't want to be caught by the enemy on her third day on the surface. 

"Wolf, stab the tongue!" Kipo told her friend who came biking on her own bike with staff in her hand.

She jumped onto Kipo's bike before throwing herself in the air to stab the tongue, or at least that was what everyone thought. Onyx was holding Dave in his legs to make sure that he didn't let go of Benson or the bike, but Wolf made sure that their plan didn't work.

"Yeah, get 'em!" Benson shouted, hopeful that Wolf would save him, but that wasn't the case. 

The young girl stabbed the dragonfly who was pulling the car of the Mod Frogs to get it moving in the head. From the pain, the poor mute stopped the car and the force made Benson get pulled back by the tongue which sent Dave and Onyx after him.

The car stopped and Wolf, Kipo and Amrar kept biking away from the mutes to not get caught themselves. Since Kipo was biking on the bigger bike and Amrar was too big to bike on the smaller one, Wolf had to place herself on Amrar's lap since she was the only one who could bike the smallest one. Amrar was too slow to move back to the luggage rack, so she stayed on her spot while Wolf made her way away from the frogs who quickly got on their feet and started jumping after the girls, the rest of the gang still wrapped up in Jamack's tongue.

"If you wanna find your home, come with me." Wolf growled as she panted loudly from slight exhaustion.

Kipo and Amrar were looking back to their friends, watching the frogs catching up on them. Wolf biked towards a big rounded hill with trees on it. Amrar got confused since hiding upon it would do nothing to escape the frogs, but she decided to trust Wolf since she knew the surface so well, though she wanted to at least save Onyx first.

"Hey, we have to go back for them!" Kipo begged but Wolf just narrowed her eyes at her friend with a huff.

"No, we don't." she answered, biking in front of Kipo to get to the hill.

"But what about Onyx? I can't leave them!" Amrar spoke up but Wolf just shook her head.

"I don't care." she said, getting up on the hill with Kipo right behind.

Amrar felt a little hurt by Wolf's words, but there was no way that she would be able to fight three big frogs twice her size all by herself. She wasn't special like her own friends, she was just a normal girl...

Wolf threw herself off the bike, making Amrar fall down the the ground with a grunt. Kipo stopped right beside her friends, watching the frogs getting closer by every second.

"You might wanna hang on to something." Wolf called out before she slammed the metal pole of her staff on the ground, making the hill start shaking.

Amrar felt a shill go down her back at the vibrations that came from the ground. It wasn't a normal hill, she was sure of that.

"The hill is moving. Wolf, the hill is moving!" Kipo chanted as she walked up to Amrar to hold onto her tightly in panic.

"It's not a hill." Wolf shrugged as a big head emerged from the water and the 'hill' lifted from the water.

It was a gigantic mute turtle and the girls stood on the shell. As the mute took the first step away from land, the Mod Frogs came to the lake, but it was too late. The frogs was great swimmers, but humans couldn't hold their breath that long and they had to take them to Scarlemagne alive, or else they could get in some deep trouble. Therefore, the frogs stopped at the edge of land and glared at the girls who was watching them from the turtle shell, getting further away after every step.

Amrar had tears in her eyes, realizing that she had gotten separated from her friend once again. There was a risk that they would never see each other again, and that thought nearly had Amrar in tears. Kipo was frowning, feeling upset by the fact that Wolf didn't even try to rescue her.

"I'm so sorry..." Kipo whispered out loud, apologizing for not doing more to save the other humans.

She walked up to Amrar to hold an arm around her to support the upset girl who did the same gesture back. 

Benson and Dave was watching the girls, feeling hurt that other humans would just leave them to die like that. Onyx had the worst look of all.

Hurt. Anger. Betrayal.

Chapter Text

Wolf sat on a long branch, emerging from the mega turtle's shell. She had been there while making sure that the Mod Frogs didn't follow them, leaving Kipo to care for the sobbing Amrar. Mandu sat beside them, looking sad as she watched her friends without being able to do anything to cheer them up. Kipo sighed as she looked where Wolf sat, back turned to her. The young girl was too stubborn to apologize for hurting Amrar and leaving her friend to be captured by the mutes. Kipo was confused as to how someone could be so cruel to just leave people like she had done. She decided to confront her friend.

"Come on." she told Amrar, helping the girl up from the ground as she walked up to Wolf, sliding down the turtle's shell to land on the thick branch.

"The frogs are never done. They won't stop looking for us." Wolf said, not turning around from her spot on the edge of the branch.

"Why do they want people so bad?" Kipo asked, holding her arm around Amrar to support the miserable girl.

"I don't really know, but that's why there's hardly any of us left up here." Wolf answered.

"And that's why we should stick together! You left our friends to get captured, knowing that they won't survive!" Kipo said, feeling the frustration grow inside of her.

Wolf didn't answer and Amrar let out a sob, realizing that Onyx would die in the hands of those frogs and she wouldn't be able to stop it. Kipo frowned as she heard Amrar's helpless sobs. Wolf had been the one to cause all that pain and she seemingly didn't care about it either. That just made Kipo madder.

"How could you do that? How could you just leave them behind!?" Kipo yelled.

Wolf finally turned around.

"Kipo, do you know how valuable you are? You could lead them to a whole city full of humans. Just be thankful we got away, because it could have been much worse." Wolf answered in annoyance.

"Thank you." Kipo muttered as she turned her head to look at Amrar who sat behind her, Mandu in her lap.

The girl had her eyes closed to keep the tears from running down her cheeks.

Wolf sighed as she saw how miserable both the girls looked after hearing her words. She knew that she was harsh on them, but she really just wanted them to stay safe. She didn't want to lose them as well.

"Neither of you have lived up here, you don't know what it's like." Wolf continued, a little softer this time.

"It's amazing! In just a day, I've seen enough wonders to fill a lifetime." Kipo answered, looking over at Amrar before turning back to Wolf to frown at her. "But I've also seen people being terrible to each other."

The shift in Wolf's mood was quick as the girl stood up, glaring at Kipo. She made her way past both of the older girls and stsrted to climb bsck up the turtle's shell.

"We need to eat." she said as her excuse for leaving, glancing at Mandu for a second before she quickly left.

Kipo was quiet as she watched Wolf leave before she got closer to Amrar to wrap her in a right hug as the girl's sobs got slightly louder. Mandu joined in the hug as well.

When Wolf was back up on the shell, she looked at the few trees that had grown on the shell during those 200 years. The trees had grown fruits in them, and Wolf figured that they'd be good enough for one meal.

She was still mad at Kipo for confronting her. The burrow girl was so ignorant and she didn't understand how much Wolf risked to take her back home. Wolf saw her as an ungrateful little brat who didn't know that everyone didn't have the same perfect life as she did. Wolf growled angrily to herself as she spun Stalky and stabbed the venomous tip into the tree, helping her pull herself up to grab onto the branches that was too high for her to reach from the ground.

"People being terrible? I'm not being terrible!" she muttered angrily as she climbed the tree.

She had been nice enough to offer her help to someone who didn't know anything about the surface. She was supposed to help Kipo to get home, and Kipo alone. She never promised to help Benson, Dave or Onyx. The boys had taken Stalky from her and Kipo still thought that they deserved Wolf's help. Wolf was mad at everyone and everything. Why had she said yes to help Kipo in the first place? Because she felt bad? She knew that feeling bad for others only caused her a lot of trouble, but she had gone with those feelings of guilt of leaving a helpless girl alone, and see where that took her! Wolf had never been good at handling feelings, so that was probably why she stabbed the tree she was climbing so hard that it got cracks.

But how dared Kipo call her a terrible person? Wolf had done everything she could to keep her safe, but that was obviously not enough for her. If Kipo wanted Wolf to risk her life for everyone they met, then Wolf had  every right to leave. Nobody had ever risked their life for her, so why would she do that for others? Those mushy mole people were so annoying!

"She doesn't know me!" Wolf muttered angrily to herself as she managed to get high up in the tree where fruits growed.

She grabbed one of the bright red fruits, figuring that eating one of them might get her into a better mood. She opened her mouth widely to take a bite of the fruit that was nearly the size of her own head. Just as she was about to take a bite, the mega turtle took another big step, which caused her whole world to shake and make her lose her balance, making her stumble and fall off the branch she stood on with a loud scream, landing harshly on her back right beside the tree. She felt the air leave her body and her back felt sore from the landing. She groaned in pain as she opened her eyes, hearing something buzzing beside her.

Her eyes widened and she gasped at what she saw. As she had fallen down the tree, she had knocked down a bee hive. Colorful lights could be seen from inside of it, and soon enough, at least a dozen bees got out of it, glaring at Wolf with anger since she had destroyed their home. Wolf stayed completely still from shock before she realized what was going to happen. She rolled her eyes with a groan of annoyance before she quickly got up from the ground, grabbing Stalky as well.

"Not today.." she groaned as she started running with the bees chasing her.

As Wolf ran around on the turtle shell, hoping to tire the bees out and get them to stop chasing her, Kipo and Amrar moved back up to rest on the edge of the shell, looking over the blue water around them. Both of them were unaware of Wolf's current situation with the bees. Amrar had stopped crying soon after Wolf left, but Kipo still kept a steady arm around her friend.

"I understand that Wolf's angry at the others for robbing us, but they still tried to help us, despite knowing the risk!" Kipo vented, still angry at her friend for just leaving them like that.

Amrar sniffled but nodded, silently agreeing with Kipo.

"I don't understand why Onyx wouldn't go with us. They're one of my best friends! We've always been so close, but they just left me..." Amrar replied, looking down to the ground as she remembered how betrayed Onyx had looked when she didn't want to go with them.

She had never felt so bad in her entire life.

As the girls talked and vented, Mandu heard Wolf's helpless tries to shake the bees off of her. They had started to surround her precious weapon, and Wolf was shaking it back and forth to try and get them to back off as she kept running in circles. The constant swinging of her staff started to annoy the bees, and they managed to avoid getting hit by it as they all started to stab her on different parts of her body with their stingers. Wolf refused to acknowledge that it was painful, instead stopping to run since it was a waste of energy, and swinging her staff around her even harder as she tried to protect herself with her arms that had already gotten stung on various places.

Mandu saw the bee hive abandoned by the tree where Wolf had knocked it down, quickly picking it up by her mouth as she walked up to Wolf and the bees. The bees stopped their assault when they saw Mandu with their bee hive, dripping with honey. They left Wolf and started to chase Mandu instead. The young girl didn't even move a muscle, afraid to draw the bees' attention back to her. When it was obvious that Mandu was their new victim, she dared to relax and get out of her defensive state.

She noticed movement from behind her and tensed up slightly, thinking that the bees had come back to attack her once again, but she relaxed for a bit when she realized that it was Kipo and Amrar. She knew that they were mad at her still, but she knew that they were both unable to hurt her, even if they tried.

"Wolf, I've decided. We're going back for Benson, Dave and Onyx. Up here, you do what you have to, and we have to do this." Kipo said, looking firm as she approached Wolf.

The younger girl glanced back at Mandu who was running to the edge of the shell, abruptly stopping before she threw the bee hive into the water beneath the Mega Turtle, the bees following after their home. Wolf's eyes widened. Mandu had been stung all over her body, just like Wolf. The pig ran back up to Wolf, smiling proudly as she panted. As Kipo's words registered in her mind, she realized that the burrow girl was right.

Wolf had treated Mandu badly from the start, trying to eat her and nearly letting her be taken by the Mod Frogs just so she and her companions could survive. Mandu had been treated with nothing but hate from Wolf's part, but here she was, saving the human girl from some angry bees and risking her own safety, and all she got from it was scars of her own. Mandu had done the right thing, helping someone in need, and now it was Wolf's turn to do the same.

Even though the people in need were a couple of Stalky-stealing, trap-avoiding, lying pieces of sh-

"You're right." Wolf said, looking back up at Kipo who paused her rambling about how important it was to stay together as a group on the surface.

"Wait what?" Kipo gasped as Amrar's jaw dropped from the surprise of Wolf's words.

"None of them are worth my spit.." Wolf started, looking down at Mandu who had inspired her to do the right thing, before she sighed as she continued. "But up here, we should stick together."

Wolf's speech was interrupted as Kipo threw her arms around the smaller girl, wrapping her up in a big hug. Wolf tensed up as she looked at Kipo who was smiling brighter than ever.

"You do care, even if you can't admit it." Kipo beamed, turning her head to look at Amrar and invite her into the group hug as well, which the other girl accepted.

Mandu hugged Wolf's left leg, since it was the only thing small enough for the pig to wrap her six legs around.

"This is lesson one of people." Kipo said, creating her own list of friendship and love like Wolf did about survival.

Wolf let herself be hugged for only a couple of seconds before she started to squirm.

"You're hugging me. Don't." she protested when neither of the girls let her go.

"Deal with it." Kipo said in amusement, hugging Wolf even tighter.

~~~

Fast forward to an hour or so later, the Mod Frogs were getting closer to their destination, the Mod Frog Pond. The three of them were standing on their black car that was dragged by a dragonfly.

"Look, we have two humans, that's pretty good! Let's call it a day and go home!" the smaller frog, Harris said in annoyance. 

Jamack, the middle sized frog, glared at his co-worker. 

"Uh, I'm sorry, pretty good? You'd settle for 'pretty good', when we could have the burrow girl and make the biggest score of our lives!? And you call yourself a Mod Frog..." Jamack answered, rolling his eyes, as he turned away from Harris and made one last note just to add salt to the wound. "Also, your tie is uneven." 

Harris gasped, feeling offended at the inappropriate comment. His other companion, Kwat, glared at him. An uneven tie was one of the biggest mistake a Mod Frog could make. Their ties were their pride. A Mod Frog without a tie was a mistake and a  disappointment to their whole species. Turning his back to hide his embarrassment from his co-workers, Harris discreetly fixed his tie until it was perfect. He looked behind him, seeing movement in the backseat of the car. He grinned, the humans were struggling to get out of their ropes, but they would all soon find out that it wasn't worth fighting their future as a bunch of human scum.

Benson and Dave had struggled with their ropes the second they had been put in the car, but Onyx had been quiet and still. If it wasn't for Benson constantly looking beside him to check on them every few minutes, he would of thought that they were unconcious.

"Man, that wolf-girl, it really burns me." Dave growled in annoyance. "She could've helped us! And these ropes are really cuttin' off my circulation."

Benson squirmed in his seat again and Dave tugged on the ropes that kept his arms behind his back. He had nearly given up on trying to get the ropes off of him, and instead tugging his arms out of his body, but then he wouldn't be able to help Benson if he really needed it, so Dave had decided against it.

"To be fair, we did take her deathstalker." Benson answered.

"So? Everyone steals, that's just survival! But turning her back on us like that goes against the code..." Dave growled in anger.

"W- we have a code?" Benson asked in confusion.

"The unwritten code that we never speak about! We both live by it, I thought you knew." Dave said, raising and eyebrow as hw turned his head as far as he could to look at his friend.

"Anything in that code about untying knots?" Benson muttered, struggling again with his ropes.

"Just stop wasting your energy. We won't escape anyway." Onyx finally spoke up, no hope in their voice.

"Damn, Onyx, I thought you were dead or somethin'." Dave said, but Onyx barely even acknowledged him.

"Don't give up that easily, Onyx. We'll escape, you'll see." Benson tried to convince them.

"How? Those frogs are way stronger than we are. We will never get out of her, not alive at least." they continued and Benson got quiet.

He didn't know how to answer. Lying to himself wouldn't make the situation they had gotten themselves into any better. He would simply have to understand that he would die very soon. Just as he had thought about agreeing with Onyx, the car stopped abruptly.

In front of them stood Wolf, Kipo and Amrar. Wolf did a few cool tricks with her staff before she pointed the venomous end towards the frogs. The dragonfly had already been stabbed by her, and it didn't want to go through that again, so it quickly hid behind the car.

"Oh, yeah, the boss is gonna be so happy when we show her what we just found." Jamack said, correcting his tie since it had been moved out of place when the car stopped.

"The burrow girl." Harris finished the sentence, getting up from his position on the car roof.

"I hate to disappoint you, you're gonna give us our three friends, and then we'll be on our way." Wolf growled.

"You heard her, hand them over." Kipo added with a grin as she crossed her arms across her chest, silently wishing that she had been wearing some cool, black sunglasses.

"Harris, Kwat, they want us to hand over their friends." Jamack mocked with a chuckle.

"I think that's against company policy." Kwat replied.

"My co-worker's a real sticker for the rules." Jamack said. "Look, I totally get it. You all want to be together. So, I'll take all of you."

His companions pulled out their weapons, slowly creeping closer to Wolf who seemed to be the group's protector, since she was the only one with a weapon.

The Mod Frogs leaped into the air with a battle yell and Wolf did the same. They all held up their weapons and Kipo and Amrar watched from the side, cheering for Wolf to best the frogs up.

It didn't take long before Wolf's staff was thrown out of her hands and she, together with her friends, were tied up and thrown into the backseat with the others.

"Welp, there goes our last hope of rescue." Benson sighed, getting squished now with the new addition of people in the car.

"Next time, we pick smarter humans to rob." Dave groaned from beneath Kipo's and Wolf's legs.

Amrar had been thrown right beside Onyx. She tried to put a reassuring hand on her friend's to make a silent apology, but Onyx quickly pulled their hand away, turning their head to the opposite side to not have to look at Amrar who fought to keep her tears back.

The car soon started to move and it didn't take too long before they arrived at the Mod Frog Pond, covered in gigantic lilypads. The car stopped one one of them and Harris and Kwat quickly got out of it.

"I'm telling, she smells awful!" Harris complained, holding his nose as the humans and Dave were thrown out of the car into a bundle on the ground.

"Humans has no sense of hygiene." Kwat agrees.

Jamack chuckled as he got out of the car from the opposite side, skamming the door shut as he messed with his tie, making sure that it looked perfect in front of all of the other frogs.

"No, that's just the smell of how stinkin' rich we're all about to be; because we have a burrow girl!" Jamack said, making sure to say the last part out loud to make sure that everyone in the pond heard him.

He managed to get nearly everyone's attention, a few frogs stopped their training of learning how to use a weapon just to stare at him, which made him grin to himself as he saw all of their jealous expressions. He had never felt this good in his entire life.

"That's right! If you ever wanted to see one in person, now's your chance. We have a burrow girl!" Jamack repeated, grinning proudly as he put his hands in his hips.

Kwat carried Kipo over to Jamack and threw the girl on the ground in front of him before backing away, disgusted by the classic human smell.

Kipo chuckled nervously at the attention she got. Burrow people were clearly special, and she didn't want to give away her identity that quickly. Kwat threw Wolf right at Kipo, to not have to carry her as well since she stank even worse, forcing the older girl to nearly fall to the ground just as she had managed to sit up, despite her legs and arms being tied together.

"Uhhh... Who ever said I'm from a burrow..." Kipo chuckled, trying to act natural and come up with a great lie, just like Wolf would have done. "I hunt Mega Bunnies. Mhm, I've been on the surface my whole life... Just surviving!" She continued, deepening her voice as she said the last part, puffing her chest out to look more tough.

"Just don't." Wolf groaned in embarrassment as she listened to Kipo's ridiculous lie.

If her hands had been free, she would have face-palmed.

Jamack raised an eyebrow, resisting rolling his eyes in annoyance. Why did human scum always have to make things so difficult?

"It's obvious she's a burrow girl - but I'd rather have proof." Jamack said, looking over at the rest of the humans that were watched by Harris and Kwat by the car. "If you can confirm it, you'll all go free."

Benson looked at Dave, Onyx and Amrar, deciding to help Kipo since she had tried to help him.

"Who, Kipo? My girl here is the baddest Mega Bunny hunter ever!" Benson said.

"Yeah, she's a legend." Dave added in with a smile.

Kipo turned her head around to look at Benson and Dave, grinning from ear to ear.

"Apology accepted, girl!" Benson added with a smug grin.

"Did it look like I apologized!?" Wolf protested, but was interrupted by the sound of a group of flies coming over to them.

Jamack gasped and immediately stopped with his braggy behaviour, standing up straight.

"Boss! You're back! I have a-.." Jamack started to greet his boss, but was interrupted.

"So this is her?" she asked, barely even acknowledging Jamack.

One of her flies pushed Jamack aside.

"A gift for you..." Jamack finished, although nobody cared to listen to him.

She stepped off the flies to kneel in front of the shorter human who just stared at her in confusion. Wolf glared at her from her position, having met her before just a few times when she was younger and new to surviving on the surface.

The boss frog, Mrs. Sartori, grabbed Kipo's cheeks harshly as she looked at her face closely to inspect her, wanting to figure out if she really was from a burrow.

"Skin untouched by the sun." she noted before she forced Kipo's mouth open. "Not a single tooth missing..."

Mrs. Sartori grinned, standing back up.

"Well done, Jamack. This girl is from a burrow. Scarlemagne will pay handsomely for her." Mrs. Sartori praised.

"What about those two.. Boss?" Harris spoke up, pointing down at Amrar and Onyx.

Mrs. Sartori frowned but moved over to them as well, inspecting the two human teenagers just as she had done with Kipo.

"They aren't clean anough to be from a burrow, but not dirty enough to be from up here. I don't recognize either of you, where did you come from?" Mrs. Sartori said.

"None of your business!" Onyx hissed, glaring at the frog.

"Don't be disrespectful to me, child. You don't know what I'm capable of. Since neither of you want to tell me where you come from, you'll all be sent to Scarlemagne as well as the burrow girl." Mrs. Sartori said, standing up.

She was just about to leave and go back to her work, when she smelt something weird in the air.

"Something smells funny." she commented and Kipo, Wolf and Amrar grinned widely.

"Oh that? It's like we've been saying all along, we're Mega Bunny hunters. And right before Jamack grabbed us, we found a nest of babies." Kipo spoke up, remembering how she had stolen a bit of a Mega Bunny baby's fur with the help of Wolf before they had 'gotten caught' by the Mod Frogs. "Their fur is so soft!"

As Kipo said that, she threw the bit of baby fur that had been hidden in her pocket all this time, in front of Mrs. Sartori. The Frog growled angrily as she looked up, seeing the Mega Bunny mother looking down at her, feeling the scent of her babies somewhere in the Mod Frog Pond.

"Jamack!" Mrs. Sartori scolded angrily as she realized that Jamack had fallen for Kipo's plan to lead the Mega Bunny right to them.

The Mod Frogs started to visibly panic, getting ready with all of their weapons to fight off the Mega Bunny before she could do too much damage to their home.

"That was the signal, where's our backup?" Wolf asked, feeling her own panic rise as well since she didn't want to be at the pond when the bunny was there to destroy it.

"Mandu, you're the backup!" Kipo yelled, looking down into the water.

Right on cue, Mandu threw herself out of the water where she had been hiding. Wolf's straff was in the pig's mouth, and she used it to spin herself, knocking Harris and Kwat into the water as they fell unconcious. Mandu then threw the weapon towards Wolf who quickly managed to grab it, cutting her own ropes before doing the same to Kipo and the others.

During that time, the Mega Bunny had made her way into the pond. One of her gigantic paws landed in the water, making the humans and Dave and a few other frogs lose balance and fall into the water. They quickly grabbed onto one of the many big lilypads, floating on the water surface. Benson looked up at the Mega Bunny, gasping in shock as he saw the frogs trying to fight off the bunny, to no avail.

"We gotta move, or we'll be bunny chow!" Wolf said, quickly getting up onto the lilypad, using Stalky to row forward, away from the pond.

The rest of the group quickly followed her as well, using their hands to push themselves forward.

"You enraged a 100 foot tall mom beast on purpose, what was your plan for after that!?" Dave asked, being the only one who didn't help the others get away from the pond.

"I never thought that far ahead, I'm new at this!" Kipo answered.

"Know what? We'd have done the same!" Benson grinned before his expression turned into terror as he pointed to something above them. "Look out!"

The group turned their heads to where he was pointing, seeing Jamack on a dragonfly, holding a nail bat as he flew towards them.

"Human scum!" Jamack yelled angrily, swinging his bat at them when he got close enough, although they all ducked.

Jamack growled angrily, turning the dragonfly around to fly towards the humans again.

"You played me! Actually, I'm impressed!" Jamack yelled, swinging the back at them again, although this time, Wolf spun her staff around, managing to hit the dragonfly which made the frog fall off and land in the water with an angry scream.

At the same time, the bunny started to get angry as she chased the frogs around, trying to figure out who smelled just like her babies. As the bunny ran further into the water, she created a gigantic wave which made the group of humans nearly fall off the lilypad as they were sent back towards the pond.

A dragonfly flew above them and Dave looked up with a grin.

"Hang on, I speak a little Dragonfly!" Dave said, calling the dragonfly over as he started to talk to it, asking it to take them away from the pond.

The dragonfly answered with something that only Dave understood, but it seemed to be something good as he grinned big.

"Alright, hop on!" he told the others as they all started to try to find a place on the flying bug.

It was a very tight fit, but they managed.

"How did you figure out that you can speak Dragonfly?" Onyx asked in an amused tone.

"We're both bugs, you just learn after a while." Dave shrugged, helping the teenager get onto the dragonfly as well.

The last person to get on was Wolf. The dragonfly was glaring angrily at her. It had a bump on its' head from a certain deathstalker...

The dragonfly said something in its own language as it glared at Wolf.

"What do you mean 'not her'!?" Dave asked, but the dragonfly refused to answer.

The Mega Bunny had suddenly realized that the smell of her babies came from one of the humans. She started running towards them and Wolf panicked. She really didn't want to die like that and the dragonfly was still resisting to let her get on. Mutes were so annoying...

Dave continued to try and convince the dragonfly, but the Mega Bunny had already gotten over to the humans. Her shadow loomed over them.

"He says he'll do it." Dave finally said.

Kipo grabbed onto the back of Wolf's pelt, pulling the younger girl onto the dragonfly's back as she yelled from the sudden movement. The dragonfly immediately took off, flying high into the air as the Mega Bunny's paw landed right where Wolf had been standing just a second ago. When she realized that the humans had gotten away, she started chasing after them.

Kipo looked behind her, gasping as she saw Jamack in his car, riding on the flies that Mrs. Sartori had used to stand on moments before the bunny had come. He looked angrier than ever, determined to catch the burrow girl once and for all.

"Uhh, guys?" Kipo called out, making everyone turn their head back to look at her.  "What's faster, a bunny or a frog?" she asked and everyone realized what she was talking about.

Amrar felt herself start to panic. She didn't want to be caught once again. She, Kipo and Wolf had worked so hard to save Benson, Dave and Onyx. It couldn't all be for nothing! Without thinking about it, Amrar wrapped her arms around Onyx's waist, and the still angry teenager didn't resist the touch this time. 

"There's only one way to shake him! Time to put your money where your mouth is, bug boy." Wolf said, looking at Benson since he had claimed to be able to get them over Scyscraper Ridge, which was right in front of them.

Benson looked at Dave as he took off his backpack, searching through it.

"King of Pop?" Benson suggested.

"No, Old School hip-hop!" Dave argued.

"Just choose one already!" Onyx groaned, already knowing what the boys were arguing about.

"Wait, I've got the perfect song." Benson said, turning on the music with his cassette player.

L.E.T.S.G.O started playing.

"See, this right here is why need experienced guides, okay?" Benson grinned, looking back at the others who looked confused.

The dragonfly started to fly towards the ruins that represented Scyscraper Ridge. Jamack went after them, driving in front of the Mega Bunny to get to then first. He wasn't about to let the burrow girl go. 

Not this time...

Chapter Text

Jamack was right behind them, trying to make the car go even faster. There were only a couple feet between him and the Mega Bunny mother. He had to get to the burrow girl before her. He couldn't let such a valuable human get away from him and take his chances of getting to meet the might Scarlemagne away. The human boy and his weird bug friend were arguing about what way to take to get around Skyscraper ridge. They were making his job so much easier, he thought as he pressed down on the accelerator.

"Eastern Spur?" Benson tried to suggest.

"North Summit?" Dave argued.

"Oh my gosh, just choose already!" Onyx yelled in frustration, hearing the buzzing of the flies that made Jamack's car move get even closer.

But there was no time to argue. Skyscraper ridge was right in front of them. Kipo, who sat on the very end of the dragonfly, looked behind her only to see a black car right behind her.

"Uhh... Guys?" Kipo asked, trying to gain attention from the fighting teenagers who were too busy arguing to notice that Jamack was catching up on them.

The green frog made the car go even faster, which caused it to bump right into the dragonfly, pushing it forward and into the ruins that represented Skyscraper ridge. The Mega Bunny continued to follow them inside, although it was hard to get through it without the whole place collapsing because of her size.

Because of the sudden push, Dave had a hard time deciding where to go, now when all of the humans were aware of their current threats. Benson decided to help his friend, not wanting to become bunny chow or be sent to Scarlemagne.

"Burrow girl~" Jamack called out in a sing-song voice as he drove beside the dragonfly.

Dave tried to make the dragonfly take random turns to shake Jamack off of their backs, but he followed them like chewing gum on the bottom of a shoe.

"Go left! Go right! Okay, go right again!" Benson yelled, trying to get the whole gang out of Skyscraper ridge alive. "Go up! Yeah, yeah, yeah! Go up, go up, go up! Right, left, up!"

Benson looked behind him, his plan had only barely worked. Jamack wasn't as close behind them as before, but he was catching up once again.

"How is he still on our tail!?" Benson asked out loud, staring at Jamack who was fighting for his life to not lose sight of the humans.

Eventually, after many sharp turns, he managed to get close enough to the burrow girl once again. He kicked the window in front of him, breaking the glass and giving him a way out of the car as he sent his tongue out to grab onto Kipo.

"He's coming!" Kipo warned, and Dave managed to make the dragonfly duck just in time.

Jamack was sent flying above the humans, but he managed to grab onto his car before he went to far, pulling himself back towards it. The humans were right in front of him. They all screamed as he flew into them, grabbing onto Kipo and pulling her off of the dragonfly. He landed on the roof if his car, holding Kipo down beneath him as he used his foot to turn the steering wheel after the rest of the humans, wanting to catch all of them.

"We're close to it, aren't we? Your home?" Jamack asked, imagining how famous he'd be if he managed to take a whole city of humans to Scarlemagne at once. "I can already tell from your face."

Kipo tried to act neutral, but her nervousity did not go missed by Jamack. She looked to her sides, not seeing any way out yet. 

"So, let's make this easy; just point me in the direction." Jamack suggested, but Kipo didn't answer.

She looked behind Jamack, seeing the Mega Bunny catching up on him now when he was too distracted to notice it. The bunny could be her only way out. She made eye contact with the green frog again who groaned internally. The burrow girl was too stubborn for her own good...

"Okay, I'll sweeten the offer; you go free, and your people will never learn it was you who betrayed them." Jamack said, getting impatient with Kipo.

With her new plan in mind, Kipo nodded and reached out her hand towards Jamack to shake his. The frog stilled for a second, not expecting her to take his deal without a fight, but it'd make it way easier for him. Chuckling, he took her hand and shook it, imagining how rich he would be. Mrs. Sartori wouldn't look at him as a failure anymore - nobody would.

Kipo's other arm reached around Jamack's back, pulling herself up a bit. In her hand was the piece of the Mega Bunny baby fur that had been used to trick the mother to the Mod Frog pond.

"You need to do some soul searching." Kipo growled just as the Mega Bunny noticed one of her babies' fur on Jamack's back.

Jamack felt something close to his neck, grabbing onto it to see what it was. When he saw the Mega Bunny fur, he looked over at Kipo in slight panic, realizing that she had tricked him again. The Mega Bunny caught uo to the car and grabbed onto Jamack's costume with her teeth, taking him away as he screamed in terror.

Now when nobody was driving the car, it drove right into a big, sharp rock that had cut through the ceiling of one of the gigantic buildings. Kipo screamed as she was thrown off of the car, her world spinning. Dave had made the dragonfly slow down a bit to be able to save Kipo from Jamack. Amrar reached out her arms to catch Kipo from falling, managing to pull her back up into the dragonfly. It took a few seconds before Kipo had realized that she had been saved, and when she did, she hugged Amrar tighly, thanking her.

"Woo-hoo! That was cold, Kipo. Respect!" Dave praised with a grin, making Onyx snort a laugh behind him.

As the group continued to go through the ruins of buildings, the Mega Bunny was digging through the top of Skyscraper ridge, Jamack squirming and screaming for his life as giant teeth were digging into his black suit.

"Don't wrinkle the suit!" Jamack begged, but the bunny barely heard him as she doved back into the ruins again, trying to find her way back home to her babies.

The dragonfly flew past the bunny right as she disappeared behind one if the many buildings that had been broken into two. Kipo could see the clover looking road further away. She got happier by the minute - she was finally going back home to her dad!

The dragonfly landed a bit away from her burrow, and the group of humans got off. Just as the dragonfly flew away, having done its' job, Dave groaned, almost as if he was in pain. The humans paused to turn around and stare at him. Dave's skin parted into two as he morphed into his next cycle. His arms and legs turned buff and his color turned into a feel color. A pair of big wings pushed out of his back.

A couple of jaws dropped in front of him at the sight of his new form; Buff Dave.

Benson didn't look as surprised as Kipo, Wolf and Amrar, but he did look pretty annoyed.

"That probably would've been helpful, like five minutes ago." Benson said as Onyx rolled their eyes beside him.

"Anyone need a jar opened? I got you covered." Dave said, ignoring Benson's comment as he flexed his big muscles.

Amrar looked at Onyx, guilt obvious in her eyes. 

"Hey, I'm sorry for leaving you.." she apologized and Onyx shook their head before grabbing Amrar's hands. 

"Don't mention it. We're good", they replied and Amrar smiled at her friend. 

"Just so you know, no one in my burrow has ever seen a mute before, besides a giant worm." Kipo spoke up, trying to prepare her new friends to meet the clover people.

Mandu snorted beside her, she had been clinging to Wolf's back ever since she got on the dragonfly. She couldn't hold onto the dragonfly herself since her six legs were all two small to get a good grip, but Wolf had let the blue pig sit on her lap, just this once...

Kipo picked Mandu up, cuddling her tightly.

"But they'll get used to you pretty quick!" Kipo cooed, petting Mandu's head softly as the pig smiled happily.

"Wait a minute, you're inviting us down there?" Benson asked, not expecting Kipo to want him or his friends with her after they had stolen from her.

"Yeah, don't you wanna come? You'll always have a warm meal, you don't have to sleep with one eye open." Kipo said with a big smile.

"Sign us up!" Dave said immediately.

"Bye-bye, surface! I won't miss you!" Benson cheered, waving towards the sky as he followed Kipo towards the bushes that had grown around the roadway.

"Wait, what about us?" Onyx called out, making the three humans turn around.

Onyx, Amrar and Wolf hadn't moved to go with them.

"You promised to help us get home." Onyx continued, wrapping an arm around Amrar to show her that they weren't going to leave her.

"Yeah, and you promised me to help me find my sister!" Amrar added, suddenly realizing that her ten year old little sister was out there somewhere, alone.

She couldn't believe that she had forgotten about her! She had been so busy being chased, but now she was so worried about her. Amrar had barely made it out alive, even with the help of her friends, and Shasta was probably all alone somewhere, without food, clean clothes and without anybody to take care of her! Amrar felt like crying. She had to find her sister, and the rest of her friends, before any of them got seriously hurt.

"But... My burrow is right here! My dad is there waiting for me, I have to go back..." Kipo said, feeling guilty about leaving Amrar and Onyx alone after she had promised to help them as well.

But she couldn't just leave her people. Her dad was probably worried sick and she had to at least let him know that she was alive. She just wanted to go back home...

"You can come with us, we'll give you a safe place to stay at, and then we can go back out and search for your friends?" Kipo tried to suggest, but Amrar and Onyx backed away.

Kipo looked over at Wolf, seeing that she didn't seem to want to go with her either.

"Wolf? Do you also wanna leave?" Kipo asked.

"I'm not going to turn into a soft, mushy, mole person. You'll be fine without me." Wolf answered, taking a step back as well.

She had promised to take Amrar back, and while she didn't owe Onyx anything, they were a friend of Amrar's.

"I'll help you get home if Kipo won't." Wolf offered and Amrar nodded, quickly making up her mind.

She knew that Wolf knew a lot about survival, she would be able to help, as long as she and Onyx didn't fight too much. Wolf gave Kipo one last look before she turned her back towards her and started walking away, Amrar and Onyx going after her.

"Where are you going?" Kipo called after them, thinking that they'd all want to stay with her for a bit where they'd be safe.

"I promised to get you home, I never said I'd be your roommate. However, I did promise Amrar to help her find her sister, and I will." Wolf answered, not saying anything more as she continued to walk away.

Onyx didn't even look back to say bye to Benson and Dave, which made both of the guys feel guilty. They didn't mean to leave their friend, but Kipo had offered something way better than surviving in a mute-eat-mute-world.

Kipo groaned angrily as she clenched her arms. Why did they have to be so stubborn!? Couldn't they even have stayed one night? Sighing in deafeat, Kipo turned back to Benson and Dave, deciding to just leave Wolf to help Amrar and Onyx if that was what she wanted. She couldn't force anyone to go with her, and she really wanted to see her dad again. She had missed him a lot and couldn't wait to sleep in her own bed again. 

"Come on, we're almost there." Kipo said, before she led the boys through the thick bushes, getting closer to her home.

She moved two bushes apart, expecting to see flat ground with a sorta secret entrance to a secret clover burrow. What she did see was a big crater of a former burrow that had collapsed. Her big smile dropped as she gasped, seeing her home turned into ruins of big rocks. There were no buildings or sign of life anywhere. Not even door prints. There was just one giant hole in the ground.

"Kipo, I'm really sorry." Benson said, frowning, debating if he should put a comforting hand on her shoulder or not.

It was too late for him to think about it, though, as Kipo took off towards the crater that had been her home for nearly 13 years. She slid down the wall of the crater, pushing big rocks away to check for signs of her people, but she couldn't find anything. They guys and Mandu was watching Kipo frantically search around the crater. Mandu snorted sadly, feeling the pain of losing her home. She had gotten away from her parents as well as a baby, and she still hadn't seen either of them.

"Man, I knew this was too good to be true." Dave sighed sadly, looking up at Benson who didn't really know what to say or do.

"Uhh, I see a lot of broken stuff, but not signs of any people." Benson said as he watched Kipo move one big rock after the other.

Kipo gasped at what he had just said, realizing something.

"No signs of any people!" she repeated, running towards one if the walls of the crater.

"Are you sure you didn't live alone, Kipo? I will not judge, okay?" Benson continued, looking at Kipo in confusion as she tried to move several big rocks away from the walls that covered something that Benson assumed was important to her. "I feel like we should follow her."

Dave nodded and the three went after Kipo to see what she had found that was so important. She moved one last rock away, showing a green wall and a big door. To open the door, she had to put in a code, which she already knew. Kipo entered the code and the door opened, showing a big, empty room. Kipo smiled at the sight of it, turning around to grab Benson's shoulders.

"Benson, you rule!" Kipo conplimented, leaning in to kiss him on the cheek softly, a faint blush noticable on her cheek.

Benson fought not to cringe.

"Oh... Wha-... What'd I do?" he asked, stuttering.

"No people, not even in the bunker!" Kipo explained. "That's where we're supposed to hide if things ever get really bad. If no one's there, they got away! My father, my friends... They got away somewhere."

She looked up towards the top of the big crater, realizing that she'd have to go after them herself.

"And if they're somewhere, I can find them!" she spoke, smiling to herself proudly. 

"You're going to need help." a voice spoke from further away.

It was Wolf.

The younger girl had managed to sit on the stinger if her staff, the mental part balancing between two rocks. Onyx and Amrar were standing on either side of Wolf, their arms crossed.

"I thought you didn't want me around anymore. I'm home now, you did your job." Kipo answered, wanting to see if Wolf was actually serious about coming back or not.

"You're not home, my job's not over yet. I won't leave before all of you are back where you belong." Wolf spoke, looking down to the ground.

Kipo smiled thankfully and Wolf couldn't help but grin herself before she caught herself and immediately turned her lips downwards.

"We'll help you too, Kipo. We got your back!" Dave grinned happily.

"Totally! What should we do it for, Dave?" Benson added, but his feet were immediately attacked by Mandu. "Ow, ow, ow! Okay, we'll do it for like, food."

Mandu attacked him again, forcing Benson to once again scream out in pain.

"Okay, okay! For free, for free!" Benson finally gave up, and Mandu nodded with an angry snort.

He then turned back to Onyx who barely looked at him.

"A-and, we'll help you as well, Onyx. I promise, this time!" Benson said, trying to smile, but the teenager was still mad for just leaving them to live a life in luxury in a burrow, free from mutes who only wanted to hurt you.

Just as Benson was about to have a talk with Onyx to actually apologize to them, Dave attempted to pet Mandu who immediately ran off, running into Wolf's staff which forced her to lose balance and fall to the ground together with it. Everyone burst out laughing, even Onyx.

The only one who didn't laugh was Wolf who just glared angrily at the others when she managed to sit up, making death traps in her head for all of them.

Benson walked up to the angry, short girl who was still on the ground, reaching out a hand for her to take so he could help her get up. She glared at the hand for a second before she slapped it away from her, jumping to her feet. Benson grinned and wrapped an arm around her, walking back towards the others.

"Let go or lose the arm." Wolf growled angrily and Benson's arm left her shoulder immediately.

"Yes, ma'am." he said obediently.

The others had sat down in a circle to rest from the eventful day. Dave was once again cooing at Mandu, who finally let him pet her. Benson laughed and Wolf sat down beside Amrar, crossing her legs.

"She likes you, Dave!" Benson commented as Mandu licked the bug's hands.

They all started laughing again, but suddenly, the sound of metal hitting the ground somewhere above them could be heard. The group paused their laughing to turn around and look up to the edge of the crater, only to be met by the sight of an army of cats in flanell. They all held axes in their paws. One cat in the front were slamming it down onto one of the big rocks. They were all watching the humans silently, without moving anything. The group of humans froze.

"Uh, guys..?" Kipo spoke up, getting a bit nervous.

Were those cats friends, or enemies...?

Chapter Text

2 days ago

Kipo was rock climbing on the gigantic wall in her burrow.

"Today's the day. All the way to the ceiling." Kipo said loudly to herself, anxiously looking above her.

She was already very far up, the highest she had ever gotten. She and her dad had many times before tried to rock climb, but Kipo would always feel nauseus and climb back down out of fear. This time, however, she was planning to get all the way up. She was going to be brave.

She let go of the rock wall with one of her hands to move further up, but as she was trying to get a grip somewhere else, her hands slipped and she grabbed onto her pig axe that she used as support to climb. She closed her eyes shut tightly as she dangled in the air, the rope attached to a belt around her waist keeping her from falling.

"What's the holdup, slowpoke?" her dad, Lio, joked from beneath her, knowing that his daughter was anxious.

Kipo gripped her axe tighter as she looked down towards her dad, trying not to look at the ground far beneath them. She smiled nervously.

"No holdup, why?" she said with a nervous giggle. "Does it look like I'm holding up?"

"No, you're clearly not holding up." Lio said sarcastically. "But, uh, while we're waiting, tell me, what minerals are in most abundance at this stratum?" he asked, trying to ease Kipo's nerves by distracting her from the rock climbing.

"Dad, that's easy!" Kipo smiled, her mood instantly going up. "Azurite and malachite, two of my favorite 'ites'."

"If you can ace a pop geology quiz, then I know you can make it the rest of the way." Lio smiled, gesturing to the ceiling of the burrow.

With her dad's support in mind, Kipo, decided to keep going. She knew she could make it. She grabbed onto a ledge and pulled herself back up, climbing higher, her pig axe in her other hand. As she stabbed the axe into the wall, strong vibrations from above made the burrow shake, small rocks falling down from the ceiling and to the ground below.

The citizens stopped for a second, but they were used to Mega mutes wandering above them ever since the burrow was first made. An old lady shrugged and kept walking with a bag of groceries in her arms.

"Whoo! Just a Mega Mute passing overhead. A little close, but nothing to worry about." Lio called to his daughter who had stopped her climbing.

Kipo looked up at the ceiling, silently counting the seconds between each footstep to determine how big the Mute was.

"Five seconds between footsteps." Kipo called down to her dad.

"Whoa, this one's big! What do you think it is?"

"I'm guessing... A 400 foot tall squirrel with eight tails!" Kipo exclaimed, letting her fantasies wander since she had no idea how mutes looked like on the surface.

"Maybe it's a giant dolphin that's adapted to walk on land." Lio suggested.

"Dolphin?" Kipo asked in amusement. "Well, I did read once they have vestigial leg bones..." Kipo rambled, just as a loud roar from above the burrow was heard.

Lio's eyes turned as big as saucers as he gasped, fear filling his entire body.

"They found us..." he said to himself, frantically looking around him for a way out.

He and Kipo needed to get out of the burrow. Now. Before it was too late. His eyes landed on the water canal right below them. As far as he knew, it was the only way out.

"Dad? Dad, are you listening to me?" Kipo asked, oblivious to what was about to happen.

The footsteps above was getting even closer, and Lio saw no other way out than what he was about to do. He loosened the rope around his waist and pulled it, making Kipo lose her grip on her pig axe as she fell into the water canal with a scream. The burrow ceiling started to collapse and Lio quickly untied himself from the rock climbing wall as well, jumping into the canal to escape with his daughter.

Kipo was quickly taken away with the strong current as she was not strong enough to swim against it, back to her dad. All she could do was call for him as she saw him landing in the water as well. 

"Dad! Dad!" Kipo screamed, panic obvious in her voice as she was swept into a tunnel that would take her out of the burrow.

Huge rocks fell down right in front of the tunnel, keeping Lio from going after his daughter.

"Kipo!" Lio yelled after her, getting out of the water as he tried to dig himself through the rocks and go after her, but there were too many rocks and they were too big for him to move.

His attempts at following his daughter was interrupted when the Mega Mute from above started to dig a hole in the burrow ceiling, sunshine shining through the cracks. A massive wooden spike pushed a hole in the ceiling as it was pressed down into the ground of the burrow, landing in the water canal, pretty close to where Lio was standing. One big cloud of dust filled the burrow, and when it all cleared, Lio watched the gigantic wooden spike that belonged to the Mega Mute from above. The citizens had gone quiet, hiding behind their buildings, waiting for whatever was about to happen next.

"It's okay, you got Kipo out of here, that's what matters. The rest..." Lio tried to calm his anxiety, pausing when the spike was pulled back out from the burrow, leaving one big hole where it came from.

"Piece of cake?" he mumbled, hearing a loud growl from above.

The light that had slipped through the hole disappeared when the Mega Mute bent over it, it's red eye filling the entire hole as it looked down into the burrow, roaring once more.

~~~

Kipo and her group were watching the army of cats, standing on the edge of the crater that once had been Kipo's home. The cat on the front was slamming his axe down on a rock beside him, watching the group of humans silently.

"Uh, guys..?" Kipo spoke up, getting a bit nervous "More mutes! Are these ones friendly or unfriendly?"

Wolf stood up from her spot on the ground.

"There's an entire army of them. Packing axes. What do you think?" Wolf answered sarcastically.

"Unfriendly. Got it."

The cat slamming his axe on the rock suddenly stopped. He raised his weapon and turned it down to the middle of the crater where Kipo and her friends were standing.

"Charge!" the cat yelled, and with roars and hisses, the cat army started running towards the humans quickly.

"Oh, man! Oh, man! Those are Timbercats! Cats eat bugs!" Dave ranted frantically, although he was immortal.

"Dave, you're flying!" Kipo pointed out. "Fly us out of here!"

Dave's eyes turned into stars. It was his time to shine. Letting all of the humans, plus Mandu, climb onto him proved to be a challenge. He was one bug, and they were 5 humans - and the pig. Kipo held Mandu as she and Wolf clung to Dave's arms while Benson sat on his back, watching out for his wings. Amrar and Onyx tried to keep their balance on his shoulders, holding onto his head to not fall off. Dave grunted as he started to slowly fly upwards. They were all so heavy and the cats were getting closer. With a pained grunt, Dave let go of his friend as he molted into Old Dave who landed in Benson's arms.

"What the hell, dude?" Onyx muttered, rubbing their head as they had gotten a rough landing.

"Yeah, sorry, guys! Dave's got a little bit of, uh... Performance anxiety issues." Benson apologized as Dave once again molted, this time into Baby Dave.

Wolf rolled her eyes, this was why she never counted on mutes for help.

"Lesson seven of the surface..." Wolf started, turning around to see the cats running right towards them. "Know when to run!"

With that, the gang started running away from the cats. There was no way that they would be able to climb out of the crater in time, so all they could do was hide. A few big rocks had created a mini-cave, and the group quickly threw themselves inside of it, out of view from the cats.

But the cats didn't seem to even care about the humans. The entire army quickly ran past them, hitting their axes on the ground as they looked for something. The leader cat from before screeched.

"The footprints led right here! The monster's got to be here somewhere. Keep looking!" he demanded, watching the cats search for whatever monster he was talking about.

"Tree-stealer! Where are you hiding?" one of the smaller cats called out angrily.

A few of the rocks started to get pushed out of the way from underneath. It was another timbercat, a white, female one. She wore a blue flannel shirt and she held two axes in her paws, spinning them around quickly as she glared at the other cat from before.

"We're wasting our time. Whatever it is, it's long gone by now." the female cat spoke, sadness showing in her voice.

The other leader cat from before hissed at her.

"You can't know that for sure, Molly Yarnchopper." he growled.

"I know what I see." the white cat, Molly answered, picking up a familiar piece of tree that she had found on the ground. "You think your tiny axes can stop the thing that did all this?" Molly asked, gesturing to the crater.

The younger cat from before gasped in horror.

"That's from the Scratching Tree! Raise your axes for the Scratching Tree!"

All of the cats meowed sadly before they raised their axes towards the sky.

"The Mega Mute must have used our tree to make this crater." Molly spoke. "We're no match for a beast who could do that. Not with our leader gone. Not without Yumyan Hammerpaw."

Kipo's head was peeking out behind one of the rocks that she and her friends were hiding behind. Her attention had been grabbed the second the cats had started talking about the monster. She knew that a Mega Mute had destroyed her burrow, but it seemed that it had taken something from those cats as well. She turned to her friends to tell them about her idea.

"Guys, I think the Mega Mute they're looking for is the same one who destroyed my city. What if my people didn't get away? What if it took them?" Kipo said.

Benson and Wolf quickly exchanged a glance before they looked back at Kipo.

"We should team up with these cats to find it. We have an enemy in common!" Kipo continued.

Wolf sighed as she took a step toward her friend.

"Oh, Kipo. Humans and mutes don't mix unless they're eating us." Wolf lectured, reminding Kipo of her hatred for mutes.

Onyx stood up from their spot beside Amrar, walking up to Wolf.

"For once, I agree with Wolf." the teenager rolled their eyes, hating to feed the tiny girl's ego. 

"Thank you." Wolf said with a sigh of relief. 

"All of the mutes we've met has either tried to kill us, eat us or send us to Scarlemagne. We shouldn't take any risks, especially when they have weapons and we don't." Onyx continued.

"But they have an army!" Kipo tried again, though this time, she didn't wait for an agreement.

She left the hiding spot and walked right up to the cats. Wolf gasped before she facepalmed her hand with a groan of annoyance. Onyx placed a hand on Wolf's shoulders, grounding her from going after Kipo and do something even more stupid.

"Hi, there!" Kipo greeted, gaining the attention from all of the cats who just started back at her. 

She quickly glanced behind her to her friends who were peeking their heads out from their hiding spot to see if Kipo's theory was lucky or just plain stupid. 

"Uh, funny coincidence, the Mega Mute you're looking for? We're looking for it too!" Kipo said, gesturing to her friends, also spoiling their hiding spot for an army of mutes. "We should totally team up! Uhh, and I know what you're thinking; humans and mutes? Crazy! But I say, peace between the species. Right?" Kipo ended her speech, not noticing that a few of the timbercats had surrounded her.

Kipo was quickly grabbed by one of the cats. She had never been a strong fighter, as she didn't believe in violence. Therefore, she was captured within seconds and thrown into a cage made out of wood. Now when she had also spoiled her friends' hiding spot, the cats moved over to them as well to capture them. Wolf immediately started to fight, getting Stalky ready to fight an army of cats. It didn't take very long until Stalky was twisted out of her grip and she was pulled away from behind by another cat. She didn't even get the chance to stab any of them!

She kicked and scream but was also thrown into the cage, together with the Benson and Dave who had willingly went with the cats, knowing that wasting their energy on a fight they wouldn't win was never a good idea. Onyx tried to fight and at least protect Amrar, but their powers didn't seem to work outside of their own world, so it was for nothing. Eventually, the entire group was inside the cage, locked in without a way out. Wolf was glaring at the cat holding her beloved weapon.

Four cats carried the cage, and they were soon leaving the crater and moving towards a forest. Kipo looked towards the crater that was getting further and further away from them.

"I tried." Kipo sighed in defeat.

She had been so close to finding the Mega Mute. She had really believed that the cats would want to join her and her friends. She had messed up really bad and she had no idea what would happen to them next.

Benson looked down at the grey sand that they all sat on. He picked some up into hid hands and then let it fall through his fingers.

"Something tells me this isn't the kind of sand you find at the beach." Benson spoke, looking over at Wolf who was glaring at Kipo from the other side of the cage.

Dave's cocoon, that was beside Benson, opened and Toddler Dave jumped out of it, immediately picking up the sand and putting it into his mouth.

"Hey! Litter is not food!" Benson scolded with disgust, patting Dave's belly to force the litter out of him, though it didn't work.

"If you had listened to me, we would have gotten away." Wolf muttered angrily, her arms and legs crossed.

"Clearly, the cats need some time to warm up to the idea of working with humans." Kipo said, stretching a hand out between the bars of the wooden cage, immediately retracting it when a paw with sharp claws started hitting at the spot where her hand once had been.

Kipo flinched slightly at the sudden movement before she calmed down.

"Maybe a lot of time, but I will win them over!" Kipo said, feeling sure of herself.

"I. Don't. Work. With. Mutes." Wolf growled, getting interrupted when Toddler Dave exploded and his remains covered half her face.

She glared at the now Teenager Dave, silently wishing that he wasn't immortal.

"I tell you, these years go by so fast!" Benson said with a sad smile, making Wolf scoff at him.

As the three friends were arguing, Amrar was sitting on the opposite corner of the cage. She was listening to two of the cats in front of her talk.

"We've been seeing many humans lately. First that one kid, now a whole group. Do you think they're up to something?" one of the female, black cats spoke, trying to be quiet.

"Nah, it's probably just a coincidence. Let's just focus on finding that monster. That's what Yumyan would have wanted us to focus on, not some stupid humans." the other male, brown cat answered, turning their conversation down.

Their words had Amrar thinking. They had apparently found another human. A kid. What if that kid was Shasta? What if she had also been here? She wanted to believe that Shasta was safe somewhere, but with those Timbercats, you could never be sure...

Benson gasped behind her as the trees started to get thicker and thicker. A community of cats seemed to have been build out of the trees. They lived high up in cots and inside the trees. The cats were using their axes to shape the trees into whatever they wanted. Big balls of yarn hung from the branches and a few cats were resting on them, watching the humans in the cage as it stopped. Two cats were sitting in the remainings of what seemed to have been a gigantic trees in the middle of their community. The cats were sad.

One of the cats, the one holding Stalky, opened the door to the cage to let the human prisoners out of the cage. There was no way for then to escape, as there were cats everywhere.

"Stand at attention! You're in front of the Scratching Tree!" he demanded.

Benson raised an eyebrow as he crawled out of the cage.

"It look like it's... Um, how do I say, uh, not much of a tree anymore?" Benson spoke.

"Hey! It's sacred to our very way of life!" the younger cat from before scolded, glaring at Benson.

The cat holding Stalky glared at Benson, noticing the picture on his shirt. It was a cat. He pointed Stalky towards Benson, making Wolf clench her fists to not attack the cat for using her weapon.

"What's that on your sweater, human? Is that supposed to be... Funny?" he growled, the sharp top of Stalky getting awfully close to Benson's face.

Benson chuckled nervously, knowing that whatever he said next could either keep him alive or kill him.

"Oh, this old rag? It's from a very long time ago, when humans used to keep cats as, uh, pets." Benson said before he quickly crossed his arms, hiding the picture of the cat on his sweater. "You know, I... I can just wear it like this..."

Wolf watched the interaction silently, scoffing when she saw the stupid cat's stupid mute paws on her Stalky. She would make him pay for taking it from her!

From behind, Dave molted once again, this time turning into Adult Dave. He jumped over her and landed in front of the group in a fighting pose.

"I'm back in fightin' shape!" he cheered before he looked around and saw all of the cats. "Aw, man, I just remembered we got caught." he sighed in defeat.

Molly Yarnchopper rolled her eyes at the bug as she stepped forward.

"What do we do with these humans? We certainly can't keep them like the kid. Should we eat 'em? We'd have to clean them first, they rode here in the litter." Molly suggested, looking over at her companion Ruffles who was still holding the tiny human's sharp, red weapon in his paws. 

"I say we bat them between our paws for several hours until we get bored." Ruffles suggested, batting Stalky between his paws as a demonstration.

"I wish Yumyan was here. He'd know what to do." the younger kitten said.

"Eat them!" Molly argued.

"Bat them!" Ruffles argued back.

The humans just watched as the two continued their arguing. 

"Eat them!"

"Bat them!"

"Eat them!"

"Bat them!"

"There's only one way to settle it." Molly glared at Ruffles.

"Caterbrawl!" Ruffles yelled as he threw himself at Molly while the other cats joined in on their fighting as the humans just watched in confusion, wondering if they should take the distraction and run for it, or if they should just stand there.

The choice was obvious when the cats started throwing axes at each other.

"We need to get out of this madhouse as soon as possible!" Wolf called out to her friends, quickly ducking as one of the axes was thrown right above her head.

"But look at them! The poor things are lost without their friend Yumyan." Kipo answered, feeling symphathy for the cats as she gestured towards two of them who were softly pawing at each other while they cried helplessly. "We should help them find him! And not for selfish reasons, although we do need to win them over.. It's just the right thing to do!"

"Yeah, no. I'm with Tiny on this one." Benson replied, gesturing towards Wolf who gave him a death glare.

"Call me that again and you're a dead man!" she growled at him.

"Hey!" someone suddenly called out, making the entire fight stop. "I'm trying to read a book to the kittens, but it's impossible when you guys are fighting like this!"

Kipo and her group looked over to where the voice came from. It was a human. A human girl in their age. Kipo, Benson and Wolf had never seen her before, but Amrar and Onyx had.

"H-Halo...?" Amrar called out, hope filling her voice as tears started to build up in her eyes.

The girl, Halo, looked over at Amrar and froze on the spot. She thought that she was dreaming, but Amrar and Onyx looked absolutely real.

"A-Amrar? Onyx?" Halo said, her voice breaking as tears started falling from her eyes before she let out a sob.

Amrar didn't waste a second before she ran up to her beloved friend, throwing herself at her as she hugged her tightly. Halo borrowed her face into Amrar's shoulder as she broke down into tears. Onyx followed soon after, hugging their friends as they tried to hold back their own tears, wanting to stay tough.

"I-I've missed you so much!" Halo sobbed, remembering how afraid she had been when she had woken up in an unfamiliar forest all by herself.

"We've missed you too! We haven't met the others yet." Amrar answered.

"Me neither. I nearly started to believe that we had all been sent into different worlds!" Halo said.

Amrar and Onyx laughed, relief filling both of them now when Halo had been found as well. They hugged her tightly once again, ignoring everyone else around them who were watching them in confusion.

When Amrar had heard about another human being found by the Timbercats, she had hoped for it to be Shasta so she could be sure that she was okay. But now when she was hugging her beloved best friend, Halo, she knew that she didn't regret it being her.

She would find her sister soon enough, she was sure of it, but for now, she had other things to focus on.

Chapter Text

"So... This is where you've been staying this entire time?" Onyx confirmed, entering the average sized bedroom, built inside one of the many trees in the Timbercat Village, together with several other homes for the Timbercats themselves.

"Yeah, Molly was kind enough to make it for me," Halo answered, sitting down on the edge of her bed made of wood, covered in several plaid blankets to make it comfortable for her.

"They just let you in with them, just like that?" Wolf spoke up, narrowing her eyes at Halo.

She was skeptical about this new girl. While Amrar had proven herself to be trustworthy, Onyx had not and Wolf didn't trust Halo not to follow in her friend's footsteps and betray them all. She had been accepted by an entire group of mutes after all, and they could not be trusted. Ever.

"I wouldn't say that, no. They were planning to send me to someone named Scarlemagne, but after I befriended their leader's pet, Pierre, they let me stay. Molly said that Pierre is very picky about the people he trusts," Halo explained, Wolf scoffing in return as she chose to stay on guard by the doorway.

"Do you think we can trust them to help us find my people?" Kipo asked, still determined to work together with the cats and fight their common enemy.

"Sure," Halo shrugged, "but they're still pretty upset about losing Yumyan and they're having a hard time working together without him."

"Well, it's worth a shot, right?" Kipo continued and Halo nodded with a smile.

"How did you get here, though? I mean, they threw us into a cage the second they saw us!" Amrar asked, sitting down beside her best friend, wanting to stay close now when they were together again.

"Yeah, how did you get here?" Wolf echoed, crossing her arms around Stalky that she had finally gotten back.

"Well..." Halo started.

~~~

3 days ago

Las Vistas was quiet, peaceful almost. The sky was blue and only a couple birds were occupying the sky. Suddenly, a bright light lit up the sky and a portal opened. Panicked screams came with it, and soon enough, a group of young teenagers fell from the portal. They were all thrown into different directions, getting separated from each other as the portal closed up.

Halo could barely see anything besides her own dirty blonde hair in front of her face. She crashed into a bunch of trees, feeling a bone or two break as she fell through thick branches, landing sharply on the ground. She took a few minutes to recover from the fall, breathing quickly. After a while, she came back to her senses and looked around. Her friends were gone, and she seemed to be in a forest. The trees were gigantic and thick. She had no idea where she was or where her friends were, all she knew was that she was lost.

~~~

"Wait, how many of you are there?" Benson interrupted.

"Six. And as far as I know, all of us are somewhere in Las Vistas, but I don't know where," Halo answered and Benson nodded in return.

"You still haven't told us how a bunch of mutes decided to take you in," Wolf pointed out, gripping Stalky tighter.

Halo sighed. The younger girl clearly didn't trust any of them, especially not her. Deciding not to let her wait too long for an answer, she continued with the story.

~~~

Halo had always been familiar with forests, how couldn't she be? She'd lived in a forest her entire life after all. Still, she was unfamiliar with that specific forest that she was currently trying to find her way through. The trees looked exactly the same and she had no idea which direction she came from.

She was hungry, tired and scared and she missed her friends and family a lot. She wished that there was a way for her to contact her friends, but there wasn't. Her phone didn't seem to work at all, as there was no electricity in sight.

As Halo realized that she was lost in a forest that she wasn't familiar with, in a place she didn't know of and without any of her friends to keep her company, the 12-year-old girl sat down on the ground and leaned back against one of the huge trees surrounding her. She was just about to close her eyes ans fall asleep, oblivious to the dangers lurking around her, when she heard someone moving in the bushes around the trees.

Halo sat up straight, eyes as big as saucers. She didn't know this forest and she had no idea what could be hiding in the dark. The bushes started to move, sending Halo cues to run. And run she did. Halo had never been the athletic type, that was Onyx's thing. She knew that whatever was hiding in the bushes easily could catch up on her, but she didn't want to give herself up without a fight.

However, she didn't get very far. Hearing something coming at her, Halo threw herself at the ground, just a second before an axe was thrown above her and into a tree further away. Halo panted, getting up on her knees to get a better view of the red axe that had cut into the tree. It almost killed her. She could feel the presence of someone else behind her, so she quickly turned around just to be met with a giant cat. She was white and had bright blue eyes. She wore a blue plaid shirt.

"What are you doing on Timbercat territory, human?" the cat hissed angrily, holding her other axe high in the air to throw it at the human if she turned out to be a particular bad one.

"T-timbercats?" Halo stuttered in fear, realizing that she was cornered with no way to escape.

"I'm the one asking the questions. Where is your family, are they close?" the cat continued, not wanting a group of humans to pose a threat to the Timbercat Village.

Halo couldn't get herself to answer. She was exhausted and confused and scared, and this cat was clearly not happy with her presence. However, what confused her the most was the sized of the cat and the fact that she was able to talk. Halo had the power to understand animals back in Ophelia, but this cat was not a normal cat. It was almost human, standing on two legs and wearing human clothes. She had no idea where she was or how she got there, but she did know that if she didn't come up with a way to flee, she would die.

"I-I'm alone," Halo managed to answer after a while, deciding to be truthful.

The cat narrowed her eyes at Halo, directing the axe towards the younger girl.

"You're lying, human. You're a kitten, and humans don't leave their kittens by themselves. I'll ask you again, where are they?" the cat prompted and Halo struggled to answer.

She didn't know where her friends were, or if they were even at the same place as her. As far as she knew, they could be on the other side of the planet!

"I don't know!" Halo tried again, getting desperate.

She wasn't lying.

"Fine. I'll just bring you back home and send you to Scarlemagne since you don't want to tell me the truth," the cat threatened, getting closer to Halo who was frozen in fear.

Grabbing the human child's arm, Molly pulled her through the forest until the trees started to get thicker and higher, looking like tiny apartments inside of them. Eventually, more cats like the one dragging Heidi started to appear, all wearing plaid shirts in different colors, and at least one axe occupying one of their paws. The gigantic cats would be adorable if they didn't seem so dangerous.

The news of a human in their village had traveled quickly to the Timbercats, who had now begun to stare at her. The white cat stopped suddenly, in front of what looked like the remains of a tree that had been ripped away. She briefly raised her axe with a sad look on her face before she turned around to face Halo.

"So, are you going to tell me the truth now? We can't have a bunch of humans come here and cause chaos just to look for you. So where's your family?" the cat tried again for the last time.

"They aren't here," Halo repeated just like before, as she didn't have any idea where her friends had went.

"Well, well. Since you won't give me an actual answer, you'll be sent to Scarlemagne," the cat said before she looked over to one of her companions, "get her cage ready. 

Just as Halo was about to beg for her life and to be freed, yells from a bunch of other cats were heard. Turning around, Halo laid her eyes onto a gigantic flea who had two Timbercats being pulled behind it by its' collar. 

The white cat sighed audibly. 

"Pierre escaped again. Any volunteers to catch him?" she asked, but nobody answering. 

The cat turned around, grinning when she saw Halo again. 

"If you don't wanna be sent to Scarlemagne, let's use you as bait to catch Pierre." 

Halo gulped as she took a step back. If she didn't come up with something now, she was officially screwed.

~~~

"Who's Pierre?" Wolf asked, wanting to know about this new possible threat.

"It's the Timbercats' leader's pet flea. He lives purely on blood," Halo explained, not missing the way that Wolf's eyes widened.

The flea was a great weapon if the Timbercats decided to turn on them. It would suck their blood right out of them, leaving nobody alive. She knew that those cats couldn't be trusted, and now she had more proof to prove it.

"Now... How did you end up not getting eaten?" Wolf prompted, getting even more suspicious when she knew that Halo had managed to befriend the cats who had wanted to feeds her to their pet at first.

Maybe she had made a deal with them to let Pierre eat the next humans passing by if they let her live? Either way, Wolf didn't trust Halo at all.

"I was just about to come to that."

~~~

Pierre roared as he laid his eyes on Halo, sensing fresh blood nearby. Halo knew that she surely wasn't faster than a gigantic flea, so she needed to come up with a plan quickly. Sadly, there wasn't time.

Pierre let out a shriek before he jumped off the ground, getting several meters high up in the air as he got closer to Halo. Looking around, Halo didn't see any way out but to climb up one of the trees. There were a bunch of cats on one of the wood bridges, and she figured that Pierre wouldn't hurt them to get to her. At least that's what she was hoping for.

Climbing up the trees as fast as she could, Pierre went after her but from the opposite direction to catch his new prey. When Halo finally got up on the bridge, Pierre was hungrily waiting for her.

"H-hey, Pierre, was it?" Halo called out softly, only recieving a few chitters from. Pierre in return.

'That's weird. Why can't I understand him?' Halo thought in confusion.

Her powers were to understand the language of all animals. She was supposed to be hearing actual words from Pierre, not sounds. Something was wrong.

Since she wasn't able to communicate to Pierre, he ran towards her, ready to suck the blood out of her. Halo was just about to lose hope about making it out of there alive when she noticed a barrel next to a food bowl with Pierre's name on it. Something clicked in her mind and she quickly grabbed an axe that had gotten stuck into the top of one of the barrel's. Getting it out, Halo stabbed the axe into one of the barrels and blood flowed out on the ground.

Pierre stopped abruptly in front of the pool of blood before he started to drink hungrily. Grabbing the iron collar that had been thrown further away, Halo managed to get it around Pierre's neck. He barely moved at all, instead focusing on his meal.

"Aww, you were just hungry, weren't you?" Halo cooed lovingly.

To her surprise, Pierre leaned onto her leg as he continued to drink the blood, relaxing now when his needs were finally met by none other by a human. The cats around the two had their jaws hanging open in shock. Nobody but Yumyan had ever gotten that close to someone, especially not a human. If Pierre liked her, they couldn't get rid of her. Not when Yumyan wasn't there.

"Fine, I guess you can stay here for a while..." the white cat from before muttered in annoyance.

She didn't like humans, not at all.

"I can? Really?" Halo asked in disbelief, although hope and excitement was evident in her eyes.

If she had a safe place to stay at, it would be easier for her to search for her friends and get everyone back together so that they could find a way home.

"Yes. Do you have a name to call you by, human?" the cat asked, crossing her arms expectantly.

"My name's Halo, what about you?" Halo answered politely.

"Molly. Molly Yarnchopper. I'll get a room ready for you. But don't for a second think that you'll get to sit on your butt all day. You're going to work and earn your keep, do you hear me? We can't afford to feed another mouth with no help." Molly answered and Halo nodded quickly.

She would do whatever it took for her to stay if it meant that she would be safe.

"Good. You'll be taking care of Pierre and the kittens while you're here. Welcome to Timbercat Village." Molly said before she turned her back on Halo to leave and work like every other cat in the village.

Halo sighed in relief. She would have a bed to sleep in at night and she hoped to see her friends again soon. Everything would be alright.

~~~

"I doubt you just befriended some blood-sucking flea to gain the cats' trust," Wolf commented, having entered the room sometime during the story.

"Well, that's how I got there. I'm not going to force you to believe me, but I'm telling the truth," Halo answered calmly.

"You mentioned powers, is that true?" Kipo asked with amazement evident in her voice.

"Yes, all of us except for Amrar have powers," Onyx answered with a shrug.

"What's your powers?" Kipo continued.

"Speed. I can run as fast as Flash the Superhero!" Onyx grinned, exaggerating a little bit just for the audience.

"Seriously? We could have used those powers all this time!" Benson groaned, thinking about when they were chased by the Mod Frogs. "Why didn't you use them?"

"Yeah, why didn't you?" Wolf added on, not liking how things were developing.

"Like Halo said before, our powers doesn't seem to work in Las Vistas. I suppose that it's because we're in another world than our own, but I would have used my powers long ago if they actually worked," Onyx explained.

Wolf scoffed, not believing the teenager's words. As far as she knew, the three new strangers could all be lying to stab her in the back later on. She would not let that happen. Not again...

Looking out of the door opening, Halo noticed that the sun was going down and she hadn't eaten dinner yet. She figured that the others were hungry as well.

"Let's go to the Great Hall, we can get something to eat in there," Halo suggested and nobody disagreed, following her out of the tree.

Benson walked right behind Dave, but was pulled back by Wolf who had exited last. He watched as the rest of the group walked further away from them and his belly growled hungrily, feeling his blood sugar going low.

"What? I'm hungry!" Benson complained but Wolf hissed at him to keep his voice down.

"Do you really believe that those cats are on our side?" Wolf asked with a raised eyebrow.

"I mean, yeah? They let Halo stay and I'm sure they would help us if we asked them," Benson shrugged, not really having out much thought into it.

"But that's it, we don't know Halo or if she's telling the truth. In my opinion, we should ditch the cats and find Kipo's people by ourselves," Wolf revealed.

"Kipo won't like that," Benson commented.

"So? We're doing this for her. To help her. She'll understand."

"I guess..." Benson figured.

"Good. Do you have any idea how we'll get out of here without causing a scene?" Wolf asked and Benson went quiet for a second before a light bulb lit up above his head.

"Do you know how to make flapjacks?"

Chapter Text

"And this is the Great Hall," Halo announced to her friends, old and new, as she threw out her arms to the sides dramatically.

Dozens of cats were seated in the big room, waiting for dinner to be served - without their leader Yumyan to accompany them.

Wolf and Benson hurried behind them, acting like they were never gone in the first place. Wolf narrowed her eyes and tensed up at the sight of all the mute cats in the room. If anything was to happen, they would be in a disadvantage against the cats. They were too many.

"Molly let me take the spot on the corner over there, I'm sure we'll all fit," Halo pointed across the room to a corner that could fit around six human adults.

The group deemed it good enough for the time being, as they would probably not be able to stay in the village for long before they'd have to leave. As the group, minus Benson and Wolf who had turned abnormally quiet - even for Wolf, sat down, Molly walked up to them.

"Everythin' good up here?" she asked with a slightly annoyed voice, her mood having changed after Yumyan left them.

"Actually, I would like to give you a taste of my world famous flapjacks, to show our gratitude for letting us stay. And with all the syrup you have, I'm going to be able to make loads!" Benson spoke up with a slightly nervous smile.

In any other case, Molly would have said no, but now when Yumyan was gone, she really didn't have the energy to argue with some human teenager. Sighing, she nodded to give him the greenlight to let Benson use their kitchen.

"Flapjacks do sound good," she shrugged before walking away.

Benson beamed internally, thankful that the first plan of his plan had worked. He turned to Wolf who was sitting beside him, trying to act all casual.

"Wolf, do you wanna help me?" he asked, trying not to mind the way the rest of the group was staring at them.

"Ugh, fine," Wolf groaned with a roll of her eyes, standing up slowly to act as if she was annoyed with the question.

"I can help too, I make pancakes for my foster brother at home all the time," Onyx quickly offered, standing up without hearing the answer.

"Oh, we don't need any help, you don't need t-" Benson started but was immediately interrupted.

"It's fine, I love helping," Onyx answered, walking past Benson to get to the kitchen.

Wolf held in a sigh before she went after Onyx, Benson following from behind. They closed the door behind them the second all three of them were in the question. Wolf grabbed Benson's shirt by the waist - since she couldn't reach all the way up to his collar - and pulled him to the corner furthest away from Onyx in case they tried to listen in on their conversation.

"Flapjacks, really? Was that your genius idea?" Wolf hissed, clearly not believing in Benson's plan.

"I never said my plan was genius, I just said I had a plan," Benson corrected and Wolf had the urge to wrap her hands around his throat.

"Are we going to start soon, or what?" Onyx called from the other side of the room having grabbed a bunch of stuff to use to make the flapjacks.

"Yeah," Benson answered, moving over to Onyx to start making the batter.

They used a barrel, which was almost as big as Wolf, to put the ingredients in. Outside of the window to the kitchen, a brown, fluffy cat was sitting, playing on his axe guitar softly. The cat barely noticed when Benson grabbed pieces of his fur to put in the batter. He hid it behind his back to not alarm Onyx of what they were doing before he put it in the barrel together with the rest of the ingredients. Wolf's job was to stir the batter with the cat hair, mixing it all out. Onyx's job was to fry the flapjacks.

"Next time you want to serve cat food, leave me out of it," Wolf growled, feeling her arms growing sore from how long she had been stirring.

"O ye of little faith," Benson teased before he continued his sentence in a whisper which accidentally grabbed Onyx's attention, "we are cooking up more than sustenance."

Onyx saw Benson sneak something into the batter from the corner of their eyes and they quickly turned around just in time to see the hand of hair that were placed inside the barrel.

They gasped loudly, making both Benson and Wolf look up at them.

"Are you two plotting something?" they asked suspiciously with narrowed eyes, noticing the panicked glance between the other two. "You are, aren't you? You're plotting an escape!"

Wolf sighed in defeat, pausing her stirring for a second.

"Fine, we are. But can you really blame us? Those cats are not trustworthy, they're mutes!" Wolf crossed her arms, glaring at Onyx as if to tell them 'don't you dare tell anyone about this'.

"I mean, I guess I can't blame you. We just got here. But can't you just try to trust them? They've been nice to us so far, and they might be able to help all of us to get back home!" Onyx defended, not wanting to make enemies with an army of cat mutes.

"Reality check, Onyx. Right before this, they were planning on trading us to Scarlemagne! We can't trust them," Wolf said, using a tone that told that she was not up for discussion.

Onyx didn't have any answer to that, but they really want to believe that the cats were nice, especially since they had been taking care of Halo ever since they got to Las Vistas.

"Fine, but I don't think Kipo will appreciate you going behind her back," Onyx said, going back to making sure that they didn't accidentally burn the flapjacks.

Wolf paused at the mention of Kipo, knowing that she herself didn't appreciate when people went behind her back and lied to her. But this time it was for a good reason! She was trying to protect her friends from getting hurt. That wasn't the same, was it?

"She'll appreciate our efforts to keep her from danger and realize that we can't trust mutes," Wolf answered, trying to convince herself as well as Onyx.

"If you say so. I'm going to go out and impress everyone with my Mister Flappy cakes," Onyx picked up two plates with flapjacks, the front looking like the face of a cat.

Wolf rolled her eyes. Onyx was new, they didn't understand the danger of mutes yet, neither did Kipo. She couldn't let someone like Onyx get to her. Benson winked at Wolf as he picked up two plates of flapjacks of his own, knowing that things were either about to go up or down. Wolf copied Benson and followed him and Onyx outside to the Great Hall again.

Wolf rolled her eyes at the sight of all the cats moping all around the room. All because their leader was no longer with them. Pathetic. Wolf had lost more people than she could count, and she wasn't crying about it like them. And still, she was afraid of them. What a shame.

Molly and another cat, Ruffles, toasted their wooden mugs filled with milk, a sad expression evident on their faces. Molly looked up at the seat in the middle if the room, bigger than every other seat. Yumyan's seat.

She sighed sadly.

"I keep thinking I'll blink, and then magically Yumyan will be there, leading our dinner like he always does," she vented before she looked away from Yumyan's chair.

The sight of it without him keeping it occupied was too much for her to bear.

"I feel dead inside," Ruffles muttered with a numb expression, not looking up from his wooden mug.

Behind them, two other cats started to hiss at each other before throwing themselves at one another, rolling around the room angrily as they used their paws to claw at each other. They almost made Onyx lose their balance and drop the flapjacks.

Benson, Wolf and Onyx spread around the room, offering pancakes to each cat. One of the younger cats, Shoelace, took her fork and stabbed it into one of the flapjacks that Wolf was carrying, stuffing the entire thing in her mouth. At the delicious taste, she found herself aching for more.

"These are so good!" she exclaimed, watching her now empty fork, "They fill my stomach, but not my heart..."

Shoelace's face sank down into the table in front of her as tears started to roll down her furry cheeks in agony.

The other cats were clearly enjoying the flapjacks as well, although similar to Shoelace, they were all heartbroken at the lack of their leader. Ruffles rested his head on his hand, but when it accidentally slipped off the table, making him throw his drink to the floor, he sat back up with a tired sigh.

"I miss Yumyan," he muttered, "we should add his portrait to our dome of great Axe Lords!"

He gestured upwards to the roof, pictures of cats carefully carved into the wood to make beautiful paintings. There were several empty spots, waiting for the next Axe Lord to be added to the roof.

"So he'll always be looking down at us while we eat," Molly agreed, barely noticing when Sam placed two plates with flapjacks in front of her and Ruffles.

"No!" Shoelace disagreed, slamming her fork down on the table angrily, "That's just for Axe Lords who are already gone. I'm not ready to hang up his axe..."

Molly slammed her fist down to the table, showing off her sharp claws.

"Let's carve his face up there!" she yelled, and with that, everyone started to argue about what to do.

Halo sighed from her seat beside Amrar in the far corner, knowing that those kind of fights were becoming more of a habit these days. Kipo saw Halo's tired expression, deciding to do something about it.

"Wait here, I'll be right back," she reassured before standing up from her seat and running down the steps until she stood right beneath Yumyan's seat.

Seeing his guitar, Kipo got an idea. She climbed up on the chair, lifting the heavy guitar that was bigger than her before she started to play. The sudden sound of the guitar echoing had every cat's head turned towards her, their jaws dropping at the sight of a human holding Yumyan's guitar. Even her friends stopped whatever they were doing to just stare at her. 

At the sudden attention, Kipo chuckled nervously as she lifted her hand up in a tiny wave. Molly dug her claws into the wooden table, dragging them across it which left marks in the wood.

"That's Yumyan's guitar, human. Nobody plays it but him!" she growled, narrowing her eyes at Kipo.

Wolf facepalmed with a sigh wondering how Kipo had managed to stay alive for so long. She was such an idiot...

"Well, since he's passed on, I figured I could play it for him," Kipo offered with a gentle smile.

Shoelace pulled her pancake out of her mouth at the words, raising an eyebrow.

"Passed on? Whoever said that? He's just stuck up in a tree," Shoelace said, gesturing towards the gigantic trees above them.

Kipo scoffed, holding back a giggle as she raised an eyebrow.

"Wait, what? All this time? Why don't you just  climb up there and get him back down?" she asked, recieving a negative reaction from the cats as they gasped and hissed as if she'd said the worst thing possible. 

Molly glared at her, standing up from her seat.

"He went above the canopy. No Timbercat has ever gone above the canopy!" Molly revealed.

"Wow, above the canopy!" Kipo spoke, amusement clear in her voice. "Why would he do that?"

"When the beast showed up to steal the Scratching Tree, Yumyan ran up there to fight him!" Molly answered.

"Ooh! Yumyan sounds very brave. You must have a lot of stories about him," Kipo prompted, once again playing on said Yumyan's guitar.

"Oh, that's not even half the legend," Molly said proudly, starting to play a song on her guitar with a grin.

The cats around her immediately perked up at the sound of music, especially as it was about Yumyan. Before the humans had any time to react, Molly started to sing. Kipo smiled happily, knowing that she was on her way to win the cats over. As Molly sang, she moved around the room to get the other cats to join in. 

He was born with an axe in his fur

The toughest cat that you ever saw

Well, he could chop down a tree with just one swing

We call him Yumyan Hammerpaw!

Whoa-oh-oh! Whoa-oh-oh!

We call him Yumyan Hammerpaw!

The cats started to grab material to use as instruments while they sang, suddenly in a much better mood than before. Kipo was clearly making progress. Wolf looked around her in confusion. Why was everyone singing? It was all so stupid... However, she barely had any time to sneak out before she was grabbed from both sides, squeezed between two cats. She scowled silently, knowing that she wouldn't be able to sneak out now.

Ruffles, the cat who had stolen Stalky, decides to sing the next verse. He punched another cat out of the way with his paw, making them fall with a yell.

He could punch out

A thousand grizzly bears

He's mighty tall at seven feet

Ruffles started to sing, lifting Stalky high into the air. Wolf glared at him from further away with her arms crossed, not liking the fact that a mute was holding her precious weapon.

His beard is so tough

It gets in fights

His favorite food is luncheon meat

As the cats started singing the chorus again, Wolf pushed the cats' arms that were hugging her shoulders off of her. She wanted to get out. The cats were clearly crazy, or at least something was wrong with them. 

As she started to wall away, she stumbled slightly on her feet because of the force it took to move the cats' heavy arms away from her. She didn't see where she was going, and as she turned her back on them, she walked right onto another cat's leg. He was way bigger than the rest of his peers, and Wolf looked up at him with dread in her eyes as he reached his arm, that was just as big as her body, down towards her to pick her up. 

Soon enough, she found herself being thrown into the air over and over again as the cat beneath her danced to the music. 

She didn't get paid enough for this-

Her friends around her were dancing without a care in the world. Benson and Dave were dancing while holding the plates with pancakes. Halo and Amrar had their arms around each other, swaying siden to siden as they sung along. Onyx was smiling at them from the side, rather doing sports than dancing. 

Unbeknownst to them, the cats started to cough up bits from their already swallowed pancakes. Benson sent Onyx a knowing grin from across the room which was returned. Their plan was coming along. But soon enough, the cats started to cough rather much. It almost looked like they were about to thrown up.

Oops...

Benson waved Onyx over and they sneakily moved away from their friends and over to Benson. He turned his voice down to a whisper, wanting to make sure that nobody could hear him despite the music still playing.

"How much fur did we put in the batter?" he whispered and Onyx's smile disappeared, noticing the chaos that was about to get out of hand.

They remembered the glance they had gotten at the cat that Benson had stolen fur from before they left the room to give the cats the pancakes. It had been brown and fluffy when they entered the room, and it had turned into a nude cat when they left. 

If they had known that they were going to be sent to another universe with vomiting cats, they wouldn't have chosen their favorite shoes.

"A lot..." Onyx answered, just as the cats started to cough rather desparately.

Kipo, however, hadn't even noticed what was going on around her. She was too into the song. She wanted to be a part of the song too, so she added her own verse.

I hear Yumyan writes manly poems

About chainsaws, cranks and gears

He also shoots lasers from his eyes

And puts out fires with his... Tears?

By then, Kipo saw every cat coughing into their hands. They looked pretty disgusted to her, and she supposed that they didn't like if she made up stuff about their leader.

"Wait, what happened? Were the lasers too much?" she asked, slightly worried about their reaction.

Down by her feet, a walked up to the chair on his knees. He reached up to Kipo with his arm as if calling for help before he doubled over and threw up all of the pancakes he had eaten, mixed with tons of hair sticking out.

Kipo jumped back a step, gasping in disgust at the sight. The other cats soon followed suit and started to throw up as well. Amrar pushed Halo behind her, shielding her from getting vomit on her clothes by the cat right next to them. Onyx waved the girls over to them, and they managed to get down the stairs to accompany their friend in the chaos.

"Come on, let's get out of here!" Onyx decided hurriedly, not leaving any room for discussion as they grabbed Halo's hand to stop her from going back for the cats.

Onyx pulled their friends out of the Great Hall while Benson got Kipo down from Yumyan's seat, pulling her with him. They ran right past Molly and Ruffles who laid on the floor, gagging. Ruffles was still holding onto Stalky, which Wolf despised him for.

Wolf quickly took her weapon away from the cat who could do nothing to stop her, too weak to be able to hold onto the staff. Wolf held her beloved weapon in her arms as if it was a real person.

"Stalky, I missed you", she whispered lovingly before she took off after the rest of her friends who had already gotten out.

She ran past Shoelace on her way out who was crawling towards a plate with pancakes. She stuffed one into her mouth, throwing it back up only seconds later. Despite knowing what would happen if she ate it, she liked the flapjacks and reached her paw out for one more. 

The humans might be traitors, but they did make some damn good flapjacks.

Outside, the human children and Dave and Mandu were running on a tree branch that stretched out from the Great Hall.

"That time, I was really making progress. I was lead guitar in a cat band!" Kipo said as she ran, disappointed that they had to leave so soon when she was just about to ask them if they were willing to help her find her way back home again.

Her sentence was cut short as she had to abruptly stop at the edge of the large tree branch as it came to an end. Benson and Dave stopped right behind her, and so did everyone else. Well, almost everyone. Wolf was looking behind her as she ran, making sure that they were not being followed by a cat army. She didn't notice everyone in front of her, so she ran into Amrar who was in front of her. 

The entire group were pushed off of the tree branch, falling towards the ground as they screamed. 

Luckily, they landed on a ball of yarn instead of the ground below them that surely would get them killed. Except for Dave, of course. The ball of yarn started to swing forward, towards the next ball of yarn.

"Jump!" Wolf told the others, and they quickly did as she said and jumper onto the next ball of yarn that in turn swung forward.

"This is a new way to travel", Benson commented, recieving a chuckle from Onyx. 

As they were going forward, Wolf saw something moving in the corner of her eye. It was the cat that they had taken the fur from - now a nude cat. It had managed to see the humans flee out of the Great Hall, and he had quickly grabbed his axe to stop them.

"Feline, two o'clock!" Wolf informed the others who quickly turned their heads to the siden to see said cat on another ball of yarn, coming at them.

The cat let out a shriek before he threw his axe at the human, which luckily was caught by Mandu. The cat exposed his claws, jumping off his ball of yarn towards the humans. Mandu cut the yarn that was tied to a large branch from above, keeping it hanging. When the yarn was cut, the ball started to fall. The cat just about missed the humans as they fell to the ground with another scream. The ball of yarn bounced om the ground, crashing right into a tree right outside the village.

The group laid in every possible position that a human could, and the one to first get on her feet was Wolf who quickly jumped off the ball of yarn. She knew that the landing had been rough, especially for a burrow girl and a bunch of teens who came from another dimension, but they didn't have the time to laze around.

"Come on!" she stressed, running towards a bunch of bushes that would take them away from the cats.

Benson and Dave followed right after her and so did Amrar and Onyx. Kipo was holding Mandu in her arms, and as she was just about to go after her friends, she turned around. Halo was still the last one behind having stopped to look at the village that had been her home for the last few days just one more time. She saw the trees collapse and it made her heart hurt. They had worked hard to carve every home. Kipo frowned at the girl before walking up to her to place a gentle hand on her shoulder.

"Let's go", she said softly and Halo took a deep breath before nodding and going with Kipo after the rest of the group.

Wolf led her companions to an old building covered in big mushrooms, away from the Timbercat village. She parted a couple of mushrooms to get through the entrance, walking up to one of the very huge ones in the middle of the room. 

"We'll camp here", she decided, recieving no complaints which she was very happy about. 

She threw herself down on her back, closing her eyelids as she finally relaxed after such a long day.

"In the morning, we'll pick up the Mega Mute tracks, see if they lead to your people", Wolf gestured to Kipo.

Benson and Dave laid down on another mushroom beside Wolf, grinning at the soft texture. Onyx, Amrar and Halo forced themselves to fit on one singular mushroom, not wanting to be apart now when they were finally together. Lastly, Kipo laid down on the last mushroom, holding Mandu in her arms.

"Good idea", Kipo spoke out loud into thin air, knowing that the others were falling asleep and most likely not listening to her, "we don't need those cats to help us, and they don't... need our help either..."

Kipo made eye contact with Halo who was the last one awake. The dirty blonded girl was frowning, feeling like the biggest traitor for leaving the cats who she had grown to love during her last few days there. She and Kipo both wanted the cats to help them, but nobody would listen. Kipo smiled at Halo, gesturing for her to get up so they could talk outside. Halo nodded, slowly moving Amrar's arm off of her so that she could sneak outside. Amrar barely flinched and Halo and Kipo met outside the building.

"Do you also have a bad feeling about leaving them like that?" Halo asked, wanting to confirm that she and Kipo had the same thoughts.

"Yeah. I mean, we were making progress with them! I bet if I had just asked, they would've said yes! We need to go back..." Kipo rambled her thoughts out loud.

"Wolf would never let us", Halo pointed out, knowing that the short girl had very strong opinions about everything.

Just like Shasta.

"Let's not tell her then. Let's go back, get their leader to gain their trust and come back here and surprise everyone before they wake up!" Kipo voiced her idea.

Halo went quiet for a second, thinking it all through. The others would probably get mad at them for leaving the camp in the middle of the night to go back go the mutes they just betrayed. But who could blame them? The cats knew about the Mega Mute and while Halo and her friends didn't live in a burrow like Kipo. They all really wanted to help. With a sigh, Halo eventually nodded.

"Fine, but we can't be gone for too long, or else they'll notice that we're gone", Halo said and Kipo nodded eagerly.

"Of course!"

And with that, the two twelve year olds made their way back to Timbercat Village, only being able to hope for the best.

Chapter Text

"I found these in the bushes. We can use them to climb," Kipo held two axes in her hands, handing one over to Halo.

"Thank you! Let's get going before the others notice that we left," Halo commented.

The two girls made their way towards one of the many gigantic trees in the Timbercat Village. Kipo looked up towards the canopy and felt her stomach drop. She hated heights, and the canopy was very far up. Halo seemed to sense her nervousness and placed a hand on Kipo's shoulder, smiling reassuringly at her.

"Yumyan better be up there," Kipo muttered dreadfully before raising her ax to slam it into the tree trunk.

Halo copied her actions and soon enough, the two girls were climbing up the tree, begging silently not to misstep and fall to their deaths. When they were halfway there, Halo's arms were cramping from all the strength she needed to use to pull her own body weight up without anything but the ax to hold onto. She cursed herself for not working out as much as she should have when she had the chance back in Ophelia. 

"All the way to the canopy..." she sighed breathlessly.

Kipo looked downwards to see how much distance from the ground they'd made. She instantly regretted her actions when she saw how high up they had managed to climb. She gasped and quickly looked away, clenching her eyes together.

"Why'd you look?" she asked herself, trying to think of something else.

She remembered the way her dad had distracted her when they'd been rock climbing together before the burrow collapsed. Smiling at the memory, she decided to use the technique on herself.

"Kipo, is this tree deciduous or coniferous?" she asked herself with a deep voice before returning to her normal voice. "Coniferous. Means the leaves are green year-round. Not bad for someone who grew up in a cave."

"So I'm not the only one who likes to distract myself by making up quizzes?" Halo asked.

"My dad is a teacher in my burrow. He always distracts me this way when I get nervous," Kipo explained, missing her dad more after each time she mentioned him.

"Then let's get you back to him as soon as possible. We're almost there," Halo answered, grunting as she climbed higher and Kipo followed.

~~~

Back with the group, they were all still sleeping, exhausted from all the running. Mandu was slowly sliding down on the mushroom that she was sleeping on, not having Kipo's arms to keep herself in place. When she eventually slid off the mushroom and onto the ground, she woke up with a confused squeal. Looking around, she realized that neither Kipo nor Halo were there.

The blue pig immediately rushed up to Wolf, squealing above her. When that didn't wake her up, Mandu frowned before licking her in the face. Wolf's eyelids flew open as she sat up with a yell. Mandu had to jump back to not get smacked in the face.

"Why would you do that!?" Wolf yelled, wiping her face with her arm while she glared at the pig that looked ever so innocent.

Mandu snorted alarmingly, trying to explain to Wolf that two of their companions were gone. All the noise woke the others up, and they all looked at Wolf in confusion. Looking around, Wolf realized what Mandu was trying to tell her. Knowing that she should of expected it to happen, Wolf growled in annoyance.

If Kipo and Halo had gotten themselves into any trouble, she would truly just give up on them.

~~~

Kipo and Halo had finally made it all the way up to the canopy. After getting through all of the green leaves, they were met with a beautiful night sky and a gigantic purple and pink butterfly. Kipo gasped at the view. It was amazing. Halo was grinning from ear to ear. After everything she had been through in the last couple of days, it was nice to be in such a seemingly peaceful place with a beautiful butterfly.

"Whoa!" Kipo whispered, mesmerized.

Neither of the girls noticed the pink eyes bigger than their heads opening up right behind them. At least not until whatever animal they belonged to started to rise. Kipo screamed out in fear and Halo tensed up, closing her eyes as she readied herself to be attacked. Instead, the animal, which seemed to be a large grey cat, leaped over them.

"Yumyan owns you all!" it yelled out, trying to attack the butterfly that without any trouble got away just in time.

The cat disappeared in the green leaves and Kipo quickly realized that he was the cat that they were searching for.

"Yumyan!" she called out, digging in the leaves in a desperate attempt to find him. "Oh no!"

He couldn't have fallen down the tree, could he? In that case she would just sit down and cry if she'd climbed up the tree for no reason!

"Are you still up here? We came here to find you!" Kipo asked into the leaves as she dug into them. 

Luckily, Yumyan hadn't left. Kipo and Halo found themselves sitting on his head as he emerged from the leaves with a growl.

"You know how long I've been chasing that rotten insect? Three days!" Yumyan complained in annoyance, grabbing the two humans before throwing them off of him.

They grunted as they landed on a thick branch, looking up at Yumyan who was glaring at the butterfly who was flying around then in circles with seemingly no care in the world.

"Oh, but to him, it's all just a dance. He flutters around saying 'look at me, I'm so pretty!' Eventually he has to tire out!" Yumyan continued, getting down on all fours to sneak up on the butterfly as soon as it sat back down. "Any moment now... Yumyan owns you all!"

Yumyan ran at the butterfly again, but missed. He screeched angrily as the butterfly flew right above him, almost teasing him for his pathetic tries.

"Hey, what's that you keep saying? Yumyan owns you all?" Kipo asked.

Yumyan sighed before standing up, annoyed at the fact that he had to explain such simple things to a human.

"It's a new battle cry I'm testing out, to strike fear in the hearts of mine enemies, of which there are many. They will cower when they hear it!" Yumyan explained, exiting his sharp claws at the thought of all the enemies he had.

Kipo looked at Halo who just nodded at her to go along and explain why they were there.

"Speaking of enemies, out there somewhere is the Mega Mute who stole your tree. I think it may also have my father. That's why we're here, to get you back down to your village, so we could all find them together!" Kipo spoke, watching as Yumyan desperately tried to catch the butterfly.

"I don't work with humans, humans," Yumyan glared at the two girls before returning to the butterfly.

"It's Kipo and Halo, for your information. Out of curiosity, why do you want that butterfly so bad?"

"He lived on the Scratching Tree. The tree's spirit lives in him now. I hear it speaking to me. I named him Charles. What's that, Charles? You want me to get you? You want me to get you? I'm gonna get you!"

"Um, mind if Halo tries? She's good with animals!" Kipo referred to her friend who stood behind her.

"Really?" Yumyan asked suspiciously, not wanting to risk a human messing up his mission.

"I- I got Pierre on his leash earlier," Halo revealed shyly.

"You put a leash on Pierre?" Yumyan asked and Halo nodded.

He quickly took a step back and let Halo step forward to deal with the bug. She slowly walked up to Charles, sitting down a bit away from him to give him space.

"Hi, buddy," Halo whispered kindly, waving to him when she got his attention.

Yumyan watched her expectantly from further away, his paws crossed. Halo reached out an arm towards the butterfly, smiling gently at it. They made eyes contact and Yumyan gasped when Charles flew towards Halo and sat down on her head. Halo giggled at the action and cooed at the beautiful animal. Kipo laughed, hoping to finally having proved to Yumyan that they could be trusted and that he had a reason to help them.

"See? It just takes a gentle touch, that's all!" Kipo said to Yumyan, watching the cute scene between Halo and Charles.

Sadly, Yumyan didn't use his ears to listen. Kipo yelped when he threw her out of the way and ran at Halo and Charles.

"Yumyan owns you all!" he yelled, throwing himself at Halo and Charles.

The butterfly quickly took off to flee from Yumyan.

"Fly for your life!" Halo called after Charles, getting up from the leafy ground.

She saw Yumyan holding his claws over something. Halo gasped at the thought of Yumyan actually having caught the butterfly. She had actually connected with Charles. She couldn't let him die! Luckily, Yumyan's paws hadn't caught anything. He frantically looked around himself, but the butterfly was nowhere to be seen.

"The tree spirit got away! Charles!" he called out angrily.

Kipo walked up to him, this time with a frustrated face. She was tired of dealing with an ignorant cat. 

"Okay, that's enough! We're not the only ones who needs your help! You have a whole village down there that's falling apart without you! I know what it's like to lose someone important. I just lost my dad. Believe me, it's not a good feeling..."

Yumyan seemed surprised at the revelation. Halo's eyes softened as Kipo spoke. She knew how important it was to get Kipo back home. She deserved to reunite with her dad.

"But... I can't leave! I lost our tree! The great Axe Lords of yore spent years scratching and sculpting it, getting it just right! And Charles has its spirit!"

"Now you're just making excuses!" Kipo accused, putting her hands on her hips as she frowned at the cat twice her size.

Yumyan turned to her quickly and growled, holding his claws up in a threatening manner which cause Halo to whimper in fear and take a step back. Yumyan sighed, his eyes softening as he lowered his paws, sinking down to the leafy ground to sit down.

"You're right," he admitted, "I ran. I ran away from the tree thief in fear."

"So that's why you're stuck!" Kipo commented, sitting down beside Yumyan before gesturing for Halo to join them, which she did. "Wanna tell us about it?"

Charles sat down beside Yumyan, and this time, the cat didn't pay it any mind. Kipo smiled at Yumyan reassuringly, silently telling him that he wouldn't be judged for anything he said. With a sigh, Yumyan decided that he would tell the humans about what happened.

"I was having my evening scratch, the next thing, I'm looking up at the biggest monster I've ever seen. Six arms, eyes red as a logger's flannel. So, I ran up this tree."

"Any sane person, mute or human, would have done the same!" Kipo told him.

"Not a leader of Timbercats. And look at them down there."

Kipo and Halo looked down at the village. They could still hear the echoing vomiting from the flapjacks.

"I am. And you know what? They need you a lot more than their tree," Kipo revealed and Yumyan almost looked like he didn't believe her.

Almost.

"She's right. They need you, man," Charles spoke up in a deep voice and Kipo and Halo just stared at him in shock.

"Maybe you're right," Yumyan muttered, standing back up.

"So, are you ready to go back down?" Kipo asked, hope in her voice.

"Okay, just... But just give me a minute," Yumyan sighed, mentally preparing himself to return to his village.

Unfortunately for him, Kipo didn't have that kind of patience. Grabbing Halo, she backed away before running at the cat.

"Kipo owns you all!" she yelled and Yumyan didn't even get to turn around before he was pushed off the tree, yelling in fear, with two human children on his back.

~~~

Down below, hairballs were rolling around on the ground. Vars were spread out over the entire village, exhausted from the night's adventure. Ruffles was playing with a tiny ball of yawn in his paws.

"First the Scratching Tree, then Yumyan, and now the humans are gone too. It's like we're not even Timbercats anymore," Ruffles ranted.

"As long as we have axes in our paws, we'll always be Timbercats," Molly replied, "And as long as we have Yumyan in our hearts, he'll always be-"

"Right there!" Shoelaces called out, pointing towards the sky, "he's right there!"

The cats all looked upwards, and just like Shoelaces claimed, Yumyan was falling down a tree while he yelled.

"Yumyan owns you all!" 

He did several backflips and tricks just for dramatics, landing on all fours with ragged breathing. Kipo and Halo slid down his back and onto the ground, grinning victoriously. When the cats around them got over the shock of their leader finally returning, they all broke into cheering.

Ruffles and Molly held his own axe up to him and Yumyan took it, looking at it with love in his eyes.

"I almost forgot what it felt like to hold this," he murmured to himself with a smile.

Kipo giggled, hugging Halo tightly. They had won Yumyan over! Yumyan held his axe up towards the sky and everyone cheered for him. It was the best day in his life!

~~~

Outside Timbercat Village. Wolf was leading the group back to search for Kipo. She was sure that Kipo had taken Halo with her to talk with the Timbercats - and get themselves killed in the process because Kipo was apparently a suicidal burrow girl!

"Guys, we had one job: keep Kipo from dying!" Wolf ranted, like she had done for the last hour.

"But she's doing it so well all by herself, isn't she?" Onyx replied sarcastically, recieving an angry glare from Wolf. 

Onyx wasn't that mad that Kipo and Halo had went back to the Timbercats. They were mostly mad that they had left without telling anybody. They were supposed to be a team and Halo wasn't one to keep secrets from Onyx.

"Hmm, let me see. Who was supposed to stay up all night making sure Kipo didn't ditch the camp? That's right. None of us! Because she's her own person who makes her own decisions!" Benson said, annoyed with Wolf's overprotectiveness over Kipo who clearly could take care of herself.

"And take Halo with her, right?" Amrar raised an eyebrow.

She agreed with Benson partly. While Kipo was free to do whatever she wanted, as long as it didn't hurt the rest of them, she did not have the permission to bring Halo into her own mess.

"May I remind you that those two are not babies? They can take care of themselves!" Benson sighed.

"Neither of them know this place! I don't think the cats are our biggest problem here, but anything can happen out here!" Amrar continued, earning an eye roll from Benson.

Why did he decide to join a bunch teenage girls that didn't bring anything but drama? Girls...

"If the Timbercats haven't already killed them, I may have to kill them myself," Dave muttered.

Suddenly, Mandu started to squeal loudly. She jumped off of Benson's head, where she had been resting for the past hour, and ran past Wolf towards the trees that made an entrance-looking way inte the Timbercat Village. The humans watched on in confusion before they saw Kipo and Halo riding on Pierre with every cat from the village walking behind them. All of their jaws dropped at the sight. Wolf had truly believed that Kipo would come back empty handed... 

Kipo was happily braiding Yumyan's grey hair.

"This is going to be so cute!" Kipo explained, finishing tying up the last braid with a pink rubber band.

"That's not exactly the look I was going for..." Yumyan commented, remembering what he'd imagined when Kipo asked him if she could give him a 'makeover'.

Kipo smiled at him before looking back in front of her. She smiled at the sight of her friends. She and Halo raised their arms to wave at their friends.

"Guys! There you are!" Kipo called for then happily, "You know how I said I wanted to hunt down that Mega Mute? And you were all like, 'yeah, you and what army?' Well, guess what? We have an army!"

The cats stopped to do a battle roar and Kipo and Halo joined them. The rest of their friends were still dumbfounded and Kipo giggled.

She truly believed that she had a great chance to hunt down the Mega Mute who destroyed her home.

Now when she had an army, nothing could stop her!

Chapter Text

It was getting hotter and hotter by the minute. It was yet another sign that they were getting close to the desert. That's where the Mega Mute had gone. Kipo hoped that her people would be there as well. Alive.

Thinking about it just made her miss her dad even more. She couldn't wait to reunite with him and tell him about everything that she had experienced on the surface. She was sure that he would be proud of her.

A smile appeared on her lips as she thought about one of the recent memories of her dad. It was only a few days prior to the attack of the Clover Burrow.

~~~

Lio was making his famous mandu dumplings for dinner. It was already smelling delicious and he couldn't wait to sit down and eat.

Kipo was sitting on the sofa on the other side of the room, reading a book about her favorite topic - space. She'd read halfway through the book in only a couple of hours. She paused her reading to tell her dad about  the things she found the most interesting.

"Dad, did you know the Milky Way is the reason we have the word galaxy? The ancient Greeks looked up, they saw a milky thing in the sky, and they called it galactos", Kipo explained, seemingly starstruck about the book.

Lio laughed at his daughter's excitement and stirred the food to make sure it wouldn't burn.

"I did. I wrote that book", Lio revealed.

"Oh. Eh, it's alright", Kipo teased with a shrug.

"Well, the blurb on the back calls it 'brilliant and insightful'. So, heyo!"

Kipo turned the book around and grinned at the picture of his father. She then looked up at the ceiling with a sigh. The constellation of star signs looked back at her and she studied it longingly. She wished that she was looking at actual stars.

"Don't you ever get sad that we'll never get to see all that?" Kipo asked and Lio turned around to look at her with a sad expression.

He turned the stove off and pulled the towel off of his shoulder to put down on the counter. He removed a bracelet from his wrist before grabbing his guitar, leaning into the wall. He sat down beside his daughter.

"Hey, you know what I used to do to cheer up your mom?" he asked and strunted his guitar.

Kipo chuckled at him, remembering all the times that he'd asked her the same thing.

"Yes, dad. You've played that song a million times! It worked for me when I was six", she said, but let him continue playing.

Then he started to sing.

"We may not have sunshine, or starlight or weather. But we've got each other."

"And that's even better", Kipo sang along and Lio chuckled happily.

Kipo bent down to grab her own guitar as her dad continued to sing.

"You don't need the sun to keep you warm when you've got arms", Lio sang, pausing his playing to give Kipo a quick hug.

"Wishes come from you and not a random shooting star", Kipo continued before she and her dad sang together.

"We may not have storm clouds, but the sky's always blue~", they looked up at the star constellation together before Lio sang the last part of the song.

"We've got something special here, and what we have is you. What we have is you. What we have is you~."

The two ended the song by just playing the guitar like crazy maniacs. They burst into laughter afterwards, and suddenly, all of Kipo's sad thoughts had just disappeared.

"Okay, I guess it still works when I'm twelve. Thanks, dad", Kipo said and Lio stood up and kissed her forehead before returning to the kitchen to set the table.

Only a few minutes later, they were sitting down by the kitchen aisle, eating their warm food with chopsticks.

"Pass the sauce?" Kipo asked and waited as Lio gave it to her.

~~~

Only a few days later, she was no longer asking for her father to pass the sauce. She was asking Timbercats to hand her an ax so that she could cut the gigantic leaves that were in her way.

"Yeah! That's what I'm talking about!" she exclaimed happily.

She was sitting on Pierre's back, together with Halo who was keeping him from going wild. She couldn't keep Kipo from going wild, though.

Kipo turned around to look at her friends who were walking behind her.

"You guys want a turn? You have to try it! Riding by flea is my new favorite way to travel!" Kipo suggested, but most of her friends didn't seem too excited.

"I will!" Onyx called out, climbing onto Pierre to sit behind Kipo.

Kipo grinned at the teenager before waiting for her other friends' responses.

"I'm good", Wolf muttered, still not over Kipo's success with befriending an entire village of mutes.

"Okay, more flea for us!" Kipo shrugged, gesturing to Halo and Onyx.

She asked Halo to have Pierre move faster, just for funsies. The other girl nodded, and soon enough, Pierre was jumping high into the air and sprinting towards Cactus Town. Kipo was giggling her head off, loving the speed. She had never been to a rollercoaster, but she was sure that it was just like riding Pierre!

As they were getting closer to the main part of the desert city, they had to slow down to not make too much noise.

Benson and Dave were walking at the very end of the Timbercat army, watching the gigantic footsteps from the Mega Mute that had made tiny craters in the ground.

"Hmmm..." Dave hummed, studying the footprint thoroughly.

It was truly a beast.

"You see the size of that foorprint? We're walking towards whatever made it", Benson said, swallowing thickly.

He had spent most of his life running away from mutes like that. And now he was trying to find it...

"Do you remember voting on this plan? Because I don't!" Dave commented.

Further ahead, Yumyan was holding a speech to his fellow timbercats. He was hoping that it would prepare them for whatever was ahead.

"Soon, we will find the Mega Beast, crush it, and take back our sacred tree."

"Sacred tree!" the timbercats agreed, raising their axes into the air.

"But first... We give Pierre a drink!" Yumyan said, cutting off a piece of a cactus to let whatever liquid that was inside quench his thirst. "Who's my good little parasite? Who is it? That's right, it's you!"

After finishing fussying over his pet, Yumyan returned to his timbercats.

"Timbercats, assemble! As you know, we're a proud litter of felines. We never lose!"

Kipo was listening excitedly to Yumyan's speech when suddenly, Wolf grabbed her arm and pulled her away from the cats.

"We're almost in Cactustown. That's Umlaut snake territory. You only make noise in there  if you have a death wish", Wolf informed, gesturing towards the Timbercats as they made their usual battle roar.

They were the complete opposite of silence.

"Our best bet is to ditch the cats and then sneak up on the Mega Beast while it's asleep.  Rule number 32 of the surface-"

"I know, I know. Stealth is your friend. I would like to add a rule 33: Friends are your friends, and the more you have, the safer you are! Plus, I don't think Halo would want to leave the cats either. They're her friends too, after all."

"Then she can stay with them", Wolf muttered but Kipo gave her a look to not say anything more about it, and Wolf let it go.

As Kipo was about to rejoin with the rest of the group, her eyes caught something amazing. A leather jacket with spikes.

"That jacket is all spiky!" Kipo exclaimed, pressing her hands onto the display window as she stared at the material inside in awe. "Do you think it would make me look more intimidating to the Mega Mute?"

"No", Wolf muttered, crossing her arms.

"But I need something that says 'Hey, you! Give me back my dad!'" Kipo deepened her voice and puffed out her chest to make herself look bigger.

Wolf just rolled her eyes.

"Do you really think you can just talk to a Mega Mute? They can't think. They're mindless giants!" Wolf said, hoping for Kipo to start being realistic.

The rest of the human group walked up to the two, listening to their conversation.

"You never know until you try! Besides, it's the only lead I have. There weren't any human footprints leading out of my burrow. So, either that Mega Mute took them, or a city full of humans just disappeared into thin air!" Kipo paced back and forth as she talked, hoping that finding the Mega Mute would finally take her to her people.

"Or it ate them", Benson added and Wolf quickly punched him on the side with her elbow, coughing to give him the hint to shut up.

While she didn't believe that Kipo's plan would do them any good, she didn't want her to lose hope while she still had the chance to find her people.

"We're all for finding the Mega Mute. Just didn't wanna do it with the world's largest dinner bell", Wolf reassured, pointing Stalky at the cats that were still making way too much noise than what she was comfortable with.

"Onward! Yumyan owns you all!" Yumyan battle cried and the rest of the cats quickly followed suit.

Wolf sighed. If the cats were joining them, there was no way that they'd be able to sneak up on anything, and especially not a Mega Mute. Why did Kipo have to be so stubborn?

"I don't know, I'm with Kipo. We could use some extra muscles and the cats are way better at fighting than most of us", Amrar spoke up and both Halo and Onyx agreed.

Knowing that she had been outvoted, Wolf let Kipo take the lead into Cactustown. She was sure that she was going to regret it.

As they walked, all of them kept an eye out on their surroundings. A snake could jump at them at any time. Nowhere was safe.

The rooftops on each side of the road was covered in skull. From both mutes and humans. Cacti were growing out of them, and it gave the humans shills. Clearly, a lot of people hadn't made it out of Cactustown alive...

"Hang on a second", Benson said to Dave, "remember when Wolf said we're all in with helping Kipo find the Mega Mute? Are we, though?"

"I thought you'd never ask!" Dave said in relief, "I'm having major reservations. Don't get me wrong, I like Kipo."

"I mean, who doesn't? And we want her to find her family, but..."

"But do we like Kipo as much as we like living?"

Benson sighed but nodded in agreement.

"You pose an excellent question, my friend. We can just turn around right now and no one would know."

Further ahead, Onyx was listening onto their conversation. Ever since they first met Benson, they had been on his side. But if he was planning to leave them, they wouldn't join him. Kipo was Onyx and their friends' ticket back home. Wolf was going to help them back home as soon as Kipo was back with her people. Leaving such an opportunity behind was not a smart decision.

"Did you hear Benson and Dave?" Onyx whispered to Amrar, who was oblivious to what was going on behind their backs.

"No, what about them?" she replied, keeping her voice low since Onyx seemingly didn't want anyone to hear them.

"They're planning on bailing on us."

"Wait, what? Why?"

"I don't know. I heard Dave say that they value life more than helping Kipo get back home", Onyx said.

They did understand. Slightly. None of them wanted to die. They wanted to get back home safe and sound. But they also wanted to stay together as a group. Splitting up would do none of them any good.

"Well, they did steal our bike before, so I'm not really that surprised", Amrar shrugged.

She didn't trust Benson or Dave completely yet. And she clearly had reasons not to. They weren't loyal to the group. Not one bit.

"Should we tell Kipo and Wolf?" Onyx asked.

"Nah. Let them leave if that's what they want. We don't need them anyway", Amrar answered, ending the conversation by looking ahead of her.

Onyx sighed. They wished that Benson at least would say goodbye to them if he was planning on leaving with Dave.

Their thoughts were interrupted when Benson yelled behind them. Turning around, they saw Benson on the ground. He had stumbled on skin. The skin of a snake.

When he realized what it was, he and Dave jumped back. They could hear the faint sound of rattles, surrounding them. Suddenly, everyone was even more on edge. Wolf was gripping her staff so hard that her knuckles were turning white. Yumyan was looking back and forth, trying to determine where exactly the sound was coming from.

"Umlaut snakes. I'd know that rattle anywhere", Yumyan muttered before jumping ahead with a flip, holding his ax in position in case he would have to attack.

"Axes on guard!" he called out, and hus cats did as they were told.

Several snakes slithered out of a building right in front of them. They were all wearing electric guitar. The leader on the front strummed her guitar with her tongue without glaring at Yumyan angrily.

"Yumyan Hammerpaw", she acknowledged.

Said Yumyan Hammerpaw copied the snake's actions before glaring at her as well.

"Cotton", he spat.

The snake and the cat were glaring at each other with hatred. Kipo gulped. Hell was about to go down.