Dad
Miranda? You good? He, okay?
Miranda
Yeah, I’m okay.
It was a cage match, and we had to split up.
I ran the shade off, but lost Asher’s trail.
Sorry.
Dad
It’s okay. Head for Shady Pawn and see if Terri can help.
Becca, Rooster, and I are taking a run at the Pyramid Garden.
Be safe. Love you.
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Green
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Asher probably thought all bunnies were jerks. It was the last thing Green wanted, but he’d rather be a jerk than watch a potential source of fun and entertainment cycle. It got boring in the Belly. Plus, Asher seemed like a decent guy, and Green was an excellent judge of character. Most of the time.
The parking lot was full of sounds; shopping carts clattering across pavement, boots stomping, and the same old holiday tunes festively playing on car stereos. Green felt a little guilty, not much, but a little. They could have gone to a smaller food box, but this one was always exciting. It was the bigger challenge.
On Green’s left, two fathers were about to slug it out over a scratched car door with their kids pushed behind them. On his right, a young girl swerved around parked and moving vehicles screaming for her parents, but Green knew better. That wasn’t an innocent child. She, like the rest, was gray. They were the unbroken; shades unconsciously hunting for human feed.
Green headed for the third block of parked cars, keeping one eye on the lost child to predict her trajectory. If she got close, he would wait to warn Asher until the last second. The fledgling needed to learn, but more importantly, Green wondered what Asher would do. Green imagined him diving clumsily over a car hood and couldn’t help but chitter, but the bunny equivalent of a human-like chuckle was short-lived. A few hops later, the small unbroken girl found her parents and her wild run ended. Oh, well. Asher still had the whole parking lot to cross, not to mention the dangers inside the food box. At some point, things would get interesting. He didn’t know why, but his gut told him Asher could handle it.
The bunny glanced back in time to see a tendril of yellow-green energy flashing towards him. Summer’s itchy shed! Green had made a mistake. So far, he'd dodged Asher’s active spell twice, but he’d stupidly offered a third opportunity. Green kicked out his back legs and zipped to the left to avoid its grasp. The tendril missed and snapped back towards the anchor in Asher's…. No, in Two-leg’s chest. The phrase Two-leg should be okay for now, unless he accepted it as a weird nickname.
Two-leg had unknowingly cast a spell of familiar bonding back in the alley. Normally, a spell like that was complicated, but apparently not for him. From what Green saw, all Two-leg had done was sincerely offer his name and thanks to him. Bam! Spell cast. It persisted as swirling energy over Two-leg’s heart, waiting for another opportunity to strike. It was an open invitation of friendship to Green, but in magical contract form. The spell wouldn’t cancel until Two-leg stopped it, Green accepted it or slammed a hard ‘no’ into Two-leg’s face.
Becoming a familiar wasn’t a decision Green was going to make lightly. Not this time. No matter how bored he was. He needed to avoid thinking positive things about Two-leg. Or doing positive things for him. Even using Two-leg’s name seemed to call the bond’s attention.
Two-leg had the raw talent to channel the power of Meyonohk — to be a tree caster. It was one of the three sources of magic. It’s what allowed him to speak with Green, but his talent in tree casting wasn’t minor. While all tree casters could speak to living creatures, Two-leg was a binder. He could create permanent connections with other living beings.
But all magic was dumb. It was a tool that needed direction.
The familiar bond normally required acceptance or force of will in forming connections, but this was somewhere in the middle. Since Two-leg cast and directed the spell through instinct, how it determined if Green accepted was primarily instinctual.
Once the bond formed, it was tough to break without the binder cycling in a way that was dangerous to the familiar. Green knew from experience. He needed to keep his distance until he’d decided. Was Two-leg a decent person? Maybe. But binding his life to Two-leg’s? He wasn’t sure about that. On the other side, saying no to a familiar bond was often permanent. He’d deal with it after the food run, if Two-leg survived.
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Then what was Green going to do with him? These days he usually let fledglings fend for themselves. It wasn't like the old days, when he'd take them to the Ragers or Color Hunters. The Ragers were more fun, but a binder needed a different faction. He needed to take Two-leg to the Wardens. Yeah, the Wardens were probably the right faction, at least for a little training. But first, they were going to have some fun.
He let out small teeth chitters of excitement as he hopped over the empty lower rack of a runaway shopping cart. This was going to be good, he thought as the cart slammed into a vehicle. The alarm's loud blare joined the cacophony of the seasonal shopping mob.
Wait, where was Two-leg?
Empty hay tray! Green needed to be careful he was getting close to letting the zoomies in. It had been a long time since he’d been this excited and he felt joy fueling his legs. He reined his excitement in and forced himself to slow his breathing. Zoomies were great, a bunny superpower. It was a little like the hyper-focus some bunny-touched humans experienced, but more. A lot more. Green loved when they came because normally he was fast, but zoomies made him near untouchable. But, he could also get lost in the feeling, which is why he’d lost sight of Two-leg. He knew better.
He dodged a shade’s leg as he slipped under a truck and called out, “Are you keeping up, Two-leg?” Green hoped he could hear him over engines, honks, and rickety shopping carts. No response. He needed a better view. Green zipped under the car beside the truck, avoiding the truck driver’s foot as it came down. He circled around the car and leaped up on to its hood. His paws slipped a little, but he used his nails to scratch to a stop. The nail gouges were already repairing as he hopped from the hood to the roof. Green was halfway through the lot, but Two-leg had yet to make the second block of parked vehicles. Taking a slow and steady approach of timing his steps to slip between groups of shade shoppers. “I’m trying to keep it at quarter speed for you. You, good?”
Was Two-leg dumb enough to answer him out loud again? Shades couldn’t hear Green, but they could hear Two-leg and other humans if close enough. They surrounded Two-leg. It would be bad. The bunny could get things going by touching the shades and breaking them. If they broke, they wouldn’t be able to see Green. They would go after other targets instead. Targets like Two-leg. He had done it to his last partner, but he had no reason to do that to Asher — yet.
Asher was about to speak, looked around, and instead gave a thumbs-up and a head nod. Smart, he had some brains. Then Green watched as energy shot from Two-leg’s chest. Gah! Green jumped from the car’s roof to the truck beside it. Avoiding the snapping tendril. He needed to stop using Two-leg’s name, even in his mind.
It was boring watching Two-leg pick his times and move forward, but it was the right move. Not very action hero like, but smart. Now, he worked his way into the center of the parking spots and moved between the metal and plastic noses. Holding up his bat and was careful not to brush bumpers when shades were still in contact with a vehicle. The bunny could tell Two-leg didn’t have a full grasp of the rules yet, but he was learning.
Damn, so much for a parking lot chase scene. When humans survived, it was entertaining. When they didn’t, it was brutal. In a group of shades this large, there was almost always a banshee in the bunch. When a banshee broke in a shade heavy place like this? Even fast humans only had about a 1 in a 1,000 chance to survive long enough to crossroad escape before cycling.
The Rager’s even made a game out of it for a while, but when they realized the odds were that bad, they moved on to less cyclecidal ways to test their limits — like organ piercings. Occasionally a Rager, hungry for the Demon Achievement, would attempt it, but it rarely went well. Stupid Ragers. They changed from a group that valued bravery, heroics, and pushing the limits of what was possible into a group that treated the Belly as if it were a video game. Achievements and all. It made him sick. They were nothing but a bunch of rabid thrill seekers now. But was it much different from what he was doing with Two-leg? Was Green any better? Putting him in more danger than necessary. Learning experience or not, Green recognized it was mostly for his amusement.
Green felt the anger filling up more than his small body could handle. He gave into his instinct and thumped a back foot down, denting the roof of the truck he sat on. The loud noise rang out through the parking lot.
Two-leg paused and looked up at Green with wide eyes. He held hands palm up at the shoulder in a questioning shrug at the loud and distracting grump thump.
Green needed to get out of his head. That grump thump distracted him. “Don’t worry about it. Take your time. If you break a shade called a banshee, it will break all the shades in the area. You’re doing it right, slow but steady.” There he helped. He hopped off the vehicle and hit the pavement, dodging familiar bond attempt number five.
They made their way slowly towards the front entrance, kneeling behind the last row of cars. He noticed Two-leg was about three quarters faded. If Green were Two-leg, he would sneak in through a side door, skip clothing, and move straight for the slow-burn high calorie fuel, but it was more fun to let Two-leg call the shots. “So, Two-leg. You lead the way.”
Two-leg peaked over the cars to where Green's nose pointed toward the steady stream of shade shoppers coming and going through the main automatic glass doors. “Through there? That’s insane!”