After they became aware of the trail of death that followed in their wake, it was impossible to ignore it. It offended Fellfren’s tastes and just made the bunny uncomfortable with having something that could be so easily tracked trailing behind them.

Before departing from their tiny slice of dead land, they had to find a solution.

With careful observation, they found out that the main offender was the mycelium fur surrounding the bunny, it reached for everything around them, and even the slightest brush would leave lines of deterioration behind.

“Well, you could part your forefeet earlier, you clearly have control over your body, and I can help.” Spoke Fellfren, matter of factly.

“How could you help?”

“I mean, I say “your body” but it is our body, you are just so much more used to it. Even when we… fought before, I was helping control the roots.”

Blue leaf shuddered.

“Erm, can’t you cover me like you did before? It felt nice.”

“In this situation, for you to move with pieces of me attached to you, you would need to rip them from me. And after the last fight I am a bit too drained for that, it will take time to recover what I lost.”

“But I was moving all the time!”

“Well, when I unfold things in the more mundane dimensions, it’s not like they stop being attached to what they were before. I choose the harder tips of my cap to cover the outsides, and the softer parts of it to cover the insides of the coverings. It’s quite simple, really, imagine being inside a squishy…” Fellfren noticed something was off when they started speaking, but only then could they point out what exactly it was. All the subtle movements and twitches from his companion were absent.

“… Blue Grass?”

Blue Grass jumped, her glazed eyes regaining focus.

“Yes! Yes! I am here, yes, of course. Yes… ahm, yes. I completely agree.”

“What was the last thing you heard?”

“Erm… Foldicap!”

Fellfren sighed.

“I can’t cover your feet and fur properly without hurting myself, I didn’t cover any parts of you that moved overly much during the fight.”

“Why didn’t you just say so! Alright, we can do the fur thingy… even if it doesn’t sound very nice.”

It was in fact, not very nice. It was not very anything, really. The mushroom felt like just an extension of her, as uncomfortable as breathing while being aware of it.

Their first attempt to smooth the fur into submission ended with a prim and proper bunny with a stylish crown. Wonderful hairstyle, really. The issue was that they still left little footprints of death behind, and any foliage that reached them lost it’s luster. They could still be easily tracked.

“Maybe we could just leave like this? What’s the worst that could happen?” Fellfren asked innocently.

“You did NOT just say that. I was going to agree with you, but now I am not leaving here until we find a solution.” Blue Grass exuded exasperation.

“What! What did I do! I just said-”

“Don’t. You. Dare.”

Much to her horror, and hesitant acceptance, they tried then to pull the fur inside Blue Grass’ skin. She was thankful when it only curled instead, a failure. The solution ended up being much simpler, and in a way complicated things a lot more.

“What if we just asked it to stop making everything dead?” Blue grass wondered.

“It’s part of your own mycelium network, well our network, it doesn’t have a will of it’s own, you can’t just-”

A tingling swept through their bodies, the bunny’s fur standing up as if electrified, only to slowly settle down. The previous hairstyle ruined.

“That should not have happened.” Fellfren felt nothing but dread. There was something in there with them, an intruder.

“See? All you have to do is ask nicely. It’s barely even harming the grass!” The decay rate was about 180 times slower, making it much harder for them to be tracked by it.

“That should NOT have happened! There is something else in here with us! And they can control our roots better than either of us can!”

“And?”

“And? And! What do you mean and?!”

“What can we even do about it?”

“I-I don’t know…”

“All we know is that it answered when asked politely, and it probably has been with us this whole time- if it really can control us better than either of us can, then why can we do anything at all?”

“That’s…! I mean, you have a point, but-”

“It’s alright, Fellfren. We are alright.”

“I- alright. Sorry I just- it’s terrifying.”

“We can die at any second the moment something stronger than us sniffs us out. At least our little friend is not trying to kill us. Besides, is it really any different from you and me being stuck together?”

Fellfren did not expect Blue Grass to make such a good argument. She had a point, If they removed their irrational fear from the equation, it really wasn’t so bad.

“Thank you, I needed that.”

“Of course, I am the best provider of the needed things.”

That released the rest of the tension the mushroom was feeling.

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“Let’s just go.”

“Hmm, maybe we should name them something too?”

“Not today, please. I am still coming to terms with it.”

“With them*, they answered me! Just like you.”

“I- yeah, with “them”, sorry, can we please start walking? I need it.”

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[This story is only available at RoyalRoad by DrySolace]

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Blue grass got up then, stretched her neck and limbs and with another check that made sure that they were not literally sucking their surroundings out of life, set out to the direction south from where the elder beast had come, southwest from the deadlands.

It didn’t take long for both of them to regret changing their fur.

“Why are these stupid branches hitting me!” The bunny raged.

“Aren’t you from here? Wait, I thought the life draining was something new, why are you having so much trouble without it?”

“It’s not my fault! I got used to it! I want it back!”

“How? Barely any time passed between us entering the forest and the clearing, and you were the one worried about tracks and predators!”

“Predators?! Shhhh, you are too loud!”

“You-”

“Shhhhh”

“You are the one being loud,” Fellfren whispered

“LOUD?! I AM THE SNEAKIEST! TAKE IT BACK!”

“Yes yes, you are, you are so sneaky, I take it back. I need to-to meditate! Yes, I will be quiet for a while.” They didn’t expect the outburst, and thankfully that stopped any further discussion on the subject.

It took a few annoyed minutes until Blue Grass got used to their “old” ways again, and when she did, Fellfren was reluctantly impressed. She reacted to everything that came in touch with either her fur or her whiskers with surprising nimbleness, using the tree trunks to maneuver over tricky areas. Sometimes it felt like inertia itself could not get a hold of her.

Avoiding suspicious or frail spots that in all honesty looked the same to Fellfren, Blue Grass navigated the dense undergrowth, the canopy up above providing shade that kept them out of obvious sight. There was no need for them to take rests, because unlike the battle they fought in the day before, Blue Grass now could maintain a sustainable rhythm.

Finally could Fellfren appreciate their surroundings. The tension that Blue Grass felt when they first entered the forest had bled to them, making any tree related thoughts to be out of reach, now all they could feel from their friend was relief and contentment.

It truly was weird. The upside down mushrooms had such variety of stem colors and textures. The small colored caps that each sky-root had were also very intriguing, they swayed with the wind like the Wind-chime mushrooms from Fellfren’s home grove. If their roots were upwards, did they have caps under them? Were they all alone, not connected in a collective? They wanted to ask, but blue grass was so fierce and joyful that they had no heart to, so they just enjoyed the wind in their cap and appreciated the pretty, weird shrooms.

When Fellfren had said that they would meditate it was in jest, but truthfully both of them ended up in contemplation. Movement and peace are not mutually exclusive, after all.

The more then ran the more the trees started spacing out from each other, and the undergrowth thinned.

Blue Grass had never truly been to this part of the forest, all they knew was that it was the direction where the scary monkeys with weird skin came from. Soon they found themselves facing another tree line. This one was, however, not a gateway to a dead plane. It gave way to tree stumps and a wide, open grassy area. It reminded Blue Grass of where they woke up but… nice, and with places to hide. It was acceptable.

They hopped around the tree stumps, using them as cover.

Albeit their last experience with monkeys was not the best one, Blue Grass at least knew that it only happened because they weren’t careful enough. She would not be caught unaware of their situation again.

As they progressed further, the tree stumps gave way to taller and taller grass, but always parted by the same dirt path. They both found it curious, animal tracks were usually way more subtle, maybe it was worth checking where it lead to. They decided to follow it from the cover of the grass, not realizing how obvious it was to have the grass parted above them.

Soon enough they were faced with their first obstacle, a fork in their journey. Under the waning light, they could see that the direction they had been following led to what looked like a weird, wide and short tree. The branching path was overgrown with grass but it clearly led to a forest, albeit clearly smaller than the one they came from.

“What do you think?” Blue Grass asked her companion.

“Well, one path is more trees, the other just looks weird. So I vote for trees.” They wobbled slightly towards the less trodden path.

“That’s not the only difference, you missed so many things!”

“Such as?”

“Well, the main path has way more tracks so waaay more animals in that direction, specially given that we found none at the entrance of the woods.”

“Well, then I see no reason to take that route. Let’s go to the tiny forest.”

“But- but that’s not everything! There is also the weird tree over there-”

“Over where? I see nothing green, just that wide elevation.”

“That’s clearly wood.” Blue Grass spoke with finality, sitting down for the argument.

“Wood? How is that wood?! It doesn’t have any of the colored root tips or the patterns on its stem.”

“Well, it just is? What else could it be? I guess it does look a bit munched on.”

“Why do you want to go in that direction anyway? You said so yourself, it’s filled with more animals and I do not want a repeat of the black tide.” Fellfren vibrated a little.

“We need to assess the threats around us. I sometimes forget that you are not used to surviving like I am. I also think we should take the other path but I don’t like how you just choose it based on what you wanted.”

“I understand now, could you just have said so instead? And tell me, why should we take the forest path then?”

“I will try, as for why we don’t go to the suspicious wide wood thing, it’s late. We need a place to sleep and then we can scout tomorrow.”

Fellfren wobbled once in agreement, and both set out in silence. The sun had not yet set but it should not take long. An hour at most.

The path towards the woods had another distinct feature that separated it from the main one, every 5 minutes of walking was marked by two small posts with a line connecting them. It was all quite weird, and Fellfren and Blue Grass both decided to keep just walking on the grass instead.

Reaching the trees, the extra cover made them both relax. Back in their element, they ventured further, Blue Grass relying on the same instincts they did before. That was a mistake, because in this forest it was not making noise that you should be wary of, but stepping on perfectly flat ground.

Blue grass landed, a crack was heard in the air and up they were both hoisted. Her dormant fur, as if sensing her panic, started actively sucking the last dregs of life from the fiber the rope was made of, but that too was a mistake, for intertwined in every twist was a thin metal wire.

“Blue Grass?! Blue Grass!” She did not answer.

The more they struggled, the more the metal bit into their soft, black flesh, and the more it constricted. The end result a tangled mess of an over ventilating bunny, slowly being swallowed by shadows as the sun finally bid farewell.

As they stood there, still, and no form of attack came upon their prone form, they started to calm down, and reassessed their situation.

“Fellfren?”

“Blue Grass! Are you alright!? What happened?”

“Fellfren, what is wrapped around me?”

“It’s, it’s thin and very very hard, I was too late to completely cover you with the cap armor, but the little that I tried was completely ignored.”

“Do you see anything moving around us?”

Taking in their surroundings, Fellfren did not notice anything out of the ordinary besides the fact that they were both kept in the air attached to a tree branch, he said so to Blue Grass.

“I don’t think this is an animal,” she responded.

“Then what do we do?”

“We wait, and we stay ready.”

The night that followed was a quiet one, the peace just a veneer above uncoiled tension. No animals approached, nothing happened until dawn was almost upon the world.

A brightness approached from the north, the unnatural phenomena making Blue Grass go taunt, and then limp again in recognition of their situation. Fellfren too had their own measures, and hid their crown within the fur of their companion. The light intensified until movement was seen and heard from a bush beneath them. What appeared was something much like the monkeys that Fellfren had encountered, and altogether different. They were short and stout, and instead of black fur they had layers of skin. As they got closer Fellfren noticed that they were not skin at all, but much like the armor that they clad their friend with, how curious.

“Well well, what do we got here?” A gruff voice reverberated, breaking the silence that had been building up for all that time.

They could speak.

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[This story is only available at RoyalRoad by DrySolace]

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