Moments before Kabiliti and Viola arrived:
In the new city of Mafanikio and inside one of the many temporary warehouses 7 men (1 Foreman, 3 workers and 3 debt slaves) were currently trying to figure out why some of the cargo crates were empty and others simply not there.
Foreman:” Check the count again!”
The Fisidamu man was holding a clipboard and gesturing for the others to get back to it.
Worker 1:” Come on boss, we’ve manually checked the inventory 3 times now! We got scammed by the delivery company. Just report it already!”
Foreman:” No! I can’t risk losing my job over this, I was the one who signed off on the delivery.”
Worker 2:” Why don’t you at least help us out?”
Foreman:” That's what the slaves are for.”
“If you would excuse me sir” a white slave with a thick northern accent interrupted.
Slave 1:” But you often talk about that time you stopped a charge by punching a horse when you were in the army. Why not use that great strength now?”
Worker 3:” he's got a point ‘war boss’. What happened to that strength?”
Slave 2: “He just full of shit”
Foreman:” N-no. It’s just…..My war wounds are acting up”
Slave 3: “You should go get them checked out by a healer then. They keep acting up when you got to work”
The workers and slaves laughed at the comment, welcoming the impromptu break that it brought
Foreman:”Oh har-de-har-har. 5 minute break and the-”
Worker 1: “What the hell is that!”
2 spheres dripping some kind of black ichor started slowly melting through the roof.
It was something straight out of a nightmare.
Worker 3: “What kind of evil spirit is THAT!”
Viola’s perspective:
We expected re-entry to be a bit flashy and epic, like a rocket return to Earth, but instead, the second we touched the planet’s atmosphere we heard:
And we both stopped in midair only for an ink-black portal to open beneath us and begin swallowing our cube shelves.
Kabiliti was panicking the whole time but I trusted Gloe not to intentionally kill us.
Kabiliti: “It’s not that I don’t trust him not to kill us, it’s that physics is using a power that violates physics! MAGIC, THE THING HE SAID HE HATES!”
Viola:” Oh, shit…. You're right!”
Viola:” WAIT SIDE EFFECTS?!?”
Kabiliti: “WHAT SIDE EFFECTS!?!”
Back in the warehouse:
Clouds started forming around the…eggs? Yes, eggs! And a low creepy hum could clearly be heard.
“What unholy spirit could hold such power? Worse yet, who could have summoned it!” These and similar thoughts were running through the heads of the 7 warehouse workers.
110 km above the warehouse:
Viola:” Oh! I just landed in something- OH MY GOD THIS TASTES AMAZING!”
Back in the warehouse:
Worker 1:” ONE OF THEM IS IN THE GOLD & SILVER ORNAMENTS!”
Foreman:” MY JOB!!!!”
Worker 3:” Don’t worry guys One toss of my military grade, silver stabbing shock spear of-”
Everyone: “JUST THROW IT!”
110 km above the warehouse:
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
Viola:” LOOK I CAN’T EXPLAIN IT BUT I JUST KNOW THAT IT’S GOLD AND SILVER AND IT TASTES SO GOOOOD!”
Kabiliti: “Gloe? Did you dru- HOLY SHIT! THAT WAS SILVER? WHERE DID IT COME FROM AND WHY DOES IT TASTE SO SWEET?”
Kabiliti: “Ok let's do the echo thing before we feast.”
Viola:” Agreed.”
Kabiliti: “But snack first.”
Viola:” Seconded!”
And with that final declaration, the twins were all the way through the portal…
“back to work making existence exist,” Gloe thought. “And now I have friends now”
Back in the warehouse:
Worker 3:” MY SPEAR!!!”
One of the eggs simply ate the spear, much to the pain of one of the workers, But then inky black tentacles shot out from that egg each one missing the workers and slaves and hitting boxes, crates, equipment and even supports. As if encouraged by its unholy twin, the other egg did the same
“FIND COVER!” the foreman shouted, in a voice that demanded that others listen lest they die. The others quickly obeyed, jumping behind anything that looked like it would stop the onslaught, they needed to get to the door but how?
Foreman: “Stay calm, we can…can…”
It was then the Foreman noticed there were a lot fewer things in what was once a nearly full warehouse…and a lot more tentacles.
His mind then figured out what it wanted: “It’s eating the building supplies! It doesn’t want us, it wants our stuff!”
Slave 2:” Then what is it doing now!”
“Huh?” pecked from his cover just in time to see a wave of darkness burst from both eggs and hit him and everyone else.
An intense feeling of fear and hunger washed over him. He felt like a baby antelope trapped in a cave full of hungry wild dogs, he needed to leave, To Run! TO ESCAPE!
|Lion’s heart, auto-triggered.|
And then it was gone. The eggs were ‘feeding’ on the opposite side of where they landed. And when he looked behind him everyone had already left.
The roof started cracking under its weight due to the lack of support.
Foreman: “Time to get out of here!”
Viola’s perspective:
Everything here tastes delicious and it seems that how much we grow depends on what we eat.
Silver and gold seem to be the most effective thing to eat but I think I ate most of the gold and silver here. Looking back it seems one of the workers wasn’t affected by the echo because he was sneaking out instead of running like everyone else.
He seems focused on the roof rather than us…then I noticed the walls had more cracks than before, oh no.
General perspective:
Just as the Foreman shut the door leading outside, the southern half of the building loudly collapsed but Viola reacted in time and ate the rubble that was going to crush the men.
The Foreman having risen up from the ground upon releasing he wasn’t dead or dying scanned his surroundings trying to understand why he and his co-workers were surrounded by a perfect circle of debris-less dirt
It was then silhouetted against the light of the sun, Viola’s developing body, growing cube by cube.
Panicking, all Viola could think to do was make her growing body do a shushing gesture, hoping the fact she just saved his friends would in-debt him to her. This was very much not the case, but the Foreman was more preoccupied with trying to snap out his co-workers from the fear effect they were hit with.
In the end, Viola simply ‘licked clean’ what remained of the second half of the warehouse and rolled her and Kabiliti to the other side while the Foreman dragged his co-workers away from the deadly tentacle eggs.
Due to saving the workers, Viola quickly reached the point where she could finally hatch… but;
Viola’s perspective:
Kabiliti: “We’re out.”
Viola:” Already? Are you ready to hatch?”
Kabiliti: “Nope. My egg says I’m only 73% there. You?”
Viola:” I’m ready to hatch. But I think we got company. I can already hear a crowd outside, and I suspect our ‘feasting’ didn’t help that problem”
Kabiliti: “I got an Idea.”
Viola:” What?”
Kabiliti: “Remember when we used to roam Wikipedia when we were bored?”
Viola:” I see where you're going with this…”
Kabiliti: “I’ll spend some of my material self and some mana to make some…”
A tendril from Kabiliti’s egg reached out and touched Viola’s egg at which point memories of staring at a computer screen reading about how to make a flash-bang filled both minds…as well as remembering the plot to flash-bang the popular girls into leaving her alone because they kept trying to copy her work, only for the plan to end in failure when her dad asked her why she had used his metalworking tools to make grenade cases.
Kabiliti: “Oh god, that's why Dad started locking his workshop… Anyway, I’ll make some flash-bang traps and you hatch.”
Viola:” But what if they just go for you”
Kabiliti:” I’ll make a wall, Just Trust me”
Viola:”*sigh* Ok, Don’t do anything stupid”
|WOULD YOU LIKE TO HATCH? WARNING, ONCE STARTED THE PROCESS CAN NOT STOP. YES OR NO|
Viola:” Yes.”
Then everything went black for Viola And a progress bar appeared facing Kabiliti.
Kabiliti’s perspective:
Kabiliti: “Ok I just need to protect her, make some flash bangs, and set a trap for if something goes wrong”
Kabiliti extended her tendrils about 5 metres away from Viola in a wide crisscross pattern and started slowly recalling them leaving a flash bang on black string wielded to the floor every 50 centimetres. The plan was to blind anyone checking on them because, with all the commotion, it was very likely someone was coming.
Kabiliti: “Oh great, She’s glowing now!”
Kabiliti started rushing the process which would likely leave a few flash bangs faulty and unlikely to go off.
“Shit shit SHIT, AH fuck it. They won’t get within 1 metre of us right?” Kabiliti exclaimed as she gave up on the remainder of her trap.
Kabiliti redirected her efforts on making a spooky wall that could hide her but...
*Step, Step, Step,*
Time was up!
Kabiliti: “Damn it! FUCK ME! SHIT!!!! COBWEBS GO!!!”