Funk and I caught up with Haley, Abby, and Lory. We stared at the bushes moving in front of us. Lory looked at me, “Are you alright, dear?”

“Yeah, I was just having a heart-to-heart with Funk.”

Abby looked at me, “Aren’t you just going around and making intimate friends wherever you go?”

“Well, we have a heart-to-heart soon, if you like.”

Abby crossed her arms, “You kind of already had one with me, when you went inside of me.”

Lory hung her head, “For the love of god, Abby, not in front of Haley.”

She laughed, “I liked that joke.”

Lory looked at her, “That is precisely why.”

I pointed at the beak out of the bushes, “Perhaps, we should keep an eye on whatever is going to jump out of there, instead of making naughty jokes about Abby’s insides.”

Funk chuckled. I looked at him, “What is it?” He just started laughing. All of us looked at him.

He shook his head, “I just can’t.”

I put my hand on Haley’s ear while keeping an eye on the beak sticking out of the bushes, Lory took the other ear. I nodded, “Go ahead, Funk, she can’t hear you.”

He chuckled, “Knowing Steve and Abby had something together, I just thought, Steve never went that deep.”

Abby hung her head, “Oh my god, Funk.”

Lory looked at me, then at Abby. Then she looked back at me, “I hope it was not like that for you.”

“What, no, I was about to fucking die, I did not even give consent.”

Funk laughed, “Oh my fucking god, Steve!”

Abby giggled, “This is fun.”

Lory looked at Abby, “If you touch my man, I am going to murder you,” she unsheathed her left claws.

I wanted to hold up my hand and noticed, I had no hand free. “Guys, I am not interested in Abby. Fuck, that came out wrong, I just want to be friends with Abby.”

Funk fell down and started laughing. I looked at him, “Damn you Funk, I will get you back for this!”

Lory sighed, “Just don’t touch my man, Abby, I rather have him die.”

“What?”

Lory shrugged, “It is the truth.”

I sighed, “Can we go on, or should we continue bickering?”

Lory smiled and came over to me, “You are mine, don’t let her touch you with those filthy parasitic hands.”

“No, I won’t let Abby touch me.”

Funk kept on laughing, I looked at him, “I really hate you.”

Funk smiled, “Man, I like you too, buddy.” I sighed and lifted my hand, and Lory did the same.

Haley looked at me, “How bad was it?”

I grinned, “Not for your ears’ munchkin. This monster is being damn patient with us already.” I poked the beak. Nothing happened. “Well, aren’t you a friendly critter?” I poked it again, it still did not respond. “Maybe it is dead?” I moved the bushes aside and it is not dead. It just stared at me.

This funny creature is a type of bird. It’s about the size of a pigeon, it has two enormous wings, two small legs and a short, elegant tail. It has a thick, but delicate skin covered in feathers, which are dark blue. The creature, whatever it is, suddenly made a sound, it reverberated throughout the forests and others responded back. They make sounds ranging from fairly low-pitched to extremely low-pitched, and they have a minimal range of sounds they make to indicate something. It is clear they are communicating with each other. “Yeah, what is your problem?”

It just made a whistling sound at me. I sighed and looked at the others. “What do we do with this thing?”

Haley looked at it, “It is cute, we should let it be.”

“Funk?”

He grinned at me, “We should cook it.”

“Lory?”

“We should feed it to Abby, maybe then she will keep her mouth shut for a few minutes.”

I sighed, “Abby?”

“To be honest, it looks like a delicious chicken, but I am just tagging along, if you decide to give me the chicken, I will gladly eat it.”

Lory looked at her, “You would eat that damn tree if I put mayonnaise on it.”

I started tapping my foot annoyed, I looked at the creature, “I am not even sure if it will taste like chicken.”

Haley pointed behind it, “Do you see that massive tree?”

I nodded, “It is massive, it might be the biggest tree in this forest, it might even be bigger compared to our airship. Maybe we should just kill this thing? Lory, for real, what should we do?”

She pointed her hand and shot the creature with an energy beam. It rolled into a ball as it got hit. Then the ball rolled away. An earthquake shook the earth as I felt something land near us. It seemed to be a giant-sized bird, this one did not look very friendly. I pointed, but before I could respond, something hit my neck. When I felt where I got hit, it seemed to be some kind of dart.

When I looked towards the giant tree, I saw the birds holding blowpipes, what the fuck? Everything turned into wacky colors before I fell to the ground.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

When I woke up, I seemed to be in a bone cage, tied to someone, seeing as I felt her tail, it must be Lory. I seemed to be tied up with flexible bones. When I looked around me, I saw we were on a cart of some kind, it had wheels. There is a huge statue of that creature we saw outside, in front of us a pit of brown liquid that bubbled. There were small doors. Out of them came more of these creatures. They had robes on, and they started to dance around us while making weird bird noises.

“Lory?”

She grunted, “Yes, it’s me, what happened?”

“I got hit by a dart, what about you?”

“Yeah, I saw you fall down, and suddenly, I got hit by multiple darts.” She looked around, “This is not good, Steve, we are about to get ritually sacrificed.”

“Yeah, I noticed that, now that we are dying, again, should we talk?”

Lory sighed, “Well, we can talk, what do you want to talk about, Steve?”

“Your passive-aggressive feelings towards Abby. You know that I am not interested in her at all, right?”

Lory spoke up, “Yes, I know that, I also know you would never do anything to hurt me, or cheat on me.”

“Alright, then what is the problem with Abby?”

Lory exhaled deeply, “I am just jealous, that is all, I am, a jealous creature and very, clingy.”

“What? You have nothing to be jealous about! You are perfect, Lory, I would not want to change anything about you.”

Lory leaned back, “Thanks Steve, but, she is strong, immortal, and she was able to save you when I could not.”

“Oh, is that what is bothering you?”

“Yes, mostly, and it is a bit weird to have your ex-girlfriend around. Even when she has a boyfriend now.”

I sighed, “well, I can understand where you are coming from, Lory. I am sorry if I did anything to hurt you, I did not mean to do that, if you like, I can spend less time with Abby, or even dump her with Bella. If we do not get ritually sacrificed soon.”

Lory chuckled, “At least this is a new situation, you don’t need to get rid of Abby. I will apologize to her once we get out of this pickle.”

“Thanks, Lory that is very nice of you, once Abby gets the chance, she is going to leave anyway.”

“Huh, what do you mean, Steve?”

“She once mentioned that she would leave if another path opened up for her, since she and I are not an item. Abby just wants us to be happy together. As for Alice, now, she was a jealous woman who felt scorned. However, I could never tell her properly she is not getting me, since you blew her up before I could do so.”

Lory chuckled, “You are a wanted man, you have good qualities Steve, you respect women, you help the people in need, you kill people when you feel like it. You make friends everywhere you go, you really smell nice, I like your pheromones. There is not a single spark of rage inside you when you are around Haley. And most important of all, you are a good father.”

Lory managed to free her tail, “Valentine once told me something strange, not too long before we left the dream world.”

I leaned back, “Thanks for the lovely words, Lory, what did Valentine tell you?”

Lory wrapped her tail around me, “She told me, she would have loved to be an item with you. Don’t get me wrong, she is, or was pleased with Riley, but she complained about some of his traits.”

“Wait, I never asked, did Valentine get the tingle for Riley?”

Lory hung her head and spoke up annoyed, “No, she did not, yet, she settled for him.”

“Oh, why is that?”

Lory remained silent for a few minutes and tried to shrug, “It must have been culture and free will colliding with each other. Valentine spent over ten years with him, she would not easily leave him for a tingle.”

“Lory?”

“Yes?”

“I love you.”

“I love you too, Steve.”

We both looked at the boiling pit of brown liquid. We saw two other cages get brought to the circle, Lizardians it seems. Not our friends. They screamed as one of them got pushed towards the brown liquid pit. One of the birds threw him in and a giant snake, fish, alien—like creature came out of the pit and chewed him up. The creature looked at us, all it said before going back into the pit was, “Tasty snacks.”

I tried to use energy, but these bones wrapped around me prevented me from using my inventory, or my energy. “Lory?”

“Yes?”

“I am fine with dying.”

“What, really?”

“Well, it is not like I think, yay, we are going to die, or that I’ll look for it. But, if we die, and we do it together, then at least we pass on together.”

I could feel Lory nod, “For some reason, it seems the birds are genuinely interested in sacrificing us.”

I saw the birds put up banners, they were hearts, and a little angel with a bow. “Oh, they want to sacrifice us since we are married, the others are just food, but we seem to be special.”

Lory sighed, “Yay us for being married, now we can get sacrificed, just, where are the others?”