"Can we take another break?" Grif asked with a yawn. 'We've been walking for ten hours now."
"We've only been walking for about ten minutes." Simmons coughed.
"Thanks Big Ben.' Grif chuckled before turning back to Delta. "Do you even know where we are going?"
"For now we will keep walking the path, listening for any signs of the other fragments." Delta said quietly.
"I don't mean to pull the Grif card, but I'm getting pretty tired of holding Gary..." Simmons muttered, beginning to grow tired of the spell.
"I could tell you a knock knock joke to pass the time." Gary said with a smile.
"No."
"Knock knock."
Simmons rolled his eyes and kept walking, making sure to stay focused on the spell.
"Knock knock." Gary repeated.
"Who's there?" Simmons sighed, knowing that Gary would keep repeating it until he answered.
"You are."
"You are who?"
"You are a dirty, dirty shisno." Gary said as he burst out with laughter.
"Very funny."
"Ah thought it was." Gary chuckled. "Wanna hear another?"
"I really would-"
"Glad to hear it." Gary interrupted quickly. "Knock knock."
"Who's there?" Simmons asked reluctantly.
"Gary."
"Gary who?"
"Gary isn't a dirty shisno like you."
"Oh, would you be quiet?" Simmons asked, growing more annoyed by the second. "Applejack is heavy."
"Don't disrespect AJ like that." Sarge said firmly.
"Sorry sir, I mean Gary is heavy."
"Why would ya say somethin' like that?" Gary asked sadly. "You'll hurt mah feelin's."
"Very well." Delta said, horn glowing faintly as he grabbed Gary from Simmons. "Now for the matter of finding Epsilon as well as the others."
A loud yell came from nearby, causing Grif and Caboose to jump in shock.
"What the hell was that?" Grif yelped.
"Was it the tooth fairy?" Caboose asked.
"I do not believe so." Delta said as he turned in the direction where the sound came from. "It sounded more like Omega."
"I guess that means we'll have to go in that direction, huh?" Grif sighed as Delta began walking to O'Malley. "Son of a bitch."
"Well you could always look at th' bright side." Gary said encouragingly as he floated behind Delta.
"Oh yeah, and what's the bright side?"
"There is no bright side."
"I could have told you that." Grif grunted.
"Stop whining Grif. You should be happy you're still alive at this point." Sarge laughed as he began to walk after Delta.
"I'm alive too!" Caboose said happily as he hopped after Delta.
Grif and Simmons shared a limp shrug before setting off after the others. After five minutes of walking Delta stopped moving and made a gesture to the others telling them to do the same.
"What's wrong green?" Sarge asked.
"It appears he was closer than I had thought." Delta said.
A small yell was heard, startling Grif and Caboose once again. Grif looked around a tree to see O'Malley strung up by his waist, hanging several feet off the ground.
"That's not a good sign." Grif coughed.
"No, it isn't." Delta said as he walked into the clearing to get a better look of O'Malley. "It seems that O'Malley triggered one of the traps."
"Really?" Grif asked, feigning surprise. "I would have never guessed."
"So what's the plan?" Sarge asked. "Are we going to leave him up there or are we going to bring him down?"
"I vote that we leave him up there." Grif said.
O'Malley looked down and began to focus on Grif, reaching down to grab him.
"Definitely. We definitely need to leave him up there."
"Ah, but where is the fun in that?" A voice chuckled, seemingly coming from every direction.
"Who said that?" Simmons asked.
"Ah don't suppose yer gunna help me get outta these shisno's hands, are ya Sigma?" Gary asked.
"How peculiar." Sigma said as he came out from behind a tree.
"So it was you that set up the traps in the forest. I had thought it was you but had ruled it out on account of you never seeing Church when I was with him. You must have seen him before I transported them away."
"Indeed." Sigma nodded as he began to walk in a circle around the reds. "I was hoping all of you would come here at once."
"Why?" Simmons asked.
"It would have been more interesting that way. No matter, I will see you all at a later time. For now I must check on Epsilon and make sure he has followed my path like you have."
"What path?" Grif asked.
"You don't think you came to this location of your own free will, did you?"
"What does he mean by that?"
"That I am not at liberty to answer, so I will bid you farewell." Sigma said as he took a bow.
"Grab him!" Sarge snapped as he lunged towards Sigma.
Sigma smiled and stepped on a vine, causing a net to fall onto Sarge as well as causing separate, larger net to fall on the others.
"I wish your actions weren't so obvious to predict." Sigma said quietly as he disappeared behind a tree.
"Well that guy was an asshole." Grif muttered as he attempted to find his way out of the net. After a few seconds he gave up and laid on his back. "Well, I guess since we're trapped under this net we'll just have to wait for the others."
"No breaks." Sarge grunted as he escaped his net. He quickly went to the others and pulled the net off of them. "Now what?"
"We consider our options." Delta said quietly, as he grabbed Gary with his magic again.
"Do any of those options let us stay here?" Grif asked as he wiped the grass and dirt off of his legs.
"Yes."
"Then I vote for that one."
"What are all the options?" Simmons asked.
"The first option is we stay here-"
"That one." Grif said quietly.
"-and we wait for the others to get here. Sigma has told us that he intended for us all to come here, so it is only natural to assume he will try to bring the others here as well. The second option is we try to find either Epsilon or the others before Sigma gets to them. The third option is we try to find Sigma and capture him before he leads the others here. The problem with that option is we won't know where the others are and it could take us hours, or even days, to find them."
"And we don't know where Sigma went either." Simmons said.
"All the more reason to stay here. We can just kick back since we know Sigma is going to bring the others here anyways." Grif said as he laid down on the grass.
"I can tell some knock knock-"
"Shut up Gary." Simmons sighed.