Freedom of Choice

by Awakened One

Chapter VIII: Fourth Night

Chapter VIII: Fourth Night

Gilda

I was pretty hungry, so I left to hunt something, the problem with trees is the amount of cover it gives to animals, which is also a good thing since most of them tend to sleep inside or atop trees. My favorite hunt is squirrel, tastes like rabbit. I lick my beak at the thought.

The area probably has a good number of animals, a stream of clear water and fructiferous trees and bushes around. One of them catches my attention, an acorn tree, it has a squirrel on top of a branch. I quickly dive and take it out. It never saw me coming.

I go for the river and take a look at my reflection, blood on my beak and talons, I wash them out. Another look around some bushes and I find some berries, they look edible, I put some of them into my bag. A look at the horizon, the sun is setting, I decide to head back to the camp.

I see our camp, Crystal is near the campfire and Igor is turned to a tree doing something. I get down without making too much noise, drop my things at my place, Crystal looks at me and waves his hoof and I wave back. I walk to Igor and see what he’s doing, he’s using the knife to carve the wood.

“Hey.”

He turns to me hey. “Hey.” And goes back to his task.

I lean a bit closer to see him making stick figures on the tree. A bunch of what appears to be stick humans with stick spears throwing them at stick ponies, which are trying to escape the humans. I smirk and shake my head.

“Why the heck are you doing this?” I point to his drawing.

“I was bored and why not? Maybe in the future some silly pony is going to come here and create some silly story about the drawing, maybe even put this entire place down under preservation.”

“Preservation? Preserve what?”

“Oh yeah, forget about it. Forgot about not being home.” He finishes doing his art and sits down. “What you’ve been doing?”

I get closer to him. “Hunting.” And give him a glare.

“You got something?” He whispers.

I back off. “Yeah.”

“What you got?”

He’s always so curious. “A squirrel.”

“What does it taste like?”

I shake my head again. “Like rabbit.”

He crosses his arms. “I thought you would say chicken (Shrug).” I have no idea how to answer that. “Never mind. What you’ll be doing once you leave?”

I don’t know why, but the way he said it hurt me a bit. “Why?”

“I figured out what I want to do. The question is, what you’ll be doing?”

Fast thinker. “Trying to get rid of me so soon?” I give him a smirk.

“No. Sorry for sounding rude.”

“No worries, I haven’t thought about that, keep traveling I guess.”

He perks up. “Have you been somewhere else?”

I nod. “Tried work at the big cities, the coastal ones.”

“Is it hard for a foreigner to find a job?”

I lean close to him. “Most ponies dislike other species, if that is what you mean, even for a griffon it is hard to find a job. There is this old rivalry between us.” I remember the first time I went to Cloudsdale, wasn’t easy.

He sneers. “How the cities smell?”

Weird question. “They don’t. Yours smell?

To my surprise he nods. “Like a fog of smoke, smog. Not good for my health, or anyone else, for that matter.” He starts to flip his knife, picking either the blade or the grip. “It is also bright, noisy and overpopulated, good riddance.” He grins and looks directly into my eyes. “A question if I may, the eye shadow, is it natural?”

I puff my chest, he’s probably going to crack a joke. “It is not eye shadow, it’s natural, so what?”

He shrugs. “Nothing, it compliments you.”

I feel my cheeks blushing. “How so?”

“I think it looks pretty.”

I turn away from him and try to calm myself down. Why he does those things? One second he doesn’t even care I’m here, the next he tries to smoother me. I walk to Crystal and notice him gripping tufts of grass, he seems dizzy, swaying a bit, and keeps his gaze down.

“Are you feeling alright?”

He nods. “I’m just…” He turns up to look at me and his eyes shoot into the sky. “I’m just a bit dizzy…” He turns his gaze down again.

“What is your problem?” He points to Igor.

I walk back to Igor, whatever he did, I want to know.

“Dude, what the hell you did with him?” I say while pointing to Crystal.

His face shows some concern. “You don’t want to know.”

I’m not so interested anymore. “Whatever. Shouldn’t you start watch now?”

“I know.” He gets up and brushes himself, he picks his weapon and we walk to the campfire.

Crystal looks at him. “It will take some time… to get used to it.”

“Stop ruminating that, you worry too much.” Igor massages his temple. “Look, look at me.” He walks to Crystal and grabs his head while maintaining eye contact. “I usually don’t do this, I’m going to sing a calm song and you’re going to calm your shit down, okay?” Crystal slowly nods and his head is released. Igor sighs. “Just this once.”

---

Crystal

A bit saddening the way he sings, still calming, soon enough Gilda and I were following his voice, I will always remember that music.

Igor looks me in the eye. “So? How are you feeling?”

I inhale and exhale. “Better, thanks.”

He waves his hand. “Don’t mention it. That was one of my favorites.”

“Tell me, is that how you feel?”

He looks into the crackling fire. “Yes.”

Gilda looks at me and I return the look, nodding to her. “So, why didn’t you go and made some friends?”

He looks at her and back into the fire. “I tried. Better to be alone than feel lonely.” That was a clever play of words, with some truth hidden between. “And then it became too tiresome to deal with people. People are more likely pick up on me than listen to me.” He sighs.

Gilda goes closer to him and gives him a tug. “I was hoping for something more, lively.”

He shakes his head. “Not gonna work. I’m feeling tired already.”

“Wait a second, when I left weren’t you sleeping?” She points to his bed.

“No, do you know the sensation of when you forget something?” He taps his head. “An annoying sensation, in the back of your head. That keeps you from doing something.”

I interrupt them. “The way you describe it, it appears to be something awful.”

“Or something that will really annoy me. Anyway, go to your beds, I’m taking the first watch, as always.”

Better give him some space, Gilda leaves to her place and I to mine. I take a gulp of my water and get ready to sleep, cradling into my bedroll a few minutes pass, I’m finally falling asleep.

“Woooooooooooooo!” What was that?

“I knew it! We have company!” Igor yells to us.

My heart jumps up my throat and my blood runs through it, adrenalin ready to help. I jump from my bed and rush to him, Gilda already by his side. He lifts his weapon and points his finger to the woods, I can see yellow dots in the woods.

“What are those?” I ask them.

“Timberwolves. I’m counting a pack of seven.” Igor answers.

“Can you see in the dark?”

“Yeah.” That explains his eyes.

Soon the wolves move from the woods to us, encircling us, Igor is right, I count seven wolves in total and ahead of me I see two.

“Two on my sight.” I say.

“I got two.” Gilda says.

“Three, the alpha and two minions.(Grunt) Why me?” Igor says.

Alpha, the way he said wasn’t good, I turn to look back at it. It really doesn’t look good. A head taller than the minions, more wood, certainly the minions are a bit shorter than me, the size of Gilda perhaps. I turn to look at my foes.

Gilda snickers at my side. “Haven’t fought one in a while. You two won’t like their smell.”

We are surrounded, I back up a little and feel the heat of the fire. I just have to concentrate a little and harden my coat, done. I pick a nearby branch from the stock pile and light it up.

“Leed den do de fie!” Lead them to the fire, I said. I had to use my mouth to hold the stick.

“Don’t need to say twice. I wanted to test my new weapon anyway.” Igor says.

“Dond sped!” Don’t spread.

“I know. Save your breath, you’ll need it.” Yes, I guess he can learn something from others.

Soon enough, I hear a howl and something charging at our location, we are spread in a triangle, behind us is the fire and ahead of us the wolves. I hear the sound of wood being broken and being peppered by wooden splinters.

“Minus one.” Gilda says.

They didn’t like seeing their pack friend being crisped. They give a collective howl and charge at us. I jump forward and swing the make shift torch, trying to dissuade the attacker. They jump back at the sight of the fire on my mouth.

Something behind me has been taken down, without looking back I keep fending my attackers. With a swing of my head I throw the torch at one of the wolves, it whimpers, drops and rolls. The way it catches fire I assume its body was dry. The second one tries to stomp the fire from his friend without any success.

It snarls at me and charges with its mouth open, I lift my hoof to give it what it wants. Without flinching I look at the wolf, its wooden teeth broken into my fore hoof coat, it didn’t reached for my skin, the animal tries to give me a smile. I spin around and throw the wolf into the fire.

I turn to see Igor charging at the alpha and follow behind him.

---

Igor

I crouch and point my halberd forward, left hand near the tip and right near the blunt end, anything that is dumb enough to charge at a spear doesn’t deserve to live, it does exactly as I expected, it comes at me and when connecting with the spear point it blows into wood shrapnel. As an instinctive reflex I cover my face and close my eyes, bad move.

I feel something pinning me down and I swiftly thrust my right palm forward: wood breaking and flesh ripping, bad time to not be wearing my gloves. More shrapnel peppers me, some piercing my clothes and burying into my skin, nothing unbearable.

I get up to take a look at the alpha, is it smiling? I quickly realize what it sees, I turn the weapon blunt backwards and it hits one of them, this time I applied enough force to not destroy and only push it into the fire, the wolf doesn’t even cry, just falling into the flames. I switch hands and using the bladed end as a shovel I hit the other one into the fire.

I rush to the alpha with the spear pointing forward, with Gilda and Crystal behind me.

---

Gilda

The first one was a piece of cake, but at the second I take my eyes off from the thing it tries to snatch me with its jaws, just like the last one it was throw into the fire. The flames help greatly when fighting them, otherwise they just keep coming back, or getting bigger as they merge with each other, the bigger they are, the harder it is to make them burn, too much sap.

I turn to see the campfire, much bigger than the first flames, Igor and Crystal are charging at the alpha and I follow behind them. The minions are piece of cake, but the big one is made of bark instead of twigs and the magical sap that lacks on the smaller ones is sticky as glue, the first time I fought one I had to spend an entire day trying to clear my wings from it.

Igor rushes and encircles the beast while pushing it, in turn the animal tries to bite or claw him, he deflects the attacks with his weapon. We three flank and encircle the beast.

I warn them. “Careful, the outer part is hard as bark.”

Igor swings his weapon at the alpha’s neck, the creature not even intimidated by his action tries to dodge the attack, launching itself towards him, and the blade gets stuck just below the neck, near the torso.

Crystal rears back and kicks the alpha in the legs bringing it down. I in turn jump on its back and start to open a way into the more soft parts, opening way to the core, I’m covered in sap, great.

Igor pulls his weapon back and yells to me. “Jump out!” I jump and flap my wings, sending me a few steps from the alpha. Igor raises his weapon and brings it down, splaying sap on everybody, and he does it again, again, again…

Crystal moves to his side and nudges him. “It’s over…”

Igor looks at him, at me, at the beast. He takes a deep breath, brings his weapon on the beast once more, and pulls it back. “Just making sure.”

I look at everybody around, we’re all covered in grime. I sneer.

“We need to get rid of it, and fast, the sooner the better.”

I rush to the river and leave the two behind. Soon enough they are both into the river washing themselves.

Crystal looks at Igor. “That was unnecessary.”

“I was just making sure, didn’t you see them rising up?”

I look at him. “Really? I’m sure I didn’t need a sap shower.” I hate this.

He keeps scratching himself. “I’m sorry! Happy now?”

I huff. “You have no idea how bad it is, hairless monkey.” I scold him.

He doesn’t even take offense, he walks to me and starts to scratch me… it feels so good. “Just show me where it is.” I wash my face and he starts to clean it up. “You’re clear.” He walks to Crystal. “You too.”

---

Crystal

I look at him and sigh. “Fine, do it fast.”

Igor runs his hand across my coat. “What the hell? It solidified already?”

“Oops, sorry.” I relax and it goes limp, he starts to rub and scratch where the splotches were, it feels comfortable. “Done.”

We all move out of the water. Igor goes to the alpha body and starts to drag it towards the fire, he’s drying it up; I don’t think we’ll need more lumber.

We all sit at our respective places, Gilda is drying herself at her place, I’m drying myself at my place and Igor is picking chips from his skin, grunting and swearing for every chip he picks.

Gilda yells to him. “You hit them and they blew, didn’t they?”

“Yes.”

“Idiot.”

“Uh huh.”

Igor finally ends his task, gets up walks to the corpse near the fire. He takes a limb from the animal and starts to sniff it, every time he wants to eat something he sniffs it first.

“Are you eating that?” I ask him.

He gives another it another sniff and throws it into the fire. “No. It’s green.” He says it with a sneer.

“What is the problem with green food?”

“Nothing.”

Gilda interrupts again. “Maybe if you ate more of it you could grow up, twerp.”

“Uh huh.” I sigh, why did I decide to follow them anyway? Igor picks his spear axe and slowly walks to the lake. “Stay awake for a few minutes, gotta clean this.” He tells us.

Gilda looks at him and walks to me. “Did you saw him?”

“What?”

“What? Him!” She whispers. “He was angry to the point of melting and then, that thing with the axe, now he’s back to normal, all passive!”

I noticed, he’s either good at controlling his emotions or he wasn’t worried since the beginning. “Tell me, what griffons know about humans?”

She recoils at my question. “Some stories, nothing silly like pony stories. A few of them are a bit more, gruesome. Most of them are stories about, you know, what he did.” She points to the alpha’s body.

A thousand years and the griffons didn’t change much. “Just leave him be. I’m sure he’s angrier at himself.”

She cocks her head. “What do you mean?”

“He almost failed, it was his watch, and he almost failed us.”

“I don’t –”

We see him coming back and Gilda runs back to her place.

---

Igor

“So, I’ll be taking the rest of my shift. You two get some rest.” I shake my head. All I wanted was some peace. What do I do tomorrow? Clearly this place isn’t safe as I thought, there are probably cockatrices or manticores around, or even an ursa. I’m not sure about them, but I’ll manage something for me.

I whisper to myself. “Stay awake, stay alert, stay alive.” And keep my watch.

End of Chapter VIII

Comments

[the monkey ninja]

Entertaining. Please continue. Also, several errors reside within the chapters of thy story. Obtain a pre-reader, you must. Eeyup.