Away and Afar

by PropsValroa

Chapter 71

"I would only wish to take what we need. I am not here to steal. The Panthins, while we may not understand them, or have had the best of interactions with them - doesn't give us the right to take anything willy nilly. So only what we need, then we leave." Collapse concluded.

Magloria seemed satisfied with that answer, and Jump Start didn't think about continuing any further. They both eventually laid themselves down, each after attending to personal things. Jump Start groomed her tail, while Magloria made sure that her earrings weren't damaged in any way that would make them fall off.

Magloria laid down in the opposite direction that Collapse was facing, only her tail was near enough that she could feel it. Jump Start had decided this to try out their bags as pillows, in case they were better then a fat squishy pony. They probably weren't.

Collapse moved closer to Jump Start and smiled to her as she tried out the bags as pillows. Not soft, for sure. Maybe they would be if they were emptied and stuffed full of something, like plants. Oh well, Collapse was too tired to think further. With a gentle motion, she hugged herself closer to Jump Start but kept her tail close to Magloria's, intentionally wanting to feel her tail, even if barely. Soon enough, she fell off to sleep.

When Collapse woke up the next morning almost nothing had changed about where her two companions were. They were still sleeping, with Jump Start's face smooshed against a bag and Magloria laying down nearby.

There was a sense of repetition that could almost be felt. They were probably just going to continue stuff they were already doing, weren't they? Boring stuff that they could just not go into detail if they wanted, to get to the next interesting event.

Another thing as well... how long had they even been on the island anyway? Unless someone had been keeping track, the numbers all seemed to just blur together. If only they had a calendar.

Collapse would have gotten up and repeated her routine like normal. It was unlikely for that to be interesting in any significant way - since that was what they did for...however long they have been here. Honestly, losing track of it made her feel better in a way - it made her not think about how long they were 'gone', ironically enough.

Either way, Collapse would propose finishing off the clearing they worked on yesterday. They would likely end up going there, and continuing their work. Depending on what they had to do, they may or may not have finished it that day. In Collapse's eyes, it was just best to get that over with, since they had to do that anyways. ~~It's not like any of this is interesting, is it? Yeah, there isn't anything all that interesting in cutting down trees, is there?~~

The entire day passed, filled with nothing but chopping down trees, unrooting plants, sipping on iced fruit juice in coconut cups and occasionally, when they needed to, removing tree stumps from the path they were building.

No seaponies arrived that day, which was a shame but they only would've been a distraction.

By the time the sun was starting to set (which they could sneak around Carocol afterwards) they had finally cleared away enough foliage that they could transport their resources through the jungle to the beach with ease. A job well done, if the sighs of contentment from Jump Start was any indication.

After a good day's hard work Collapse could only smile. Perhaps she was making her grin excessively large to get added attention from her two companions. That smile of hers looked quite exaggerated, didn't it? But she only giggled upon looking at the cleared path. "All done. Job well done." she said in a cheery fashion, looking to Jump Start.

Then she would look to Magloria. "So, we'll need the sails, the sealant, likely any other hardware we need, what else?" shea sked, just wanting to make sure before they went.

"Rope, for tying the sails. Nails, for keeping everything together. We can probably find it in the same place we'd find the sealant and adhesive. All those are commonly used for construction." Magloria replied.

"This should be our last time going into that place, right?" Jump Start asked, referring to the Panthin city. "Should be." Magloria shrugged.

"It better be. I don't wanna have to go in there again. I am kind of amused at the thought, do the Panthins look like...kittens, when they are young?" Collapse held back a giggle at that. "But I am curious, what are they doing down below?" she remembered the blockade.

"Weird question to ask, but if griffon chicks are any indication then the young Panthins would look like kittens. Bigger kittens, but still kittens nonetheless." Magloria said.

Jump Start pondered over Collapse's other question. "Uhh... they could be... fishing? They are close to a river from the sea so maybe they catch whatever comes down it?"

"In any case..." Magloria interrupted, "I suggest you get what you think you'll need and be prepared to move out to Carocol. At least we don't have to take machines this time, so you shouldn't need to stress yourself as much, Collapse."

Collapse would retrieve her bags and get on her boots, getting herself be prepared. "Well, I would find that a whole blockade and shooting anything that moves - is a little complex for fishing, if we are going back one *last* time, I would want to find out any information as to why they are down there and what they are doing, at least." Collapse mentioned, and was thankful she didn't have to take any overly huge items with them.

"If it wasn't for the fact that we're heading into extremely dangerous territory, I would allow that. As it stands however, we'd either have to find the one place with the records of what is going on down there, or go down there ourselves." Magloria began explaining.

"The first choice would be a blind search for not only the right building, but the right place inside the building, and that's if it even exists at all. What we've been doing already at least has some semblance of possibility."

"The second would bring us back down to that guarded blockade, and then what? We watch and listen to them for hours and hope we don't get spotted by hiding in a closet? It's just unnecessary risk."

She looked straight at Collapse. "Unless you had a better idea of how you were going to find out?" she inquired.

"I was thinking we could watch the areas a bit and perhaps inspect them from afar to see anything that looks close to what a records would be, but that's basically just the first choice of what you said. But I don't wanna go back down into the blockade, and that was hours and hours of walking back up - I don't wanna undo that possibility." she spoke.

"But the second choice would prove more fruitful to our answers, but, I am not sure if you wanna risk that, and I am not sure if I am either.." she grinned somewhat. She remembered when they hid behind that rock they had to squish together. That was the best part, wasn't it? "Although I would suggest for us to go there during the day and you know...try talking to them through normal means, but they already know that some of their stuff was stolen and who are they gonna blame for it? Us, because we look a lot different than they do." she added.

"What if we just... I dunno... take a small peek around where the tunnel is? Maybe they have a building near it that has important mine-related stuff?" Jump Start suggested.

Magloria huffed, not saying anything for a bit as she decided. "Fine, we can go there for a *tiny* amount of time, and maybe return during the day. But we're not hunting all over the city for something, and we're not going back down there, not unless we have a real reason to."

"Small peak it is, *Only* a small peak." Collapse agreed, and would look towards Magloria. "Anything else we should discuss before we set off for our expedition?" she asked with a slight grin.

Magloria thought about it for a bit, but shook her head when she came up with nothing. "No, let's just go while we've still got a bit of sunlight left for travelling." she replied, pointing off into the jungle in the direction of Carocol.

"Let's go, then." Collapse spoke and began to walk in that direction. Her tail wagged somewhat as they walked in the direction towards their destination.

The sun dipped below the horizon as they walked up the river, leaving them nothing but the moonlight to navigate properly. A little less time than they had hoped, but it didn't stop them from reaching their destination. On the upside it gave the panthins more time to fall asleep.

Once again they saw the city borders ahead of them, the walls and drops of the multi-layer city ahead still just as hindering as they were before.

After Magloria led them a bit of the way in they found a vantage point that they could use to see most of the city. This was where she told them to start looking for the entrance to the underground caverns.

A bit of searching from all 3, they spotted a hole in one of the walls that seemed big enough to be the entrance. That's where they would eventually explore, but perhaps not first.

Upon finding the entrance Collapse was pleased they could find an entrance like that. First though, Collapse wanted them to retrieve the items that they needed to get. It was best to focus on that. Collapse would keep this location in mind and begin looking around discreetly for any places that may potentially hold any of the things they needed. She was sure to be as quiet as possible and on alert, just incase anything suddenly happened.

They spent an hour looking around at each building, sneaking around the place to get better looks at the dark buildings, until eventually they came across a street and saw one building that looked like a carpenter's shop. It had lots of wooden products on display, some of which had been nailed together, painted and a variety of other things to treat them.

The reason they found it also ended up being an issue as well. There was lights on and movement inside, which meant that if they wanted to get what they were searching for, they would need to go inside the building with the carpenter themselves inside too.

Inside the carpenter's shop was probably what they needed. Like measuring devices for wood planks, perhaps even something that can be used for sails. But the movement inside was an issue. "Hmm. I don't know what we could do there, maybe cause a distraction, but nothing as big as last time?" Collapse whispered quietly to Magloria. "But we should take a closer look to see if we can see if it has anything we need in there, and then weigh the risks." she added.

"It would have to be a pretty big distraction regardless if it's to draw them away from whatever they're doing, to give enough time. Simply throwing a pot at a wall wouldn't be enough." Magloria pointed out.

"Though I can't say no to just a little closer look before deciding which *group* of pots we throw." she agreed.

Collapse nodded and moved a bit closer, her eyes looking and scanning the interior of the shop if anything of interest was able to be seen. She was sure to remain out of the direct line of sight from the interior of the place.

From a few windows, it seems like the place might have everything they needed. A workshop room at the back contained buckets if nails, a barrel that appeared to be the wood sealant that they would need, or something close enough at least, and there was rope among the pile of raw materials.

The grey panthin inside however kept moving around the place, constantly entering the workshop to do things, then going to other places to do something else, as if they couldn't properly focus on a single task.