Skyward Pt. 2

Vela blinked. She felt heavy. Electrified. Dangerous. Her fur felt thick, like it was covered in tar and it was so… dark. She didn’t look like herself and that scared her but … who was that? Who was she? What did she look like? Where was she from? She didn’t know. She’d lost sight of who she was entirely.

Panicking at her lost memories and disfigured form, She cried out. It was a desperate plea for help, but it came out a monstrous roar that frightened the fleeing pippets and pouflons nearby. She was lost. Just another victim of the corruption.

****

“I think the crack has stopped growing”, Clove reported. Amias joined her at the window of their makeshift hideout and confirmed it to the rest of the pouflons with a brief nod.

There was no joy at the news. Everyone was still reeling from the loss of Vela, grieving quietly in their own ways.

Clove and Amias stared out the window, taking in the devastation that was spreading outside. The ear shattering noise of the broken sky had faded for now, and the crack that had grown greedily outside, consuming much of their once beautiful sky, had steadied. However, that had only been the start.

While fleeing, the flying pouflons had noticed something horrifying. It was, they suspected, the cause of the corruption that had grasped much of their beloved home, and now took over their pets and friends one by one. It was the cause of the corruption that took Vela away from them.

A beast of incomprehensible size was making his way through Goldfair and leaving a trail of devastation in its wake. It was the stuff of nightmares.

Eventually, the two groups of pouflons made it to a little uninhabited cottage that had miraculously escaped the wrath of the entity.

Shuddering, they had recalled what happened. Rosie spoke first, on behalf of the flying pouflons. She spoke of how they almost fell out of the sky, blinded by the crack and deafened by the noise that accompanied it. She spoke of how just when they thought they could take a break, and then continue flying to a bigger town to call for help, they had seen the monster, and found the nearest intact cottage to hole up in. How Sunny had bravely volunteered to find Fraise, Fairy, Ashley and Vela. And how they returned without the latter.

Ashley then managed to recount what had happened to Vela, his voice cracking with emotion as he told Amias, Caius, Aimee, Killian, Clove, Sunny, Rosie and Willow how she didn’t clear the branch, and was engulfed by the corruption before they had a chance to react. How they had stared, terrified, as their friend turned into a red eyed monster that growled and chased them through the woods until they managed to lose her. How, since then, Fraise and Fairy hadn’t uttered a word, just curled up in a corner with tears in their eyes as the guttural scream echoed through their heads, over and over again.

Aimee, bless her, had tried her best to get them to talk- she found water, and brought it over, and asked them if they were okay in a quiet, shaking voice. They didn’t respond, and she shrugged helplessly at Caius and Sunny, who were watching them with solemn expressions. Caius walked over, and silently lay next to Fairy, comforting his best friend without words as she cried silent tears.

Killian had taken charge of the pippets, and had cuddled up with the shaking puppea and ichigato, who whined and whimpered for their owners.

The group was lost in a state of despair, and sat silently for a while, mentally recovering from what happened.

Clove was the first to break the silence. “So what now?”, she asked, her voice cracking. “Where do we go from here?”.

Fairy moved for the first time since she first staggered into the cottage and collapsed. Using all her energy, she slowly raised her head, and everyone turned to her.

“Now,” she said, her voice wobbling, and a tear falling down her cheek, “we find Vela.”