"Mom, how could you do this to me?"

"Dear, it was for your own protection. They were going to experiment on you, just as they did with your brother. I was afraid they would take you away, as they did with your sister. The BIG was becoming harsher and harsher towards humans, leaning away frim their animal expiriments and getting more interested in human subjects. The only reason they hadn't taken you away as well was because once your sister dissapeared in the night, and your brother was taken, I hid you. I wondered why they hadn't come for you after your brother was taken, why they went for your sister instead. It was only later that I learned you were part of a much bigger expiriment all along. Becoming the very first genetically engineered Homo Avian. Then your father and I got these letters in the mail. They were from a mysterious figure called Catastrophe. He offered us a job working with his team of scientists. Because the BIG was changing so drastically, we accepted the job offer. But then you were left behind. When we were working for Catastrophe, he asked us to work on this formula. He wanted to complete your metamorphasis. He said you could be a valuable soldier for the cause."

"Mom, the BIG wasn't changing! That was the SOCS taking over. Catastrophe tricked you into working for him. The BIG is still alive. Also, what has happened to you that you would send your child to be a soldier?"

My mother sighed, and wiped a tear from your eye. 

"They warned me that those hobos at the Resistance might have done something to you. I'm so sorry honey. I wish I could have saved you."

"But they didn't do anyting to me! They're my-"

Just then one of the walls caved in and Jake walked through the rubble holding a blowtorch. As if things couldn't get any more awkward. 

"Prof. Brown?" Asked Jake, staring at my mother with eyes like saucers. 

"Hello Jared. You always were good with a blowtorch. And trashing places. Oh, this brings me back to last New Year's..."

"Wait, Jake?! How do you know my mom?"

"This is your mom?" He looked at her, then back at me. 

"Huh, I can actually see the resemblance."

"But why are you here Jared?" Asked my mom

"Jake, my mom works for Catastrophe. We gotta go."

I opened my wings, and Jake turned off the blowtorch and hopped on my back.

And we left Jokull without my sister. She must be somewhere else. 

At midnight, I left.

I had to know what really happened with Shadow, and this could TOTALLY help. I hoped. Really. Hoped.

And besides, I needed to know if Ronan was really dead--oh Kyngdom, why was I thinking of that now!? I promised myself I wasn't going to cry again!

I had promised that I would meet Caelani at the gate of the ruins of the labyrinth---since B.I.G had scattered, cracked, and collapsed. That's what the animals had all dreamed of. But I felt sad that B.I.G never got a chance to repent before Catastrophe descended like a storm.

Anyways, I had brought a few Resistance soldiers with me as backup, handpicked from one of the northwest camps.

And there we stood, behind Jokül (or was it Jökul?), each silently praying in each of their heads that the guards and soldiers had each had too much Tonic (a wildly popular beverage--however probably not sold much in this part of Kyngdom--t was not alcoholic, but had a similar taste, and left the drinker drowsy).

At long last, I said, in a low voice, staring at the log lodge walls, "You know what to do. Don't tamper with anything noticeable, and save anything critical to the Resistance while finding a way to pin it on the guards."

Then one of them began tying the rope around my waist--I'm still an excellent climber, as I was in my naïve childhood--and I began my climb.

There was a sort of type of vine-moss that must grow in winter, although heavily frosted over, on the walls. I immediately scanned it and glanced at the interlocking log patterns of the walls, murmuring several things under my breath.

Then, pulling my jacket tight around me, I began the climb.

Getting to a window ledge was easy, and I balanced in it perfectly like either a cat or a thief, my toes angled just right, my hands working the grappling hook around my waist, attaching it to the window ledge, and giving it a good tug to make sure it was steady.

Then, breathing deeply, I yanked the window up with gloved hands, then scuttled in.

I WILL find out the truth about whatever happened to Ronan here. I swear.

* * *

I avoided several close calls in the winding hallways, and finally found myself facing the cellar. From my memory, they kept the prisoners in the cellar, among Regina's old crates.

My hand slowly reaches towards the pine board trapdoor, slowly opens the trapdoor outwards by pulling the polished iron ring, and I start to descend down a clausterphobic and tight series of cement stairs, with the cement walls pressing in on me, wondering how a reindeer fit in here. There must have been a different acess. But where? I never noticed--

I get so wrapped up in my thoughts I don't notice the boy coming, and soon I'm staring down the point of a sword.

"Intruders." The boy, Asian with a proud face that's pulled into an angry and fierce glare and scowl. He's very skinny, and you can tell he's lived a beaten down life, but he carries himself with so much authority, straightness, and pride that you don't notice those features at first. He's wrapped in a red cloak, a Song of War Bird pin declaring himself on Catastrophe's side resting at about his left collarbone. But, the serious look is thrown off by a pair of fuzzy orange earmuffs on his head.

I gulp. His sword is awfully shiny and steely...

I just find myself saying to the teenage boy, "Hi, what's your name?" brightly and cheerfully.

He answers, which suprises me. But maybe his name is something he prides himself on. "Hazard. CAPTAIN Hazard." He says, then gives me a glare with as much steel as his blade. "But you're in no position to be asking questions. I am, and you had better answer, or you'll get a better taste of this sword than just a look."

My face melts into deadly serious, which seems to suprise him, before he goes back to that steely glare. "Who are you, and why are you here?"

Okay, this gives me an opening. "I was a helper of Regina's. I helped her with the housework and kept her company." I said, not bothering to add any 'omigosh-I'm-so-scared' to it.

"And you were going to the cellar? Likely story, and we know everything about the guardian." Hazard produced a snarl.

I was about to answer, but suddenly realised--"Hey, those aren't earmuffs, those are fox ears!" I blurted, as I had looked better at his head. "You have fox ears!"

"And a tail." He said, then rolled his eyes and said "and you have a friendship locket."  

I actually ended up giggling. The locket was to disguise the keys to any possible rooms if I got any. It reminded me too much of my old locket for comfort, though.  

He started to laugh, then his face hardened. "One more chance. Talk." He growled, poking the sword closer.

"Look, I'm sorry..." I said with a sigh, then lashed out at his legs with my feet. The ceiling was low, but I managed a jump and planted one foot on the hilt of his sword, knocking it out of his hand. I felt triumph, then the side of the sword started to cut into my other foot and I gasped, lifting it and then quickly retrieving the sword.

His eyes went wide and he snarled, starting to reach into his cloak. "So you're not just a little girl." He said, snarling, his free hand stretched out, and I noticed his fingernails were unnaturally pointed and built, more like an animal's claws, but well kept and trimmed.

"Nope." I said, smiling, and then my face went stone cold. "I'm a thirteen year old who hasn't had a growth spurt for two years." I said, and then knocked the hilt into his head.  

He collapsed onto the floor, his eyes giving me one last glare as they rolled back in his head. Unconscious and not able to harm anyone, for now.

I carefully removed his red cape and draped it around my shoulders, and attached the golden and gleaming Song of War Bird pin to the cape around my collarbone. I also took his scabbard and attached it's unfamiliar and heavy weight to my belt, sliding the sword in.

It was a ruse that would fool nobody in the light of day, due to my still short height and petite build, and pity my hair had grown long and wild, but hopefully it was darker in the cellars.

Just as I had reached the bottom of the stairs and was about to open the final door, I heard footsteps from behind it and froze. Someone was yelling at someone.

I slowly yanked the door open, but I noticed a woman's eyes darting towards me--she was the one being yelled at--and I quickly bolted.

Please tell me I didn't come here in vain. Oh, feathers, please. 

Five days after I was captured, I started off again. I went into the Decoy Forest, no caring who or what the decoys were. I saw another picture of the power of the hoof. I kneed it straight away. I finally came to the center of the forest. What I saw made me catch my breath. All sorts of Catastrrophes minions were milling about. Vampires, humans, all sorts of beings! And in the center of the hubbub stood a ornate tent, no doubt Catastrophe's himself. Mr. Destroy-Kyngdom's tent was as ornamented as an Asharian religion dancer. A disformed figure catches my eye. "INTRUDER!" he yells. I curse under my breath and turn into a mole. I dive under the ground and start burrowing. A few more tiny figures burrow after me. I think they might be animals. Traitors.

Is this okay? 

I quickly turn into a shrew when I reach an intersection of tunnels and burrow through a film of dirt onto the ground. Then, I shapeshift into a butterfly and flit away. 

Jaaws~

Jaaws was back at Jokull, brooding silently in an empty parlor.

"My existence is growing dreary," she sighed to herself, spreading out on the floor and rolling onto her side. "All the excitement is happening without me."

She stared glumly out the open door, which, after she had crashed through it, was more like a gaping hole. She suddenly heard footsteps clattering down the hall.

Jaaws righted herself and sat in a more regal position. When the guard passed her door, she hissed at him.

"You there."

The guard froze, then turned to look into the parlor. He shivered when he saw Jaaws, her red eyes glaring at him.

"Give me some news. Has Catastrophe found the Shield of Battleclaw yet?"

The guard glanced around the hallway, then nodded. Jaaws's gaze intensified. "He has?"

"Y-yes. He found it when he destroyed the Oracle's flower," stammered the guard.

"Brilliant," Jaaws said, giving him a sinister smile. The guard shivered involuntarily, then took off down the hall. "Now, I didn't say you could leave!" Jaaws snarled after him, standing and running out of the room after him. She plunged the hall into darkness, then caught up with him. "That was stupid of you," she hissed. "I know Catastrophe hates it when I eat his guards, but I'm sure he won't miss you."

"D-don't eat me..." the guard whimpered, unable to see anything but well aware there was a dragon only a few feet away from him.

"Perhaps I'll spare you mercy if you spare me your stupidity. Tell me what else is happening in Kyngdom."

"The Black Skull is beginning to rise," the guard suggested, hoping this would interest the dragon.

"Oh?" Jaaws said.

The guard nodded.

"Is that all?"

"Alexandria is dead..."

"I know. I was there."

"Um...Great Fanham was bombed..."

"I know."

"Er..."

"I'm only toying with you now. You can go."

The guard mopped his brow as the lights returned. He looked around, but Jaaws was nowhere in sight.

Jaaws~

Jaaws slinkes invisibly down the halls of the mansion Jokull, searching for another place to rest.

Catastrophe, she says, broadcasting her thoughts into the boy king's mind. Where are you?

[I think Catastrophe is back at Jokull? If not, correct me.]

In my office, he replies through his mind.

Jaaws cocks her head and sniffs the air. She can smell Catastrophe's scent coming from somewhere deep within the mansion. She follows the smell until she arrives at an oaken door flanked by two guards. Without knocking, she pushes the door open and slides inside. Catastrophe glances up when she enters.

"Jaaws. Where have you been lately?" he asks.

"So you can see me," Jaaws murmurs curiously. She gently closes the door behind her, letting her invisibility fall away. "I've been around. I heard you found the Shield."

Catastrophe nods, scrutinizing Jaaws's cool expression.

"So the Crown is all that's left."

Catastrophe nods again. Jaaws notices the temperature difference in this room compared to the rest of the mansion. It's cooler. Duller. Deader.

Jaaws can sense the relics. They're close. Their power pulses within her, returning energy to their creator. "How close are you to finding it?"

Catastrophe's eyes narrow. "Close enough..."

"Now now," Jaaws says, sitting down on the floor. Her head is still grazing the ceiling, and bits of plaster shower down onto her. She blinks as they fall around her eyes, stinging slightly. "I was just curious."

More silence passes, in which Catastrophe returns to his papers and Jaaws snoops in his office.

"Don't touch that," he says abruptly, as Jaaws observes a skull on a shelf. Jaaws draws back, then turns her head to stare at the boy. She squints at him, then turns around and faces him, knocking her tail against the shelf on purpose and sending its contents clattering across the floor. Catastrophe sighs, then rubs his forhead, looking up at Jaaws with a pained expression.

"What do you say I help you find it? The Crown," Jaaws says. "For old times' sake."

----------

Ummmmm.... No. Catastrophe hasn't found the Shield. Trixie is the one who knows where it is. (But Catastrophe doesn't know that she knows!) There hasn't been anything about it being stolen as far as I know.

Good like finding the Crown, vermin.

Time lapse to present~
(My charrie was captured by Catastrophe's patrols. I feel like this is the best way to introduce her to the different sides of the war. She's been there a few days in the prison; this is her in the present.)

Kimi~

Ugh, why did I let this happen to me?

Something held me--and it wasn't just the guard's firm grip--as I was dragged me through the Decoy Forest on a guard's horse. I guess it's what you'd call curiosity--a feeling I had never been allowed to feel, living where I lived.

Now, trapped between walls of stone in the basement that once belonged to a reindeer, my curiosity is giving way to boredom, which is rapidly dizzolving into anger. Anger. The one emotion I could never quite control no matter how hard I tried.

The worst part of it all is that I can't convince myself it's real. Living in the Decoy Forest, the members of my tribe never assumed anything was real, ever. Most of the anthros in our camp were Decoys anyway at a given time.

I sigh, sitting stiffly on my cot, but when footsteps echo down the hall, I stand up. Though my weapons have been taken--leaving me feeling rather vulnerable--I still have my fists, which are armed with some pretty sharp claws.

"She doesn't match any of our wanted posters," the guard is saying. His voice rebounds upon itself, making him sound closer than he is. I can hear another pair of footsteps walking next to him. I angle my ears in their direction, walking over to the grimy bars trapping me in. I grasp them, feeling my fingers slide on their oily surface. I can hear much better now.

"Should we just free her?" asks the second guard.

"You never know who's with the Resistance," the first replies quietly. They're both getting closer. "But she's taking up valuable space in our prison."

"The interrogation should clear some things up. Seems like a--uh...nevermind, nevermind. It's just protocall--I'm not complaining," he adds hastily.

The footsteps loose their echo as the two guards appear in front of my cell. I jump back in surprise, but quickly force my face into an emotionless mask.

--------------------

Sorry, I'll have to finish this post later.