"Okay," you hiss, "Dad, keep the bug quxet and don't let her zap anythxng. LL, there's a hxdden patch of beach on the clxff that way, under where the flappy rats make thexr nests. You can't see xt from the woods. We'll just get crapped on a bunch and waxt the horrxble lxttle thxngs out whxle they have thexr stupxd murder party or wheaver xt xs they're doxng. Who even comes out here?" You decide against using any psionics for this. You can make it mostly-invisible, but you never know when someone is going to turn out to be sensitive to weird energies, and today seems to be a bad time for pushing your luck.
"Fuck if I even know," you whisper back. Fortunately it doesn't take long to pack your shit--your husktop and candy and wrappers and shit all go in your sylladex inside a minute and a half. You're tense as you follow Galley out, but you manage to keep your shields firmly in place. It turns out anxiety can be useful for that shit, and you are pretty sure you are goddamn done with hearing anything else die for the next several sweeps. You are also kind of terrified that you'll hear another gunshot and jump straight out of your skin and give everyone's position away. You weren't made to be a stealthy-ass troll, damn it; when you let shit out, you let it out LOUD. Nothing else dies in your head. There are gunshots, though, and the cliff does weird shit with the echoes so it does even worse things to your poor frazzled bloodpump than just hearing a loud CRACK would. You nearly swallow your own tongue, but you manage not to make any noise. If the buglet can do it, you figure you can manage. Soon you're almost at the little patch of Secret Beach. Above, approximately a thousand seagulls are getting their collective snooze on. "Please just don't let them try'n peck my ears off, my Lords, that's all I fuckin' ask." you mutter.
Otterdad comes galumphing along, bringing up the rear of the sneak-line. His mouth is full of snarly hair as the grumbling grub sways from his inelegant gait. The grub opens its sleepy bug-eyes halfway, and lets out a low "Gnak" of disapproval, and tiny pink sparks fizz around its head. You see where this is going. "Here, here," you say, picking up a finger-sized stick of driftwood from the wet sand. "Candy." You wedge the stick in the larva's gaping maw before the wail can come belting out, and for a miracle, the oncoming storm is quelled. The contented grinding and splintering noises that replace it are kind of horrible, though. "Bon appetxt," you say, and point your lusus toward the back of the depression in the cave where LL is carefully avoiding splatters of guano and looking for a place to sit. He trots in with his apparently very omnivorous charge, gives a single "chuff" into the darkness, and just like that, all avian hell breaks squawkingly loose above and around you. The air is full of feathers, snapping beaks, gull shit and ungodly cawing. "Daaaad," you groan. You know exactly what's set them off.
You wail. It takes all you have in you not to completely get swept away by the sheer wall of birdrage. Your skull feels fit to split, but your walls stay up--and even then you can still hear everything, you're just not blotted out with the overwhelming urge to dive and peck and KILL KILL KILL. This isn't much comfort either, seeing as soon you are covered in shit and bleeding from dozens of little pecks because you're too busy covering your fucking ear fins to decently ward any of them off. The moment you find the space to, you give Otterdad the biggest stinkeye you've ever done in your life. You know it too, because you feel it radiating from every goddamned hellbird in the flock. You wouldn't be surprised if you looked in a mirror now and saw little rage flames dancing up in your eyesockets. It is a look that screams: YOOOOOOOOU with every ounce of conviction in your soul. In the few seconds before another seagull divebombs his face, Otterdad has the good grace to look sheepish.
You scoot under the rock overhang after LL. Oh good, she's found a big enough gap in the rocks for you to all huddle together. This night just gets better and better! The gulls flap around the entrance, but they don't come in. Maybe because it smells, somehow, even worse in here than in Fuckshit Angry Bird Thunderdome? Otterdad flips himself over as soon as he's out of the deluge and rolls in the gravel, which only smears the guano. The look LL is giving him through her war paint is giving you godawful horror chills, and you don't blame her. "How many txmes," you grumble. "How many FUCKXNG txmes." But. Wait. "Where's the grub?" An icy flush of panic washes over you as you realize birds eat worms.
You pause in the middle of attempting to rid your headfuzz of bird shit and stare at him, alarmed. But then--oh. You manage a little grin (oh he's gonna be so mad) and point discreetly at his left largest horn, like you would when someone has a bit of embarrassing spinach in their teeth. The second he realizes it, you slump against the wall and bust up cackling. Fuck the birds, fuck the FLARPers, fuck your LIFE, this shit is goddamn hysterical.
When she points, you hear a tiny munch munch sound. Or maybe you just imagine you hear it? Later, you'll never be able to say for sure. "GYARG!" You slap at your head like it's covered in spiders and are stung by itty bitty lightning for your trouble. "FUH! DON'T EAT MY HORN!" You get it by the hair and pull it away. "Nargle," the grub replies. It spits a hot little mouthful of pulped driftwood and digestion goo in your face. You will kill everyone in this cave so help you god, especially that indigo-ass motherfucking motherfucker over there that's laughing.
It's several minutes before you can catch your breath again. You're wiping moisture from the corners of your eyes and your stomach is cramping all to hell, but lords you needed that. Soon you're sprawling there, covered in poop and gravel and sand and grime without a care in the world because at least now the birds are going back to their little nests and you're all safe, at least for the time being. You breathe out a long, wheezy sigh and grin at him, waving in the general direction of the cave tunnel. "Think that goes back very far?"
"Probably," you say. "We're rxght by where the breedxng caverns let out. The whole area xs basxcally swxss-cheesed lxmestone. And just plaxn rock doesn't stxnk lxke thxs." You kick some gravel at her. "Also, look what we're sxttxng xn."
"Oh," you say and make a halfassed attempt at leaning away from the gravel spray. You spy little lizard bones and bird skulls and husks of things. "Alright, yeah, I dig. Wanna head back a bit then, afore the birds decide to come lookin' for us?"
"X guess. At least we can keep ourselves occupxed whxle the douchelords have thexr flarp orgy." You shake the vomitous grub for effect. It giggles. "Maybe we can put thxs horrxble lxttle sac of dxgestxve enzymes and glee back where she belongs." Otterdad stops wallowing in bone-dust and looks at you with wide shiny eyes. "No, X'm sorry, Dad. X was only kxddxng. X wouldn't really do that. She's your foxble to regret." Otterdad gives a solemn nod and a sneeze of acceptance.
"Just a guess but X've had stuff thrown xn my face by guys and gxrls enough txmes. Pukxng acxd on someone? That's a gxrl thxng." You wipe again at the tingly spot on your cheek. You might get a blister. Also, and you will never admit it, but you just plain feel weird calling the yellow grub "it" all the time, when that's what you used to be called when you were hardware. You immediately tell LL so, trying not to make it sound like you care about the grub or anything.
You snicker and grin filthily, but say no more on the subject. "Well then, should we all be namin' her something besides Pinkie Buglet?"
You snort and shrug a shoulder. "I guess nothin' much, I was just wondering if she might not want another one. But I guess there ain't no need to unless she's all askin', now is there?" Grunting, you sit up and dust gravel off yourself. "Lords, I hope there's clean water back there, I could use some ablutions something fierce. Wanna go check it out?'
"Sure," You elevate yourself and press the grub facedown into your lusus's filthy back-fur. "Dad, can you please keep the uh, juvenxle person safe and non-regurgxtatxng for the duratxon?" "Kek," Dad says. He's obviously happy to be back down here. Time to admit it: your lusus is a hardened, fish-smelling criminal. "X only ever went in as far as the lxght. Past that, who knows. We could leave marks so we don't get lost, lxke they do on Doomed Moron Adventures."
"Mm, you sure 'bout that bro? It might drag attention to ourselves, is all, and anyways couldn't you just blast us a exit with your bug zappy powers if we get turned around?"
"Heh. True. Okay, shit, let's be doomed morons. X call the yellowblood who always gets garrotted for snoopxng. You can be Nansei Darude. She at least lxves some of the txme."
"Fuck that bro, you get to be Cavefucker Blasteyes, the awful bastard what survives every time." You inform him and poke his ribs in passing. "I'll be that troll what always tells the corny joke at the end, all, 'I can't BEREEF we survived!'" Giggling, you scuttle down the tunnel before he can swat your ass.
