A Crazy Plan

After landing in the crypt and dropping Ares' body with a thud, Aurora looked on as Ripred unloaded fruits of different sizes from the pouch slung over her back. When the bag was empty, he had half a dozen brightly-colored fruits at his feet.

"What are they for?" she purred. He had told Aurora nothing of his plan.

"They're for when we go Over—our disguise." Ripred still didn't want to explain for fear of her rejecting the plan. There was no way she would consent if he told her, and it would have been too risky to do it the way he had with Luxa.

"Tell me!" cried Aurora, pushing her nose to the rat's.

Ripred thought of how he would tell her what the juices of these fruits could do, how many painstaking weeks he had taken to find them, and how many tests he had gone through.

His idea hadn't worked once.

Of course, it was crazy.

He mulled it over one more time, self-doubt growing as he realized what he was going to do. When he came across the acidic pod-plants that had eaten Mange in the jungle, Ripred knew they were far from ordinary. To break down a body that quickly… he was sure that they killed cells fast and hard.

He'd read plenty about cells. Sneaking into the Overland when he was young, stealing books page by page from the libraries, had paid off. Ripred had read enough, in fact, to come to the conclusion that something living can be rejuvinated right before it dies.

And so, as Aurora stood gawking at the fruit, he almost laughed. She had no idea what their juice could do—rebuild cells. Ripred's tests consisted of dripping the acidic pod's juice on something, then dousing it with the other fruit, the miracle fruit. He'd tried it with many a blade of grass in the faraway cow's field, even with fish. That part had worked. The part that was crucial to his plan, though, hadn't. Ever.

"Aurora," he said, ready to tell her at last, "We must become human."

Aurora fell out of the crypt in a dead faint. As he was about to scream at her to fly, she flapped and alighted unsteadily in the crypt once more.

"What mean you?" she said in the quietest, most intense whisper he had ever heard.

"Exactly what I said," Ripred replied. "I've found these fruits, see, in the jungle," he began. "One all but kills you—" a gasp from Aurora, "—and the other brings your body back to life. Well," he said, reconsidering, "you're not really dead, just almost dead. I've been almost dead twice, it's not that bad…"

The bat's mouth still hung open.

"Okay, so here's my idea: we put a drop of Overlander blood inside the second fruit. That way, when it brings us back, it'll change the destroyed cells into human ones." After letting out a deep breath, Ripred inspected the damage. Aurora was silent and Ares—well, he was silent-er. Of course. "Yes or no?"

"Why?" asked Aurora, "Why can't we just sneak in the dead of night, see Gregor, and leave? I know they cemented the vent shut but we can just walk a little way—"

"I'm tired of that," snapped Ripred. "Sick and tired of it. I want to see their world for real, and the only way to do it is that way."

Aurora looked at him, deciding if she was going to confess that she had the exact same feelings.

"And…" said the rat, cautiously, "there's one more thing…I put both juices in the mud that I disguised Luxa with." He laughed mockingly. "I'm beginning to feel like a chemist."

"You…how could you…" Aurora was too mad for words.

"There's a simple cure, but… I thought this would be a motivation." Ripred knew he had her, that she couldn't say no.

"Yes," she sighed. "You know I am beaten."

Ripred prepared the experiment.

He really did feel like a chemist.

Too weird? Probably. It's just an idea that's been floating around in my head for quite awhile—had to get it out there!

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