New Worlds
AvalonReeseFanFics
A/N: Well Hello there my wonderful readers! It's another update, and it's on time. Super proud of myself not going to lie. This update as yet another trigger warning on it, as the graphicness is going to continue. After this there's only going to be one more update! Exciting right?! I'm working on one last story in this series before I can say we're done, but I'll tell you about that one next time. As always don't' forget to tell me what you think and I'll see you guys next week (hopefully!)
Chapter 20 – The Troublesome Twelves Part 2
Disaster hit over night.
Una woke suddenly in the night feeling ill. An illness in her stomach that made her feel like she was going to throw up. It was a pain she had never felt before, and as the night turned into morning, the pain grew worse.
She described it as waves, waves of this clenching pain in her lower stomach.
The bleeding continued, just as heavy as the day before. Una had spent most of the day moving around yesterday, in and out of the water to keep herself warm. That day, however, she couldn't move. Moving hurt.
She just lay, arms around her stomach curled into herself groaning and whimpering.
Rela had to all but force her to eat.
It was terrifying, because Rela knew what happening. She was dying.
Rela was practically inconsolable, but she couldn't show it. She had to be strong, for Una, who was scared. She was feverish too, there was a sweat dripping on her brow. She wanted to be by her mother, so she was curled into her flank, shivering and groaning.
She had hoped if her hatchling had to pass it wouldn't be in agony, but she was not lucky. It seemed to be her last moments on that earth were going to be in pain. Oh how she longed to take it from her, but she couldn't. She could only lie there, her head on her hatchling's back trying to sooth her with her licks and purrs.
But nothing seemed to take that pain away from her.
"Make it stop mummy," Una had murmured a few times throughout the day, but there was nothing she could do.
Roc came once, to drop off food for the two of them, but neither ate. Rela couldn't bring herself to. She couldn't tear herself away from Una's side.
She saw it in Roc's eyes when he realized it, that Una was dying. He nuzzled her head, softly, almost in a farewell and then he left. The coward.
As night fell they heard the pack's calling cries in the distance. Singing a song of lament for her hatchling.
Una was deep in sleep, the pain having knocked her out by this point. Rela was just glad that she didn't have to hear it, didn't have to worry about her own passing.
Rela just kept crooning to her, hoping to soothe her hatchling in some way before she went.
-JP-JP-JP-
The next morning, the pain seemed to have left her hatchling. It was either gone, not that bad anymore or her hatchling was completely numb to it. She was, however, unarousable.
No matter how Rela prodded her, Una just did not want to wake up.
"I'm tired mummy, please let me sleep."
This was how it ended, she knew it.
Her hatchling was going to fall asleep and stay that way. But Rela didn't want to scare her, so she let her hatchling rest her head against her flank and sleep. She could count her lucky stars that Una could no longer feel the pain at least. That when she passed it would be quietly and while she slept.
Rela hadn't eaten in two days, but even now she wasn't hungry. Una wasn't hungry either, though Rela did her best to get her too. She had to beg to get the tiniest bit of mango past her lips. It took even more to get her to take a sip of water.
She spent the whole day counting her hatchling's breaths. She didn't want to miss a single one of them, and with each exhale she worried that an inhale wouldn't follow. She rejoiced with each inhale her hatchling took.
Roc did not return. Rela knew he wouldn't. He was a coward, too afraid to watch their hatchling die. Though, to be fair, she wasn't really his hatchling. Yes, he had come to like her as she aged, but he had never imprinted on her the way she had.
She couldn't blame him though. If she could turn a blind eye to the suffering her hatchling went through, if she could not watch her hatchling die, she would have. But Una needed her, so Rela stayed.
When night fell Rela swore to stay awake, to make sure that she was awake and with Una until her very last breath.
Whenever that may be.
-JP-JP-JP-
Rela woke up the next morning with a jolt. She hadn't meant to fall asleep, but she too had been tired and couldn't keep her eyes open.
She check on her hatchling right away, holding her breath worried that Una had slipped away in the night and Rela hadn't been there for her.
But to her surprise Una not only was breathing, but she was waking up.
She stretched out against her mother's flank. Stretching her little arms and legs forward, toes curling, groaning as she went.
"Mmm, did you just wake up mummy?" she asked as she smiled sleepily up at her.
Rela found herself silent, if only in relief. If she was a biped she might have cried, but she didn't think she was capable.
Instead she butted her snout into her hatchling's head. "I did. It was a late night for both of us."
"Mmm," rumbled out of her hatchling as she nuzzled into her mother's gesture. "I'm hungry mummy can we go get something to eat now?"
"Yes, yes, little hatchling, we can go get something to eat," she said. "Stand up, let's see how we're doing today."
Una stood up quickly. "I think it's stopped."
"Mm, we'll have to be sure, of course. We'll walk through the water, just in case."
Una happily jumped up, skipping further into the waterfall's pool to suck in some water. Rela too took a drink, took that time to eat the flank that Roc had left for her two days ago, to pry the rest of the flesh off of the bone.
Normally she liked fresh meat, but beggars couldn't be choosers in this case. She could always hunt something as she went too.
Together her and her hatchling walked the shallow waters to where the mangos grew. Or well, close to where the mangos grew. Rela left Una in the water, and picked some mangos for her hatchling before returning to the water. She gave her the mangos to eat, and then went in search of food for herself.
She caught herself a little monkey, ate to her fill and then returned to her hatchling.
"And how do you feel now?" she asked.
Una turned that bright toothy smile to her. "Much better, mummy. What about you?"
Rela leant in to nip at her hatchling's hair again. She felt much better too, now that Una seemed to be on the mend.
"Let's see, let's walk on land see if you bleed."
And so they did. They walked all the way back to the waterfall with only their feet in the water. When they got back to the waterfall they both checked.
Nothing had trickled down her legs, but the smell was there, and when she sat back down in the water there was a bit of red in the water. So it was still there just not as bad.
It seemed to be that the bleeding was stopping.
Una might survive this biped illness after all.
-JP-JP-JP-
In the morning the smell was gone. The red in the water was gone and Una felt much better, though tired. Well Rela was tired too.
All of this had been exhausting, but they were glad to be returning to the nest. Rela was just happy her hatchling was alive.
Una had her energy back, and her good mood. She was her normal self again and Rela could go back to being the Alpha.
Though she was quite worried she'd have to fight for her spot. She'd hunt first, make herself strong and then take back her rightful spot.
She'd have to make sure Una was safe first though.
They made their way back to the nest, Una talking a mile a minute and Rela contemplating the best move to make if she came back and had to challenge someone. It would all depend on who she had to challenge.
All the other females in the pack were all much weaker than her. She might not have to hunt to overpower them.
When they got to the nest there came a chorus of: "She's okay!" and then they were surrounded by the pack led by Rhum and Roc.
They all took turns sniffing her, butting heads with her, making sure that she was still the same Una, that she was, after all, okay.
"That was scary," Rhum announced. "Please don't do that again."
"Why would I choose to do that again?" Una asked then she tilted her chin up defiantly. "I defeated it, it's not going to come back."
The others brayed joyously, nudging her towards the nest they had made her. To show her that they were hoping she'd be okay and come back so they were ready for her return. They had even gotten a stock pile of mangos and other fruits for her to eat. Even those orange ground tubes she had craved before.
Roc stayed close to Rela, who too got greetings.
"We were lucky," he whispered to her. "Next time a biped sickness comes, she might not be strong enough to fight it off."
Rela hissed at him. "She'll be fine. Una is strong. She can beat anything."
Rela wasn't certain if that was true, she was just glad that this was over. She never wanted to go through something like this again.
-JP-JP-JP-
They were not that lucky though.
In the next moon cycle it happened again.
Granted, this time they were much better prepared, but it still happened again. Una simple woke up covered in that blood again and she had been so confused.
She had cried, though, as per usual, her moods had been everywhere before the bleeding came again. They realized then that moods, and the food cravings they were all a part of the bleeding. They were a sign that the bleeding was coming, and they stayed when the bleeding was there.
That time the pain in her tummy started on the second day and stayed until the fourth. The flow of the bleeding had been different too. Starting out really heavy and then going to nothing for the last three days.
The pain in her tummy didn't hurt her as much. She learned that swimming, keeping her legs moving and bending up and down made it feel better. So she did more moving that time.
It wasn't nearly as bad as the first.
They hoped that this would be the last time, but when it happened again, another moon cycle later, they had to concede that this was just a biped thing.
Bipeds bled once a moon cycle.
It was absolutely ridiculous.
It wasn't the only change though.
Her body started to change, more than it had before.
Her chest began to grow. It got sensitive and heavy as it took a more rounded protruding shape. It made it hard for her to run, so she had started ripping up bits and pieces of second skins to wrap around herself to bind them into place.
She stopped wearing the large second skin because it wasn't long enough anymore. It wouldn't cover her sex parts anymore, and she couldn't find any that did. It hurt to run around without her lower sex parts protected so she went in search of something else.
And she found a different pair of second skins, a bottom set. She put them on but didn't know how to keep them on, so to keep them from falling she tied them to herself with bits of vine and other string like things she could find in the biped nests.
Her face began to round out, she got taller, she got leaner.
Una was growing up, changing right in front of her, so quickly that she seemed to be a completely different creature in a short amount of time.
Rela had no idea what was happening, neither did Una of course. They could only hope that nothing more drastic changed. That this would be the last of it for some time to come.
Rela couldn't take anymore changes. She wanted her hatchling to stay the same, she wanted everything to stay the same, but if things hand to change, she knew that it would be okay.
With her by her hatchling's side, they could face ever changing world together.