4

At Castle Plundaar the next day, Simi inquired of his semi-charge where he had been the day before. Kringer thought about telling him the truth. He was the only Mutant in the castle he came close to trusting to any extent, and one of the few that had any honor, but finally he decided against it. "Just out. I saw some snow and played in it, that was neat!" That was the truth anyway. He might go there again, too. Maybe Simi or maybe Lupino could help him make a sled.

"Hoo, well be careful. You could freeze you know."

"I know. I have fur though! I'll be careful," he said quickly, before Simi could say anything else. "I might go again today, can I?"

"Sure, kid. Just don't get lost...well you know the drill."

Kringer grinned. "Yep! I won't!"

****

Again on his ground skimmer, he clutched the object he had spend all night making. He liked working with wood, and both Simi and Lupino, who were good with woodworking had been helping him when S-S-Slithe wasn't hollering at them to do something constructive. The child had spend all night, after he stopped shaking after the encounter, making a couple of gifts.

This time, the little jackal was actually terrified to go near the Lair. Panthro had scared him pretty good, but he had had more fun the day before than he had in a long time. Most the time he was shoved outside to play alone, or told to get out of the way of the adults. There were no other children at Castle Plundaar, and he often went exploring on his own. The only good though about it, though he had no other lifestyle to compare it to, was that he could do pretty much what he wanted.

Of course if the adults knew half the stuff he did, he'd get thrashed a good one. But what they didn;t know wouldn't hurt them.

But after a long time, he got up the guts. No one was outside, and he sure couldn't go up on his own and ring the bell. The adults did not like him. He didn't like adults very much most the time anyway. Most of them, even the Mutants, weren't very nice. They never listened to a cub, and always were mean to someone at first, not even knowing who they were. Kringer always thought this kind of foolish, but never dared say so...not even to Simi or the other few he considered friends at the place. So he waited. He sat on his cold metal of his ground-skimmer, hovering a few feet off the frozen ground, and waited.

It was almost three hours in the frigid air before he saw the twins. They were on their hoverboards and were not coming from the Lair, but from somewhere else, headed inside. They went in for about twenty minutes, then came back out. Swallowing hard, and making sure the grown-ups were not behind them, he began to approach.

Inside, Wilykit and Wilykat were a little offended that the adults wanted to watch, but they had misunderstood. They thought the adults wanted to watch to make sure they were safe, but in reality they wanted to watch so they could see for themselves that the little guy was no threat. They assured the twins of this. Finally understanding that the adults were trying to take them a little more seriously, the twins finally relented and agreed to it.

Not even sure if he would come back, Wilykit and Wilykat went back outside. It was the Christmas day anyway, and they wanted to go outside to look at their tree and open presents. There were only five or so, one each from the twins to each other, two from Tygra and Pumyra to each other, and one from Lion-O to his guardian, Snarf. And there was a sixth one, a new one.

Wilykit and Wilykat opened theirs and laughed really hard. Both had made exactly the same thing for each other: a thick leather sheath of sorts for their lariats and their capsules. They had individually gone to the Warrior Maidens' village to barter the leather and made it. Wilykat's was dark brown, and Wilykit's was a sleek looking black. "Boy we sure think alike!" Wilykit said.

"Yeah, talk about scary. My brain's thinking down to your level," Wilykat snickered.

Wilykit laughed and shoved her brother. Then, as the twins attached the leather to their belts and put their weapons in it, Kringer timidly approached, taking little steps.

Wilykit saw him first and grinned. "Hi!"

Wilykat looked up. "Hi, Kringer! We were hoping you would be back."

Kringer smiled a little, but kept looking nervously at the Lair, so close. "H-hi..." he said. "Did...did you get in trouble yesterday?"

Panthro had scared the pants off of him, and he asked if they had gotten in trouble? Very un-Mutant-like. Wilykat hoped the adults had the audio sensors on to hear that. Maybe they should say un-evil Mutant-like...they were starting to learn that not all Mutants were as those they had fought for so long. "Naw, they were mad, but we talked to them. Panthro felt bad for scaring you."

Now it was Kringer's turn to look surprised. "He did?" Wilykat nodded. "Oh...they don't like me though do they? Because I'm a Mutant?"

"Well...adults are like that. They fight a certain kind of person and they all of them are bad..." Wilykit had a thought. "I bet the adults at Castle Plundaar say all kinds of nasty things about us too, huh?"

Kringer actually laughed. "They sure do. And in Plundaarian, too. Plundaarian has good curses."

Both twins looked interested. "Hey could you tell us some?"

Kringer grinned. It was not often he could teach something to someone who was willing to listen to him. He said a few of them, and told what they meant, and all three cubs were giggling madly as Wilykit and Wilykat tried to say them.

Part 3

Part 5

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