Snuggles The Symbiote
After what I estimate to have been two days in the jungle, I noticed movement at the very edge of my field of awareness. some kind of humanoid figure with a raptor's head dressed like a stereotypical "sexy primitive" type... I think it was a girl one, but I don't know the sexual dimorphism of dinosaur people.
So, the three of us began the slow trek to where I'd seen the dinosaur person. Meanwhile, Ashley was explaining the most likely causes of dinosaur people.
"So, there's this guy named Dr. Stegron. That's his real name," by the way, she clarified. "He stole the notes for the Connors formula, which turns you into a lizard man, and combined it with DNA from a bunch of savage land dinos to make dinosaur people... But last I heard he was in jail."
"Didn't you say not too long ago that supervillains escaping from prison was Tuesday for you?" I pointed out.
"Yeah," Ashley admitted, "but Stegron's a D-Lister. Anyway, the other most likely guy is Sauron."
"You mentioned him the other day and... Is he really named after..."
"Yeah, he's a huge Tolkien Fanboy. And a total Edgelord. He named himself Sauron because Tolkien's ultimate evil was the evilest thing he could think of."
"...Morgoth," I said.
"Huh?"
"Tolkien's ultimate evil was Morgoth, the original dark lord and a higher class of being than Sauron," I explained. "In Tolkien's lore, he was essentially analogous to Satan. While Sauron bound his essence into the One Ring, Morgoth bound his essence into all of the matter that composed the world. The very capacity for evil, in these stories, is Morgoth's essence in all things. Many works say that their ultimate villain is made of evil but in Tolkien's Legendarium evil is made of Morgoth."
Ashley looked up at me and blinked.
"Oh, you can go off on these tangents all you want but it's weird when I do it?" I deadpanned.
"A little bit, yeah," Ashley admitted.
"So this is what it would have been like if I had two daughters," Yuri injected.
A few minutes later, Ashley spoke up again. "So... Was that stuff about Morgoth in The Silmarillion? Cause I didn't read that one."
"It was in The History of Middle-earth," I clarified. "volume 10, Morgoth's Ring."
"Okay then..." Ashley appeared to be deep in thought now.
I was starting to realize that there were very few animals in this part of the jungle. And the closer we got to where I saw the raptor person, the fewer there seemed to be.
We were maybe ten yards away from our destination when Ashley stopped and started sniffing the air.
Then she dashed off, diving under a low-hanging tree branch and vanishing into the tall grass.
"Would it make me a bad mother if I admitted that part of me misses when she was bed-ridden?" Yuri asked. She took off running after Ashley before I could answer, which left me to bring up the rear.
Tracking them with my bugs, I found the two of them in a clearing, Ashley still sniffing the air.
"Alright Ashley, what does your super nose smell?"
"Miss Militia was here," she said. "And... two others... One of here," she said with a gesture to a section of foliage that looked slightly disturbed. "And then, the second came out here," she gestured to some broken branches and what looked like s forest path... "I think there was a struggle. Miss Militia hit her head here," Ashley pointed to a rock with some dried blood on it. "And then the other two carried her off back where the second one came from."
"You got all of that just from smell?" I asked.
"I'm getting good!" Ashley chirped back, clearly pleased with herself. "I can probably track where they went from here" and without another word she moved to the uncovered path and started walking down it, clearly expecting her mother and I to follow.
Ten minutes later, while marching down a dark road through the jungle, a figure turned a corner and stared at us. Easily nine feet tall, barrel-chested with limbs like tree trunks was an orange scaled figure with the head of a triceratops.
The creature's beady eyes narrowed. "Trespassers" it hissed in... Was that a Wisconsin accent?
"How do you know we're not natives?" Ashley asked.
"Ignoring your new york accent?" The creature pointed to me. "Wrong clothes."
"See this is probably the jungle princess outfits and fur bikinis," Ashley mumbled.
Undaunted by the interruption, the creature pointed to Ashley. "The native savage-landers are a mixture of pre-cataclysmic Atlanteans, neanderthals genetically engineered to resemble hybrids of man and beast, human mutates, and the descendants of European explorers. You're dressed for the part but you don't look it."
The triceratops man finished by pointing to Yuri. "And you're literally wearing a Fantastic Four uniform. So... You can come quietly back to Sauron or—"
It was at this point that Yuri let out a high-pitched cry and struck the creature's sternum with an open palmed thrust. The creature fell on its back and stopped moving.
"If I knew how to use chi, I could have made his heart explode," she shared matter of factly.
"...You didn't kill him, did you?" Ashley asked hesitantly.
"No, no, I just stopped his heart for a few moments and the shock knocked him out cold," Yuri quickly explained. "He'll wake up in a couple of hours feeling like crap but otherwise he'll be fine."
I didn't think it worked like that, but I wasn't going to call Yuri out right now.
After climbing over the unconscious dinosaur man and continuing on our way, now knowing that we were on the right track, I asked Ashley "so you were explaining this Sauron guy earlier but we got a little side-tracked."
"He's an energy vampire that turns into a pterosaur-man if he feeds on mutant energy. He's also got Hypno-eyes. And for the last couple of years, he's been obsessed with turning people into dinosaurs."
"...This entire universe is just a bunch of comic book nonsense, isn't it?"
"And your universe is dark and dreary and way too darn serious so it balances out," Ashley replied cheerfully.
We came to the edge of the jungle and in the distance, we could make out a village. Primitive buildings next to futuristic structures with metal walls and assorted humans and dinosaur-people dressed in a variety of anachronistic outfits.
"Miss Militia's scent ends around here, somewhere in the village..." Ashley pointed to a green figure standing near a large building. "That's Sauron," she said, "and... I imagine that building is his lair. If you're gonna find Miss Militia that would be the place to start, but..."
"We're gonna need a distraction." Yuri finished...
It was a solid minute of silent thinking before Ashley spoke up again, "I think I've got an idea."
Ashley explained her plan... And to be honest, I didn't like it. Her mother didn't either, but neither of us could come up with something better...