Chapter 2

When Sage entered the room, which Kyu had dubbed as 'their base'; he was actually a tiny bit disappointed. This was less of a base and more of... just a room. It was larger than Sage's chamber, in fact almost 5 times as large and it had multiple counters and wardrobes, dividing it in different sections for different purposes, but it was still just the living space of someone. To his left; there where the backsides of two bookshelves with a gap between them, obviously replacing a proper door frame. A blanket was placed at the gap, dividing the place completely into two. To his right; there was a hip-high cabinet and a closet dividing the room further into something that seemed like a pseudo-bedroom.

From what Sage saw in this angle, there was a bed in that right section and some storage room for personal belongings, but he could also see another door leading to, presumably, a bathroom. Right in front of him, in the section that he could directly access from the door, there was a group of pillows and couches, in front of an old tube-TV. Most of the inventory actually looked like it was at least second hand and a lot of it had short, white hair sprinkled over it, like there was a white-furred cat running free here. He was pretty unimpressed by this until Kyu pushed him towards the blanket that divided the room. When he passed through this make-shift door a slight, sulphuric smell crawled into his nose and made him shiver. The rest of the 'gang' was actually already present. The two redheads sat on a small couch in a corner, next to a bookshelf overflowing with books of different kinds while the Riverelf was standing in front of a working table that was filled with chemical elements of different kinds and Bunsen burners and Erlenmeyer flasks. Sage only now noticed how small she actually was, ranging at not more than 1.3 Meters and looking almost like a child with cartoonishly large eyes.

There was actually an additional member present, sitting on a table in front of the couch and eating what seemed like legitimate red meat. Sages jaw almost dropped when he saw the girl, for several reasons. First of all there was the face, which had such a beautiful almond-shape and the purest of all pale skin tones that it was hard for him to not stare at her immediately. Only then he noticed that fact that this girl certainly was not an Elf of any kind. On the one hand there was there pure body size. She had some difficulties sitting on the small chair and cut her meat in a bent over position. But she looked a bit weird for a human too as Sage noticed her strong jaws and wide shoulders as well as a yellowy tone in her eyes. When taking a bite of her steak she revealed weirdly long canines that had more resemblance to the Riverelf's shark-teeth then than a Human jaw. Maybe her clothing added and over-exaggerated her weirdness a bit. She had a woolly cap on her head, from which long, white hair ran down to her chest, so sage couldn't actually confirm from the shape of her ears, that she was actually not an Elf. Her body was cloaked almost entirely in a white dress with no cleavage and sleeves that nearly covered the entirety of her hands, which was kind of impractical when it came to eating. She was dressed into wide pants that kinda looked like they were bought from a 70s themed hippie market.
"Okay, since the entire group is here now, let me introduce everyone properly..." Kyu said her loud, heroic way. She first pointed towards the redheads.
"These are my Sisters, Titania and Laniel. They are both older than me, so do respect them."
She pointed to the Riverelf who didn't even bother all the much looking up from her chemistry stuff.
"This is Curel, the gang's brain. Seriously, she's crazy smart and actually twice as old as all of us, so DO fucking respect her."
She pointed to the white haired girl that was still busy eating but now gave a Sage a shy wave between her bites.
"This pie there is Inu, our mascot and muscles. Be nice to her, she's more sensitive then she seems."
Said girl blushed a bit and gave Kyu a slightly annoyed look: "I would be happier if you just told him to respect me as well; just like you did with the others..."
Kyu sat down next to her and wrapped her arms around her shoulders.
"But you're our clan's special guest, no matter what so you get a special treatment."
As she was saying that she bent over and kissed that girls cheek.
To Sage, each of the things Kyu had said was a revelation on a different level. Kyu and the two redheaded Elves were sisters? While you could see the family similarities clearly in Laniel and Titania, none of the two looked much like Kyu in any way. Then, it surprised him that the Riverelf really was that old. From her body type she absolutely looked like a child and even though Sage could see a higher age in the way she looked and acted, Sage did not expect her to be technically a mature woman. And third, that Inu girl was special. In which way however, Sage could not yet tell. But he didn't buy into her human disguise, yet he didn't dig deeper either just yet.
Laniel was the first to speak up again after Kyu had ended.
"So... what is he doing here?" she asked with a doubtful gesture towards Sage. "I thought this was a feminist group and no boys allowed."
"Never said that..." Kyu said in the tone of a deeply convinced leader.
"Yes, you did..." Titania contradicted.
"Indeed." Curel added from the background.
"N-No boys allowed." Inu said, still being hugged by Kyu. "Your words."
"It's the reason I can't use this for quality time with Uyilam", Titania added.
Kyu looked around and blushed, but was quick to find a solution to this.
"I-it's just a temporary membership." she said. "An honorary one... Also, for today's mission we can use all help we can get."
Quiet sighs went through the rooms and Titania leaned forwards: "Alright, what's your plan anyways?"
This was obviously what Kyu had waited for. With a huge gesture she slammed her palm onto the table and said: "We will do what we always do. We fight the oppression!"
The enthusiasm seemed to stay within the borders of the reasonable in the sight of such a vague statement, yet Kyu didn't seem to mind the lack of enthusiasm in her friends.
"You all know that what I'm saying is correct. These damn Maranurr National Party Nazis have set up a camp by the road-bridge to the John Bell district. They are harassing our clan and the members of the other clans in our district, who have to go to the Elven Schools in the John-Bell-District.", Kyu said.
Titania crossed her arms, seeming genuinely curious about this undertaking for the first time today.
"Wait..." Laniel said. "You wanna attack the Nazis on the Cambridge Road? That's insane. The Gardyner chief went there to negotiate and was taken into custody. "
Kyu nodded: "That's why we're not negotiating. They are not armed with guns and only harass women and teenagers, who can't defend themselves. And they are only 5. So we can defeat them, if we have Sage. After we beat them up sufficiently, we will escape by splitting up and we either take the Lynfalyl route or the sewer access in the Jamestown Passage."
Laniel, Inu and Titania looked at each other as if they all knew exactly what these words meant, while Sage had nothing left but blinking confusedly.
"This..." Titania said slowly. "Sounds actually like a really great idea... but what makes you think we can outrun the humans or even the Police"
Kyu grinned widely: "Did you expect I hadn't planned this already? I had Curel prepare some gadgets for us..."
The was obviously the Riverelf's moment to shine, as she raised from her working bench and held up 6 glass bottles who were seemingly filled with different layers of powder and metallic plates between them.
"These are my most recent smoke-bombs. I pulled the basic design from the internet but I improved it by making the firing mechanism more reliable and the bomb as a whole smaller."
She walked over to the table and placed the bottles on the table. Each of them was held closed by screw-cap and the way Curel respectfully placed the bottles on the table showed that these were anything but harmless toys.
Everyone, except for Sage leaned in curiously on the bottle and finally he could see why all these girls were still members of this club, even though Kyu's way of going about it was clearly something one would need to get used to. They played around with explosives and did forbidden things, just like other teenagers or young adults, but taken to the next level.
"Okay, using these smoke-bombs is not 100% safe." Curel started her lecture on advanced homemade explosives. "But if you handle them correctly and don't break them they should easily explode. To make this happen, you need to take off the cap and grab the bottle by the neck. Like this..."
She wrapped her small hand around the upper half of the bottle, so her hand was covering a layer of white powder at the top end of the bottle.
"Next you need to wait 5-10 seconds until you feel this part getting extremely hot. Then you need to throw it quickly. As soon as the glass bottle is broken, the reaction will start and cover an area of 3-8 meters with smoke within a minute. With all 6 of these babies we can transform their entire camp into a smoke-signal for the natives."
"Sounds easy enough..." Laniel said and picked one of the bottles up with an exited glimmer in her turquoise eyes. Curel quickly pulled the bottle from her hands and placed it back on the table with a strict look in her black eyes.
"Here are some rules. Do not open the cap unless you want to throw it. You can stop the reaction from happening by closing the cap again, but I would not recommend it, as the risk of explosion is high and the smoke-bomb will not work anymore. Do NOT throw it between your feet like a Ninja, as glass splinters will cut through your legs. You can use this as a throwing weapon, but remember that this wound is a 1st degree armed assault and since we're Elves, we'll serve a life sentence for it. Then, do not purposefully inhale the smoke. It's not poisonous, but inhaling large quantities of it will lead to asphyxiation. Understood?"
She looked around like a teacher who had just finished a safety lecture on chemistry. As everyone nodded she turned to Sage.
"You too?"
Sage, who kind of only realized now how neck-deep he was stuck in this, nodded quickly and uncomfortably.
"One more tactical tip..." Curel added. "Only throw them when you are trying to escape. If you throw these to attack the Nazis, you'll have to walk into the smoke, fight and get out again with your orientation intact. None of us can do this."
"Alright," Laniel sighed, clearly bored by all these safety rules. Finally Curel allowed the girls to pick up and examine the bombs. Kyu actually took two of them and looked appreciative through the transparent glass.
"Excellent work, Curel. I don't know what we'd do without you." she said and handed one of the bottles to Sage. Nervously he looked over the mixture inside and placed it in one of the wide pockets of his robe.
"Can... anyone maybe explain me what all of this is about?" Sage asked.

Everyone turned to Sage, as if they had forgotten that he was there and a slight smile hushed over Curel's face.
"Of course she didn't explain you a thing, eh?" she said with a patient tone. "Well, given that you probably don't know much about the whole situation, allow me to give you a brief rundown. The Maranurr National Party is supporting Anti-Clan laws in this country, which would effectively allow the government to throw Elves into jail that live together in groups. Everyone knows this is ridiculous, but these thugs are trying to push for the laws by making us look dangerous. In other words: They assault and harass Elfish children and women until someone fights back and then they frame us for being 'violent, mafia-like structures'."
Sage thought of what he heard right now and then gave Kyu a puzzled look.
"Wait..." he said slowly. "Doesn't that mean we're doing exactly what they want us to do?"
Kyu crossed her arms resiliently: "Yes, we do. That's why we have to hit them hard enough that they do not come back. We're not gonna let them harass our kin any longer. How long until they determine that verbally abusing and threatening our family isn't enough, so they beat a child into hospital to provoke a backlash. All of this has happened before and we will not let it happen."
Sage looked around, if this kind of thought resonated with the rest of the group and apparently, it was ideologically consistent in that regard. While he was checking on the other members in the room he noticed Kyu eyeing him curiously. He understood. This was a test.
Kyu didn't just bring him here to increase her manpower, she did it to test if he would take their side or not. And Kyu was the kind of person who dealt in absolutes. Who was not with her, were with the Humans, this was just the way political radicals like her thought.
Strangely he did not feel any reason to not do it. Not like he has anything better to do with his time currently and he could not find a way in which Kyu's ideas and actions were not justifiable. Even though he recognized the dangers and flaws of her thought, he sympathized with her for whatever reason.
He nodded: "Alright, I'll help you."
A faint smile crept onto Kyu's face.
"Alright! Then there is no time to waste.", she called, while clapping one hand against the bottle she was holding, making its internals shake a bit and giving Curel sweat on her forehead. "Let's put these sweeties to a good use."