Chapter 220:The Speaker's Secret.
"This had to be a dream... she was only dreaming as a little fragile weak house pet!"
-ilovedracoDH, Pure as White
After Woundwort had been defeated in the video game, Orchis hopped away, to simply stare at the sky. He was the first to notice the fire, after the smoke started to obscure the sunset. He also spotted the falling branch a few moments later.
-"If Vervain were here," he said, although nobody was listening, "he would probably see this as an opportunity to try and kill Campion."
Despite Vervain's possible wishes, Campion nowhere near the fire, or the branch. Instead, he was sitting on a small wooden platform near the top of one of the structures. It was the perfect place to look around the warren, and he could clearly see Spartina further away, also looking.
Suddenly, he heard loud screaming coming from the ground. Quickly, he turned and saw the chaos unfolding. The flames, caused by LH's cigarette and the spilled gasoline, had spread almost as far as the river, with various rabbits running away as fast as they could to avoid getting burned. Brain's stick of dynamite exploded with a loud noise, causing even more smoke, and debris flew across the area.
Before he could react, the platform started shaking violently: the structure had been damaged by explosion. Sensing an imminent collapse, he dashed towards what he thought was the only way off, but it was already too late. The wood broke underneath him, and he found himself hanging by his front claws, from the metal beam that supported the platform.
After a few moments, a falcon, the same that had taken the branch earlier, perched on a beam just above him.
-"You appear to be in distress. Do you need help?" she asked.
-"No! Please don't try, you'll kill me! The Black Rabbit will be furious..."
-"Are you sure you don't need help?"
-"I'm sure! Please go before Woundwort notices you and kills you. You showing up near me twice in two days would be suspicious. Please..."
-"As you wish. Keep calm and battle on, brave rabbit."
The bird quickly flew away. Campion, meanwhile, felt his front paws lose their strength. He made one last, desperate effort at getting back up, but the beam he was holding on to broke. This was it, he would die again. He really should have accepted the falcon's offer of rescuing him...
When suddenly, he felt someone grabbed his paw. Looking up, he saw that it was the Speaker of the Past. He had no idea how she had gotten up there so quickly, but she had saved him. That was all that mattered at the moment.
-"You should have accepted the bird's offer," she said, calmly and emotionlessly as usual.
-"Yes, I should have."
-"Seriously, if someone wants to help you, let them. In this case, it might have saved your life."
-"Please don't rub it in. Just save me."
The Speaker pulled Campion back up; he was soon able to lie down on a beam that, despite the destruction of everything around it, still remained solid. As he looked up at the Speaker, he saw that her appearance was changing, her fur was turning black. The skull over her head disintegrated, revealing eyes as black as her fur, although they briefly glowed red. Campion gasped.
-"You?"
-"After everything you have been through, you deserve to know," the Black Rabbit said. "I am the Speaker."
-"But...how? This only raises further questions!"
-"It would take a long time to explain, and we are not there yet. For now, however, you cannot stay up here, this will collapse in just a few moments. You are going to plummet to the ground, but do not worry, you will be fine, you will not die this time. Do not tell anyone what you saw, that would be compromising for me. I know you have been considering recruiting Aspen as a fellow rebel against Woundwort; you may, but my identity must remain a secret."
Campion opened his mouth to speak again, but before he could, the Black Rabbit pushed him off the beam.
As the explosion damaged the structure's foundations, Spartina struggled to retain her balance. Burying her claws into the wooden platform to avoid falling off, she quickly analyzed the situation. The structural integrity appeared to be compromised; seeing everyone on the ground panicking, it seemed that this was an accidental disaster. Darkhaven was being destroyed, and the weapon she was searching for had nothing to do with it.
But Spartina had more pressing concerns: unless she acted quickly, she was about to die, as the platform underneath her was collapsing. She was too high above ground to be able to jump, and the main path leading back to the ground was already gone; she would have no choice but to navigate a secondary, torturous path, before it too collapsed.
Ironically, this path required Spartina to start by climbing even higher up; to do so, she was forced to jump from one platform to another. Finally, she reached the top of the structure: a conveyor belt leading to a large roller. While this machine was originally intended for crushing rocks, it was sometimes used by the Darkhaveners as a method of execution, the results were usually terribly gruesome. The machine was turned off, and with the rest of the structure falling apart, all it took for Spartina to dislodge the roller from its stand was single push. This revealed a staircase, usually used by the junkyard employees to access the machine for repairs; for Spartina, this was the only way for her to survive. She ran down as fast as she could without tumbling, as the steps gradually collapsed underneath her. She soon reached a dead end; by that point, however, she was close enough to the ground that she could jump. She landed on top of Orchis' infamous torture barrel; by now, it was on the ground on its side, empty and harmless. She reached the ground just in time, as the entire structure collapsed behind her.
Brain got up, slowly and painfully. He sadly looked at the memory card in his hand, or rather what remained of it: it had snapped in two, and the piece he was still holding was on fire. All the footage he had filmed of Woundwort and his owsla was irretrievably lost.
-"Wee!" came Pinky's voice. "This was more fun than any theme park ride, Brain!"
Turning around, Brain saw that the tip of Pinky's tail was on fire; the dim-witted mouse did not appear to have realized this.
-"You have a very weird definition of 'fun'."
Meanwhile, Woundwort was staring at the destruction in absolute shock.
-"What happened here!?"
-"I don't know," a random officer said. "It just suddenly started burning."
-"I know." The Speaker of the Past, now looking normal again, approached the General. "The mouse Brain said he would use dynamite to destroy the outsiders' warren. He used it to destroy this warren instead."
Woundwort turned towards the mice, a look of absolute furor on his face.
-"Is this true?"
Brain was sweating profusely. What the Speaker had said was indeed true, although it was only an accident. Nevertheless, his plan to take over the world seemed about to backfire once again.
-"Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering?" he asked nervously.
-"I think so, Brain, but there are many different types of endings. Sometimes, even if it wasn't intended to be the ending, it is still decent. Sometimes, despite it really being the ending, it's really bad. Think of calling the name, and on the other end, there's the Thames and Talia. And other times, it just drags on so long you're glad when the ending finally comes..."
Brain facepalmed: Pinky's ramblings about endings were illogical and had nothing to do with the current situation.
-"We need to run. NOW."
The mice ran as fast as they could, with Woundwort running after them. Despite having a few seconds' head start, it was clear to the mice that Woundwort would catch up with them sooner or later. Suddenly, Brain spotted a drainage pipe, and ran into it, pulling Pinky inside with him. Woundwort stopped at the entrance, and growled in frustration: the tube was too narrow for him to put his paw inside, the mice were beyond his reach. He stayed there for a few minutes, before returning to his owsla.
-"If any of you ever see these mice again, kill them."
-"General Woundwort!" Lady May suddenly came running. "Finally I catch up with you! Wait, why is there so much blood on your face, are you hurt? You don't look hurt, but you look even uglier! Anyway, I don't know what just happened, but it's horrible! It's so dusty in this warren now. It was always very dusty, but now it's not just in the ground, it's in the air! I'll never be able to properly groom myself like this, with the dirt literally in the air. Also, something shattered my mirror, so I won't be able to look at myself to guide my grooming. You'll have to find me a new one. Speaking of grooming, the other rabbit you asked to help me, I think you said his name is Kurai? He's an even bigger freak than that weird Speaker doe! He tried to kill me!"
Woundwort stared at the panicked doe. With so much anger towards the mice, and now Lady May being self-absorbed as usual, he completely snapped.
-"That's it, I've had enough. You are no longer queen."
-"What?"
-"Lady May, I was willing to give you a chance because, like me, you used to live in a hutch. But all you did was confirm my fears. Your mind has gone soft, obsessed with your appearance and your flayrah. This is the tragic fate that would have befallen me had I not escaped when I did, but it is too late for you. You are no longer my queen, our relationship is hereby dissolved."
Lady May lowered her ears. Her life was falling apart, she was losing everything.
-"But what about the next generation? Didn't you want us to have kittens together?"
While she was not a fan of the idea of mating with that ugly buck, maybe by mentioning this, she would be able to get him to reconsider, and she would remain queen. Woundwort merely scoffed.
-"It's not like you could have provided any decent kittens anyway. They would have inherited your nasty fur."
-"I thought you liked my fur, and you found it pretty..." Lady May quickly became demoralized.
-"Beauty has nothing to do with it. It's impractical. Dirt and weeds can easily get stuck in it."
-"Oh, that's absolutely true. Which is why, as I was saying, I will need a new groomer that doesn't have any murderous impulses..."
-"You are no longer queen, which means that you have lost your grooming privileges, you'll have to do it yourself. You are also hereafter forbidden from entering the flayrah chamber, you'll be eating grass like everyone else."
-"Grass? Ew, that's gross!"
-"You are also to report for owsla training tomorrow morning."
-"That's no way to live!"
-"If you are not satisfied with these new rules, you are free go back to your hutch; it's up to you. You have until tomorrow morning to make up your mind."
With that he hopped away. He briefly turned back for one last order:
-"Oh, and by the way, find your own burrow to sleep tonight."
Pinky and the Brain remained inside the drain pipe long after Woundwort had gone, catching their breath.
-"That rabbit truly is terrifying," Pinky finally said. "One wouldn't expect cute little bunnies to behave like this."
-"Indeed, one wouldn't," Brain said with a sigh. "Come Pinky, we must head back to the lab to prepare for tomorrow night."
-"Why, Brain? What are we going to do tomorrow night?"
-"The same thing we do every night, Pinky: try to take over the world!"