Chapter 236: The Mission Goes Wrong.
"Par ce geste, il n'indiquait pas qu'il s'en fichait, car évidemment ça n'était pas le cas, mais simplement qu'il n'y pouvait rien. Ni lui, ni personne."
-Sherryn de Darkal, Retrouver mon âme soeur
(translation: "With this motion, he didn't mean that that he didn't care, as that was obviously not the case, but simply that he couldn't change it. Not him, nor anyone else.")
A short distance behind the junior owsla's patrol, four other rabbits, as well as a mouse, were keeping an eye on them. This was rather difficult: if they got too close, they themselves would be noticed, defeating the purpose of this secret mission.
-"So far they are doing very well," Holly whispered.
-"You're right about that," Hazel agreed.
-"This warren has a promising future ahead with this new generation of rabbits," Vesper said; while he was not initially supposed to join the others on this mission, they invited him after encountering him halfway to the bottom of the Down.
-"Shall we go back to the warren then?" Bigwig suggested.
-"If they're doing so good, why aren't they smelling us?" Hannah asked.
-"...that's a valid point," Hazel said, anxious. "No, we're not going back to the warren, we must supervise them all the way. Primrose would be so worried if we didn't."
-"All right..." Bigwig rolled his eyes, more trusting of the kittens' skills than Hazel and Primrose. Secretly following them had been Hazel's idea, and Bigwig had initially agreed, hoping Hazel would soon snap out of it. However, the Chief could be very stubborn...
-"This seems like a good time to go on our own way," Blueberry whispered in Gilia's ear.
Gilia looked at her siblings, they seem fully absorbed in their duties, carefully looking around them and sniffing the air.
-"Yes it does. Let's go."
She was about to dash away, when suddenly...
-"Stop, I heard something."
The seven rabbits abruptly stopped, and sniffed the air.
-"I recognize this scent," Nyreem said. "It's a Darkhaven patrol."
-"What if they have caught our scent?" Periwinkle said, trembling. "What do we do?"
Pipkin thought quickly; as leader of the patrol, he was responsible for the safety of all his teammates. What would Bigwig do? There was no way the could the small patrol could defeat the Darkhaveners in a fight. Maybe with help, they could pull it off, but that would require going back to Watership Down, and if the Darkhaveners had picked up their scent, they could easily track them down and report the warren's location back to General Woundwort. This left only one possibility.
-"We have to lead them away from the warren," he announced.
-"Where shall we go?" Snowdrop asked.
-"The farm. If we have to, we will let the dog and cat deal with them."
-"We should wait a bit longer to leave, until we lose the Darkhaveners," Gilia whispered in Blueberry's ear. "We don't want our mission to end right away with us getting kidnapped, do we?"
-"No, we don't," Blueberry said. "That would be a disaster."
-"They seem to be straying from the path we had agreed on," Hazel commented.
-"They're not that far off, Hazel..." Bigwig said, feeling annoyed at the Chief for being overprotective. "Let's not worry just yet."
Hazel, Bigwig, Holly, Vesper and Hannah were still following the junior owsla's patrol. Despite Bigwig's comments, Hazel remained concerned. Suddenly, Vesper's nostrils picked up an unusual scent. He turned to Bigwig and Hazel, and realized that they had noticed it too.
-"Darkhaven patrol."
-"Let's go get Pipkin and the others before THEY do," Holly said.
After a tense journey, Pipkin's patrol finally reached Nuthanger Farm. Before venturing into the cat's territory, they stopped to smell the air.
-"No scent of Darkhaveners..." Pipkin concluded, and smiled. "Looks like we got rid of them. Good job everyone!"
-"While we're here, how about we stop for some flayrah?" Nyreem suggested.
-"Always a good idea. But be careful, the cat may be about. You all go to the garden, I will stand guard."
The garden, despite the damage sustained in the past, was very appealing. A new crop had been planted, and small carrot greens were sticking out of the dirt. The rabbits started to nibble.
-"Now that the Darkhaveners are out of the way, it is likely safe to go," Blueberry whispered in Gilia's ear.
Gilia smiled: this mission was finally happening, she and her lover would be going on an epic journey!
-"Catch me if you can!" she teased, as she ran off.
-"Hey, wait for me!" Blueberry, not expecting Gilia to run away like this, prepared to dash off, when suddenly, he felt someone tackle him.
-"Now just a moment!" the attacker said; Blueberry recognized the voice as Snowdrop's, and felt relieved that it was a fellow rabbit who had pounced on him, rather than the infamous cat Pipkin had warned him about. But this was also confusing: why was she acting like this?
-"Huh?"
-"That's my sister you're taking away on your silly pointless mission," Snowdrop said with contempt.
-"It's not pointless, we have a very specific goal in mind. How do you know about our mission, anyway?"
-"You two weren't exactly subtle last night, you know?" Periwinkle said. "You asked us to go inside the burrow, which we did; but we still stayed up and listened."
-"What's all this about?" Pipkin asked: he had overheard the kittens' conversation, and he was confused by their behaviour, this did not appear to be a game.
-"He's taking her to the other end of the Big Water to find his memories," Periwinkle calmly said.
-"You two were really going to sneak off without telling us?" With a frown, Mallow hopped over to Blueberry, who was still being held down by Snowdrop. "Honestly, that hurts. You would have let us worry about what happened to you two? Had we not listened last night, we would never have known the truth, and we would have assumed the worst, that Darkhaven, or elil, captured you."
-"Not to mention, you would have made Pipkin look bad, losing two rabbits on a single patrol," Nyreem said.
Blueberry considered the other kittens' words, and recognized that they made some valid points.
-"You're right, this shouldn't have been done so secretly, it would have worried you all, and that isn't nice. But now that you all know what our plan is, how about you let us go? You can relay the message to everyone else at the warren."
-"Sorry, no," Mallow said. "Gilia may be well-intentioned..."
-"Also crazy with love, don't forget that!" Snowdrop added. "If it was, say, Hawkbit or Thethuthinnang with amnesia, she wouldn't have accepted to go on this mission, would she?"
-"Regardless, she's still our sister, and we love her," Mallow continued, "The mission you two have planned is very dangerous, we won't let anything happen to her."
As he listened to the kittens arguing, Pipkin was disappointed. From the looks of it, he was the last one to find out about this secret mission. Had he known about Gilia and Blueberry's plan ahead of time, he would have warned their parents, and perhaps even called off the patrol. Instead, he only found out once it was too late to do anything about it.
Suddenly, Hazel and Bigwig burst out of a nearby bush; Holly and Vesper arrived moments later.
-"Rabbits!" Hannah jumped off Bigwig's head. "Woundwort is after ya, let's go!"
The junior owsla did not move, and simply stared at the four larger rabbits.
-"What are you all doing here?" Periwinkle asked.
-"Were you spying on us?" Nyreem added.
-"There's a Darkhaven patrol on your tracks," Hazel explained. "We must go away before it's too late."
-"Actually, we got rid of them without your help," Pipkin said proudly. "If you smell the air, you'll find no trace of them."
-"They might still be hiding. We need to go home before they find us."
-"This is unfair!" Mallow complained. "We wait seasons to be able to go out on wide patrol, and then it gets cancelled halfway-through over a technicality."
-"None of us are happy with this," Bigwig said, "but safety needs to be our top priority."
The kittens were left very disappointed by this turn of events. After so long, they were finally allowed to go on patrol, alone, only to be secretly followed all the way. They felt they had been betrayed: if the adults really trusted them, they wouldn't have spied on them like this.
-"MEOW!"
Everyone was startled by the sudden cry of the cat, and only then realized that Tabitha was just a few hops away. With everyone arguing, nobody had been standing guard for several minutes, allowing the feline to sneak up to them undetected.
-"Oh not smelly fish-breath again..." Hannah mumbled.
-"I'll save you all," Blueberry said, "I have some fighting skills that..."
-"That's just reckless!"
Holly pounced on Tabitha; the force of the blow knocked her away, but she quickly got back up and hissed in anger.
-"Everyone run, I'll hold her back!" Holly ordered.
The other rabbits did not hesitate to run. The junior owsla, recognizing the danger posed by the cat, put aside the perceived betrayal and joined the adults in fleeing. Everyone soon made it to safety, just outside the farmyard; Holly joined them soon afterwards. He had fared much better than Blackavar had when he had fought Tabitha: he had survived the encounter.
-"Holly, you're hurt," Bigwig instantly noticed.
-"It's just a scratch. I suffered far worse, in my youth at Sandleford."
-"Is there anyone else hurt?" Pipkin asked, concerned.
At first, there was silence, until Nyreem yelped.
-"I think I hurt my paw running like this."
-"Blackberry will fix you both up in no time," Hazel said. "Let's go home."
-"Pardon the interruption," Vesper said, looking around in concern, "but one of us is missing."