AUTHOR'S NOTE: thank you Anonymous Guest for the review. I'm afraid the kidnapping subplot is nearing its end, though...
Also, following this chapter I will be taking a short break. The next chapter will most likely be posted on 5 September.
Chapter 158: Doing It Yourself.
"But still there was one more question to be answered. Why had no one reported it earlier?"
-Chris Boyce, The Discovery
After the "plump rabbit" incident, training went surprisingly well. Bigwig was not able to identify who had used the two infamous words, but nobody repeated the "insult" afterwards, and almost everyone remained focused on the task at hand. However, some rabbits, notably Bluebell, still had a hard time taking things seriously.
-"I'm a water rabbit!" he suddenly cried out, jumping out from beneath the surface.
-"You're MY water rabbit," Blackberry said, playfully tackling Bluebell.
Further away, Hawkbit and Acacia were also getting distracted. After another rabbit accidentally threw water on Hawkbit's face, he groaned loudly.
-"Don't be so grumpy Hawkbit," Acacia said, nuzzling him and kissing him a few times.
-"You don't have to kiss me THAT much, you know?"
-"You've been through a lot. You need more love. Unless, you want me to stop?"
-"I don't mind it, but Bigwig might." Hawkbit glanced nervously at the captain, who was supervising other rabbits further away. "We're supposed to be training. Once we're back at the warren, though, you'll be free to do what you want.
-"It's true, we must not anger the cute Bigwig."
Thethuthinnang had never learned to swim before. At first, Vilthuril and Vesper guided her; after a while, however, she was able to handle it all on her own. She only wished Hyzenthlay had been there with her, but her friend had stayed at the warren to help set up the traps.
As she moved to a shallower part of the river, she felt her hind leg touch something sharp. At first, she thought it was a rock, but as she looked down below the surface, she realized that it was unlike any rock she had ever seen before. It had a weird shape, and was very shiny.
-"You all might want to stay away from this section of the river," she said. "There's something sharp at the bottom."
-"Show me the exact location," Bigwig asked.
Thethuthinnang swam over to the spot where she had encountered the shiny object. As Bigwig took a closer look, he too was left puzzled as to what it was.
-"Dandelion, go pick that up," he ordered.
Dandelion was sitting further away in the water. He was doing little more than playfully splashing around with captain Broom, uninterested in serious training. When he heard Bigwig's voice, he stopped and turned his head.
-"I'll have to dive head-first to do that," he complained.
-"I know," Bigwig replied.
-"Why me?"
-"Because you're the one who needs the extra exercise the most! Now go!"
Dandelion cautiously swam over to the object; once there, he lowered his head below the surface, only to instantly jump out of the water.
-"I can't do it. I'll just sink."
Bigwig rolled his eyes.
-"Someone hold his hind legs."
-"I'll do it," Hawkbit said.
Hawkbit placed himself behind Dandelion, who took a deep breath and plunged again. The grey rabbits could hear sounds of displeasure coming from Dandelion below the surface. Additionally, the quick movements of the hind legs resulted in water getting repeatedly thrown in Hawkbit's face. To avoid getting too wet, he closed his eyes and turned his head.
-"Hey, calm down! You're dragging me down with you!"
After what felt like forever to both rabbits, Dandelion finally returned to the surface, carrying the object in his mouth.
-"Took you long enough, but good job," Bigwig said. "Now put it on shore where we can take a closer look."
Dandelion slowly swam over to the shore. Around halfway there, he suddenly yelped, dropping the object in the process; it quickly sank back to the bottom.
-"Sorry, it was sharp..."
-"If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself..." Bigwig mumbled, before diving himself, picking up the object, and carrying it the rest of the way to the shore, much faster than Dandelion.
A crowd gathered around the object, with most rabbits sniffing it and some touching it with their paws. Despite this, nobody was able to positively identify what it was. It did not appear to be alive, and it was certainly not a rock, but it remained very mysterious.
Vilthuril in particular spent a long time staring at it. Unlike the others, who didn't know what it was and soon moved on, she had a vague feeling she might have encountered it before. While she soon went back to the river, she kept thinking about it afterwards.
-"When we're done, I'm bringing that thing back to the warren," she eventually said.
-"Why would you want to do that?" Flyairth asked. "Aren't you afraid it might bring the White Blindness?"
-"No. There is no problematic scent, and the water would have washed away any carrying fleas. Besides, if it really was dangerous, we would all be already infected by now, since we all touched it."
-"Still, do you really want to risk it? It obviously has no meaningful purpose or value."
Nevertheless, Vilthuril disagreed with Flyairth's assessment; later that afternoon, when Bigwig had decided that his owsla had gone through enough for the day, she brought it back to the warren like she had said she would. To avoid further complaints, she stayed away from Flyairth in the crowd.
To Bluesky and Raincloud's annoyance, Toadflax indeed guided them all the way to their burrow. Even after they had entered, he lingered just outside for an uncomfortably long time, for unclear reasons. It got to the point where they considered chasing him away, but he ultimately left on his own before that was necessary.
Now that the two tricksters were alone, they could finally discuss things.
-"We can't delay much longer, or he'll get too suspicious," Raincloud said. "We'll have to contact Cowslip, or rather pretend to, soon."
-"I'm afraid you're right," Bluesky felt ashamed to admit. "But I don't know how to make it convincing enough. He's not as stupid as some other rabbits we tricked in the past."
-"Perhaps you should go out there and gather supplies."
-"Hey there, what about me?" came a third voice.
The two rabbits were startled by the voice. As they jumped and turned around, they saw that Flesca was there in the burrow with them.
-"What are you doing here?" the two bucks asked at once.
-"You didn't notice I was here?" Flesca shook her head. "I thought you were just ignoring me. How distracted can a rabbit be?"
-"What do you want?"
-"It's about Pimpernel. He's still alive."
-"It was only yesterday that you asked us to kill him," Raincloud said. "These things take time."
-"You're not just distracted, you're also slow. A day is more than enough time to commit a clean murder and also frame someone else."
-"So now it's no longer enough to just kill him, we have to frame someone too...who?"
-"I know how this works. Unless you frame someone else, you will quickly be found out, and reveal my involvement in exchange for a lesser punishment. As for who to frame, Toadflax would be a nice candidate. He's a big jerk, it would be nice to see him gone. I would ask you to kill him too, but from what I've seen of you, you don't have the skills to handle it. Now that I think of it, you may not have the skills to take care of Pimpernel either, but the secret's out, so you have no choice but to carry out your mission. Just make sure you do it properly, I don't want you to leave him half-dead: someone could stumble upon him and nurse him back to health. Or worse: he could expose you with his dying breath, at which point you snitch on me again."
Bluesky and Raincloud kept staring at Flesca in confusion. It seemed that she had carefully planned for various scenarios, but it all relied on them fulfilling their end of the bargain, which they weren't particularly interested in doing if they could avoid it. They still remained unsure just what she was even trying to accomplish.
-"Can we at least ask Prince Rainbow for his wise thoughts on the situation before we do anything permanent?" Raincloud finally said, hoping to buy him and Bluesky some time.
-"We all know you're not Prince Rainbow's messengers. Besides, I heard you scheming just now."
-"Murder goes against our morals," Bluesky improvised.
-"Fine set of morals you have...no problem tricking innocent rabbits into believing you're Prince Rainbow's messengers, and yet you refuse to kill someone who deserves it. Pfft. If you want something done right, do it yourself..."
Flesca slowly hopped out of the burrow, still mumbling incomprehensibly. Raincloud peaked outside; once she was gone, he turned to his partner.
-"Before this pointless interruption," he said, "you were going to gather summoning equipment."
-"Didn't you hear what she just said?" Bluesky replied. "It was ominous, like she was about to go kill Pimpernel herself."
-"And your point is...?"
-"Shouldn't we stop her?"
-"Enough with the excuses. Go prepare yourself for pretending to talk to Cowslip."
Not wanting to feel his partner's wrath, Bluesky went above ground. He still had a bad feeling regarding the entire situation with Flesca, especially with her final statement. Upon seeing her lurking in the grass further away, in the general direction of New Sandleford, he felt he had just one moral option: running towards her and pouncing on her.
-"Oh Toadflax, you embleer..." she started to say, until she realized that it was not Toadflax who had tackled her. "You! What do you think you're doing!?"
-"I won't let you kill Pimpernel."
-"You won't let me kil..." she repeated in confusion. "I wasn't going to kill Pimpernel, where did you even get that foolish idea?"
-"From you. When we refused to do it, you said that if you want something done right, you do it yourself.
-"That was just a metaphor! Did you see my size? There's no way I would ever be able to take him on and win, no matter how weak and sickly he may be!"
-"Oh..." Bluesky said stupidly.
-"Now will you let me go, or do I have to kill you too?"
-"Uh, yes..." Bluesky hopped off the doe. He was about to return to the task Raincloud had given him, when he made a troubling realization. "How big is this Pimpernel fellow?"
-"Oh, slightly smaller than you," Flesca said. "Why does it matter?"
-"You're too small to kill him, but you could kill me?"
-"Huh? Why would I want to kill you?" The doe seemed genuinely confused.
-"You threatened to do it if I didn't let you go."
-"OH FOR FRITH'S SAKE! That was another metaphor! Do you really need every single detail explained to you?"
Her frustration growing with each passing moment, Flesca hopped back underground, away from the source of these negative feelings. Bluesky still remained nervous, but nevertheless went back to work. Perhaps "Cowslip" could warn everyone about the doe's schemes.