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CH 3

Plans and Names

"Is every one in agreement?" Aeddan asked, looking up from the map. For the past few hours, Aeddan had used all the knowledge he had accumulated throughout the years on map reading, to plan the route the group would take out of the desert biome to what he hoped would be a better situation.

"no, ah' am not in agreement" the southern wolf said, crossing his arms. "what happens when we come in ta' contact with one a the other teams?" he asked. "We need a plan in case it comes ta a fight. Who actually knows how ta fight?" the wolf said, shrugging his shoulders. "If it comes ta a fight, all of us will be un-prepared, unda equipped, an' as my daddy always says, up shit creek without no paddle."

"He has a point you know" the dragon said, rolling the knife Aeddan gave him from claw to claw. "Do we fight them with just these or should we designate someone who has experience in a fight to protect us if we run in to trouble?"

"Well the first thing we should do is get moving. We only have a days' worth of rations and three canteens of water. The sooner we begin covering ground, the sooner our situation might change for the better." Aeddan said folding the map up, hefting the bag, and setting out for the first way point he had designated on the map.

At first the others were hesitant, and then the dragon started after Aeddan. After that, the rest began to follow closely behind, not wanting to be left behind.

"So, how do you know all this information anyways? You seem more like the stay at home and play video games kind of anthro" the dragon said catching up to Aeddan.

"Huh? Oh, I read a lot of books. I haven't actually done this kind of thing before, but I have a lot of free time on my hands." Aeddan said shifting the bag on his shoulder. Aeddan hadn't realized how heavy the bag really was now that he was moving. Every step felt heavier than the last one, and every so often his feet would slip in the sand.

"Huff, huff, this is harder than it seemed in those adventure books" Aeddan thought as he trudged up a dune. "Whoa!" Aeddan said as he slipped falling back.

"I got ya, you ok?" the dragon asked catching Aeddan before he fell back down the dune then pulling him to the top of the dune.

"Yeah, just slipped there for a second thanks uh... who are you any ways?" Aeddan asked with a quizzical look on his face.

"Heh, guess we covered everything but names huh? Well for future reference, it's Marcus Nachtschuppengurt. Just call me Marcus though." Marcus said taking the bag from Aeddan and sholdering it himself, then extending his one of his claws.

"Aeddan uh.... i don't know my last name. But Aeddan is fine" Aeddan said extending his paw and taking Marcus's claw in his. "So Marcus, your last name sounds german". Aeddan said as they began to trudge forward again, a light wind begining to whip some of the sand over the dunes. "Nachtschuppengurt...that translates in to Nighscale right?" Aeddan asked, wracking his brain as best he could for the information.

"i'm acctualy suprised" Marcus said, looking genuenly suprised and impressed. "Just how much information do you have in that brain of yours?" Marcus asked, lightly knocking on Aeddan's head like one would to a watermelon to check on how ripe it was. "But yes, it is german. My parents live in germany and i am, was a foreign exchange student. I came over here to study the sexual relationships between humans and anthropomorfic sapiens. They grabbed me as i was walking home from the library in the Scales district" Marcus explained as they topped another dune. "How did they grab you, if you don't mind me asking".

"it was basicaly the same way for me. I was walking...home, and an armored car pulled up behind me and before i could shout or do anything. They had me bound, gagged, blind folded and injected me with something that put me out." Aeddan said, slipping a little down the other side of the dune. "hey, how are the rest of them coming along?" Aeddan asked Marcus once he reached the bottom.

"suprisingly well acctualy for a bunch of kids who have no idea what they're doing. Then again, i guess i can't talk since i'm in the same boat as them. What really suprisses me is the fact none of them have broken down from dispare yet." Marcus said watching the skunk help up the shark man after he had taken a spill down the dune.

A few of the other anthros had spots on their shirts and pants where the sand had stuck to the sweat that had appeared over the course of the last couple hours of hiking over the dunes. They were starting to show other signs of wear to how ever. Where they should have had an easy time walking down one dune, they slipped and slid down. Their breathing had become labored to the point that Aeddan could hear them as well.

"Let them know we are almost to the first way point, i can see it from here" Aeddan said pointing off towards a large, pointy bump in the distance. "Won't be long until we can rest for the night and, if everyone isn't too tired, eat what little supplies we have".

They were to tired to eat the supplies they had, once they reached the sharp bump which turned out to be an outcropping of rocks. The outcropping had natural bridge conected to it that the tired out group took shelter under; they would have thrown up any ways after pushing themselves that hard. Earlier that evening they had "drawn straws" to see who would have night gaurd duty; in reality what they did was took some grass and cut it in to different lengths then each of them chose one. And wouldn't you know it, Aeddan had first watch. It didn't help that the other "loser" was the sweet looking female lion that had treated him so nicely earlier that day, so it felt rather awkward to Aeddan. As the other eight settled in to sleep, Marcus still in posetion of the food and water, Aeddan and the lioness watched the artificial sun "sink" below the horizon and the "moon" rise.

"it's Miia in case you were wondering" the lioness said suddenly, her voice like a soft melody.

"wh-what?" Aeddan stuttered, starting to blush again under his fur.

"Miia, my name is Miia. But don't ask what my last name is...i don't exactly have one. I am what you would call an orphan" Miia said flicking her tail from side to side in aprehention.

"ah, mine's Aeddan" Aeddan said sticking out his paw jerkingly.

It was the first time a female, let alone one his own age had spoken to him with out sounding like he was something disgusting they had found on the under side of thier shoe. So he didn't exactly know how to react seeing as how she wasn't putting him down for how he looked or for his speices.

"i uh...don't know my last name. My parents died in an accident when i was veary young, and i was dropped at an orphanage too so...um, yeah" Aeddan said looking away scratching the back of his head, his embaresment increasing by the second. "i'm going to just, i'm going on patrol around the area" Aeddan said, extracting himself from the situation.

Aeddan hurried away before Miia could say any thing more. Aeddan didn't really believe he needed to patrol. The area where the group had plunked it's self down had decent enough cover and only two ways in and out, he just wasn't exactly good at talking to girls. But he was good at escaping... usauly.

"Aeddan! Wait a minute" Miia said starting after him.

"wait, she's following me? Oh come on" Aeddan thought, pretended not to hear her. He picked up his pace a little, hoping he would loose her.

"Aeddan, hey Aeddan. Hold up" Miia said starting to quiken her own pace to catch up to Aeddan.

Soon Aeddan was jogging just to try to get further away, not caring that he now was openly ignoring her. But now Miia was one step ahead of him and doubled her pace so she was now closing the gap. Aeddan noticed this and tried to out run her.

"I...huff...said...huffff...WAIT!" Miia said takeling Aeddan.

Miia's takel sent both of them flying. Aeddan felt her hit him. He felt the sensation of falling again. only this time, it didn't stop. Aeddan had closed his eyes, awaiting the impending impact with the solid ground. But because it never cae he opened them. The two of them were falling straight down a hole. The hole had been hidden by the shadow of a large rock that stood at the mouth of it, and it wasn't so much a hole as it was more of a jagged tear in the ground. So it was realy more of a crevas. The only reason Aeddan and Miia hadn't seen it was because niether was paying attention to where they were going. But like all of Aeddan's slips, trips, and spills, they were relativly short.

Aeddan hit the bottom of the crevas with a resounding WHUMP in a sort of spread-eagle formation, which he followed up with a short but painful "oof" as Miia landed on him.

"wow that was lucky. I landed on something soft. Hey Aeddan, where'd you go?" Miia asked, looking about for Aeddan in the dim light from the artificial moon that was shining down through the crevas opening.

"down here" Aeddan moaned, the ground muffeling his words so it sounded like he was speaking in to a thick blanket or pillow. "would you mind getting off me please?" Aeddan asked.

"oh! Oh Aeddan, i am so sorry" Miia said getting off Aeddan. "are you hurt baddly? Can you move?" she asked, feeling absolutly terrible about what just happened.

"just what ever pride i could possibly have left, nothing really seariouse. I think i can make it" Aeddan said running through his mental check list, checking to see if there was any brain damage or any detrimental effects on his memory. Once he was satisfied he stood up, or rather tried to atleast. When he tried to stand, a sharp pain shot up his leg and he toppled over. "damn, ok, maybe i am hurt" Aeddan said panting a little from the pain in his leg. "i think i landed on that wrong" he said, feeling his left ankle.

Aeddan's ankle was indeed injured. It was begining to swell and if he had been human, his ankle could have been broken. But it was injured all the same and he was in enough pain that it was hard to breath if he put any real wieght on it.

"Here, let me help. It's the least i can do seeing as how you broke my fall" Miia said kneeling down and picking Aeddan up, supporting his left side. "besides, we need to find a way out of here and you seem to know more about a lot of things than the rest of us do".

"not really, i just know what I know from reading books. I have no actual experience at doing any of the things i know of" Aeddan said, blushing from embaresment again. "there are a few tricks to climbing out of a crevas that i know of, but i don't think we can impliment them with the way my ankel is right now" Aeddan said, scratching the fur on the under side of his muzzle as he thought.

"so where does that leave us?" Miia asked, shifting Aeddan a little bit to a more comfortable position.

"well it leaves us needing to find an alternate route out of here. We need to move out of the light" Aeddan concluded taking one limping step forward.

It was slow going, Miia supporting Aeddan, as he limped toward the edge of the light falling down through the crevas. It was an eerie sight once they reached the lights edge. It was like coming up to a wall made of nothing but darkness. It sent a chill down both thier spines.

"i'll go first. You know, to check to make sure there even is any more ground after this" Miia said setting Aeddan down on the ground.

It was veary surreal, watching Miia walk in to the darkness. It was like watching some one step in to a heavy stage curtin and magicaly disolve in to it. Aeddan felt a sliver of panic invade his brain as Miia was just suddenly gone from his view. It didn't help that sand covered the floor so he couldn't even hear the sound of her foot steps receading.

"Miia? You ok? Hello? Miia, are you still alive?" Aeddan said, getting a little anxiouse and worried. Aeddan turned around on to hands and knees and reached for the darkness hesitantly. The tips of his paws, just inches away from the currten of shadow.

"Hey there Aeddan" Miia said popping out of the shadows, mear inches from Aeddan's face. A mischeiviouse smile played across her lips as she poked the upper half of her torso out of the darkness like a demon forming it's self from the shadows.

"AAH!" Aeddan shouted, tumbling back wards. Then, "urg!" as he tumbled back on to his ankel, causeing more pain to shoot up his leg again. After a while the pain subsided and he was left with a dull, aching throb.

"hey Miia, let's not do that again ok?" Aeddan asked, laying on his back looking up at the dome cieling. Aeddan wondered how the government was going to explain away the disappearance of almost a hundred children from the nation's populace and the neighboring countries. Aedan knew that he and Miia were easy cases to explain. They were both from an orphanage, so any excuse could explain them disappearance.

"you ok? You looked like you were really out there" Miia said standing over him on all fours. If any one was to find them down there, they would think something was about to happen between the two of them.

"Miia. Do you know where you are right now?" Aeddan asked, raising an eyebrow suggestivly.

"oh! I uh, sorry" Miia said, a little bit of red showing under her fur from embaresment as she huried to remove her self from the position she was in. "here", Miia said taking hold of Aeddan's paw and pulling him to his feet "it's safe by the way incase you were wondering".

"i was infact wondering that. But for how far?" Aeddan asked, as he tried to balance on his one good leg.

"preatty far actualy", Miia ansewered as she took Aeddan's arm again to help him walk "it looks like there is a long tunnle if we go this way".

Miia helped Aeddan to the edge of the light again. It still creeped Aeddan out. The darkness looked like it was ready swallow him whole, suck out his spirit, and crush his being in to tiny little pieces. Aeddan began to shake a little as he neared the darkness.

"Aeddan? Are you afraid of the dark?" Miia asked, concerned by Aeddan's little shaking fit.

"it feels like i'm about to step in to the belly of a beast that wants to swallow my everything and spit out nothing but bones" Aeddan said, continuing to shake "i guess i am still afraid of the dark. I'm such a kid huh?"

"Aeddan, we are both still children. I'll be right here next to you the whole time. Now let's take it one step at a time ok?" Miia asked, giving Aeddan's paw a comforting squeeze, "it'll be fine. On three ok? One...two...three"

Hey there every fur. Thanks for reading CH 3. I still havn't heard anything back from any of you on what you thought of the story so far. So please, send me a message or leave me a shout. I work hard on this so all i ask is that you guys read it and give me feed back. Who knows, i may even include one of your RP characters in the story at some point. So get those digits moving and drop me a message. Hopefuly i won't get writter's block and will have a new chapter up some point in the coming days.

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