Needle and Thread

Skyward Sword

[$^$]

"There should be a tribe just near us," Winter said. "The data says that it's made up of close to fifty faunus, and that they're echidnas."

"Echidna's here?" Hadi asked, swooping down from her skulking spot in the tree branches above. "Where? It's been so long."

"Uh, no. Echidnas. Like the animal."

"Oh jeez. I hate them. Please tell me we're not going to go see a whole tribe of the little imposters."

"What--"

"We are, aren't we?" Hadi huffed. "I hate you. Why couldn't I get an actually nice Player, with a companion that gets me. Maybe like a rat or something."

"You are lucky that you did not get an echidna," Ananda warned her. "Perhaps I will recruit one, when we find them."

"Stop arguing, you two," Winter sighed. "It's getting old, fast."

"What is?" Everyone whirled around to face the voice. Winter pulled out his sword without even thinking, before realizing that it was just a faunus. He was relatively handsome, or he would have been if he ddn't have spines protruding from his back.

"Agh, get it away!" Hadi said, shivering.

"I don't like to be talked to like that," the echidna said. "Does she have echidnaphobia or something?"

"That's a thing?" Winter asked, surprised.

"I don't know. I just made it up."

They stood in awkward silence for a minute.

"So, what's your name?" Ananda asked.

"Gus," the echidna replied.

"Gus?"

"Gus." The echidna scratched the back of his head. "Are you guys going to just stand around all day?"

"Right," Winter said, remembering. "Uhm, could you take us to your Lore Master?"

"Sure," Gus said. "Follow me. But he's really old, so don't tick him off."

Gus led Ananda and Winter towards the echidnas. "I'll just stay here," Hadi said. "Make sure that you don't tick off the old guy while you're trying to extract info from him and find out how to beat one of the most powerful beings on the planet!"

"Gee, thanks," Winter muttered as he walked away.

[@2D3D4D]

The ship was not, in fact, hauling any treasure. Nereida huffed exsasperatedly. "All that work, and all we get is more useless cloth and more slightly more useful metal."

"We can use the cloth to repair the sails," Benny reminded her. "After all, they're bound to tear every now and then. Or we can trade it at port."

"I'm a pirate, not a merchant," Nereida grumbled. "No, I need something cool. Something big. Something... like a home base."

"Uh oh," Benny said. He knew something bad was going to happen when Nereida took that tone of voice.

"Yeah," Nereida said, staring off into the distance. "Yeah! Benny! I've got an awesome idea!" She didn't wait for him to answer. "Let's grab an island!"

"But, Nereida. Who on Earth would have an island for us to steal? And aren't you the princess? Wouldn't it be useless to grab an island anyways when you could probably just ask for one?"

"That's not the way pirates do things," Nereida replied. "Thought you'd have figured that out by now."

Benny sighed. "I just had to ask."

[Fandom+ (1)]

Lyra was shaken awake by Andesine. She cracked one eye and groaned. The sun wasn't even up yet. She closed her eyes again.

"Lyra wake up!" Andesine hissed.

"I'm not gonna fall for that," Lyra grumbled, turning onto her stomach.

"Lyra, GET UP," Andesine replied, jerking her into a sitting position. "Some guy stole our food, so I beat him up, and now i think his frieds are kinda pissed--"

"Stupidest story I've ever heard," Lyra said.

That was when she felt a sharp prick of pain in her arm. She opened her eyes, prepared to scold Andesine for pinching her only to see a small dart sticking out of her arm with a purple feather on one end.

"Oh, hey," She said. "There's a dart in my arm."

"No shi- ow!" Andesine plucked another dart out of his sweater. "These needles are long."

"Who's attacking us?" Lyra asked, looking around as another dart whistled close by her head. "And, uh, are these darts poisoned?"

"You're such an idiot- ow. Of course they're poisoned! Take them out!" Andesine reached to pluck out the one in Lyra's arm, only to get hit by another dart. "Would you stop that?!" He yelled at the bushes.

"You've lost it," Lyra said.

All she remembered after that were her dreams. They were all the ones that she'd had before, of course. It had been that way since the Magma Temple. Thankfully, though, no weeping angels lurked in the shadows.

***************************

"Ugggh."

"Finally. Earth Jesus, you took way too long to wake up."

"Andy?"

"Don't call me that."

"Whatever. Where are we?"

"I don't know everything. Although, we are both tied to poles."

"Sexy." Lyra opened her eyes and looked around.

They were in a small clearing in a forest. Trees towered over them, letting very little sunlight in. Strangely, though, it was silent. Andesine had been suspended about a foot above the ground, so he couldn't teleport away. Someone had wreathed his horns in little flower garlands, and removed his sweater. Her hands

"Stop staring at me," Andesine said.

"I'm not staring at you," Lyra replied. "Anyway, you wouldn't know unless you were staring at me."

"I wasn't staring at you," Andesine said.

"Yeah, but you're blushing."

"I am not--" Andesine stopped and took a deep breath. "Listen. Just summon your sword and cut us free. I am not waiting around to see what these guys wanna do to us."

"Fine. But I swear, if they were nice and I hurt them, you're gonna get it."

Lyra was just about to pull out her sword from the other dimension where it was stored when their captors came.

Lyra had never seen a stranger creature. They looked almost like Pikmin. They were little creatures, about half as tall as Lyra, with flowers on their heads, and their bodies were covered in light, moss-colored fur.

"Uh," Lyra said. "Hi?"

"Hello!" They chorused.

"Um. Why are we tied up?" Lyra asked.

"Because we are going to eat you!" They replied.

"Great," Andesine sighed.

"I would get mad at them," Lyra admitted, "but they're way too cute."