Beauties and Beasts

Chapter 92: brought to you by falling off mountains

Next time on Yugioh: Captain flips over a trap card. Protagonists with crazy anime hair go 'oh no!' while the holograms of their bunny and leopard monster cards give grim frowns. But then Shay, with lightning bolts of blond in her bangs, go 'ho ha! You are but scum, captain! And lecturing you on your scumminess somehow gives me the power to play THIS!' What 'this' is exactly is for you to find out!

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Captain stood at the head of the tunnel, bright light pooling around him. "Why are you leaving?"

Neara stepped behind Vincent, who put Shay down from his back to place a protective arm over her, moving her behind him slowly as he stared Captain down. Harvey had fallen behind them as they went and, as Neara glanced back, only the gleam of his eyes from the shadows could be seen.

"Shay needs to leave."

Captain sighed. "Tell me why?"

Vincent just scowled. "I don't need to say."

"If it's food, and I know you were worried about that, we would have left to find her some. She had sixteen kits, of course she's going to be skinny." Captain's voice sounded calm and reasonable, but as it echoed and magnified in the tunnels, it turned sinister.

"Wolf shit." Vincent spat, his good eye blazing as he shielded Shay. "I-I-I need to..."

"You need to?" Captain's voice sounded infinitely patient. Neara glanced nervously at her friend, who seemed stunned into silence, her mouth still open. Harvey's growls could be heard in the shadows behind them.

The dragon head on her shoulder stirred, snuffling as it caught on to the tense atmosphere. The strands of hair that had escaped her braid to dangle past her cheek shifted and tickled with his rising.

"I... we..."

"So you want to play the hero for her mates?"

"No, that's not..."

"Then what, Vincent? If not for Aetius, you and Harvey would have the females to yourselves. We promised, we'd take them back, didn't we?"

"That's not it!"

"Then speak. I give you this opportunity to explain yourself." Captain stood still, his hands at his sides.

"Shay is too thin. She needs to get out. She's dying of the birthing sickness."

Captain waited in the silence.

"So...so move..."

"What about the babies? Did you think about them? Lost without their mothers, all twenty-two of them." Captain shook his head slightly. "Selfish, especially considering if they die, there won't be anymore."

"Don't think I--of course I..."

Captain waited, but Vincent wouldn't say anything else. His face was unreadable in the darkness. "Are you finished?"

Vincent said nothing, clenching his fists and looking frustrated.

Asher gave a low-throated growl.

"I kept them here because Shay's mates are waiting outside the original tunnel. While I could excavate it, the children will do better if their mothers were here during their transformation. Once that happened, and the snow melted, we would place Shay and Neara inside the tunnel with sufficient supplies to get them to the other side safely, without the need for male interference. We would collapse the tunnel behind them, sealing that way to the Valley off forever. It has been compromised."

Vincent scoffed. "Captain, more words don't make you right. She's my mate. Mates come first."

"Oh? Well, that's a first among us Rabbits. I'm afraid to say you're alone in that belief. We wouldn't have known about this escape plan without Aetius." Captain continued.