At The Core Of It All

More Peaceful This Way

They walked along the crisscrossed path of the jungle, Sprite had told Corey that they would find Druig here. They'd also explained who Druig was.

Corey walked alongside Sprite sneaking glances at the Eternals' face, emotions masked but she could see the thoughts that Sprite was drowning in, their eyes gave it away.

They came to the edge of the path which led to a small village where people milled about chattering to one another.

The people walked by and stared at them, some waved and smiled others side-eyed them and walked by quickly.

Kingo said something in Spanish to someone, Karun had pulled out the camera again and was filming.

"It's very nice here, sir," Karun said and Corey smiled nodding her head in agreement.

"Peaceful," She murmured and Sprite looked up at her for a moment.

"Don't be fooled," Kingo said behind them. "Ignorance is bliss."

Sprite and Corey walked up to someone and Sprite began speaking Spanish. Corey spun around quickly amazed at the village.

Suddenly the person Sprite had been talking to changed, their eyes went yellow and Corey jumped back startled.

"Hello, Sprite," The person greeted but their voice didn't sound quite their own.

The doors to one of the buildings opened slowly and someone walked out, they walked over to greet them.

"I missed all of you," They said. "Please, make yourselves at home."

-☼-

They sat inside one of the buildings it had picnic tables and Corey sat on the edge of one. Her legs crisscrossed as she rocked back and forth slightly.

"You've given me a lot of bad news in one go, my lady," Druig spoke, they'd explained to him what had happened and what would happen.

"Will you help us?" Sersi asked hopefully.

"I am glad that..." He was cut off by the sound of a ring tone to Lizzo's song Juice.

Corey smiled and nodded her head along slightly as Sersi fumbled for her phone and silenced it.

"Hey, what's your service? I'm not getting any bars." Kingo whispered to her and Corey looked at her own phone, no bars.

"Do you all remember this forest? Beautiful. It was the last place we all lived together," He said walking over to Thena and Gilgamesh.

"I've protected these people for 20 generations now from the outside world and from themselves." He said walking toward Kingo and Karun, Kingo had motioned for Karun to stop filming for the moment.

"Your kind, my friend, you will be responsible for your own extinction one day. Don't you think?" Druig said to Karun.

"I think we must learn from our mistakes and do better, sir. You must not give up hope-" He didn't get to finish before Druig took control of his mind and forced him to throw the camera breaking it. Corey winced at the noise and put their hands to their ears.

"Oh no you didn't," Kingo said standing up. "Okay, new rule, no more possessing people's valets."

"Oh, where is your sense of humour Kingo?" Druig asked as they stood face to face.

"I'm sorry, sir," Karun apologized.

"Don't apologize it's not your fault," Kingo told him before turning back to face Druig. "You are not a god. You know that right?"