Echoes of lost civilisations [sequel]

8

CW/TW: Gore, blood, death

Maggie hides behind me, holding my tail as I glimpse over at Survivor who is putting Nightcat on his shoulders before looking back at where the sound could have come from. Something about this pulls and twists at my conscience, giving me a horrible feeling in the gut.

I swallow and tighten my grip on my spear. I watch as a pile of rubble in the distance rises, as if something or someone was climbing out. A light pink slugcat climbs out, however it's back is facing us and it's tail still seems to be stuck. I hear Maggie gasp and run over to the figure as if recognising it.

I attempted to grab her arm to stop her but I wasn't quick enough. She's already behind the figure, pondering to touch its back. she rests her hand on the slugcat's shoulder. Survivor and I give each other an unsure look. He looks back at the slugcat as a piece of rubble falls from the pile as the slugcat begins to turn around.

Maggie takes her arm back and smiles. The slugcat's eyes are lifeless, as if they were dead. It seemed to have no mouth and it stared at Maggie silently.

Survivor takes Nightcat from his shoulders and sets her down before beginning to approach Maggie slowly from behind. "Maggie," he begins. The slugcat rises and oddly familiar tentacles emerge from the rubble. Once the figure climbed out entirely, the wires connected in my mind and it's obvious it did for Survivor as well.

The light pink slugcat's stomach was ripped and gouged out, leaving a disturbing sight of its ribcage. It's tail was mangled and torn apart. The tentacles that were seen in the rubble were growing out of the mangled tail.

Survivor begins to run towards Maggie as the slugcat reaches for her slowly.
I begin to run towards the scene as well, watching Maggie back up in fear, horror in her eyes as she screams and begins to cry from the sight in front of her. Survivor grabs Maggie by the armpits and pulls her back right before a tentacle stabs aggressively into the ground where Maggie was standing.

A long painful moan is heard coming from the rot infested corpse's tail. It's disgusting but I try to ignore it. Survivor looks back at Nightcat who's sitting alone in the distance watching everything. I turn back around towards Nightcat and take Maggie with me. I can't risk anything bad happening to the kid. It's probably hard enough with only one arm not even being an adult yet. I put Maggie on my shoulders. She continues to cry, hugging my neck tightly.

I hear a thump right as I reach Nightcat and take her by the hand. I turn around to see the slugcat falling to the ground and squirming. Survivor had stabbed it in the neck, but how come it was so weak? Telling by it missing a mouth and its mangled tail, it probably had a similar condition to Spearmaster where it receives its nutrients from its tail. I can tell it's been dead for a while now as it's incredibly weak from presumably starving.

Survivor reaches for his spear to pull it out of the slugcat's neck when a tentacle stabs him from behind right in the center of his chest. He yells in pain as the tentacle is roughly yanked out and he falls to the ground.

As soon as the slugcat's tentacle stabbed  through his chest I grit my teeth in anger. I have no choice but to set both of the children down. "Don't move a muscle." I command before running towards the scene. The light pink slugcat is so focused on Survivor that I run beside it in an attempt to stab it, but as I'm doing so I accidentally step on one of the bloody tentacles, drawing its attention to me.

I grunt out of frustration and barely dodged a tentacle in front, forcing me to take a step back but before I could catch my balance another one hit me, throwing me across the ground. If I stood up and ran back to the slugcat it'd be too late before it does something bad to Survivor or the kids or-

I suddenly noticed Maggie got up from her spot. I get up to try and see where she went while running back and picking up my spear.

But before I can take another step the slugcats head falls off. Maggie had miraculously climbed on the slugcat's back and grabbed onto Survivor's spear, bending it and making the stab larger, ripping the head off of the light pink slugcat's body.

I fall onto my knees in exhaustion. The slugcat stops moving and Maggie turns around, bends over and throws up.
I stand up and hold her fluffy cheeks back to prevent vomit from getting on them.

I try to avoid looking at the decapitated head as it's making me wanna throw up too, but I refuse too. I'm so relieved but surprised Maggie was brave enough to pull that off but at the same time she couldn't have done it if Survivor hadn't stabbed it in the neck... But why did Maggie run up to it in the first place as if she recognised it?

Maggie wipes her mouth off as Nightcat bumps into me. Her eyes are closed shut to prevent looking at the corpse. I chuckle and put Nightcat on my shoulders and walk over to Survivor's dead body and pick it up. I hold him closely to me and Maggie follows behind me as we walk away from the body awkwardly as if this all never happened.

I'm so puzzled and confused that I pop the question.
"Maggie..." I begin.
She looks up at me and tilts her head.
"Who was that?"

She lets out an uneasy groan and frowns.

"My friend. She saved me." She replies.
I take a moment to process this information, unsure by what she means with "friend"
"From what?" I question. She points forward and I follow her gaze.

She points at a ridiculously tall building where the top is connected to the edge of a cliff. A humongous gate stands on the top of the building, connecting to an even larger city and by what I see an iterator superstructure in the far distance that leads higher up a mountain on the cliff, passing above the clouds.

I look around and realize this city isn't even remotely close to the minimal size I can even see of the one past the comically large gate. The small city we find ourselves in at the moment is surrounded by the tall cliff as if we're in a deep pit. The large sky scraper seems to be the only way up to the gate.

"Was something inside that building that your friend saved you from?" I ask, my gaze wandering back to her as she waddles quickly to keep up with me. She nods.
"We can't- we can't go back there-!" She cries. And holds onto my leg. My eyes narrow and I sigh. "I'm not going to let anything hurt you again. I promise, okay?" I say and stop walking. I give her a comforting smile and she nods. "Ok..." She sighs.

"Hunteeeeeer!" Nightcat whines and leans her chin on my head. "I'm hungry!"
That's right. How could I forget to feed the gremlins.
"Hunter, I'm hungry too!" Maggie exclaims, jumping up and down.

There's still a long time before the cycle ends. I'm not seeing many clouds. I grunt. "Alright" I grunt. We arrive at the large sky scraper. In the first room are columns of shelters in the walls. Blue fruit dangle by old vines in the ceiling. "Huh, practical." I shrug.

I set Survivor down inside one of the shelters as the two kids feast on some of the bluefruit, and then proceed to join them.

Once we finish we settle down in the same shelter i set Survivor in. I'm confused about why there are so many shelters lined up next to each other but I suppose I'm not complaining. The shelter is long and rectangular shaped. I scoot Survivor over to the far back of the shelter and lay next to him as Maggie and Nightcat cuddle up to me.