Heroes of Flowers: Karmi's Camden Adventure

Chapter 12: Past and Present

Red lights, the sound of machines whirring and the pained cries of his siblings. He couldn't tell if the tiles were red because of the lighting or red because of the liquid pouring from the machine.

Mountains and mountains of spotted fur that belonged to his family were piled at the end, and all he could do was watch more of his kin be fed into the maw of death.

He felt his bones shake as a shadow loomed over the prison he was in. It had black and white fur on the top of his head, just like a dalmatian, but the creature looked human.

If he could call it that... with green eyes that pierced his soul, it smiled cruelly as its claws reached for him-

"DANTE!"

A gasp came from Dante's throat as he jolted upwards, as he blinked he saw that there wasn't a strange monster in front of him, but his littermate Deepak.

It had been his brother's voice he heard in the nightmare. "You were thrashing in your sleep." Deepak murmured. "Was it another dream?"

"It felt more like a vision." Something in his gut told him that there was this danger looming over the family. It wasn't the first time he had nightmares of blood-red rooms and mountains of fur, but this was the first time he saw anything resembling a living being in those dreams. "Whatever bad thing that's gonna happen, it's gonna happen soon."

"Oh dear." Deepak winced. He wished he could soothe Dante's stress over these string of visions, but he was equally terrified of whatever visions his brother was having of the future. "Maybe some food in your belly will give you the energy to help figure out what's going on."

The dark-furred pup frowned. "You always say that."

"Come on, let's get you downstairs, everyone else is at the table." Deepak nudged him off of the bed. "Dizzy and DeeDee were worried about you when you didn't wake up at the morning stampede."

Dante twitched an ear in acknowledgement. "Mhmm."

"And then Dylan sent me up to go check on you, I would've done it regardless but our older brother could use an attitude fix-"
Even if he wasn't sure what the future had in store, having his family there in the present brought some comfort to Dante, but it also made him more scared of whatever danger was going to happen to them.

"Bye Mum! I'm off to Kirby's again!" Eleanor waved to his mom as he prepared to head out.

"Hold on a moment there, Ellie." Eliana had something to say to that.

He gulped nervously. Oh no don't tell me they figured out I've also been going over to grandpa's a lot! When Eleanor wasn't over at the Greens household to help Karmi with her superhero training, he paid a visit to his grandfather to learn a little more about their family history.

It made him feel good, seeing the proud expression on his grandfather's face when practicing the fighting moves that had been passed from generation to generation. He'd even been sharing some of those moves with Karmi, telling his grandfather that made him give the animal whisperer a big hug.

"Yes, Mum?" He squeaked.

Eliana didn't comment on his nervousness. "Calm down, I just wanted to say I'm happy you've been out of the house more nowadays."

Eleanor relaxed. "Oh..."

"I was getting worried, you used to say you could talk to animals all the time." His shoulders tensed at his mother's words. There it was. No matter how many times he or his grandpa Davidus told her, Eliana never believed in his animal whisperer abilities.