Smiling Critters: Ancestra Au - Cancelled

The Cause - End of Season 1

It was cloudy, a child was crying and a woman was on the phone, she was calling someone, it seemed like she was asking for help. She left the phone on the table where she was and went to take care of the child.

The woman was a swine, a pink pig, a bit skinny but pretty because of her clothes; she took the baby from an old crib and tried to calm the child.

Some time later, not long after, the door was abruptly opened by a human man holding a glass bottle of some kind of brandy. The two argued for a while until the man broke the bottle and attacked the woman, who was stabbed and fell sitting near a dresser.

She bled for a while as the man stabbed her several times in the stomach, the child was not hurt so far, but she cried louder…

Police car sirens could be heard in the distance and the man was already losing his patience with all the noise; he went to the sink and took a knife... he approached the child, put his fingers in her mouth, pulled out the child's tongue, and with the knife... He cut it off.

Picky woke up. It was a nightmare. Her heart was racing and so was her breathing. The bed was soft, but the nightmare made the pig feel hard. The girl sat on the edge of the bed and began to regulate her breathing. At that moment, someone opened the bedroom door.

It was a fox, no, it wasn't Nathan, the fox was a girl with a strange eye color, with a pink in the center and a light green on the edge of the iris, the pupil remained black. One of the fox's eyes was covered by some white stripes, the eye in question was the right one.

— Have you had nightmares, Miss Picky? I came back, but I found out that you got a new partner, a girl named Hoppy.

Picky replied yes, her gestures also complement that the rabbit was her childhood friend. And important ones.

— Hehe, yes yes, well I could feel your nightmare, I told my father and he will look into it… after all, your past is hidden, right? Any nightmare counts as evidence — she approaches the bed — well, wash your face and come down, the food will be ready soon.

“Mia is back… she didn’t seem angry because of Hoppy’s arrival, yeah, she must be fine, but… my nightmare, what did all that mean? Why did that man cut the baby’s tongue?” Picky thought as he saw Mia, that fox, leave the room.

After thinking for a while, she got up and went to a bathroom in the room. She not only washed her face and brushed her teeth, she took the opportunity to take a quick shower. The nightmare made her sweat a lot.

Downstairs, Picky received her breakfast plate which she ate slowly, as if she were not hungry;

— If you don't want to eat, that's okay, after all... you had a nightmare — said Nathan sitting in his armchair.

The pig then leaves the plate aside and tries to explain what the dream was like, briefly recounting some scenes, but most importantly, the baby's tongue that had been cut out.

—Heavy, huh? Supposedly your tongue was cut out when you were a child, and from what you told me, that man could be your own father.

— Her father then killed her mother, and then cut out his daughter's tongue... he must have died because there were police sirens, they probably killed him... — commented Mia, the girl who was now wearing a white dress with details of waves in a watercolor blue tone.

As they talked, they debated this story for a while and came to a brief conclusion: “it’s your father’s fault”, because she was both an orphan and mute.

After breakfast, a short rest, and during this rest, Hoppy appeared, all energetic and bouncing next to her pig friend. She soon noticed Mia and became curious about her, in a controlled manner she asked some questions and got answers.

Mía, Nathan's daughter, has powers that she doesn't want to use for safety reasons. Although she looks very young, like someone who is nineteen or twenty, she is actually over seventy years old... her father doesn't want to reveal his age.

After conversations and more conversations, the group went out to train;

— Hmm..? Who's that? — asked Hoppy, seeing someone in the middle of the place, which now had a flowery floor.

— Keith… my boyfriend — Mía replied — he only came here because he heard about Picky, and that she is an axe user.

— So he came to fight? Or rather… — the rabbit emanated energy — to fight?

— No, you silly girl — he laughed a little — it's just that he's also an axe user…

Everyone approached Keith, he was a gray wolf, wearing a slightly faded brown scarf, a worn white shirt, dark blue shorts with some square patterns in a lighter blue. On his back, floating without being attached, a kind of guitar that resembled an axe... it resembled an axe much more than a guitar.

— So… Picky, huh? An apprentice who uses an axe…

— Tell me, you’re not more than twenty years old either, right? — asked Hoppy, questioning his own age…

— I'm seventy-two, and don't ask why…

The rabbit was confused to the point of becoming dizzy with all this, but she didn't notice that Picky, next to her, was already pulling out his axe from his apple necklace, even though the brightness was blinding, she still didn't notice.

Mia teleported both her and Hoppy away, in this case, close to the house; the rabbit questioned her best friend's attitude of accepting a fight like that, so quickly and without knowing the opponent.

Nathan explains that much of the old training involved a one-on-one fight, apprentices, veterans, or masters of the same type of combat; both fight with axes, one can learn from the other.

Far away… inside Estella, or rather, underneath her; Bobby, the huge bear was in his office, tapping his pen while staring at a paper with some texts.

“Why do I still insist on delaying? We already have the right force to invade Incript and take the Star of Will… I think I’ll speed this up.”

She got up, and with slow steps, left the place, took the elevator and went up to the garage area where at that moment, Catnap was present and helping in the improvement of a Lamborghini, a Murcielago.

The bear screamed to get attention, the place fell silent and she made her announcement;

— This new year that is coming will be the final stretch, we manage many plans to reach our goal, or rather, my goal, and next year, the training will be intensified, there will be a selection of those who will stay, and those who will leave. Catnap! You will be an important piece.

“W-What? Now? I barely have direct contact with Dogday and now this? She’s going to speed things up and fire a bunch of people… she’s only going to want the strongest ones… he’s only going to cause trouble” thought Catnap, he was nervous and his fists clenched, but even so, he agrees with his mother.