The Animagem (Complete)

Chapter 5, The Queen Bee

Kiarah opened up the map and told Alex where to go,
"Turn right at Tahlia Street, and left at Jun drive,"
Now they were entering the outskirts of the city. Tall weeds and grass grew beside the road. They passed fields with cows grazing, and Sheep being sheared. They were about to have the smoothest journey all day, until Aidan showed up. He and his army stood right in front of them. Alex slammed on the brakes just before hitting him.
"What do you want traitor?" Alex asked him harshly.
"Well hello Alex, I see you've got some new friends, it looks like you've heard my story," Aidan grinned, "I pushed Smoden into the Lapgon turning him into the mouse thing, blah blah blah. Well that doesn't matter, we've found you here because you left tracks outside the aquarium. So we followed them, figured you were going this way, and set up reinforcements. Oh, I'm so evil!"
"Clear away Aidan," Jamie asked harshly.
"No, unless you have some other magic powers that make people move, then I am staying glued to this spot, RIGHT HERE,"
"I'll make you move, painfully." Alex warned, get her hands ready.
"No-no, I'll make you a deal. You give me the little one and all your friends, and I'll set you free, or, you hand yourself over, and I let your friends go free. You don't choose, you die."
Neither option appealed to Alex.
"I guess we'll have to die then,"
Alex hopped off her motorcycle, and strut towards Aidan. He pulled out a gun. Alex whipped it out of his hands before he could even aim it properly. It landed somewhere in the long maze of grass.
"You hurt me or my friends and you get what you deserve," She said with hatred
"Then why don't you just do it now?" Aidan lamely argued.
"I was waiting for you to ask,"
She pulled out a clawed hand and swiped it across Aidan's face. He was left with a 3, 12cm scratches. 
Alex strut back over to her motorcycle, hopped on and floored the accelerator. Squidbrain and Jamie did the same. Aidan's crew had to leap out of the way to avoid getting hit. Aidan and his crew pulled out shotguns and began to shoot at them. Alex and Kiarah ducked and weaved. Miraculously not getting hit, until a bullet skimmed across Alex' forearm. It felt like when you fall over on concrete, the feeling that your knees give when they are grazed. Except this was on her arm. Alex hid the pain and continued on. They had soon outrun them. But Alex didn't want to get all comfy for too long, because she bet that Aidan had gotten to that spot on some sort of vehicle, or maybe the Lords were lucky and just caught a taxi.
The next location was a beehive, not a house, a beehive. Alex had no idea how they were going to do this, but she hoped that they would succeed.
"Here!" Kiarah exclaimed.
They had arrived at their destination. Alex hopped off her motorcycle and turned it back into a pen. Jamie and Squidbrain did the same. They had ridden to a large field full of dead grass, and only one tree. At least finding the beehive wouldn't be hard. They hoped over a barbed wire fence and changed into animals. Jamie a wolf, Alex a lioness and Squidbrain an otter. They trotted over to the tree, even from a 10 metres away Alex could hear the bees.
When they got there they changed back. Alex and Jamie both looked at each other for ideas.
"Uh, hello? My name's Alex, and this is Jamie and this is Kiarah and Squidbrain," Alex took a stab in the dark.
Nothing happened except a few bees flew out. Alex hadn't wanted to do this, but they were going to have to go inside.
"How the heck are we going to get in there?" Kiarah asked.
"You're going to do it," She pointed at Squidbrain.
"Me?!" Squidbrain complained.
"You can be a krill right?"
"Yeah, but I'm going to need some water,"
"Jamie!"
"On it!" He blew a small bubble without a bubble wand, and it floated onto Squidbrain's head.
"It'll be like you're a hamster in a glass bowl,"
Squidbrain finally agreed to do it, and transformed into a krill, the bubble shrunk to her size. After a bit, she teleported into the beehive.

Inside was covered with all the honey, honey comb, and bees Squidbrain could ever want, in fact, it was a bit too much. Squidbrain had absolutely no idea about how she was going to do this. She rolled over to a bee,
"Hello?" She said in Krill language.
"Buzz, buzzzzz," It said.
"Do you speak me? Ugh, Queen? Leader? I need Leader!" She tried asking for the queen bee.
"Buzz, buzz, buzz," The bee flew away, but soon came back.
"Follow you?" Squidbrain asked.
The bee made a reassuring buzz and flew off, slower this time. Squidbrain followed. They rolled and flew through a maze of caverns and caves until they reached a throne made of honeycomb. Sitting on the throne was a teenage, human girl with brown hair and blonde tips. The weird thing was that she was the size of a bee. She was drinking a cup of honey. When she noticed Squidbrain she nearly choked. She flicked a drop of honey at Squidbrain, and it passed through her bubble and into her throat.
"Speak," The queen demanded.
"My name is Squidbrain," The queen snickered, "Hey! Don't laugh! My besties made that up for me! Now, I have reason to believe that you are a Lord of the Wild like me and my friends,"
"Lord of what's? All that I know is that a talking krill is in my beehive."
"I'm a Lord of the Wild, like you! This is just one of my many forms, my main one is a human,"
"Tuh, as if I'm to believe that."
Squidbrain changed into a plankton.
"Hmph, okay. Maybe you are a Lord of the Wild,"
"So you do know what they are!"
"Of course I do, I am one of them. As were my parents,"
Squidbrain was stunned, a minute ago she had known nothing about the Lords of the Wild, but now this arrogant queen seemed to be an encyclopaedia on them. "My parents were taken away from me when I was 8. Lawyers came and said they'll be gone for just a few days, but days turned into years. So I finally found some courage and ran away from home. I eventually stumbled across this tree. I was afraid of the bees at first, but they couldn't hurt me even if they tried. It was like I could understand them, they taught me how to use my powers. How to shrink and turn into a bee. Now that you've heard my story, I'd like to give you my name. Victoria, pleased to meet you."
Victoria held out her hand and Squidbrain held out a feeler, they shook hands/feelers.
"I'll call you Vic,"
"Fine, now tell me why you have come here,"
"Smoden, the Lord of Pollution, and Aidan, some evil pig guy, plan on polluting the world forever. But we need to stop him. Alex, I like to think of her as our group leader, has seen Smoden before, and apparently it was pure evil. Anyway, we have this one Lord of pollution on our side, Tornadius, and he has given us a list to do.
1.Find all the Lords of the Wild
2.Find the Sharma, whoever she is
3.Face Smoden and stop the world from ending
Simple! The only problem is that you're going to need to leave your hive and come with us," Squidbrain exclaimed.
"Problem!? I've been wanting to get out of here for ages! The bees won't let me, I think they expect me to start reproducing their kind. How about I put someone else in charge," She scanned the room, "Jacinta!" a bee flew over, "Get over here! You're next in line right?" The bee hummed and sat on the throne, "Just until I get back okay?" The bee buzzed happily in response. Squidbrain got ready to teleport.
"Hold on!" Squidbrain warned.
Vic felt the world go upside down and then back again.
They landed with a thump, right outside Vic's hive.
Squidbrain had changed human and Vic was now normal size. Alex, Jamie and Kiarah jumped with fright.
"Well hello," Vic curtsied.
"Um, hi. Nice crown." Jamie pointed out the crown made of honeycomb on Vic's head.
"Um, thank you," Vic replied, "My name is Queen Victoria, or just Vic to you. I am thy Lord of Insects,"
It was a good start to a conversation.
"Hi," Alex chimed in, "I'm Alex, this is Jamie, this is Kiarah and I expect you have already met Squidbrain."
"Yes, now give me the hoedown on what we need to do, Squidbrain has explained most, but I want to hear your story, and then we'll trade and I'll tell you mine,"
Alex told their story all the way up to when they met Vic, Jamie and Squidbrain adding in bits that they thought were when they were most heroic. Then Vic told hers, how her parents left her, and how she learned how to shrink and change into insects.
"Well! That's good, um." This was getting very awkward, "How about a picnic?" Alex asked.
They spread out on the grass. Jamie and Alex fetched the food from the saddlebags of the motorcycle. Alex didn't know what to think of this Lord, she was a bit old-fashioned speaking. Alex hoped she would get used to their kind of talk quickly. Otherwise Alex would have to go find some books by Shakespeare. Alex carried the platters from when Tornadius had given them food. Luckily the saddlebags had built in coolers.
Alex summoned fire and held out a steak above her hand. She did this to the half of the meat, and some of the vegetables. They had kept some of the bread, from the bunker. So they made medium-rare steak sandwiches with grilled vegetables on the side. For their drinks, Vic had provided them with honey. They ate happily.
After they were finished and all packed up, Alex brought out Tornadius' list. Next they had to go to...
"21 Pine Street, Wangaratta."
"Wanga-what?" Squidbrain asked.
"I've been there a few times," Kiarah explained. They all looked at her, wanting her to spill.
"Prudence took me there, it was supposed to be a meeting with all the other Lapgon children. All I got to do was play on the playground. I think I remember how to get there,"
"Well you're our only hope, the map only shows Melbourne and the suburbs. I'm guessing it's far away." Alex suggested.
"Well, the bunker was in Violet Town, so we may be in, Benalla, so if my calculations are correct, we should be there in less than an hour," Kiarah said.
"Great! We may want to hurry though." Alex said pointing to the road next to them. Coming towards them fast were three Lamborghini's with racing decorations on. Jamie leapt up and ran towards the motorcycles, he threw a pen at Vic and luckily again, it was the right one. How come Alex was the only one who got to be zapped?  She was looking forward to seeing the others almost electrocuted.
"Push the button!" Jamie shouted to Vic. Vic pushed the button and started with amazement at the motorcycle with honeycomb decorations that the pen had transformed into. Alex and Kiarah sprang onto theirs, and Jamie and Squidbrain did the same. Soon enough the motorcycles had ripped through the wire fence and onto the gravelly road. Roaring engines were sounding behind them. But Alex and her group were faster, just fast enough to outrun the Lamborghinis. At least that was what Alex thought. Barry the half goat stuck his head out the window and reloaded a pistol. He fired it, the bullet narrowly missing Jamie's wheel. Vic took occasional glances behind her, until she finally stopped and leapt off her motorcycle. Alex told everyone else to stop.
"Vic! What are you doing?!?" Alex exclaimed.
Vic strode towards the cars and did something that Alex did not expect. She grew, and grew until she was as tall as a small skyscraper. She ran/stomped over to the cars and crushed the one with the frog and fish hybrid inside. Vic looked back at Alex, who was staring awkwardly at her.
"What? You've never had to fight in your life," Vic said.
Alex considered the time when she scratched Aidan, but let Vic have her moment of glory. Alex pounced off her motorcycle and changed into a black puma. Jamie and Squidbrain looked at each other and changed into the most fearsome animal they could think of, Jamie a snow wolf, and Squidbrain a squid.
"Maybe like a water snake?" Kiarah suggested to Squidbrain, "What about a shark?!?" She said with excitement. Jamie was about to run off but then heard what they were talking about, and blew a bubble. Once again it landed on Squidbrain's head, and she changed into a great white shark. The bubble growing as she did.
Alex had so much determination that she lit herself on fire. Not just her hands, her whole body. She almost flew over to one of the cars, and ripped off the top. Inside was the fish and frog hybrid. cowering in their seats. Aidan's army had ranged weapons, but Alex whipped them away just like she had done with Aidan. The Lapgon children were thrown out of their seats and into the long grass. They wouldn't trick Alex into letting them go, those things were pure evil. But what if they were working for Aidan against their will? What if... They took one hostage. Now that appealed to Alex. She hopped off the car and sprinted towards the long grass where she had thrown them. After about ten minutes of searching, Alex found them both passed out in the grass. The fish was dribbling in his sleep. Alex didn't want to touch that, so she changed human again, pulled the frog one over her shoulder and started back. Luckily the fight had finished, Aidan and Barry had fled, Vic and everybody else was back t normal, and only the stomped and roof gone cars remained. Their first victory against Aidan. The only bad thing was that he was still alive with Barry. He would go to Smoden and tell him information, and how they lost some brave children.
"What the neck is that?" Jamie exclaimed, indicating the frog person over Alex' shoulder. Maybe she should just leave this thing here instead.
"I'm never mind him," she said, settling down the frog on the road

Meanwhile...
Aidan arrived at the Animagem only a few hours after the battle. Barry trailed behind him as he approached Kate's desk.
"Well, look who it is! I expect you slaughtered some Lords and brought me back all their precious belongings like you always do?" She asked smiling.
"Sure," Aidan lied, "We need to see Smoden. He needs to hear our disappointing news,"
"Oh, erm, right this way!" Kate directed Aidan even though he had been there at least 50 times. Smoden never had an office so usually he would just settle in the stadium,  where Alex and Jamie were blessed.
The doors opened and Aidan reluctantly stepped in.
"I expect you bring me, cough, good news," Smoden said. He sat on a gold throne, wearing the same cloak but this time with the hood gobinder his head.
"No sire, the Lords got away, and Jennifer, Danny and John have passed. And Jarrod, we have no idea,"
Smoden slammed his lousy fists on the arm rests of his chair in rage.
"This is the second time Aidan! I even gave you guns! What, cough, else do you want?"
Aidan considered this.
"Don't be mad sure, but would a fighter jet be in order?"
Smoden sent a chair from The audience flying at him. Aidan ducked so the chair hit Barry instead. Knocking him out cold.
"GET OUT!!!" Smoden ordered.

The whole group cheered and cheered. The first, sort of victory. That wasn't so hard. But Alex knew better to think that that would be the last of them. She thought about how they would be properly armoured next time.
The next Lord was the Lord of the birds. Alex recited the address in her head. 21 Pine Street, 21 Pine Street. After a bit more of cheering, and a little bit more, the sun started to go down. Alex decided that they should venture into the long grass and find a place to crash for the night.
"Alright everybody, we haven't saved the world yet," they wouldn't listen, "Every hero needs his/her rest," still nothing, "ENOUGH!!!" That seemed to get their attention, "We will find a place to rest in the grass and that's the end of it! We have a big day ahead of us tomorrow, and I'm sure the Sharma doesn't like being kept waiting because you guys were tired to go on! So get into that grass and get some sleep!"
The group stormed off into the grass, and after about 20 minutes of walking, they fell asleep on the soft beds of soil and grass.