"P-!"
The plosive was barely past Jelly's lips before she heard the crunch! of steel and Pop's staggered gasp. He collapsed to the ground, his front right leg completely disabled. The consumed canictonis whipped it's stinger around again, this time aiming to envenom a wolf instead of a spaulder. Jelly could barely think due to the overwhelming scent of chaos and sound of skittering legs, cackling pincers, and avian-like squawks.
This wasn't supposed to happen.
The canictonis before them was huge -- the largest they'd ever seen.
She had been resting at the edge of the oasis, camouflaged at the edge of the reeds. From a distance, Jelly and Pop could only see a bustling group of young canictonis consumed with chaos. The young seemed to have only gone through an instar or two. Pop knew from raising his own canictonis that the feathers didn't come in until after the second molt.
Clearing them out would be easy. At this age, canictonis could barely aim their stingers. It had been days since the adventurers had seen a consumed monster. This seemed to be a good sign: perhaps this would be their final battle before they could return home to rest.
The Kits approached quietly but with excitement. Hiding in the reeds, Pop growled and snapped to scare the mimics. The young canictonis rustled their feathers and honked nervously, but they wouldn't flee. Jelly tilted her head in concern. Interesting. Canictonis rarely stuck around for a fight. It would be easier and safer to pick them off as they scattered. She lifted a paw to signal Pop to wait, but it was too late. Rising to the challenge of these brave mimics, Pop burst out of the reeds with a howl.
Raucous honks and flapping faux-wings greeted him, but the consumed beasts still did not flee.
Instead, their consumed mother began to quake and rise from the ground, her dozens of canictonis babies clinging to her back. She was so massive that curled and napping beneath her children, she looked like a pile of filthy feathers. It was already too late for Pop. As she rose, her vicious swan-like stinger lunged at the threat to her offspring. Neither of the Kits could react in time.
Jelly was frozen, watching with wide eyes and a slack mouth as the mother turned her stinger towards her. The giant beast took a step towards Jelly, lifting and opening its faux-wings. She hissed angrily, chaotic ooze bubbling at jaws.
Coco cried and bit Jelly hard on the leg, having foresaw what came next. Jelly gasped and shook out of her stupor, leaping away moments before the great stinger came down in the reeds.
Breathing hard, Jelly weighed her options. The mother was righting her stinger and shuffling around on her eight legs to relocate Jelly. Pop was alive, but that sound... the way his armor was bent... broken leg? Not a great sign. Snap was perched on Pop's back, pincers up and stinger waving threateningly around. At least Pop would be defended while Jelly dealt with... this. Coco ran, yowling angrily to attract the mother's attention. The canictonis continued to spin on her lumbering legs, chasing the sound of Coco.
The answer came to her suddenly. The poison. At their recent resupply at the river crossing, Oats the Dog had sent many gifts from his garden. One was a poison he had developed at Sunset's behest. Sunset requested that Jelly and Pop try it out on one of the consumed beasts in Goldsea and see if worked.
Jelly grit her teeth and wrinkled her nose: "Well it better, Oats!" She used her mouth to reach into the fur mantle around her shoulders. In her left armpit, hidden in the furs, she kept a small pouch. The poison had been stored there since it was picked up a week ago. The pouch contained a dagger with a deep blue blade -- the wolfsbane poison concoction. She was careful, gingerly holding the handle in her teeth.
Coco was still yowling and running. The mother was spinning and hissing. The babies were flapping and honking and clattering their carapaces together. Jelly caught Coco's eye and saw the flash of understanding. Coco's foresight did the speaking for them.
The Lunaria spun on her heels, darting back the other way. The mother canictonis lunged, slamming her stinger into the earth where Coco had been a second earlier. Jelly raced forward. The mother's chitinous underbelly was revealed when the stinger lifted. She aimed for the separation between the plates and stabbed the dagger deeply, not slowing her stride at all as she crumpled against the canictonis' massive body. Jelly let go of the dagger and rolled away.
The mother spasmed and roared. She struggled to turn towards her attacker, but the poison worked swiftly. There was a gurgling from the mother, then twitching in her legs. The beast fell to a knee, then two. She could barely keep her pincers up. The consumed babies on her back honked fearfully. The mother whipped her stinger around, thrashing the reeds in her death throes.
Jelly and Pop looked at each other with wide eyes. It was over as soon as it began.
spoot
