#goose scribbles

🌠 carrying your loss forever, i feel your absence everywhere i go. 🌠

Pies? Sure. Weird quests? Not out of the ordinary. But if she finds out that Ren is behind the locusts, she'll be having a word with him. Or a few.

Cleo picks another locust off the back of her neck and mercilessly crushes it. This is ridiculous. No one else seemed very bothered but, then again, no one else was a walking bug buffet. She hisses as one nips at her arm.

That's it.

ZombieCleo: I've had it with these things

ZombieCleo: I'll burn down the whole server

joehillssays: That seems like a bit of an overreaction but I support you in all your endeavors. 

ZombieCleo: The bugs

joehillssays: Oh. 

ZombieCleo: They're driving me batty

joehillssays: Ah, I was wondering if anyone would bring that up. I have a theory about the locusts that I think may solve your problem. 

ZombieCleo: go on

joehillssays: Well, bees have a queen, kind of like a monarchy but not really. Locusts, on the other hand, aren't bees, so they don't have a queen. 

ZombieCleo: ??? 

joehillssays: So, by that logic they must have a king! Because as everyone knows, flying insects all abide by a monarchy system. They'd have to, I can't imagine what democracy among bees is like. 

ZombieCleo: joe please what are you talking about

joehillssays: Hold please. 

Before Cleo can really think about what Joe could possibly be talking about, she hears the signs of fireworks and a soft landing nearby. The man himself runs up.

"Howdy, Cleo!" he says.

"Hi Joe."

"So as I was saying, all flying insects abide by the monarchy system. So that's bees, locusts, you know that kind of thing. This also implies currently, the Hermits are flying insects, which does make sense as we do fly—"

"Hold on," Cleo stops Joe (probably for the best, he was turning a little red), "are you implying there's a king locust?"

"Yeah, of course there is."

"Right," Cleo says, holding back from rolling her eyes. "Well, I'm sick enough of these things I'll try pretty much anything. Any ideas where to find this king locust?"

Joe purses his lips. "Well bees have beehives, but I've never heard of locust hives. Don't they live in the ground?"

"That's cicadas."

"What's the difference?"

"Not a clue."

Joe shrugs and bats away a locust. "They get quieter at night. Maybe we can follow them to their nest?"

"A stealth mission, I like it." Cleo grins widely. 

It turns out that the stealth mission also involved killing half the day. Cleo explicitly bans Joe from working on his poetry anymore (it wasn't that it wasn't good, it was, it's just that she can only hear the same line in different accents so many times). Joe ends up going over some plans for his base while Cleo carefully works on her bullet journal. 

In hindsight, setting up an entire arts and crafts session may have not been the best idea while waiting to start a stealth mission.

Cleo elbows Joe and cuts off his whine with a finger to the locust cloud moving away from them. They're up and in the air in . . . Well, not very quickly. Cleo wasn't just going to leave her journaling supplies out in the elements, after all. A mad dash to put everything away and they're finally rocketing off after the insects. 

"Should we hang back so they don't see us?" Joe yells over the wind. 

"Joe, they're bugs. They have terrible eyesight."

"How do you know?" 

"They have compound eyes, so they can see more but they don't have depth perception, so they have to move closer— you know what? I'll tell you later."

"You know, several species of spiders hunt via sight— although those are arachnids so they don't really count I guess. Dragonflies are also known for their excellent eyesight, and I don't even know what kind of monarchy system they abide by—" 

They continue to discuss the eyesight of certain insects as they follow the swarm. Flying a bit higher helps to see where the swarm is headed; the locusts funneling into a hole in the ground. At Cleo's direction, they land once the skies are clear and Cleo peers down the hole. She grimaces. 

"I hate small spaces," she groans. 

"I'm claustrophobic!" Joe says cheerily as he climbs down the hole. 

"Don't you sleep in a pinball?" Cleo ducks down to follow him. 

"...Anyways!" Joe ducks his head and shimmies into the small space. 

The tunnel is rough-carved and damp. Cleo has a much harder time fitting through than Joe does, but eventually it opens up into a cave. Cleo can see the flit of bugs through the air. As Joe lights a torch, Cleo can see the massive cave is lined with locusts on every available surface. Joe nudges her and she follows his gaze. There, in the center of the cave, is a locust at least twice as big as a horse. 

"You're joking," Cleo whispers. "How did you, I mean. There is actually a king of locusts."

"Of course there is," Joe says, like it's the most obvious thing in the world. "You know all this about eyes and stuff, but the hierarchy of flying insects is new information?" 

"Joe, maybe we should keep it down."

"Bugs don't have ears. At least I don’t think. Anyway, like I was saying." Joe pulls out a few sticks of TNT. "Bees have queens, locusts have kings. Wasps probably have, like, Tsars or something, I'm not sure. Hold on, let me put this down."

She watches with bated breath as Joe creeps far closer to the resting king than she would. He sets down a few pieces of TNT near it, then hurries back up to where Cleo is waiting. 

He gestures to the TNT. "Zombies first, please."

That almost makes her laugh. Cleo pulls out her bow, lights the arrow, and draws. 

Everything, predictably, goes to shit. 

The explosion rocks the cave, but the King isn't dead. It is, however, very upset. The cave erupts into chaos as locusts take flight. 

"Go, go, go!" Cleo yells over the sound of wings. The crawl back up out of the hole is considerably faster than when they came down. Cleo fires a rocket as soon as she's clear of the hole with Joe right on her heels and the swarm on his. 

"Joe, I think we might be in a bit of trouble," Cleo yells back to him. 

"I am very aware of that situation! Follow me, I've got an idea."

Cleo turned to follow him. Probably not the best idea, given that the last idea he'd had got them chased by a swarm of locusts, but seeing as there weren't many options, well. Joe dips down the side of a mountain and turns sharply, disappearing below the treeline. Cleo follows best she can. Joe's hand is on hers the second she lands and he pulls her through the trees until she's pulled into a dark cave. Joe turns on his heel and piles stone up at the entrance until they're bathed in darkness. 

Cleo pulls out a torch and lights it to see . . . a bed? There's a bed. And a chest. And unlit torches. Altogether it looks like a very small bedroom. 

"Welcome, Cleo! Don't mind me, cowering as I always do in the Just In Case Exclusive Emergency Bunker number seven." he says with a flourish, grinning like a madman. He drops his hands and says "I might have to work on that acronym."

"You have seven of these?" Cleo gapes. 

"I have ten," Joe says, "this is just the seventh one. It does pay to be prepared for every situation. Oh, I should start a service for that, maybe like 'Hermit Hidey Holes' or something. It's like camping, but sudden!"

"Joe."

"Oh, pardon my manners, I'm a terrible host. Do you want some snacks?" He opens the chest to reveal it's packed to the brim with foodstuffs. Cleo doesn't even know what to say. It feels like a really, really weird dream. She picks up some jerky and a few cookies. 

"Are you alright?" she reaches out to touch the back of her hand to his head. "You haven't fallen recently, have you?" 

"I mean I fell off a tree yesterday. Though with the respawning thing I doubt that's an issue. Why? Do I look like it? " 

"Being prepared is very out of the ordinary for you."

"I'm going to try not to take offense at that." He snags an armful of snacks and plops down onto the bed. Cleo joins him. 

She's halfway through a cookie when she looks over to him, a thought occurring to her. "Are you really claustrophobic?" 

"Nah," he says around a mouthful of pie, "Just thought that would make you feel better if you heard I was terrified."

She laughs a little. "That's very thoughtful of you. So . . . What are we doing about the bugs?"