Ch. 7 – Plan Of Attack



Dante woke with a start.

"Finally awake, then?" the familiar shape of Doncath said.

The bear creature was leaning over a pot set over a campfire, using a long wooden ladle to stir its contents.

"How long was I out?" Dante asked, sitting up.

"Only for a couple hours," Doncath replied. He scooped out some of the pot's contents using the ladle and poured it into a wooden bowl.

Dante suddenly realized how hungry he felt as a delicious smell wafted into his nose.

He accepted the offered bowl and spoon, only noticing the white shoots in the broth before taking his first sip.

It was hot and burnt his tongue, but it was also the most delicious thing Dante had ever tasted – sweet and earthy at the same time

After a few more bites, he finally began to take in his surroundings.

They were in the corner of a large stone room, massive tree roots growing out of the walls and ceiling. The village refugees were spread around this room in little groups, tending to fires and pots of their own.

Near the far side of the room were their attackers, tightly bound and gagged.

Dante started to ask where they were but then remembered they had been heading for some ruins before the attack. They must have been inside them now.

Something small and green yipped and bolted over to him, nearly making him drop his bowl.

"Kibou?" Dante asked, staring down at the therivorum, who had been restored to his original form

"He changed back not long after you passed out," Doncath explained, readying a second bowl and setting it on the floor for Kibou. The therivorum yipped happily before starting to slurp up the soup noisily.

Dante became aware of a throbbing sensation coming from his left hand.

When he looked, he found a slight red color on the palm – it looked and felt like sunburn.

"What…?" he started.

"I'm afraid we can't answer that," answered another familiar voice.

Dante looked up to see Skye approaching.

Unlike Kibou, the griffin was still in his transmogrified form, wearing the same robes that had appeared on him and carrying Prospero's staff in hand.

"So, you're still… changed?" Dante asked.

"Indeed, it's normal for creatures of Nibiru to retain their altered forms once transmogrification takes place."

Skye looked from Dante to Kibou. "That being said, I can't say why your friend here reverted to his original shape. I can only assume it had something to do with Prospero's alterations."

Dante stared at the therivorum as he licked his bowl clean, wondering what other surprises the little creature had in store for them.

"Now that you're awake," Doncath said, "now's as good a time as any to catch you up on our plan."

"Huh?" Dante asked, looking up at him. "What?"

"While you were out," Skye explained, "me, Doncath, and some others discussed our current situation and what we should do next."

"The obvious plan is to infiltrate Imperius' island fortress and rescue Prospero and the other captives," Doncath stated before he took a large gulp out of the pot.

"So you say," said Garrus. The adult griffin, sporting a bandage on his side, approached where they sat. "That still leaves us with how to pull that off. The fortress is well guarded. It would take at least a dozen armies to make it through the outer defenses."

Skye gestured around at the gathered group. "And in case you haven't noticed, we're only a handful."

Doncath muttered something unintelligible through his mouthful of soup.

Stirring the contents of his bowl, Dante thought about it momentarily.

"What about a smaller team?" he suggested after a moment. "If we focus on making it a stealth mission, we may have more success that way."

The three creatures shared thoughtful looks with each other, pondering his words.

"Yes…" Doncath said thoughtfully, "I think that could work… provided we operate quickly."

"That still leaves the problem of numbers, " Skye said. "The attack earlier today left many of us weakened. At best guess, less than a dozen could undertake this mission."

"What about the other villages?" Dante asked. "Prospero said there were others. Wouldn't any of them be able to help us?"

Doncath scoffed. "Haven't you been paying attention? They've all been captured already. They'll be under heavy lockdown if they haven't been given over to the Void by now."

"Is there a way of finding out which are being guarded?" Dante asked. "I might have an idea."

+++++

The sun was setting when the scouts – all smaller bird creatures – returned to the ruins.

As they reported what they found, Skye made notes on a map of the Cross Channel Archipelago he had drawn up, circling some villages while crossing some out.

After a few minutes of this, he finally leaned back. "Alright, that will have to do."

Dante looked down at the map, which displayed a handful of vaguely spiraling islands. If he remembered correctly, the one they were one – Kortana – was the biggest of the islands. It was also the closest to Keahi Island, where Imperius had built his fortress.

Several villages on Kortana Island were crossed out, while very few were circled.

Still, it might work.

"How many would be needed to pull off a stealth mission?" Dante asked.

"At least fifty," Garrus replied, "any able-bodied creature should at the very least be able to incapacitate one of greater strength if caught off guard."

Dante nodded and looked over the map.

"Okay, how about this?" He pointed at the map. "We go to the villages here, here, and here on Kortana, and then move over to this island." Its name was Avarus, a smaller island that was a little ways past Keahi Island. "We rescue the village there, which should give us plenty of creatures who can fight."

"And then we approach Keahi Island from behind the fortress," he concluded.

"Yes," Doncath said thoughtfully, "it makes sense. They'll expect us to come from the nearest island instead of the opposite direction."

"And with the volcano taking up most of the island, there will be very little in the way of patrols," Garrus added. "We'll have to keep an eye on the terrain as we go, but it should work."

"Great plan!" Doncath said, clapping Dante on the back, "For someone with no knowledge of the ways of battle, you've certainly got some great strategies in that head of yours!"

Dante didn't think it wise to mention that when he and his friends were co-oping in a game, they had used a similar strategy to overtake an enemy stronghold.

While a simple but effective approach to the situation, he didn't think it would give the bear creature much confidence in knowing that.

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A shorter chapter, meant to be a pause between the action :D

When I first wrote this, I had originally made the food being cooked a generic stew... that happened to be blue XD after thinking it over some, I decided to make it Bamboo-Shoot soup. It was one of the more interesting things I've researched, and more will be used in later books :)

And for those who want to know which game Dante is making reference to at the end of the chapter - it's the Far Cry series ^^;

Read and Enjoy ^_^

~Aaron