“I can’t go up today? Why can’t I go up today?”

Ryuu sighed.

“Take it up with Challa. She makes that schedule. I’m just telling you what I see.”

“Aren’t you in charge? I need to go up today. I have some things I have to get done up there.”

“Again, you’ll have to talk to Challa. Go find her. I have to get things moving for the new base today; I can’t help you with this right now, Ms. Perry. Here, Hey, Donald! Take Ms. Perry to the kitchens to see if she can’t find Challa.” Ms. Perry harumphed, her tail thumping back and forth on the floor. A golem escorted her away.

Ryuu rolled his eyes. Despite delegating most of everything to the others, he still ended up getting tracked down. He turned back to the men packing up the hydroponic farm equipment.

“Can you put it back together pretty easily when we get there, Patel?” Patel nodded as he looked at a small pipe.

“Yes, it’s not hard. What is hard is making sure the water has enough nutrients for the plants to grow.”

Patel was a blue dragon with scales crisscrossing across his body. He was completely bald as the scales had taken over his whole head; even his eyebrows were gone. His clothes always had some kind of stain, either greasy or black, and his face always had some kind of cut, scratch, or burn.

“Did you get what I asked you to get?” Patel asked.

“Yeah, yeah. I managed to find it. Had to go into the fairy towns. Cost a damn fortune,” Ryuu replied, digging through his bag. He pulled out a pump.

“Thanks. This will help the water flow better.”

“Anything helps,” Ryuu replied. Patel squinted at him.

“Fuck, you’re still hoping for it, aren’t you?” he asked as he pocketed the pump. Ryuu wavered a bit.

“Oh…well. We’ve discussed it as a group, you know, the leaders, and if there is somehow a chance-“

“I am not gonna go with you,” Patel said.

“What?”

“I’m not gonna let you take the farms or anything. I’m not going with you.” They stood silent together; the sounds of the other workers taking apart the farms echoed in their small area.

“That’s fine, Patel,” Ryuu said, “You don’t have to do anything. Just, I was only saying if there was a chance, we would take it. If not, then we keep doing what we’re doing.”

“Whatever. I still think you’re full of shit, but I gotta keep moving. We have to finish by tonight,” replied Patel, and he walked away, back to his work.

The area the farms were in was small and long, even if cramped. The water supply was weak, so Ryuu was happy they were moving to a place with a bigger reservoir. Apparently, there was some kind of underground water cave they could tap into at the new place.

He sighed, remembering the raid on Mark. He should probably see if he could call in the other crash sites.

Crash sites were useful to them as they tried to keep their main community in the underground. They attracted the fairy mafia, unicorn tribes, and other undesirables, distracting them from the main group. They also allowed for trade with the fairy enclaves and other groups so that they could have ample supplies.

The attack on Mark was worrying to Ryuu. He had anticipated the site attracting the attention of the Hornslash tribe, and possibly the Bloodraid tribe, but he had not anticipated a complete wipeout of everyone. Even unicorns were unable to ensure absolutely everyone was killed. What worried Ryuu was the fact that it looked like a unicorn raid, but it stank of fairy involvement.

He went down one of the tunnels, heading towards the prison. Standing at the door outside, he pulled out his notebook, squinting in the dim light of his flashlight.

Talk to Somda? Check. Set up farms for movement? Check. See Heartless? Going to.

He wrote down some quick notes, scribbling with his pen a bit to get it to start.

“Damn,” he cursed, the ink running faint and empty, “We just found this stash. I need to go to the market to see if someone has anymore.” He sighed, holding the pen awkwardly in his clawed fingers. Perhaps someone had an extra. He had pencils, but the luxury of a pen gave him a pleasure few other things did.

“It was such a smooth write, too,” he lamented, pulling open the door to the prison section.

Unter was sitting at one of the tables, munching on breakfast. It was mush. There wasn’t much to eat unless they had access to the cities, so a lot of their meals were mush. Breakfast was usually mush. That was why the farms were so important. Imagine having access to fresh fruits and vegetables! Then they could have fruit and mush. Or beans and mush.

“Hey, Ryuu, did you have breakfast yet?” he rumbled. Ryuu smiled faintly, waving his free hand.

“Yeah, yeah. It was pretty good today. Less…moldy than usual, I think.” Unter laughed lightly. Or as lightly as a heavy golem could. Ryuu felt a trail of smoke leak out of his nostrils and coughed a bit, blowing it away to the right.

“So. How’s it going with Heartless?” Ryuu asked, sitting himself down. He always found it was best to be on the same level as the person you were talking to. He was an authority here, but he was friendly. He could sit with people and see them where they were. People tended to be more forth coming if you weren’t throwing your authority around.

“Oh, yes. It is going well. No major incidents. Day has been coming in and out, staying at times for the little one. She seems to actually like to come here,” Unter replied. Ryuu contemplated.

“That’s great. Let me know right away if anything…bad happens. I’ll be visiting tonight before bed, but you can send Day to get me if anything happens. I’ll be staying in base until the big move,” Ryuu coughed, “I’ll let you know what to expect when we are ready to move everyone.”

“Okay! Sounds good!”

“Is Armel awake?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t seen him in a while. Want me to go get him?”

“No, no. It’s okay. I’ll check on him and then I’ll get going on to my next task.” Talking to Polly. She was busy organizing people to escort the farms to the new base. Already Ryuu heard there were problems with some of the tunnel blockages causing issues with fitting everything through. The hardest part was trying to keep their movements from being known by people outside the community.

Fairies in particular were sneaky. They had eyes in certain places, and more than once, he heard about them infiltrating one of their crash sites to get information about some of the people in their underground community.

His community was not exactly made up of the most nefarious fellows, but he definitely had acquired some notorious figures. Patel was one of the most wanted resources in this concrete jungle. Polly had a bounty on her own head, and he knew of a few others with records. Armel was definitely a person of interest to the fairies. Any unicorn was. After all, didn’t their horns grant a person youth and beauty?

Ryuu shivered.

He approached Armel’s room, knocking on the door.