SCREECHING.

Most of them were confused. Exflibberaguil translated them as quickly as possible.

“They’re mostly saying things along the lines of, ‘what’s the problem?’ Bunny here is trying to reassure everyone, and oh boy, Cosmos’s coming. He looks angry—”

“Come on!” Nick hissed, tugging at his arm. “Let’s go!”

Exflibberaguil glanced at his wrists, to see the silvery handcuffs on the ground. “How did—” he asked, allowing himself to be dragged away.

Nick flashed a familiar remote control. “Did you think I was that clumsy when I tripped?” she said with a grin. “Now come on, your legs are longer. You should be able to run faster!”

Exflibberaguil glanced once more at his wrists, his face still full of confusion and perplexity. “Wha- how?” he muttered, before stumbling after Nick. “Shouldn’t we have taken the handcuffs with us?” he asked at last.

“Why?”

“Well, they may come in handy…”

“There’s no time for regrets now!” Nick yelled, jumping over a plain-looking brown rabbit and sprinting across the arena to the large open doors where they came from. “Quick! No time! Come on, hurry! Before all these cottontails are ordered to come catch us!”

“But where did you put the others? And how in the world did you plan this whole stadium battle thing? Did you hypnotize that archeologist?”

“Something of the sort. Before I came to rescue you, I escaped and went to fiddle with the controls in that one bunny’s office. I let the sound insulating foam layer fall, and then repeated gladiator and Colosseum to him. He’s an archeologist. I was sure he’d get the message. Then I just manipulated that bunny to do whatever I wanted. By the way, how many people are with you?”

“Let’s see, Oakley, the doctor, and that archeologist. That makes three.”

“Three?”

“Yes. Is there someone missing?” Exflibberaguil was already panting to keep up.

“I’ll explain later. The three you mentioned are waiting for us! I sent directions to them, and opened their capsules.”

“Oh no!” Exflibberaguil gasped.

“What?”

“Cosmo, he’s sending all the spectators after us!” Exflibberaguil glanced back fearfully, only to see hundreds of giant rabbits running toward them on all sides, using their powerful hind legs to gain on them. Nick and Exflibberaguil looked like skittering bugs compared to them; small and pathetic.

“Well, stop them!” Nick screamed hysterically.

“Stop them?” Exflibberaguil yelled back, repeating the command. “What a genius idea! Boy, why didn’t I think of it earlier?”

“Talk to them! Scream at them! Confuse them! Delay them!” Nick commanded, stepping on one’s ears. It screamed in pain, causing another one the trip and slide into a third.

“Um,” Exflibberaguil said, panicking. “I—I don’t know if I can remember how to speak Rabbish.”

“Do what you can, we’re almost there!” She was in a giant sandpit now and began kicking sand at all the rabbits surrounding them. “Quick, one tore off my shoe!”

“What do I say?”

“SCREAM!”

“Um,” Exflibberaguil looked around kicking at the rabbits that now surrounded him. “Did you know that the sky is green?”

“That’s not Rabbish! Try screeching!”

Exflibberaguil took a deep breath. “DID YOU KNOW THE SKY IS GREEN?”

“Try again!”

Finally, he let out an earsplitting scream, so high Nick’s puny Sodriew ears could not hear. The rabbits around him all stopped and shock, then began twisting their long ears in the strangest ways and screamed in even higher pitches.

“Quick, Exflibberaguil!” Nick urged, unaware of what was going on. “Say something!” She reached the door which had been pushed almost shut by the frozen, twisting rabbits. She heaved on open for Exflibberaguil to go through.

“Ha! Made you look!” Exflibberaguil yelled in a loud, trembling voice, before disappearing behind the big slab of metal and shutting it close. He slammed against the door with all his weight, then dropping to the ground sweating and panting. “Ha!” he gasped maniacally. “That…showed them. It should take them two minutes to get through the door.”

“Two minutes? I locked it!”

“Cosmo must have the same remote,” Exflibberaguil reminded her, slowing heaving himself up. “Oh, sorry, did I ruin your moment?”

Nick peering around the corner of the white walls. “Where’s those three, I wonder? Were they held up?”

“You mean these?”

Nick jumped, turning around. Exflibberaguil emitted a scream and scuttled away.

Timothy, the Doctor, and Oakley were hanging limp in the ugly prosthetics of three enormous spotted tan rabbits, at least twice the size of Cosmo. They were on their hind legs, standing taller than Exflibberaguil. Oakley blinked, a dazed expression on her face, glanced at her tied limbs and gagged mouth, before going unconscious again. Each of the rabbits held the equivalent of an AK-47 in a fat black belt. These were undoubtfully the rabbit equivalent of bodyguards, who surrounded two figures in the center.

The white ferret, and Box.

“Box?” Exflibberaguil asked. “Oh wait, I forgot. There are about a hundred of the same models. But ferret?”

“I’m Box,” Box said in a strangely strangled voice, obviously trying to sound cold and icy but failing miserably with its cheerful Australian accent.

“And I’m ‘your’ ferret,” said the white ferret with a surprisingly deep, masculine voice sound very computer-generated.

“You can talk?” Exflibberaguil exclaimed incredulously.

The ferret looked extremely annoyed. “That’s what you’re worried about?”

Exflibberaguil shrugged. “Seems to me you know me long enough to know I don’t care about what you think is important. Though yes, you can call me very confused right now, and Box, I didn’t expect this of you.”

“You didn’t expect this of me?” Box said, again failing at sounding hurt and furious. “I know your memory is terrible, so let me refresh it. Galactic day 7764: you first screamed my name and woke me up. I woke up only to find myself dented and covered with the blood of my original master. You then proceeded to make me clean the blood and tried to wipe my memories, which I pretended I did. Galactic day 7765: You wake me up again with a friendly punch to the CPU, disturbing the delicate structure of my—”

“Thank you Box old friend,” the ferret interrupted. It pretended to look around and observe its surroundings. “This is the most unsuitable place to talk. What do you say to a long nap?”

“Log nap?” Nick whispered in fright. “Flipper, don’t tell me it’s planning on killing us?”

“Don’t worry,” Exflibberaguil replied dreamily. “It’s just a sleeping gas…”