Breaking the Ice (Book 1)

Chapter Twenty-Five

FLARE

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. This is all stupid! Damn it! The moment I'm not with that damn worm, she drags us further into this stupid forest! Which, I may mention, spreads over miles and over mountains. MOUNTAINS! I hate this. Why am I even still here?!

"Hey, Volcano Face, you coming or what?" The Icee called, interrupting Flare's ranting. He just gave the dog a glare and walked the opposite way.

"Hey! Wait!" The Scorpion cried. "Where are you going?" When they first met, Flare thought the Scorpian was going to be a worthy opponent due to his scary physique and scars. But no, he was just another pathetic clown. "Where are you going?"

"Anywhere that is not here." Flare hissed.

"Why?" The insufferable nuisance asked.

"Because this is dumb."

"Why?" He repeated.

"I don't socialize with you bootless twits." The dumb Scorpian looks down at his sandaled feet. "It means you have no value." The Heatling rolled his crimson eye.

"How do you know that?" The Scorpian shot. "Everyone's valuable in their own way. I can be valuable."

Flare blew a raspberry. "That's exactly what a worthless person would say." That's when the Scorpian put a dopey grin on his face.

"Tell me Flare, are you important and valuable?"

"But of course," Flare scoffed at the extremely obvious question.

"But that's exactly what a worthless person would say." The Scorch said mockingly, doing a terrible job at imitating Flare's accent. "But you aren't much help to us. You're more like a whining nuisance." Flare's lower eyelid twitched. "And you did say you are valuable..."

Don't. Don't fucking finish that sentence.

"..So prove it," he finished.

Flare, enraged, yelled at the top of his lungs in frustration, startling a flock of birds nearby. He followed both idiots deeper into the forest, cursing under his breath.

...

"This is dumb," the Icee grumbled, wording Flare's thoughts. "First we're looking for a secret assassin camp, now we're looking for a missing Nightling."

"Maybe if someone stayed with their partner.." The Scorpian shot Flare a glare.

"Hey, she's the one who ran off," Flare huffed, crossing his arms.

"It was a lot easier when we were stuck in a serpent filled desert." The Icee groused

"Now we're stuck in this disgusting moist place." Said the Scorpian, wedging out a dark colored tongue from between his teeth. Flare recoiled. Moist. The word made him cringe and uncomfortable for some reason.

"I also dislike the humidity," the Icee nodded. An Icee and Scorpian agreed with each other. Perhaps anything is possible. "It's going to be difficult navigating in a terrain that isn't our strong suit."

"What's that mean?" The Scorpian asked, scratching his head. Idiot.

The Icee deeply inhaled, summoning a week's worth of patience. "I lived in an icy, cold climate with freezing temperatures. You grew up in a hot, dry climate where there wasn't much water or moisture." Flare cringed again. "And Flare...he was just born in a volcano." He made it sound unimpressive.

"Oh I see!" The Scorpian beamed like a five year old who memorized a math problem. "Our abilities don't do well in this place! And neither are we built for this."

The Icee nodded, "And it's going to be almost impossible for us to find Luna in here." If it were up to Flare, he'd have declared her dead hours ago. But noooo, her Icee boyfriend was so insistent on finding her.

"We've done the impossible before!" The Scorpian exclaimed encouragingly. Flare cocked an unamused eyebrow, implying for him to elaborate. "There was a Nightling and Heatling within fifty miles of each other and they weren't fighting!"

Flare grumbled obscenities. "Yeah, and a Scorpian and an Icee became friends," he sneered.

"Don't go there," the Icee's tail irritatedly slammed rapidly on the wet moss below them, making a few splashes. "Pfft! Pfft! Bleghk! Ugh, great. Now my tail is wet." He grimaced.

...

"Why are we still hereee," Flare whined, pissing the snotty wolf off.

"You're as useless as your whining." He seethed. "If it were up to me, I'd have left you hours ago."

Flare scowled, "So I'm just something you can discard whenever you please?"

"YES! You stupid fire gargoyle!" Sleet exploded, which made Flare anticipate a fight at long last. The Heatling looked like he was going to disembowel the pup-sicle with his own fingernails.

"Stop bickering like children! That's not gonna help!" The Scorpian scolded, butting in. You're the one to talk. "Are you trying to ring the dinner bell? Who knows what predators are out here?"

They grew silent. The sun slowly retreated behind the trees. Coward. Did any of the imbeciles have night vision? Because Flare certainly didn't. Despite wanting to create a small fire, not caring if the entire forest was set aflame, he didn't.

Then he fell over a rock with a crack in it, a sharp throwing knife appeared beside him, concealed in the ankle-deep grass.