Captain Sunshine

Chapter 12: The Brothers Who Care and Those Who Don't

Chapter 12

Solar carefully inspected the seed in his palm. It was small, rough, and brown but had a golden hue as if it were glowing.

"I present to you, the Oakuat seed. Plant it and take care of it well and from the seed you will find the timber elemental power." He looked up just as Gaharum's wrinkled wooden face morph  into confusion, "But I am quite curious, little sunlight. What is your purpose for the fruit it will bear? You do not hold the element that connects to it."

"I don't," He admitted as he looked back to Hang Kasa who had been observing them from the side, "But I believe it will serve its purpose in the near future."

For the past few weeks, Solar had been coming back and forth trying to gather ingredients for Gaharum. A royal cook and a faithful friend of the previous Darkwood elemental owner. He had needed the Oakuat seed for one of his... personal missions... and fortunately the alien was generous enough to let him, seeing his determination and wit worthy.

But in exchange, he had to get him some... Tom Yum ingredients.

It was a strange request, but who was Solar to complain?

 It had been rough trying to balance his missions and duties as Captain, but if there's one thing Solar was bad at-

-it was being a failure.

The whole time he had been gathering the ingredients, he had met the little stalker- Qually, who tried to be the perfect little side-kick. Until Solar caught him trying to steal the golden sacred chili behind his back. And through quick thinking, threw him under the bus when the bird aliens found them roaming around the chili pepper farm.

It wasn't hard when he hinted to the aliens that the precious golden chili pepper he was 'supposed to find' was missing and carefully made sure they would check Qually's bag.

His soon to be ex-companion tried insisting they were a team, but through Solar's eloquence and top-notch acting, he managed to convince the aliens that he had no idea as to who he was and he was just being pulled into a crime he definitely was not a part of.

Qually then tried to tell them about a sob story of how he was trying to prove himself to Master Gaharum when he realized there was no way out of his situation, which unfortunately for him, did not waver the bird alien's resolve. Nor Solar's.

With all the lies the midget had come up with, who's to say that this wasn't just one of them as well?

And so, as soon as they dragged Qually away, Solar sneakily stole other chili peppers and hastily made his escape before they could get back to him to question him further.

He should feel guilty, but really... all he did was double-cross the double-crosser.

Qually should've known better than to try and fool someone like Solar. A miscalculation he couldn't blame him for.

After that, it had been smooth sailing gathering the other ingredients while Qually had been busy with his trials. 

And then Fang joined his team just in time for him to hear that Qually had been released (escaped? he wasn't really listening-) from his imprisonment.

A perfect opportunity to safely deliver his goods.

However, he couldn't let the Lance Corporal in on his plans, especially on a mission he had been working on for too long. It was a waste of time explaining how everything had ended up the way they were. And after everything that happened in between, it was too much of a hassle.

So...

"I can't believe you! I thought we were a team!"

He turned just in time to see a shadow eagle drop on the clearing behind them before dispersing into nothing, leaving an angry-looking Fang and a confused Qually.