Scurry: The Shadow's Curse

by Mac Smith

I seemed to have started the story a little before book 3, but only by maybe about 15-20 pages, but by this point hopefully one has read them by this point and know, already. Wix is talking like crazy at Pict, he asking her what was wrong, and she sharing what she'd seen of the city and how bad off they were right now. Doggies were on the hunt, in particular Atlas; and Pict and Wix were dealing with ravens after they got stuck in the water and had to continue by foot. Soon, they are greeted by an opossum, who leads them to the bunch of mice they met in the forest, the warehouse being full of food.

Pict at first wants to keep moving, but is convinced to rest a bit and eat something before setting out again. Meanwhile, Resher was planning something evil, since having to wait still, and not wanting to bring the weak along. Wix has another strange dream and the opossum makes convo, explaining more about what the Guardian was and preceding to a flashback showing what the humans had done. This drove the Guardian into hiding and the witches (foxen) believed she was still alive.

The only way to wake her would be to end the winter, this taking the death of the deadly shadow wolf, Pict then waking up and walking out saying they should leave, and the 2 biffing off. As they're running along, Pict discovers 1 of their own, a young mouse who went missing some weeks ago, Wix believing his odd state was caused by fire wolves, Pict adamant on having to return before Resher implemented his plan, Wix cautious of the hawk now flying nearby, so takes them to a more covered route. When they get to the field near the house, Umf discovers them a warmly welcomes them back. After giving short updates of the goings on he'd experienced, he tells Pict the state her pop, Orim is in, and she leads them off to where he was resting in his room.

She reaches his guarded room, but busts in anyways, the guards looking oafishly about how to respond. When Pict attempts to give her pop some water, Wix stops her for smelling poison, Umf corroborating this when she wonders why her hand was smacked. When her pop confesses he'd already been getting dosed with poison for some time and hadn't noticed, feeling it was too late for anything to be done, he states Pict must be ready to help Wix take over as leader, since Resher was already doing so hostile-y. As Wix is ready to find fresh water, Pict informs him it's too late, her pop passing, and she looking ready to take down Resher.

Meanwhile, upon Resher being updated, Kessel gets pissed off when he suggests it's time to kill the group as they stood in Orim's room. Kessel doesn't realize how far Resher's hold had gone, since upon ordering his guards to arrest him, he's instead shanked. Resher is now ready to handle Pict and bunch accordingly, since they hadn't gotten to the rest of the colony to spread their news, yet. They don't catch her before she's already in the main room, where the mice can ID her, Resher pretending his political joy at seeing her, she blatantly accusing him of murder.

Pict doesn't allow him to attempt his liquid way of turning the table so Wix looked like trouble, Pict calling him out and explaining how he'd drugged the cats with nip in order to have them work with him. (This is where book 3 is introed, so I may have jumped the gun by a smallish amount.) Wix notices and trails after the 2 suspicious guards, Umf keeping watch on Pict as she outed Resher for his oily ways, the Elders q'ing him and he ofc straight up denying it. As Pict suggests they get Kessel to arrest him, he ofc, doesn't care about waiting for the dead mouse to show up, this occurring as Wix sees the 2 idiots trying to push over some lighter fluid. Wix readies himself to stop their plan, with metal bar, he getting noticed, but putting up a good fight to waylay them.

It works, but a flame does get out, and now they are dealing with a growing fire. Pict isn't fought with by the rest of the mice much longer, Resher giving up on them when they decide to follow Pict for knowing where there was more food, he settled on going to the city regardless of it's crumble-ness, but also deciding he'd take whatever food he and his little group required. Pict annoys him with her resistance and nearly clocks her, Umf coming to play and allowing his fist to meet his face. One of them then notice the fire coming out of the storeroom, and the rest of the mice flee as Pict has an elder help the young and injured out.

Then Umf helps Pict when she realizes Wix was in the storeroom, whilst Wix is already getting one stupid mouse kilt by his own need to murderlize him. He puts up a good fight, but Wix wins in the end, Pict and Umf going after him and getting sidetracked with a little mouse trapped amongst the flames, and Pict getting trapped in his place. but uninjured, fortunately. What is a bit crappy, is now she has to run away from Resher, whom chases her upstairs toward the hawk flying about outside. When Wix has trouble breathing for the smoke and growing flames, he sees a fiery Titan chasing him, but loses him on a collapsing wooden crossing.

This is happening as Pict is being chased after and looking out across the field from the roof, Resher catching up and attempting to threaten her. She meantime has done her duty, and relates how he hadn't chased her to the end of anything, he'd been "lured" by her, Mr. Hawk grabbing him snuggly. Wix then reaches her in time for her to warn him of 1 of Resher's cronies was about to attack him from behind, he nudging him back off the edge and into the Titan flaming mouth. Wix and Pict meet up with the rest of their mouse group and ponder where they would go from there.

This is where the episode ends, apparently. The month long wait to see this continue may be frustrating, but understandable what with RL living. Great flocking series though, and I'm going to be continuing once I get through my laundry list of other webcomics/novels. Continuing on!