Prisoners of Paradise Part 2

Notice: This is the second part, read the first part before you proceed!



“What´s the plan?” Aija asked. By then, they were already in one of the spots with pretty poor lighting, but unsure of what to do next, so they stopped briefly and looked around.
 
“Making a plan,” Caigo replied simply as he glanced back over the street to see if anyone was watching them, but found that most people seemed to be asleep already, judging by the small number of windows that still had light shining through them.
 
The two then went for a bank near the employees entrance and took a seat, relying on the fact that they might as well pass as a couple as an excuse if anyone were to see them, especially since Aija didn´t seem to bother sitting a little further away from Caigo, but instead pretty much leaned against him as they sat. From their new position, they could easily see the entrance, though it was actually very poorly lit as well, “see the second entrance over there?” Caigo asked as he pointed towards it.
 
“Sure,” she answered expectantly.
 
“The door is most likely locked, can you see any other way inside?” though he wasn´t really expecting much, he still tried his best to sound hopeful.
 
“There´s a tilted window, everything else seems to be closed,” Aija pointed out.
 
“That might do, let´s go see.”
 
With that said, they headed for the entrance, Caigo still making sure that nobody was watching them, then, once in the safety of the shadows and after making sure that there were at least no cameras to be seen, he tried to open the door normally, but unfortunately found that it was indeed locked.
 
“Alright, get on my shoulders,” Caigo commanded after he had positioned himself in front of the tilted window, allowing the neko to see inside the entrance after she swiftly jumped onto his shoulders without him even helping her, “Can you fit through if we open it?”
 
“Sure I can,” Aija confirmed, again expecting him to come up with a plan.
 
“Do you see some kind of lever or handle on the inside of the window?”
 
“Uhm…” silence ensued as Aija was looking for anything suspicious on the inside, “there´s a stick thingy next to the window, I can reach it with my fingers”
 
“Alright, try turning it sideways,” Caigo instructed. Everything fell quiet again, until he could finally hear the handle turn, “Now close the window, then push it open.”
 
After a moment, he could hear the window hit its frame, followed by another noise when it opened up, “great, now climb inside.” With that, the weight on his shoulders quickly disappeared, followed by an almost inaudible impact as Aija hit then ground inside, “Now, do you see some kind of key in there that we could use to open up the door from inside?”
 
Another long wait ensued, until he finally heard the clinking of keys on the other side of the wall. “I think I found some,” Aija said from the other side, her voice a mixture of cheerfulness and uncertainty. “Try them on the door then, if you can turn the key after it´s all the way inside the lock it´s the right one,” Caigo instructed again.
 
Time passed as he heard key after key enter the lock while he waited on ‪the other side of the door, ready to be let in. After a few minutes, he could finally hear the lock moving, leaving the door ready to be opened. Opening the door with the handle from outside, he opened it to find a puzzled Aija looking at the door that had seemingly opened on its own, then glancing up at him with joy. Signaling her to remain quiet, he closed the door and tilted the window back to how it was before, pulled out a flashlight, switched it on and began to move down the entrance, followed by her, slowly but surely making his way through the employee quarters. The first thing they came across were three desks that probably served as the park´s bureau, just behind a glass door to the left, with rest rooms on the other side. Further down the hallway, they eventually reached three doors at an otherwise dead end. Judging from the distance they have crossed by then, they should have been at a central point of the park and pretty close to an entrance, at least to the first habitat. The door to their left proofed to be a simple storage room for all sorts of medical equipment, meaning that there was a doctor´s examination room nearby. Indeed, the right door was a real examination room, almost as if it was taken right out of a clinic, with another door to their right leading back out of the room and into whatever laid behind the middle door. Intending to carefully close the door, they found it was actually lockable with a heavy lock, which seemed to require some kind of digital key input to unlock, making it pretty clear that this was meant to keep the fairies inside the facility. Now though, they kept it ajar instead, just in case it would somehow lock automatically when it fell shut. Taking the second door, they again found themselves on an empty hallway, this time with no more doors to either side, but a single, thick metal door on the far end, and the middle door at the end of the last corridor behind them. Briefly looking at it, they could easily tell that it too was locked the same way the one in the examination room was intended to. Leaving the examination room behind, they headed for the door on the far side of the hallway, briefly examining it, but found that it seemed to be just an ordinary door, perhaps painted on the outside to conceal it from the public. Pushing down the handle, Caigo mentally prepared himself for some kind of alarm to go off, even rethinking whether this was a good idea for a moment, but before he knew it, he had already pushed the handle down, waiting for a second that seemed to last forever, then he slowly pushed it open.
 
Glancing out into the habitat, the sight before him seemed almost surreal, as he could see the entire, vast habitat in the bright moonlight of the night, as well as the glass tube that previously separated him from the captives of this attraction. For a moment, he truly felt like he was locked in here, forced to live in this enclosed space while having to watch and entertain those who lived freely, wandering across the glass tube that, ironically, was smaller than this habitat. Carefully, perhaps still expecting there to be some kind of trick to this, or even the fairies to be able to use magic after all, he raised his voice in a whispering tone, despite the fact that he actually called out aloud, ”Hello?”
 
His call went unanswered at first, perhaps because everyone else was just as startled as him. Looking back over his shoulder, he found Aija´s eyes, equally scared, though it was hard to tell whether she was genuinely aware of the precariousness of the situation or if she was simply afraid of fairies for a good reason. The moment faded into seconds and eventually, there was movement somewhere down the grassy slope that had appeared almost flat from the slightly higher lying path for visitors. Somewhere down there, he could see something move, slightly reflecting the moonlight even. At first it only seemed to wake up, regain its senses, but then it took off and came flying towards him, pace increasing as it went, perhaps equally so the certainty that this was indeed who she had been hoping for. Barely remembering to slow down in time, she came to a halt just a couple feet away from the two, wings beating with joy and anticipation even after she had landed.
 
“You really came to save us!” she exclaimed cheerfully, stirring more movement amongst the other fairies within the habitat.
 
“We should better hurry, there´s no telling if there´s nobody guarding this place after all,” Caigo said quickly, signaling her to follow him outside.
 
Watching her wave for the others to follow her for a moment before he turned around, the unnervingly loud sound of dozens of pairs of wings fluttering behind him was more than enough to let him know that they wouldn´t be getting out of this unnoticed. As he led Aija and the hoard out of the habitat, he fully opened the door leading into the examination room, followed by the door leading out of it, before he hurried down the initial corridor to see what things looked like outside. He knew it was weird to think so, but he had this weird, paranoid feeling that this couldn´t be this easy. Glancing out of the exact same window that Aija had used to climb in here, he noticed a shadow in one of the few windows that still had light coming out of them, with its head turned sideways. He was pretty sure he was imagining things, but it seemed as though it was slowly but surely turning towards him, as if it was watching someone approach the entrance from around the building. Looking over his shoulder, he saw countless questioning and desperate faces glancing back at him, fearing that something had gone wrong after all and perhaps that they could be punished for trying to escape.
 
“How many are we?” Caigo asked into ‪the crowd as he glanced out of the window to make out what the figure was looking at.
 
“We´re 37,” a male voice answered from somewhere further down the corridor.
 
A moment later, a single security officer came into sight, making his way towards the entrance and shining his flashlight towards the door. Caigo duck away from the window, also pulling Aija down who had been idly looking out of the window next to him, then he briefly glanced at everyone and considered hiding until the guard was gone. Seeing the light coming through the window now, they could watch the cone it illuminated slowly shrink as the man came closer and closer. Being forced to make a choice, Caigo figured that it was probably too late to make everyone hide properly anyway, so he held up his hand, counting to three with his fingers, then he opened the door and shouted for everyone to hurry after him. The man who was now so close to the door that it almost hit him in the face stood there, startled for a moment as Caigo rushed past him and headed towards their homes, which was the only place that he could navigate towards to reach one of the city´s gates. Looking back, he could see how the seemingly never ending stream of fairies flying out of the building slowly but surely called the guard back to earth as he started to set into motion again. As they had almost all left, he could suddenly see how he grabbed one of the fairies by her ankle. To make things worse, his grip strengthened as she could slip through his grip until his fist reached the box at her ankle, causing her to cry out and kick for his face with her other bare foot as his grip was now too firm for her to break free. Luckily hitting him hard after several attempts though, she managed to stun him enough to break lose as he bowed down in pain while holding his nose, which Caigo could only assume she had broken in her desperate attempt to break free.
 
With everyone out of the park, Caigo now had a huge swarm of fairies blindly following, relying solely on the knowledge of someone who still considered himself a newcomer in this city and hardly capable of finding his way around at night. To what degree that could be said about Aija, he actually couldn't quite tell, especially after her behavior and apparent age contrasted so much, he swore he would never jump to conclusions again, at least not when it came to her. He was still trying to settle for a quick way to reach a gate out of the city, when he suddenly felt a pair of arms firmly gripping him from behind, reaching beneath his arms and lifting him off the ground. Incredibly, he had to realize that he was presumably going about twice as fast as before, judging by the amount of ground they were covering. With a brief look up, he glanced into the face of his previous first contact, who was now concentrating on flying on about ground level without letting Caigo touch the ground while doing so.
 
"Thought we could speed this up a bit," she explained briefly without looking down, "so, where are we going?"
 
Before Caigo could make up his mind so he could at least say something that he would feel comfortable sticking to, Aija spoke up to take charge and ordered the fairy carrying her, "turn right around that corner over there, then go straight and we should be on our way."
 
And so they followed her instructions, flying across the still pretty empty city, using one of the broader main streets that led right towards one of the gates of the city. Every now and then, whenever they came across an inhabitant of the city, they witnessed what had to be the essence of utter fear, with people trying to hide in corners or doorways, some frantically knocking on doors and even trying to break through them recklessly to get out of the way of what had to appear to them like a fairy swarm ready to bring about the end of this city, leaving Caigo wondering how terrifying fairies actually were, even worrying that he might have not chosen the right thing to do after all. Even if he did not, and he was still pretty sure that he was doing the right thing, he still felt sorry for the panic they were causing over essencially nothing, so he at least shouted “sorry” every time they came across someone, though he eventually stopped it because he felt stupid. However, when Aija noticed that he had stopped, she took over as she too felt it was the right thing to do, making him smile and encouraging him to join in again.
 
Soon enough they reached the wall separating the middle and lower tier of the city, which took them into the more dense part of the city, though the main road they were still on retained most of its width. Deciding that they might as well scare fewer people to death, Aija then guided the group through the narrow alleyways in between the tiny houses that they too called home.
 
"Are you sure this is the right way to go?" The fairy carrying Caigo asked Aija. She obviously grew suspicious due to the quite obvious change of their surroundings.
 
"You're scaring people, this way we won't run into as many people on our way out," Caigo explained, understanding her reasons perfectly.
 
The fairy visibly had mixed feelings about this, as the human could tell just by looking up, presumably because it was not as self-evident to the fairies that people around here couldn't know that they were unable to use their magic. There was also perhaps a slight suspicion that they might just lure them into the fangs of someone else, but to who's use? Non the less they were ultimately depending on the human and the neko they have only just met to get them out of here. If they had to abandon them after all, there was no telling what the other people here would do if they asked for help. Still, they went on flowing through the winding allyways like blood through the city's vains, soon emerging from ‪the darkness that was engulfing the narrow, poorly lit paths to see the light of the broad road that led right through a large gate, revealing the tree line of a forest in the distance. A cheer went through the swarm behind them, as the fairies felt great relieve at the sight of something that was not man made, but a resemblance of their natural home. In eager anticipation, they picked up their pace with newfound confidence, but as they closed in on the gate, Caigo signaled them to slow down. Up ahead, one of the guards who were meant to control who or what entered the city had caught a glimpse of them. He briefly gulped at the sight that lay before him, then he took a deep breath and slowly walked towards them. Sensing that it was the right thing to do, the fairy carrying him let down Caigo, allowing him to approach the guard in an equally uncertain fashion.
 
"What are you up to?" He asked with another glance over Caigo's shoulder. The man didn't exactly seem like someone who'd be easily frightened, in fact, he seemed like a tall, well-built man underneath his uniform and helmet, surely not someone you'd want to get into a fight with, yet he was practically shaking in front of winged, half naked people trying to leave the city.
 
"We just want to get them out of the city, they've been held captive and want to return home, they didn't harm anyone," Dicque explained slowly and cautiously.
 
The guard seemed hesitant, figuring that those fairies have obviously been bought and most likely freed illegally. On the other hand, what kept them from making him just another victim if he refused to let them go? As if on cue, the screaming night-watchman came running after them from the main road, still covering his now blood covered face. He actually seemed to care much more about the fairies escaping or most likely rather his job, than about himself looking like he had just killed someone using nothing but his teeth.
 
"Don't let them through, they are property of my client!" He screamed on top of his lungs before he had to catch his breath quickly, after he had surely run all the way here to catch up to them before they could leave the city.
 
Glancing back at the guard, Dicque could still see his uncertainty, but he could easily recognize that he knew he would have to side with one of them now. Then however, his eyes quickly widened and as Caigo turned around, he did so just in time to notice the fairies heading their way again, with the same girl picking him up again and rushing past the guard before he could chose to pick the wrong side, which was either one in this case. As the fairies took off from anew, dashing off above him, the guard sat down to get out of their way, staring up at the crowd of flying people above him in fear while they rapidly picked up height and speed. It appeared quite evident when glancing at the great gate ahead that there might actually be some more tricks to it that may stop them if they were not actually let through intentionally, even to the fairies that were not particularly willing to take a risk at this point. Flying higher and higher, Caigo and Aija watched as the huge wall rapidly passed by right in front of them, soon giving way to the clear, dark night sky ahead. Several more meters higher, just to be save, they then made their way across the wall, seemingly left to mind their own business as neither of them could spot any movement that indicated an action of the guards below. Leaving the city behind, they also left the guards on the other side of the gate staring after them in shock and surprise, before they vanished into the surrounding forest and were out of sight for good.
 
*******
 
Despite the fact that they were basically free now, the fairies carrying Caigo and Aija didn't seem to be up to letting them go just yet, as they flew on even after they were well out of sight and probably already far enough off for anyone to give up on searching for them. He guessed that they had their reasons, though that was perhaps just to distract him from the fact that there was very little stopping them from regaining their powers by now. Hoping that they didn't just take the two with them as a snack to go, they found themselves doomed to accompany the swarm of fairies for however long they saw fit, or so Caigo thought.
 
"I believe we're out of the radius by now," Aija pointed out.  By then, they had been on their way for several long minutes of traveling at the remarkable pace the fairies could muster, quite to Caigo´s astonishment since there were even children among them if he wasn´t mistaken.
 
With that heard, the two fairies carrying them were the first to land a few feet past the tree line to get the most out of the moonlight, followed by everyone else. Looking around into the relieved faces of the predators surrounding them, Caigo found himself once again wondering what exactly they were up to. As if on an unheard command though, most of the fairies took off the unwanted clothing now, much to Caigo's surprise, then they sat down and tried to figure out how to remove the devices around their ankles. Even though he and Aija still had mixed feelings about it, they too went to see the devices with the two fairies that have been carrying them before.
 
"Do you know how to get these off?" Aija asked curious. To Caigo's surprise, she actually seemed a lot less concerned about their wellbeing as he was.
 
"Not really, Fionee broke off a piece when she hit it with a stone, but we don't know how to do it properly," the female fairy explained while she proceeded fidgeting with the device.
 
"They are technical devices so there should be some kind of key required to open them normally," Caigo reckoned, still unsure of whether helping them was a good idea or not.
 
When the fairy realized that he perhaps had more of an idea on how to handle it, she held her foot up in his direction, urging him on to try his luck. Taking a look at the device, he first checked whether the band holding it in place was perhaps not particularly durable, but that did not seem to be the case. Then he took a look at the actual device, which was not much more than a tiny black box with a little display that was black though. Feeling buttons on either side of the display, he simply tried pressing them in various combinations until the device sprung to life, flashing a dim, blue light on the display. After a moment, it showed writing he obviously couldn't read and the imprints on the buttons too were impossible to see because of the moonlight being not bright enough, so he just proceeded to press buttons randomly again.
 
"What are you doing?" Aija asked him over his shoulder after a while. She had been watching him the entire time, but had watched quietly until then.
 
"I'm trying to get this thing to open up," Caigo responded with a hint of annoyance at the devices resistance.
 
"You should read what it says, I think you've been pretty close a couple times already," she said in a suggestive voice.
 
"Wait, can you read this?" he asked.
 
"Sure, we've been living in Negav for quite a while after all."
 
With that, Caigo left the handling of the device to Aija, who indeed managed to open the strap around the fairies leg within just a few seconds.
 
***********
 
It was somewhat astounding to him actually, seeing how Aija handled those weird devices that stripped the fairies of their power, while he couldn´t do anything, although he had considered himself the more civilized after everything he´d gotten to know about her. Perhaps it was foolish to assume that she hadn´t adapted to the city at all, but with her still not being familiar with a doorbell, he just wouldn´t have thought that she had learned to read after she had probably been a complete stranger to written language, since she had apparently been living out in the wild before. That might have been just something she had learned over time, since who knows how long she had been living in the city, though that raised the question why she was still so easily thrown off by something as simple as the doorbell after so much time.
 
After she had freed the first fairy, who had introduced herself as Havema, the others expected Aija to help them as well, which she complied with without hesitation, while the one who was now free to use her magic again tried to help by changing the size of the fairies or the device, which strangely didn´t seem to work. Caigo however watched over her shoulder and could also help removing them after he had watched a couple of times, memorizing the order in which he had to press the buttons to turn the devices off. As it turned out, the function was by no means meant as a simple way to release the fairies, but it was rather a hidden feature for an emergency release for whatever reason. If Caigo hadn´t found it by chance without even knowing it, Aija wouldn´t have found it either. A while later, the ground around them was practically covered with the green fabric they were made to wear and the devices they had discarded carelessly. With all of them free to use their magic again, the question of what the fairies had taken them out here for arose again, though getting rid of the devices might have just been the reason.
 
“So, what´s your plan now?” Caigo asked Havema cautiously.
 
“Well we´re heading home, those who don´t know where their home is will probably just stick together,” she explained with a content smile, before it turned a little sweeter, “So what´s your plan?”
 
“What do you mean?” Caigo asked back.
 
“That evil human following us didn’t seem too happy about what you´ve done,” she recalled giggling.
 
“You´re right, we´ll probably be taken into custody if we try to just go home again,” he reckoned, “I´d like to have at least told my boss what´s going on, he said he was mad about the last one on my position do the same. And I think the same goes for you and your brother, Aija.”
 
“I think he´ll figure out what´s going on if they try to find us,” Aija replied with a stunning carelessness.
 
“It´s settled then,” Havema proclaimed as she walked up closer to the two.
 
Without another word, she quickly shrank down both of them to a handy size of only a few inches, caught both in her hands, Caigo in her left and Aija in her right, then she turned around and faced the horizon, from where the slowly ascending sun was starting to illuminate the dark night sky in blue for them.
 
“Let´s get going,” Havema told the others, which made all of them take off almost simultaneously.

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The next couple of paragraphs were loosely inspired by one of my favorite songs right now, if you don´t mind some electronic music and want to get into the mood, see the link in my comment below!

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The first few fairies already separated from the group after a few minutes, wishing them good luck at finding somewhere to stay and then saying goodbye before they took off in a different direction. Those must have been the ones who had at least been to the outskirts of Negav before or perhaps had heard of the cities location some time so they knew how to get home from here. Meanwhile, Caigo and Aija were a lot more occupied with their current predicament. From their new height and perspective, they were left to stare down at the unfathomably distant ground below, with the only thing stopping them from plummeting to their deaths being Havema´s hands. That, in turn, was not really the best of conditions, since being under the absolute control of a predator in itself was equally dangerous and perhaps even scarier than the high altitude itself. What made the view even scarier though, were the constantly size changing fairies playing around below them as they went, passing by or even matching Havema´s tempo on purpose to taunt them. All of a sudden though, their view changed when she changed her position to fly on her back, so they had to look up into the sky. The sight of the first light reflecting off the clouds with the sun slowly ascending up ahead was truly a sight to behold, allowing them to briefly forget what was going on around them. That was only until she began to readjust their position in her hands though, as she turned them around so they could face her naked form from above, she flashed them a toothy grin before she let them dangle from only her thumbs and pointer fingers, causing them to panic helplessly. She stared back at them as they looked down at her, her huge mouth specifically, before she opened her maw, revealing her pearly white teeth once more, this time giving way to see all the way down to throat. Without waiting any further, she dropped both of them, leaving them to fall towards her mouth freely. Fast approaching her waiting maw, they could feel the warmth of her breath, the increasing moisture in the air, and everything around it faded out as they plummeted to their inevitable deaths.
 
In the last second however, she suddenly vanished from underneath them, slowing down and then flying backwards, leaving them to fall freely, while she casually returned to her former flying pose and returned into the  swarm of remaining fairies. Down below however, the two falling tinies spotted yet another fairy with her mouth opened wide, waiting for them to fall in. Adrenaline pumping through their veins again, they tried to flap their arms like wings to alter their fall in order to evade her, but found that they were still falling so quickly that they couldn´t help but fall right towards her. Time seemingly slowed down as they approached yet another hungry maw, ready to devour them for good, but then they suddenly felt a sharp push as a gust of wind hit them, followed by darkness swallowing their upper bodies. In the blink of an eye, everything went chaotic and nothing made sense anymore. Somehow, they had stopped falling, and found themselves engulfed in warmth above, but feeling the rush of wind at a high pace on their lower body. As an ominously loud giggle rang to their ears from above, they quickly knew that they were indeed stuck inside the mouth of yet another fairy. They could feel the warmth of her mouth all around them, even seeping into their legs after a bit, when they could suddenly feel her stop very quickly, accompanied by the sound of her teeth smacking together, thankfully a bit above their heads. As another effect though, the fairy seemed to have briefly forgotten about them and allowed them to slip out of her lips again, leaving them to fall freely for the third time. As they fell backwards at first, they briefly caught a glimpse of the  fairy that had caught them before, rubbing her head as she had bumped into the chest of another fairy as she had probably not been paying attention to where she was going. Being forced to face downwards in their fall though, the two of them quickly found themselves staring at yet the most horrific sight far below them.
 
This time however, they barely recognized it as such immediately. At their current size, even the face of the slightly tanned, green haired fairy, casually flying on her back with her arms behind her back, took in almost all of their field of view, even though she was still considerably far below them. Her pearly white teeth appeared almost as tall as buildings to them, her tongue large enough to destroy a tiny city with a single swipe and her ever cheerful eyes so large, they had to wonder if she could even see them since they must have appeared like a speck of dirt to her at best, while she was easily 70 feet tall. Their fall again felt like an eternity as they approached her mouth, this time certain that there was no escape, since there was no way they could alter their direction enough to evade her, even if they had a parachute. If another fairy was to catch them in time again, she would probably just go ahead and eat that fairy as well. Meanwhile the giant fairy seemed to smile hungrily at them, even though her mouth was opened wide and invitingly for the minuscule human and neko. Figuring that there was not much else to do, the two of them took the chance and drifted together a little further again and held hands as they approached their end, glancing into each other´s eyes with fearful expressions, gradually fading into an encouraging, warm smile, trying to make each other feel like everything was going to be OK somehow.
 
With a last look down at the mouth that by now surpassed their view so far that they couldn´t even see past her lips when turning their heads, they suddenly spotted Havema coming towards them from right inside the giantess´ mouth, still at human size herself. Catching the two of them in both her hands at once. When she recognized they were holding hands, she took them up higher and back to a save altitude, while the gigantic fairy closed her lips below them, just enough to playfully hold Havema back at her ankle briefly, while it was still slightly inside her mouth. As all three of them looked down at the huge face below, they received a playful wink and a giggle that actually shook Havema enough to make the tinies in her hands feel the vibration still, before she let her go. Just before they had cast their glance off of the giantess, they caught her shrinking away to nothing and returning to a more natural flying pose. Looking up at Havema now, they found her grinning down at the two while she gradually reduced her pace while the other fairies were flying past them now.
 
“Welcome to the family,” she said with a giggle.
 
“Sorry if I scared you,” the tanned fairy apologized, now hovering next to them at a matching size.
 
"Since you can't return to the city anyway, we thought we might just take you in," Havema explained. While the offer itself was obviously kind, it still startled the two how she still managed to smile innocently after what they had just done, clearly taking all of that as a simple joke. Despite all the risks they were taking, returning to Negav was not an option, at least not for the foreseeable future, and since it was the only truly safe place in Felarya, the next best choice would logically be to socialize with those who you seek protection from, at least from a theoretical standpoint.
 
"Thanks then," Caigo said, still unsure how to answer. Figuring that he probably didn't have that much of a choice either way, as long as he valued his life at least, he simply agreed to take their offer. A glance towards Aija told him that she had equally mixed feelings about this, though she too seemed to understand the potential consequences of declining their offer right now, given the various ways to die just then.
 
"Great! We should pay you back for saving us anyway," she explained her reasoning. Only now did Caigo and Aija also notice the rest of the swarm, hovering or flying all around them to welcome them now that the crisis was over for them. Ironically, this might as well be the beginning of their very own crisis.
 
***
 
Epilogue:
 
Life sure had changed a lot since Caigo and Aija had moved out of Negav. Some things out of necessity, others due to old habits and possibilities that they didn´t have inside of the city, but all of those had one thing in common: they were, for the most part, positive ones. Living together with the fairies they had saved made life simple and careless, much like their nature, even though the world they were living in without any walls or boundaries to keep them safe was one of the most dangerous known to man. After the final moments before Havema revealed to them that they were just playing around after they had regained their magic abilities got both of them to admit their feelings for each other a little more, Aija and Caigo had obviously grown a little closer on a private level, even though they would have probably shared a room anyway, but that was only during the night, when they could be in their little tree hole without being disturbed as much. During daytime, the two got to know right off the bat how incredibly playful and energetic a being that is this careless and free could be. Whenever they couldn't find them inherently occupied with something important, which was already difficult enough to get across even if it were the case, given the fact that most of the things on their minds were food and games, the fairies would make them play with them, even if that meant practically abducting them. What soon added to them growing a little apart during the day was that they very quickly made out who of the two was good for what and thus always demanded for only the one who fit the idea in their heads best.
 
Caigo was basically getting by by being their personal plaything of some sort. It bothered especially Aija at first to see how they used him more like a doll while playing, rather than a sentient being. Throwing him around while they played simple games that involved mostly interaction between each other, rather than some secondary object that he posed in those situations, was basically the norm and soon enough, he had, obviously against his will, found himself in the mouth of pretty much every fairy around at least once. He himself of course didn't take it particularly well either, but eventually grew accustomed to it and even began to laugh with them at some point. The whole being in someone else's mouth part was probably never meant to be one of his favorites in the first place, but at least the fear of death he had experienced the first couple of times was gone eventually. Surprisingly however, the fairies that generally enjoyed playing with him while he was smaller than them, basically voiding his authority and opinion, still listened and obliged to him whenever he told them they were going too far or putting him into unnecessary danger.
 
Aija on the other hand was usually consulted when they were going out to hunt for food. Caigo was not particularly thrilled when they first asked, given the double moral standard he saw in it, but he eventually looked past it since Aija had apparently been a predator herself before she and her brother moved to Negav as well. She greatly enjoyed being able to hunt again, since doing so was illegal in Negav because tinies were inhabitants of the city as well, joining the fairies on hunts and occasionally even acting as a coach and just watching them go about it their way. What she didn't tell Caigo, and probably never would, was that she even joined a hunt on humans on very rare occasions. If the fairies were to identify someone as evil, for whatever reason it may be, they would get her and let her decide. If she came to the same conclusion, for example when a small caravan of slave traders passed by, she would join them on their hunt, deeming it a just thing to do, but she would always decline if she didn't see any wrong in their actions.
 
The newly founded family the two were part of had also changed over the relatively short period of time, which was to be expected during the earliest days. They were by then down to only thirteen fairies, since some had changed their mind about not going back home after all, came to find the joy in traveling while they were on their way to find this place, or because they found another reason to leave. Meanwhile Caigo and Aija had somehow become pretty much the heads of the family by a somewhat foreseeable development. While the fairies were by no means dumb, their carefree nature made it hard for them to think particularly far ahead if there was something, or anything for that matter, at hand to distract them, so it was only natural for them to prefer following the advice of the couple instead of bothering with any kinds of choices themselves.
 
And so, under the guidance of the neko and the human they had taken in, they had developed their own little family, settled around a group of trees somewhere within a forest a bit off towards the east from Negav. They had remained pretty much undisturbed for the most part, since this part was actually well known among merchants for being rarely occupied by predators, though there were also very few that had a reason to pass through here as well, making it a land free for the taking for a reason. On one day however, a merchant's chariot passed through underneath the tree that Caigo and Aija called their home, together with another trio of siblings and a fourth fairy that had preferred to have her own place. Noticing the nearby vehicle from quite a distance due to her predatory senses, Aija hurried out of their home despite the early time of day. Looking out across the trees towards it, she found a new-looking chariot with a single merchant riding it, idly coming through on its own. Figuring that this would surely not remain unnoticed for long, she hurried towards the other two homes to inform their inhabitants about what she intended to do, jumping from branch to branch elegantly, careful not to draw attention.
 
"Nermi, I need your help," she explained briefly after she woke the lone fairy by pulling her leg from a branch below her.
 
"What is it?" She asked as she rubbed the sleep out of her eyes, then she noticed the prey passing bye below them, visibly bringing her fully to life.
 
"Don't haste things, take me to the others first," Aija commanded, making it clear that she had a plan.
 
With that, the fairy got up, shrank herself and Aija down to a size that allowed them to fly around without being spotted as easily, then she picked her up and headed for the second home in their tree. The three siblings were living inside a hole in the tree just like Aija and Caigo did, though they actually volunteered to have the smaller one since they didn't need any more space than what they considered to be necessary to sleep in, which was considerably little since they could alter their size anyway.
 
“Get up there´s something I need your help with,” Aija ordered when she noticed that the three fairies were already waking anyway.
 
“Hu? What is it?” Zuteko asked while rubbing his eyes.
 
“There´s a human passing by below us, I need you to bring him up here, I need his help with something,” she explained briefly.
 
With the simple notion of a human passing by, she had already peaked their interest. Since humans were known for carrying around all sorts of different interesting things, even among the fairies, they were always happy when one of them came to “visit” them, even if they might not be allowed to have them afterwards. Seeing their eager expressions, she just left their home and got comfortable on a branch a little higher up, resting against the tree trunk with her legs cross. Merely a few seconds later, Nermi came flying up to deliver the human she had ordered, placing him on the branch in front of her before she returned to meet up with the others below to investigate the interior of the chariot. Glancing down at the shrunken human before her, looking around in confusion and an expression of absolute terror on his face when he realized what he was looking at before him, she gave him a sweet smile, then she leaned over to the side.
 
“Can I have him back to normal?” she asked rhetorically. Even though Nermi was nowhere to be seen, she must have heard her over the eager chatting and rumbling inside the chariot, because moments later the man sitting in front of her was even a little taller than Aija, “Greetings.”
 
“Wh-What´s going on?” the stranger asked. He was clearly still in shock and confused by his sudden size shifts that had by now become almost natural to Aija, even though she had to rely on the other fairies to perform them for her.
 
“This is our home now, though this is probably your first time passing through here in a while isn´t it?” Aija asked interested.
 
“I rarely have to pass through here, but this road was supposed to be safe…” he explained before his thoughts seemed to have drifted off. It was quite clear that he was convinced of the fact that this was his end, even though it was definitely a good sign that Aija had his size restored in the first place.
 
“It still is. If you do me a favor, that is,” Aija began with a grin as if she was going to make a great bargain, “I suppose you´re heading for Negav?”
 
“Yes, why are you asking?”
 
“My brother lives there, but we can´t return to the city, so I need someone to deliver a message for me,” she explained simply, “it´s as simple as that, promise you deliver my message and you can leave without anyone bothering you.”
 
“S-Sure, what do I tell him then?” he asked uncertain. There was a strange mix of hesitation and eagerness to his voice, as if he was expecting there to be some kind of trick to this, since it appeared too easy of a task to save his life, while at the same time he was perhaps aiming to get this over with before she could change her mind. With the noise the fairies were making below them, he was probably also fearing for the safety of his goods.
 
“Tell him we´re safe and living together with the fairies, he doesn´t have to worry about us, he´ll know what I mean. Also, tell him that we did get together as he had said,” she chuckled in reminiscence at that, “and that I have someone looking after me now, he doesn´t have to come after us, I know he prefers living in Negav. That should be it.”
 
“Got it, I´ll definitely tell him,” he promised. If it was only such a simple thing to ensure he would get out of this alive, so be it. It would have been unfortunate and most likely the end of his job, but if need be he would have given his goods and chariot to get out of here, though she didn´t have to know that.
 
“Oh I forgot something,” she pointed out after a short pause, “you´ll probably have to hand over some of your stuff. I don´t need anything but the little guys looking through your chariot are pretty curios.”
 
“I-That´s fine, I guess,” he said hesitantly, before he added, “I´d still like to have something left to sell so I can afford living in the city for a moment and to stock up my supplies, if that´s not a problem.”
 
“Oh that´s not a problem at all, just a moment,” she told him before she leaned over the branch again, “Could you come up here for a second?”
 
Amazingly, the fairies followed her bidding quickly, showing up within just a few seconds. If he didn’t know about how dangerous they could be, he would´ve thought those fairies were mere children; each of them was holding a couple of his goods in their hands and inspecting them with great interest, unable to contain themselves even for the short time the neko asked them to stop their search for interesting stuff he had among his goods.
 
“This man is going to visit Negav and he will deliver a message to my brother, so make sure the others don´t bother him,” Aija explained as if she was actually talking to a child, “and he also needs his things so he can sell them to people in the city, so each of you can only have one thing each, alright?”
 
“Right,” the fairies responded with a hint of reluctance. The fact that they found it hard to choose one thing even though they most likely didn´t know what most of the things he had with him were used for, puzzled him more than he would have wanted. It was hard to imagine, but behind the cold blooded killer everyone was seeing in fairies, they did indeed seem to be just carefree and innocent beings for the most part. The fairies then returned into his chariot and tried to choose their one item, hopefully not the most expensive of pieces he had with him.
 
“You know,” Aija interrupted him when he seemed caught up in his own thoughts, “I think we could arrange something if you want to continue coming here.”
 
“What do you mean?” he asked, unsure of what she had in mind.
 
“Well, you could come here regularly and be safe around here and in exchange we would get a way to access Negav,” she pointed out, “plus if we need something, I´m sure you could keep an eye out for us.”
 
“I guess I could,” he agreed. He didn´t quite want to give it away, but he did recently have more of a reason to take this route repeatedly, though there was no telling what they would even be looking for if she would request something, which made it a questionably rewarding deal after all.
 
At that, the fairies returned to present what each of them had settled on, revealing an electric lamp, a notepad with a pen attached to a string at the top of the notepad, a beautiful but simple dress that was cut out in a V shape on the back and a handmade neko doll, that had a strange resemblance of Aija, for Zuteko.
 
“I´m glad you could settle on something, they seem like interesting choices!” Aija complemented the four of them, “I´ll be right back, give me a second.”
 
With that, the neko left the poor stranger alone with the four fairies, which made him feel a lot less confident about his safety again, though it seemed that the predators were actually pretty caught up in their new toys, rather than being interested in him. Since they thankfully didn´t seem too interested in nibbling on him, he too drifted off in his thoughts, hoping that his remaining goods were alright and wondering what the neko had left for. Before he could really think of something though, she came back from above, holding a simple satchel in her right hand.
 
“So, how much are these?” she asked. The fact that she seemed genuinely interested in paying for these was probably the thing that he would have expected the least, mostly because he wouldn´t have expected them to have any money, or rather an interest in keeping it in the first place. When he didn´t answer at first, she added, “We´re paying the market price, don´t worry.”
 
Due to his surprise and perhaps even slight relieve when he had actually expected worse, he even subconsciously sold the items for less than what he had paid for them himself, but since it was only these few and also some of the cheaper things he had in stock, he didn´t mind. He wouldn´t have minded giving them away for free actually, but since she insisted on paying for them, he didn´t see any harm in taking her money; perhaps she was feeling better about not practically stealing it as well. Afterwards, she asked the fairies to return him back to his chariot, while she herself left them on their own again. While the prospect of being shrunk again was not particularly pleasant, he was somewhat glad to leave this place for now, mostly to come to terms with what had happened in this little time. He had not only seemingly secured a new, truly safe road for himself as it seemed, but also another potential “market” to sell his products on, which also seemed to be interested in his usually less popular stock. The sheer fact that they even had money to pay and didn´t just go with taking what they wanted in exchange for his safety baffled him somewhat, but he was quite sure he didn´t want to know where the money came from.
 
As much as the fairies seemed to be absorbed in their new property, they had still, unbeknownst to him, vanished briefly to drop them off at their homes, before they returned to take him to his chariot. They didn´t quite know what Aija had been doing when she gave him  those strange golden coins, though they had assumed it was some kind of trade in exchange for what they had picked to keep. The whole concept of giving a human something in return was new to them in itself, since they would usually just let them go if they received something else that was more valuable to them than having them for dinner, or just ate them and took what was left for free. This man however, seemed to have all kinds of different treasures in his chariot and with what´s been going on, it seemed as though they were going to treat him extra kindly so he would come back and bring more for them, which they obviously welcomed. For this one time, they simply shrank him down, still visibly starling him by just doing so, and Nermi carried him down into his chariot, where his size was quickly restored, before he was sent off by all four of them wishing him good luck and asking him to come visit soon. He went free this time, but all of them knew he wouldn´t go without having to play with them next time he came along, which was not quite as self-explanatory to them as it may seem. After they had their fun with Aija, she got back to it after a while and explained how it may be fun for them to play like that, but that it was quite likely that people would get it the wrong way and that they would scare them off, so if they wanted someone to come back, they´d have to play nice with them until they got along. Having to explain it like this actually seemed pretty ridiculous to Aija, but due to their carefree nature, most of them never really bothered thinking that much into humans and thus found it hard to understand how humans thought of their actions, even those that were ultimately harmless, though maybe a bit cruel on their “victims”.