The Audacity Gambit, VI:2

[bzedan]

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What had pissed her off so much and kept her walking fuelled by anger for most of the first day hadn’t been that the dryad had spirited her off, or that it prevented Emily from asking questions and getting a feel for the Sidhe. It was that she’d woken up in the middle of absolutely nowhere and now had to walk for ages with no sense of where to find anyone.

The small compass she pulled from her pack steadily pointed somewhere not north and for lack of any other idea where to aim herself, Emily walked in the general direction it pointed, using the sun to check that the direction held steady—something that proved easier than she expected. There was absolutely nothing magical about anything she encountered. Not the tall grass that was unexpectedly matted at the base and kept snagging her feet, or the sweat that pooled beneath her pack. She’d stripped down to a tanktop and long pants. It was warm enough for shorts but the grass would have whipped her legs raw.

There was an incredible lack of landmarks and Emily’s battered plastic Casio sputtered LED runes between giving her a blank screen. Even the wind-up pocket watch she’d brought along “just in case” was useless.

With no real way to guess how long she’d been walking, it took Emily a while to realise that her pack wasn’t hanging heavy on her shoulders after she’d been carrying it for some time. She’d expected that getting used to carrying a heavy pack of supplies would be one of the more challenging physical aspects of the entire trip. It was a nice pack, with a chest strap and padding for the shoulders but no pack was nice enough to make it feel like you weren’t carrying anything. Emily didn’t have much time to think about it before she realised that a slow buzzing had been building up as she walked. The sound had reached a thrumming, heavy volume and she stopped, looking around for the source.

It felt like the sound was moving, sliding from one corner of her vision to another. Emily slowly knelt, sliding off her pack, cursing herself for stowing the bowie knife and not wearing it on her belt. She rummaged through the main compartment, glancing up every time it sounded like the buzzing moved closer. Finally she remembered that she’d packed the knife in the front pocket, so it would be easy to get to. She grabbed it in a mild panic, but before she could unsheathe the blade a grasshopper landed on her arm and Emily, feeling stupid, realised what the noise was.

“Your blade won’t do much good.”

Emily blinked slowly, assured herself that it was the grasshopper that had spoken and brought her arm up so she could look it in the eye. “I suppose not.”

“I could draw your blood with one quick bite, but you wouldn’t be able to cut me with that no matter how fast you moved.” The grasshopper cleaned its eyes as it spoke. “Besides, I could call my friends and we’d cover you dead.” Listening to the waves of noise that surrounded her, Emily nodded, carefully.

“True. Listen, I’d like to sling this on my belt, but I need both hands.” The grasshopper jumped to the top of her pack and watched Emily unbuckle her belt and thread it though a loop at the top of the knife case. “Thanks, I should have done that earlier, anyway.” Emily settled back on her heels and looked at the insect. It was about as long as her thumb and mottled green and brown, matching early summer fields. “So,” Emily didn’t know what to say but forged ahead, “what are you up to?” The grasshopper jumped back to her arm and Emily obligingly lifted it back up to eye level.

“Eating. We’re eating a lot, it’s nice.” Wings striated proudly. “Some fighting, we’re in top form, which is why I wanted to warn you before you did something stupid like try to fight us.”

“That’s nice of you. Thank you.” Emily wrinkled her nose, thinking. “Hey, is there anything I could do for you?”

The surrounding thrum built louder for a moment and she felt like she was being laughed at. The grasshopper cleaned its eyes again, somehow mocking the human movement of rubbing one’s eyes in disbelief. “You? Do something for us? That’s a joke, right? Like you help us and when you needed some help in a quest we could do it while you slept in despair. I hope you’re not implying that we need the help of someone like you?” It clicked its mandibles menacingly.

“Oh dude, no. I was just being polite.” Emily kept her face straight and hoped that insects couldn’t pick up when a mammal lied.

“Because I could still call my friends and we could fight you.” The buzz around Emily rose louder again.

“That really is not necessary. At all.” She sighed. “Listen, I am new here and I was trying to be nice, because I don’t know how things work and the last thing I wanted to do is piss a bunch of people off.”

The grasshopper preened. Neither of them said anything for a while, one eyeing the other. Emily started to move, then thought better of it. “Hey, I want to get something out of my pack, you can stay on my arm, if you want, just hold on.” The insect skittered up to her elbow and balanced itself while Emily dug out the tobacco pouch and rolled a cigarette. After lighting it, she brought her arm back around, balanced on her knee and looked at the grasshopper from the corner of her eye, blowing her smoke away and up.

“Maybe you could help me.” The grasshopper thrummed its wings but didn’t reply. “I know, okay I can’t help you at all, so saying ‘I’ll owe you one’ probably doesn’t mean much. But I’m lost and you probably know this area better.”

“We do. It’s our land, we fight for it.”

“Right, I know you fight pretty well for it.”

“Very well for it.”

“Okay. Point being, can you help me?”

The grasshopper swivelled its head to look out in the direction Emily had been walking, though it still held her gaze with its compound eyes. “You were walking straight.”

“Yeah, but straight to where?”

“You are the dumbest creature we’ve met.” It jumped back into the grass, kicking Emily’s arm with its spiny back legs and leaving a scratch.

Emily shouldered her pack again and started walking, checking herself against the compass and the sun. Alongside her waves of grasshoppers would crest the top of the field, mocking with harsh clicks. She kept her eyes forward and smoked angrily, exhaling through her nose.

Mirrored from Journal of a Something or Other.