Blaza sighed quietly. He hadn't been able to find Meme, and had returned to Woolf around thirty minutes after he'd been sent to find the doctor. Meme wasn't a real doctor, of course, but he had enough knowledge to be able to help heal a number of injuries in the past. When Blaza had returned to Woolf, Nadwe was gone. Woolf'd refused to tell Blaza what Nadwe had said, and said that he wanted to tell everyone at once. Woolf'd also said that they needed to find Dino. The urgency in his voice had made it clear that something was wrong.

They'd spent the entire night looking for the furry, and eventually had found Dino at around one in the morning. Seeing Woolf, a guilty expression had slid onto Dino's face. The trio had gone back to the village to rest. They'd asked Socks to guard Dino for the time being. 

It was morning now, however. Blaza, Socks, Oof, and Tbh all stood around Woolf in a small house of the village. Dino was tied to a coat rack in the corner, muttering annoyedly.

"Woolf, can you just tell us already?" Oof groaned.

"No. Meme needs to be here. And Laff, preferably."

"And Muffin," Blaza said quietly. "Muffin would want to hear it, too."

The door to the house suddenly burst open. Meme stood in the doorway, clutching Laff's arm tightly, possibly cutting off his circulation. He'd very clearly dragged the brit all the way to the house.

"I saw Nadwe!" Meme shouted, dragging Laff in and slamming the door behind him.

Blaza flinched at the loudness of Meme's voice. Meme's fluffy, blue hoodie had many twigs and leaves tangled in it, and the fur was matted. It seemed like he'd run through the entire forest to get here. He probably had. Then Blaza realized what Meme had said. He looked over at Woolf, who nodded.

"So, now that you two are here, I can explain a little bit. Meme, around what time did you see Nadwe?" Woolf asked.

Everyone was silent, staring at Meme. "It was this morning. He looked terrible. Burned all over and—"

"Great. So, I'm going to tell you what I've seen, and what I've heard," Woolf said, cutting Meme off. "Yesterday, I was chilling in the forest. Yeah, I know you told me to go lay down and blah blah blah, but I wanted some fresh air, Meme. Anyways, I'd heard screeching. When I looked up, I saw something in the sky. On fire. I'd thought it was a phoenix, or some other kind of fiery creature. This thing had crash landed in the forest nearby. I found it in a clearing. This was no creature, however. It was Nadwe."

Though everyone had clearly been anticipating this 'thing' to be Nadwe from how long Woolf was dragging the story on, they still seemed worried about the child— Meme especially.

"Me and Blaza had brought him to a lake to help with his burns," Woolf continued, nodding to Blaza. "I'd asked Blaza to go find you, Meme. He hadn't been able to. In the meantime, however— when Blaza was looking for Meme— Nadwe had woken up. I'd talked to him. He'd been friendly. He told me that he was worried he was going to hurt everybody because someone told him that he was dangerous."

Woolf paused, glaring long and hard at Dino, before continuing once more. "He told me that he had been talking to Muffin before he was pushed off a cliff by that certain someone." Another glare at Dino. "Could you confirm that, Muffin?"

Silence. Woolf looked around the room, a frown forming on his face as he realized the mistake. Muffin wasn't in the building. Blaza sighed quietly, having noticed this long beforehand. Everyone had a slightly panicked look, but Meme just shook his head.

"He's probably crying, thinking Nadwe's dead. Now, it'd be great to tell him he's not, but I also don't think he wants to hear that Nadwe's missing again. If we find him, let's leave him alone, alright?" Meme said.

Woolf blinked. "You lost him?"

"He flew off. I think he was mad at me."

Woolf nodded understandingly, turning to Dino. "So, explain yourself, asshole."

Dino's usual frown, over the progression of the story, had slowly deepened. He was clearly upset that Nadwe wasn't dead. The furry seemed to be contemplating his options. Then he spoke— a short, simple statement.

"I have my reasons."

Meme's eye was twitching. He hadn't let go of Laff, and somehow managed to tighten his grip. Laff winced. "Alright, then. Tell me your reasons."

Dino hardened his glare, but it softened again when he caught Woolf's eyes. Then he turned to Blaza. "Why don't you explain?" the furry growled.

Everyone turned to Blaza, then. Blaza looked around at the confused faces of his friends, taking a step back. "Me? What do I have to explain?"

Dino scoffed, but didn't respond. Tbh let out a loud sigh. "Alright, well, if nobody's going to talk, then I'm out."

The crab man started heading towards the door. Socks followed soon after. Then Blaza. He'd heard what needed to be said. Dino tried to kill Nadwe. Nadwe was okay. But Dino was blaming Blaza? Blaza shook his head, confused. He walked through the village, thinking to himself, before spotting Tbh sitting by the small pool of water the waterfall poured into.

Blaza blinked, then walked over. "Hey," he said, voice soft.

"Hey."

It was quiet for a long while after that. Morning soon turned to noon. Eventually, Blaza let out a gentle sigh. "So, uhm... How's your day—"

Blaza was cut off as Tbh spoke, "Have you had any new visions?"

Blaza blinked, slightly startled, before shaking his head. "No. Nothing new."

Tbh frowned slightly at that, huffing. "Well, tell me if you do. I really find them quite interesting, y'know? It's—"

And like on a cue, Blaza's head started to get fuzzy. Tbh's voice faded out of focus. Blaza's vision clouded. And then he tipped and fell, everything going dark. But it didn't stay dark for long.

(/==^o^==\)

Fire. Fire everywhere. Screaming is heard, but it's unclear where it's coming from. Two figures in a burning clearing of pines, unidentifiable as always. One is slumped, crumpled on the floor; presumably dead. The other is stood in a triumphant way over the body, sneering down at it as flames lick at their clothes.

More screaming is heard, louder this time, and it seems to get the person's attention as they look away from the body, scanning the trees around them. Now they suddenly seem slightly panicked, likely realizing their surroundings. Creaking is heard. Then a shout.

"Get out of there!"

The person doesn't move. They look back down at the body, now seemingly saddened by it. More creaking. A different voice shouts, this time much, much more familiar.

"We need to run! Please! There's too much smoke—!"

Loud coughing is heard soon after. More creaking. The person in the fire-lit clearing suddenly seems to gain control of their movements again, taking a step in an attempt to run but a loud 'CRACK!' makes them stop and look behind themselves and then—

(/==^o^==\)

Blaza gasped for air, flailing his arms around and hearing sloshing as he did so. Instead of receiving the air his lungs burned for, water flooded in, causing Blaza to gag and choke on the liquid. He couldn't breathe. Blaza tried to reorient himself unsuccessfully, his vision blurred by the water around him. Black spots started to swim in front of his eyes.

A hand grabbed Blaza's arm, pulling him upwards and out of the water. As he broke the surface, he immediately started coughing, strong arms gripping him and laying him down on wet grass.

"Blaza? Blaza, are you alright? Man, if you die, Memegod's going to murder my ears with lectures and— shit— I do not want to sit through that! Blaza, come on, please!"

Blaza blinked his eyes open, seeing the blurry crab jumper above him. "Tbh?" Blaza croaked out, coughing as the crab man exclaimed an 'Oh, thank God!' and squashed him in a hug.

Blaza let out a strained laugh. "Stop it, you're choking me!"

Tbh let out a quiet laugh, too, rolling off of Blaza. His face became concerned once they were both quiet, though. "You are okay, though, right?"

Blaza nodded, lips quirked up in a slight smile. He sighed contentedly, grinning up at the blue sky as he heard the shuffle of Tbh getting up. Then Tbh stuck out a claw for him to grab. He did so, and Tbh easily pulled him up. After, though, the simple content slipped away as an awkward silence fell over the two, Blaza's every so often cough being the only sound other than the gentle rustle of wind passing over leaves. Blaza blinked at Tbh. Tbh blinked at him.

"So uh... Try not to pass out into a pool next time, yeah?"

Blaza looked to the grass. "Yeah..." He rubbed the back of his neck. More silence.

"... So was it a visio—"

"I'd rather not talk about it."

"Yeah but—"

"My vision. My choice. I said no."

"Well, yeah, but Blaz—"

"No."

The two locked eyes, Tbh's eyebrows furrowed in an irritated way.

Blaza sighed. "Listen. It was... Just... A cat."

"A cat?"

"Yeah, a cat. And he flopped around a lot."

"And that was it?"

Blaza nodded. "Mhm. Just a cat."

Funnily enough, Blaza had had a vision of a cat before. This cat had been in many other visions, too, though they didn't seem to be about the fluffy feline, most of the time. So, at least he wasn't entirely lying— he had a vision about a cat. Just... That wasn't this vision. That's all.

"Well, uhm... Y'know what? I think I'm just gonna go. Sorry I bothered you in the first place," Blaza said, beginning to move away from Tbh.

"Oh. Uh... Y- Yeah. Have a nice day, then."

Blaza nodded, scooting further away from Tbh, and then turning and walking away from the village and into the forest. He sighed quietly, thinking as he walked. But at least he knew one thing— he didn't want to explain himself. He didn't want to at all. Not for Dino. Not for Meme. Not for Tbh. Because sometimes, it's better to keep things to yourself. And Blaza remembered why he'd decided that now.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

{CHAPTER NOTES}

Summary: Blaza and Woolf searched for and found Dino, then called a group meeting. Woolf tells everyone that Dino had pushed Nadwe off the mountain, Meme becoming furious with him. Dino just implies Blaza knows why he did it, which Blaza doesn't. Eventually, everyone leaves the meeting. Blaza goes to sit with Tbh, passing out into the water and having a vision of a fiery forest. When he wakes up, Tbh pulls him out of the pond and insensitively asks him if it was a vision. Blaza doesn't tell him and leaves, irritated. (Word Count: 1744)

[NEW NOTE]: Every time I think about this chapter I still think it's going to be cringe and horrible and that I'll need to rewrite it, but then I'll read it and it's perfectly fine. The tone is kind of weird but it's okay? The pace is a bit off but it's also normal? I don't know, the way I wrote it makes the surroundings seem all bright and sunny while the characters are all angsty. Maybe that's just me. When I imagine the scenario it's weird in my head, but average on paper. I don't even know why.

(Old Note): Hey, guys! Holy crap, it's been almost two months now, hasn't it? I'm so sorry, I wanted to start writing more but I just got caught up with so much stuff that I forgot. It's even stupider that I had like 1000 words of this chapter done in April and I could've finished it so easily (The only reason I hadn't is because I was going to rewrite the entire chapter, but looking back at it, I'd realized it was fine the way it was)! *dies* Anyways, I'm hoping to write more, but don't count on it. Chapter summary: Blaza- Group meeting, we find out Dino tried to kill le child, but Dino blamed Blaza. Blaza then has a vision, and decides he's not going to share with Tbh. (Word Count: 1623)