Winning any great battle is a matter of training and strategy. He who is best prepared, wins his fight before he ever sets foot on the battlefield.

—Nightwing

Inside Nightwing's Cave, the monsters were finally going to sleep.

Though the day had nearly come and gone, Nightwing had stayed up all day, herding in prisoners to create new monstrosities, and then pitting them against one another, until he'd created his ultimate warrior—the Conqueror Worm.

Only then did he tell his minions, "Go search the forests. Bring me eagles and rattlesnakes, a thousand of each! And with them I will build an army that all of the forces of S.W.A.R.M. cannot repel."

Ben felt sickened by the barbarity of the display, the endless bloodshed.

He wanted to run away, but he'd seen what happened to Nightwing's familiar when he tried to escape. So instead, Ben took a little comfort in knowing that one day was almost done. If he had to serve Nightwing for a month, that meant that he only had twenty nine days left to go.

Many of the monsters went out that night to hunt for snakes and eagles. Ben suspected that in the morning, Nightwing would begin creating whole new races of monsters to fight his war. And within a day or two, they'd go to war.

Right now, the cave was relatively empty. Only a few guards remained.

Before they went to sleep, Nightwing ordered Fanglorious the snake, "Bring me a fresh newt!"

In moments a rubbery brown lizard was squirming in the snakes jaws, trying to escape. The snake wriggled up to Nightwing and dropped the lizard at his feet. The newt cowered before Nightwing and said, "Eat me and you'll die! My skin is poisonous, you know!"

"I know," Nightwing said. "But it's not your skin that I want, just your eye. Now, will you show me what I want, or will you make me rip it from its socket?"

The newt stared blankly, then said in a deep voice, "Three answers you may have of me: ask what is now, what shall come, or what may be."

"Show me my ancient enemy," Nightwing commanded, "Rufus Flycatcher, the High Wizard of S.W.A.R.M."

The newt's eyes glowed fiery green. Ben peered into them.

He saw a gorgeous scene. It was sunset in a swamp, far, far away. Green dragonflies cruised lazily through skies painted gold from a setting sun, while cypress trees cast blue shadows upon the dark water.

Frogs were singing everywhere—croaking so loudly that to Ben it sounded as if he were in a football stadium. There were leopard frogs, bullfrogs, green frogs, tree frogs, spring peepers, carpenter frogs. The calls were so loud and insistent and varied, Ben had never heard anything like it.

The vision zoomed in, down around the roots of a huge cypress tree. There on the cypress knees—knobs of wood that poked up from the black water—, sat a handsome bullfrog. Baby alligators patrolled the waters behind him like sentries, while a beautiful white heron watched the bank above, and a pair of turtles—large cooters—sunned on a log nearby. Fireflies danced in the air around his head, their green lights dipping and rising.

Ben had a terrible longing to take a jar and catch the fireflies.

Rufus Flycatcher was busily instructing some young frogs, most of which hadn't even lost their tails yet, about the difficulties in repairing the damaged wings of fireflies.

"The problem," Rufus was saying, "is that fireflies aren't real flies. If ya-all look close, you'll see that they're beetles, and like any beetle, the real wings are hidden beneath an armored shell, called the elytra. So these wings, constantly banging agin' this shell, get worn out quicker than a butterfly bucking against the wind of a tornado . . ."

"Perfect," Nightwing chuckled upon seeing the old bullfrog. "This looks just perfect." Suddenly the bat hissed a loud curse, then magnified his voice as he addressed the frog, "Rufus, I'm coming for you."

Through the newt's eye, Ben could hear the bat's words repeated, only there in the swamp the voice seemed to come from everywhere, booming from the sky, bouncing from the waters, filling every corner of the cypress forest.

The fireflies dipped in the air, startled from their flight, while young frogs and tadpoles croaked in fear and leapt for the safety of the water. Even the alligators dived for safety.

But Rufus Flycatcher boldly held his ground, sitting on a mossy cypress knee while green algae floated all around him. "Nightwing?" Rufus said. "So, you're still alive? I figured for sure that you'd be toasting like a marshmallow in hell by now."

"I'm more alive than you are," Nightwing said. "Your time has come."

"You still runnin' that school of yours, S.A.D.I.S.T.? Not much of a magic school, from what I hear? What kind of magic do you teach?"

"Like most schools," Nightwing admitted, "we don't profess to teach much at all. We just take smart, impressionable young ones—and turn them into monsters!"

"You know, you're one sick puppy," Rufus said. "It's all that evil in you, poisoning you. I tried to heal you of it once. But you clung to it like a baby possum clinging to its mama's belly. Now, if'n you'd free yourself of evil, you'd be a whole lot better off!"

"Why, I thank you for your concern, my old master. But I don't want to be healed. I like being a sick puppy. It's the only thing that I really excel at."

Rufus Flycatcher shook his head sadly. "Once, there was a time when you were a man, a man who could cast a spell over an audience with just the sound of your voice. You'd stand there and tell a poem, and folks would just gasp in amazement. Women would throw themselves at you and swoon at your feet. What I want to know is, whatever happened to that feller?"

"Ah, well," Nightwing said, "Poets have fallen out of favor in the past hundred years. Now the humans prefer rock singers. And aside from Ozzie Osbourne, they're all no-talent hacks."

The fireflies were still bobbing in the air around Rufus. They brightened a little, believing that the danger was gone.

Nightwing said, "I'll be seeing you soon. You'd better get some rest. You'll need it." Then, in a falsely sweet voice he offered, "Here, let me turn out the lights for you."

And with that, Nightwing hissed a second curse. The fireflies exploded in mid-air and went raining down into the water, leaving trails of smoke and debris in the air, until they hit the brackish pool, sizzling.

"You can't scare me, I'm from Texas!" Rufus said in a challenging tone. "I got warts on my armpit that are scarier than you!" He let out a strange croak, which started deeply, causing the whole cave to thunder and shake from the sound. But as the croak ended, it rose to a piercing shriek that caused Nightwing to hiss and throw his wings up over his ears.

The bat's eyes got wide with terror, as if the continued shrieking would kill the bat. In desperation, Nightwing waved his wing.

Instantly, the newt's eye cleared, and the vision faded.

Nightwing stood for a moment, trembling in pain, trying to compose himself. Ben realized that the bat's ears had been too sensitive to withstand the bullfrog's sudden assault.

Ben was still gasping in shock at the murder of the poor fireflies. Though he had gone the whole day without eating, he felt as if he would be sick.

Ben crawled to the edge of the rock and began to gag, remembering the fireflies burning in the water.

Nightwing turned on him, angrily stalked closer. "What, you don't want me to kill the little froggy?"

Ben shook his head sadly.

"You don't like what I'm doing with your power?" Nightwing demanded.

Ben looked up, frightened, and shook his head.

Nightwing snarled, "What kind of tick are you? A luna-tick? A roman-tick? Or are you just fran-tick?"

Ben knew that sometimes when someone is mad at you, you're better off just to say nothing, so he sat there, squirming, until Nightwing shouted. "Your attitude displeases me. One day shall be added to your term of service!"

Ben's heart froze. He had dared to hope that in twenty nine days he would be free. But Nightwing had just made it an even thirty again.

The bat sneered at him, and Ben could sense the creature's game. For every day that Ben served, the bat would think up some excuse to keep him a day longer. Ben would never be able to serve Nightwing well enough to get free.

I'm his slave, Ben realized. I'm his slave forever.

The very thought made all eight of Ben's legs so weak that he collapsed to the ground like a rock, his legs clattering around him like broken sticks.