Chapter 11

The new camp was situated amidst the forest. It did not sit upon any roads, rivers or bridges and no sane man would ever come here on his own accord, or so a good soul might have thought. The ground was trampled under the heavy footfalls of the multi-ton monsters that walked here and the herds of slaves they brought with them. Most trees had been cut down and used for fire wood and other things. Smoke rose from the primitive fire pits and the air smelled of sweat, ash, copper and piss.

If in the abyss of antiquity there had once been cities of giants, this was the closest thing to one in thousands of years.

Around five hundred giants dwelled here now, an army in service of the pale king. Their numbers were nowhere near those in the last war, but to the humans they would be a force to be reckoned with. Sustaining such an army on foraging alone was a difficult task though, and had been the immediate reason behind their move of camp.

Stonetree was out of place as he walked in between stockades, packed with human slaves, livestock and plunder. He came past groups of his kin, talking and indulging in the stinking, foul human drinks that dulled the senses. There was a fighting pit too, where giants let humans fight each other to the death, betting drink, plunder and more slaves against each other.

A human life was cheap and easy to take, but the old giant saw much less barbarism than he had expected. In an effort to evolve with the times, the giants tried themselves at metallurgy and smithing, so far only with dubious success. Stolen metal from the humans, they attempted to melt down and mould into things useful to them, like pots, weapons or even armour. But while copper and maybe even bronze could be worked in a fire pit, iron was a much more stubborn and steel of any useful quality was simply out of reach, even with the help of human slaves who knew the trade. A smith had little to fear in terms harassment and abuse, as did other skilled slaves like furriers and tanners.

Druids and witches, though, were not suffered to live. In charge of their questioning and ultimate disposal was a beast called Varg the Impaler. She was young, but her talent for violence had already earned her a reputation. Amongst the tallest of her kind and unusually muscular for a female, her face was that of a young girl with a horrible overbite, blue eyes looking in opposite directions and coarse, blond hair braided into pig tails left and right on her head.

She had earned her nickname by practice of inserting sharpened wooden stakes into the bodily openings of her victims and ramming the other end into the ground, leaving them to be impaled more and more, their own weight crushing their inwards until the stake eventually emerged out of the other end of them. Some took days to die this way.

Other methods were quicker and she employed those just as eagerly. When Stonetree saw her, she was naked in a circular arrangement of her impaled victims, a human boy’s feet kicking out of her bunghole, while pushing a girl-human’s face into her cunt.

He turned away to look for the pale king. The white, red eyed giant stood at fifteen meters tall, the only male larger than the females, but still, Stonetree could not find him anywhere.

A group of armed humans caught his eye, wandering through the camp, unmolested and unopposed. They looked serious but a little forlorn, like a fawn that had wandered into a bear’s den. Some wore mismatched pieces of armor and their attire and weaponry was far from standardized but all wore some resemblance of Wolf about their person, be it a crudely drawn picture on a surcoat or piece of cloth, or a piece of wolf’s fur itself. Stonetree had seen these humans before. They were the ‘Howling Wolves’, a raiding band of thugs that pestered the countryside.

Now they were thralls to the giants. It was another brilliant move by Albino. The giants’ numbers were still too small and while the humans had been able to rebreed after the long and horrible war, the giants had not. By elevating some humans over others, Albino bound them to his cause. Soon, more would follow, perhaps more reliable and better equipped ones than this lot. Maybe Albino was finding more human allies even now.

“Hail, Impaler!” The Howling Wolves’ leader, a copper-skinned man with black hair bound to a ponytail hollerred when they halted in front of Varg’s gruesome enclosure.

The giantess grinned at them and pulled the two humans out of herself. Murmuring spread through the ranks of raiders at the sight. The boy was dead after finally having suffocated but the girl was coughing and wheezing when Varg dropped them to the ground. The fall had hurt her, but she was not given any time to linger in pain, as her head was crushed under Varg’s heel a moment later. Stonetree could see the Howling Wolves’ Leader swallow hard.

“Diego!” The impaler greeted him with a menacing smile.

“My scouts have reports for the king.” He announced insecurely. “Where is he?”

“He left to hunt down a traitor and murderer.” Varg replied, still smiling. “I am in command until he returns.”

That was not good.

“What reports do you have for me?” She went on after taking another step forward, threateningly towering over the tiny humans.

Her common tongue was excellent and proof enough that she was cut from a different cloth than Edda the ogre, albeit not quite equal to her cruelty.

“Thorwalsh on the river.” Diego reported dutifully.”Making north to Andrafall, from the capital. Meanwhile Horas marches men and material to Nostria. Judging by the machinery they bring with them they either want to revive their old feud with Andergast and sack it while it’s weak, or…”

He cocked his head as though he feared to be punished for his next words: “Or they are meant for you.”

“You humans are truly pathetic.” Varg scoffed. “Needing machines to kill us.”

“Yes, impaler.” He replied submissively. “But I urge you to be cautious. The Horasian war machines are famous, all through the world.”

“Do you think the Nostrians and their petty reinforcements would submit to our cause if we promised them Andergast in return?” The impaler inquired, cocking an eyebrow.

“They might.” Diego replied cautiously. “But Andergast has already been promised. I am to rule it and marry the ugly widow-queen as soon as the walls fall.”

That produced an even wider smile on Varg’s girly face.

Diego looked appalled: “If you presume to cross me on this…”

“If you presume to threaten me,” she interrupted him angrily, “I will add you and your pathetic little friends to my collection.”

She gestured at the impaled humans around her. Many a tiny hand reached for their weapons, but no steel was drawn.

“Did you really think we’d give you a kingdom for your handful of raiders?” The giantess laughed at his scowling expression.

“I command near three hundred now.” He cautioned her. “If it weren’t for the walls, I’d have taken Andergast myself by now. Give me ten of your giants and the city is mine within a fortnight.”

Varg shook her head: “I will give you two sacks of that gold you love so much. One for your trouble, and one to convince those boat people on the river to join forces with you.”

The raider made a sour face at that.

“The Thorwalsh are not unlike you giants.” He explained. “They do not value the metal quite as much as a man should. They will carry it most gladly off a merchant’s cog but you cannot buy their loyalty with it, nor make them forget who their friends and allies are.”

“Iron is harder than gold.” Varg shrugged. “Smash them then.”

“They have no horses, true.” Diego looked in pain. “But their warriors are fearless and strong. I might lose half my force if the terrain does not allow me to ride them down, which it most likely won’t in these gods-forsaken forests.”

Varg rolled her eyes which made her look like an imbecile.

“Pathetic.” She repeated, dismissively. “I will have a look at your boat people then, most of us are itching for a fight anyway. But you will join us. I want to see if you and your men are worth our trust.”

“Humans and giants, fighting side by side? That will be a first.” The raider said and scratched his chin again. “But tell them not to kill anyone with a wolf about him.”

Varg grinned mischievously, and Diego cursed under his breath. In alliance with giants the humans drew the shorter straws. Diego’s gamble was that their enemies drew an even shorter one. In the scheme of things, nothing was certain.

“Do not look so dread!” She laughed at him. “We will try not smash your puny, little friends.”

“There is another thing that should be cause for concern.” He began, but Varg’s eyes turned him down. “The titanesses…”

“If you continue to spread this vicious lie I will tie you to the bottom of my foot and step on you, all the way to Andrafall.” She interrupted him, threatening. “Too many of our own believe the stories and it saps their spirit. Albino is the largest and most powerful giant there is, and that is all you need to know.”

Diego bowed his head to hide his face.

“Three of my outriders ran into a druid.” He changed the subject. “A mighty one, it seems. He was riding a bear. The beast killed two of my men while he got away. The third one only lived long enough to tell me of it. I believe he might be the one you seek.”

“Where?” Varg inquired feverishly.

“Near the…” He began, but halted.

The giantess seemed to understand and her face turned dark.

“He could be anywhere by now but send more outriders that way anyway. Tell your men not to let any more of them get away. I will give you a fat sack of gold for any witch or druid you bring me. Next time, bring me news of these tidings first. Catching Vengyr is our highest priority.”

“Aye. Gladly.” He nodded with a sour smile.

While Varg commanded a dozen giants and giantesses with her and Diego and the Howling Wolves returned to their horses, Stonetree fled the camp. There was no doubt in his mind that Albino was out to get him. How Albino knew of what he had done, Stonetree could not tell, but it was not uncommon for the pale king to simply know things. Why he had done it, he could tell neither, but the urge to do it had been strong and he had failed to fight it. It had just felt right, much more than he could say of anything he had done in Albino’s service as of late.

But without his kin, where was he to go, he asked himself. There was a way though, to gain Albino’s favour back: Find the old druid, before Albino would find him.

-

Back inside the spaceship, Laura and Janna sat at the table while their tiny classmates marvelled at and measured the dead giants. Janna had put on a bra and pants, Laura was still only in panties and T-shirt.

"Alright, eleven meters, sixteen point four metric tons, is that one." Christina read from her sheet when she had stepped out of the tiny space ship. "Her shoulders alone are three point three meters wide and her hips two point six meters. That's normal proportioning, though. I've added common amount of blood for her size into the calculation because she was pretty bled out from her wounds."

"The other one, with the head wound," she continued, "a little smaller, uh, ten meters ten, twelve point seven tons. And finally the fat one, eleven point six meters and, obviously, twenty three something tons."

"God damn!" Steve commented, looking around the bodies in amazement.

"Uh..." Christina began, clearly uncomfortable. "I have analysed their stomach contents. There is lots of stuff in there, indicating that they are omnivores. Also, there are traces of alcohol. What I found too though, was something that, according to my knowledge, could be nothing else than human bones."

"You mean they ate humans...from earth?" Laura asked with wide eyes.

"No, I think they ate locals." Christina said with a look on her face that said her stomach was turning. "I plan on sequencing the genome but that will take a while."

"You do that." Janna threw in. "I would have done it by now but we have no energy supply."

"Also," Christina said and visibly had to fight throwing up, "there were bones of children in the fat one's stomach."

"Jesus Christ." Steve murmured and looked at the bloated body of the monstrous killing machine in front of him.

"You guys are seriously lucky we found you." Laura remarked grimly.

Valerie leaned next to the entrance of the space ship and kept her mouth shut, but now she gave Christina a bump into the ribs with her fist.

"Uh, yeah." Christina said, even more uncomfortable than before. "We would actually like to analyse your stomach contents too."

Janna thought she hadn't heard right.

"Why would you do that?" She asked.

"To prove your innocence." Christina replied, uncomfortably.

"I can't believe you are still going on about this!" Laura commented in disgust.

Christina looked genuinely embarrassed but determined too.

"I know..." She argued. "But what do you have to lose?"

"My stomach content, for one." Janna pushed back. "It's hard enough to find enough food at our size. We don't have a nice pile of rations we can snack on anytime we want."

"Yeah, and we just ate!" Laura joined in. "I'm not puking it out for you just to prove Valerie wrong. That's sick!"

"Oh, what did you eat?" Valerie asked bitingly.

Janna cringed inside. The suspicious pilot had kept her mouth shut the entire time and waited for them to make a mistake like this.

"Uh...you know..." Laura stuttered. "Berries and fruit and wildlife and stuff."

"Pretty quick." Valerie pointed out with a victorious smirk. "How did you find that much food so quickly? How many tons do you eat in one meal?"

"The nearby village gave us some, alright?!" Janna tried to shut her down.

"Oh, so there is a nearby village. How convenient for you!" Valerie went on, her voice pregnant with cynicism. "I guess I would give away my stuff too to keep two fucking Godzillas from eating my kids."

"We don't eat any fucking kids! What's wrong with you?!" Laura shouted.

Valerie laughed: "So, only grown ups then, huh. There's more meat on them anyway, am I right?"

"They protect the nearby village and they give them food in return. It's okay." Steve joined the conversation in an attempt to cool it down.

Valerie looked glaringly at him for picking the opposite side.

She remained adamant: "Then just take the fucking test and be done with it."

"No." Laura and Janna said firmly at the same time.

"Guys, please." Christina argued. "I don't like this one bit more than you do. Just take the test and we can all move on in peace."

That was hard to argue against.

"I knew Valerie was a colossal bitch from the first time I saw her." Laura addresssed the tiny black girl. "But I really thought you would trust us."

"Go fuck yourself, you giant monster!" Valerie shouted at her.

A sudden pinch in Janna's chest told her to defend her girlfriend and she could feel anger rising within herself. She really wondered what would happen if she and Laura would tell the truth now. They probably wouldn't have to watch every word that came out of their mouths any more and that sense of uncertainty she felt inside their 'home' since their tiny classmates arrived might go away too. The more she thought about it, the more inclined she became. Also, there was something else she had come to think about.

"Come on, guys." Christina raised her voice again. "By not taking the test you make it look like she is right."

"What's the point?!" Valerie now fell out at her too. "They wont take it, basically admitting that they eat people! They probably ate a bunch just a few minutes ago!"

Janna looked at Laura who looked back, helpless.

"Let's assume that's true, what will you do with that knowledge?" Janna asked calmly.

"Report it!" Valerie blurted out. "We'll add it to our emergency call! 'Hey guys, SOS, we've stranded on a different planet and found extra terrestrial life. Oh, and we met some giant freaks from your program who are mass murderers, so please hurry.' Catchy, isn't it?!"

"And what's the call right now?" Janna went on, looking at Steve.

"Just standard." He shrugged, having no idea where she was going with this. "We've been sending that, ever since we got here."

"I see." Janna smiled and turned back to Valerie. "And what do you hope to accomplish, reporting us?"

"So you'll get punished!" Valerie explained, perplexed as to why that wasn't obvious.

Janna looked over to Laura once more, and this time Laura's eyes seemed to beg her to stop. It seemed she suspected Janna was going to come clean.

"Mhmhm." Janna nodded at the three tinies on the table. "So we get thrown in jail, reputation tarnished, big scandal..."

Valerie nodded vigorously: "Just what you deserve!"

"Professor Miller is maybe going to jail too, university discredited, anthropology department closed..." Janna went on.

The blond pilot's nodding grew slower until it ceased completely.

"You see..." Janna began. "I don't think they would do that. I think it's more likely they'd try to sweep it under the rug. The government too, I mean, this is the first time anyone has found aliens, right? Can't have this sort of thing spoil everything."

Laura looked relieved that Janna had seemingly found a way to deal with the situation that didn't involve revealing anything. However, Janna wasn't quite sure about that yet.

"Well, let's see about that." Valerie stubbornly said and walked to enter the ship.

Janna was about to reach out and grab her but Christina was quicker, still standing in the entrance, blocking her path.

"No, Val, we agreed to let them take the test first." She argued firmly.

"But they won't take it!" Valerie shouted at her. "And they have just admitted that they eat people!"

"No they haven't?!" Christina heatedly pointed out. "Janna said 'suppose it were true.'"

"But it is true!" Valerie shouted and tried to push past the black girl in her way.

They were wrestling and shoving each other. Valerie, taller and with longer limbs, had the upper hand, but Steve intervened before a clear victor emerged. Janna still felt the urge of just coming clean and ending this ridiculous farce. The time ahead, as she foretold it, would be unspeakably stressful if Valerie kept doing what she had been doing all the time. But that would put the three tinies, and maybe Laura too, in an uncomfortable position.

"We can't go on like this." She finally said. "We need some ground rules for living together. I am not having this discussion every time we talk."

"Then take the test and be done with it, for the hundredth fucking time!" Christina angrily repeated her mantra.

"No, ain't gonna happen." Janna said simply. "Off the table. What else have you got?"

Christina and Valerie looked at each other, past Steve who was still keeping them at a distance, but Janna couldn't see that they were saying or even whispering anything.

"Well, if there is nothing else," she continued, "I suggest you guys stop going on about it and we continue to study and catalogue this stuff."

She reached for the decaying male giant and put it next to them, so that they could measure it. The male was fully grown, but was still significantly smaller than the females, a fact she found duly worth noting. But in that light, bringing him around didn't have the effect she desired.

"Fuck off!" Valerie spat enraged. "I am going to send out that message. You guys can't watch me all of the time!"

That was what Janna had anticipated and feared.

"Well, in that case," she began unconcerned and reached for the ship on the table, "I'll have to take away your ability to do so."

Laura didn't look comfortable with that but said nothing.

"Wait, you can't do that?!" Christina said, baffled.

"I have to." Janna explained with a shrug, lifting the ship off the table and setting it in her lap. "If you guys want to escalate this shit like that, I have to take away your leverage."

"But where do we sleep, eat, shower and stuff?" Steve asked helplessly.

"Not my problem." Janna replied, giving Valerie a victorious smirk.

There was a moment of silence before Laura finally rejoined the conversation.

"Janna." She said soothingly. "We can't do that, that's unfair."

"Hey!" Janna justified herself. "They pushed us into a corner, I'm just reacting here."

"Yeah, but there is a smarter solution." Laura replied with a smile.

"Janna is right, Valerie." She continued and regarded the tall blonde with a sorry expression. "We can't risk letting you wreck us like that."

"Hey, what the fuck?! Put me down, you bitch!" Valerie screeched hysterically when Laura pinched her in between thumb and index finger.

In retrospect, Janna would have said what went wrong started when Laura's fingers snatched tiny Valerie up. They both hated the tiny pilots guts, but before that point they had never violated her bodily integrity. With that barrier crossed, the doors had been opened for disaster.

"Sorry." Laura mused, wrinkling her nose in that cute way Janna loved so much.

"Wait, she's not going to kill her, right?" Steve asked, horrified, when Laura stood up with the kicking and cursing pilot and walked over to the supply boxes.

"No." Janna replied and put the ship back to where it had stood before. "I think she is just putting her away for a while so that she can cool off."

"But you can't just do that to somebody!" He fell out, spreading his arms.

"She threatened to crush our reputation." Janna shrugged in response. "We're actually quite civil about it. I know someone who would kill to safe his reputation."

That shut him up for good.

Laura found a small glass cup and returned with Valerie inside. The girl was still screaming obscenities at them and demanded to be let out, but they ignored her completely. At the initiative of Steve, they allowed Valerie a blanket, a pillow, some food and drink and a bucket, all from the tiny ship. It was humiliating all the same.

After that, Laura was suddenly having a blast, venting on her. She lifted the cup and shook it, turned it and played with it, turning Valerie into a rag doll inside.

"Hey there!" She cooed playfully and tapped against the glass with her fingernail. "Enjoying your new home?"

Incomprehensible, raging screams were the reply and Laura shook the cup again, throwing Valerie off her feet.

"Oh, what's that?" She mocked from above. "You want out? Sorry, can't let ya. First you have to apologize. I might just let you out right now, if you ask nice enough."

Nice was clearly not the choice word for the answer Laura received but it seemed to please her even more. Janna could fully understand the urge of bringing down a little payback on Valerie for being so obnoxious but she figured that it wasn't the smartest thing to do in front of Christina and Steve. Valerie seemed to know that too.

"Look at what they are doing to me!" She screamed in tears inside her prison, beating against the glass to get Christina's attention. "They are guilty! They are guilty, otherwise, why would they do this to me?!"

As much as Janna enjoyed punishing her, she had to agree that it made sense.

"But really..." Christina turned to Janna after chewing on her tongue for a while. "If you guys really didn't do anything, you could just let her send the call. The government, if they even care, will clear you of any wrong doing, right?"

"Watch this!" Laura exclaimed suddenly, full of excitement and completely ignoring her tiny, black classmate.

She picked Valerie's glass prison up and brought it around her back after lifting herself off of her stool. The grimace Laura made already told Janna what was coming. With a short, high-pitched tone, she farted directly into Valerie's prison. After that, she cracked up with laughter and put the cup back on the table. The fart smelled quite bad because their diet was too rich in meats, Janna concluded.

Valerie was coughing furiously before she bent over and puked into the bucket.

"That's so disgusting." Christina said and turned away while Steve looked on with great discomfort showing on his face.

"That's what she gets for all the names she called me." Laura said viciously, before her face lit up again. "Oh, I have another one coming!"

The cup was already in her hands when Valerie screamed: "No! Please! I'm sorry, I'm fucking sorry, please!"

Laura listened to it with interest showing on her face.

"Aww." She cooed, as if she were talking to a baby. "Don't want me to fart on you no more? Is my fart too stinky for ya?"

And after another wicked grin, she quickly brought the cup around her backside again.

Janna was unsure what to make of this. Laura's attitudes often changed dramatically in a matter of seconds. Whether or not she could join in on the fun or whether she should preach moderation, she didn't know. Maybe Laura was playing, humiliating Valerie as a means of changing her attitude.

Laura laughed heartily though, when she farted on the tiny pilot again and put the cup back on the table. Without anything left in her stomach, Valerie was coughing and crouching over her bucked, convulsing with gag reflexes.

"Rocked you real good, huh? You little fucker." Laura laughed victoriously into the cup.

The air around started to smell worse than rotten eggs and Janna felt sorry for the tiny girl. On the other hand, it felt incredibly just to see her suffer. When Janna looked at Steve and Christina, she found that the latter was missing. A moment later, the tiny black girl emerged out of their ship.

"You can stop now and take her out." She announced sternly, but with a tiny hint of fear in her voice. "I just transmitted the call she was going to make."

"You did what?!" Laura asked aghast, her smile gone in an instant.

"You heard me." Christina said, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

Janna felt as though someone had swept away the ground underneath her feet.

"So, let me get this straight." She said with a shaking voice. "You have just potentially jeopardized our life, career and freedom?"

"I had to put a stop to it. You were endangering her life." Christina argued. "That amount of gas can kill someone, Janna, you know that. Just look at her, for bloody Christ's sake."

Christina was the biologist of their group and Janna knew that she was right. Valerie was curled up in a ball, wrapped in her blanket, seemingly barely conscious though still convulsing from time to time. But Janna only registered all that from the corner of her eye.

"You just made a huge mistake, little girl." She said, glaring at Christina.

It felt like Christina had taken the last thing Laura and Janna had had to lose. Of course, that wasn't true. What Janna had said about the government potentially sweeping their crimes under the rug was a good possibility, but of course not one hundred percent certain to happen. On the other hand, it would all have gotten out eventually anyway, and then there was that little fact that Christina was a real human and a classmate of theirs. But Janna paid these rationales little heed. She was furious.

Steve seemed to grasp the situation quickest.

"Woa, woa, woa!" He pushed forward and put himself protectively in front of the Christina. "I get that you guys are angry, but you're not going to hurt her, right?"

"I don't think that is a smart place to stand right now." Janna threatened and could almost see his knees begin to tremble.

"Step aside, Steve." She continued, breathing heavily. "She's mine."

Christina started to whimper and cry involuntarily. She may have had anticipated some retaliation, but when the reality of Janna's size and power kicked in, she became afraid and hid behind Steve's broad, muscular back.

"Hey, I want a piece of her too!" Laura protested and leaned closer to the tiny couple.

"Guys, that's not funny!" Steve called out with a shaking voice.

"Step aside, you little shrimp, before you get hurt!" Laura dismissed him, angrily. "She just flushed our lives down the fucking toilet!"

Eventually, Steve became overwhelmed by his fear and, with a hint of shame in his eyes, abandoned Christina and stepped aside.

"But she is a human being!" He called helplessly upon Janna.

That pinched something. It was true, killing Christina would, without a shred of a doubt, be murder. But Laura was right too, and Christina deserved some punishment. Eye for eye, tooth for tooth...life for life?

"Please don't hurt me!" Christina cried.

She had sunk to the ground and started to shiver.

"You brought this upon yourself!" Laura berated her before turning to Janna. "It's okay, Janna. You can squish her as long as I get to watch."

"Hey!" Steve intervened quickly. "It's totally understandable that you guys are angry! But let's not blow this out of proportion, alright?!"

If they really killed Christina, Steve and Valerie would have to go too. The thought of making Valerie her little bitch was intriguing to Janna, but putting Steve through some hours of pussy play before squashing him with her boobs seemed even better. She could feel herself getting wet beneath the table. But it was wrong, something cried out within her. Wrong!

"I didn't send anything!" Christina called out. "I wanted to, but I couldn't figure out the damn console, please!"

"A snitch and a liar, huh?" Laura mused. "Come on, Janna, squelch the bitch!"

If it had been a lie, it had been a good one. But then again, adrenaline often sent the brain into overdrive. Then, Steve was suddenly sprinting towards the ship and vanished inside before anyone could stop him.

After a moment of perplexity, Laura looked alarmed and reached for the ship, shaking and turning it to get him out of there. A good amount violent shaking later, he came tumbling out of the entrance, hit the surface of the table with a smack and cried out in pain. Something in Janna wanted to reach out and protect him, but Laura seemed far too determined to let that happen.

"What do you think you are doing?!" She growled, her face menacingly hovering over his tiny form "Wanted to make sure the message got through?"

"Argh!" He grunted and sat up, rubbing his back and head. "I wanted to see if it's true. It is. She didn't send anything, we are still broadcasting standard SOS and coordinates."

He seemed miraculously little hurt from that fall, Janna thought. That little guy could take a beating for sure. A few seconds later, he was on his feet again while a certain silence befell them all. Janna wanted to see what Laura would do, but Laura did not seem to know that either.

"Look, uh..." Steve began, still looking somewhat in pain. "Let's chalk all this crazy talk up under rage and fear over losing your careers. Get Val out of that thing, we all apologize a little and it's all good. Right?"

He looked up at them, grave concern on his face. Janna sensed an opportunity to de-escalate and chose to take it. It was either that or murder them.

"Okay." She said quickly and to Laura's visible surprise. "We're sorry. I never would have hurt you, Christina."

That was a blatant lie but the tiny, black tomboy wiped the tears from her face and looked up at Janna: "I'm sorry too, I only wanted to protect Valerie!"

It seemed to be Laura's turn then, but she did not agree.

"I won't apologize for farting on her." She said, nodding at Valerie. "She got what she deserved."

"You're a bitch, Laura!" Valerie's voice sounded strange when she spoke softly and weakly in her glass prison.

Laura looked at her for a moment, before she snatched the glass off the table with her right hand. It happened so quickly that Janna could only shriek when Laura held the glass cup like a pitcher in a softball game and hurled it through the ship. With a crash, the glass cup that contained Valerie burst into a thousand splinters on the wall next to the door to the room with the stasis covens.

Christina started howling and collapsed, Steve looked with wide eyes and his mouth agape, trembling. Laura glared at them for a moment before she opened her left hand on the table. Valerie was inside, awake and unhurt, but visibly shaken up. Pillow, blanked, rations and bucket were with her, all sprayed with her vomit.

Janna understood. When Laura had picked the cup up she had done it with so much inertia that Valerie flew right into her open left hand when Laura halted the cup at her own chin. All the other stuff of course, most unfortunately the puke bucket, came with her. Then Laura had thrown the empty cup with her right and made it look like she was killing the tiny pilot inside. It had been quite a neat, little magic trick, almost, and perfected by the shock value of it.

"Let this be a lesson to you." Laura said coldly from above. "We're not in this with you, you are in this with us. And no more broadcasting."

In a swift motion, she took the ship off the table and set it at the ground by her feet.

"No, don't!" Steve called out as her knee shot up, but it was too late.

When Laura brought the ship back up, the lights were out inside and the cockpit looked like crushed tinfoil, occasional sparks and smoke rising from it, before the circuits gave out completely. It was just like Laura said, there was no more broadcasting, even though the rest of the ship remained intact, if a little bent.

Disgusted, Laura turned her hand and dumped the contents unceremoniously on the table before wiping her hand clean, using Valerie's blanket like a tissue. Every tiny's chest was heaving up and down and they seemed far too shaken to say anything.

"We walk barefoot a lot so we will need to pick the glass up." Laura commanded calmly and placed her right hand on the table. "Hop on."

There were no protests now, not even from Valerie and after a moment they all complied without saying a word. It looked like Laura's scheme had it's desired effect.

"I'm sorry for scaring you guys." She said, sounding deeply serious. "But you have to understand that there is only so much shit I'm willing to take in one day."

Careful where to step, she carried them over to were the glass had shattered and the distribution of splinters on the ground was densest. After that, Janna slipped into her boots and Laura into her sneakers. Glass splinters were a real danger. One could get one in the foot and maybe not even feel it, before it could make it's way, travelling through a person's body and end up stuck in nerves, causing chronic, excruciating pain, if it didn't end up in the heart or the brain to cause much greater damage.

The three tinies were gathering shards of glass like they had been told to, and piled them on a paper tissue Laura had put there for them. It was tedious work and Janna helped as much as she could. Two or three big shards were so large that the tinies couldn't pick them up, but others were so small that Janna had a hard time even seeing them.

She tried to keep a safe distance to them, crouching on the floor in her heavy boots. Whenever she shifted her feet, something broke and crackled under her soles.

Valerie was still shaky on her feet and Christina still looked frightened. Steve was easily the most productive in removing glass and he could lift some of the bigger pieces that Valerie and Christina were struggling with.

"Uh, there is bound to be a lot of stuff behind those boxes!" He called up at Laura who was sitting on the bed, watching them with disinterest. "Do you want to move them, or just leave that where it is?"

Laura didn't bother helping them and looked bored instead. Janna knew, dangerous things could happen when Laura was bored.

"We can leave that there." Laura decided with a derisive frown. "Better scoop up the small stuff under Janna's boots."

"Janna?" He called over to her, a little embarrassed. "Could you, maybe, move away a little bit?"

"Uh, sure." Janna replied and let herself plop on her behind.

She pulled her feet up and carefully brushed the debris off the soles with her hand, letting it fall on the ground she had crouched upon before. Nagash and that tiny thing Janna had fingered to death had cleaned her boots from the outside, but clearly never bothered with the sole.

Steve rushed over and went to work in his earlier industrious fashion. Soon, though, he frowned and held something up in his hand.

"What is it?" Laura inquired of him, leaning closer.

"It, uh, it looks like a spear tip." He answered. "There's like a ton of weird stuff here."

No doubt a remainder of squashing King Aele's army under her boots, or maybe raiders in the forest, Janna thought, but it was easy enough to explain away by claiming it had been stuff lying around somewhere that she hadn't noticed.

"Wow, this here might have been a helmet." Steve went on and lifted a flattened metal disc from a small pile of earth. "It..."

He swallowed hard and seemed to poke it with his finger until something fell out.

"Oh my god, that's part of someone's face!" He exclaimed and started to gag.

The flattened helmet fell to the floor and rolled once around it's own axis before it halted with a clattering sound. Christina and Valerie had stopped working and watched.

"Oh...uh..." Janna fumbled for an answer. "I must have stepped on the poor guy in the forest."

"There's more." Steve said disgusted and rummaged through the debris.

By the end of it there were two more helmets, a dozen spear tips, two broken swords and a squashed torso in chain mail, mingled with a bunch of earth that had stuck to Janna's sole. How such an amount of metal could cling to it without falling off while Janna moved her twelve thousand something tons through the forest was beyond her. But then again, squashed bodies were messy, as the ground had been on the day that she planed the battlefield at Ludwig's keep.

Laura looked alarmed now and chewed on her lip.

"How did all that stuff get there?" Steve asked, directed at Janna.

"I don't know." Janna shrugged and put an extra amount of effort into looking distraught over the find.

She looked over to Christina and Valerie. It was perfectly clear what the two girls thought, but both of them remained silent. Before, the blond pilot would have thrown a fit, but not this time. Maybe Laura's stunt had worked wonders, Janna thought and wondered, how long it's effects would last.

"Did you miss an entire army when you were walking though the forest?" Steve asked again but Janna couldn't tell whether it was meant seriously.

"Well, sometimes it gets kinda dark." Laura answered for her. "And twelve spears don't make an army as far as I know. Might have been a group of bandits or what ever."

"Or maybe you stepped on some poor little weapons cache." Steve added to Janna, leaving no doubt this time that he was being sarcastic. "Oh, meh. I forgot about the head and the torso."

To Janna's surprise though, he didn't press the issue any further and carried the items over to the tissue and dumped them with the glass.

"What are you two whispering over there? Get working!" Laura commanded over Christina and Valerie.

Without so much as exchanging another glance, the two tiny girls hurried back to work. Janna sensed that it would be easier now. Fewer problems, fewer fighting, less tantrums thrown, but the battle for Christina's mind was probably lost. That didn't sit well with her at all but as much as she wrecked her brains about it, she could not come up with something to turn the tide around again.

While she was still thinking about it, she suddenly found Laura soundly asleep. It had to have happened fast, very fast, but was not entirely unprecedented. En plus, sleeping was the smartest thing they could do at noon, except for going out and finding food. A sleeping body used far less energy and thus required less food to sustain itself.

Janna wondered how many lives would be spared in a day, just because Laura took a nap. She knew she would be smart to do the same, but Laura's absence presented her with an opportunity to maybe make things right by Christina.