The Restoration Protocol

25 || hideaway

Soleil gives Mono the run-down of the story so far. She manages to be brief, yet without leaving out any key elements that could help to persuade the skeptical kitsune in favor of their cause. And it proves to all be necessary, down to the last detail, as only in that very final string of speech, Mono sits biting the edge of his tongue in obstinacy. Clinging to the last thread of distrust fastening his sore hands together...

Soleil removes the handcuffs for him — before Mono even gives his verbal affirmation that he will, in fact, take them to where Pyra is hiding. This act in itself serves as an extension of her own trust. Well, it starts that way, but Soleil in her sensible, dutiful state of mind is quick to level with Mono, too.

"We would just end up following you around," she tells him with a shrug. "With you now being freed from your certain death, we know the inevitable outcome is you returning to Pyra yourself, thereby leading us to her location eventually anyway."

Mono seems to accept the cruel reality of his position. Begrudgingly, but he accepts it nonetheless. Soleil is right, after all. The two outstanding factors of their current situation are that 1) they need Pyra's key, and 2) it would be a fruitless, tiresome effort to wander the Iceberry Mountains without a knowledgeable guide to take them through. Mono lives here. Not to mention he supposedly knows Pyra's exact location, too.

The skies are fairly clear now. Fortunate, seeing as they would be trekking on a snowy mountainside for an indefinite period of time — Mono won't tell them how long it would take to get there. For safety precautions, he says, he must be vague in everything. And for the same reason, he insists on traveling at the rear of the group, as opposed to the front, which one would think would be most logical for a mountain guide.

"I can't have my backs to all of you," he says. "We are strangers to one another. That would be foolish of me. Listening to my instructions should be enough. We all face forward, and we get where we're going. No funny business."

As it turns out, and to absolutely no one's surprise, Mono has ulterior motives. He tries to slip away. Several times along the rocky pathways when most everyone is too focused on not losing their balance, the sneaky fox man displays his cunning tendencies and would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren't for Soleil's own, equal display of the same. He even tries the old-fashioned, "hey, what's that over there??" technique. But after the third failed attempt, Mono is left with no choice but to travel at the middle of the group where at least someone can keep an eye on him.

Again, begrudgingly, but he can do nothing about it. Mono is scared of Soleil. And of that small, bottomless, magical backpack of Mariko's he watched a loaf of bread disappear into before they set out on this trip. If he keeps trying to escape, Sebastian warns him, he'll be the next thing to disappear into the bag.

"There's something I should probably tell you about these mountains," Mono begins, shortly after one of his periodic 'GPS' announcements — the least cheerful GPS Mariko has ever heard, that's for sure, but he at least seems confident as to where they're going. And thank goodness, because almost everywhere around them looks the same, and the map on Mariko's watch gets no signal way out here. She would get lost in minutes.

"And what might that be?" asks Sebastian, throwing a glance over his shoulder as Mono delays in elaborating. "C'mon, don't be ominous. What, are they alive or something?"

"Quite the opposite." Mono shakes his head. His eyes dart to a small rabbit that springs from one snow drift to another. "If you spent any time in Bluegate, the locals talk of the spirits of the mountain quite often. We believe souls who die in our lands come to wander here. The higher up the mountain, the more likely you are to see them. Hence why our civilization is set up at a much safer elevation..."