"Hey Squirt, you doing okay?" Arthur called to Claudia behind him and Orm as they swam.
"Oh yeah," she panted. "I just - I could use a breather."
"Yeah, of course." Arthur immediately stopped.
Orm reluctantly did too. "Need I remind you time is not on our side?" he said. "We don't have time for a 'breather'."
"Need I remind you that I don't have the Atlantean stamina you do," she shot back between pants.
"No, you needn't remind me." He took everything so literally. "That was why I said you shouldn't come in the first place. I knew you would only slow us down and be a burden."
"Hey, I offered to help you. If anyone is a burden, it's you-"
"Enough!" cried Arthur. "Lay off, both of you. Bro, I know we don't have a lot of time, but we can spare a few minutes For Claudie."
Orm just grumbled, about the current situation and the 'Bro'.
"See, you really are a super tight butthole."
Claudia snorted in agreement. "Like, super tight." They bumped fists.
Topo floated up beside her and gurgled. "Huh?"
"He said he can carry you the rest of the way, if you'd like. Anything for his other rescuer."
"Aw, thanks buddy. That's sweet of you."
"He says when you're ready, just grab hold of his tentacle and he'll do the rest."
"Which tentacle? Any will do?"
"Yeah."
She took a few more moments to catch her breath and then reached out for one of Topo's extended tentacles. She had barely grabbed hold of the end of one suction-y appendage when Topo took off, leaving the brothers in the dust - well, in this case, the bubbles.
"Whoo!" she whooped. "This is awesome! Who's falling behind now?!"
--------------------------------------
"Ha! I win!" Arthur said like a child as the three flopped onto the beach, he first apparently, at last having reached their next destination. He and Orm collapsed onto the sand, heaving for breath after the long swim. As for Claudia, she was doing great, thanks to Topo's help.
"Topo, go back to Atlantis and give them our coordinates," Arthur told their squid-like friend.
Topo gurgled and slunk back into the sea and disappeared.
"Bye Topo!" Claudia called with a wave. "I should get a personal octopus."
"Cephalopod."
She turned to Orm. "Really?"
And although the suit was comfortable and agile and all, as they had established early on, she was happy to remove her helmet and mask for a while and breathe in the fresh air.
Well, kind of fresh. The air was thick and heavy with orichalcum. A thick, green fog was being pumped out from inside a volcano.
"Dormant volcano, that's our spot," Arthur announced. "Onward!" And he began striding forward into the dense jungle.
"You sure it's dormant?" Claudia asked.
"That's what the fat fish said."
"You really trust that guy?"
And so onward they went, Claudia and Arthur keeping the conversation flowing, Orm staying - mostly - silent.
"I hope Atlantis brings some snacks with them," Claudia said. "I'm getting hungry."
"Same Squirt. Hey Bro, you gotta admit, food is so much better up here!"
"I find that hard to believe."
"You know what I'd die for right now? A big greasy cheeseburger and a pint of Guinness!"
"Stop!" Claudia cried, practically drooling at the thought.
"Yes," Orm said, mistaking her meaning. "I have no idea what you're saying."
Arthur turned on his brother. "Are you telling me you've never had a burger? Or a slice of za, pepperoni? Or a big, juicy medium rare steak with fries and a shake to dip them in-"
"Even the words Surface Dwellers use for their food sound disgusting."
"Hey-" Arthur stopped him. "You're letting your prejudice stop you from enjoying half the world. You should think about that."
"He's got a point," Claudia agreed.
"Speaking of-" Arthur cackled as he plucked a rather large cockroach off a branch it had been scuttling across. "-Bet you never had one of these!"
"What is it?" Orm recoiled.
"It's a cockroach."
"You eat it?"
"Oh yeah, shrimp of the land."
Claudia tried not to smile or laugh as to give Arthur's prank away. This was so something a sibling would do.
Orm eyed the flailing bug, then took it, examining it. Then he turned to her, as if for confirmation, and she just nodded.
And so, he held it up to his mouth, and-
CRUNCH!
She tried not to groan at the noise the roach made when he bit into it. Talk about gross!
But Orm clearly didn't think so. He shoved the rest of the bug into his mouth, crunching away, nodding in approval. Was there even a smile potentially playing on his lips?
Arthur was clearly thrilled and he searched out the next victim. This time he chose a coconut, which Claudia could definitely roll with. "Here, try this-" He ripped it open, only to have thick, dark insides spill out along with a rank smell. "Ugh - "
"Ugh," she agreed.
"You first," said Orm, and continued walking.
They broke through the thick bushes and came to a clearing - the volcano still a ways in the distance. But the view was amazing: lush green jungle, speckled in the most vibrant flowers any of them had ever seen.
"Whoa," Claudia cried. "Look-"
A butterfly, as colourful and beautiful as the flowers, soared gracefully through the air and landed on a flower directly before them. If that wasn't amazing enough, the fact that both flower and butterfly were giant was.
"Are you seeing this?" Arthur cried.
Even Orm seemed wowed, which was impressive in and of itself. "That's not normal?"
Their wonderous silence was answer enough. However, then things took a turn.
The flower swallowed the butterfly, like crushed it and ate it in one big gulp!
All three jumped.
"Definitely not normal," Arthur said, and they were then quick to return to the jungle and move on.
"You see how dangerous the orichalcum can be?" Orm cried.
"That's why everything is so much bigger than usual?" Claudia confirmed.
"Yes. It must have mutated the flora and fauna of the whole island in a short amount of time, turning it mon-strous."
He was cut off when they came across something else unusual, this one even worse and certainly, in Orm's words, 'monstrous'.
A giant rat - gross! - lay on it's side, very dead, with it's stomach ripped out. And if that wasn't bad enough, a giant grasshopper then peeked over the body from where it was feasting on the rat's insides.
No one said anything, too shocked to speak or move.
But the grasshopper wasn't alone. They watched in horror as one, then two, then three, then four more giant bugs popped out from behind the rat, eyes settling on the three.
"RUN!"
They needed no more convincing and all took off back the way they had come, the shrieking of the grasshoppers signaling their pursuit.
Claudia quickly fell behind the two bros, Arthur in the lead and Orm in the middle, which gave her a perfect view of Orm and whatever the hell he was doing: running with his feet turned out, bent forward, and arms outstretched stiffly at his sides.
"What the hell are you doing?" she hollered.
"I don't know, I don't know how to run!"
Okay, that made total sense. And if she hadn't been so afraid for their lives she would have howled with laughter at how ridiculous he looked.
Arthur was throwing glances over his shoulder at him too. "Do what I do, pump your arms!"
Orm tried it. "Like this?"
"Yes!"
He quickly advanced, overtaking Arthur.
"Holy shit-"
"Yeah, yeah!" Now he was in the lead, with Arthur in the middle, and she still last.
Arthur now threw a glance over his shoulder at her. "Keep up, Squirt!"
"I'm trying!" she heaved. Pumping her arms was not doing her as much good as it had done for Orm. So not fair. "Not all of us can be freaking giants like you two!" And now she didn't have Topo for help.
"Here-" He stopped, picked her up on his back piggy-back style, and kept running.
"AH! ARTHUR WHAT THE HELL!"
She was nearly thrown off his back when they skidded to a stop suddenly, and then she saw why.
They had come to a cliff's edge. It was a dead end.
(I'm blown away by the positive response to this story - thank you all so much! :D
Thank you so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed! :))