Alpha had suddenly made himself scarce. That meant that his hunting party would be fanning out over the fifteen square kilometers of the Earthwise Forest reserved for their trial. There were also caverns in the Earthwise woods. According to Maurice, all the creatures of the world came up from the roots of those caves.


    “You know where I am looking,” said Maurice.


    John watched as his friend sized up a headband and started tapping on the lamp attached to it.


    “It’s working,” said John, “It’s just too bright to tell right now.”


    Maurice cupped the bulb in his hands, then threw his cloak over his head. He came back up grinning and shrugged. Then pulled the band over his head letting it rest around his neck.


    John sometimes thought that Maurice’s acne, also the dark rings under his eyes, were the probable result of stress induced insomnia. Apparently, Maurice’s cavern theory was just one of the bedtime stories his father had lulled him to sleep with as a child. John knew a word for that type of theory. A word that had gotten him a strange look when he’d mentioned it over lunch at Maurice’s house one afternoon.


    A lot of things, like the theory of evolution, electricity, and magnetism, produced a vibe like he had just farted. Those were concepts he’d brought over from his high school education on the Globe. Although his friends had made the grades over here, those textbooks were fresh off the press in Rootworld.


    “Dad told me that everything came up from the Root through those caves,” Maurice had said, during that lunch. “Some things worked and some things didn’t. Anyway, the strongest animals spread out, eventually populating everything.”


    “Not true!” Maurice’s little brother Bobby had piped. “Mom says that Father Time and Mother Earth gave every being exactly what they asked for when they were created, and that if you were nice and grateful enough not to ask for anything special like, fins, or wings, then they gave you a brain to think for yourself.”


    “Okay, Bobby! Don’t you have homework to do or something?” Maurice rolled his eyes. “Anyway, even if all that was true too, they still came out from the caves. The living things we know about are just the ones that made it out to the sands before getting eaten by some other creature.”


    That’s when John had said it was like evolution. Only the strong surviving and all that jazz.


    After the fart abated, Maurice had said, “Thing is, Dad told me that all those things that didn’t make the cut are still down there, trying to fight their way out.”


    “It’s not true, Maurice!” Bobby wailed, squeezing his stuffy.


    “Just think!” Maurice pushed, seeing he’d gotten his little brother in a tussle, “think of all the weird mutations skittering up through those caves. Some with an extra arm, or three eyeballs!” At that, Maurice had made bug eyes at Bobby, and the poor kid started wailing.


    “Maurice!” came his dad’s voice from the kitchen before their mom had come in and scooped up the balling child. “Don’t scare your brother like that.”


    John still remembered the flush on Maurice’s cheeks. “I was just telling John about the caves.”


    “It sounds like evoluti—”


    But Maurice’s dad had made a chopping sign at John with his hand, and the look he gave him said that the word was taboo. It had made him think back to how Kristen’s mom used to forbid her from hanging with his crew because they were all boys.


    Seems it wasn’t only the Globe-siders who were having trouble accepting new truths, John thought.


    John was broken from his reverie when a voice that always reminded him of a ferbie doll blurted out, “Go big or go home!”


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    Teasle was approaching the crew. He was hefting what resembled a Globe-side blunderbuss over his shoulder. He reminded John of Gunner from back home, well, minus the elbow and knee pads. Teasle is half-bunny, which made his joining the Hunting guild a bit awkward to Globe-siders like John. But the guy would be straight from a Rambo novel if not for the ears.


    John pointed at the blunderbuss. “It still rubs me wrong that I couldn’t come through with my paintball gun, but crafting explosive weapons from salt peter, sulfur, and stone seems to be okay.”


    Teasle scoffed. “Globe side it’s chemistry, but here it’s just considered good ole alchemy.”


    “You planning on pouring what’s left of your kill into the tube?” Maurice asked.


    Teasle chuckled, which was always entertaining to watch.


    Ben had satisfactorily examined his tube and collapsed it again. He was currently putting it in his satchel. “To be clear, your documents go in the tube guys. Technically that’s the most important part. Alpha won’t tell us, but we are literally heading up the Academy of the Arts classification department. No one was ever interested in documenting the species of things over here before the Globe-siders showed up.”


    John though about it.


    The assignment was really simple. “Hey, what was the trial like before the student exchange program?”


    “Uh, that’s a question for Alpha. I think his father was a guild instructor before the breach,” said Ben.


    “Or,” said Teasle, dropping the barrel of his cannon into his left palm, “You could ask Sail.”


    John followed the bunny’s right ear, which had gone rigid and pointed the girl’s direction. Sail had her foot up on a bench and was tightening the laces of her leather high heeled boot. He couldn’t tell if the pointy metal things that protruded from the leather body suit were decorative or deadly. And why, he thought, would such a tight suit need laces? She reminded him of Cat woman, but with scarlet pig tails. He was thinking the red blotch on her face made her look menacing when her green eye darted their way.


    “She’s new here,” John said.


    “Far from it!” said Ben. “It might be the first year she’s been in this guild, but Sail has been around.”


    Teasle’s ear went limp when he saw her coming. “Not in that way, John. Ben means, she’s flunked a few trials. I heard she failed the Rogue trial. You don’t fail the Rogue trial and live. It’s the Rogue trial!” The bunny was trying really hard to ignore the incoming Sail.


    Her heels clicked on the pavement. She put her hands on her hips just a few feet away.


    “Did you paint your nails for the event?” John asked.


    Teasle dared a slow glance her way. Ben adjusted his binos. The reflection in his lenses showed a set of huge leather breasts, which was an effect of the glasswork, as the chick was, at best, a c-cup.


    Sail lifted her fingers and turned her hand so they could see the red nails and she did a little midair piano dance with the digits. Then she balled them into a fist and flinched.


    Teasle’s ears scrunched up like a cat doused in cold water and Sail stood there smiling. Her eyes landed on John. “Just for you guys as a matter of fact.”


    Teasle relaxed. Maurice’s laughter only tempered by Sail’s possible wrath.


    “They’re nice,” John said.


    Her hand dropped languidly to her side. Her body turned beneath her head like a marionette on strings and she said, “Happy hunting.” Then her head snapped around, catching up with the rest of her.


    Happy hunting, John thought. That’s what his dad had said before he crossed the Memorial Skybridge.


    He was thinking of asking his question when Teasle’s voice took over. “Now there’s your new species!”


    Sail turned her head back toward Teasle and put two fingers up, flicking her tongue in between them, then continued walking.


    “She’s always teasing me,” said Teasle.


    “Quiet down, man,” said Maurice. “You want her hunting you?”


    Teasle licked his wrist and ran it up along his ears and then over his head. “Sure, as long as she cleans me after.” He continued cleaning himself with his spit.


    “Ug,” Ben said. “You do know there’s such thing as a shower.”


    “This is more tactile,” said Teasle.


    “Well, just don’t ask me to scratch for you.”


    “Wouldn’t give you the pleasure of pleasuring me,” said Teasle, putting his eyes to the ends of Ben’s binos. Then, throwing an arm over John’s shoulder, “I’ve already got a cuddle buddy.”


    John gingerly lifted the hand away. “Uh, not this time Teasle. I’m gonna run this thing on my own.”


    Maurice deflated but then shrugged. Ben adjusted his binos uncomfortably.


    “Okay,” said Teasle. “So that’s how it is, huh? I thought we were a team.”


    “Look,” said John. “You guys have been riding my coat tails the whole year—”


    “—Uh, who sighted your bow for you?” interrupted Ben.


    “Really?” scoffed Teasle at Ben.


    “Please!” barked Maurice. Then at Ben, “Who taught him to throw?”


    ‘Well who—” started the bunny, and the arguments blended together in an uproar.


    “Okay,” said John evenly, but when Teasle took Maurice by the collar and Ben grabbed Teasle by an ear, he finally put his arms between them. “Okay! Enough!”


    They finally abated.


    “Truth is, we’ve been riding each other’s coat tails. But it’s time we stand out.” He looked over when he noticed Sail give him a final glance from the edge of the woods. Besides the collapsed tube slung over her shoulder, she only seemed to be armed with a set of throwing darts and a deadly looking hairpin that she’d slid between her pigtails as she disappeared. He pointed, “She seems to be confident enough on her own.”


    They all looked at one another.


    “I just wonder where she keeps her pencil,” said Ben.


    They all laughed.