The Bug Collector

Vida’s reflexes kicked in just in time. Officer 9045’s webs barely missed the girl, cutting the length off of one of her dreadlocks.

“Why do you run from fate?” 9045 looked at Vida as he spun his web between his hands.

“I won’t let you kill me!” Vida’s voice was shaking and she couldn’t stop tears of fear from flowing down her cheeks.

“It’s inevitable. It seems my brother has already sent a black-haired child into a bleeding state of delirium. Him and the purple haired girl must already be on their way out.” The Officer’s words caused Vida’s knees to get weak. Amora’s eyes widened as she put a name to the descriptions.

“Taro… Akilah… No…” Vida’s vision began to blur, but not from pain. Tears overflowed between her eyelids. She dropped to her knees in despair.

“That’s it. Accept your place under my cathedral of silk.” Officer 9045 spun his web into a thick noose.

“I can’t… I can’t do it… I’m sorry…” Vida looked down at her bruised hands. She hung her head in defeat.

The world went silent as she retreated into her thoughts. Her memories flashed before her, all the fun times she had with Akilah growing up, the times Taro’s banter made her laugh. She couldn’t think of anything but death.

“Vida! Vida!” Amora’s voice rang through the deafening silence.

Vida turned to Amora, tears still streaming from her eyes.

“Get up! For Akilah. Please. He didn’t say they were dead yet!” Amora was crying as well, but she felt even more powerless than Vida.

Amora ran up to Vida, giving her a tight hug.

That lovely rainbow light appeared around them, engulfing them in floating rainbow shards of glass.

Officer 9045 jumped back, ready for the light to initiate some kind of attack.

“This feeling…” Vida thought. It was the same feeling she felt when she touched Amora’s Mode last.

She felt her fear, sorrow, dread, and pain all go away, even if it was just for a couple seconds. She flashed back to her younger days. Days when all she worried about were the little things.

Five years ago:

It had only been a year since Hendrix had joined the Frewins. He was still that quiet young boy that made Vida curious in every way.

Vida was in her room, reading a book on the different animals of North America, when she heard a high-pitched scream from downstairs.

She rushed downstairs to find the source of the scream. She laid her eyes on a fear-stricken Amora and Akilah, focusing on one spot in front of the fireplace, dead center in the living room.

“What is it?” Vida asked.

“It’s a spider!” Amora climbed up onto the couch as she pointed down at the carpet.

Vida peeked over the couch to see what all the fuss was about.

She let out a high-pitched Eek! as she joined Amora on the couch. Both of the girls tried to keep their feet as far away from the floor as possible.

“What are you guys doing?!” Mr. Frewin walked downstairs with Hendrix, chuckling at the sight.

“That’s a spider!” Akilah exclaimed.

“It could be venomous!” Vida added on.

“What?” Hendrix walked over to the living room carpet, quickly laying his eyes on the arachnid.

“Woah!” Hendrix exclaimed, showing intrigue and curiosity instead of fear.

“Don’t worry! I will save you!” Chase charged into the living room with no clue about what the commotion was centered around.

Chase jumped into the living room, following Amora’s eyes to the subject of the fear.

“Oh shit!” Chase jumped onto the couch next to the girls.

“Chase! What have I told you about using those words-” Mrs. Frewin’s lecture was interrupted when she caught the movement of the spider. She also let out an Eek! Rushing over to Mr. Frewin. They grabbed onto each other as Mr. Frewin signaled for the curious Hendrix to stay back from the spider.

“Why is everyone so scared all of a sudden? These little bugs ain’t gonna hurt nobody. They don’t even hurt plants, like the venus flytrap, huh?” Mr. Frewin chuckled and looked to Vida, whose fear quickly subsided to make way for curious excitement.

“Oh, yeah! They eat spiders and stuff!” Vida’s smile made Hendrix smile as well.

“That’s awesome! See? No need to be scared of something that can’t even hurt plants-” Mr. Frewin had taken his eyes off of Hendrix for a moment, but he was already standing in front of the spider.

Hendrix stepped on the spider with his bare foot.

“Ew.” Hendrix lifted his foot to reveal the mess of green and white spider guts.

The other four kids all screamed in disgust and ran up to their room.

Hendrix put his hand out, thinking he had done something wrong for them to all run away from him. He tried to hold himself back from crying.

Mr. and Mrs. Frewin looked at the mess on his foot, then laughed.

Hendrix looked at them with curiosity once again.

“Seems your friends aren’t as brave as you, Hendrix.” Mrs. Frewin chuckled as she smiled at the young boy.

“C’mon, let’s get that mess cleaned up.” Mr. Frewin picked up the eleven year old boy.

Vida watched the conversation from the staircase. She couldn’t help but smile.

Present day:

“I can’t die. I can’t leave you guys behind.” Vida mumbled as her tears continued to flow. Her bruises disappeared, along with any scrapes and cuts from the fight so far.

“Thank you, Amora.” Vida put her hand on the arm of Amora, who still hugged her.

“Please, never give up on us.” Amora said as the light began to fade.

They both stood up, now renewed with Amora’s Spirit.

“Are you done with your pitiful crying? I’d like to wrap you in a cocoon already.” Officer 9045 stretched the web between his hands as far as he could.

“Let’s try something new.” Vida held her hands in front of her, channeling her Spirit into her palms.

Officer 9045 took one step forward, but his second step was taken off balance by some sort of shaking underneath the ground.

“What the…” The Officer mumbled to himself.

The small room’s walls began to rumble violently.

9045 looked around the room for the source, but couldn’t find it.

“What kind of Mode is this?!” 9045 directly asked the girl.

“The last one you’ll see.” Vida had grown tired of the Officer’s snarky remarks.

Suddenly, the Officer saw something green break through the floor to his left, crumbling the concrete to pieces.

He jumped to the other side of the room to avoid any attack.

As he turned around to see what had broken through the floor, he saw a peculiar looking plant, about the size of a person. The motion stopped as the plant slowed to a halt.

As the motion ceased, the Officer began to try to piece together the objective of the attack. He began to chuckle.

“You expected to catch ME by surprise, with THAT?!” 9045 took his cap off and scratched his head, chuckling all the while.

“What’s the plan now?!” Amora whispered to Vida.

“Catch him.” Vida whispered to Amora.

As Vida spoke to her, Amora recognized the plant from one of the books Vida used to read when they were kids. Vida’s plan made sense now.

“Now, time to fall prey to a hunter.” Officer 9045 lunged at the two, who quickly dashed to the other side of the room, with the mysterious plant in the middle.

The Officer pivoted off of one of the walls, landing directly on top of the plant, right in front of the girls. His shoes pressed against the little, tiny white hairs that covered the pink surface of the plant.

The two teens faked a sense of fear, backing into a corner to bolster confidence in the Officer.

“You think plants can kill a predator? Ha! Now, you have nowhere to go-” The Officer’s words were cut short as, in the blink of an eye, the jaws of the mysterious plant closed on the Officer with the sound of bones crunching under the pressure.

His right hand became the only thing visible to the two girls. He struggled inside the mouth of the plant, screaming in terror.

Vida and Amora dropped their fearful act as they walked around to the front of the plant, where the Officer’s hand stuck out from.

“This is a Venus flytrap, you stupid bug.” Vida spat on the hand of 9045 as it clenched into a fist.

Amora looked between the teeth of the ginormous plant, seeing its mouth fill up with the digestive enzymes of the plant.

The Officer’s screams turned from anger to terror as they began to drown in the digestive fluids covering him from head to toe.

“Thank you, Amora.” Vida turned to Amora as they both walked out of the room.

Amora nodded, still catching her breath.

“Taro! Please! Wake up!” A scream echoed down the hallway.

“Akilah…” Amora muttered.

“C’mon.” Vida started to jog as Amora joined her.

The Officer’s hand went limp, eventually falling off of the rest of the body with a wet thud as the ligaments in his elbows were dissolved by the enzymes of the Venus flytrap.

The room fell silent as the girls made their way towards the kitchen.

In the kitchen storage room, Akilah continued to scream, hoping someone would come in time.