Chapter 9: The Adventures of Pluto and Thena, 4250 – 3900 BCE (2)

[Tanzania, 4150 BCE]

It has been fifty years since the tribe incident, and we are going strong on the mission. Thena and I figured out a template to deal with the deviants. The plan is to stay in a region for fifty years, hunt every single deviant in that area, and watch if there's a hidden deviant in those fifty years.

Right now, it's our first try at that template, and we are now in Tanzania, and we have set up a camp in this grassland.

I am now sitting in front of a campfire, minding my own business, but then Thena walked up to me, and she handed me a rather roughly crafted bowl with soup inside it.

"Food." She simply said.

I raised my eyebrow at her. "I didn't know you could cook." I said while grabbing the bowl. I drank the soup, and my God, it tasted horrible.

"I changed my mind. You CAN'T cook..." I groaned as I tried to swallow the soup. "Please, let me do the cooking duty as usual."

"Is it that bad?" She asked as she slurped her own soup. She tasted it, and shrugged. "It's not bad..."

"What do you mean, 'it's not bad'? It tastes horrible." I murmured. "Just leave the cooking to me... please."

"Very well..." She answered. "I was just trying it..."

"Well, nice try..." I said, "But don't do it again."

After that, we wanted to end the day there, but then, we heard a scream in the distance.

"A human scream." Thena noted as she stood up.

"You think we should help him or her?" I asked the Goddess of War.

She nodded weakly. "Let's go."

Before I could say anything, she dashed forward, leaving me behind.

"You've got to be kidding me..." I sighed as I summoned Apophis. I jumped on his head and commanded him to move.

Apophis then quickly slithered to the source of the scream, and I saw that Thena was fighting... Deviants?

"There are still more deviants here? I thought we'd already eradicated it. " I murmured. I commanded Apophis to support Thena.

I jumped off of Apophis, and the giant cobra quickly slithered to the deviants. It first strikes a rather small deviant, instantly absorbing its cosmic energy and making it wither away.

"Don't absorb." I commanded Apophis, I'm interested in these deviants that can't be detected by us in these fifty years…

Apophis continued to attack, and now, he wrapped a deviant around and crushed it using its muscles.

Thena, on the other hand, is acting quite weird. She's fighting passively right now... not moving at all.

"What are you doing, Thena?" I asked from afar, confused at her movement.

"It's the humans!" She shouted. "One of them is injured!"

"Oh, fuck me..." I murmured. Because of this, I summoned a construct. It was a new construct I've developed. I called it Anansi (Arachne, Arachne, Spider/Deviant Hybrid). It's my most 'powerful' yet, because it's made of 8 constructs, unlike Ammit and Apophis, who are created using six constructs.

It is not a big construct; rather, its size is the same as a normal lion, but its ability is quite useful.

Its ability is to make cosmic energy strings, like a spider web, but probably more durable... And it's permanent until I say so.

I commanded Anansi to wrap the rest of the deviants using its webs with the support of Apophis, who is still fighting them.

After that, I ran to Thena, who was still guarding the humans, holding her usual spear and shield combination.

"Is that human alright?" I asked Thena that question. "Why are we helping them any-"

Before I could continue the question, I saw that behind her was a group of humans; two men, two women, and six children.

"There are children Pluto." She stated, and she pointed her fingers at a girl who was laying weakly on the ground. "She's hurt. Do you have a construct that can heal or something?"

I shook my head. "Of course not. If I had that, Ajak's power would have been useless."

"Then we need to find some medicinal plants for her." She pushed.

"What about the deviants?" I questioned.

"Your constructs can deal with it, summon more and protect these humans." She said, bolting off from the place before I could say anything… again…

I sighed. "Sometimes I wonder if I like her company or not…"

I snapped my fingers, and summoned a bunch of dog constructs to protect the area of the humans.

"You alright?" I asked the humans, who were frightened because I had just summoned a bunch of golden constructs. They also didn't seem to understand me as well. "Right… don't know your language…"

The humans stepped back as I tried to get closer. I sighed, seeing this. "It's a bad idea to leave them with me…"

After seeing the humans' reaction, I decided to just stay away from them, I don't really know how to comfort these humans, so I'll wait for Thena to come back.

I watched how Anansi and Apophis worked together to defeat the deviants. Anansi, with its golden webs that entangled the deviants, and Apophis, with its long tail and sharp fangs, killed the free ones and the trapped.

As soon as they finished, I commanded Apophis to search the perimeters, checking if there were still any deviants left, while I told Anansi to bring all the deviant corpses to me.

After a while, Anansi finished the corpse gathering, and I decided to check the corpses while waiting for Thena to come back.

"Hmmm… new variant?" I questioned myself as I examined the deviant. "Small, four-legged, has a sharp tail that can probably kill a human in one stab, and... oh? Interesting skin. " I murmured. "Chameleon skin? That's interesting. No wonder we can't detect it using our eyes only…"

I then summoned the circle, and absorbed all the corpses for further studies, I need to think of a way to make them detectable.

I turned around, and saw that the humans were afraid of me even more, probably scared that I would also absorb them.

Thankfully, Thena came back, and in her hands were a bunch of herbs.

"I think this will do..." she said.

"You know about medicinal herbs?" I questioned.

"Just in case." She answered.

"Well, that's good." Thena quickly walked over to the girl and started to treat her, while I watched them from afar. Afraid of scaring them even more, I absorbed all my constructs and let Thena do her thing.

Around thirty minutes later, she's finally done, and I could see that she's helping the human girl to sit.

I could see that the others were thankful about it, and they're thanking Thena rather excessively.

Seeing that Thena is finally done, I walked up to her.

"Is she alright?" I questioned, looking at the girl who was sitting weakly.

"She will be." She nodded.

After that, we went into a comfortable silence, but after a couple of minutes, I decided to break it. "What's with you and children?"

She raised her eyebrow. "I don't understand what you're saying."

"I've noticed that when it includes children, you seem to soften a bit."

She just hummed at my statement and spoke. "Children are innocents. It's already a cruel world. We don't have to make it crueler for them." After she said that, she walked to the group of humans again. She began to try to converse with them. Although it's not really working, I can see that she's pointing at the direction of our encampment.

After a while, I saw the humans nod, and Thena began to turn around.

"I've decided to stay in this area for a bit longer." She told me.

I shrugged. "Alright, I need to think of a way to deal with those deviants anyway…"

She raised her eyebrows. "You're fine with this?"

"You tolerated my selfishness earlier when I said that I wanted to study the animals in the savannah, so… it's the least I could do."

She smiled weakly at my words. "Thank you. I just need to watch these children grow up so they can take care of themselves. The two men and women aren't enough."

I hummed. "Should we give them a ride?"

She shook her head, "No, they're scared of your constructs, I'll carry the girl, the rest of them seemed to be capable of walking."

"Very well." I nodded. After that, we walked back to our encampment nearby, giving further treatment to the girl and making the other humans some temporary shelter.

The next day, I woke up to hear a rather loud sound outside my place. I stood up from my bed, and looked outside. I noticed that the adults are building their own semi-permanent houses... or tents.

I scanned the place, and saw that Thena was watching the rest of the children playing, her face showing a weak smile.

This is a rare sight…

I walked up to her and said. "Not uneasy with humans anymore?"

"Hm?" She made a questioning sound.

"I remembered that you don't really like mingling with humans." I stated.

"Well, people change." She continued. "I'm still uncomfortable… but… I'm willing to try it."

"That's great." I hummed. "What's the plan now?"

"Right now? I wanted to train these children in basic skills. " She answered.

"By basic skills, you mean 'skill with spears' and 'marksmanship'?" I mused.

"That's one of the skills." She nodded. "As well as maybe some medicinal knowledge that I learned a bit."

"That's nice of you." I commented. "Well, I'm not going to stop you, I need to find a way to track those chameleon deviants." I said as I walked away from her. I passed through the adults, and they seemed less afraid of me. They showed a little bit of respect for me, which is nice.

After that, I wandered off from the place, searching for a particular animal, a bat.

---

[4 years later in Tanzania]

It's been four years since Thena brought the humans to our place, and it's been a peaceful life since then.

Ever since she brought them to live with us for a while, every morning I woke up to the sounds of children playing and laughing, and every time I got out of my place, I always saw Thena watching them.

Now, though, the children are not children anymore, which means they have to leave soon.

In the morning, I saw Thena training the now teenage boys. She was teaching them how to use a bow properly.

I always walked up to them and watched. I had nothing to do, I finished my research on those invisible deviants, as I now have a way to find them.

We also learned their language, I can talk to them, but I didn't bother to learn their names, to be honest.

The women also gave birth to a couple of babies, and Thena helped them all the way, while again, I'm just watching them from afar.

The humans are still a bit afraid of me, but it's mostly in private. They greet me when I'm walking past them, which is nice.

"Here, you have to aim properly." I heard Thena say, in their language, that she was giving pointers to the boys.

The boys aimed their bows, and they shot them, hitting the target that Thena set up.

"That's good." Then Thena nodded in approval. "Right, I'm going to teach the girls about healing. You guys can rest. " She left the boys, who were admiring their own work on using the bow. She saw me watching them and walked up to me.

"I think they are starting to develop a crush on you." I joked.

She rolled her eyes, signaling that she was not amused. "Their hormones are starting to increase; they're going to have a crush on every girl they see."

Is that true? Oh well... "They're growing up." I said.

"Yes, they are." She repeated, She probably knows where I'm going with this.

"We need to move on." I spoke.

"Yes, we must..." She said weakly. "How about next week?"

"Take your time, Thena." I smiled. "I'll wait."

"Thank you." She nodded while smiling. "I need to go see the girls now." She patted my shoulder and walked off.

Bruh… 'I need to go see the girls now'? We're like husband and wife or something...

I just chuckled at my own thoughts, and I walked away from the settlement, as I needed to check this place one last time.

I summoned the result of my experiment; a bat construct I called Camazotz. It's made from two Bat/Deviant hybrids and the bull-like deviant I got a couple of years back.

It's quite big. Their height is the same as mine, but they are obviously much larger in terms of width.

Its ability is quite amazing to say the least. You see, from what I've observed, Camazotz is blind, unlike my other constructs that can see through their 'eyes'. Instead, Camazotz uses echolocation, just like a normal bat, but it can also 'produce' sounds that can make your ears bleed and disorient you using cosmic energy.

Trust me, I learned it the hard way.

So after I summoned it, I commanded him to patrol this area of Africa, checking if there were any more of those chameleon deviants.

After that, I came back to my house, as I'm doing sculpting again. This time, I'm doing my newest constructs.

---

[The next week]

We were at the edge of the settlement when Thena was saying goodbye to the human tribe. I could see that the boys and girls who had trained under her were crying right now, hugging her.

It's sad and all, but I don't really have attachments to them. Again, I don't really talk to them that much. In just a couple of decades, they'll die, and we'll still be alive. In fact, when we return to the others, all of them will probably be dead.

Thena probably knows this as well, so she makes sure to say goodbye to them, and to her, they're good company.

But then, the boys and girls walked up to me, which surprised me.

"T-Thank you... For S-saving us before... " One of the girls spoke to me in a really broken English (?).

I was definitely surprised at this.

"We know we haven't talked to you much, but we are grateful to you." She continued, again, in broken English (?)

I just smiled and patted her head. "I don't need your thank you, I just need you to live." Bloody hell, that sounds cringy.

The girl smiled and nodded her head. After that, she and her friends walked back to the adults, and they waved at me while I was summoning my winged deviant.

"It feels nice to be thanked, right?" Thena spoke to me suddenly.

"It does... a bit." I shrugged as I hopped onto the winged deviant, helping Thena hop on too.

"Well, we're leaving now." I said as my winged deviant flew off to the south, leaving the tribe behind.

Thena left behind a legacy for that tribe; a legacy of the skill of using a bow and a legacy of healing knowledge.

---

[South Africa, the same day]

It was midnight, and we were at the literal edge of Africa, at the Strait of Gibraltar.

"Well, what are we going to do?" I asked the goddess of war.

"Same as usual, kill, kill, and kill." She casually said.

"Killing deviants." I added.

"Let's clean this area quickly." She continued, nodding her head.

And after that, we hunt.