“Gründ!” Haylir, Gotha and a few others were starting for the forest when they saw him emerge from the trees. “Is he hurt?” He couldn’t take another step. He had to take another step. “Where have you been?” “You look awful”...

Gründ finally recognized the voices. He was home. He could collapse, now.

“Oh no! He’s bleeding!” Gotha started crying. Haylir rushed to her friend’s side, motioning for the others to go fetch a stretcher. He wouldn’t be able to walk any further, not with such a wound. “Haylir!” Gründ would recognize the color of her fur anywhere.

“Haylir, I flew! I really did! Flew far and found something amazing!”

“Hush now. Don’t talk, you need to rest.” The stretcher had arrived, it was not time to talk but to carry the wounded Töskr to safety and medicine. She still wondered, though… “A krunskuver and I got in a fight. It wouldn’t let me fly…” Darkness finally claimed Gründ, leaving Haylir and Gotha wondering what he had meant.

The next pulse Gründ woke early. The Core was barely lighting up and he felt terrible. He found himself on a bed of hay in Haylir’s house, his wounds taken care of and Haylir herself softly snoring on another bed. The Töskr raised himself, his hindpaw hurting but nothing too serious.

Still weak, he started looking for some food and drink. His mouth was extremely dry and his head ached. “I must’ve lost a lot of blood,” he thought to himself. Hearing a muffled curse as he misstepped, Haylir opened her eyes slowly. “You better not be trying to run off again,” she remarked groggily. Startled by her voice he turned, flinching as another shot went through his leg.

“Running is definitely out of the picture for now! I’ll need a good meal first… And maybe some wings to take the strain off of my leg.” She sighed and shook her head. “You’ll never let go of it will you? -Not with what I found… Was it yesterday? How long have I been out?”

She rose to her paws. “Yeah, it was yesterday.”

A good few moments went by. Fed by Haylir and his head throbbing, Gründ couldn’t help but falling into slumber again. After a dreamless sleep, he woke to Bared shaking him awake.

“You idiot! We thought we’d lost you!” Gründ sat up, his head hurt a little less, but a deep booming voice right in his face didn’t do it any good. With his eyes barely open he replied: “Wait until you hear what I found, I was far from lost!”

Bared threw up his arms. “I don’t care what you found! You took off from my house, flew away at a huge speed and suddenly you come back covered in blood! What happened in that time? A krunskuver clearly took their chances at a lonely Töskr running through the forest but what else?!”

Grund inhaled deeply, trying to collect his words and keep down the excitement bubbling back up inside him. “A flying machine! I found a flying machine, Bared!” ...His containment failed.

The elder gave a look of amazement. “You’re kidding, right? If wings weren’t enough, how hard was your landing this time?!” Grund huffed, “look I FOUND it Bared! I swear I found something, there were ruins. And they described this machine, that could fly… And I found it!” With those last words Gründ fell back on his bed.