Toy Soldiers

With the banquet beginning to wind down, Tiramisu and Lego hurried to reunite with the others. Blackmist was hovering over the other two raptors, his expression growing more and more weary the longer they watched him. The girls were circling his front legs and pestering him with questions, providing the ideal cover for their jailbreak shenanigans. Lego felt a wave of relief as Blackmist met her eye with a notable look of pleading instead of suspicion. She hurried over, careful not to jostle Tiramisu too much to keep up their facade.

"The leaf chew worked a treat, he's still a little queasy but he's ready to go home now," she informed the Iguanadon in a rush. He nodded at her, clearly relieved to be rid of the young raptors at last. 

"I'm glad you're feeling better," he said genuinely, leaning down to speak to Tiramisu on his level, "Thank you so much for visiting and all your efforts to help, please have a safe trip home."

"Wait!" A loud voice interrupted Blackmist's heartfelt moment and he looked up, annoyed. His face dropped as he recognised the approaching Iguanodon. 

"Please, we can't be this short on numbers," he hissed, his crest rising at the other black and white Iguanadon.

"We are," Agnus retorted sharply, "Get these three ready for the ceremony and report back to me within the hour." She turned on her heel and marched off to deliver similar orders to the rest of the banquet table. Thistle looked up at their crested friend and saw his jaw trembling as he tried to clamp it shut. Her head was spinning, was Misu right about them killing dinosaurs down here for their meat? Was this ceremony about to end with them on the chopping block? She glanced around anxiously at her pack members, Foxglove looked clueless and Misu's face was pinched in a scowl. 

"Blackmist," Lego said, her voice low and serious, "Tell me you're not going along with this?"

"I have no choice," Blackmist responded, resolutely, "I- I'll volunteer to work with them, to keep them safe, they can't - by the stalks and stems Lego, they can't make children fight!"

Tiramisu looked sharply at the others, his eyes narrowed and his lip already peeling back from his teeth. Thistle tried to gesture at him to stay quiet so she could listen in but now the adults attention was on them again.

"What do you mean, fight?" Tiramisu snapped. Blackmist sighed, avoiding the stony glare from the knight carrying the young raptor and leaned in again.

"Atlantis is falling," he said grimly, "The dome is cracking and we won't make it if we stay here. Queen Rhys is ordering our evacuation to the surface and every member of the court, and every ally we can find, must aid in the effort."

"The plants, the Oviraptors were planting food for you all to eat when you moved?" Foxglove asked, surprising the Iguanodon with her observation.

"I- yes that's it, we were trying to make the islands more hospitable to us before we moved, but we've run out of time. I'll explain more while we wait for the ceremony, please, children, just bear with me."

--

The queue was long, long enough that Thistle began to scan the crowd for a break in the line of guards. As she did, a Tapejara broke from the crowd and made for the treeline. The guards didn't bother chasing it and she soon saw why, the second the Tape hit the trees it was piled on by a troop of monkeys, bringing it to the ground and dragging it away in the direction of the prisons.

"So we die fighting for these jackasses who want to take over our islands or we get put in prison?" Tiramisu grumbled.

"I know it looks grim, but I promise we wouldn't be getting this aggressive if it wasn't necessary," Blackmist insisted, "If there was time for a gradual integration I'm sure the Queen would be favouring that path instead." Misu snorted, turning away from the Iguanodon to stare ahead at the large stone platform that waited ahead. The Queen finally had shown herself, standing on her stage in front of the cowering crowd. She didn't even look cool, Tiramisu scoffed internally, not enough sharp edges to her armour. All she had were her fancy feathers and her creepy monkeys. Thistle and Foxglove seemed subdued by the atmosphere, but he knew that Thistle at the very least was weighing their options in her head.

Foxglove looked to their left where Agnus, the Iguanadon that had ordered them to the ceremony, was standing. Blackmist was standing to their right but he felt more like a guardian than a guard. Agnus certainly felt like a guard, occasionally shooting them dirty looks when she thought they were getting too restless. It wasn't easy to stand still for this long, the pink raptor was tapping her claws in the grass and fidgeting with her wing feathers while they waited. Blackmist had told them it was a knighting ceremony, the Queen would make the knights somehow and then they would have to work for Atlantis. Like a job, she supposed, but with a lot more fighting. She didn't really mind fighting, though she knew Thistle and Misu preferred a more peaceful life. She knew that if it came down to it she'd fight harder than anyone to keep her friends safe, and it sounded like Queen Rhys and Blackmist wanted to do the same. 

The queue shuffled along slowly at first, but clearly the crowd weren't the only ones getting impatient and it began to move faster. It seemed every minute the raptors were being pushed forward a little more until they eventually stood at the foot of the stage, watching the Oviraptor ahead of them be knighted. Rhys would take her thumb and draw a symbol in the air with it, say something and then the Ovi bowed and hurried off. 

"You can all go up together," Blackmist whispered, gently urging them forward. Thistle couldn't hear anything over the ringing in her ears as she looked up at the Queen towering over her. The bland, neutral expression on her face fell briefly into something unreadable, but her composure was regained so rapidly it was impossible to analyse. She said something, drew her symbol in the air and moved on to Foxglove, not waiting for Thistle to bow. Foxglove was finished quickly too, along with Tiramisu who made a point to keep his head raised. Before she could even grasp the ceremony, Thistle felt Blackmist's crested tail herding them off of the stage.

"Was that it?" she asked, dazed.

"Yes, you're all done, congratulations, you did incredibly well," Blackmist praised them. Foxglove preened but Tiramisu remained unmoved by the platitudes. 

"What now?" the brindle raptor asked bluntly.

"Now, you perform your duties to Atlantis," the crested Iggy said nervously, like he was waiting for the inevitable refusal, "It'll just be some fortifications for the dome, it won't be any kind of fighting."

"Do you promise?" Foxglove asked, her eyes wide and pleading at the thought of her friends being hurt in battle.

"I-" he hesitated before a stern look came over his face, "I promise, on my honour, I will not allow you to see combat. No matter what orders come." The raptor chicks looked at him in awe, feeling his conviction at full force. Even the ever-skeptical Tiramisu found himself trusting the Iggy's solemn promise and he nodded at the girls. They would play along with this knight malarky, for as long as it helped them to make it back to the surface.