Chapter 01
Most people would consider being woken up in the middle of the night by gunshots and screaming to be a terrible way to start the day. However for the woman laying in bed, it was a typical Tuesday here in Madagascar. Definitely not the most kid friendly place to be. Luckily for her, she was an adult. The woman brushed a strand of her orange and yellow hair out of her vision, just staring up at the ceiling. With a sigh she thought, '16 months and still no leads. Where are you Dooie?' Sitting up she gazed around the plain thatch hut she was staying in. Nothing new.
*16 Months Earlier*
There was a knock on the door of her front door. She got up, walked towards the entrance and opened the door. Suddenly a couple of loud pops were heard that startled the woman causing her to jump back and make her fiery hair to quickly bop as streamers gently fell from the skies.
"Happy 18th Birthday Spitfire!" The couple of friends around the same age - one guy, one girl - cheered to the woman while each held a small confetti cannon. They both dropped the cannons and grabbed one of Spitfire's arms as they pulled her into a group hug.
After a few moments of standing and embracing her friends, Spitfire pulled herself away from them before brushing a few stray hairs from her face with a massive grin, "I have to admit with all that's been going on lately I forgot it was even my birthday. I was planning on having a day of reading, but I guess that plan's out the window now, huh?" She explained with a small chuckle.
Soarin, the man had dark blue hair and green eyes, had a quick laugh as he pulled out an envelope, "Speaking of your weird book addiction." It was small in size but rather thick and placed it into Spitfire's waiting hands. "It's a few vouchers for your favourite book store, you better be grateful, I spent a lot of bits on this, so make the most of it." His grin was practically ear to ear when he saw Spitfire's shocked face.
"You could have gotten me like a fifty bit one and I would have be happy."
He just laughed and used his thumb to point to the woman next to him. "Fleetfoot here said that I had to get presents that costed at least four thousand bits, so I got you something you can use to get whatever book you would wanted."
Spitfire quickly looked Fleetfoot after Soarin's explanation, "Four thousand?! Fleet why so much?"
Fleetfoot, the woman had white hair and green eyes, bent down to pick up a large package and held it out for her friend. "Well you see, my gift got more expensive after each one I bought. I managed to get you a new book series that came out recently. It's suppose to be about a female archaeologist who is looking for ancient artifacts and take them to a museum to protect them from falling into the wrong hands. There's apparently already five books in the series and it barely started a year ago. I heard a lot of good things about them so I thought you might like it." She finished explaining with a smile as Spitfire took the books.
"But over four thousand bits, are the books printed on gold?!"
"they are all the very first copy of each and signed by the author. If you don't like them you can give it back to the book store, I put the receipt in the first book." She smiled. "And this way you can spend your day reading."
Soarin's head quickly shot towards Fleetfoot, "I thought we were taking her out for a drink."
Spitfire shook her head. "No thanks Soarin. Do you two wanna come in, I can open the presents and we make some plans for tomorrow or something."
"Sounds like a plan. Can't wait to see your face." Soarin said with a laugh before he took the two presents from Spitfire.
The three friends walked in, the girls sat down on the couch while Soarin placed the presents down on the coffee table in front of Spitfire before he took the seat on the opposite side of her from Fleetfoot. Spitfire looked between her friends waiting for them to let her know if she could start. Two nods later she was opening Soarin's present. Sure enough inside were three gift vouchers for her favourite book store, The Golden Oak. she looked at the number indicated on each card. One thousand five hundred bits, each.
Spitfire was shocked to say the least. Soarin was a bartender so he wasn't making this kind of money. "S-Soarin! What the hell! This is far too much! Where did you get this kind of money?"
Soarin shrugged at the question, "I got a few loads from my dad."
"But-but-but." She was speechless, her mouth agape.
Fleetfoot slugged her shoulder but to avail. "Wow if you reacted this badly to his present you will faint when you see mine."
Spitfire just looked at Fleetfoot then at the present. She reached out and began open the package, The paper wrapping fell to the floor and the small stack of five books were presented. Spitfire picked up the first book and looked at the cover. One it was a woman, she wore a dark olivine vest and cargo shorts, a tan pith helmet with a dark olive band, hanging onto a tree vine with one hand while the other held a blue jewel statue of two jackals looking in opposite directions with a gem between them, the statue and gem were both made of Sapphire, if the title was any indication. Bellow her were three crocodiles, one was right under her and making an attempt to bite the woman.
But there were only two things that Spitfire took notice of, the multi toned grey hair and the Cutie Mark that was present on the back of the hand that was holding onto the vine. It was a Compass Rose. Spitfire held the book in one hand and gently placed her hand on the image of the woman. She stared fondly at the image for what seemed like an eternity.
Fleetfoot and Soarin shared a worried looked. Soarin placed his hand on Spitfire's shoulder making her start at the contact. "Hey, Spitfire? you okay?"
Spitfire just nodded and spoke, "Just... Thinking." she got up and walked to her desk at the back of the room. Placing the book down she began looking through her draws near frantically. "It's gotta be here. It's gotta be here. Please let it be here."
"uhm Fire... you're starting to freak us out. What's going on?" Soarin said as he slowly began closing the distance between him and Spitfire.
Spitfire shot up holding a photo album in here hands, "Found it!"
She picked up the Daring Do book and carried both to the coffee table. Slamming them both down she started paging through the photos before stopping on a page that was filled with an 8 year old Spitfire and another girl, she was at least about 13 at the time, she had multi toned grey hair and each had an arm around each other both holding up their free hands to reveal the newly earned Cutie Marks of the girls. Spitfire had a wing that seemed to be made of a roaring fire, while the other girl had what appeared to be a Compass Rose.
She looked between the two images, one of the friend Spitfire use to spend days on end playing with and the other of the woman narrowly not getting bitten by crocodile while holding an ancient artifact. "Why?" Her breathing became hitched and her vision became blurry. Picking up the Daring Do book she hugged it tightly to her chest and began to sob. "Why? I thought you were dead." Her voice grew louder and louder after each word. "WHY DOOIE?!" Her friends could do nothing to stop the tears from cascading onto her legs.
PLEASE READ AUTHOR NOTE BEFORE READING CHAPTER 2
Chapter 02
A woman Blitz stool on the balcony of a penthouse over looking Manhattan, it was a beautiful view, the other guests where busy mingling amoung each other to notice the woman. To any man she would have been breath taking, multi grey hair, Magenta eyes and a stunning dark green dress and to any man brave enough to talk to her, she would just reject without mercy, so she was left alone to her own thought. Until now.
"I must ask why it is that such a fine and stunning woman such as yourself is standing outside here by herself." A man with dark grey stated as he stood next to the woman, placing a glass of wine by her hand, leaning over to rest on the balcony.
"I don't understand why you asked me here, Caballeron. You're constantly seek me out to try and kill me, steal the artifact I'm after or just get in the way and now you invite me to a party at your penthouse, what's the catch?"
The Caballeron stood up straight and lifted his index finger, "First of all, it's Dr Caballeron." He lifted his middle finger as well, "Second, I needed you here because that man," He pointed to a man with blue hair and mustache wearing a very fine suit. "Mr Fancy Pants over there, needed someone to find an artifact for him. I told him you were the best Archaeologist I knew."
"So wait, you're getting me jobs now? What happened to the whole arch enemy thing you had against me." The only reply was Dr Caballeron sliding a small piece of paper over to her. "What's this? Your number?"
He sighed sorrowfully and spoke in a low voice "I gave you this number because I would like to discuss things with you in private. My employer has eyes everywhere, i can't even sneaze without him knowing."
"So why the number then? Are you going rogue?"
"Not quite. There things I need to discuss with you, both professional and personal." He turned to walk back but looked over his shoulder to finish his conversation. "Just call me tomorrow at noon and we can set the arrangements."
*2 Days Later*
Daring Do was in her Yearling disguise clothing, she walked around a corner and spotted the meeting place. A bar? She approached with caution as to be sure it wasn't a trap. The doors opened at her touch and sure enough there was Dr Caballeron, sitting at the bar having small talk with the bartender, yet aside from them, there was no other occupants.
The bartender nodded his head towards Daring Do, "Can I get you anything, Miss Yearling?"
Daring Do just shook her head, "No thank you, sir. I'm just here for a meeting and I'll be on my way."
The bartender nodded again and began walking back to the kitchen. Daring Do took a seat next to Dr Caballeron.
He made a small laugh to himself as Daring took her seat. "Still going that by Yearling, I see."
"I have to. It's a personal thing."
With a sigh Caballeron leaned to his side and picked up a folder and placed it between the two, "It's the entire profile I've had to be kept on you."
"And you're giving it to me? What's the catch?" Daring asked with doubt.
"So you can at least try to believe what I am about to say miss Do. The men I work for hate you and wish to have you out of the competition in the archaeology field. I don't want to hurt you, Miss Do. They know a lot about you, but only from what's in this file. Which as you can see, is not much. I placed as little information about you as I could but still make it seem like it was all I knew."
Daring opened the file and saw the five page profile of her. "This doesn't seem like a little."
"I know far more about you than what is said in the ink."
"Like what?" Daring said in an attempt to sound challenging. "Prey tell."
He retrieved another file and handed it to her, "For the past few months there has been a female Blitz soldier who's been looking all over for you, a Miss Stacy Blazewing. I'm assuming I don't need to explain who she is."
"And what makes you think I know her?" Her question was answered when she opened the folder and saw a picture of her and another woman, young, still children and just having got their Cutie Marks. Her heart skipped at the sight of the old picture. She placed it down. "What have you done to her?" Her gaze was at sub-zero and aimed directly at the doctor.
"Nothing. I do a lot of bad things in my line of work, Miss Do. Cheating, lying and misdirection, but I don't kill or hurt anyone." He noticed the deadpan look Daring Do was giving him, "If you recall, i was never the one that shot you. I don't like hurting people, and I tend to keep it that way."
"Then why are you showing me this, if not for a threat?"
Caballeron had a chuckle to himself, "You really do think so badly of me, don't you? The reason I'm showing you this is, from what my men have discovered about her so far, she's spent the last 16 months looking for you."
"Why are you trying to help me Caballeron?" Daring Do asked with more worry than curiosity.
"I'm tired of our cat and mouse game, Miss Do. That's the other reason I asked you here. As you may recall I explained Mr Fancy Pants an artifact to be retrieved for him. This artifact is in Madagascar. Well if you are to accept, I will be sure all expenses are taken care of, and you are paid beautifully."
Daring Do stood up, grabbed the file of the girl and turned her back to Caballeron, "I'll think about it, and thanks for this info."
"My pleasure."
Later that night Daring was kept from her sleep by one single thought. 'Why is Spitfire looking for me? After what happened, I thought she believed I was dead.' She gazed at her wings through the mirror of her bathroom as she sat in her bathtub. There wasn't any water, she just enjoyed the smooth texture of the tub. She pulled out the photo that Dr Caballeron had given her, 'Why now?', turning the picture around she noticed a handwritten message on the back. "During her first tour she will be in Madagascar. Does this make you reconsider?" Daring laughed to herself as she read the message from Caballeron. 'Am I that predictable?'
*The next day*
Dr Caballeron was in his office attending to some classified documents regarding the possible locations of the artifact that he suggested to Daring Do. A quick knock on his door broke him out of his concentration. A Jinx woman was peeking her head through the doorway to look at her boss.
"Uhm... Dr Caballeron. There is a Miss Yearling here to see you." She spoke with a timid voice.
"Thank you Candy. Please let her in." The woman nodded and closed the door again. After several seconds of silence the door opened again. A Blitz woman with red spectacles, a grey florist hat and a purple coat walked through the door. "Ah, Miss Yearling." He emphasized the use of the woman's fake identity. "What can I help you with?"
Yearling sat in the chair opposite Caballeron. "I'll take the job. So what am I getting?"
"It's simple." Caballeron leaned onto his desk and held his up with his knuckle. "I have a file that explains all the possible locations of the pieces of the artifact, The Crystal Cane. Legend has it that whoever wields it will have complete control over the minds of those who seek to harm him. There are only 4 pieces to construct this artifact. We are only certain about one location, the one in Madagascar. Rather lucky don't you think?"
"So what do we know about the other pieces?"
"Their scattered. Around the world to be precise. How or why we don't know. The case of exactly where is also a blank mark on the data. We have figured out the countries they are located in, though. Here take this file and ask Miss Candy, my receptionist, to make a copy for you."
"Got it." Daring Do, or at the moment A.K Yearling, stood up and walked to the door before stopping, "Oh and Caballeron." He looked up at the back of her head. "Thanks." With that Daring Do left the room leaving Dr Caballeron with a small smile.
