Yueret, holding an energy lamp over his head, carried his sister to a corner of the hall littered with boards.
"Do you think this place is suitable?" Unana asked. "Perhaps it would be better to go straight to the forest?"
"No, in the forest, the doll can attack from any direction, and very unexpectedly," Yueret lowered his sister to the floor. "The main thing is not to speak loudly, so the doll won't hear you if it's behind this wall."
"She can probably sense..."
Unana did not finish speaking. Footsteps came from the entrance. Yueret summoned his sword and shield, but decided not to activate his aura to avoid revealing himself.
"You may come out," the voice of the spirit of cold lizard said. "The doll has left."
"This is…" Unana peered cautiously from behind the boards. "It would be better if it were a doll."
In the middle of the hall opposite the doorway stood the same lizard girl. She wore only her scaly suit, and the hat she'd worn earlier for camouflage had been replaced by horns.
"I think we can go out," Yueret turned to his sister. "If the doll didn't cut her, then it definitely left."
"I'll stay here," Unana turned to the wall.
"Okay. Just don't get lost."
Yueret emerged from his hiding place and was immediately spotted by the spirit of cold lizard. A tongue flew at the guy, stopping only a step away from his face.
"It's me, bear cub," Yueret introduced himself.
Timnichan didn't answer, as she was busy sucking her tongue deep into her bottomless throat.
"What happened to the doll?" Yueret asked. "Was she scared by your tongue?"
"No. I didn't stick my tongue out. I hid in the river."
"Is there a river in the forest?"
"Yup, it's small, so I can't completely hide inside it. If the doll found me, it would think I was just a cold lizard."
"Were you watching the doll?"
"No. She said something, but I wasn't eavesdropping. The first creator said only bear cubs can be eavesdropped on."
"Is she far from here?"
Timnichan left the station with a silly smile on her face and returned with the same smile.
"You found out something," Yueret guessed.
"Yup," the lizard girl answered. "The mountains are still where they were."
This was too stupid. Yueret lowered his head and walked back to his sister. Unana leaned her head against the boards and her feet against the wall. The energy lamp hung above her chest, illuminating her well, but her brother wasn't interested in it at all.
"I think this doll was trying to tell us something..." Yueret began to remember something.
"Yeah, she wanted to say something," Unana bent one of her legs at the knee. "But she said she'd tell us after we defeated her."
"We defeated her."
"Really… So that's why she disappeared."
"But another doll appeared, her sister."
"Yueret," Unana turned to her brother and pressed her foot into his belly. "I don't think that's her sister. She said her sister was somewhere else. It was that very doll."
"But you broke it."
"What?"
Yueret told his sister how the battle on the roof had ended. Unana straightened her leg, which had been bent at the knee.
"Uh..." The "bear cubs" looked at each other.
Yueret, distracted by his thoughts, didn't notice how his younger sister had found herself on his neck, her thighs propping up his cheeks.
"We need to find the doll," Unana said. "That man who looked like our dad was our dad. I'm sure of it."
"Why do you think so?" Yueret asked. "Maybe it's another uncle we don't know."
"Because I think so," Unana hit her brother in the chest. "Go into the forest."
Yueret had no choice but to grab her sister's legs to keep her from falling and leave the station. Timnichan followed them, but soon noticed the older "bear cub" was heading in a completely different direction, and blocked his path with her blue tongue, which looked like it had crawled out of a scary game.
"Sorry, Unana," Yueret sighed. "Can you walk on your own?"
"Yup," the archer turned away and accidentally caught sight of snow-capped mountains on the horizon.
Yueret gently lowered his little sister to the ground, and then patted her head. Unana smiled and tried to hug her brother, but at the last moment she took a step back.
"What is it?" Yueret asked. "Are you hungry?"
"I'm not a pet," Unana turned away. "You'd better tell that to the lizard."
But the lizard didn't have to say anything. She sucked her tongue back into her mouth, then ran forward and pointed at the mountains in the distance.
"My memory isn't so bad that you have to remind me so often," Yueret looked at Timnichan.
"Let's go before I discharged," the lizard girl said.
"I don't want to ride on her tongue," Unana warned.
"No," Timnichan sat down on her knees. "We'll walk. It's not far."
"Dad," Yueret looked at the snow-capped mountain peaks, which looked like little ice cream cones from here. "Why is she so stupid?"
***
Halankuo stepped out of the wooden train car onto the stone platform and didn't immediately realize where she was. The wooden station with its columns looked so standard that the only way to tell where she was by the inscription on the energy banner above the entrance.
"Yenekit," Halankuo read. "I still remember these symbols. Now I just need to get home."
Halankuo's gaze shifted to the paved path that led up the steep mountainside.
"Sis, they let me on the train," a head in a hood with several strands of blue hair hanging from it suddenly appeared in front of the girl.
The head belonged to a doll and was attached to its neck. Halankuo immediately recognized this creature as her "little sister."
"What's wrong with that?"
"The network writes that dolls aren't allowed on trains," Sitihi explained.
"They just thought that if you're my sister, you couldn't be a doll. You hid the head and the shovel, right?"
"Yes."
Sitihi raised her hand slightly, but Halankuo grabbed it and nearly tore it off.
"Not now," the "big sister" explained. "There are people here. They might recognize me."
Sitihi turned her head to the side, and Halankuo noticed with horror that it wasn't turning with her body. The "big sister" had to quickly lead the "little sister" away from the station, where they hid behind the trees near a small, fast-flowing river.
"I told you not to show that you're a doll," Halankuo whispered.
"I didn't show anyone anything. I didn't even show anyone your head."
"I hope no one found out it's a doll. Now I need to somehow sneak into the city unnoticed. It's a good thing it's small."
Halankuo looked at the steep mountainside, covered with a multitude of medium-sized trees, and realized something.
"Let's go through the forest."
"Why?" Sitihi asked.
"So people won't notice you."
"Does my hair look noticeable?"
Sitihi summoned a mirror, saw strands of blue hair and hid them deep inside her hood.
"Now they won't know I'm a doll," Sitihi turned her head toward her "big sister" and looked at her with large, bulging eyes and large pupils.
"You should also put on some glasses," Halankuo advised. "I think I have some somewhere."
Soon, black glasses appeared on the doll, hiding her terrifying eyes.
"Now I'm ready," Sitihi turned to the road leading to the city, but did not have time to leave the river bank…
… A hand emerged from the ground, holding an eye in its palm. Halankuo noticed it and was about to shout something to her "little sister," but she was faster...
The shovel appeared in Sitihi's hand, knocking the eyeball out of the palm with one movement before it could activate the pupil.
"Sis, be careful, there are other dolls walking around here," Sitihi said as if it were just an insect.
Halankuo watched as the hand that was left without an eyeball went underground and then appeared at the very edge of the water and picked it up.
"Was that a doll's hand?" Halankuo realized this only after the disappearance of this strange body part.
"Sis, she's hiding somewhere," Sitihi literally looked around. "Her arm can detach from her body and walk on its own. This isn't an ordinary doll. This is a highly developed doll. Maybe it's not even a battle doll."
Sitihi approached her "big sister," who had fallen to her knees in shock, and tried to lift her up.
"We need to get out of here," the doll looked at the trees. "The arm will heal soon and come out. If you want to go through the forest, we'll go that way. It's even better that way. There are people on the road. They shouldn't see the arm and eye."
"Yup," Halankuo agreed, though she understood little of what had happened.
A weapon-head appeared in Sitihi's hand, free from the shovel, which then filled with energy and shot into the river. A small energy platform connected the banks.
Soon the "sisters" crossed to the other bank and began walking along the steep slope through the forest...
"Uh..." Halankuo stuck out her tongue. "I'm done."
The slope ended as suddenly as it had begun. The forest gave way to stone houses, familiar to any resident of Yenekit.
Halankuo sighed with relief and fell to her knees to rest.
"We're almost there, sis," Sitihi said. "Just a little while longer, and you'll be able to hide in your home."
But Halankuo wasn't happy. Even though the doll hadn't attacked them in the forest, the very appearance of this creature in the vicinity of Yenekit was terrifying.
"Itinit should be home by now. I need to get there or at least write to him… No, it's only two quarters away. I can walk there."
Unfortunately, even two quarters proved an insurmountable obstacle for a living, tired creature with a low metabolism. Halankuo could only stand and walk a few steps on the cobblestones, but then fell to her knees against the wall of the nearest building.
"Do you know where the cave-like cafe is?" Halankuo asked.
"Yes," Sitihi turned her head to her "big sister." "Dolls can go there."
"Can you go there and tell the man with brown hair what happened?"
"No. The hand with eyes and its owner could be there. Sis, you can't be left alone."
"But I can't walk."
"I'll pull you."
The weapon-head's mouth opened, and a rubber tongue tumbled out.
"No, that thing will attract attention," Halankuo bowed her head. "It's better not to do that."
"But if I don't do this, I'll have to wait until you can walk again. The dolls might attack us in the meantime. They're very strong. One of them is definitely strong. She can control her hand even from a distance, and her eye transmits information about what she sees."
"That means the doll without an arm is in a different place. Or rather, when we saw the hand with the eye, the doll should have been in a different place. That means..."
"She's here, sis."
Halankuo looked at Sitihi and noticed that she was looking at a small stone tower on the edge of the city. There, on top of it, stood a doll wearing a mask that completely covered her face. Her costume, however, was more revealing: a skirt of large oval leaves reached mid-thigh, and from it, a green liana extended up to her navel, then continued to her shoulders, where it joined her pink hair.
"She has two arms," Sitihi noted. "The arm is already attached to her, or that she has three arms."
"A three-armed doll is too much. But this one probably only has two. A third arm wouldn't fit unless it came out of its mouth."
"She doesn't have a mouth. There's a mask there."
"The mask can be removed."
"What do you mean?"
"I forgot Sitihi was a doll and I'm talking to her like she was a person," Halankuo thought.
"I want to know if her mask can be removed," Sitihi pointed her head-weapon at her opponent.
"Don't..."
Despite the two beings' conversation, the doll atop the tower seemed oblivious to them. Her head was turned forward with the mask towards the center of the city, where a monument with the head of a three-horned dinosaur stood.
Only two beams of blue energy emitted from the weapon-head's eyes caused the doll to move. Sitihi noticed this, grabbed her "big sister" by the arm, and dragged her behind the wall of the building.
"Why did you do this?" Halankuo asked.
"She has eyes in her hands," Sitihi stopped and turned fully to face her "sister." "They show her what eyes in their heads show ordinary beings."
"Exactly, I hadn't thought of that. Air control works well with the eyes on your hands. You can control two targets at once. But living beings can't do that."
"Sis, I think her brain is split. One part controls one hand, and the other controls the other hand."
"All humans have split brains."
"No. It's like she has two brains. Every doll's brain is wired differently, so that could be hers."
"I don't know what's wrong with her, but she's really scary. We need to run to Itinit. He'll know what to do with the dolls."
Halankuo and Sitihi took a few steps deeper into the quarter, but before they could get past the building, a pink-haired doll emerged from the ground right in front of them.
Sitihi swung her shovel to knock off her head, but the enemy's eye on her hand saved her. The blade was stopped half a step from the mask.
Halankuo glanced at the eye, noticed that same purple pupil, and tried to stop it with a wrench, but then she saw the other hand, clenched into a fist...
... An electric charge erupted from Halankuo's hand, which was immediately reflected upward by the purple pupil on the other palm.
"How did she manage to do it?"
Luckily, Sitihi fired two energy beams from the weapon-head's eyes. The enemy was forced to hide underground.
"Sis, she's doing something..." Sitihi began to say, but Halankuo covered her mouth with a wrench.
"I'll explain later."
Now Halankuo dragged her "little sister" deeper into the city. This time, they managed to get through a quarter and found themselves on a narrow street lined with gray two-story houses and avenues of coniferous trees.
Neither the doll nor its hand appeared again. The "sisters" reached the cave cafe, after which Halankuo entered the password into the door lock...
"Sis, are you sure you're on the wrong door?" Sitihi asked.
Halankuo looked at the ceiling and confirmed that artificial stone icicles were hanging there.
"Yeah, that's the cafe."
"But, sis, there..." Sitihi pointed her shovel into the depths of the room.
Halankuo turned to the side and saw a girl with dog ears curled up on one of the tables. She fit entirely on the decorative item, holding the tip of her brown furry tail in her hand.
"I don't even know who that is," Halankuo said, twirling a strand of hair around her finger.
"Maybe this is another cafe?" Sitihi tilted her head to the side.
"No, that's not what I'm talking about. I don't know who it is, Kimchan or Noru. They're too similar. How does Itinit distinguish them?"
Halankuo's gaze shifted from the dog girl's thick thighs to the floor, where a white box with a picture of a brown-yellow cake lay.
"It's a sawdust cake. That is, it used to be. This girl ate it and then fell asleep."
"But your friend isn't here," Sitihi's head twisted around her neck.
"But there's his character."
"But it's only her. I thought..."
Sitihi didn't have time to finish her sentence. A bright flash of red light flashed between the "sisters" and decapitated the "younger" one.
Halankuo didn't immediately realize what had happened, as she was looking out the window. When she saw her "little sister" without a head, she almost fell to the floor.
"My head is here," a voice said nearby.
Halankuo looked at the floor and soon discovered a blue-haired doll's head against the wall.
"Ahh... it happens," Halankuo said, feeling relieved. "Let me put it back."
Halankuo approached her "little sister's" head and crouched to pick it up, but then she saw something brown out of the corner of her eye.
"It's not a bear."
Halankuo whirled around and saw the dog girl above her, bent over and sniffing the air with her eyes closed. Her long brown hair was smoking, and her breast, covered in a fur top of the same color, covered most of her face.
"Noru, I told you, sniff first, then do it," a voice rang out from the back of the room.
The dog girl opened first one eye, then the other, then bared her teeth and growled like a real bear.