5.
Ainsley and Perris celebrated well into the night, surrounded by their closest friends on The Layer. They sang Hedgely folk songs at the tops of their lungs, danced like they might burn a hole in the floor, and gambled with the only currency any of them knew: little cuts of carrots and potatoes and celery. Perris even indulged in a bit of pipe tobacco, a habit that he'd somehow managed to avoid most of his 58 years on Layer 30, apart from the occasional puff on poker nights with the lads.
One of the Hedgefolks' favorite games was Ring Around The Ainsley. The game was simple: players took turns throwing wooden rings at Ainsley Moose's antlers, trying to get as many to loop on as possible. If you missed a shot, you drank. If you lost the game, you drank. The winners of the game? They drank, too. It was a win-win-win type of game, and Ainsley was happy to give them the opportunity.
Mr. Pots was particularly skilled at the game, and to nobody's surprise, he won rather fiercely that night. Perris decided to keep the man's high going with an offer he couldn't refuse.
"I'd like you to take over Perris Farms, Mr. Pots," he said, sitting across from him at one of the old, stump-made tables. "The garden is just coming into bloom and the sheep are ripe for sheering. You can take anything you like from the house, the barn – anything. You can even gut the place, let all the animals go, burn it and move on with your life if you'd really like."
"Oh, you know I'd never do that, Mr. Perris," he said, his cheeks red from the drink. Perris took the keys from his pocket and slid them across the table. Mr. Pots took them in his little hand and squeezed them tight. "I thank you for entrusting me with such a task, Perris. The farm will be here when you get back as a permanent resident. Assuming you don't find a better Layer, that is."
"There could never be a Layer like this, Ched." Perris' eyes welled up with tears. Quickly, quietly, he pulled the tip of his hat down to wipe them away with the brim, never letting his smile break.
"Thank you, Mr. Pots. Not just for this, but for everything. I wish I could thank every single one of you for taking me in for so long, and for taking in Ainsley, too. I know we overstayed our welcome by a good long time, but—"
"That's only in the eyes of The Ministry, Mr. Perris. You could never overstay your welcome, and you'll always have a home here. You're a good lad with a good heart. Whatever you're meant to learn during your time on The Thread, whatever you're meant to take Offthread, I know you'll--"
A sound that Perris had never heard in his 58 years of visiting Greenhedge broke through the bar; the front door slammed against the back wall. All heads turned to see a Hedgeman standing in the entryway, covered in sweat, panting as if he'd run a mile.
"Bugs," he choked, hardly able to get the word out. "Bugs are—"
Before he could get out the last word, a green blade tore through his back and out his chest. The Hedgeman gurgled and sputtered blood. His eyes widened into a look of blank horror as the blade travelled back through the way it came. His limp body hit the floor like a sack of bricks, revealing a blood-soaked, 8-foot tall Mantis in the doorway, the likes of which Perris had never dreamed could exist on Layer 30, let alone at all.
"Bloody hell," the bartender yelled, dropping a glass. "Run! Everybody run!"
The bar erupted into chaos as every drunken Hedgeman and Hedgewoman in the place scattered for the back exit. Somehow, the town of Greenhedge had been invaded.