On day 17, I woke up tired. I could barely sleep during the night of the 16th day. Why? I was just too excited. I just couldn't wait for my 17th day of life to start. When I tried to sleep, my mind kept on thinking about the fun I had when I was leading my family and spending time with them. I couldn't forget the unity we had and the bonds we made with each other that day. Training was like the first actual family activity we had together other than the migration. I also couldn't forget the feeling of power and control I had when I directed them. It felt like for the first time I had control over my family's actions.
Huh? Did I go power hungry and abuse my power? I don't know. Probably? Maybe? No? You'll just have to find out as I continue to tell you my story...
So anyway, I spent the whole night poking my head out of my shell waiting for the light of the next day to appear. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, it was morning.
I excitedly poked my head out and began my morning routine.
'It has been a long time since I felt the morning sun.' I thought to myself as I observed our leaf and the surroundings. Once again, the sun was still blocked out by the gang of clouds that hovered over us. 'They must be trying to block my trial, my heavenly ascension.' I remember thinking to myself.
I looked hard at the clouds above me. With my excellent snail-hawk-mutant vision, I mean just normal snail vision, I studied them. Their fluffy bodies swirled slowly above me. As I watched, they seemed to slowly grow larger, taller, and darker.
'They are going to attack soon.' I thought in my head. "We have to train again today and do nothing other than that," I told myself as I ate and pooped myself as I slid towards my siblings to gather those in the defence team for another round of training.
Swiftly, I found all the snails of the defence team. I gave their shells a small tap to wake them and I gestured for them to follow me. Soon I had gathered the sixty or so snails of Teams: Black, White, Yellow, Red, Blue and Pink and we stationed ourselves at a secluded edge of the leaf-like the day before.
Don't worry, I made sure they ate while we moved. I wasn't that dumb okay? I couldn't let them train on an empty stomach.
...
"Attention everyone. Please get into your teams. We will start training shortly." I shouted. Slowly the snails started to move into their groups.
They seemed a little more coordinated than the day before. Instead of sliding all over each other, they crawled around their obstacles and line up with their respective teams.
"Good. Now let's start with stretches like yesterday."
And so we stretched like the day before. This time, none of the snails questioned my directions. All the snails in my snail army began stretching their bodies out as long as possible. Some even used each other as weights to hold themselves down as they stretched. 'That's pretty smart.' I thought to myself as I let them stretch their bodies for a few minutes. After our stretch, we started our run.
Unlike the day before, I had them run within their teams parallel with each other. Although they were in different teams, I wanted them to move as a whole - an army of snails that will demolish everything in its path. Or at least that was what I had in mind...
"Stay together!"
"Pick up your paces!"
"Great Job!"
"We're almost there!"
I yelled occasionally to keep them in line. The snails were doing much better than the day before as they kept up their pace. They were getting faster and stronger. I was proud of this fact. 'As long as we get stronger, we can beat our enemies and even one day the clouds into the floor.' I thought to myself.
...
We took a short break after our laps and I gave another announcement after the break.
"Please remain in your teams... we are going to move on to a new training exercise. Can anyone guess what it is?" I asked.
"More running?" Someone... I mean some snail answered.
"No."
"Chasing each other?" Another asked.
"No," I replied once again. "Today we are going to fight to the death!" I chuckled.
It was a joke, but they responded differently. They thought I was being serious! Ha, they took their brother too seriously.
"How could we do that?" one shouted. "I don't want to kill my family." Another added. A bunch of new voices joined into the fray as unanimously shut down the idea of fighting each other to the death.
I raised my foot and waved to quiet them. "I was only joking of course. But I do want you all to fight. Well to spar. I want you to stick with your teams and fight other teams."
"What do you mean by a fight." One of my snail-blings asked. "Yeah!" another added.
"I mean as a team, you will try to beat your opponent teams snails into their shells. Just treat each other as the enemy and defend against each other. If a snail hides in their shells they will be considered "dead" in our battles. The team that defeats their opponent wins! Treat it as a game..." I said.
"What do you mean game? How can beating each other be a game?" Another snail asked.
"Well, play to win. Use tactics, use force, use whatever you want to win. And if you're too afraid then just hide in your shells and be out for all I care. Just don't come back to training tomorrow." I replied. I was met with many more questions, but I just ignored them.
"Okay let's have blue team face red team, the yellow team face pink team, and finally black team face white team," I said as I had their teams face against each other.
I was buzzing with anticipation. I wanted to know what types of plans they would make up while confronting another team. I wanted to see what tactics they would use to win. I couldn't wait to watch the battles that were going to unfold before my eyes.
I stood tall and raised my eyes. "You will all begin when I call out fight... READY! SET!..." I began. But, before I was able to yell out "fight" I felt something tap on my shell.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
You probably would have guessed it by now. I turned around and saw 7 just like the day before. But on the 17th day, he was accompanied by 11. Like the embodiment of my other responsibilities that I was trying to block out of my mind, he came up to me and gestured with his foot. He fiercely pointed out that I needed to get back to diplomatic matters with the Spike-shelled snails once more with his gestures. "Something is happening, we need to check up on them quickly." added 11 with a concerned face. "I'm busy training the snails... we can do that tomorrow..." I said. "But the situation's growing... the Spiked-shelled snails are in preparation for something." 11 complained.
"Can't you see that I'm busy? We can meet them tomorrow." I replied. They continued to complain but I ignored them. I was too invested in training my fellow snails that I didn't want to leave.
What? You don't believe that I would just brush off 7 and 11 just for the purpose of training? What was my true motive? Okay fine. I wanted to watch snail to snail combat okay? Snail to snail combat is way more interesting than diplomatic issues and I didn't want to deal with the Spike-shelled snails. Well, of course, I shouldn't have done that, but I didn't think that putting off something would be bad at that time okay? You say that I was an idiot? Yup, I was.
...
So instead of continuing with diplomacy issues, I was a "big stupid idiot" and I decided to watch my siblings fight each other.
"READY! SET! FIGHT!" I yelled out as I observed the three battles closely.
Boring. All the fights started off the same. All teams in all three mock-battles just stared at each other without moving. They didn't know what to do and all looked to me for advice. I sighed and yelled out "Think about a plan amongst yourselves I'm sure you guys can come up with something." I said.
"Oh don't take too long or you give the other team too much time and they may attack you while you're preparing," I added a few moments later.
As soon I said that the teams grouped together to discuss plans. I couldn't hear them, but I was surprised about what had unfolded in each battle.
...
The first scene of action began with the white ranger team vs. the black ranger team. As team white was discussing their plan, team black immediately broke their huddle and rushed team white. Seeing the sudden rush, team white turned their bodies and scrambled to organize themselves into a square-ish formation. But they couldn't, they were caught by surprise. In their panic and disorder, members of the black snail team moved in and cornered four of the white snail team snails that were caught out of place away from the rest of their team. In groups of 2-3, team black snails bombarded the white team members with hits from all sides. A few seconds later, those 4 white snail team members hid into their shells. Thus the first 4 of the snails were eliminated from the battle and it became a battle of 10 team black snails against 7 white snails. Team black pushed their advantage and beat team white. Yup. They were initially at a disadvantage of 10 snails to 11 snails, but they managed to win with their quick thinking and initiative.
'Initiative is important.' I thought to myself.
...
The blue versus red battle was also interesting. The blue team sent two snails up team red. Each of them waved and taunted the snails of team red. It looked like team blue had sent two sacrifices or two pieces of bait.
The snails from team red seemed to be cautious of the situation and didn't separate. As a group, they stayed in a formation and chased the two blue team snails that had separated from their team. After they saw the red team move, the two blue team snails turned and ran.
It was obvious that the red team wanted an advantage. If they chased and caught the two blue snails then the battle would have been 10 to 8 snails. A 20% snail advantage! Unfortunately, the red snails didn't realize that they had fallen into the trap even though they moved together.
Yes, the blue team had sent their two fastest snails as bait. As the red team chased the two blue snails, their formation began to crumble. Taking this chance, the other 8 blue team members flanked the red team and attack them from the side. With their formation further broken by the attack, the red team had been easily defeated thereafter.
'Distraction and flanking... that's a good tactic.' I thought to myself.
...
The battle that team yellow had with team pink was well... different. "Let's settle this snail to snail." one side yelled. Instead of attack as a group, they sent out individuals and had duels. 10 snails vs. 10 snails. Team pink won in the end.
'I guess honourably fighting was also a choice...' I concluded.
...
After all the battles were over, we discussed the tactics that were used together. I was proud of their thinking and different solutions they came up with. I reinforced that we can use these tactics in a real fight with our enemies. Well, we would actually fight to kill in future battles, but these spars were the beginning.
After eating and pooping, we slept in our shells that night.
Unknown to me 7 and 11 had left with Timmy for the Spike-shelled snail colony after I ignored their pleas that day. They didn't come back that night...
Summary of Day 17: I let the teams battle while 7 and 11 left to negotiate with the spike-shelled snails without me.
+ 1 strength
+ 1 speed
+ 1 stupidity
+ 1 leadership
[Quest: Defend the Colony] (updated)
Snails: 86
Adventurers: 6
Diplomacy: 1 (4 M.I.A.)
Army: 61
Defected: 5
[Quest: Diplomacy with the Spiked-shells] (updated)
[Spike-shelled Snail Colony] (updated)
Relationship rating: -10*
Status: ???