I spot Mercutioodon’s beloved on the bound on the ground around the bend in the tunnel and know immediately that there is extreme danger to be found right there. I do not have time to consider the best next steps when July lifts her little handgun and steps around it.

What choice do I have but to follow?

She is better armed but I am faster. I sprint from behind her and ricochet off the banked tunnel wall to take whoever is holding the familiar human hostage by surprise.

It is a human, and one that I feel like I’ve seen before too. The man has one of the little submachine guns on his shoulder.

The gun was pointed at July before I made my appearance. Two bullets impact the tunnel wall and draw sparks as they bounce around the corner. The gunshots destroy my hearing. The only thing I can hear is ringing.

I hit the human in the neck with one claw while the other forces the little gun off target.

A three-round burst of fire misses me again and the flash of light from the muzzle of the gun nearly blinds me as well as maintains my deafness.

The human is strong, probably stronger than I am in truth. But it is very hard to put your strength to use when someone is crushing your windpipe. I know that Mercutioodon’s person would not be bound if he were dead, so I do not know whether I should be trying to kill or disable this one. But I do know that those gunshots could very well have killed July if I hadn’t distracted him at the critical moment.

Two more gunshots ring out in the tunnel, though I can barely hear them from the echoes of the previous burst still ringing painfully in my ears. The controlled shots are from a semi-automatic, not the little machine gun. I put all my weight on the man’s arms and drive him into the far wall.

The tunnel is only wide enough to fit one vehicle very carefully. I imagine that turns like this one were intentionally created to make the tunnel more defensible in a firefight. Any single shot would not be able to traverse the entire length of the tunnel and choke points such as this give the defenders a chance to corral their enemies into an easy firing point. But that presumes that the enemy cannot outrun your guns.

And while I cannot outrun a bullet, I do have faster reaction times than a human. I do not know where the last two shots impacted, but I cannot focus on that now.

I clench my claws around the wrist of the man’s trigger hand. If I had only human fingers this would have been a painful grip, but as I have sharp claws instead they break the skin and I feel slippery tendons fray as I pinch them against the solid bones. The sharp tips of my claws on his neck splay away from the skin to avoid excess damage there.

Unfortunately, I do not have control of both of this man’s hands.

The hand that had been supporting the little gun drops it and he pulls it out from under me as I struggle to split my focus between controlling the little gun and preventing him from breathing. The free hand hauls back and punches me square in the face.

My vision blurs and I feel a crunch of bones breaking under the assault. We are not durable creatures.

It doesn’t leave me with an out. I clench the claws that hold his delicate neck. Blood spills over my fingers and it is every bit as red as my own. It scares me how much there is.

There is blood everywhere. His arm pulls back, but knowing that it is coming, I am able to dodge the second, much weaker punch. If that were me losing that much blood, I’d absolutely be basically dead and only waiting for the technicality of it to occur to me to stop moving.

I kick away the gun he’s finally dropped and keep control of his throat as he fades from consciousness. I had no idea that there was so much blood in a human body. I had no idea.

I do not know what to do next. He weakly grabs at my claws, but his fingernails scrape uselessly against my feathered wrists, pulling feathers free and accomplishing little else.

I hiss. It’s an unbecoming sound, but I am at a loss for anything with more wit to it. My ears are still ringing.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

Somewhere the hiss turns to keening and the anger at having threatened my July turns to pain and then to sorrow, guilt, and shame, and also yes pain.

The ringing in my ears is much less loud when I feel human hands grip my shoulder. July does not have to use force to pull me from my prey. I comply easily with her lightest touch.

I still cannot hear what she is saying, but it does not matter. Right now her presence is what I need because it tells me that she is unharmed.

I let go of the corpse and force myself away from him and into her arms. July cradles my head so carefully, but my every movement feels like glass in my face. Hot blood dribbles down my jaw and stains her soft palms. Fat tears leak from her eyes, running down her face and falling to dampen my neck. If I could cry I would do the same. If her voice could reach those heights she would likely be keening in the same notes as me.

It hurts so much that I forget momentarily about anything but the pain.

“-going to come for him soon. We can’t stay here.” July’s voice slowly cuts through the pain and the high pitched drone of the ringing sound in my ears. “There’s a car, we can take it.”

With my remaining good eye, I scan the tunnel and indeed there is a small car not far up the tunnel. A second corpse lies across the tunnel floor between here and there. Blood pools beneath it in a spreading stain that glistens wetly in the single lantern’s glow. Looking around is all I have the energy to do right away. I cannot move quickly with the damage to my face. My head swims every time I attempt to move at all.

We have survived this encounter, but at what cost?

“Oh good the keys.” July pulls a small object from the dead man’s pocket and helps support me as I stumble to my feet. With her assistance, I fumble my way to the vehicle. She helps me in and drapes me across the back seats. I wish she would never leave my side, but when she returns to the car it’s dragging the captive human. She struggles with his weight, but manages to get him into the front seat.

It worries me greatly that he still has not woken up. There must be something very wrong.

I lose track of time again.

That might be because I lost consciousness.

When I awaken again, my face feels only a dull reminder of the pain that sharpened its claws on me. I cannot open the eye and give up on trying to do so. My claws crunch as I flex them. They are unclean and crusted over with drying blood.

The vehicle is silent. I wonder if there is even anyone still here with me. It is not moving. I hear voices outside the car.

It takes a few minutes for me to be able to parse the human language. I have been learning English for a few years now, but it is complicated and I still struggle with the translation when I’m tired.

“He’s dead,” a human man’s voice says quietly. I don’t think it’s referencing me. “Your Troo killed your cousin.”

“I know.”

“You can’t bring him back here.”

“I know.”

“Nobody else saw. If you stay here with the car and say that his own people rescued him they’ll believe you.”

“I know.” Something in the flat tone of her voice frightens me.

“July, you have to act. You can’t just stay paralyzed here. You have to make a decision.”

“I know, Dirk.” I hear the rustle of her clothing. “I know.”

I fumble with the latch and open the car’s door. If my fate is being decided, I would like very much to be a party to the decision being made.

“Oh honey no, please lie back down.” July jumps away from the stump she had been sitting on and rushes to my side. My eye must look as bad as it feels. She puts her arm across my shoulders and tries to guide me back into the vehicle.

“I can’t just sit here while you decide what to do.” I put one crusty claw on her arm and then recoil from the sight of it. “Let me help.”

“You need a doctor.” Dirk - Mercutioodon’s human - leans against the side of the car almost casually. “I can get you home or to where ever you think you’ll get treated faster.”

I rummage through my memories to try and figure out what would be the best course of action. I remember the mangled bodies pulled from the burning fortress. I remember the medic team flying in on the copter. And I remember where they must have come directly from for my mother to have been so formally dressed on arrival.

“Trooaris. I need to get to Trooaris.”

“Why him?” July looks confused. “Why not your family estate? Isn’t it closer?”

“Rumor says he is trying to end this. If I go to him with a Troose, he won’t finish me off for being a traitor.” Dirk stands up when he hears me name myself a villain. “And I will be. I have no proof to show that I don’t know where I was nearly killed.”

I take July’s clean hands in my filthy claws.

“Go home, my dear. Lie just a little longer for me. I’ll send you information that will give you another clear victory. Together we can help Trooaris be positioned better to sue for peace.”

July nods sincerely. She helps me into the car, carefully buckling the seatbelt around me as best as she can. She kisses me gently on the uninjured side of my face, but even that indirect contact causes sparks of violent pain to explode across my vision. She watches as the car rolls away from her, leaving her barefoot in the woods.

“Dirk, I’m going to need my kit.”