Moving quickly, I raced up to the corner and listened closely as the paw sounds came closer and closer. Based on the breathing and the size of the dogs I had seen I estimated their height and the number of dogs. There were three dogs, about my size.

“I keep telling you, we should clear more land,” dog one said.

“You know we can’t-“ my left paw shot out, claws extended. The dogs throat was cut in a spray of blood, which I ducked under. My right paw came up and took out a second dog’s throat. I kept moving past one to the third.

“Wha-“ He tried to shout but my claws struck either side of his neck. Unlike the Apostates my claws faced no resistance with these creatures. The dog stumbled backwards for a moment. I quickly moved around his body as he collapsed to the ground, dying near instantly.

I didn’t have time to wipe the blood off my claws and fur. I was on a time limit now. I noted all three dogs had hand guns. I quickly took all three and checked them over. They were well taken care of, which meant they knew what they were doing with these weapons.

Shaking my head, I quickly pulled off my hoodie, which I liked wearing. Under it was my sport’s bra and combat harness. I tossed the hoodie to the side and put the three guns into my waistband. No alarm had gone up yet. Time to take out as many as I could and avoid getting pinned down.

I went back to the windows and began checking them. Closed. Closed. Finally, this one was open. I leveraged it upwards. Checking the other side, it was behind some crates. It would be a tight fit, but I could do it. I went through the window and twisted my body, fitting through. I then leveraged myself up from the wall to the top of a stack of two crates.

The building’s footprint was fairly large. It was clearly a warehouse of some kind. The smell of dog was everywhere, but I listened closely and heard footsteps between one of several metal shelving racks with various odds and ends. I rolled over the top of the crates and dropped down into the aisle silently.

The warehouse was laid out in a square with stuff around three of the edges and several aisles and shelving racks running from the front to the back of the building.

Racing forward, I saw a dog about to round the end of an aisle, away from me. I tucked into the aisle before his, hoping the dogs at the far end of the warehouse didn’t look down the aisle. The dog coming up to the other aisle’s end turned the corner into the rear aisle.

I spun back around to the rear aisle and came up behind the dog as he was moving away from me at the end of a shelving rack so the front of the warehouse wouldn’t be able to see him. My claws struck out, ripping out his neck. The dog collapsed to the ground, instantly dead. No gun on her. A female dog. I pushed back any qualms I had.

This was my job. I had to do this. These were enemies of the Covenant Church, and there was no way I could stand against it. Focusing, I looked around the corner towards the front. Several dogs were still handling the barrels of fertilizer.

I moved across the back aisle and reached the side of the warehouse. This place looked more dusty and the smelled older. I quickly went up the aisle towards the front of the warehouse. Since this side aisle was so far to the side, it was out of sight of the dogs working on the barrels. It was also away from the side of the warehouse with the side door and the three dogs I had killed initially.

“Guys! Someone killed Growl and his crew!” I heard a young voice call out. There was shouting after that and dogs drawing their guns. I looked around the corner, several had run off, leaving four behind. Only two had guns and were looking out of the truck entrance towards where the other dogs had run off towards.

I quickly raced forward. Hesitation was death. The first dog I killed, slicing out his throat. He began choking to death on his own blood as I raced forward. I took out a second dog. Both of these one’s hadn’t been the ones with guns. That was when one of the dogs with guns turned to look over his shoulder.

There was too much distance to cover. I was already pulling a handgun free from my waist, breathing out and aiming with both paws. The dog tried to bring his gun up and around, but he was too slow.

BANG!

BANG!

The louds sounds echoed out in the warehouse, bouncing off the metal roof. I took out both dogs at the entrance. I quickly raced to the other side of the warehouse I had come from. The side door was locked from the outside and I could hear dogs rushing towards the truck entrance.

I reached the side door and listened for a moment. I put the handgun into my left paw. My aim was going to be terrible. But I could hear four dogs on the other side. I pushed open the door since it had a bar latch and turned to my left, using the opened door as cover. I could see several dogs looking at the corpses.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

I raced forward, unloading the rest of the clip. There were too many enemies and my cover had been blown. The gun jerked in my hand each time it fired. The dogs scrambled around the side of the warehouse to the back for cover. The gun clicked empty and I leapt off the ground as hard as I could. Never attack from the front.

My claws dug into the side of the building, and I used my momentum to pull myself onto the roof. Even with the noise I had made there was a lot of panicked shouting. I carefully checked over the edge and there were four dogs with guns looking at the corner of the building wearily. All hand guns, nothing heavier thankfully.

I dropped down behind the group silently. Racing forward, I killed another four dogs to add to the three initial ones I had killed out here. I quickly picked up two handguns, which brought my total to four. Anymore and it would impact my movement too much. There was shouting coming from inside the warehouse.

The side door had closed by itself, but that didn’t matter. I went back in through the window once again. Looking out from the top of the crates, two dogs were crying over the dead female dog at the back of the warehouse. I had taken out twelve so far. There were a lot of dogs left to go.

I was content to wait. Running around as much as I had would distort where my smell was and make it hard to track me. The initial surprise would have faded by now. And I couldn’t get off these crates without being spotted.

“Find whoever did this! Secure the bitches and pups!” I heard an angry voice shout. Armed dogs rushed forward and took the two crying female dogs away. I calmly waited even as they passed right under me in the aisle and outside this storage building.

I heard stomping around on the roof, and I noticed a small pack of four dogs checking the top of shelves and crates. I made my way to the back of the crates, using my tail to sweep the dust behind me, to not make it clear I had been up here. I then rolled sideways, between the crates and the wall, bracing myself above the window, but below the top of the crates.

The trick with hiding like this was to ensure your spot wasn’t found and to have an escape route. This was a very hard to find spot, and I could always go back out the window if needed. I heard movement near the crates as dogs checked above them and around them, but there was no way to easily check behind them. They moved on.

After another ten minutes, I went back on top of the crates to wait some more. To allow them to let their guard down after they exhausted themselves looking for me and then attack a second time. With how I had killed the dogs, the order of events would be unclear and my looping around would have made tracking me by smell very difficult.

After half an hour a pair of dogs came and took the corpse away. Then another couple of dogs came and began to clean the blood afterwards. I could sense the tension had drained out of most of them. They probably thought I had run. Even if they had found me, I was ready to act at any time.

I quietly rolled off the top of the crates and landed silently on the concrete floor while both cleaners were facing the other way. I rushed over and killed both of them. Their bodies dropped to the ground. I checked around the sides of the metal shelving and the large truck door had been closed.

Making my way down one aisle, I listened carefully. There were a pair of dogs sitting at a table playing with a card came. Their guns were on the table. “We should be out there,” dog one said.

“We do our jobs and keep this building secure. Otherwise, it will be our tails on the chopping block. Just deal,” dog two said. They were too far away from any cover to get one of them without the other one spotting me.

“Half the pack is too old to aim properly,” dog one said as he dealt cards between the two of them.

“And the sense to know that whatever killed our comrades isn’t normal. Some people think it is a wolf, gone feral,” dog two said.

“Those are just child stories, bah!” dog one said loudly. I looked at the shelf next to me and there was a bin filled with small parts that were a bit oily. Carefully picking one up with the tips of my claws, I chucked it away from me into the air. It the ground with a clack and both dogs looked in that direction. I was already racing across the floor towards them.

“What was that?” dog two asked.

“Let’s check it-“ I cut his neck open. The other dog turned to see what had happened, but I was already on him and I cut his neck open with my claws as well. Both of them slumped down on the table, messing up their card game with their blood.

That had been intense, almost too intense. That was sixteen so far. I was about a fifth of the way through the dogs. I went to the front door next to the large truck door. It had a window built into it that I looked out of. There were several dogs moving in groups of three, all with guns.

Time to lay a trap. I dragged both dog corpses partially down one of the aisles offset to the side of the front door. There was a blood trail left behind. I picked up one of their guns, still had the four on me, and began to pull the trigger and tried to make my voice sound deeper.

“Help monster! Help!” Once I was done firing, I dropped the handgun and raced away from the blood trail and to the top of one of the shelves. I pulled out my handguns and set them next to me on top of the shelving rack as I heard a large number of dogs racing towards the building.

Three dogs burst through the door guns pointing everywhere. I gave them a moment to spot the blood trail. I unloaded six shots into them and took them out. The distance was a bit high and I wanted to make sure they weren’t getting back up. One of the dogs got a shoulder it and started shouting and shooting. When he was hit again, he stopped.

Four dogs ran in after them and I unloaded four more shots before quickly switching out handguns and unloading with a second one. One dog went down, two raced back outside, and another was wounded but ran into the warehouse. I could hear shouting outside.

I picked up the last two handguns and dropped down off the shelving rack. I then made my way to the side door. I didn’t open it, since I could sense a lot of danger outside. My fur stood on edge. Time to come up with another plan to keep the dogs second guessing themselves.