Tiddles bounded towards the township. He knew the general direction of the Geblex and cut a path that led him to where he believed the groups would be. The size of the groups had surprised him; he had never seen so many creatures behave in such a manner. They were like a swarm heading towards the town from all sides. He bounded at an insane speed and soon reached the road where they had been previously. There was no sign of the creatures now apart from the dark pools of foul-smelling blood where the ones which had been shot had fallen. The area stank of mouldy dampness and the foul stench assailed his nostrils. At times like this, he wished his senses were not so strong.
He paused briefly before crossing the road and disappearing into the dilapidated inner district. The buildings directly surrounding the township were all derelict and not lived in. Over the years of the township being situated, an area surrounding the outer stockade had been cleared of most debris, leaving a clear sight from the watch towers that dotted the exterior. The stockade was no obstacle for Tiddles; it only rose between twenty and twenty-five feet high, and he could quickly scale it.
His problem was that he had never been in the town and had yet to learn where TJ or Lars would be. Who were the two people he knew he could trust to get a message to that would be taken seriously and not cause absolute panic? He had not seen where the Geblex had moved from the road, only knowing it was further north. The main entrance to the town was from its western side, and he knew there were better places to approach than the funnelled entrance. So, he turned further south, paralleling the outer wall.
As he traversed the wall, he noticed that many guard towers were unmanned. That was not a good sign, as with lookouts, they would see the creatures approaching. He sped up, bounding further south before cutting towards the stockade. He had to cross the open ground to reach it, and as he did, he spotted the forms of figures further ahead moving across it also.
'Shit, I am too late', he thought. He turned immediately towards the stockade and launched himself up the wall. His claws extended, digging deep into the wooden barrier, easily penetrating the surface as he hauled himself up. He reached the top in moments and peered over. There was an inner fence in front of him, and on the other side, open ground again, and he spotted a group of Keefir. He had no idea there was anything like this inside and hoped there would be no guards in the area. He triggered his stealth skill and jumped down.
Moving over to the inner fence, he looked up. It was only about twelve feet tall and no obstacle for him as he leapt vertically up and over it, landing on the other side. If he could get into the town so easily, he knew Spylore or other Wild Ones could have also easily entered. Over the field, he could see the lights of the township itself and hear noise carrying through the night. It looked busy, and apart from this location, everywhere seemed to have torches or lanterns lining the streets. He knew this was going to be the tricky part.
His stealth skill was brilliant; if he was stationary, he was virtually invisible, but he knew that it did not work as well when he moved. He was glad that it was night-time and that there was intermittent cloud cover. He began to move towards the lights, skirting the field so as not to spook the Keefir lying in one corner. The last thing he needed was a Keefir herd running rampant. 'Then again’, he suddenly thought. He changed direction, approaching the Keefir. The herd was large at around thirty of the Wild Ones, and he could also see young calves mixed amongst the herd.
As he slowly approached, he deactivated his stealth ability. His fear aura from his elemental core was always active, and as he got within a hundred feet or so, one of the herd reacted, sensing something. He doubted they could see him. Even without his stealth skill, he was as black as the night itself in colour and would not be easy to see. The Keefir slowly began to stir, and he circled them, getting them between himself and the town, and then he bounded at them. The cries of panic and terror that left the Keefirs were like a cacophony of trumpets as they stood and began bolting across the paddock, heading directly towards the lit streets of the town. He just hoped this would work.
Once they were moving, he stopped and let them run. They reached the far side of the field, crashing into the wooden fencing that made the paddock, until one of them broke through. The remainder of the herd followed when the fence gave way, squeezing through the gap it created. Tiddles cut left and headed for the hangar that he could see reactivating his skill. He hoped the disturbance would draw people to investigate. He moved down the side of the hangar and followed its edge until he was close to the start of the streets. He had yet to learn where TJ or Lars would be, and he was struggling to pick up their scent amongst so many Risen packed into one area and the strange smells of all the products the town sold.
He heard shouting alongside the Keefir herd that had thundered towards the town and knew that people were reacting. The streets themselves were a ramshackle hodgepodge of buildings of various sizes. Some were wooden, others were brick or stone, but nothing followed any form of unity. A few of the buildings looked like they may have been the original ones from the site, but everywhere else was just a mixed array, and the streets were narrow and cramped. The town was smaller than he had expected inside for its housed population.
He moved towards the corner of a stone building at the start of the nearest street. There were no lights on inside, and he peered carefully around the corner, looking down the road itself. There was no way he could get down the street without being seen. The number of people still out even in the middle of the night. He looked up at the roof and decided it was his best option, effortlessly leaping onto the single-storey building. The roof was made from timber, and he was worried initially that he might fall through, but thankfully, it took his weight, although creaking loudly in protest. The next building was two-storey, and he moved to the edge before launching upwards onto its roof. This building was tiled, and his claws skidded on its angled side as he tried to maintain his grip, having to embed his claws into the surface, cracking several tiles.
The shouts from off to the right and Keefir's cries hopefully covered any noise he made. He slowly continued to work from rooftop to rooftop, being as careful as he could, looking down and surveying beneath him for any signs of TJ or Lars. Only when he had crossed the fourth street, he came upon an open square. Across the square, he could see guard trucks parked up, and he knew it had to be a barracks or something similar. The building was sitting alone in the middle of the square with no other buildings near to it, and there was no way he could cross the gap, even with a running jump to reach it. He inwardly cursed, knowing his only option was to drop back to the ground.
The building itself was well-lit, with light flooding from the front of it onto the street. The doors were open, and guards were coming out to deal with the chaos he had just caused at the paddock. The closest distance to the building was a nearly sixty-foot gap, meaning he would end up at the side of it. The issue was that the building closest to that side was also well-lit, and he would drop into a lit area. 'If only all Risen spoke beast', he thought, huffing as he planned to cross the open space.
Using the rooftops, he moved around to the dark side and was about to drop down when he heard a voice he recognised. "And I want them back in the paddock, which will be repaired in the next hour." It was TJ. Tiddles's heart leapt in excitement, and he turned to see him at the front of the building where he had just moved from. 'Fuck it,' he thought as he jumped down. His stealth skill was still active, and he ran to the front to where TJ was.
The blast caught him before he even heard it, the pellets peppering his left side and rear leg. He howled in pain from the blast and crumpled to the floor thirty feet from his goal of reaching the corner. The guard who had hit him with the shotgun blast had walked out of a side entrance he had not noticed and, on seeing the beast, immediately opened fire. He was quickly reloading his weapon, breaking the breach, removing the spent cartridges, and sliding two more cartridges into the barrel. Tiddles needed to reach TJ. He forced himself to stand, the shot burning into his side, and he staggered forward, grimacing in pain with every step. His display had triggered on being hit by the blast, and he knew his side and leg were seriously damaged. The guard had been so close to him when he had fired.
The man cracked the barrel closed and pulled it back up, not hesitating to open fire again. More shots peppered his rear, and he again howled in agony as it tore into his rear, having turned away, moving towards the front. His left leg gave out, and it went limp. He knew that it was damaged beyond use. His health bar had plummeted, initially dropping to 60% and decreasing to 30%. He knew he would not survive another blast from the pellets even if he survived now, but he needed to reach TJ. He dragged himself forward by his forelegs, his rear right leg struggling to work from the buckshot it now contained.
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At that moment, TJ appeared at the corner and saw him. Tiddles smiled as recognition spread across TJ's face.
"STOP!" he screamed at the guard, who was reloading again and running towards Tiddles. "What the hell are you doing here?" he asked, looking worried, seeing Tiddles's state. His left side and back legs were riddled with buckshot and bleeding steadily.
Tiddles threw out his foreleg and flopped to the ground, showing TJ the rope around his leg and the attached note. TJ grabbed the message and pulled it free, quickly reading it as more guards appeared and pointed their weapons at the colossal beast lying on the ground. "ASHTON!" TJ yelled.
The other supervisor came out of the barracks along with the remainder of the guard who had been inside to find out what the fuck had just happened outside the barracks.
"We have a major problem. We have Geblex groups approaching the town from multiple directions," TJ shouted. "We need every guard member now out towards the perimeter."
"How do you know?" Ashton asked, walking forward.
TJ thrust the note at him. "Get Reece now, and I want anyone who can hold a weapon active. I don't care who the hell they are."
Ashton read the note he had been handed, and his face paled. "You heard TJ move it, you sacks of shit."
"And someone finds me, Lars, now," TJ shouted.
"He is at the front gate. I will go." a guard answered.
"You fucking idiot," TJ said to Tiddles, kneeling by his head.
"I agree," Tiddles said, although he knew TJ could not understand him. The pain radiating across his side and rear was intense, and his health bar was slowly ticking down. It was currently at 28%.
"I am going to start pulling the shot out, and it will hurt like hell," TJ said.
Tiddles just looked at him, gritting his teeth in pain.
TJ removed a small knife from his belt and went to Tiddles's side, placing his hand against his warm body. "Ready?" he asked as he poked the knife's blade into where the first of many pellet holes was. Tiddles's howl would have woken the dead.
The pain was unbearable as TJ dug into his flesh with the small, sharp blade, slowly prying the metal lumps from inside his body. He had only got to the fifth one when Tiddles passed out.
It took Lars nearly twenty minutes to get across the town through the erupting chaos. TJ was still busy working at Tiddles, trails of fresh blood oozing from his multiple shot wounds as he managed to remove the shot from them. TJ knew that shot would go septic quickly if left inside an injury and had witnessed the insanity it caused when he was a raider. A raider who had been injured attacking a township had been affected by the poisoning, literally going mad. He needed Kyto but knew there was no way of getting in or out of the town now.
Lars ran over to TJ to see him by Tiddles. He signed, asking what he could do. TJ had a worried look and knew that Tiddles was in a bad way. "The girls have some of the imbued stuff at the stall. In the locked cabinet bottom shelf, get what you can," he said.
Lars turned, hurrying off towards the stall. The streets were full of people screaming and shouting, and a general pandemonium was occurring with the news that the Geblex were attacking. Even though the township was being attacked, tempers had flared inside, and fighting and scuffles had broken out due to the panic. If it was not bad enough that an enemy force attacked them, the internal strife was causing an even larger problem. Lars arrived at the stall, not considering any damage, and smashed the lock open, removing the small tray of tonic from the bottom, hurrying back to TJ and Tiddles.
The guard could not cope with the incursion alone, and they had called upon any able-bodied who could carry a weapon to help defend the town. The Geblex had begun attacking various locations, now scaling the stockade walls. They had even broken down the chain-link inner fence at the southern edge of town. The fighting had become intense, and the flow of Geblex did not seem to be receding quickly. The reports were returning to the barracks, and Reece had arrived to oversee the coordination and positioning of the guard. He had also called for a doctor to look at the beast.
The northern edge successfully pushed the Geblex back with minimal losses, but the southern side failed. Reece had now headed over there himself to take charge. The western side, the longest side of the town, had several spots where fighting had started, and there were severe losses on the Geblex and several from the defenders. The creatures fought with an aggression rarely seen, and many of the town's combatants were not natural brawlers, meaning their fighting prowess differed from the guard or Geblex. Determination, anger and survival are the only things allowing them to stand their ground against the monsters.
Lars returned to TJ with the tonic, and TJ was still working on removing the shot. A doctor had arrived and, although protesting initially at working on a beast, had begun supporting TJ in cleansing the wounds. He had only been able to help for moments before the order had been received that they required the doctor in the south to support the injured there. He had apologised as he left.
"Lars, see if you can get him to swallow the tonic," TJ said.
Lars went to Tiddles's head and opened his eyelid. Tiddles was out cold; there was no way he would wake up to swallow tonic. He opened his massive jaws, which was even an effort for a man as strong as Lars and poured the first bottle into his mouth, reaching back as far as he could. Tiddles's unconscious form had reflexively coughed, bringing most of it back out of his mouth. Lars then decided upon an extreme solution: running inside the barracks. He returned with a small tube length and moved around to where TJ was picking at the shot, indicating for TJ to move aside.
"What?" TJ said, frowning at him.
Lars crouched down and lifted Tiddles's tail before he pushed the tube straight into his arse. TJ visibly winced, "What the fuck." Lars then uncorked the tonic bottles and began to pour them down the tube. The liquid was slowly absorbed into the beast's rectum, and as it was, he topped the tube up with more. TJ just looked at him in amazement and continued removing the shot. As TJ pulled what he hoped was the last of the shot, Lars was finishing tipping the ninth and final bottle of tonic down the tube.
The wounds on his side had begun to reduce their blood flow, and TJ ran into the barrack block, returning moments later with several sheets and began to apply them to his wounds that continued bleeding. Tiddles felt as though he was burning up. They knew he was usually warm due to his core, but this temperature was nothing they had felt before, and he hoped it was his core fighting for him and nothing worse.
"I need to go help out at the fighting," TJ said, standing after tying the last sheet around Tiddles's bulky form. Tiddles now looked like a patchwork quilt, with fresh splotches of red where the blood was soaked up.
Lars nodded at him and indicated he would stay with Tiddles, sitting next to him, stroking his head and hoping that he would survive.