by C. R Corbin
"Amanda..." I whispered while glancing at her.
"Away from here." she stated and grabbed my hand. We walked into the middle of the forest and she stops with both of my hands in her's and looks up at me. I bite my lip while the moonlight flickered off of the leaves, the forest floor was pitch black and the only thing visible in the distance was the flicker of a flame.
"You didn't think I would love you the same if I knew what you had done?" she asked me softly while I leaned against the tree, my broad back pressing against the bark while I stared at her and nodded
"I didn't think you would have accepted me. I'm sorry. It must sound stupid but I thought that you guys would have trusted me even less." I admitted.
"We would have...I can see why you did what you did but....I don't know. There's something keeping me from you, how can I know that anything you've told me is truthful if you were lying about everything else?" she asked
"I don't know what to say but....I'm laying my heart bare for you here. I'll tell you whatever you want to know, anything you want i'll tell you just please....I want another chance." I admitted and she begins to cry, the tears run down her cheek and she sighed.
"I don't know what to say...but I want to forgive you and something is telling me that....you really aren't the heartless monster that those guys are anymore. Whenever we talk about what happened there's this regret in your eyes that runs deeper than any trench in the galaxy." she says to me and rests a hand on my cheek.
#
Amanda
I knew that I wanted to take him back, I knew that the love was still there on my part and I could sense that there was a great deal of truth still lurking in his eyes so I...I let him enter my heart once more. I rest a finger on his cheek and looked into those brilliant blue orbs while he watches me as well.
There is a sadness in his gaze, a regret that I can sense that will never fade.
I knew that he was here in my best interest, I knew since he had saved me from the laser rifle yesterday, since had taught me how to shoot and protect myself, since had picked me up from my depression. Why else would he do these things for me as well as for the others should he not be a changed man? Should he not care for us? I know that he wasn't lying anymore, at least not about anything that was important.
So..I believed him.
"I...I love you." I stated and leaned in, pressing my lips against his as the back of his boot slides against the tree bark.
I feel hands run across my back as his chest presses against me, his tight muscles tensed up and I dashed my lips over him as he stroked my cheek and sighed. His breath scratched my lips and I find my blue eyes locking with his while that golden skin continued to glimmer in front of my very eyes.
"Then you would have me again? As your mate? As your lover?" he asked and I nodded.
"I will...I'll take you back only if you promise that you'll never lie to me again. I don't care about what you have done, only what you will do." I stated while glancing him over and he nods.
"I swear that I will tell you the truth and only the truth from this moment on. No more facades, no more masks and running away from what I was. You taught me compassion, you taught me to have a heart and now....You have finally taught me how to accept myself." he said and I smiled with the tears still running down my cheeks and onto the ground.
"Like you taught me." I said and leaned in for another kiss.
We stay there for a while, my neck was bent upwards for him to kiss me and I giggled as he hoisted me up during one of our embraces. I can feel the heat increasing in my cheeks but I realize that now was not the time. Now was not the time for any of that, after this was all over we could enjoy ourselves.
We walked back to camp and converse with the others who were both eyeing us expectantly. He begins to relay the plan, the trap, what we would need, all of it. We would have to do it now if we had any hope of stopping them.
"We can't wait another day. If we do they might find our location since the poison has worn off. They'll likely be well enough to hunt is if we wait so now's the time. We need to set up traps on each side of the river before dawn. Kelly, you can hide away in a spot with Josh while the traps are triggered. Amanda....you keep watch over me while I initiate all of it." Dez says.
"You want us to set this up now?" Josh asked him.
"Yes. If we do it in the morning they might have already caught up enough. We do it now and we still have a window. Judging by the fact that my sense of smell is still going kind of haywire along with my sight the poison hasn't flushed out of their system quite yet. In the morning when everything clears up I will lure them here and we will initiate the plan. All of you need to stay secluded and covered in one thing. Mud." said Dez.
"Mud?" asked Kelly and Dez nodded.
"So what is this like camouflage? A fetish?" asked Josh and I cracked a smile.
"It's to mask our scent. The water vapor should mask a great deal of it but once they get in close enough proximity they might be able to see you. Covering each other up in mud also masks us in all of this wood and dirt so that's another reason. They'll be focusing on me the entire time so....let's do it." said Dez and the rest of us looked at one another, smiling and nodding to each other.
Tomorrow would be the most important battle of our lives.
#
Amanda
We spend the entire night setting up traps and were exhausted by the end of it. Kelly and I took shifts to keep watch over our small section of the camp while Dezdrin remained in the middle of the area, gazing around to see if there was any trace of them and there was none yet. He said that his senses began to clear up in the middle of the night so he would be out to lure them soon. Josh was completely exhausted from tying up all the ropes and telling Dezdrin where to place everything but he would have his rest soon enough once all the traps were laid out. I was really the only one needed for the battle, to toss out the grenades, but the other two could be needed if things went south.
So now it was just a matter of waiting.
"I'm not entirely sure that i'm good enough." I remarked while standing there, continually firing the bolt into the tree trunk and getting closer and closer to the notch each time I tried but still....I wasn't entirely sure.
"You don't have to be perfect with it. You just have to be good enough to hit them in case i'm in danger." said Dezdrin.
"Well...I am getting closer." I admitted, beside me, near the log that I was leaning against, there laid a variety of sharpened sticks that were being used as the ammunition. He strips off one of his gauntlets and ties it to the tree to check the penetration power of the bolts and it doesn't manage to pierce the frame but it does knock it back slightly. There were points on his armor where there was a simple jumpsuit instead and although it failed to pierce the fabric it did leave a sizeable protrusion that should be useful for causing harm. These were the various spots on his armor where there was no plating, on the joints and under his arms, so I had a window of opportunity there.
"And then there's these." I stated and lifted the grenades that Kelly has manufactured up, he nodded.
"You feeling alright about it?" he asked while I hurled some rocks similar in size to the grenades over to the stream, I hit my mark most of the time.
"Yeah how hard can it be? Just light it up and toss." I remarked with a smile and he stroked my shoulder while kneeling in front of me. It was almost time for him to go.
"I am so proud of you...I once thought that I would never find a mate and that I would be lucky to get anyone but you are better than anything I could have ever hoped for. I love you." he stated and leaned in for another kiss while the suns begins to lift behind his back. I nodded as he lifts his face away and glanced behind him at the sunlight.
"Go get them tiger." I said and he smiled, nodding before he hurled himself into the trees. I watched Kelly and Josh who were busy sleeping, soon enough they would have to wake up and we would have to earn our freedom.
I stared at the weapon
s in my hand and back into the canopy that he had leapt into and realized that doubt no longer lingered in my heart, it no longer made its home in the back of my mind and for that I was grateful. I knew now that those days of thinking that I was lesser than I actually was had died and I had found a reason, a motivation. I had this life, I was now protecting the camp...I was finally someone that I could be proud of. No longer would I look at my reflection in the water and feel the unease creep up, my own skin finally felt comfortable.
And it was all because of what he had done.
When I saw him bleeding out on that hill I had first thought that he was just some straggler that couldn't be trusted. Someone with the potential to do great harm to all of us since his kind had already attacked our base. He had this emptiness that lurked in his eyes, emptiness in everything that he did with exception to when he would glance over at me. There was this bond that formed instantly it seemed. It was tempered and hardened by the ragged ways of teaching me and our nightly conversations and now...neither death nor fear could break it, nothing in this world could shatter it.
And for that I was grateful, for that I would protect it with my life.
"Alright then...let's get started." I remarked and tensed my fingers around the bow and waited for the battle to begin.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Dezdrin
It was easy enough to find them.
They had gotten sloppy due to the use of the poison and had since strayed far from where they had attacked us. It seems like the poison caused them to wander in circles for a while before they headed downstream again. They had started late in the day, however, and were soon forced to rest before making any meaningful progress. I knew that they would be wise to us today however and this was the best time to strike with their sense of direction still a bit haywire along with their distance from us being the largest it was going to be in the next couple of days, especially when considering that they were much faster than the humans and could move much farther.
They were gathered in the trees, I would have eliminated them myself but use of that gas grenade would have affected me as well since the vapor had an incredible area of spread, I couldn't just toss it and shoot due to that fact, either I would miss or I would be too close to the cloud, and thus that was not an option. All that there was, was the lure them back and pick them off one by one. We would lure them into the traps and failing that we would have to use the grenades to pick them off and one of the humans would have to kill them but even a blinded Jorathian was still strong enough to snap a human in half so they had to be careful.
So I whistled while in the canopy and they raised their heads to glance at me before pursuing.
I turned on my heel and ran, travelling through the trees while they trailed behind. They fire off shots with their laser rifles and I manage to dodge most of it. I carve and weave through the forest until the markings that I had placed came into view. I was near camp and the traps would be close. I roar and see the team spring into action. They rise up from behind a tree and immediately I see both Kelly and Josh grab a variety of the bombs that we had made and run off to the side while Amanda remains behind a boulder with some of the explosives and the crossbow.
I lunged towards a branch where the trip wire laid and tried to lead Mephisal through it but he seemed to notice it and dodged it by jumping off to the side. He laughed at me when I gave him a frustrated glance and lifted his gun to fire off several laser bolts at me which I managed to evade.
"Oh come on! Thought you were better than that old friend!" shouted Mephisal.
"Try this on for size then." I shouted as I ducked under a spot where both Josh and Kelly were hiding. I direct them to toss out one of the non-poison explosives and they do, it creates a large cloud of dust behind me and in that confusion I see Mephisal stumbling forward. Kol stops further behind and lunges from the back, he is inches from me but I manage to catch him coming in with a punch. He falls to the ground and I turned to see Mephisal stumbling out of the radius of the bomb, he was coughing from all of the dust so I lunged at him with my knife and tried to stab him in the neck but he blocked it with his forearm, leaving a large gash to mar his arm.
"Shit!" he exclaimed before I kicked him in the leg once and dragged the knife out of him. I am then tackled to the floor by Kol but Josh leapt in and jabs his laser tool into Kol's neck which burns him before Kol gathers the energy to toss Josh off of him.
"Don't forget about me you little bastard." said Mephisal as he fired a laser bolt at my back. I stumbled forward as the searing pain struck me before I rolled forward and ordered Kelly to toss down another explosive. It activates another dust cloud that consumes the area as we all scurried away, I leapt into the branches once more soon after. The wound wasn't that severe, probably a third degree burn but it did hurt immensely.
"Come on, don't run just yet!" shouted Mephisal as he leaped into the air. I looked back to make sure that both Josh and Kelly were fine and they were. They managed to scurry into the bushes before Kol could spot them.
"Come on boys! Thought you could take down some weak humans and the soft Jorathian!" I shouted out while twisting through the branches. I leapt up high into the canopy and ripped a branch out before tossing it back down directly at Mephisal who leapt over it. I grab a vine and swing down, catching him on the chest with a kick that knocked him back through the canopy.
"Coming through!" shouted Kol as he jumped around and lunged at me with his own combat knife. I catch his hand before he strikes me and we both go falling through the trees until I managed to escape him and grab onto a nearby tree with my claws. I leapt from it towards the river as I spot Amanda in the distance, readying the bombs and her weapon. As soon as I cross the tree lines she tosses three of those explosive bombs and the resulting impact is swift as Kol stumbles out of the explosion with an incredible amount of dust in his eye and a cut on his face. Seems like his armor protected him from most of the wooden shrapnel but that didn't matter to me as I leapt at him while he was disoriented and jabbed my knife at his face. He caught it as it just cut his cheek and I quivered as I gripped it and pressed it into him with even more vigor until I was barely at the cusp of his throat and then I felt a branch thwack against my head. I stumble back with a large gash across my head as I looked up at Mephisal who was stumbling out. Amanda had already gone back into hiding and was in the bushes when she fired off a shot that grazed the back of Kol's neck, giving me a window to escape. I run past her on the way and grab an explosive from her and leap into the trees again.
"Now for the traps." I muttered.
"You're a dead man!" shouted Kol.
I leapt into the forest and found that same trip wire and tossed the explosive down into the air behind me after lighting it. I light it up at the perfect interval for it to obscure the tripwire and it explodes as I leapt over a tripwire and Kol crossed it unintentionally which caused a log to swing and strike him in the head. He falls back onto the floor and I see an immense amount of blood begin to pool on the back of his head while he laid flat on the floor.
So one more.
I run through the forest in search of him but don't manage to find him and stumbled back to the river. I looked around until I heard him call out.
"Looking for me?" Mephisal asked and I looked back at him, he was holding a struggling Josh with a knife up to the man's throat.
"Let him go." I growled.
"Only if you drop all the weapons on you right now and get on your knees." he said and I snarled, he didn't seem fazed.
"Only one way i'm making it out of this and it involves you surrendering. Now stay in place and wait for me to come over there." he said and I saw something move in the corner of my eye, it was Amanda. She was holding one of those gas grenades and I nodded slightly.
"We all know you're going to kill us all anyways Mephisal so why don't you just start?" I asked him and he laughed.
"Oh I don't know. Maybe cause you're the biggest fish. Truth be told, I don't
know why you're even following along with this. Maybe cause you think if this bastard lives a little longer then they'll kill me? Fat chance. The only one that had a chance was you and we all know how that turned out." he stated as he stopped directly in front of me. Josh was cowering until I saw the canister leap into my line of sight before exploding.
The strange gas floats out and I shook as it consumed my entire visual field. I was coughing, shaking as my eyes watered and I stumbled back. The pain was intense but I managed to stumble to my feet as I watched Amanda run towards us with one of those wooden bolts in her hand. Josh had fallen onto the ground during all of the chaos and was busy crawling away while I saw Mephisal coughing in the distance. He was trying to stumble back into the woods but Amanda leapt onto his back and jabbed the wooden arrow into his neck. He grabs her and tosses her into the bushes before I roared and rushed at him, gripping my knife and jabbing it into his face before doubling over in pain.
It was over, it was really over.
#
Amanda
"Really went for a ride huh?" Dezdrin asked me and I shrugged.
"If i'm going to be your mate I might as well get used to it right?" I asked him and he shrugged before letting a small chuckle creep through.
"I don't know about that..." he said with a sheepish grin.
We were all lying next to the river bed licking our wounds. I only had some minor cuts and bruises from the fall I took while Josh had a broken rib and leg, the important thing was that we were all going to survive the ordeal. Kelly didn't have any wounds to speak of while Dez had a burnt back, some cuts on his hand, a cracked skull, and a number of bruises as well as a fractured rib.
"This is why I never joined the army." joked Josh while Kelly rubbed his side, her fingers pressing into the wound as she rubbed some of the medgel that we had found on the bodies onto his wounds.