A Deal With the Devil. (back in 1870-ish)

The backwoods town was still bustling quite a bit considering the sun had already started to set behind the tall pine trees to the west. The two adolescent squirrels sat side by side in a deserted alleyway watching the strangers, and their chocobo's, pass by. They seemed completely invisible to the adults wondering the town's dusty streets, and that felt just find at the moment.

The female squirrels turned her head to male next to her. She almost found it hard to recognize him. He was the same size as her, and covered by the same shade of brown fur. He was covered in dirt and grim, which was nothing new, but he looked so serous… and tired. She wondered if her appearance was as awful as his? No wonder they weren't able find any work earlier. They had run out of food the night before but were lucky enough to take water, unnoticed, from the chocobo stalls.

She looked away from in and at the ground below her as the guilt came crawling back. "This is all my fault." She scolded herself in her mind. He would have never left home if she had just stayed and done her daughterly duty. Sandy sighed while placing her face in her hands. She hated crying, but being seen crying was even worse.

The teenaged male briefly glanced over to the female then focused his attention back to the now dying down street traffic. He placed his arm around her shoulder and pulled her close to him in. She quickly pushed him away and then scooted a foot away from him. Sandy dried her eyes, and puffing out her chest, in a sad attempt to show her defiance to his sympathetic embrace.

The male, Randy, rolled his eyes at her stubborn response and then grinned. "Don't worry sis. We'll eat tonight!" He shot a glance towards his sister long enough to see her concerned frown. He then jumped to his feet and started walking towards the now dimly lit street.

"Randy!" The agitated female screamed behind him, but he paid her no mind. They had come too far to give up. He would make sure she found a better life out here… at least better than she would have had with him. Randy's fists tightened as he recalled the man his father insisted she should merry, and his pace picked up with the ever growing anger.

It seemed like a blink of an eye from the time Randy had been sitting with his sister in the ally way until he was in front of the tavern. He stood and stared briefly in shock, as he tried to regain his lost time. He snapped out of his frazzled daze once he felt a firm grip on his shoulder that was followed by a higher pitched growl.

"Sandy…. Don't." He pleaded while still looking at the taverns sign.

"NO RANDY! YOU DON'T!" She jerked him back causing him to lose his balance.

Randy was able to regain his footing but not before he fell into a man, behind him, walking towards the tavern.

The man, a white wolf two heads higher than Randy, pushed the squirrel away from him. Causing Randy to slide, face first, into the dirt road. The wolf, obviously drunk and enraged, stumbled towards the injured Randy. "What da fuck is yer problem, boy?" He screamed as his half dozen friends stood back and watched.

Randy tried to push himself up, but ended up falling back down in pain. This caused the wolf much amusement as he walked aggressively towards the downed man. Sandy, watching the whole thing play out in horror, she jumped between the two and held out her hands in an attempt to stop her brother's attacker.

The wolf stopped briefly and then laughed. He was about to lay into Sandy until she struck her defensive stance, which he'd never seen before, and caused him to stop in confusion. He looked a bit closer at her and realized that this was a female before him, despite the dark brow male apparel she was wearing. He laughed again and took a few steps back before nodding at the mass of men behind him. "Well, it looks like we got ourselves a girl here fella's!"

The men behind him laughed, which only caused Sandy to focus more on the wolf in front of her as her pulse raced. The wolf took a step back towards her, as she took a step back, while stiffening up more. "Come girl! Let's all go back to our room, and…."He grinned showing his yellow teeth.

Randy moaned from behind her. She looked back to see two of, the wolf's, friends pulling him up and binding him. Just as she looked back in front of her she saw the wolf, right in her face, grinning at her right before smacking her down.

Sandy was in and out of conciseness for a while. By the time she came to completely, she was in what seemed like a barn. She heard many angry male voices yelling at each other. She was still out of sorts and couldn't' figure out what they were saying. She attempted to look around before the frigid cold took hold of her and she closed her arms around herself in an attempt to warm up only to find the clothing she had been wearing was in shreds. Absolute horror overtook her, and she began to breathe heavily in a panic.