Chapter 4- Going Too Far
'My secret side I keep under lock and key. I keep it caged but I can't control it. 'Cause if I let him out he'll tear me up break me down. Why won't somebody come and save me from this, make it end?'
-Crimson Moon Day Four; 6:32 am-
"Sit down or go outside. You're starting to wear ruts in the floor." Shadow growled at Kouen, who was pacing back and forth in the waiting room of the kitsune hospital. Kouen glared at him and snorted. "You're like a father who's waiting for his kid to be born. I should know."
"Do the world a favor and shut up." Kouen snapped, a scary light shining in his eyes. He's been in there for two hours... that's not good. He thought, referring to Jin, who had been close to death when they had reached the hospital soon after the battle.
Shadow stood up and walked over to his friend, placing a comforting hand on his shoulder. "How about you go find Toushiro and Alex and go assess the damage and rescue survivors. That should take your mind off things while Rowan and I keep an eye on Akamizu's movements." Kouen glanced at him, his green eyes gleaming with stress and barely contained fury. He was now allowed to roam freely as long as he was accompanied since he had proved that he could somewhat contain his feral form.
"Sure." he sighed, running a hand though his hair. "Thanks pal." he let a slight smirk spread across his features and Shadow grinned, patting him on the head like a child.
"Anytime." Kouen swatted his hand and grinned, making his way outside, following the still fresh scents of Hitsugaya and Alex, whom had left to assess damage half an hour ago. Kouen hadn't wanted to go, feeling guilty that Jin is in the condition he is because he couldn't get there fast enough. Walking through the door that contained a portal to the human realm, he grimaced at the amount of damage that had been caused to Karakura and the surrounding area. Humans, demons, werewolves and the like were scattered everywhere, some dead, some dieing, some struggling against death. Others were hardly recognizable.
"Kouen!" Alex called from down the street by a collapsed building. "Give us a hand over here." she grunted, hefting a piece of rubble as big as she was while Hitsugaya handled the smaller bits.
"Ah, sure." he jogged over, jumping over and weaving through the carnage. "Any survivors?"
"Yeah, we had to collapse this building into a bunker for humans. But something must have hit it and collapsed it more. We have to get all the rubble moved before more die." she said, rolling a bit of stone away. "Help me lift this." she pointed to a chunk that was as big as Kouen's feral form. He nodded and grabbed one end, while the cat demon lifted the other. It must have weighed a ton at the very least, but the got it moved, leaving a hole where they could peer through to the humans inside. Hitsugaya climbed up and slipped inside, using his small form to his advantage to go count the dead, injured, and alive.
"Three dead, five injured and eight alive but shaken. Make the hole a bit bigger and we can get them out." he called from somewhere inside. Kouen grabbed a chunk about as big as the other and tossed it to the side with a grunt.
"Pass the dead to Alex, I'll come in and help the injured." he said, jumping inside. Hitsugaya led him to the back where some humans were trying to move rubble off of the dead ones and two injured ones. Kouen moved them out of the way and started to pick up large chunk after large chunk, freeing the live ones and dragging the dead ones out. "Take these two over there, my friend will take them." he said to a few of the uninjured ones. They didn't ask any questions, just nodded shakily and set to work. Kouen looked at Hitsugaya and said; "Any more trapped ones?" the boy shook his head.
"Not that they know of. This section and the entrance were the only parts that collapsed." Kouen nodded, but jumped slightly and looked down when he felt a small hand tug on his pant leg. A small four year old girl was looking up at him with huge watery brown eyes.
"Somethin's wrong with my momma. Can you help her?" she whimpered, sniffling. Kouen melted.
Kneeling down he ruffled the girl's hair with a soft smile. "Sure. Where's your momma?" he said softly. He felt Hitsugaya's eyes on him but ignored it as the girl took his hand in her tiny ones and lead him farther back into the building. Kouen followed patiently. "So what's your name little one?" he asked, trying to cheer the girl up.
"Aki. What's yours mister?" she asked, her sniffles dieing some.
"Kouen. Where's your mom?" he looked around and saw only rubble. Then he heard a low moan of pain and his head snapped in the direction of a large bit of rubble beside some knocked over tables, chairs and other office-like pieces of furniture. One seat, which was a small couch was set up right and he could see the black hair of a woman around one side. Another moan pierced the air and Kouen's blood turned to ice. Scooping up Aki, he sprinted to the woman's side to see that she was heavily pregnant and obviously in a lot of pain. "Crud." he growled, cursing colorfully under his breath. Setting the girl down, he took her temperature, felt her pulse and checked her breathing. Her temperature was high, sweat beading on her forehead, her heart was frantic, and her breathing ragged. "Toushiro! Get Alex down here! We have a huge problem!" he bellowed, catching the woman's attention.
She swallowed hard and reached out, a scared look crossing her features. Kouen stared at her for a heartbeat before reaching out his hand and taking hers. "It'll be alright. Help's coming." he murmured, his eyes solemn. The woman let out a low moan, her back arching as pain coursed through her. Alex sprinted up with Hitsugaya on her heels.
"What's- whoa! This is bad." she panted, skidding up beside Kouen as Aki attached herself to the werewolf's pant leg, staring at the demon with huge scared eyes. Alex knelt down by the woman's head. "I'll take it from here. Take care of the rest." she said, giving them a pointed look.
"I'll trust your judgment. You know more than I do and you're a girl." Kouen sighed. "Should I take the little girl too?" he asked, looking down at Aki.
"Yes. We don't want her to see her mother like this." Kouen nodded and took the little girl's hand.
"Time to go Aki." he said softly, keeping his voice level.
"What about momma?"
"Momma will be fine. Let's go." he picked her up and lead the way out, followed closely by a pale Hitsugaya, who obviously had never seen something like this before. When they reached the front room, a pair of teenagers were trying to help an old man out of the entrance, which was about five feet off the ground. Kouen put Aki down and smiled softly at her. "Stay here with Toushiro." she nodded. Kouen walked up to the teens and old man and put a hand on one of their shoulders. "Go stand back there." he jerked his head back to the rest of the humans. "Its better for your health." he added to get them to move faster.
The helped the old man back and Kouen turned to the wall, sucking in a deep breath. "I can't believe I'm doing this." he growled to himself, assessing the bit of wall that was still solid and attached to the rest of the building just below the hole. Holding his hands in front of him, he let loose a blast of fire, blowing the wall away and into the street with an explosion. Screams erupted behind him and he heard feet scrabbling to get back as he blew another section of wall away to make the exit larger.
Cutting off the steam of fire, he turned to the humans with a somewhat sad expression. "So are we getting out of there or what?" he muttered, expecting things to be thrown at him. The roof shook suddenly and Kouen paled. "Move it!" he bellowed as rubble started to fall. The humans ran past, the old man on the back of a man in his twenties. Toushiro and Aki were the last ones out. "I'll go back for Alex and the woman. Get them to safety." he said as the boy hesitated at the exit. Hitsugaya stared at him for a couple seconds and turned, running after the group to make sure they didn't scatter with Aki on his back.
Kouen cursed as a chunk of ceiling landed next to him and ran to the back of the building. He slapped a hand over his eyes when he saw the woman's pants and underwear draped across the back of the couch. "Can she be moved?" he asked in a cracked voice.
"What do you think you weenie? No one can be moved in this state!" Alex snapped over the woman's pained and scared screams. "For now just keep any rubble from hitting us. Like in a video game or something except there's no reset button." she growled as Kouen uncovered his eyes. As she said it, some of the ceiling broke loose and fell toward them. Kouen snapped out one arm and blasted it away with fire, growling to himself. The woman screamed again and Kouen's ears rang a its pitch. Sticking one finger in an ear, he twisted and turned it as though to poke a coming migraine until it went away.
This went on for five minutes until the woman was holding a screaming baby girl in her arms. Kouen narrowed his eyes at Alex as she helped the woman stand to get her pants back on. He continued to stare at her until she looked at him. "What?" she demanded, glaring at him. Kouen shrugged and helped support the woman, making their way to the entrance only to find their way blocked. "Can you make a path?"
"Only if you want what's left of the building to come down on us. I can make a new door though." Without fire... I'll just make another hole with a body slam or something. He unbuttoned his shirt and dropped his pants, leaving his boxers on, not really caring about them; handing his clothes to Alex. He got a confused stare from Alex and the woman but ignored it. He quickly transformed into his hybrid from, making the woman scream, and approached the nearest wall. "Be right behind me." he growled, backing up some. He charged at the wall, smashing through it with a grunt and stumbled to a halt, shaking his sore head. Alex skidded to a halt behind him with the woman on her back, making the demon look small. "That... was painful." the werewolf slurred, his eyes crossed and his ears folded back.
"You look drunk." Alex remarked, setting the woman down and handing her her child back, having been holding it herself.
"I feel drunk." Kouen growled back, shaking his head to uncross his eyes. "Let's get her back to Aki." he muttered, changing back and taking his clothes back from Alex, yanking he pants on and leaving his shirt unbuttoned. Not a heartbeat later, the building gave a last shudder and collapsed fully. The two helped support the woman, the screeching of the infant starting to grate on Kouen's nerves and give him a migraine. God forbid if I go feral because I get pissed at a newborn... he growled to himself, following the scents of the humans that hung in the air.
After they had returned the woman to the group and gotten the humans somewhere safe, the trio continued to search for survivors. Alex broke off and headed for downtown where the damage was about the same, leaving Kouen and Hitsugaya to continue through the business district. "I'm surprised that no rescue squads have shown up yet." Hitsugaya remarked.
"Yeah, but they'll probably be here within the hour. America might send aid too." Kouen replied.
He felt a presence behind them and spun around, feeling something pierce his neck, making him drowsy. He fell to the ground and passed out.
-Several Hours Later; Location Unknown-
Kouen felt something sticky running down his right arm and torso and his neck throbbed like there was no tomorrow. His back hurt too. He was laying on a metal table, held down by metal restraints in some form of cell. Cracking his eyes open, he winced at the bright florescent lights that glared down at him. His eyes narrowed, he looked around to find that he was in some sort of testing facility. He flexed his muscles against the restraints, testing their strength, surprised that Akamizu- he knew that this was Akamizu's doing- had restrained him with something as weak as steel. Of course, it was only weak to him, and its hard to find enough unicorns- which exist- to make restraints out of their horns- the hardest substance to exist. It was the only thing that could restrain Kouen long enough for someone to get enough of a head start to possibly get away if he wasn't pissed enough.
To his left was a clear glass wall that looked out on a wide hall with another cell with a clear glass wall just like it. In that cell was some sort of of distorted, gray creature with huge gnarly teeth and long black claws. Wouldn't want to run into that in a dark alley. He thought as he looked to the other side of the cell, finding nothing but a plain gray wall. He grimaced when he recognized the place he was in. Area 51, an international supernatural testing and holding facility somewhere in middle-of-nowhere New Mexico, USA. Kouen had been here once before and didn't enjoy it at all, and that was when he was captured because of his own stupidity. Now he was here because of someone else, so he knew that there was no way he was going to enjoy this visit either.
Jerking his arm up and breaking the restraints with a metallic creak, he sat up, snapping the ones around his legs off too. He noticed that a long gash had been made in his right forearm, and another one, which was bleeding profusely was across his chest. He reached up with one hand to feel his neck, paling when he looked at his hand. Spread across his fingers was a slightly transparent, pale blue sticky liquid.
Werewolves are a lot like vampires in the sense that both usually feed off of humans and both produce venom. Whenever a werewolf's fight or flight drive kicks in, their venom glands- which is right behind the ear, much like a snake- swell some, producing more venom so that should they run into trouble, they can bite someone and turn them into a werewolf to preserve the species once they die. Obviously, this is what Akamizu was after, Kouen's venom. This would produce a legion of extremely powerful werwolves that would make Kouen himself sweat. The strength of the werewolf that is made depends on the strength of the werewolf making them after all.
"I see you've figured out my plan." said a voice from the clear wall. Kouen glared at Akamizu, who stood there all high and mighty in one of his best royal robes. "You always have been smart haven't you?"
"You bastard." then he realized something. "Where's Toushiro?" he snarled, getting up from the table and stalking to the wall, standing a hair's width away from it. "What have you done with him?"
Akamizu sneered at him and spread his hands in a flamboyant manner. "Why, he's just down the hall. We tried to get your petty army's plans out of him, but apparently injuring you wasn't enough." Kouen reached up and ran a finger down the gash on his arm. "So we gave him some... incentive." Akamizu shook his head. "That isn't working so far either. No matter." he held up a vile with what looked like blue spring water, but Kouen knew better. "I'm going to create the strongest army to ever exist, and I'll have you to thank Kouen."
"You want my venom? Take it! Take all of it! Just leave Toushiro out of your plans!" Kouen bellowed, slamming one fist against the wall, watching as a spiderweb of cracks appeared then disappeared. Self-fixing glass.
"Why its far too late for that my boy." Akamizu sneered, narrowing his mustard yellow eyes at Kouen, who growled. Akamizu made a motion with his hand and a security guard walked into view, yanking Hitsugaya after him. The boy's hands were bound and a look of pure agony was plastered on his pale face. "He, you see, is our first recruit."
Kouen let out a snarl, letting loose the anger he pent up in him, going feral. Akamizu took a step back as he transformed. Kouen roared at the other werewolf and smashed a hand through the glass, grabbing Akamizu's robe and pulling it through as the glass formed back around it. "You've gone too far." Kouen growled in a guttural voice, barely controlling himself. Akamizu tried futility to pull his robe through, not wanting to tear it, and having too much dignity to strip out of it. He also didn't have the strength to smash the glass.
Kouen charged through the glass with a roar, barreling into the security guards and scooping Hitsugaya up. His first priority now was getting the boy out of there, not killing the currently vulnerable Akamizu. Cradling Hitsugaya- who was shaking violently- Kouen kept him safe as he barreled through the flood of security guards that were coming down the corridor, smashing in doors to cells as he went, letting the supernaturals loose on them. Crashing through the door at the end of the hall, Kouen ran out into the desert as a fighter jet took off from the base to chase them. Kicking into high gear, he left a dust trail as he thundered through the sand and brush. Once he put some distance between them and the jet, he hid in a clump of trees and set Hitsugaya down, crouching beside him and the boy struggled to sit up once Kouen smashed the binds on his wrists.
Hitsugaya's breathing was ragged, his face pale with sweat on his forehead. Pain shone in his eyes even though he put on a brave face for Kouen to try and reassure the wolf. Kouen wrapped one hand around him and sat down, holding the shaking boy close. "I'm sorry. This is my fault." Kouen murmured.
"N-No its not. Quit blaming yourself for everything." Hitsugaya snapped back in a shaking voice. "I've actually been wanting this for a while."
"What." It was more statement than question as Kouen's fur bristled. "What do you mean a while?"
"About two months?" Hitsugaya drew in a shaking breath. "I don't know. But now long is it going to hurt like this?"
Kouen sighed and ran a finger across the boy's hair. "You get used to it in about two days but it lasts about a month. Until the next regular full moon." He felt Hitsugaya stiffen, but the boy relaxed just as fast, running a hand across Kouen's chest fur.
"You know, for someone with a personality as silky as a cactus, your fur is soft." he remarked, trying to lighten the mood. Kouen felt his face heat up, thankful that he was still in his feral from. That thought made him shove his anger to the back of his mind and change into his wolf form, which was about as tall as Hitsugaya is at the shoulder.
"We'll stay here until night then find the nearest town. Those goons will be searching for us but they can't cover ground like I can. I put about ninety miles between us and that base in the space of ten minutes."
"You broke the land-speed record." Hitsugaya laughed, hiding a wince as Kouen curled around his form on the ground.
"My record is four hundred miles in half an hour actually." Kouen chuckled, feeling Hitsugaya shift painfully and lay with his head on the wolf's side. Kouen curled the rest of his form around him, placing his head in the boy's lap. "For now pretend I'm a dog and pet me. It'll distract you from the pain." he grumbled, embarrassing himself for his lover's sake. The boy laughed and ran his hand through the thick auburn fur of Kouen's neck, dozing off after about five minutes, his hand still resting on the wolf's neck.
I love doing stuff like that to Kouen. He's so fun to mess with and has such a broad personality that you can make him do just about anything given the right circumstances. Reviews make me happy and a happy me writes better and longer chapters! So review!
