Ok a very, very late chapter. I am really sorry to all my readers but life has a tendency to steal time away from me. Hope you enjoy this chapter. Reviews will be greatly appreciated.
'Happiness is like glass; you can't always see it but it's still there'
Toboe stood on the edge of the ice, panting as he stared into the ocean. Blue made a gagging sound as one of the soldier's bodies floated up to water's surface. The head lolled to one side so the eyes stared, unfocused, at the wolf-dog.
Kiba left the edge of the ice and stood next to Hige. Cole was lying down on her side with Sali standing behind her. Moss snarled at Hige, every time the fluffy wolf tried to move. Kiba growled at Moss when the older wolf tried to attack Hige.
The greying wolf stepped backwards away from the other pack's leader. Moss whimpered as he put his full weight on his injured hind leg, "You are pushing my patience." He snarled at the younger wolves wincing as the pain ebbed away. Hige snarled, his left eye swollen shut from being hit by an ice-shard during the initial fight.
"Hige!"
"Moss!"
Kiba and Sali growled at their respective pack mates. "Moss, the fight is over you are just making a fool of yourself." Sali said stepping towards the angered wolf.
Hige sighed and sat down shaking his head slowly. The clink of bracelets attracted the attention of the five wolves. Tsume and Toboe walked on either side of Gramps, supporting the ragged wolf. The old Lupine was gasping for air, his sides heaving, his legs shook from the strain the fight had put on him. Tsume and Toboe helped the elder onto the ice-floor next to Cole.
Blue came over to the two packs shortly after, carrying a leather draw-string bag in her teeth. Her movements were uneven due to a shallow bullet wound in her shoulder.
Hige was the first of the wolves to catch the meaty scent that protruded from the bag in Blue's jaws.
"Ah man Blue; you are the best wolf ever." Hige said trying to snatch the bag away after Blue dropped it.
Tsume bashed Hige on the head with his paw, earning a whine of protest from the latter. "Eat later, we have things to work out now," Tsume demanded before turning to the other pack of four wolves, "Are we enemies or what?" Tsume asked Kiba.
The white wolf nodded and turned to Sali, "Why did you attack us earlier?"
Sali sighed heavily, "In this new world we had four extra members in this pack. Three of them were Cole's pups."
Toboe perked at the word pups, "Congratulations." He said happily.
Cole hung her head as Sali continued his story, "They were implanted in Cole by Jaguara's scientists."
Toboe's head dropped, "Not congratulations?" He seemed a bit confused at what his response should be so he felt phrasing it a question might be a good scenario.
Gramps and Cole both chuckled at the pup's confusion. Gramps continued where Sali left off, "The pups were taken away from us six months after their birth. We know they are most likely alive but they have been introduced into the black regiment which brain washes the wolves into mindless fighting machines so the are pretty much dead to us."
Kiba cocked his head, "You gave up part of your pack so easily?"
"We didn't have a choice! You's wouldn't know nothing, pup." Moss said
Kiba flattened his ears as Hige jumped into the conversation to stop the impending fight, "Hey, Kiba, we don't know what we would do in that situation so we can't judge."
Kiba looked at his friend and remained silent.
"What about the other wolf?" Tsume asked finally watching Blue as she licked her bullet wound.
"Tetsu, is being held hostage at Jaguara's keep. We were told we must attack you or else he will be killed." Gramps finished
"That's..." Toboe stopped searching for the right word.
"Appalling?" Blue offered helpfully to the red wolf. Toboe nodded.
"But the troop here is dead so we must return to the keep were our pack mate is being kept." Sali told Kiba
The arctic wolf bowed his head softly, "I hope you rescue your friend."
Sali nodded getting to his paws, "The chances are we'll meet on the battle field again, but before that time we will call this a truce...and I'm sorry about your horse friend."
Kiba dipped his head and watched as the older wolves started to leave. Moss snapped his teeth in Tsume's direction before leaving, earning a death glare from the grey coloured wolf. Cole barked softly at Blue before trotting to Gramps's side and helping him up. Sali flicked his head at the pack and surged forward despite his injuries and led his pack deeper into the frozen waste land.
Blue pushed her muzzle into the bag at her feet and tossed the raw lambs meat out onto the ground. The injured pack did not hesitate to gorge themselves on the food before heading back out to their journey to reach paradise and hopefully bring Cheza back onto their side.
The atmosphere of the pack was heavy and sad, wolves were protective creatures the loss of Kuro even if they had only known her for a week, except for Kiba.
They found a cave at the outer edge of the ice desert. They wondered into the shallow cavern. A storm had started up about an hour ago and they decided the smartest move would be to find shelter and wait out the worst of the storm.
Toboe sneezed loudly, his body trying to get rid of the snow that had built up in his nose. Hige shivered and stepped over Tsume still form. Blue shook the white sheet of snow off of her black coat. The only wolf completely unaffected by the snow storm was Kiba since his body was designed for the tundra weather.
Toboe broke the silence, "Where are we going to go now?"
"To paradise." Kiba said simply looking out at the tempest.
Hige lifted his head, "How? We don't have the flower maiden."
"That doesn't mean anything Hige," Blue said, "You guys are wolves you must know another way to paradise. Kiba? There is another way, right?"
Kiba lowered his head, "Not that I know of."
"Then how will we get to paradise?" Toboe asked swishing his russet brown tail behind him.
Tsume answered his question, "Cheza is still going to look for paradise. Darcia and Cheza will head over to the end of the world. We'll meet them there and open paradise."
"So basically we have reversed the roles. Darcia tries to open paradise and we attack him just before he does?" Hige asked sarcastically.
Kiba turned to face his friends, "That seems like the only option. It has been over four hundred years since the world froze over it's about time we set out and find paradise."
"The world is ending once more." Blue said, "Do you think I'll see pops in paradise?"
The cave fell silent except the howling wind outside. "Quent should have been reborn as well. When I was little before I found you guys again I saw a newspaper article that had a picture of Cher, a forensic anthropologist now, getting an award for her work." Tsume said quietly.
"How come you never told us about that?" Hige shouted suddenly.
Tsume growled, "I would rather not remember the place of hell I was born into."
"What did happen to you? Since your pack did not exile you, you shouldn't have that scar." Kiba said pointedly.
Tsume glared at Kiba then at Toboe and back to Kiba. Toboe shrank back he probably wasn't supposed to have told Kiba about Tsume's past life. In Toboe's spirit had heard Tsume's story despite his mortal body running cold from death when the pack had first searched for paradise.
Tsume snarled at the arctic wolf, "I was born into the underground dog fights. My mother was the best apparently so they made me fight the more experienced dogs to see if I had the gift and in the one fight, my opponent got in a lucky bite. That is all you need to know" Tsume snapped irritably he wasn't ashamed of his past but he did hate the memories so the sooner the pack knew about them the less it would come up in conversation.
The pack all had varying degrees of shock at this piece on information from Tsume's past. Not even Toboe had known about the dog fights but that did explain why Tsume was a better fighter in this life then he was last time.
Hope this chapter wasn't to bad. Small spoiler, Tetsu is not an OC but that's all I'm going to say. Bye thanks for reading.
