Sixclaw
Chapter 37
FORT SKULL
At the patch of forest east of Fort Skull, the place where the inhabitants of the fortress buried their dead, a large concentration of creatures gathered around a polished wood box beneath an oak tree. One-Eye came up to the box, reached into his armour and pulled out a silver chain studded with bullets and dropped it in the empty casket. "See you in Dark Forest, mate."
Sixclaw hated funerals. She had attended far too many of them to begin with, and now that one of her closest friends had died on her watch, Sixclaw was mad as hell. In addition, the stress from her recent promotion was not helping matters at all.
A small mouse in a robe came up to the empty casket and began his eulogy. "We gather here today to honor one of our own, a brave soldier by the name of Crabfang. He died to save the rest of his squad from the enemy, and we hold him in the highest honor for this. Although there is not a body in this coffin, Crabfang is here in spirit, and he always will be. Family and friends are now permitted to pay their respects."
Ok, you can stop listening now.
One-Eye, Sixclaw, Red and Deyna came to the casket and shifted it into the grave. As Deyna approached the grave to pay his respects, he suddenly noticed something. A one-armed beast in a Death Squad mask hobbling towards the grave.
"INTRUDERS!" yelled Deyna, taking out Martin's sword.
Not even five seconds later, everybeast at the funeral had a weapon out and pointed at the intruder. "Wait, wait wait. Hold your fire! Don't shoot him yet, dammit!" said One-Eye, running in front of the approaching creature. "Can you speak?"
The beast nodded, and pulled off his mask, revealing slightly charred brown fur, amber eyes, and large fangs. "What, you thought I'd miss my own damn funeral?" said Crabfang, who promptly face-planted on a gravestone.
Deyna massaged his temples with his paws. "Can we get him a medic or something? He doesn't look too good and he just collapsed." These weird vermin are driving me crazy!
"Yeah, I got it." said Sixclaw, who promptly contacted Fort Skulls's resident medic. "Hello? Yes, this is Sixclaw. I need a medic immediately please. The injured creature is a male feral cat about sixteen seasons of age. Yes. Thank you."
After five tense minutes (Sixclaw had been counting in her head), the medic arrived, loaded Crabfang on a gurney and carted him to the medic's tent, most of the funeral-goers close behind.
Once they arrived, the hedgehog doctor promptly got to work on Crabfang."How is this one still alive? He's lost almost half the blood in his body!"
"The mask." said Deyna. "It looks like it's constantly pumping adrenaline gas into his lungs which keeps him strong enough to move, even with all this damage to his body." Everyone stared at him. "What? I'm not stupid."
"I need somebeast with steady paws." said the hedgehog doctor.
"I'll do it." said Sixclaw, putting on surgical gloves.
"Good. Now I'll remove the mask, and you put this tube into one of the veins in his remaining arm."said the doctor, watching Sixclaw find a vein and insert the tube. "I need a blood transfusion, blood type, O+. From one of you two." she said, gesturing to Deyna and One-Eye.
"Why us?" asked Deyna.
"Because you two are the biggest here and can probably spare more than others- Hey, what are you doing with that?"
One-Eye grabbed the end of the IV tube and stabbed it into his arm, letting the blood flow through the tube and into Crabfang's veins.
"Well, that solves that problem." said the doctor. "Sixclaw, can you get this mask off of his face?"
"Yeah, no problem."said Sixclaw, wedging her claws under the lip of the mak and pulling. The mask came off with a squelching sound.
"Sixclaw?" said the doctor, looking inside the mask. "There's somebeast's face in here.
"Huh. That's new." said Sixclaw, putting the mask aside."
By the time Crabfang had enough blood, it was early evening and the sun was setting. "Are we done?" asked One-Eye.
"Yes." said the healer. "He'll live, but Coggs is going to have to make him a prosthetic arm."
"Excellent. I'll have him begin work on it by tomorrow afternoon." said One-Eye, pulling the IV out of his arm, and trying to walk away. The warlord got about three steps before crashing to the floor.
"Take it easy, you've given away a lot of blood." said the healer, washing her hands in a nearby basin.
Sixclaw helped the wildcat up, and the unbalanced duo limped off to the apartment One-Eye shared with Crabfang and Red.
"Thanks, Sixclaw." said One-Eye.
"No problem." Said Sixclaw. "What else are friends for?"
THE FLATLANDS
Sunfur and five hundred troops arrived at the crater, battlefield and wreck where a massive stronghold once stood. "How is it that those bastards manage to sow chaos and destruction anywhere they go?" said the gold fox.
Suddenly a semi-high ranking soldier came up to the Supreme General. "Sir, we looked around the battlefield. Turns out that when the enemy cleared outta here, they took anything valuable or any weapons, vehicles, or debris that could be salvaged with them."
"They are desperate. They are going to make one last push, one last effort to win the war."
"And? What will we do?"
"Contact the barracks, treasury, and mechanics department. I want everything set up by tomorrow. Fort Skull falls in one week."
A/N
Hey guys, I know it's been a while, so chapter 37 is finally here and I have to say, it is one of the best so far in my opinion.
R&R
