Chapter 30: Dark Encounter

Once inside the hospital's main corridor, Ralph quickly found that the building was actually even darker and even eerier than he had previously thought. The only light the canines had to guide them was a creepy glow from a tented window somewhere deep down one of the hallways. There was where Ralph was able to faintly see Calhoun and the others sniffing around.

"Come on, Captain," the stern doberman hissed loudly when she vagely spotted Ralph behind her. "Keep up with us or you end up as puppy chow."

Deciding that didn't sound like much fun, the mastiff gulped in fear and quickly jogged over to where the others had their noses. He tried to glance around nervously, unhappy with the fact that he was unable to clearly see where he was going in the mostly dark, creepy hallway. And although there being a wide distance between the walls down the hallway, the nervous dog couldn't help but feel extremely claustrophobic.

Ignoring his uneasiness, Ralph imitated the others and blindly sniffed the floorboards. A sudden loud sound of a door shutting in the distance caused him to jump, accidentally crashing into Marco.

"Watch it!" the golden retriever growled, shaking his fur in anger. "You only weigh a thousand pounds there!"

"S-sorry," Ralph quickly jumped back, tail between his legs in embarrassment. "I couldn't see."

"Well, no duh! None of us can!" Mac hissed out nearly, making Ralph gulp.

Calhoun's distrust and annoyance with him were clearly starting to rub off on the other pooches on the force as well.

"Why is it so dark in here, anyway?" The mastiff distracted himself by wondering out loud, trying to allow his eyes to adjust the extremely dim light. "The hospital was open when the scorpion things attacked, right?"

At his unprofessional question, Calhoun paused in her smelling and sighed loudly in the dark. Although she already had some serious doubts about this supposed captain, the doberman was really getting tired of this mutt and his oblivious questions.

"Of course it was open!" she snapped across the room. "The power got shut off so that the water tankers will be ready to get to spraying as soon as possible!"

Somehow spotting her pitch black form in the darkness, Ralph somehow managed to wander over to where Calhoun was walking. Having to quicken his pace, he quickly stumbled after her.

"Water tankers?" He asked her without thinking, feeling his face wrinkle slightly in confusion. "You mean those ones outside? Why do they need to be here, anyway?"

At his words, Calhoun stopped walking so abruptly that Ralph had to stumble forward a little on his large paws in order to keep from crash landing on her. Although it was pitch black with no trace of light anywhere around them now, Ralph could still feel that the doberman had turned to stare at him.

"What are you, thick?!" She hissed at him ridiculously. "Completely drowning them in water is the only way to stop a large group of these mutated scorpions! You didn't know that?!"

"Oh, wait- yes, of course, I did," the hiddenly blushing mastiff quickly stumbled out as a weak answer. "We just did things a little different in, uh, my unit."

Laughing nervously and awkwardly, Ralph avoided acknowledging the sharp feeling of an unseen, piercing glare he was receiving from the sergeant. Instead, he pressed forward, silently pleading Calhoun would ignore his foolishness and just focus on their mission.

The lightless hallway leads the group of dogs into a large room, which Ralph guessed was a huge waiting room. It, like the hallway connected to it, was pitch black with no light peeking through a window as previously enjoyed.

Random hospital instruments were laying around, apparently quickly abandoned as a result of a mad dash. The waiting room chairs and tables once peacefully bearing magazines were toppled over, creating an interesting, unseen obstacle course for the sniffing pooches.

Stumbling over a flipped chair leg, Ralph whimpered slightly as he collided into a wall, the others snickering at his fall.

"Good grief, it's even darker in here!" The mastiff whined out loud as he stumbled to his feet- only to trip over an abandoned stethoscope in the process. "They really can't turn the lights back on at least until we actually find the scorpions? I mean, what if we step on one or something?"

Somewhere unseen to his right, Calhoun groaned out loud as she exasperatedly threw her head back. She turned slowly around towards the source of her aggravation, stalking toward him.

"What's one of the first rules of any police K-9 unit, Ralph?"

Gulping slightly, the mastiff picked his brain for the best answer he could come up with.

"Uh...'No cuts, no buts, no coconuts'?" he muttered the first thing that came to mind. The group around him, still unseen, laughed callously at what they thought was a bad joke.

Except for Calhoun. She had had enough of this unprofessional, untruthful...beyond annoying mutt.

Extending her neck just to stick her nose straight into his own nose, Calhoun growled into the mastiff's face.

"It's to obey the orders of our human leaders. Right now that means finding those mutated scorpions, retreating back to Office Croft, and leading her and the other officers to where the scorpions are- and that's it, soldier!" The doberman hissed loudly, causing Ralph to jump. "Our comforts and wants always come in second to their orders, Pussycat! So stick with the program!"

Her nose pushing so hard into his, Ralph shook slightly in fear- beyond getting her point.

"Uh, right. Aye, Aye," he quickly agreed as he nodded, turning his head away from her piercing, concealed glare.

In response, Calhoun just rolled her eyes as she turned away from Ralph and walked deeper into the room. She had bigger things to worry about than this supposed, dense captain.

"Now everyone, keep a watch out the best you can in this waiting room," she cautioned her other troops. "We're fully relying on our noses and ears right now. Don't let them fail you."

Ignoring the uneasiness starting to grow deeper inside him, Ralph quickly separated off into a different part of the room from the others. He tried to busy himself by blindly sniffing around the baseboards, flipped waiting room chairs and various medical tools- trying to catch a scent of an unknown creature to him.

His leather like nose suddenly brushing against the top of a small, hard object by the baseboard, Ralph paused to eye the object more closely in the low light.

At being disturbed by the mastiff's untimely sniffing, the object abruptly became alive- wiggling around for a moment right before it hissed out a strange, low buzzing sound. Cautiously yet curiously peering closer at the small object, Ralph watched in awe when small, green, glowing spots appeared on the creature's back, offering some sort of soft light to the mastiff's eye...

Allowing him to see that the object was in the faint yet distinct shape of that of a scorpion.

Quickly stumbling back, Ralph blinked repeatedly, suddenly startled -and terrified- by his discovery.

This must be one of the mutated scorpions the others were talking about!! his mind screamed at him, loud alarms ringing inside his head as he tensed up. The way they made it sound like, these creatures are heartless killers!

His mind made up, Ralph was about to turn and run, afraid of just what this mutated creature could apparently do...

To realized seconds later that the small creature before him was still just sitting there, appearing to be completely harmless. It's two large, glowing, almost cute eyes peered up at Ralph innocently, and by the way it blinked them tiredly, it was clear the creature wanted nothing more than to go back to its deep sleep.

No, this can't be one of the mutated scorpions everyone is so scared of, the mastiff suddenly scoffed as he smirked. This tiny creature is nothing! It's not even a quarter of the size of one of my paws! It's not scary or threatening at all!

Although being more intrigued than afraid now, the mastiff still cautiously tip-toed forward a bit- and sniffed the scorpion-like creature a bit more.

A mixture of various, sour smelling medicines immediately shoved its way into the mastiff's nose, odors so offensive to him that it made Ralph's eyes water. Backing up until he was a fairly safe distance from the strong aromas, he realized that the odors were seeping from the small living creature before him. The mastiff had no idea such a small thing could smell so bad.

At being further disturbed, the small object suddenly became unhappy, more alert- and uncoiled itself, unfolding its six, strange looking appendages as they poked out from underneath. Two large claws-like arms also appeared, causing Ralph to cautiously back up a little further than before.

Ok, this thing is a little scary...and creepy...

Suddenly appearing to be extremely irritated by the presence of the much larger animal, the scorpion revealed the most terrifying thing Ralph had ever seen...

That of an enormous tail that was hidden underneath the creature's body- and a crazy sharp stringer at the end of it.

At seeing the terrifying and large stinger, the mastiff froze in his place. He didn't care to be at the receiving end of that thing, that's for sure.

Appearing to now view the mastiff as an enemy, the creature hastily scampered to the side, then back again in front of Ralph. It froze for a mere moment in time, staring in a trance up at Ralph...

Before slowly beginning to extend large, hidden wings- and began to slowly lift off the ground.

The scorpion's large and possibly growing tail raised and curled more threatening as it hovered up a little above Ralph's eye level. Then, without warning, the creature darted stringer first towards Ralph's direction, moving at lightning speed.

Fortunately able to jump out of the way before the stringer struck his face, Ralph launched himself to the side- then unfortunately ended up crashing into the wall.

Shaking his large head, Ralph laid plastered on the ground for a moment, his lungs feeling squished he was panting so hard.

Oh, that was a mutated scorpion, all right...and it's even worse than I thought! he realized in horror.

No scorpions he could think of had wings like that, glowed green spots like that, moved that fast...or grew as fast as that thing did.

Forcing himself to slowly and cautiously sit up, Ralph saw in horror that the creature was still flying around in the air and was thrice as big as it was seconds ago. Its' strange glowing spots on its back were now neon green, nearly blinding the mastiff if he looked at them for too long.

But the worse of all, the creature's all too big sharp and powerful stinger on its tail was now even larger and sharper than before.

At missing its desired target, the mutated scorpion swooped back down and masterfully curled to fly up high, missing crashing into the wall with great skill. It paused and hovered before flying down and calmly landing on the ground- just inches in front of Ralph.

Creeping closer and closer to Ralph's feet, the horrifying creature continued to grow and mutate slowly as it did. Its' pinchers were now twice the size they were originally and the veins in the wings glowed as brightly as the spots on its back did.

The creature hissed threatening at Ralph as it approached, causing him to scatter backward on his hindquarters. He backed up as far as he could against the wall- and unfortunately backed himself in a large corner of the room.

At the tip of the creature's menacing stinger, some sort of bright neon green dripped freely- and the smell of medicine became that much more potent.

These crazy things inject medicine into whatever they sting?! Ralph gawked, getting more horrified by the second. What like of freak experimenting is this?!

Whimpering in fear as the scorpion continued to get closer and closer, the mastiff slightly raised a front paw off the floor. He knew this was it; he was done for.

With it's huge, dripping stringer raised and ready to strike, the creature ventured in, and was about to drive it's stringer into one of Ralph's huge paws when-

WACK!

Calhoun came out of nowhere and kicked the scambling creature swiftly with her back legs, causing the creature to go airborne involuntarily. It crashed into one of the walls hard and crumbled as it hit the floor seconds after, jerking its long legs around until it finally became still.

Gawking silently, Ralph blinked blinding in the dark for a moment- but even then he still could feel Calhoun smirk cockily.

"You're welcome."