Hours flew by us faster than I could blink. The air around us didn't blow so it felt stagnant. The sky had clouded up a little bit but in the distance I could see a strip of green light that broke through the darkness. When we all got closer, it was clear that this was Jaguara's city. It was domed just like Freeze City's exterior. The light looked to be the power source of the city. Hige ends up finding us a way inside which was surprising because he usually doesn't see the need to take the lead. Toboe enters first through a large pipe.
With the humans inhabiting this city, we had to be in human form. The place looked so huge from the inside. "Wow! It's so warm!" Toboe exclaimed happily. That tunnel had led us to a lower portion of the city so we couldn't be spotted right away. "See? When I'm right I'm soooo right. Right?" Hige says, lifting his head up high. The scent of this area was far worse than I believed it to be. It made my nose crinkle up but I didn't say anything about it.
"Hige, how'd you find this place so easily?" Kiba asks puzzled. Hige looks back for a moment before shrugging. "Can't say for sure. Must be my keen instinct." Hige answers, a smug look on his face. I just rolled my eyes. "Your instincts huh? I'll believe it when I see it." I say, cracking my knuckles. "Look, unlike Kiba, I don't use them as much." he responds, walking by Toboe. "Look how high the ceiling is! Man, this dome is the highest I've ever seen!" Toboe laughs, looking at the ceiling. I turn to Tsume and Kiba.
We had to figure out a plan if we were gonna get Cheza back. "What's the plan you guys?" I ask. "Well, we do know that Cheza's here somewhere in this keep." Kiba responds. Hige comes back over to us while rubbing the back of his neck. "Well, if that's the idea then we need to go in that direction." he points out. I gaze back at him in perplexion. How the hell does he know that? Had he been here before?
Just before anyone could ask, the sound of Hige's stomach growls. My eyes roll in annoyance. "Didn't we eat not too long ago? You're like a bottomless pit." I say, putting my hands in my pockets. He nervously chuckles at that because he got caught. "Eh… how about this? Let's break up into teams! You three find a way and the runt and I will scope out the joint. K?" Hige suggests. "Don't you mean scope out the food?" Tsume growled, taking a step forward. Hige holds up his hands as if to surrender.
"Don't worry. We'll bring just enough for everybody." he announced. I scoff at this because I highly doubt he'd actually do that. He might do it again. "Yep, leave it to us!" Toboe agreed, pounding his chest with a fist. "And that will give you and Luna some more quality time." Hige teased. I blushed a deep red and tried to cover it up. "Shut the hell up porky." Tsume growled.
"Never mind that, that would work since we'd be less conspicuous if we split up." I say, changing the subject. Kiba nods at the idea. We didn't want to humans to get suspicious that 5 wolves had entered the city. "Alright. The three of us will check out the area around the keep." he says. "It's a plan! Let's meet back here at moon high!" Hige replies, giving us a thumbs up. He then runs in the other direction. "Hige wait up!" Toboe calls, going after him.
(Blue & Cher)
Blue holds a helpless man up against a wall by his neck. Her and Cher were getting the man's ID tags in order to blend in with the rest of the city. Especially Blue. "What the hell is this? You bitches tricked me!" he grunts. Blue gives him a wolfish grin. "Do you want to get slapped again?" she calmly asks. "Okay! Here! Take them!" the man said, giving them the ID tags. Blue gives one to Cher but didn't let the man go. "Hm, if you had cooperated nice and easy, you wouldn't be covered in bruises now would you?" Blue chuckled, letting the guy go.
Cher then approached the man with a smile. "Flowers have thorns. Try to remember that." she says, poking the man's bruised face. The wolf dog and woman walk side by side with their tags. They felt proud of the fact they just robbed a human of his tags.
(Hige & Toboe)
"Wait up Hige!" Toboe calls, catching up with Hige. "And just up ahead there's an elevator and past that…" Hige murmurs to himself, seeming distracted by something. And just like he said, there was an elevator in a back alley that looked to be out of use. "I don't believe it!" Toboe exclaimed, amazed. The two wolves get on the elevator and Hige presses a button to send them up. "This should get us where we need to go." Hige says, looking up. "I don't know Hige, maybe we should go back. They might be waiting for us." Toboe says, feeling uneasy about this.
"Calm down, will ya? We'll be fine. You'll see. Let's see what this place has got." Hige says, brushing it off. Hige was totally cool about all of this but Toboe wasn't and he wasn't concealing it either. Something was off about this place that Toboe didn't like. It felt strange. "Hige, you knew about this. Have you been here before?" Toboe asked, catching with Hige. The two walked down the street inconspicuously.
:Nope. But when you're instincts are as good as mine are, you get a feel for things." Hige replied coolly. The wolves didn't realize that they were being watched by a secret camera that was sitting in the back of the alleyway. It was watching their every move.
They wandered down a desolate street and keep their eyes forward. The various humans were looking at the two while talking. "Man, this place is huge! It's got plenty of food and water that should be easy for us to find." Toboe said, looking around the surrounding area. There was more than enough for the pack to have to satisfy everyone's hunger. Even if Luna doesn't exactly enjoy having to hear Hige's stomach growling every five minutes.
"After turning the corner up ahead, there's a big stairway that leads up." Hige mumbles. This was starting to worry Toboe. Just as he said, there was in fact a long stairway after they turned a corner. "Whoa, it's really here." Hige quietly said. Toboe was surprised at this. Toboe wondered why Hige knew where everything is despite them never being here before.
Then suddenly, two boys on skateboards flew down the stairs; nearly running the two wolves over. "You dumbasses! Watch where you're going!" Hige chides, waving his fist at them. But they only got laughed at by one of the boys. "Looks like there's others like Tsume too." Toboe whispered, blinking.
(Luna, Tsume, Kiba)
The three of us bounced swiftly to an upper level of a building. We had a much better view of the entrance to the keep. But there was a problem; the soldiers were blocking it so we couldn't get in there so easily. "Well, front's blocked. Any ideas?" I ask, giving them a side glance. "Well, going through the front is suicidal." Tsume says. Kiba and I look at him. "Not that it scares me, just seems futile." Tsume said, giving us a sly grin. That made me blush deep red.
"Wry man's words. You two want to find a back door?" Kiba asks. "If you insist." the grey wolf says. "Of course, don't think anyone's guarding anything back there. We should ask around." I say, shrugging my shoulders. The two nod at me and we left the area in a sprint.
(Hige and Toboe)
The two wolves walk casually down the scentless city once out of the alleyway. The city was the most immaculate they've ever seen. Toboe felt shivers run up his spine. "Wonder why there's no scent in this place." Toboe asks, looking behind him. "Don't know. That Jaguara lady is probably a clean freak." Hige shrugs, picking up the place. He suddenly stops and puts a hand to his forehead, it started to pound incessantly.
"What's the matter?" Toboe asks in concern. "My head pounds whenever I try to think…" Hige whispered. "Maybe the strain hasn't got to you yet." Toboe optimistically says. Something was wrong with Hige so he says, "Hige, tell me what's wrong." "Agh, nothing's wrong okay?" Hige argued, growing agitated. He seemed to be on edge by the sounds of it. "But you've been acting weird since we got here." Toboe says. "Get the hell away from me!" Hige snaps, twisting his angry face at the young wolf. He then takes off running.
Toboe waits a second before chasing after him. In catching up with him, he sees Hige standing in front of a statue that resembled Lady Jaguara. Hige feels the immense pain in his head graduate, causing him to grab onto it with both hands while screaming. It was as if the whole world around him was crashing down onto his very being. He takes off running into the woods in sheer panic with Toboe behind him in hot pursuit.
Then, there was a road. Hige leaps across it without looking. Toboe comes to it but is stopped by a truck. He was left standing there without Hige anywhere in sight. "Hige… HIGE!" Toboe cries out but receives no answer back. Hige was gone…
(Luna, Tsume, Kiba)
We spent the next half hour running into absolutely nothing. But there was a desolate alleyway that we found ourselves in. The sound of a door slamming from another part of the alleyway catches all of our attention. "THIEF!" someone shouts and two human boys run by us with sacks in their arms. Seeing this only makes me chuckle. "Remind you of anyone?" Kiba smiled. I looked up at the grey wolf with a confident smile on my face. "Looks like you're not the only one to steal just to survive. Wonder what happened to that certain someone?" I say, giving Tsume a nudge. Tsume looks at me with a genuine smile.
"He's not the same guy he once was. But guys like them know the back alley better than anyone I've ever known." Tsume admits. Oh, I believe that he's still there. I'm sure of it. And with that, we chase after the boys. Tsume decided to get a better angle on them and I decided to join him. We jump down directly in front of them, getting them to jump.
"Whoa, what do you two want?!" the boy with the hat asked. "We just want to ask you something." Tsume said calmly. "Keep walking buddy. I'm not doing any handouts. Get your own food." the boy scoffs, holding the sack close to him. "C'mon, we'll leave once we get the answer we're looking for." I say. The boy's look at me and the expression he had on his face made me a bit uncomfortable.
"Hello, there. You're really fine, you know that? Why not come with us for a while?" the same boy says. Hearing that made Tsume go into protective mode. "Touch her and you'll regret it." he threatens. Obviously these humans don't get what fear I was feeling last time that happened. That boy laughed at Tsume's threat and tried taking a swing at him. We were able to dodge that rather easily. I use my body weight to push the boy into the wall with a hard impact. Tsume glances down at the boy, who was sweating.
I gasp when I see him pull out a pistol from his coat pocket. He then starts to fire the gun at us with multiple shots. It went through the bag of food that they carried. Kiba uses his foot to kick the gun out of the boy's hand. When Kiba lands on the other side of them, he slowly turns and gives them a narrowed look. "You guys are so cool!" the chubbier boy said. Us wolves showed them who's boss.
The two boys lean on the wall and they faced us. "Okay, I'll give. Where are you three from?" the first boy asked. "Oh we're from wherever." I answered confidently. "Boy don't we know it. Verbal and I have been from every city you can think of ever since the fat hit the fire. Word is that this is the best and we decided to check it out." the boy with the hat said, looking over to his friend. So these two humans have been on the move like we have been? But it was for different reasons.
"We were wondering if you two know a way into the keep?" Tsume asks them. They looked as if they had misunderstood him. "In there? You don't seriously mean Jaguara's keep?" the first boy asks. The three of us nod. Both boys look at us as though we were juvenile delinquents. "Whatever your reasons for going there, you might as well forget it! There's no way you three will be able to get in there." the first boy says. This Jaguara lady wasn't going to stop us from going in there. We still needed to get Cheza; especially for Kiba's sake.
"Look, we need to get in there because they have someone of ours." Kiba says to them. "You want to steal them back from that noble? You three must take me as a sucker." the boy says. "We're dead serious. We're going in there." I reply, my voice cool. "Wah?! That's suicide! You can't be messing around with nobles like Jaguara! Word on the street is that she's some witch that casts some wacky spells!" the boy exclaims while doing hand motions. I kneel down to their level with my arms resting on them and I look at them dead in the eyes.
"Look, we don't care about whatever she's doing in this matter. We came here for one thing only and nothing more. Can you show us a way in or not?" I say in a serious tone. The boys were wide eyed by my instant response. "Okay, we'll take you three to a back door but you three are asking for loads of trouble. But I don't give a damn." the first boy says. Satisfied with that answer, I stand up with a grin. "That'll be enough. Once we're in, the three of us can handle the rest from then on." Kiba replies. Both boys blink at us in amazement.
"Damn, you guys are cool." the first boy replies. We got those human boys to fall under our command for right now. They lead us to a tremendous ditch like area that was filled with an immense amount of cables and pipes. Looking at it, my strength felt as though it was starting to deplete. Kiba and Tsume felt this too. I can't explain it. "This is the place. No one has ever followed it the whole way before. But the cable runs through the keep itself. With much luck, you guys should get in easily." the first by says. Tsume, Kiba, and I walk ahead of the boys.
"Tsume, Kiba, tell me I'm not the only one feeling that?" I whisper to them. "No, you're not." Tsume replies. "Yeah, it's like the contradiction of basking in the moonlight." Kiba says. "Yeah, it's getting worse by the second." I whisper, looking off to the right. Now that we have found a way in, we can go without the human boys following us.
"You know, Hige and Toboe might wonder where we're at." Kiba says. "Whoa, do you really want to go back now?" I say, glancing at the white wolf. "I agree with Luna, do you want to give up so easily?" Tsume says with a slight chuckle. Kiba was left unable to answer those questions. Also since when did Tsume start to agree with what I had to say? Although I won't complain about it.
"Let's keep going then. They can catch up with us. It shouldn't be too hard." Tsume stated. "I agree. We just need to have faith in them." I beam, looking ahead. The two wolves were shocked by my words. And with that, we all jump down to the pipes swiftly. And in jumping down, I swore I could hear the other boy say, "Good luck wolves. You can do it." How did he know we are wolves?
(Hige)
During all of this, a staggering Hige was leaning up against the wall while holding his aching head. It only seemed to grow worse and worse with each passing second. "Damn it! What the hell is…" he groaned, almost on the verge of tears. Suddenly the sound of a gun cocking behind him makes him gasp. He jerks his attention towards them with wide eyes. He makes a run for it but ends up getting blasted by the pulse gun and it ends up sending him over a ledge with a scream.
Once over it, the tan wolf crawls away from them in an attempt to get away from them. But he comes to a dead end. Those same soldiers were coming towards him with their guns partially raised. The pain in his head suddenly strikes again, causing him to shout in pain and fall to the ground on his side. His visions started to get cloudy and blurry. The soldiers were in front of him. He was sure that they were going to kill him.
One soldier kneels down and inspects his collar. "Number 23 huh? Doesn't look like he's with anyone else. Let's go." he said, getting up. To Hige's surprise, the soldiers left him there. He pushes himself up in a confused manner. "What…? Why did they spare me?" he says to himself, his breaths labored. Seconds after, the pain struck him again and he cringed in pain. It was hurting like hell on earth.
