Chapter IV
A feint. Then a dodge. Lion-o rolled to avoid the next attack. This exercise was meant for him to tell where the attacks were coming by reading mana. Cheetara wasn't going easy on him anymore. Her movements were a lot faster than when they'd started this drill. But he could read it clearly. Now he was just pushing his own body to move in time with what he knew was coming.
Cheetara whirled her staff and shot a jet of electric power at him. The attacks left charred burning marks in the ground and trees behind Lion-o when he dodged. Her mana moved with an ebb and flow. It reflected her own calm, earlier when she had started teaching him to read the mana flow hers had still been tinged in blue and agony. That had faded as she reached clarity of purpose.
The abruptness of Jaga's sacrifice and the reminder of Mumm-Rah's power had been a heavy blow; but they knew what they had to do. So she trained Lion-o, and they all searched for the book.
The mana changed when Cheetara opted toward physical attacks. She came at him quick and there was only the barest indication in her mana before she was attacking at close range. Metal struck on metal when Lion-o raised his sword to defend.
"You should still be able to see it, right?" Cheetara said, her attacks not wavering. Lion-o didn't answer but nodded. It was true, even without the surge and draw of her mana reaching beyond her skin during the magical attacks, the motion of where she was going to move was still showing an afterimage in the mana flow.
Every time Lion-o thought he was getting the hang of a particular reading and attack she changed it and he had to struggle again to keep up. The close-range was entirely different from the long-range attacks before. He'd had this thought before when they first started – but having to concentrate and watch her mana, he was essentially looking at her bared soul. It was a bit like seeing her naked.
From this angle he could see her cleavage, and a light sweat ran from her lean neck down to the full mounds of flesh below. The gorgeous globes seemed to bounce with every movement, and her shirt kept slipping lower…
The butt of Cheetara's staff slammed unceremoniously into his face. Lion-o grunted and stumbled back, promptly tripping over a raised root and landing on his back. He heard Tygra snort somewhere nearby.
"Lion-o?" Cheetara asked surprised that her attack had connected. She hadn't changed strategies yet either, and Lion-o had been doing well up until that point. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah." Lion-o affirmed from the ground. He knew what went wrong. If he concentrated harder than was necessary to read the attacks he was essentially able to see her naked… it was highly distracting and it usually meant he lost track of what that same mana was saying about her movement and potential attacks. As long as he wasn't fighting any hot females in the future this technique should come in handy.
Cheetara extended her hand to help him up, he took it. "Are you having trouble concentrating?" she guessed, Lion-o looked away sheepish, and she shook her head, "Why don't we take a break?"
"Maybe you should fix your shirt," Tygra suggested to Cheetara who glanced down, frowned and tugged her shirt back into its usual position.
Lion-o agreed to a break though and they moved back toward camp where Tygra sat; he had clearly found their 'training' amusing. "Try to focus on your breath and keeping your mana steady," Cheetara instructed.
"I am, but you keep changing it up so fast," Lion-o muttered, "The moment I'm comfortable reading the mana flow you go and change the way I have to do it."
"Just keeping you on your toes," Cheetara told him grinning, "Don't worry. You're improving a lot."
Lion-o nodded and took a deep breath to begin.
"Well, while he's meditating or what-have-you," Tygra stood up, stretching his arms, "You don't need a break. How about we spar for a bit?"
"Can you even fight without that gun?" Cheetara wondered skeptical.
"Of course I can." Tygra assured, setting the weapon down and taking up his usual bolas whip.
"I feel better already," Cheetara arched a single brow, but took her staff in hand and moved with Tygra back to the designated training spot by their camp.
"I'll have you know, I held the record back at the royal palace for 100% victories." Tygra couldn't resist bragging, barely leaving off 'Lion-o also never won once against me.'
"What a coincidence," Cheetara smiled, "I've never lost either."
With that, Lion-o's chances of actually meditating went out the window. He was too busy watching those two go at it. Cheetara wielded her staff, and did not resort to using her magic to shoot attacks; similarly Tygra relied on his whip.
Tygra struck first trying to trip Cheetara's feet from under her with a whip-lash strike. She was too fast and dodged quickly, attempting to come closer range to land an attack. But Tygra quickly re-shot his whip trick to try and seize her staff. Cheetara had to withdraw to shake off the appendage wound about her weapon.
It was a similar procession as Tygra made several attempts to disarm her, while Cheetara tried to alternate between close-range and long-range attacks, which were largely deflected. Eventually Cheetara disarmed Tygra, letting his whip snap around her arm and tugging it away, simultaneously attacking close-range and having Tygra wrench the staff from her.
At that point a sensible fight might have devolved into a fistfight. Tygra opted to wrestle, and Lion-o felt more annoyed than he should knowing that he'd had tried the same tactic. Wrestling with Cheetara would probably be a lot of fun. It ended quickly enough though when apparently both Tygra and Cheetara had the bright idea to have hidden weapons with them. A single silver blade poised at each other's necks.
The weight of him above her was warm and solid. She could feel the strength of his muscles against her, just as clearly as he could feel her heated skin and the sinew of muscle behind soft and pliant flesh.
If Cheetara had won she likely would have said something about how a warrior should always be prepared. If Tygra had won he likely would have said something insinuating something else. As it was they both laughed in amusement at the draw before releasing each other and rolling away to their feet and retrieving their respective weapons.
"You're pretty good!" Cheetara told him, both of them still smiling, "You should rely on that weapon more than that gun."
"Well, this has it's limitations," Tygra shrugged talking about his bolas whip, it was clear that he saw the effective power as the gun still being greater, no matter what skill level he had managed to achieve with a conventional weapon.
Lion-o was not angry. Nor was he jealous. Not in the least. This atmosphere just felt a bit too friendly was all; it was natural to be a bit infuriated. He just wasn't too fond of the image of Tygra straddling Cheetara. No, wait, he wasn't angry. Not even a bit. He just felt it was time they get going.
"Well if you're done there, I think we should pack up camp and move on." Lion-o told them loudly, as he stood up and motioned to the sky. The sun wasn't that high yet. But it was better to get moving early and cover more ground.
The other two didn't contest this suggestion and the three of them packed up their camp and remaining supplies – they were running low, so it would be a good idea to stop at a town soon and stock up. Supposedly there was one not too far outside the forest they were currently in.
OooooooooooooO
They would have to wait a little longer to re-supply.
The map was not wrong and they had followed it. They knew where the town would be; they had followed the river to exit the forest to where the waterway ran through the town. Town was a kind word, it was no longer that. It was a smoking ruin now. This should have been one of the Thundercats towns, it wasn't particularly large but it hadn't been particularly small either.
The three were silent as they walked into the main street leading inwards. The gates had been torn off and the wall was so crumbled in so many places it wouldn't even keep out scavengers. Burnt remains littered the streets and the smell of smoke was still strong.
"Mumm-Rah's forces must have come through here and just destroyed everything." Tygra said his nose wrinkled in disgust. It was tasteless. They were just eradicating Thundercats. There was no other reason for them to come here, this particular village had housed no great power or relic or informants. This had been senseless destruction.
The city's demise had been recent, that was clear enough by the dying fires that still seemed to be burning through the ruin. "Do you think there are any survivors?" Cheetara asked as the three of them walked slowly deeper into the ruined city. Most of the buildings lay in heaps or so fallen down and burnt that there was no way there could be anything left inside.
"Maybe," Lion-o admitted as they headed toward some of the smaller structures still left standing, if only barely. "If there are, we have to try to find them."
The three of them separated briefly to look through the hovels, still standing if only because there were three or barely four walls left. Tygra pushed aside the flap that was one home's door. Within were clear signs of struggle and opened cabinets and doors. This one had been sacked for everything; there were only a few crumbs left scattered on the floor. Bodies lay piled and decaying in what might have been the bedroom.
The three of them met back outside. "I don't think there is anyone left," Cheetara admitted sadly, "I can't smell anything here but smoke and death."
"There don't seem to be any supplies left either that we can use," Tygra told them, "The lizards must have burned and sacked the city – all the places I looked they cleaned the houses of food and items before they left."
Lion-o seemed about to reluctantly agree before they reached the center of the city. Off in a little byway there appeared to a full structured building that was more or less completely intact. "Let's check there, first." He decided. His companions looked over at the building as well.
"Yeah," Tygra agreed, "If anyone did survive Mumm-Rah's troops, they'd want to be holed up there."
Inside it was dark and dusty. The smell of death was less though the scent of smoke was still strong. The stairs to the second floor were damaged on one side but it still seemed stable enough.
"Hello?"
"Is anyone here?"
Cautiously the three of them made their way inside. The whole place was still, reluctant to actually split up the three of them moved as a single unit as they walked through the first floor calling out to see if anyone would answer.
"We aren't with the lizard army!"
"Nice. If you say that they'll think we are, for sure."
"You mean if there really is anyone here," Cheetara said doubtfully as she cracked open each of the doors on the way. Though every room appeared to be empty anyway.
"Forget this then, let's see if the lizards missed taking any supplies or food," Tygra grumbled as he moved ahead heading to where a regular house might have its kitchen.
Lion-o and Cheetara caught back up to him. Apparently Tygra had done a decent job of finding where the food should have been kept. The structure really was just a large house or other kind of center, half the kitchen had been outfitted to look like a café, complete with a backdoor porch that led to the street.
"It might have been a charity organization?" Cheetara wondered.
"Doesn't matter." Tygra muttered as he rifled through the cupboards and drawers looking for anything that might have been left behind. Lion-o moved toward the icebox, the lizards had left the frozen peas at least, but there was nothing else in the otherwise empty ice-chest.
"There's nothing here."
It was then that all three became aware of something in the otherwise silent building. Some sort of presence, like eyes watching them. "There's something here…" Tygra finally said after a moment the air becoming heavier around them.
Lion-o's eye caught on a shadow of movement out of the corner of his eyes. "There! Something moved!" he turned to try and find it. But it was gone. In the dark room and the whole building there were dozens of places something or someone could hide!
Was it possible that the lizards hadn't entirely left?
Lion-o felt Cheetara's mana flare, as she drew her staff, Tygra and Lion-o both baring their weapons too in the event of an attack. But all was still for moments more despite the prickling feeling of observant eyes and a lingering presence.
"There!" Cheetara cried as the shadow moved again and she instinctively shot a bolt of electric energy at the creature! Tygra and Lion-o rounded to face the threat. All three tensed ready for an attack. The creature leapt nimbly over the rampart of the ceiling and dropped silently to its feet in the doorway to the hall.
The three of them ceased their movements entirely once they got a good look at their 'attacker.' It wasn't nearly as threatening as they first thought it had been.
A young cat-boy stood before them, face carefully blank and watching them with golden eyes, only the slight swishing twitch of his tail betrayed any sign of anxiety in the otherwise small and blank-looking figure.
"It's a kid?" Tygra started finally when no one else spoke for a moment. The three of them and the cat-boy just regarded each other for a moment before Tygra lowered his gun, "Uh… hey kid. What are you doing here?"
Following suit Lion-o sheathed his sword, "Are you the only survivor?"
Cheetara similarly abandoned her staff and had the boldness to slowly move forward, "It's okay," she told him, her voice gone honey soft, "We aren't going to hurt you."
The kid's tail twitched again, and the swishing movement stopped. "You sure about that?" he asked his voice likely stronger and bolder than he really felt.
Cheetara smiled and set her staff down on the ground looking over her shoulder pointedly at Tygra and Lion-o to do the same with their weapons. When they complied the boy bared a toothy grin and motioned to someone in the hallway. A young cat-girl of roughly the same age joined him, two tails now slightly waving.
The two of them were multi-colored; both were obviously of mongrel mix-breed, and the poor state of their clothes also indicated a hard life even before Mumm-Rah's attack. The two of them came forward circling the three of them in curious child-like manner.
"So what are you doing here?"
"Did you also survive the attack?"
"Cool sword!" the boy exclaimed looking over the sword of omens.
"What is this?" the girl asked puzzling over Tygra's firearm.
"You smell nice!" they declared circling Cheetara.
Then, "Do you have any food?"
So these two were in this building for a similar reason. Sadly it seemed both them and the children were out of luck. "We were actually just passing through, and when we saw the town destroyed we thought to check for survivors," Lion-o explained, "We were displaced by Mumm-Rah's initial attack on the capital."
"So, you kids are the only survivors here, huh?" Tygra wondered gruffly as he retrieved his gun and holstered the weapon.
"That's right." The two of them beamed, "WilyKit," the girl bowed, "and WilyKat" the boy bowed, "at your service!"
"Honestly it was miraculous enough that even just these two managed to survive," Cheetara shook her head.
"But what should we do?" Tygra scratched his head, "We can take them along for now but…"
"You're right, we'll need to put them in another Thundercat group heading north." Lion-o affirmed.
"The messengers we sent before to the other cities should have all been notified by now, if we make it to another town we may hear news of the different migrating groups that are meeting in the north." Cheetara suggested.
"So we'll just have to take you guys along with us for now," Lion-o agreed turning to address the kits as well, "There are a lot of us left so we'll surely be able to find a group with some people to take care of you."
"North?"
"To avoid Mumm-Rah and the lizard army."
"Ah." The kits looked at each other and seemed to shrug, "Alright then!"
"Glad that much is decided then, but," Tygra started, "Your home was just destroyed and all, you're awfully chipper since all your friends and family are probably dead."
Cheetara and Lion-o had nothing to say or do; they just stared at Tygra aghast at his lack of tact. No, the kids crying would hopefully put him in his place. But no. The two of them just shrugged and grinned.
"Nah."
"We never had any parents, or anything like that." WilyKit said matter-of-factly.
"Yup." Wilykat confirmed, "So it's just us, and we're fine so-!"
The sound of a rumbling belly cut him off, followed by a second sympathetic stomach making similar noises.
"Right, you guys asked earlier if we had any food," Cheetara recalled, "Well the lizards left most of the vegetables, if you don't mind eating that, I can probably make us something?"
"You can cook?" Lion-o asked in surprise.
"Of course I can!" Cheetara told him now choosing to ignore the group as she set about boiling water and adding the frozen vegetables.
"Huh," Tygra grinned, "Who knew?"
Lion-o smiled and sat down with the others to wait, Cheetara's turned back a clear indicator to leave the master chef to work. "So you guys haven't eaten at all since yesterday?"
"No." WilyKat corrected.
"We managed to filch some things from the lizards when they came through," WilyKit explained.
"Even some food," WilyKat continued, "But we ate it all earlier this morning before we went looking for more when we got hungry again."
"We also filched this!" WilyKit said taking up the small shining device connected to a chain around her neck, showing it to them and then rubbing the smooth metal against her face like a treasured item. "WilyKat gave it to me." She said sending the other kit a toothy grin.
"It wasn't that big a deal." WilyKat said coolly as he looked away, though his cheeks were a bit pink.
The room soon filled with the smell of seasoned vegetable soup and before long Cheetara was finished. "Who's hungry?" she asked as the kits declared loudly that they were. It was well after noon by this point and even Lion-o and Tygra were happy to partake in Cheetara's cooking. They could not have foreseen that even vegetables, when coked by Cheetara, could actually taste this good.
"It's not even meat but-!"
"It's delicious!" Lion-o exclaimed, "This is amazing Cheetara!"
"Well, 'I' am pretty amazing," the young cat-woman declared smugly, flipping her hair as well for effect.
"That you are." Tygra agreed as she joined them taking a bowl of soup.
When they had all finished the kits thanked Cheetara profusely and the five of them departed the town together to head for the next city where they might encounter Thundercat refugees heading north.
OooooooooooooO
"Well uh, General Slithe sir… we don't know where it is?"
General Slithe lashed out instantly. Claws raking across his subordinate's scaly face. The lizard-man cried out in pain as the blow drew blood and he stumbled backward.
"You idiot! We needed that! That was our entire mission!" Slithe raged, a large toad-like lizard with bulging eyes and a wide jaw with sharp jagged teeth, "How could you have lost it!"
"Sir, there was a great deal of confusion during the attack last night," Lieutenant Rezard, a tailed iguana-man, stepped in to spare the poor private who had been in charge of transport. The younger lizard gave the lieutenant a thankful relieved look as he withdrew from Slithe's range of attack.
"After you gave the okay for our troops to sack what remained of the city no one was at their correct post when they needed to be and there are several other supplies that are missing as well."
"No excuses!" Slithe declared, "We need that device back! Now!"
"I realize our situation, sir," Rezard grit his jagged teeth, he never understood why it always seemed the strongest lizards who became leaders and generals were always so hardheaded and shortsighted. Just calling this blockhead 'sir' sometimes was grating, "But simply placing blame and yelling about it will not help us retrieve the device any faster."
"Then what do you suggest we do about it?" Slithe demanded cold reptilian eyes going bloodshot.
"It is clear that since we lost the device during the sacking of the town, that we would find it there." Rezard said coolly.
Slithe took a moment to stop spitting daggers at everyone and considered this for a moment, "Fine!" he said finally, "But if it's not there and we don't find it I'll hold you personally responsible Leuitenant Rezard!"
"Yes sir," Rezard agreed, his clawed fist coiling tighter until it felt his scales would stretch apart. Even if he was a lizard sometimes even he swore his cold blood could boil.
When the lizards arrived at the city, before Slithe could blow a gasket and declare Rezard useless and demote or otherwise harass him, Rezard's men found fresh Thundercat tracks. There were five of them, three at least full-grown. How had they missed them in the attack?
Slithe hopped on that faster than the fat toad he nearly was. "After them! They stole it! I know they did!"
OooooooooooooO
The five Thundercats in the meantime suspected little of their trackers or the coming attack. The lizards were on them in moments and it's all they could do to feel their presence moments before attack and have their weapons at the ready.
Cheetara shot lightning from her staff and Lion-o threw slashes of electric charge from his sword, as far as attacking by magic he had improved quite a bit. Tygra's gun fired off at the closest targets first, his second hand opting to continue using his whip to cover his other side as well. They had to use everything at their disposal in a surprise attack against so many.
"They are using magic sir! Another one has a firearm! We can't get close like this!"
"Who cares! Just kill them and get the device!" Slithe demanded. "It's there! That little one has it! Get it! Kill her and get it now!"
"Sir, should I take a group and start getting the mechs ready for combat?"
"No," Rezard disagreed, it would take too much time and if they didn't overwhelm them with numbers now, disabling their magic attacks, they could escape or defeat them all too easily. "Go get the ansiblar and activate it."
"Yes sir."
There were many of the lizards, but they were no match. The Thundercats were always superior fighters, it wouldn't take long now; and it even seemed that the leaders of the group were nearby. If they could take out that large one – the general it seemed – they should be able to momentarily disarm this battle unit of Mumm-Rah's completely.
"Lion-o! Cover me!" Cheetara told him as she leaped over the heads of the first wave of attackers moving closer to where the general stood – all she had to do was take him out with a single shot – her magic would work fine from this range.
The lizards hauled out a large metal box of some sort and threw some switches, the mechanism inside began to turn and a low rumbling sound filled the air. Cheetara aimed her staff and directed her mana outward to attack. But something was wrong.
The attack did not come, and worse she could feel it now, as though her mana were being pressed down and kept inside her like a second layer of skin had tightly wrapped around her and was suffocating her magic.
"Cheetara!" it was Lion-o's voice. She turned to see the wave of attackers that had turned. She extended her staff to fight normally, but she couldn't shake the sickening feeling inside her.
"Our magic doesn't work?" she cried out and her eyes met Lion-o's, it was true, he could feel the pressure the same as she could. Tygra at least appeared unaffected.
"What's wrong with you guys! Look out!"
The lizards had thrown a net over them – soon their movement would be restricted completely. They couldn't use magic – without that could they even fight against this many?
What could they do?
AooooooooooooN
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