By the second day of squatting in the cabin, Zul'kresh had overcome the infection in his head and hand via a steady intake of most of the alchemical stock in the basement. Rest, however, wasn't responsible for that recovery since he'd barely had any. Plotting vengeance was a laborious task, and the equipment typical of a hunting lodge left no shortage of ideas.

Closing the curtains and fixing the door frame with birch tar followed quickly after covering his own tracks outside. He even masked his scent with lime on the ground and cut lumber in the cabin just to be sure. If he had enough time to properly prepare a trap, he might as well go all out. That was only the beginning.

Mostly clothed in furs, he sat down on the couch to take a break. He'd just spent hours setting up snares from the ceiling, and before that he'd raided the wine cabinet, crushed the bottles, and affixed the broken shards beneath each windowsill with more tar. His task of planning creative ways to ambush whoever walked in had kept him so preoccupied that, when he found himself with little else to do, doubt crept into his psyche.

Although he'd obviously been wronged in every sense of the word, his inability to remember what had happened cast his plans in a bad light. He'd been inside of the cabin for two days, and there were no signs of life aside from his ravager. He was penniless excluding what he could steal from the cabin, and that was a risk; the nearest town was neutral but mostly human, and his current location was marked as Alliance territory. Trying to sell anything he could carry could possibly land him in jail in a foreign land, leaving him with few options to move on with his life and get back on his feet.

So for how long? How long was he willing to wait there to exact a revenge that may never be possible? He had no idea who the inhabitants were or where they were. He'd need money not only for himself, but for others. His boat was moored at the rivermouth near Thas'talah along with his other companion pets; the dryads there couldn't care for those forever. If he started walking at that moment, he'd need several days to arrive assuming the cabin was near Bradensbrook since he'd have to stop and forage for food; he'd already eaten most of the cabin's stock.

And then the big question...what if he had it all wrong?

What if the inhabitants had simply bought his stuff and the guitar from the black market? What if they were innocent, having thought the goods were legitimate, and had nothing to do with his misfortune? What if he waited for days and took revenge on the wrong people?

As he pondered, his gaze fell down to the ashtray. His new head and hand were still lightly colored but not as much as they'd been originally, providing a stark contrast to his old hand. Whoever had taken it must have skinned it, treated the flesh chemically, then stretched the skin back over the muscles and forced the fingers into a cupped position. The resident taxidermist whose workspace was in the corner hadn't carried out the act on a whim; what they'd done was a willful act which must have required a considerable investment of time.

He scowled. Screw doubt; the next person he saw was going to die.

Zul'kresh didn't have to wait long. On the following afternoon, he was taking a nap on the couch when voices awoke him. His ravager remained curled up on the rug, but his big troll ears could easily pick up on the sound of a group of people in the quiet woods. They were still far away, granting him time to wake up his pet bug and hide.

His pulse raced as he waited for the voices to approach. They spoke Common with Gilnean accents, and a few were in worgen form. He couldn't count them exactly due to the way their voices reverberated among the trees. Maybe four? Five? They seemed weary but healthy, and they were carrying things. He could hear the sound of cheap iron camping equipment as well as a heavier soft object. His ravager nearly jumped out of his arms, ravenous at the sound of strangers, and he had to hug the creature to his chest to keep it quiet.

He had to work to control his breathing. Every time one of the voices laughed, he felt a pant of anger strike him even though he wasn't sure who they were. Keys jingled and gave him a jump, and he fought himself not to shift and drag the fur clothing he'd appropriated against the table he was hiding under. Any unnecessary sounds or movements at that moment could ruin the whole plot.

"It's good to be back," a Gilnean man in human form said while more keys jingled.

The group continued to chatter amongst themselves as he worked the door open, unaware of what lay in wait. Zul'kresh almost snorted in delight when the door swung open and pulled the string for the shotgun trap he'd set up.

BLAM

The scream of the human was louder than the gunblast, and it was followed soon thereafter by angry shouts and humans shapeshifting into worgen. The door continued to hang open and shadows dashed across the midday sun, sending the ravager into a silent frenzy. Zul'kresh could already hear people stalking around each side of the cabin as the others regrouped.

"You bastard, you rat bastard," the injured man yelled at the doorway while shapeshifting. "Got me in my arm, and a little in my chest," he then said to the others.

"No arteries were hit, I think," replied another, older sounding wolfman.

Before those at the front door could even counterattack, Zul'kresh felt the air pressure shift rapidly in the cabin. A slight shake in the walls signaled a window being opened upstairs at the loft, and another scream rang out a second later, shocking the worgen at the front door.

"Son of a bitch, my foot! Pull me out!" the one who'd climbed in through the window yelled after stepping on the broken glass shards beneath the sill.

"Get him out, quick!" the older man yelled. "Move, move!"

More footsteps raced to the back of the building when the first few arrows flew in through the front door, though Zul'kresh used the commotion outside to mask the sound of his creeping up to the loft. Many hands scrabbled against the outside wall of the building.

"I'm stuck, I can't get my leg out!"

"Calm down, let me climb-"

"My foot's cut bad, I can't set it down to press out of the window!"

"Stay calm, let me climb up next-"

Like a dodgeball of death, Zul'kresh launched his pet ravager at the bloodied worgen leg sticking in through the window, allowing the insectoid to sink its toothed jaw into the furry flesh. The mere companion pet wasn't strong enough to pull the worgen inside on its own, but Zul'kresh was, and the ravager helped him to minimize resistance.

"Nooo! It's another one of those things!"

"Hold on-"

"It's got me, it's got me!"

Once they'd pulled the injured wolfman inside, Zul'kresh dragged him across the loft and strangled him while the big bug bit one of his wrists. Not foolhardy enough to crawl into a window with a rabid ravager on the other side, the would-be savior dropped to the ground with a thud and ran back around to the front door, where more arrows had been shot through.

"I'm going in!"

"No, just wait!" the old timer yelled.

"No, they got him! We've got to do HHAAARRRR!"

The would-be savior barged right in to the cabin, knocked the shotgun trap aside unintentionally, and stepped directly into Zul'kresh's steel bear trap (which they'd stolen). The forest troll couldn't actually see it from the loft, but he heard the trap snap shut and a bone breaking within flesh, and the blood curdling roar of the victim made the troll warrior grin even more than crushing the first infiltrator's Adam's apple did. The intruder downstairs hit the floor hissing, but the sound of another one entering and fiddling with the gun killed Zul'kresh's joy.

Half a second too late, Zul'kresh twisted to use the suffocating wolfman he was strangling as a living (or perhaps dying) shield. The wolfman who'd initially been shot at the door fired the last remaining round in the shotgun blindly, sending buckshot through the floor of the loft and into the forest troll's left leg and hip. The worgen in his hands finally died, bleeding onto the floor and into the holes punched in the loft by the shotgun pellets; the troll hoped his own blood, which was flowing painfully and copiously, wouldn't cast too much of an odor. The flesh wounds stung like knife wounds but he kept quiet, trying to conceal his exact location.

Unable to restrain his ravager due to his attempts at muffling his own sounds, Zul'kresh could only watch as the loyal companion pet pounced from the loft onto the shooter's head, eliciting a muffled yelp and then a gurgling cry. The sound of an arrow soon thereafter caused the troll's heart to sink, however. Ravagers were built like tanks, even the little miniature battle pet breeds, but arrows could pierce armor both manufactured and natural. Even if the specific breed he'd owned only lived for a year or two at maximum, the thought of one of his companion pets dying for his sake after having served so well on Argus sent his heart pounding in rage again. He couldn't even hear insectoid legs skittering on the wooden floor - the archer outside must have scored a headshot. That made two of his pets they'd murdered, in addition to two people that seemed like they'd been his friends.

Claws scrabbled at the doorway, but the wolf men kept quiet for a few seconds as they dragged a body out. A chain rattled, and that was when the noise level shot up again.

"DON'T LEAVE ME!" the worgen who'd stepped in the steel trap yelled.

A female Gilnean in human form, probably the person who'd been shooting arrows, replied. "Shut up! Don't draw attention!" she whispered.

"Get me out! Get me out!"

"Shut it you stupid git, it might not be dead!"

Guessing that 'it' referred to himself, Zul'kresh slid across the floor of his loft, leaving the corpse of the wolf man he'd strangled behind him as the two people below argued. Every inch he crept felt like he was being shot all over again, and the troll remembered that the buckshot he'd loaded the shotgun with had been mixed with rock salt. The wound hurt much worse than it actually was, and he ignored the pain until he slid to the safest distance he could from the edge of the loft. He could see the legs of a dead worgen as it was being dragged, probably the one who'd been shot at the door and then shot him back, as well as the back spines of his ravager and an arrow sticking down in the same direction. He counted...he'd just killed two of the bastards, another was stuck in his bear trap, the archer was dragging a corpse, and he suspected there were more of them outside. This wasn't over.

The wolf man stuck in the trap continued yelling, obviously panicked and ruining the plans of his allies, who stopped responding to him. The man's roars blotted out the sounds of those outside, a major detriment to any more sneak attacks.

"...can't go..." Zul'kresh heard one of the worgen outside say, likely the older male. The conversation was muffled by the outer wall and the panicked idiot downstairs. "...booby trapped..."

"...not to lose..." replied the female.

"We can't...will go...but we got..."

Just as the noise provided cover for the two worgen plotting outside, it also covered the troll's movements against the wood planks. He'd raided the cabin's weapon racks over the past three days, and he'd hidden their own weaponry all over the place. Leaving the trapped idiot to scream downstairs, he took up a few human-sized spears that felt more like darts in his big troll hands and peered around to see where the remaining worgen were.

The chain rattled again as the trapped worgen tried to escape, though he'd only cause himself more bleeding. "GET ME OUT!" the man yelled as he struggled.

The door frame creaked like it did when Zul'kresh had walked through, and he knew the worgen-form fellow had entered. Maybe he was trying to surreptitiously rescue his trapped friend...he'd pay for his heroism. As soon as the brown hairs of a worgen ear appeared above the loft's edge, the forest troll leaned over and let one of the short throwing spears fly. He caught a brief glimpse of the older worgen's unprotected neck, the trapped idiot screaming and pointing at him, and the human-form archer in the doorway who must've guessed Zul'kresh next move. She looked like she'd seen a ghost even as she shot him with an arrow.

The projectile hit him in the shoulder, piercing his appropriated fur coat and sticking into the deep muscle. He growled and rolled further back on the loft at the same time the spear he'd thrown impaled the older worgen's neck, eliciting a gurgling cry. The idiot in the bear trap roared melodramatically and collapsed to the floor, but the archer was more focused.

"Bloody hell, it's the bugger we killed!" she gasped, helping Zul'kresh to ignore the pain and focus on his anger when she confirmed that he had, indeed, caught the right people.

Another arrow pierced the floor of the loft mere inches from his head, sending pinpricks up and down his skin. He slid over to the strangled corpse and tried to move behind it, but their combined weight threatened to collapse the entire loft.

"What do you mean - Denny is dead!" the idiot cried.

"I mean, that's the monster we shot in its sleep! The one we found with the two others!"

"That was weeks ago you nitwit!"

"Weeks?" Zul'kresh murmured irately.

The archer shot another arrow through the loft, scoring a direct hit into Zul'kresh's thigh by chance. He held his breath and carefully pulled his leg up, tensing up when the loft's rafters groaned.

"I swear it's a zombie or something! It's the same bloody mongrel!" the archer insisted while shooting another arrow into the loft.

The arrow tore into the spot where the buckshot had ripped through earlier, opening the hole a tad bit wider. When the hole was large enough for Zul'kresh to see the last worgen bleeding out onto the floor in his steel trap, he knew there was a problem. The loud creak of the loft rafters wasn't even a shock anymore.

Sturdily built but not intended for a troll and a human in worgen form to occupy it at the same time, or to be shot full of lead and arrows, the loft started to tip over. The rafters only leaned to the side and allowed the entire loft to slide off of them. Glass from all shelves on the walls as well as a case full of stuffed exotic animals shattered as the whole wooden plank forming the loft's floor crashed to the ground floor in a pile of wood and other debris. Zul'kresh tossed an entire mattress off of him, since it had fallen on top of him, only to immediately take an arrow to the side of his torso. His kidney felt like it had a bunch of stones in it, though it was only the arrow, and he gasped in pain as he instinctively rolled behind a countertop which wasn't quite large enough to cover his entire body. He heard the archer knock another arrow.

"That's it! That's it! That's the damned thing!"

The next arrow soared over the countertop and cut off half of his ear, though his kidney already hurt so bad that he barely even noticed. Chains rattled and another arrow was loaded as the two survivors frantically tried to back away, scared after seeing three of their companions killed in a matter of minutes.

"It's back from the dead, I tell you!" the archer yelled while shooting another arrow which scraped by Zul'kresh's other ear before embedding itself in the kitchen door behind him.

"I'm bleeding, kill it fast! I'm bleeding, oh Light I'm bleeding bad!" the trapped worgen yelped.

"Bloody hell, it's got to be undead!"

"My leg is broken, kill it now! I'm bleeding!"

"Go back to hell you rat bastard!" the archer yelled while shooting off half of Zul'kresh's other ear.

"I'm losing a lot of blood!"

"Die, beast!"

"Is it dead? Please let it be dead!"

RRRRRIIIIPPP

In the cacophony of yelling, neither of them had noticed the way the forest troll was remodeling their cabin. Gripping the cabinetry and grounded cupboards on both sides, Zul'kresh ripped the entire kitchen cabinet and countertop for the breakfast nook off of the floor and lifted it in front of him like a shield. He couldn't see around it safely, but he did hear the sound of another arrow and felt it pole a hole in the cabinet and break a few coffee mugs inside. Safe in the knowledge that she needed time to reload, he threw the entire cupboard, countertop and all, in her direction. She dodged, but he saw her bow clatter to the ground in the process.

Bleeding, limping, and reeling, Zul'kresh gripped a sword he'd hidden near the kitchen door and tried to cut the human-form archer down. She rolled out of the way, leaving him to cut one of their couches in half as she started to shape shift. Not granting her the chance, he tensed up and charged at her despite the grinding pain of the hot lead still stuck in his hip, reaching her as she was halfway through her transformation. He returned the favor they'd bestowed upon him, slashing at her with the sword and separating her patchily furred body from her twisted, terrifying half-human and half-animal head. The effort forced him to squeeze into a hallway leading to another sitting room, and the arrow stuck in his kidney caught on the wall in the cramped space. Unable to control the effect which the movement pressed into his kidney due to his wound, he felt his bladder shift and his stolen pants soak with a small bit of urine and a lot of blood. He pulled the arrow out of his kidney, groaning in pain and hoping that specific wound would heal before the others.

Every step he took back to the main room of the cabin made him feel like his body was about to break apart at the midsection. He found the last survivor curled up into a ball and dry heaving on the floor. When Zul'kresh reached for the wolfman, he was surprised to find that his target had been carrying a sword. The worgen slashed upward at Zul'kresh and severed two of the forest troll's fingers halfway down, sending the wriggling extremities to the floor. A second slash missed by a long shot since the steel trap on the wolfman's leg was chained to a distant floorboard, and the worgen collapsed in a bloody heap a few feet out of striking distance.

The slice of the sword was so clean and fast that the wounds didn't even hurt, and Zul'kresh felt more confused than angry. "Seriously?" he asked with a raised brow.

Shocked at the sound of a troll speaking its language almost competently, the worgen looked up for a pregnant moment. The wolfman was already trembling from system shock, and he'd die from blood loss no matter what since Zul'kresh didn't know anything about first aid. Once he overcame the initial surprise, a morose expression spread across the wolfman's lupine face.

"It was worth a shot," the worgen replied, and then coughed and hacked for a few seconds. A strange melancholy sadness filled those lupine eyes, and though Zul'kresh was still pissed off and unmoved, he did pause long enough to let the worgen have a few last words. "I wish it hadn't turned out this way for any of us."

Zul'kresh folded his stumpy knuckles up in the length of the fur coat he'd worn to slow the bleeding. "Me too," he answered before turning the wolfman into his soup for the evening.