• Act XV-Poison


    Is it ok to not tell someone you love the truth because you know that they will fear and hate you because of it?


    The morning wasn’t one of the best I’ve ever had. Partly because today was the day we were going to set out with that completely hardheaded little b*tch called Kumori. But, mostly because the very woman I loathed extremely abruptly woke me up via nice bucket of ice cold water.

    After drying myself off and muttering some very nasty things about Kumori, we set off. Octa told us to follow the scent of smoke, blood, rotting flesh, and even other wolves. It troubled me knowing that the smell of wolves was on our list, what did they have to do with our breed? Were they just wolves? Or something far, far more gruesome?

    Problems started to arise s soon as we left the borders of Nobell. Kumori stopped us right in the middle of running and put her snout right into my face, “Listen, freaks,” she began, “I know what Scrapers look like, smell like, fight like, and taste like. So, don’t think that just because father Octa said you had to come with me on this mission that you’re some kind of elite army. You guys no nothing of what you’re up against and it’s up to me to train you.”

    I had to let out a wolf’s scoff, “Train us?”

    Kumori became a human, took out her dinky bow and arrows and aimed it at my face with a smile.

    “Did I stutter? If you babies don’t want to die, you need to listen to me.”

    Ichio flashed into his human form as well. I was still new to his human appearance. His hair was the color of soaking wet sand, like my mother and his face was almost a spitting image of my father’s.

    “Hey, I take offence to that!” he objected folding his arms in front of his chest.

    Kumori aimed her weapon at Ichio now and gave him a smug grin, “Do I look like I care?”

    My instincts kicked in randomly and I launched myself at her bow and snapped it in half with my teeth. I spat the splintered wood form my mouth with a small growl. I didn’t regret what I did after I blinked human and saw the emotion on Kumori’s face.

    It wasn’t the reaction I was expecting though, indifference.

    “Anyway,” Kumori started only, she grabbed my gun out of the holder I had strapped at my waist. “Fire arms won’t work against Scrapers. You can hit them anywhere you want and they won’t die.”

    I snatched my gun back and lightly placed it back in its place, “That’s impossible.” I scoffed and placed my hands on my hips.

    Kumori jabbed her index finger right onto my forehead, “The only place to kill them is the Infected Space, or I.S. A Scraper’s I.S is the place in which they were hit with a poison dart.

    “That poison dart is what turns ordinary wolves into Scrapers. But, the only problem is, that every Scraper’s I.S hides in an individual spot and is smothered by thick armor. The only way around the armor? Water.”

    I could feel the confused stares join with my own. “Water?” Zero said as a human.

    Kumori walked over to a puddle and held her hand over it. Slowly, the water began to rise off of the ground in a crude cylinder. And in seconds, she made the column of water jump from one hand to the other smoothly and without a single drop out of its place. Of course, Hotaka was all eyes and looked like nothing in the world could be more interesting than watching Kumori juggle water. Which was actually true, this was definitely something one doesn’t see everyday.

    After making water defy gravity, Kumori flicked a couple of her fingers and the water froze into ice immediately. Then, with her usual smug grin, she flung the huge icicle at a tree and it almost stuck out the other side.

    “And unless you pests can do that, you need my help,” she scoffed last.

    I felt huge warmth coming from beside me and I then saw Sparks in flames, staring at Kumori, “How can I use water? I am literally made of fire.”

    She pondered for a moment, “Well then, you will make a great diversion. They won’t expect something like that from you. While they are distracted with you, we can get the Scrapers’ I.S”

    I hated the idea of someone like Sparks being like bait but she was right. Someone like him wouldn’t benefit at all by using water as his weapon. I suddenly got an idea, “What if you make me ice bullets. Then I can shoot them and with the warmth of the gun, the ice will melt and the water will hit the mark and kill the Scrapers.”

    “Nice idea,” Hotaka intruded, “But with the trajectory, velocity and momentum of your gun, the water would just spray everywhere once it left the barrel.”

    Kumori came over to me, took my gun out of its holster and inspected it. “Not necessarily, Hotaka. If I tinker with this a little, I can make Yukiru’s plan work. But, that’s a lot of tinkering. It would take many hours maybe days for me to successfully adjust this gun. Good thing it’s a good model.”

    And for once, I actually saw Kumori keep a serious tone and mean it. I looked over at Zero and he seemed a little bummed that the gun he picked out for me was going to be altered drastically but I was actually excited. And with that, we continued on with our search-and-destroy mission.

    //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

    Following Kumori was much more than a chore. Twisting and turning, stopping suddenly and running up and down steep hills and mountains. We even had to jump down a waterfall, is she trying to kill us? But, as the sun began to sink, I refused to sniff, turn, and run another foot. As soon as Kumori gave to ok to relax, all except her fell to the ground like we had just died.

    “How much more of this, O Great One?” Zero asked in hilarious sarcasm.

    “Until our quest is complete!” returned Kumori sternly, “Now, we have four hours to rain before they become active.”

    “Before who becomes active?” I heard Ichio ask in an exhausted whine.

    “The very things we are set out to kill, duh!” once again, she was never short of an annoying, snappy comeback.

    After we gained some of our energy back, Kumori filled up these huge empty seed pods-about the size of a balled up fist-with water. She then taught us to slam the pods onto the Scrapers’ I.S without causing much harm to ourselves.

    In about 4 hours the sun had died and the moon smiled down and gave us quite a lot of light, even through the dense trees. I was sitting down with my legs crossed and marveling at my new gun that Kumori had altered. It was ice cold even as I held it in my hands. I glanced at Kumori and she looked at me at the exact moment she shouldn’t and our eye locked.

    “I replaced all of the metal components with an ice metal blend so that when you fire, the ice would melt but stay at a normal bullets density. In short; water bullets.” Her gaze fell back to the small boar we captured for dinner and she was cooking over a fire.

    I held my gun up to the moon light and a small twinkle ran from the back to the very tip of the gun and I swear I heard a ‘ding’ when it ended.

    I would’ve become a wolf and fell asleep by the fire but a certain little continuation with Zero was in order. I turned my head to see him sitting on the balls of his feet about 6 inches from my face and his usual up-to-something smile begged for a smile in return.

    “You forgot didn’t you,” he said with a subtle purr.

    “Pfft! What? No, why would I?” I asked with the nonchalance I did not feel.

    Following a quick, deep kiss from Zero--a preview if you will--we walked away from the fir and everyone else. His hand was in mine and Zero was in front of me, leading me to the perfect spot for our “continuation.” Which just happened to be a huge tree just diagonal from an even more massive waterfall. I was just in awe of the water fall and how high it was, how mighty and just how beaut-

    Zero firmly planted his lips onto mine and my brain completely switched off. I was going to step back to give my self the space to breath when needed but my foot caught on something and I tumbled and fell and tumbled some more- wait…why aren’t I falling?

    I opened my eyes to see bark against my back and Zero looking concerned. I slammed into the tree and Zero was nearly sandwiching me to it, I’m not complaining though. I gave him a reassuring halfhearted smile before we commenced our relentless assault on one another. My arms slowly made their way around Zero’s neck and is hands pressed gently yet commandingly on my hips.

    And just like always, we were in sync, out lips, heads, tongues and breaths were all carried out for the benefit for ecstasy.

    I was just about to wrap a leg around Zero’s waist before we heard a loud, unrecognizable snarl come from the direction of our camp. For a millisecond I froze, unwanting to know what it was but then I heard Ichio yelp and Hotaka growl. Zero and I flashed into wolves and darted to the rescue, I hoped.

    Nothing really could have prepared me for what I saw, a huge wolf, standing on it’s back legs—like a man—and holding a small sword. Its I.S was over one of its eyes. I then smelled the strongest smell of blood and metal ever to curse my nose and I knew it was a Scraper. Kumori was already knocked out and the rest were cornered. Sparks was fully in flames and Hotaka had his water pods at the ready. I saw that my gun was right next to one of the Scraper’s back paws. I glanced at Zero for reassurance, which he didn’t give. I blinked human and dove at my gun. Before the monster could even react I had fired a couple of water bullets at its I.S and it fell immediately after I hit the mark.

    I silent sigh of relief sung among us. I walked over to Sparks to let him relax enough to fizzle out. Hotaka didn’t even check to see if Ichio or Sparks were ok before running to his precious little Kumori. I almost died of laughter when she awoke and, out of reflex, punched Hotaka square in the nose.

    I giggled, “She seems to be fine.”

    I lightly put my gun back into its holder as I walked over to Zero who was tapping the dead Scraper with his foot.

    “Damn, these things are ugly. They smell terrible too.”

    I rested my chin on his shoulder and sighed, I bet there’s more where these came from. Right, Kumori?”

    Before she could answer, Zero screamed in agony and fell to his knees. My eyes caught the Scraper who had pulled out a blowgun and launched a dart with purple feathers at Zero’s side. I shot it in the face again and now I knew it was dead because parts of its brains were spilled on the ground.

    I bent over to help Zero but he flung his arms at me, pushing me away.

    “I’M FINE! Leave me be!!” He seethed after yanking the dart from his side.

    Kumori’s face showed terror, worry and disbelief. I couldn’t stand it when she gives looks with no explanation.

    “But Zero…you don’t-“ I tried to say.

    “I said I’m FINE! Can’t you hear, you freaking idiot!?”

    I pressed one hand on his shoulder and he glared at me with bright read eyes with piercing cat pupils. I was frozen from shock that rocketed through me. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing, hearing.

    Zero raised an arms violently and slammed the back of his hand onto my face, “Leave …me…the…f*ck…ALONE!!!”

    I could feel the sting of tears behind my eyes, “Z-Zero?” I whispered in a quick breath out. What’s going on? Kumori’s face was one that predicted death, and not just one person’s.

    End of Act XV