Indeed, the next few days were tense while we were in the barracks. I don't think Amalia spoke a word to me, and aside from the odd click of her beak or cutting her eyes at me, it was almost like nothing happened. The eerie calm was kind of unsettling, but the lack of lecturing from Serge meant that she probably hadn't told anybody about the argument. That was fine. A renewed bout of insomnia, brought on by the incident and all of its lovely baggage, had me in a less than stellar mood anyway.

On the upside, we didn't receive any new field assignments for a couple of days, during which period we were all working random patrol routes or manning weapon emplacements around the AFB. Carmelita got to handle one of the 20mm machine guns with Serge one day, but the patrols were done without partners so I didn't even have to interact with Amalia. Perfect.

All good things come to an end of course, which happened to be the fourth day after the argument. I was halfway through a shift in the base's hospital when I caught wind of some gossip between third platoon's medic, Corporal Adelaide Clawmarks, no relation to Isaac I was assured, and a pair of techs in charge of maintaining inventory.

I was in the presently deserted nurse station and far from prying eyes, but tried to look busy anyway by flipping through some blank medical charts on the desk while they talked in the storage room behind me. Adelaide asked, “You're sure this is right? We've put in requests for antibiotics, saline, med-x, radiation drugs, potions, you name it, and they send half of what we need and five times the tranquilizers we have storage space for and no need of?”

One tech replied, “You tell me. We just take the shipments from the pad and make sure they get where they're supposed to. You want me to send your concerns up to Lieutenant Ironclaw?”

“Yes, please do. Something probably got written down wrong back in Fillydelphia.”

The other tech said, “You know, now that you mention it, I heard some talk at the FunBarn that they were shipping a bunch of cages and transports out this way. Nobody says why so I don't ask, but I bet you three cigarettes that they're related.”

The blank medical charts were far less interesting now that I'd heard that, and I wasn't really even pretending to read them while I waited for the ominous conversation to end and for the two techs to leave. Adelaide drifted back in shortly thereafter and sat heavily. She stroked her beak thoughtfully and quietly, as I was beginning to gather she did with some frequency.

“Everything check out?” I asked casually, setting the charts down.

“Hmm? Oh, yes, I think so. Just a clerical error to clear up I think.”

“What's missing?”

The butter colored griffoness grabbed a pen and blank sheet of paper. She started scribbling some notes down. “A little bit of everything, unfortunately. And we got enough tranquilizers to kill a dragon.”

“That does sound a little bizarre. Can't begin to imagine what we'd need that for.”

She shrugged. “Me neither, so I'm chalking it up to clerical error like I said. And we might have been shorted on other supplies but we should have plenty to get by for now. Plenty to last until we can get this straightened out at least.”

“That's good. I'm sure it was just a simple mistake,” I lied. I couldn't imagine someone mistakenly packed that much tranquilizer in a box to ship off here and nobody back in Fillydelphia asked questions.

“Yep. I'd joke that things are going smoothly right now so we shouldn't worry about running out of supplies, but that would just be inviting irony to strike.”

Adelaide wandered off at that point, probably to go check up on whoever it was that showed up that morning with food poisoning. I should probably be doing something like that myself, but I got a little too caught up in wondering what was about to happen. Lots of cages and transports were headed this way too? If not for that I might just think that Red Eye was hiring more Talons to strengthen our position here, but it seemed unprompted. Maybe he was planning on expanding Fillydelphia into satellite settlements or something and wanted to try it out near a Talon base first? Sounded almost plausible.

“Hey, Kaz?”

I started a little and grabbed at the nearest thing to look busy, which happened to be tongue depressor. “Huh? Yeah?”

Adelaide pointed a talon back through the door her head was peeking out of. “Someone's here looking for you.”

Oh joy. “Okay, thanks.” I dropped the wooden stick and followed her back out to the spartan, unfinished and entirely undecorated metal walled waiting room.

To my surprise it wasn't Isaac this time, but to my displeasure it was Amalia. “Get your gear and meet us up on the landing pad. We're mobilizing.” She sighed and spun around to leave. “And make it quick.”

Don't worry, I wasn't going to tarnish the good reputation of Talon Company with intentional indifference.

Oh well, at least it had been boring so far in medical, so Adelaide wouldn't miss me.

Serge's quick briefing didn't instill me with much confidence or courage.

The details were scant, but didn't sound good. Another caravan, run by Rawhide Routing, was inbound to Fillydelphia and scheduled to arrive at the AFB two days ago. It was on time to its last checkpoint and had not arrived yet, so something had gone wrong.

“It could be something as simple as a broken axle or wagon tongue,” Leigh suggested.

Carmelita scoffed. “Yeah, it might have started out that way, but if I were out there I'd just leave the busted wagon and get a move on to get here.”

Sensing that she knew something I didn't, I asked, “Is it a particularly dangerous area?”

“You kidding? Everywhere outside of Fillydelphia is a 'particularly dangerous area.'”

I rolled my eyes. “You know what I meant.”

“And I told you, didn't I?” Lita crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair at a seemingly impossible angle. “But yeah, it's a known trading route so anyone with two brain cells to rub together would know to hit it if they were looking for easy targets.”

Serge said, “That's why we're going to investigate it. We're looking for the caravan, or if we find evidence that raiders hit it we're supposed to try to locate them.”

“Ugh, seriously?” Lita asked. “First of all, how come we're getting caravan babysitting duty again? Didn't we just do that like three day ago?”

“Because Lieutenant Blackfeathers said so,” Serge answered.

“Right, anyway, we're supposed to go looking for raiders? I mean, sure, I'll be happy to shoot the little shits if they're at the caravan when we get there, but what's that even mean? We could spend days looking for them!”

Serge held up a claw. “Our orders are to fly no further than six hours out of the base. If we haven't found the caravan by then they'll send a larger force tomorrow that can travel overnight. And as far as the raiders go, the lieutenant is leaving that up to my discretion. We won't be spending all day on it, that much I can guarantee.” He extended a single talon. “And while we're on the subject, our orders are to just locate the raiders and any strongholds they have, if they have one. We're not supposed to attack unless they attack first or if the caravan is actively in danger.”

The air was heavy with the unspoken question of “What the hell?” At least until Lita asked out loud.

“It's not my call and it's not up for discussion. Orders are coming from higher up than even the lieutenant, so we can't screw this up.” Serge stepped over to his bunk to start grabbing his gear. “Everyone finish getting ready. We're lifting off in ten minutes.”

Lita groaned and got up. 'Do I at least get to carry the big gun?”

“You want to haul that thing all the way out there?” Leigh asked.

“Hell yes! If we're not allowed to shoot the raiders at least I scare the shit out of them.”

Serge slammed his footlocker closed. “Take what you want, but do not screw this up, Lita. I'm serious. Captain Stern might be watching the results here.”

“I got it dad, jeeze.”

I pulled the little pistol from my holster and asked, “I don't suppose I was issued anything else?”

Serge shook his head. “Sorry Kaz, that's it for now. We're trying to avoid a confrontation so don't worry about it.”

Amalia got up and swished her tail in my direction. “Don't worry, if a fight breaks out we can handle it.” Isaac made a distorted chuckle.

I'm sure you can, miss little professional soldier and mister berserker griffon. Didn't mean I wasn't going to end up like Nadine. “Guess I don't have much choice,” I grumbled.

“That's about the size of it,” Serge answered simply. “Now cut the chatter and meet me up on the landing pad.”

How reassuring.

Finding the caravan was easier and took less time than I expected. We knew the general direction they should have approached from, so that cut the search time down considerably. I'm not sure that we flew more than two hours before the remains resolved themselves on the horizon. Twenty minutes more and we were close enough to see that, sure enough, something had gone catastrophically wrong.

Overturned and ransacked wagons sat exposed among open plains for many kilometers around. The canyons and mountains were the only place that raiders would likely have set up camp, and this seemed awfully far away for them to risk traveling in plain sight. They'd have had to have known when the caravan was coming too, if they were going to hit it at all, which made the situation seem all the more fishy.

There was clearly a fight, either way. Two dead ponies laid in tangled heaps next to the wagons. The ground was pockmarked with dried and soaked in blood, and the wagons were sprinkled and sprayed with red across the white tarps. More blood than I'd have expected from guns too, so it must have been one of the kookier raider bands that used swords made out of sharpened sky cart bumpers or street signs. Yet, there were craters everywhere, implying that they'd been hit by someone hauling explosives, or used some to defend themselves.

Not much sign of tracks either, but out here the wind was strong enough to cover up most within a day. And yet, some of the smashed crates had been dragged about and the tracks and trails of those were still evident.

“What are you thinking, sergeant?” Leigh asked aloud.

Serge hovered in place, weapon pointed down at the debris. “Hellhounds. No doubt about it.”

Leigh nodded simply. “That's what I was thinking.”

Hellhounds? Really? I drew my pistol and scanned the craters. I'd never seen a live hellhound, and that was just okay by me, but I had heard that they tunneled underground. That would explain a lot.

“So, no raiders. Does that mean we can go home now?” Lita asked. “Or do we have to shoot hellhounds because Captain Stern only said to not shoot raiders?”

Serge started a slow, lazy circle over the site. “I don't know. It looks like they're gone and there's not much we can do about the wagons.”

“Good, because I'm not hauling those back to base,” Lita added. She hefted her weapon up and shifted her grip a little. “Carrying Bitch here is a bitch already.”

“That's why I suggested leaving it at base,” Leigh quipped.

One of the dead ponies stirred.

I gawked involuntarily as the mare stretched a lime green foreleg out and cried softly. As much blood as there was, I couldn't believe she was alive, especially after all this time. She was gravely, maybe mortally, wounded. But she was alive! If I didn't do something she'd die for sure. “Wait, one of the ponies is alive!”

Everyone looked her way. A few raised rifles. Serge drifted a little lower and tilted his head. “You're right. Wait, Kaz, stop!”

I heard the warning, but pretended I didn't. The potions were only for Talon use. I know! I was going to catch shit for it, I know! But they were going to have to stop putting me in these situations if they didn't want me to 'waste' a potion on someone.

“Kaz, stop! Get back up here now!” Serge shouted.

“Wait, it's not safe!” Leigh joined in.

“What are you doing!?” Lita cried.

Isaac grunted something.

Amalia yelled, “Stop!”

Heavy flaps of wings signaled someone diving after me, but I was already on the ground. Everything they shouted started to register just as I landed next to the pony. At this range I could tell something was wrong. Her eyes were fixed ahead and lifeless. It was difficult to tell through fur, but her coloration looked wrong. Her lips were pale and blotched…

All sound was drowned out in a dull roar as she erupted from the ground. I gasped and backed away as something enormous and amorphous rose before me. A primal and deafening roar issued forth and the wind tore at my face as the titanic creature swung and missed by a hair's width.

“Ambush!” Lita shouted.

“Bloodfeathers, get off the ground, Kaz!” Amalia screamed from just above me.

Gunshots blasted through the relative silence. Sprays of dust and chunks of earth jumped ahead of me as bullets punched into the ground. The gray and black giant of a hellhound twisted and snarled amid the thumps of bullets slamming into it.

“Fuck's sake, get out of the way! I can't get a clean shot!” Lita yelled down.

Already trying! I jumped up and tried to flap my wings to take off, but in a panic I only managed to get a little distance before landing again. I drew my pistol, drew aim and squeezed the trigger. Nothing! Fuck, forgot the safety. I flipped it and squeezed again. Blam! Blam! Clunk. Shit!

Something latched onto me from behind and tugged hard. “Are you even listening!?”

Without thinking I wrenched free and tumbled over. Amalia glared daggers down at me for an instant before raising her rifle back toward the hellhound. All sound was again drowned out by ringing as she squeezed off more shots. I felt the shudder of the monster collapsing to the ground.

Again, Amalia grabbed me by my armor and hefted me upward. I'm pretty sure she was shouting something angry, but I was too distracted by the ringing in my ears and the ground shifting beneath me.

Dirt flew upward and into my eyes as another hellhound emerged from underground. This one wasn't content to claw at me and hefted a weapon up that I was sure was too big to normally be portable. Blinding flashes and renewed booms of automatic weapon fire tore through the haze and ringing, and I felt the backwash of supersonic bullets shearing the air around me.

I think I screamed when one drilled into my foreleg, but I couldn't hear it.

Amalia lurched and let go, sending me tumbling back down to the ground. I had only a full second to twist around and land on my claws and paws, and immediately regretted doing so as I tried to stabilize and flexed the muscles in my wounded leg.

Carmelita opened up next and the hellhound shuddered as its weapon jerked about from impacts. Two puffs of smoke and flashes from the chamber later and it stopped firing. The shooting pain in my leg vanished as quickly as it came and I scrabbled away from the enraged canine as it slammed the ruined machine gun down toward me. The gun threw up a cloud of sand and dirt, and a bullet threw a spray of red as a precise shot punched through the hellhound's skull. Carried by momentum of its upswing, it twirled backward and onto one of the wagons, snapping an axle and collapsing what was left of it in a splintering heap.

Was that all of them?

The ground trembled yet again and I flared my wings to get airborne before my luck ran out. Two more sinkholes formed beneath me as I rose into the air, followed by two black hellhounds clawing their way through the earth and leaping upward after me.

A massive and impossibly strong paw wrapped around my hindleg and drew me back down, eliciting a very unflattering squeal. I reflexively pointed the pistol down at it and squeezed the trigger, but of course it was still jammed, so nothing happened. Its face twisted into a rancid grin and it drew back its other paw to swipe at me. I panicked. I threw my pistol and hit it squarely in the face. It didn't give a shit.

I remembered the other one and looked up just in time to see claws as long as my beak scything toward me. A dozen gunshots rang out and the hellhound stumbled. Its claws dug into my armor and cut a deep gouge from my neck all the way down to my belly. For an instant I thought its weight would snap the clasps and tear the breastplate free completely.

The collapsing hellhound fell onto its companion claws first, and it did give a shit that time. Both howled in pain and anger, and finally my captor released its grip.

Dozens of booms and muzzle flashes drowned out all of my senses as I beat my wings with all of my might to gain altitude and distance from the battlefield. Call me a coward or a quitter, I didn't care, but I was completely unarmed now and facing something that took high caliber shots to even faze.

Back at the altitude of my squad, I whirled around and reassessed the situation. The two hellhounds were now dead and leaking blood from more places than I could count at a glance. Four of them. That was it. Just four. It felt like forty, but there were four of the hulking beasts lying in mangled heaps on the ground below.

Amalia was still separated from the rest of us. She flew higher and spun to watch the ground below as she rejoined the squad. The ground was motionless and everything was deathly silent, aside from the persistent ringing in my ears. At this rate I was going to go deaf!

I spied my pistol laying a short distance from the last two dogs, but opted to leave it where it was. Talon Company could bill me! I wasn't going back down there for it!

“Was that all of them? I don't see anything else,” Lita said, sweeping her machine gun over the debris and bodies.

“I think so. Kind of a small band. Maybe if there were more they got the hint,” Serge replied. “Whatever. We found out what happened so let's get out of here before more show up.”

Sounded good to me! I wasn't even going to mention the pistol, lest he change his mind and send me down to get it.

Lita looked my way. “Oh… shit!”

What? I looked around and behind me. Nothing there.

“Kaz is hit!” Leigh yelled, pointing a claw my way.

Oh. Right, I'd completely forgotten. I flexed my leg and held it up to get a better look at the bullet wound. It was bleeding, but not as heavily as I'd expect from an impact from a 20mm machine gun. Guess I got lucky in the ironic sense. “It's fine. I'll be fine, I just need to drink a potion and it'll be fine until we get back to base.” Really, I was surprised at how little it hurt. Kind of like cutting yourself with a knife. There was the instant stab of pain, and only a burning, throbbing afterward.

“Leigh, get on the radio and inform Corporal Clawmarks. Anybody in medical!” Serge exclaimed.

“I don't have it! They were still rewiring it so it wasn't ready!”

Okay, guys, you're making a big deal about this, but it was okay. “Calm down, I'll make it back to base fine!”

Amalia drifted closer and her eyes snapped open. Isaac gurgled something and mimed for me to look down.

I've never been a squeamish person. You really can't be when you're in the profession I was. I wasn't squeamish, but I learned that day that there's a powerful difference between seeing someone lying peacefully on a surgical table, or even seeing someone else eviscerated, than seeing it happen to yourself.

My entire underside was drenched in blood. The hellhound's claws had dug trenches in my breastplate, and when they ran out of breastplate, they dug trenches in my flesh. Ragged meat was plainly visible between the shreds of ballistic mesh. In my shock I might have just imagined it, but I was certain I could see my own intestines. My beak dropped open and I tensed up. Blood spurted from the wound and the visible organs shifted.

All at once, I was overcome with incredible pain and nausea.

The last thing I remember was everything growing distant and dark, and the feeling that I was receding away from the world amid faint shouts.

Gain Experience – You gain 3,500 experience points for crushing your enemies.