FSE

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"I just don't understand-"

_ _

"Understand what?" The panther crossed his arms over his chest, shadow-black fur of his shoulder catching a streak of light filtering in through the dusty window. Even there the thick, taut muscles that he'd spent so long honing could be clearly seen. Above that shoulder rose the stock of a rifle, the only one in the community and, as far as anyone had seen, possibly in the entire city. In that streak of light, the couple of markings he'd scratched onto the butt stood out: eleven total, for eleven shots fired.

_ _

Ever.

_ _

"Just..." God, but he was tall. Had to stand up straight and lean his body back to look him in the eye, since when they argued he didn't like the feeling of tilting his head back. "Why it's so important."

_ _

Golden-yellow eyes glimmered dangerously. "Important?" The panther swung his arms out to motion around him. Strong arms, tight and full, capable of catapulting a head-sized boulder fourteen floors up to break a bandit group's makeshift scaffold. Or of hefting an injured partner over his shoulder to carry him the seven miles back to camp. "Look around. People are starting to starve here. There's too many of us in too small an area."

_ _

"So just - expand the farms! Raise the hunting effort! Jason, we can-"

_ _

A sharp-clawed finger jabbed close to his face, making him stumble back. "I wasn't finished. This community started because it was safe. Do you remember when I told you about that?"

_ _

He did. It had stunned him all those months ago, when he'd been alone and frightened out in the city on his own, to find out there was a gathering, a haven of people working together for their common good. This panther had found and convinced him to go along, and though he'd been rightfully distrusting of the intimidating shadow-furred predator at first, now he was glad that he'd done it. For many reasons, of course, not the least of which was how those horrible screaming creatures in the night would not come here.

_ _

"Yeah." He swallowed and, begrudgingly, took a half-step back. Jason straightened back up to his full height. "I remember."

_ _

"Feral wolves and bears and other wildlife our patrols can deal with. The bandits and marauders could be repelled at first with our training, but they've learned what we have here and have made us a focused target." A second finger joined that first one, then a third after. "And - do you remember the main reason why this area was safe?"

_ _

The panther hadn't said anything deliberately intimidating, yet still he could feel his own confidence shriveling under the sharp feline gaze. That commanding aura, the intense feeling of strength and pressure he gave off, had always brought him comfort to be near him - comfort, or something slightly like fear.

_ _

Although when Jason pinned him beneath those powerful arms of his, and he'd settle his weight down on top of him and grin, showing each and every of those sharp fangs that glittered as brightly as his hungry eyes, when he'd lean in to set those teeth against his shoulder, his neck, and then his lip, with smooth barbed tongue following, that 'fear' and 'comfort' mixed together to 'arousal' and-

_ _

He cleared his throat. "Yes. I do."

_ _

"They won't cross running water. We have two streams coming in from the plains outside the city, surrounding the community." A strange, beautiful, and terrifying sight, those two rivers having cut their way through the ruins of the ancient city, weaving their way between crumbled skyscrapers and through overgrown parking lots, slashing streets apart and barreling through concrete. "Those streams are drying up."

_ _

Both of them fell silent for a moment, the sounds of the community around them continuing on regardless. The crackling of fires and rumble of conversation, of a hundred-something other people gathered in this cluster of buildings, predator and prey both. A haven.

_ _

The panther reached over his back, then, not for his rifle but for his pack. A moment later he brought out a box, and held it forward in both paws. "I've accepted that I'm not going to convince you this time."

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"I just..."

_ _

"I know." A gentle smile spread across the panther's muzzle, not the sharp, unforgiving grin he adopted when slinging arrow after arrow towards a group of three bandits and their trained war hounds, nor the hungry and needy half-smile that dripped onto his face when he pressed his hips forward and back atop him, when his breath came out in hot, short panting, when his tongue dragged up along his throat... "And that doesn't worry me. You can take care of yourself now. I've seen that."

_ _

"Thanks to you, I can."

_ _

That smile widened a little. "You're a quick study. I've told you where I'm going, somewhere more reliable and better hidden than this, and... I'll be waiting for you." He pressed that box into his arms. "You can use this to find me. Okay?"

_ _

"But..."

_ _

"I'll be waiting." Then he leaned in, touched his lips to the wild dog's, held there for a moment, and drew back. "I love you, Askia."

_ _

Askia sighed where he sat, fingers playing over the smooth brass metal surface of the little clockwork device. He'd gotten used to the heft and feel of it in the time since he'd last seen his panther, his Jason but still every time he saw it, every time he turned the key and let it play its odd little collection of sounds, it brought back the same bittersweet wistfulness that he'd first felt watching him leave.

He'd been right, of course. The wild dog swallowed, turned it over again, looked up and out over the streets below, careful not to upset his balance on the twisting limb of the tree upon which he sat. Another month at the community and the streams had dried up, leaving the place even more vulnerable than it had become under the slow, steady exodus. No nearby source of water meant no irrigation for the farms, fewer patrols meant more dying every night... at least he left before it had crumbled completely.

True, genuine screams were one thing, but having to hear both that and the mockery of those hideous creatures... that had happened to Askia once in the past, and in some dark way, he was glad that he'd left the community before he'd have to make that once into a twice.

How long had passed? He kept track of the passage of days in a notebook in his pack, but page after page after page of tally marks jumbled together and tricked his eyes. Six months, by his estimate. The same length of time between when he'd first met Jason and when they'd parted ways.

Amazing what can happen in six months. Amazing, and terrifying.

He tugged his hood a little further over his head, then had to adjust it for his wide dinner-plate ears to fit right in the holes he'd cut. Right after, though, one of them flicked toward the broken window through which they'd made camp tonight, and... after another moment his sharp predator's eyes picked up a familiar silhouette in the smooth velvet darkness of the room.

_Another night._Felix had done well in the time since _he_had almost gone his own way, four days ago now. It was obvious that he'd spent enough time on his own to know his up from down, so to say, and the longer he spent alongside the wild dog, the more confident he became. No longer did he flinch every time Askia turned to say something to him; no longer did he jump and startle at every unknown sound from the bushes and trees, no longer did he cower and, maybe unconsciously, wriggle closer to the dog if they found themselves still on the ground at nightfall.

Tonight, thankfully, had been another uneventful night. With the barest sliver of the sun's morning light starting to peek between the leaning pillars of the skyscrapers clustered around the streets, Askia briefly leaned his head back against the rough bark of the tree, let out a soft sigh, and slid the device's box over into his lap. It took up a lot of space in his pack, but it was by far the most important thing he owned - other than the revolver hanging at his side, of course. A gun was infinitely valuable in this world.

Due to his still-wounded arm, Felix left most of the hunting and watching to Askia, though the opossum had offered to take up a watch shift of his own the other night. "To give you a break," he'd said, a soft smile on his snout. "You deserve it, I think." He'd become more attentive and observant in those few days, too, pointing out places that would make good camp locations, nudging Askia if he started to feel uncomfortable about something or another.

He had a good sense for danger, too, once he'd managed to clamp down on his innate prey-born skittishness: two days ago they had unknowingly entered the territory of a small group of marauders, Askia not realizing it because they had masked their scent with mud. It was Felix who noticed, lifting his nose to the air and squinting with concentration, and then Askia picked it up, too. The smell, the reek, of burning fur and charred flesh. No smoke trailed into the sky, but past another few trees half as thick as the buildings themselves, they saw him standing by himself in a clearing, a slim, small dark-furred foxwolf who had painted one of his ears and set trails of hungry fire up his arms and shoulders.

A different kind of fire burned in his eyes, too. The two turned and ran as soon as they had seen that, Felix gradually falling behind but this time managing to keep to his feet. "How can he do that?" the opossum asked once they'd gotten away, panic spiking in his voice. "How is it that he can-?"

Askia pushed the box, clockwork device nestled snug inside, back into his pack and slung it over his shoulder. Living out here on your own for so long, he'd replied, you learn to ignore certain kinds of pain.

But not all of them.

As Askia hopped in through the window, the opossum turned his way, still rubbing at his eyes, and smiled. "Good morning," Felix said, then yawned; "heading right out, I imagine?"

The wild dog nodded. Felix still showed some discontent at the pace he'd set, but he kept most of his complaints to himself. Most. His behavior might have been an enigma to Askia, had it not all felt so, so familiar.

"All I'm saying..." the wild dog went on, "is that I think there's no real reason we need to keep such a close eye on things. I've been out here on my own since-"

_ _

The panther's gruff voice startled him, made his ears flatten back, nearly caused him to miss a step. "You got lucky." Those sharp, dangerous eyes flicked towards him, then back towards the slim alleyway in front. "I've seen the way you handle yourself. You don't know how to fight, you can hardly aim a bow, you're the loudest goddamn predator I've ever had the misfortune of babysitting."

_ _

"Well - then - isn't that something worth keeping close, then? Isn't-"

_ _

"No. It's not. Rule one of the world is that you cannot rely on only one thing, all the time. Because everything fails you eventually."

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The wild dog scoffed and crossed his arms. "I thought rule one was don't stay out after dark."

_ _

It gave him some manner of satisfaction to see the way Jason's small ears flicked at that, with his tail to follow. He deliberately avoided meeting Askia's eyes then. "Well, that's a good one, too."

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"Or..." Askia tapped his finger against his chin. "No, wait, rule one was always keep at least one bullet in your gun, since you'll never know when you need it for yourself."

_ _

"Ammunition is-"

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"No, that wasn't it. You told me that rule one was-"

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"Askia." There were those eyes again. "Remember what I said about you being loud?"

_ _

The thing was - Askia looked over the remains of their campfire at the opossum as he loaded his few things back into his own pack - Felix seemed... confused. Not in a mental-cloud sort of way, not in the sort of dazed, distant way that some of the people at the community looked, as though they'd been plucked out of their dreamworld and deposited here in this hell on earth, but as though there two sides of the opossum warring inside of him. Only the one side, the shy, nervous, prey side had shown itself to Askia early on, but as time had passed...

Felix did have his strengths, of course. Where Askia held to the hunting, Felix could make his way around the indoor environments and higher tree branches much more easily, and as a nocturnal species, could hide himself more efficiently if he had to. That knife wouldn't do him much good in open combat despite how Askia still had him train with it each and every night before bed, but truth of the matter was, Felix was prey. Fighting wasn't his first resort anyway. Not to say he couldn't do it: he had survived this long on his own, and in this world, that was already something worth pride.

"Ready?"

The opossum tugged the strap of his backpack tight, sat up, blinked, then scrambled down to open it back up. Then, satisfied, he tightened it again. "Yeah. I think so."

It wasn't when he wielded the knife that that second side to Felix showed itself. It was when a nightmare yanked him unsteadily awake and in a fierce panic, when a group of wolves cornered him in the lower levels of a building, when he turned a corner to come face to face with a cobalt-blue hybrid of a dragon marauder towering some seven feet tall. He made himself seem larger, tightened his stance like Askia had seen in someone ready to fight to the death, steadied his grip on whatever weapon he held at the time, and nearly snarled, deep in his throat.

Fighting may not be his first instinct, but running certainly wasn't, either. That time on the street, though, when Askia had trailed him through the trees as he fled from the pack of wolves...

"God! Fuck!" The wild dog looked up to the sky, teeth gritted so hard he thought he could feel one chip, and in a surge of sudden tension banged his head back against the brick wall behind him. The burst of sharp pain and lingering dizziness did little to cover the relentless burning ache in his leg. "Aah, mother of-"

_ _

"Kia! Kia..." He had to squint against the swimming lights to see the panther's familiar form come towards him, tossing his bow to the side as he skidded closer. "Lord above. Are you alright?"

_ _

The hot, sticky wetness had already soaked through the gash in his pants and now matted the fur of his paws, made his grip unreliable and slick. Now he wasn't sure whether the dizziness was from his head or the blood loss. "Do I fucking look like I'm - gaah, God..."

_ _

Suddenly large, strong paws took his muzzle, grip soft yet steady, pads calloused yet gentle. Sunlight-yellow eyes glimmered at him, the panther close enough that he could feel his breath. "Look at me. Look at me, Kia. Okay?" One of those paws fell away...

_ _

"I can't - really - look anywhere else, you - nnh, fuck! Fuck fuck - what are you-"

_ _

"There." A soft, metallic clatter; something cylindrical rolling down the shattered concrete beneath him, getting caught in the knotted foot of a tree root. "It's out. The worst part is over."

_ _

"It's all the worst part!"

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"I know. I know it hurts."

_ _

He hadn't gotten an injury this bad in the month since this panther had brought him to his safe haven. Although, come to think of it - he hadn't ever gotten one this bad. A broken arm was one thing, but this... "This is - more than fuckin' pain, this-"

_ _

"I know. Trust me, I know." That paw gripped his jaw again. "I said look at me. We're in a bad way, here."

_ _

"'We'?" Askia finally managed to open his eyes again, then regretted it. The world was still spinning around him. He clamped them shut. "You look fine. As good as you ever have. Me, I'm... God, maybe I am just fuckin' lucky, since I feel like there shouldn't be this much - fucking blood in my body..."

_ _

"You're fine. You're doing fine." Without missing a beat Jason shifted his grip on him, hooking one arm around his head and lifting the other carefully up underneath his knees. It seemed effortless for him to hoist Askia into the air, even with that rifle still over his back, his own pack and the wild dog's, and the collection of books that they had been sent to retrieve. "We'll have to go back before we get the rest. We weren't expecting this many bandits here. Stay awake for me, okay? It's a bit of a run back, but I should get you there before..."

_ _

The jostling and jerking just aggravated his dizziness. Before he could stop himself, Askia lurched to the side and emptied the foul steak and shrunken potatoes he'd eaten for breakfast into the thick grasses covering the road. "Gaah. They could've - at least aimed for my head..."

_ _

"It looked like an old bullet." Keeping his eyes closed, unfortunately, just seemed to make it worse. He swallowed down the sharp, acidic taste and held himself against Jason's warm chest, looking nowhere and feeling the low vibrations of his voice while he ran. "Rusted to hell and back. Probably not a lot of good powder in it. I thought it was a misfire, but then you shouted, and... God, Kia, I'm so sorry."

_ _

"Just one?"

_ _

"What?"

_ _

"Just-" He had to swallow again, cheeks bulging out for a moment. "-one bullet?"

_ _

The panther's grip on him tightened in concern. "You think there's more?"

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"No - I don't think so - but it just... God, it feels like he just - fuckin' - broke a window and shoved every piece into my leg..."

_ _

"Some of the metal might have shattered. I've got to get you back before dark."

_ _

Silence for a while, other than the panther's quick, steady breathing, the crunching of leaves and twigs beneath his footpaws, the rustling and bouncing of everything he carried. The pain remained strong and intense, though had dialed from a sharp burn into a hot throbbing.

_ _

Then: "Askia?"

_ _

His throat felt dry. It took three tries to find his voice. "What?"

_ _

When Jason didn't go on, Askia lifted his head up - the stink of the world assaulted him and he nearly vomited again - and, for just a moment, caught those yellow eyes looking like soft, smooth cut gems rather than burning, blazing pyres. "Nothing," the panther managed after a moment, looking back towards what used to be the road. "Just making sure you're okay."

_ _

Sometimes, running _was_the best choice. Askia paused atop a moss-coated boulder in the road, a massive chunk that had fallen from the building to their right, and braced a footpaw against a protruding girder; Felix continued on a few steps then slowed to a halt as well, looking up to the wild dog for guidance.

"What is it?"

"Nothing." He licked his lips, swallowed, squinted into the dark shade of the trees. "Doesn't look like anything's here, but the roads still don't seem right."

"What do you mean?" Felix glanced down to watch his footing, then made his way closer. "You have a map or something?"

For a moment, Askia looked back down at him again. Expression as soft and gentle as that grey fur coating his body, felt in just a few instances on a few nights under the guise of drunkenness or companionship... "Yeah." Askia swallowed again, then hopped down. "I've got a map."

Such a strange creature, this opossum. Even to that little confirmation, that small piece of unimportant conversation, Felix gave a smile as though Askia had given him reassuring news. Or, maybe, to reassure him.

The clear, exact opposite of what the wild dog had grown used to. He had travelled, worried, bedded with a tall, strong panther who had a face and body of a warrior as sharp as the machete he carried at his side yet with a golden, caring heart beneath, for six months - and now walked these broken roads alongside a slim opossum who hardly came up to his chin.

An opossum with a sweet, gentle exterior, and a raging heart of fire and jagged steel. That was what came out when Felix found himself or his companion cornered, and truthfully, it frightened the wild dog. That wasn't something that happened easily, not anymore. Not since he'd felt himself slipping away in Jason's arms a mile from the community, feeling as though he'd lost half of his body weight in the trail of oozing blood on the way back. Not since the community's healer, a warmhearted and somewhat top-heavy motherly wolfess had shocked him through the veil with enough force that he rebounded against the walls of the afterlife and bounced right back into his own body, shrapnel picked out of his shredded leg and the flesh sewed together.

And this... scavenger, this little opossum who laughed at the noises the leather straps of his backpack made and got distracted by pretty flowers growing in the patches of sunlight or by butterflies as wide across as his spread paws - he frightened him. The way his determination and mental strength spiked when in danger, how he dug himself deeper in his stance and faced down whatever threatened him, so long as he had the ground to support himself...

The world had done him a great wrong for which he had never forgiven it. That was what that said to Askia. A great wrong at the teeth of those awful screaming creatures that prowled the night, perhaps: Felix bristled whenever those sounds echoed through between the buildings, and where the sound was enough to make even the strongest blood turn cold, the opossum's reaction looked... personal, almost.

It had happened the previous night in the middle of Askia's nightly ritual - perimeter search, set up camp, count the bullets in his revolver, settle the watch shifts, look at the moon, let the clockwork device run for a bit - and had sounded close enough to catch both of their attention. Askia had felt himself lift an arrow to his bow without thinking, and out of the corner of his eye Felix nearly dropped the spear he'd been working on for the past two days and focused his eyes in the direction the screams had come from. In that gaze, some of the fire that burned in his heart showed itself.

He had mentioned how an unfortunate encounter with one of those prior to Askia's first meeting with him had melted his previous spear and given him that grievous wound across his paw, and yet even last night, even with that new spearhead not quite attached and that paw still missing some of its skin and fur, he clutched his weapon as though he fully intended to find the source of the sound and silence it. As though he were equally terrified of and enraged at them.

A great, terrible wrong, leaving behind fiery anger and deep, awful, wretched loneliness. "We each need someone," Felix had said, rejecting Askia's offer to send him off with his revolver; "It gets lonely out there. I need someone."

"Just tell me what you need."

_ _

Askia rested back against the small stack of pillows, basking in the comfortable warmth of the panther beneath the blankets with him against the chill of the morning. Two months, now, about - it had taken two weeks for Jason to bring him to this community of which he'd spoken, and in the time since, the wild dog had been able to feel their bond grow steadily closer and deeper.

_ _

"Hmm." He rolled onto his side to face the black-furred cat, and brought a paw down to trace his claws through the panther's chest fur. His scent wrapped around him as snugly as one of the blankets; Askia closed his eyes, smiled, leaned forward to push his nose against the source, giggled softly when those strong arms wrapped around him in return. "I think you know."

_ _

"I do?" His voice came out low and deep, though still above the almost-silent purring that rumbled in his chest.

_ _

"Yeah." With only a little bit of effort, Askia managed to pull himself up atop the panther. Strong paws settled against his shoulders to hold him in place, then swiftly yet gentle slid down his back towards his rump... "I need you."

_ _

For the entire journey to this community, he hadn't been certain whether Jason knew how to laugh. Now, though, it came easily, and always - always - echoed through the wild dog himself. The two lay there laughing quietly for a moment... until one of those paws squeezed his rear and the other spread it.

_ _

"Well," the panther responded, hungry growl matching his purr, "I'm in luck, since I need you too."

_ _

Askia stuck his muzzle forward. "Yeah?"

_ _

"Yeah." Just as planned, he received a kiss to the lips. "Right now. Askia..."

_ _

"Askia?"

The wild dog blinked, shook his head, looked forward again. Felix stood a small distance off, looking back at him.

"Are you alright? You slowed down a bit."

Here he was, down on the streets, surrounded on all sides by broken buildings and too-tall monsters of trees, vaulting up into the clouds. Smell of stone and rust and mold and plantlife, all familiar but not in the right way. Not like Jason's scent, lost to him for some six months now.

Damn you for being right, he thought to himself. Damn you for always being right. I'm coming.

"Yeah." He cleared his throat and picked his pace back up. "I'm alright. Are you?"

The opossum seemed startled for a moment, but then his face broke into a warm smile. Suddenly the forest didn't seem quite so dark. "Yeah. I'm good."

~ ~ ~

The size of the city still baffled the wild dog, even though he had spent nearly all of his life here. _Especially_because of that, perhaps: except for the five months spent in Jason's community, he'd spent most of his time travelling, holding to the accepted custom to never stay in one place longer than a handful of nights at a time, and he had been outside the borders four times in all of those years. Outside to the wide, open plains, flooded with grasses twice as tall as a person and dangerous in their own unknown ways.

As it went with that, _danger_was something as familiar and close as the beating of his own heart here. By the time the sky had started to dim between the trees, signifying the approaching onset of nightfall, Askia motioned for Felix to come closer and stay near him in case anything happened - he'd learned long ago that some of the more daring bandit groups went out for their prime hunting expeditions in the period just before sunset, knowing that that was when any travelers would be clustering towards the lower floors of buildings.

With knowledge of danger, too, came heightened instincts and reactions - and before he'd realized the reason why, suddenly Askia had his arm out to keep the opossum back, other paw hovering over his revolver at his side. The jangling of all of their weapons and equipment continued for a moment, then stopped, letting the quiet whispering of the wind in the trees tickle at their ears... and then that, too, dropped off into silence.

It wasn't the sound,_though, that put his hackles straight out. It was the _smell, the drifting spice of a recent fire, of wood ash and... and something else, something sharp and bitter that nearly wrinkled his nose. He glanced beside him, met Felix's gaze, nodded forward, and the two continued, trying to maintain the silence of the forest. A thick root lay across the broken road; Askia placed a paw against it, vaulted himself over, then turned back and reached across it for Felix after verifying there was nobody on the other side.

Felix landed beside him, moved to brush himself off, and then stopped when he realized what it was they had jumped into. Ahead and pushed back a bit towards what might have been an alley forcibly overtaken and widened by tree branches and searching vines sat a small camp: a clothesline hung between a pair of thin trunks, a bedroll lay half-hidden beneath fallen leaves and branches, the remains of a fire sat sheltered in a circle of stones and cement chunks. Askia sniffed at the air again and, satisfied there was nobody nearby, trudged forward towards the camp.

"Kia, wait-" Felix said, reaching out for him. "We don't know what's-"

But, he couldn't stop himself. Now that he'd come closer, another scent lay beneath everything else, one that pulled him forward as though it had hooked a chain into his chest and yanked him. A single shirt lay in a still-damp heap underneath the clothesline; the ashes of the campfire weren't warm to the touch, but he could tell that it had to have been put out at some point earlier in the day; the bedroll...

"I need you."

A paw rested on his shoulder from behind as he knelt over the bedroll, making him jump. "Kia. What is it?"

"Felix..." The wild dog pushed the debris off of the bedroll - it had been deliberately put there - and pressed the interior fabric to his nose, breathing deep of that scent. It had been so, so long, and yet here, finally... "Where is he?"

"What?"

"Where is-" Askia glanced around, saw a patch of bark torn from a tree trunk, noticed a disturbed bush... then caught sight of a machete lying in the leaves near there. Not just any machete. Jason had re-wrapped the handle of his in red-dyed leather streaked with black, and this one...

Then, though, it finally hit him what that other scent was: that was the reek of burned fur and charred flesh. Just like what they'd smelled on that foxwolf the other day. He rose slowly, shakily to his feet and stepped towards the machete, only for his eyes to catch something else. A drop; a streak; a trail. Just like when he'd taken a bullet to the leg and oozed like a leaking pipe. Leading out over the next knotted root.

Felix's voice again: "Askia?"

Without thinking, he pulled the revolver from his side with one paw and drew his hatchet with the other. His throat felt dry, his heart pounded in his ears, it seemed as though he were focusing on everything at once and nothing at the same time. The revealed root there showed a sign of a scuffle, claw marks across the top, a torn shred of fabric, a thick stain of blood.

And then beyond, in the ditch just behind that root... his hatchet clattered against the wood, but he clenched his gun tighter in his grip. The world fell away, and for a moment, his heart stopped.

A great wrong. A great, terrible wrong, leaving sharp, intense, consuming anger and cavernous loneliness.