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Chapter 2: Graveyard Visit

After an hour of driving, Yoko finally arrived at the New Dawn Cemetery. Yoko was sitting on the grass in the middle of the large graveyard in front on two marble graves. She had her arms wrapped around her legs with her face buried between her knees. Her cheeks were stained with tears. She lifted her head from her knees and contemplated the tombstones in front of her.

"Mom and Dad," she said to the graves. "I know. You guys always said I shouldn't be outside this close to sunset, but I had to get out of that hell house."

The sun disappeared under the horizon. The blending colors of orange and red slowly faded away, leaving a dark indigo blanket in the sky. Darkness fell over the graveyard. The only light sources were the dim, fleeting flickers of the cemetery lampposts. Yoko picked herself up from the ground, wiping away any tears that remained on her face. She began to walk to her car as the eastern, evening breeze brushed against her face.

'God, what am I gonna do?' Yoko pondered, rubbing her temples, 'I can't stay with her any longer.'

The grass crunched under her paws; her fur, fluttering under the rapidly increasing breeze.

'I can't stay at Jade's. That'll be the first place Grandma will think to look for me. Maybe I can stay in my car or something.'

The breeze became a powerful gale, spraying dust into the wolfess' eyes.

'What the hell is up with this wind?' Yoko placed her arms in front of her face to shield her eyes.

The gale howled throughout the graveyard, rustling the trees and shaking the lampposts. Yoko could see through her arms a figure moving through the dark, darting from tree to tree as it approached her. Yoko could barely see it; it was moving so fast and it was too dark. The shadowy shape shot out from the tree like a cannon, flying towards the young wolfess at incredible speed. As the figure passed under the flickering light of the lamppost, Yoko caught sight of it holding something shiny and reflective. She noticed the silvery, metallic gleam.

'Is that...a blade?!' Yoko thought in distress. "HOLY SH...!" She screamed as she ducked, attempting to dodge the sharp edge of the knife. The squelch of the blade as it ripped through flesh echoed through the cemetery. Blood splattered across the lawn.

"Oh, crap," Yoko panted as the stinging pain coursed through her body. She reached for her back and winced as she felt the large gash on her left shoulder blade. Blood seeped into her palm and dripped between the spaces of her fingers, staining her shirt. She managed to move out of the way enough so the blade didn't cut through anything, but not enough to dodge the blade completely.

She turned her head to meet the fearsome form of her attacker under the dim, blinking city light. It was a weasel, a very tall and seemingly malnourished one. The creature's ribcage was plainly visible under its chest fur. It had dark brown fur that was balding in patches. Each strand of fur stood up straight like a thorn and seemed able to skewer a poor unsuspecting victim. The creature's paws contained three gnarled fingers; each with a claw. The sharp appendages were made of a dense metal and were as long as a railroad spikes, gleaming a silver sheen under the lampposts. The claws in its left paw were dripping fresh, crimson blood from the tips. It has a strange marking on its forehead: a four-pointed star inscribed in a circle. The marking glowed a dim-red and simmered like an ember.

The monster's blood red eyes glared at Yoko, never once blinking as it locked her in its sights, targeting her. It bared its fangs and crouched, ready to pounce. Its three claws stretching and twisted. The fingers fused together to form a crooked scythe. The blade was as long as Yoko's forearm and curved as it tapered into a single, sharp point.

'Oh, crap. It's coming again!' Yoko panicked. She scurried to pick herself up and mad a mad dash to her car, hoping to shelter herself in the machine and drive away as fast as possible. The scythe weasel launched itself, moving faster than hurricane-force winds. It rocketed past Yoko; the winds in its wake threw the wolf away from her path like an old ragdoll. Yoko lands face first on the dirt. She lifted her head and spat out the dirt from her mouth, looking at the relentless destruction. Sparks flew as the metal of the scythe easily sliced through the metal of the car like a hot knife through butter. In mere moments, the weasel reduced the golden convertible to a pile of metal dust, glass shards and shredded tire rubber with it standing on top, snarling like an alpha who has claimed new territory.

Yoko's eyes were as wide as dinner plates. Her fastest mean of escape was destroyed in an instant. 'There's no way I can outrun it without my car. I'm so screwed.' Yoko slowly rose to her feet and move as slowly as possible. 'Okay, if running away makes it attack, all I have to do is sneak around it slowly' Yoko formulated as she quietly crept around the pile of automobile dust. The beast's eyes were focused on nothing but the sneaking wolf; the bloodshot spheres, throwing daggers at her. Yoko gulped nervously seeing the creature hatred pierce through her. She lifted her hands and faced her palms towards the scythe weasel, showing it she meant no harm and had no weapon to do so. Yoko successfully sneaked around the beast and the dust pile.

'Great, this is working. All I have to do is sneak away slowly and carefully to the exit. Crap, that's like...50 yards away.' Yoko placed her left paw behind her right, and her right foot behind her left, repeating the process to put some the distance between her and the weasel. 'Ah, my back,' Yoko grimaced. The pain from the laceration ran through her body and pierced her like a thousand needles.

The weasel charged in an instant and thrust its knee into Yoko's stomach. She fell onto the sidewalk with a loud thud, coughing profusely, trying to recover from having the wind knocked out of her. The beast landed on the wolf, pinning her down to the ground. It barked and growled in Yoko's face. Its rank breath smelled of dead animal and moldy cheese and permeated Yoko's nostrils. The foamy, mossy green spit from its maw landed in her eye. "HELP! SOMEBODY, HELP M...!" screamed Yoko, but she was interrupted. The weasel shoved one of its scythe into her mouth. The iron taste of blood filled her maw as the scythe cut the corners of her mouth and left a gash on her tongue.

She thrashed around under the weasel's weight, but to no avail, she couldn't get free. The weasel raised its other blade into the air. Yoko's muffled whimpers for mercy did not register to the beast. Yoko's heart thumped loudly in her chest; sweatdrops, sliding down her face and mixing with blood around her lips. 'Oh, god. I'm gonna die,' Yoko thought in despair, expecting the worst.

"Yoko, close your eyes! Now!" shouted a familiar voice. Yoko complied, shutting her eyes tightly. Through her eyelids, she could see a bright flash of light. The heat from it evaporated the water from her moist nose. The weasel roared in pain. Its bloodshot eyes were blinded and watering from the intense light. It ripped its scythe out of the wolf's mouth, transforming its blades back into paws to rub the pain out of its eyes. Yoko sat up and began to cough and hack, spitting out, onto the pavement below, the blood from her lacerated tongue and bleeding Chelsea smile.

She lifted her head and saw an elderly wolfess pointing her fist towards the beast; the manual extremity, glowing a dim yellow. "Grandma?"

"Duck!" Yuriko screamed. The glow of her fist intensified before a golden beam launched out of it. The rocketing ray of light flew over the injured wolfess and hit the weasel square in its face. It howled in agony as its facial fur and whiskers were reduced to smoke. Yoko hurriedly got to her feet and ran to her grandmother.

"Grandma? What...H-how?" Yoko stammered. She tried to form sentences, but felt too much pain from her injured tongue.

Yuriko, while still focused on the scythe weasel, aiming her glowing fist at it, said, "Yoko, there is no time. My truck is up ahead. Use it get out of here. I'll hold it off as long as I can. Run quickly!"

"Grandma? What?"

"GO NOW!"

The confused wolf did what she was told, darting with all her power down the sidewalk to her only remaining means of escape. She looked over her shoulder as she ran. Golden beams and flashes illuminated the dark, dreary background. Yoko could hear Yuriko's grunts and the scythe weasel's growls as they fought against each other. The blood loss from her wounds was making running nigh impossible. She placed her hands on her knees, leaning over to catch her breath.

"What the hell is going on?" she panted loudly.

"AROOOO!" a loud howl pierced the night air, like a beast, triumphant in battle. Yoko jumped, startled, hearing it come from the direction of her grandmother. She stood up straight and continued running down the path.

Yoko made it to the crest of a hill and saw Yuriko's black Chevrolet parked on the pavement ahead. "Oh, thank god," the relieved wolf sighed. She made a mad dash for the car. She extended her arm, reaching for the car door handle. A sudden gust of wind blew to her and knocked her off balance. "AH!" she screamed, after falling onto her back. She reached behind, feeling for the source of burning pain. In her grasp, she found something cylindrical and woody; a long stick, jammed into her cut. The splinters pricked at her internal tissues. She attempted to pull it out, but was stopped by a growl she heard in front of her.

There was another scythe weasel perched on Yuriko's car. It was identical to the one that attacked her before; just as rabid and ferocious-looking. They even had the same four-pointed star branded on their foreheads. Yoko was about to high-tail it, when a third scythe weasel showed up, blocking her path. The beast's fur was covered in black, smoldering patches and half of its face had its fur replaced with numerous burn blisters.

In its left arm was the beaten and bloodied body of Yuriko Matsumoto. Yoko gasped and covered her mouth. Her knees buckled and head started to spin, almost passing out from the sight of her grandmother. She caught herself by leaning on the hood of Yuriko's truck. The char-broiled scythe weasel raised its right blade and thrust it into the asphalt, splitting the ground. Out of the fissure, bubbled an eerie, green soup. Its stench of decay and raw sewage filled Yoko's nostrils. She swallowed, feeling the contents of her stomach work its way up her throat. The foul liquid seeped out of the crack like blood from a fresh wound and spread out until it formed a small pool. The green water started to swirl and formed a whirlpool; its center, dark and void like a black hole. The beast dropped Yuriko into the vortex. The bleeding body sank into the dark abyss feet first. Her legs and torso were ravenously swallowed by the swirling slop. When her head finally disappeared into the pool, the water's edge receded, flowing back into the fissure.

Yoko watched in horror as the slime oozed back into the fissure, vanishing along with any trace of her grandmother.

"No...oh, god, no," Yoko panicked, hyperventilating through her blood-crusted maw. She stared at the fissure, hoping by some miracle that her grandmother would be forced back through the crack and return to her. "She...can't be gone." She raised her head from looking at the split until her gaze met the murderous beast in the face. "You killed her."

The fear and despair in her heart were quickly replaced with rage. A burning heat flared in her chest and boiled her blood. Yoko clutched her breast, feeling the blaze in her heart become more intense by the second. Yoko looked down at her chest and saw a golden, glowing spot forming from the very area she was clutching. The incandescent spot grew and spread out until it covered her torso; it's glow, visible through the threads of her blouse. The heat traveled through the sleeves of her denim jacket and through her capris. The strange glow flowed across her hands and feet and snaked around her fingers and toes until the extremities were shining as bright as a sword out of a furnace.

"What is this?" Yoko inquired. Her skeleton burned like it was placed in a cremator. The glow spread upwards, coating her neck and face in uncomfortable, scalding heat. The blood dripping around her mouth sizzled and evaporated. In no time, her entire body shone as bright as the sun. The three scythe weasels shield the faces with their blades. They growled and snarled; their bloodshot, angry eyes, watering almost boiling from the intense brilliance.

Yoko groaned; the heat grew even more intense. Her radiating fur changed from a sun-kissed gold to a blinding white. The pavement under her paws started to char. The pebbles became a bright orange, on the verge of melting into lava. Embers fluttered away from the smoldering grass. The metal of Yuriko's car blazed a dim red and the tires bubbled and drooped around the hubcaps. The weasels were curled up on the ground writhing in pain. Their scythes were scalding and dripped of liquid steel. Fur and flesh were burned away, exposing their skeletons, which were quickly charring. Yoko let out a loud scream. A sphere of white light emerged from her chest, quickly expanding. The sphere enveloped Yoko's entire body, growing like the blast radius of a bomb. The sweep of light consumed everything it passed through. Yuriko's car, the three weasels; nothing could escape it. The blast illuminated the night sky and, with each incineration, a tower of smoke erected itself, billowing over the graveyard.

The explosion disappeared in an instant. Yoko remained supine on the pavement, lying on her stomach. "Get up, Yoko," she said to herself. She tried to push her torso off the ground, but immediately flopped back onto the pavement. Every fiber in her body cried out in agony. Through blurry vision, she saw a ring of ash and cinders surrounding her as if she was at ground zero of a missile attack. The grass around her was reduced to kindling embers. Yuriko's car was a molten pile of metal and fiberglass. The weasels were gone. She turned her head to look around her. All around her, there were waves of smoke rising from destroyed flora and charred tombstone. She couldn't find a spot that was spared. Her ears perked upon hearing the sound of water bubbling out of the ground. Between her paws was a fissure with putrid, green slime gushing out of it, spreading out into a pool.

Yoko wasted no words or thoughts; her instincts screaming for her to get the hell out of Dodge. Yoko grunted, extending her right arm to pull her body across the asphalt, then doing the same with her left arm. Her nerves flared in fiery anguish each time she dragged her body across the ground. The acrid pool of slime spiraled into a whirlpool. Out of the center emerged another scythe weasel, howling to the sky. Yoko didn't bother turning her head around. She groaned through the pain while focusing on crawling away. The weasel stepped out of the green portal. Its fingers and iron claws cracked and crunched. The bones and metal rearrange to transform into a long scythe. Before the beast was able to pounce, an azure portal, shimmering like a sapphire, appeared between the desperately crawling wolf and her savage predator.

An enormous, nearly seven feet tall, black bear stepped through the ethereal gateway. His imposing, powerlifter-like figure was clad in a charcoal and gold kimono and a vermillion haori jacket. The beast charged at the middle-aged bear with foam flying out of its maw. Without even batting an eye, he caught the weasel's head in his large paw. Him arm muscles flexed and bulged his jacket sleeve outward. His fingers tightened around the weasel's dome until an ear-splitting crack resonated through the air. The weasel's skull popped like an egg. Its headless body flopped to the ground; legs, twitching. The mysterious bear quickly jogged to the injured wolf and picked her up in his strong arms. Yoko looked over the bear's shoulder toward the decapitated body. The corpse disintegrated into pale green dust that flew through the air back into the whirlpool portal. The funnel disappeared into the crack, which closed tightly, making it seem like there was no crack in the first place. "Don't worry," the bear said calmly, "You're safe now." Yoko's eyelids grew heavier while she was carried through the blue portal. The bear's reassuring and friendly smile was the last thing she saw before she fainted in his arms.