Interlude: The Grey Lion II – A Deadly Game Part 2

Lynx

We tore off into the alien forest, navigating through the oddly colored trees. They were all a variety of different colors, mostly pastel in tone. I had to stay close to the idiot to keep from getting tripped by the annoying tether.

“Come on, this way!” He yelled, teleporting to the side and into a faster sprint. I stumbled from the sudden jerk and snarled in annoyance. We kept running in a different direction this time, weaving carefully through the jungle trees. I had to use all of my agility and strength just to keep up with the insane crash course Ravus was setting.

About five minutes into running, a loud whistle pierced the steamy air. It rang on an extremely high pitch and hurt my ears immensely. I stopped running and shuddered at the sudden ringing and headache. I had forgotten about the tether, and RD did a faceplant when the cord went taught.

“What the hell man?” He shouted angrily up at me from the ground.

“Don’t you hear that whistle?” I snapped at him, shuddering slightly.

Ravus paused, panting slightly. He tilted his head to the side and squinted slightly. “I don’t hear any whistle,” he replied in confusion. “Are you sure you aren’t imagining it?”

“Don’t be a dumbass, of course I’m not imagining this,” I snapped at him. My fur began standing on end, and I fought off the urge to shudder. “There’s this piercing whistle echoing through the forest. God it’s annoying. It’s like the sound version of you,” I grinned savagely at him, but winced when the noise intensified.

“Well I can’t hear it. You probably can because of those ridiculous ears of yours,” Ravus said with a slight smile.

“First of all, my ears aren’t ridiculous, they’re useful and they match my other feline features. Second of all, whatever the noise is, it’s coming from right above us,” As I said this, we both looked up. There was nothing there, just a thick canopy of leaves.

“Whatever, lets keep running. Maybe the noise will stop if we just keep running,” Ravus replied with a shrug.

Ignoring the stupidity of his logic, I picked up him up and took off into the jungle again. As we ran, I could hear the noise begin to follow us.

“Its gotta be a tracker or a beacon for something, probably those giant mutant dogs we saw earlier,” I panted.

“But why didn’t you hear that when we first saw them?” Ravus asked as we maneuvered through the jungle.

“I did, right at the end,” I growled at him.

“Oh yeah, I heard that one too,” He said sheepishly, shaking his head.

Ravus Decem

I shook my head and kept running. I couldn’t hear the noise now, but it didn’t really matter. We continued through the jungle, Looking into the future to time my Movements perfectly. The forest began to thin, and I could see it stop up ahead.

We burst out into a large open space. The light grey wheat-like plants waved lazily under a dark grey cloudless sky (colorblind, remember?). It was a large plain, with gently rolling hills off in the distance and a gurgling stream to my left.

I bent over, breathing heavily. “Well, what now?” I asked.

Lynx didn’t seem that tired. He looked around with slitted eyes, then froze. “The noise stopped,” he said cautiously.

“Aw shit,” I sighed, bending down and picking up three fist sized rocks. “That doesn’t bode well at all,”.

A roar emanated from the forest, echoing through the trees. “Something’s getting closer,” Kitty warned.

“Let’s try to work together better this time. I don’t wanna be tripping over you and vice versa,” I responded. “In fact, I think I may ha-” I was cut off by more roaring and shouting from the forest.

Lynx and I turned to one another, then ran back into the forest. We both knew that to get back home, we had to defeat the other pairs and the dogs. Real life doesn’t always let the heroes save everyone. It doesn’t even always let the heroes save themselves.

I let Kitty take the lead; his hearing was a better guide than mine. The noises escalated, and I could make out some other ones. Large mechanical clicks and whines, as well as an odd rushing noise reached my ears. After about a minute of sprinting, we reached the battle.

As far as I could tell, there were three different groups fighting. The first group was the two mutant dogs, though one was bleeding heavily from it’s back leg. The second group was, cyborgs? They were two short grey skinned aliens, with metallic implants and lights studding their bodies. Oh, and they both had three arms. The third group was composed of two, average height humanoids. They had extremely dark grey carapace, and segmented eyes. Their bodies were smooth, with multiple jointed limbs. All the combatants paused when they saw us, and the sounds of combat died down. That’s when Kitty pounced.

Lynx

I decided to capitalize on their brief moment of surprise, and went after the short yellow cyborgs first. I yowled a vicious war cry and lunged towards the closest one. Luckily, Ravus knew what I was doing, and he teleported up to the other, striking out. The two cyborgs were very slow, their armor combined with their short stature weighed them down. I could hear the two dark brown aliens engage the mutant dogs off to the side.

I slashed the cyborg with my claws, rending gashes in the metal plates on it’s chest. It extended it’s arm and a projectile flashed out. A rock flew into it’s path and incinerated in midair.

“You’re welcome!” Shouted Ravus. I snarled, and threw my cyborg at his. I flipped a log on top of their chests, pinning them to the ground. I grabbed their tether and wrapped it around several branch-like protrusions on the log.

“Swing me!” He shouted again, and teleported off to one side. I grabbed the tether as he appeared ten feet off to the side. The rope contracted violently, and I pulled it, swinging him into the alien/dog melee.

Ravus smashed into the four of them, and pulled the tether, snapping me towards the jumble. I lashed out with all four paws, striking each one with extreme force. The dogs roared and the aliens made a shushing sound as fluid sprayed from each. RD appeared with a goopy rock in his hand and one of the carapaced aliens a couple feet away. It’s battered body slid towards the other alien, as their rope retracted.

The two dogs dropped the chewed up bug-like alien and backed away. Ravus and I exchanged glances, and charged. He ducked under one of the dog’s paw, and came up and body slammed the dog. Simultaneously, I vaulted up into the air above the other dog, using the tether to help Ravus body slam. I landed on top of the other dog, and cracked him on the skull with my two fists together. As my dog was stunned, I darted over to his to slash at it’s injured leg. He teleported to the other side of my dog, and snapped back towards me, hitting the dog in the head again. Both mutts collapsed to the ground, as the world twisted oddly.

We appeared in the throne room, where the alien king bounced happily on his throne. “Congratulations! You win my competition!” King Da’K’Chk said, in a booming voice. I shook the blood and ichor off my claws and paws.

“Gee, thanks. We’re more than honored,” I said sarcastically. “Can you send us back to Earth now? I’d really like to go home,”

“Are you sure? As my current champions, you would be treated like luxurious princes,” Da’K’Chk whined. Ravus looked at me longingly, blinking the mud and blood out of his eyes.

“No, just send us home. Now,” I told him with a glare. The Lord of Unendurable Violence bent his fluffy pink head, and the world twisted away one more time.