Caged In

Chapter 7: The Red Dawn . . . (edited)

Meanwhile, back on the road near the site of the car crash . . .

Rive and Taus had been sent to pick up Joradari after he failed to show up at the agreed upon meeting time. They wore almost matching floor length red cloaks with black arrows on the cuffs of the long sleeves, at the middle of their chest, and at the bottom of the cloak. The back of the cloaks had yellow circle, shaded in with black to appear like a crescent moon, and one black arrow shooting out of the circle in a different direction on each of their cloaks.

" I knew this would happen! We should have sent Gata with him instead of Remus, he's the only one who can keep Joradari in line." Taus grumbled, running a stressed hand through his black hair that faded to white towards the tips.

" There's no point in complaining about it now. Besides, there was no way Gata would've agreed to that anyway, since he's always Tor's partner." Rive sighed," I would've been more than happy to join Jora this time, but you wouldn't let me." Rive's dark green seaweed-like hair bounced as she happily skipped next to Taus.

" You lost the privilege to choose your partner after the stunt you pulled on the mission you and Briar went on." Taus replied sharply.

It was supposed to be a reconnaissance mission where they scouted the edges of the territory in the Vampire Kingdom belonging to the Vice Baron of Envy, but Briar and Rive had somehow managed to start a full-on melee with the Bloodbow Special Ops along the border.

" Plus we've both already been identified, it wouldn't make sense to send us with someone who hasn't been identified yet." Taus added.

He placed a large portion of the blame for getting identified so easily on Rive, who refused to use any sort of transformation magic to appear human and blend in. She refused to cover up her attention-grabbing hair or discolored greyish skin, and there was no way in hell that Taus ever had a chance of convincing her to cover up the pod markings on her face. He'd tried to before and got punched in the solar plexus so hard, he thought he was going to die. He had learned his lesson and simply given up.

" Aww. You don't have to make up excuses, just admit you just don't want anyone to take me away from you." Rive teased as she ran ahead.

" Hey, that's not –"

" Hey, I found him!" Rive sang as she bent over," Geez Jora, you're a mess!"

" More like a reckless idiot." Taus muttered as ran over to where Rive was kneeling.

But then again, people like Jora can afford to be reckless. After all they're –

Taus's thoughts were interrupted when he saw the extent of Joradari's injuries. He towered over Joradari's beat up body and scanned over the array of deep gashes.

" Heeyyy it's River and Mouse." Jora groaned, purposefully mispronouncing their names as Rive helped him sit up.

" Dude, your forearm's in pieces, your radius and ulna are shattered." Rive exclaimed as she brushed her scaled hand over Joradari's left arm.

Jora is practically invincible, Taus thought as a chilling fear made its way up his body, what kind of monster did Remus and Jora run into ?

" Where's Remus ?" Taus asked with a clipped tone as Rive began to heal Joradari's injuries.

" Somewhere in the woods over there." Joradari coughed.

" Why isn't he on his way here, I can't sense his presence." Taus said, looking into the singed forest.

" Corpses can't walk, dumbass." Joradari replied before coughing up a congealed red substance into his right hand.