>:]
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    Xanthos
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There's always a certain uneasy feeling that accompanies seeing a giant rift tear through the sky. I would also like to say I was prepared for what was about to happen in the next few hours, but I wasn't. I would never have been. There's not a single alternate timeline where I could have predicted what happens next.

A deafening boom resonated throughout the trees. All of the claws who had been previously marching towards the battlegrounds stopped to stare up at the sky through the breaks in the trees. All you could see was a florescent blood-red color. There was a slight humming in the air that made some of the claws curl up and cry out. I pressed my hands against my ears and glanced around blearily, trying to make sense of what to tell my own warriors.

Then I spotted a small brown claw break rank and go running off towards the direction of the humming. Glamora help me, nobody else seemed to notice. I gave the orders to follow Nepal's lead to my second and built up speed, chasing after the rogue claw.

It wasn't hard to recognize Arroyo.

"What are you doing?" I demanded, catching up to him.

"What's it look like I'm doing?" He gasped out, exasperated.

"You can't take her on yourself." I insisted.

"Then Glamora take me if she pleases, I'm just here for vengeance." He spat.

I side-stepped in front of him, so that he would slow down and listen to me. "Arroyo."

"What?" He snapped.

"We're going back to the group, you're going to get yourself killed if you try and take on Tenebris all by yourself." I said, maintaining a calm and steady appearance.

Arroyo breathed in and out harshly, it was more from emotion than fatigue. "She'll have killed more innocent souls than me then."

I knew he probably had more than his mother on his mind. I swallowed uncomfortably as I remembered the sight of Ostend's body. I stared into his eyes and I knew I was right.

"Okay." I couldn't stop him. "Just stick with me please."

He nodded, and we took off again.

The sight of the clearing was something to behold. The tear in the sky swirled and dripped and wherever that unearthly liquid fell the grass burned. I make quick note of a lot of things. One of the ice-cla's Meðal-claw's had just flown off and the other, Jay, was crouched over the still form of one of the four. The fox was laying still a few meters to the left. The deer unconscious to the right. There she was, Tenebris, stood over a burning pyre and laughing like someone who know's they've one. At her feet was the still form of the large red wolf.

My heart sunk as I realized we were on the loosing team now.

"Oh look how pathetic." She laughed, and took a few steps towards us. "Let me guess, your reinforcements won't be arriving in time for you to live. It wouldn't matter anyway because you won't be able to defeat me now."

She raised her paws dramatically towards the sky and the two out of the reaming three of us with sight glanced up at to see something was sensing it's way our of the sky rift, and small tornado made of of that similar black slime. It circled and twisted, the wind was starting to pick up, and eventually made it's way down to her paws. She screamed out, I couldn't distinguish is it was pain or pleasure, as she began to suck the substance into her body.

Arroyo screamed, then leapt across the reaming space between us before I could stop him and threw himself as her throat. The black slime was piling onto her in waves so he hit her body like a mosquito hits liquid amber. He must of felt the same of a mosquito because she didn't even notice until he bit down. Then she cried out, and flicked him off.

He came tumbling towards us and I just managed to catch him, sliding down into the dirt next to Jay.

"That was annoying." She salivated, now that the black slime had stopped descending from the rip in the sky and she had grown to five times her size. "I'm going to enjoy killing you even more now. It'll be my birthday present."

She closed the gap between us in on leapt, tearing up the earth with her massive paws on landing. I fell over, my heart pounding rapidly as she towered overs us. Her eyes gleamed, One green, one blue. Those were Zara's eyes, a sob pushed it's way out of me. That was my friend.

"Eenie, meanie, miny, mo..." Tenebris stared at each one of us. "Which little baby's first to go?"

"Zara please." Jay begged. "Please I know you're in there. You can't do this."

Tenebris' eye twitched. "You then."

He paws moved faster than anything I'd ever seen as she scooped Jay off the ground and sent him dying into the air. He twisted about, snapping out his wings and tried to figure out which way was up. Then she swiped his from the air and again and slammed him down against the ground, Jay coughed violently as her paw pressed down on his whole body.

"Zara.... please." He gasped, clawing desperately at her foreleg.

"It's annoying little feelings like those that get you killed. Zara is dead." Tenebris spat. "Any last words?"

"Jay!" I cried out, only to the discover that the black slime had drooled over our limbs and held us steadfast.

    "Kill me then." Jay spit in her face. "Zara I don't know if you can hear me, but I love you."

    Tenebris paused ever so slightly. "What did you say?"

    Something was different in her voice.

    "I love you." He gasped out.

    Tenebris coughed suddenly. She coughed and she hacked and she released Jay from under her paws. He gasped in air and rolled away as Tenebris stubbles off and started hacking her lungs up. Her body twisted and began to loose it's shape. It went from feline to amorphous blob and then... there was something... something there.

    A small brown paw breached the slime. Followed by another and finally a face. pure white with one patch over the right eye. Zara gasped in air and slid onto the ground, covered in a thin layer of black ick.

    "Jay?" She glanced around madly.

    "Zara?" He gasped, ears turned towards her.

    "My head hurts." She muttered, and collapsed.

    Jay crouched over her, then swiveled back towards the two of us. "She's fine, she's perfectly okay she's," he sighed. "She's okay."

    "What did you do you? What happened?" I asked, crawling over to the two of them.

    "I don't know." Jay admitted. "I was just being sincere.

    From a ways off, Tenebris screeched in pain. She was raking her now slightly smaller claws against her head. When she turned towards us her eyes were a stark, brilliant lavender color. I could have sworn I had seen them somewhere.

    "I will kill one of you, I will." She insisted.

    Her purple eyes flicked over to Arroyo, who was crouched defensively, his eyes wide with terror. Tenebris' tail flicked once before she pounced. I watched in horror again as her jaws started to close around Arroyo's whole body. The she stopped, and began to choke. More black slime splattered onto the grass, along with something that looked like blood this time. Two more paws appeared on her tongue and clawed their way out. Two bright purple eyes and dark brown splotches. She started crying.

    "I'm so sorry." Avangeline collapsed onto the ground.

    I stared at the now-five of us in pure shock. I didn't know very much about possession but I had never heard of anything like this. how many layers were there? How many people were trapped inside of her... no... As Tenebris rose for a third time from a lethal coughing we could all tell he was extremely pissed off.

    His eyes were a pale glowing green, no pupils, and this time I could place exactly who's eyes they were, but I didn't believe it.

    "What?" He laughed. "What is this? Have I just managed to stumble upon the only three beings who could ruins my plans? What kind of game is this?"

    I stood up shakily upon my feet and started taking small steps towards him. The ground was wet with the slime that was now pouring off of him in large collective pools of dank goo. It stuck too, my nostrils burned.

    "I think it's fate." I whispered under my breath.

    Tenebris' smile suddenly faded away, and was replaced but what can only be described as a true fear. The kind of emotion one feels when they know they've really been beat.

    "I know it's been almost three years now, and I never really did get the chance to say it, b-but... I do love you." I said, it was so soft I wasn't sure if he heard it.

    A small crack appeared of Tenebris' face, which you could hardly call feline anymore. It was just the shape of a form with bubbles pouring of of him, blacker than space. More cracks formed. He started screaming and clawing at his own body as more cracks appeared, along his chest and arms and up to his face. They started at his eyes, that's where everything began I think. Then slowly the black began to peel away in strips to reveal a face underneath, a face I recognized. I still couldn't believe it. I would never. It was happening right before my eyes and I was still finding it very hard to believe. The figure underneath the black reached out for my face and I might have started crying.

"Father...?"