Running was all she could think of. All she could do. All that was keeping her alive.

The ceaseless pounding of her feet upon the clay like mud, through the dew-laden undergrowth around her was all she could hear. All she could feel was the whipping of needle - pointed branches against her that tore and shredded her skin, her silken emerald garb and leaving behind her long streaming trails of crimson blood that created a glistening silvery path within the sun's rays.

Her lungs burned, bursting for oxygen as she could only keep going, tears streaming from her soft hazel eyes and mingling as gleaming crystal droplets into her flailing long locks of roaring red hair as she ran.

"There!" An unknown voice cried out from a distance behind her in this natural labyrinth of shrubbery. A place where aged mighty trees of old had grown weak and linked together, their branches supporting one another together, creating walls all around, with sunlight blaring down in between the gaping holes in a canopy roof of browned leafs in this Autumn environment. "Over there! I see 'er!"

She ran blindly. She ran only holding onto dire strings of hope that she would run from this place and to an unforeseen salvation.

Yet every second that passed away, that slither of light was slipping away from her slackening grasp. And every second's passing also brought her closer to death.

"Don't lose her!" A much graver voice suddenly yelled out to berate the other. "Luke! The Clackers!"

It was only a few moments before this was answered by the whistling, whirling noise that wracked away through the air behind her. Followed even more closely so by the sound of the undergrowth behind being scythed away and tossed back up into the air. Followed closest of all by another sound.

She wasn't sure whether the sickening snap that ensued was that of the bolas weighted ends hitting each other as they bound themselves around her leg, or if it was the shattering of the bone.

But the sound that finally came was definitely her own scream of pain and agony.

Head over heels she tumbled down to the ground - down the embankment before her and into the ditch, lying limp and breathless as her right leg lay bent into an unnatural angle and tears of exhaustion and despair continued to flow down.

"Never miss Janus." Slowly they advanced upon her with a relaxed pace, they knew there was no longer any need for haste. For moments that seemed to stretch on like eternity she could only lie there in the mud, immobile from her pain.

The three stood over her sneering with content for the prone creature sprawled in the dirt before them - clad in stitched black leather and covered in studs, chains, rings and all other metallic paraphernalia they stood.

All three stood heads above her, heavily muscled and twice the fearsome figure she could ever hope to be.

"Please?" Her small pitiful voice only quivered away between sobs and gasps as she set her gaze rapidly around all three, looking for the faintest signs of mercy - or even sympathy. Yet, with all three, they held nothing but contempt and an unconditional hatred towards her.

The largest of them, evidently the leader, was the one who moved forward and then suddenly clamped around her muzzle, holding so tightly she could only breath through her nose. "You'll be quiet fox, if you want this to be quick and painless."

With those words he then stomped down with a steel-capped boot onto her tail and she let out a stifled howl of pain with even more tears resulting as he gradually drew his dagger.

Fox was an adequate description of her after all.

She lay in the ditch adorned in a green habit-like dress of silk, torn and bloodied in several places, but you couldn't really distinguish most of it as the blood merged and blended in with the lush, thick fur that covered as much as could be seen - if not all - of her form.

Crimson - auburn fur covered her mostly, complemented by a creamy pearl - white fur present in dappled areas: under her muzzle, leading down the neck to create an underbelly unseen thanks to her garb and the flecked white that was the tip of her tail.

That in itself was decorated by the ebony black ring that almost separated the white from red areas, but also visible in several other features, stubby paw like feet, her small, clawed hands, the drooped, pointed ears that emerged from her tear and blood filled hair and the twin, tribal-like stripes that flanked either side of her muzzle.

"Okay Luke, take your clackers off, don't want to damage the things." From the vixen's restrained vision, the one named Luke suddenly disappeared from view - accompanied with a hollow 'thunk' noise for lack of better words.

"Luke?" Slowly the other two looked back and froze immediately at the sight of their companion, pinned to an ageing oak tree, where an arrows flight had so suddenly sprouted from his throat, pinning him into the trees bark.

Yet the voice that called out, itself was nothing but a gruff bark. "If I see any creature in this clearing after the next five seconds who does not have fur on their back, I'm going to turn them into an honorary hedgehog!" The two remaining humans now averted their attention from their prey, standing. That voice seemed to have echoed out all around them, the voice was nearby, but as they glanced everywhere, their unseen adversary was nowhere to be seen. Slowly he began counting.

"One. Two. Three. Four. Five!" At that word there was an extraordinarily loud twanging noise as a stone headed arrow tore through the air, not only cutting into the second of the group, but flying with such force that it ripped straight through his heart, through as ribs, through his back, to emerged from the other side of his body and only to finally stop when it had embedded itself into the ground.

With a deep laugh, the colossal figure slowly ambled forward from the cover of the shadows and shrubbery, fletching another stone headed arrow to his bow as he walked into view.

Every step the hulking figure made was a ripple of bulging muscle and sinew underneath skin and fur.

Alike the young one on the ground, he possessed a muzzle filled with sharp, pointed teach, elven like pointed ears further up on his forehead than the humans and a long brush tail.

Yet this creature was more akin to wolf than fox: entirely silver - white furred from tip to tail, with a much broader and more impressive build to house his stout and proud stature, wearing nothing but a small leather cloth around his waist like a kilt, fastened by a dark leather belt, where small bags and other items hung. And while the young vixen had the natural decoration of black to her body's fur, this lycanthropic beast was almost entirely covered with deep, painful scars all over his furred body, only serving to further fiercen his great, yet terrible form. He slowly glared around with hard brown eyes, baring his aged, yellowed fangs forward in a snarl now as his face seemed ceased into a permanent frown.

Janus, the only remaining human reacted with desperate speed as he snatched up the young vixen before him and then twisted his skinning knife to an angle aside her neck, ready to slash her jugular vein within an instant. "Back off feral."

This wolf only laughed as he slowly raised his reloaded bow to point at him. "Or what exactly? You're going to show us the colour of that young one's insides? It seems a pretty pointless threat, after all, I think we both know if I were to back off and leave you, you would do nought but slash her throat anyway!"

The vixen could only stare in horror as she felt the daggers edge biting in before her neck, drawing out droplets of her blood as the wolf kept his raised bow ready to fire, ready to rip straight through the human's hearts, straight through hers! "It would be best for me to kill you and end her suffering all at the same time."

The tension of the next few moments was unbelievable.

Both powerful figures stood there unmoving, soundless.

Not even the birds dared sing, nor would the crickets chirp.

Only the wind would dare make a noise as it whistled and whipped through the surrounding forest, wrapping over them all and fluttering fur and hair for either respective individual.

But finally it was the cruel Janus who was to break their stalemate, dropping dagger and victim to the ground. "Go ahead and shoot fur - I'm unarmed now!"

"Aye and so is that girl beside you, but it didn't stop you attacking her." He raised his bow, held at full taut.

"Would you willingly admit you're like me then?" He sneered back with his own cunning.

With one more gruff glance at the vixen cowering on the ground, he relaxed his grip on his loaded bow, tossing it aside to be followed quickly by his quiver of remaining arrows. "If we are going to kill each other, no reason we can't do it like civilised beasts."

Both moved forward with similar builds in comparison to one another as they moved closer, tall, stocky, and so ridiculously muscled that it appeared neither of these overly - built monsters held a neck to balance their heads atop.

They advanced upon one another, as wild dogs would do - sizing one another up, progressing with an outward confidence and a fearsome battle stance, coiled like snakes as they tensed, waiting ready to strike.

Yet between the two of the vixen, it was the wolf who struck her as even more terrifying, although he preyed upon the humans, there was no guarantee that he had not saved her life merely for his own sport - at eight feet tall, he was a titan among his species and even among humans as he stood a near foot over his opponent - maybe his intentions were good, but his brute power itself was a sight to truly fear.

So it was to her great surprise when she became involved, catching sight of her human tormentor withdrawing another knife gradually from behind him, out of the wolf's view and she in response cried out in shrill panic. "He's still armed!"

In the next instant to follow, several events were to fall into place one after the other in a blinding sequence of actions. Firstly was Janus to twirl about, ramming his clenched fist into the side of her muzzle, dazzling her view as she then slumped weakly to the ground.

Then the wolf leapt!

Pouncing with all the potential energy built up in his massive hind legs, he rushed out as the human turned again, roaring above the entire forest as he attacked, and in retaliation, Janus slashed out.

It was only through force of bad luck or fate that his assault did nothing more than to strike past the flying lupine figure's cheek, a trail of crimson droplets following in his path as his leap continued and he speared straight into the human, knocking them both to the ground.

But once more the lupine form was the one to react faster, swiftly pinning down Janus on all four limbs as he panted, hot damp breath wreathing into his prey's face as blood dripped down from his slashed cheek, leaving a pitter patter of noise in the ominous silence that followed.

"Furless mammals, it's a pity you cowards die so easily, or I might have a sense of satisfaction!"

His victim only had time to live for one more agonised scream as the wolf lunged, clamping his bestial fangs down upon his neck and gored into him with all power and savagery that Nature had blessed unto him.

He tore, ripped, shredded and pulled apart, shaking his victim senselessly as a dog would so do with its meat.

And then he found it - the vein of life. For in one sharp clamp downward, his blade - like molars found the jugular vein of the human and ruptured it - crimson blood spewing out into the air and falling like rain downward to taint his silvery fur completely cover him in a dripping red mask of his own gore and ferocity.

And so ended the human, Janus, assailant, heathen, murderer and coward.

For moments on end he kept tearing away at the corpse held within his jaws until finally a terrible ripping noise was heard and he spat away a chunk of the corpses neck contemptuously before gradually turning - now to advance on the young vixen in a leisurely stride.

It's an interesting study of what happens to the body at rest.

Philosopher's speak of a world of nothing, a world out with the physical realm where you're truly at peace - except the occasional dreams - you can feel as if you're floating without anything to drag you down in an endless sea of nothingness, with no form to speak of, just floating there in an endless sea of tranquillity - a place beyond description where you could lie in an eternal rest - if left be.

What interrupted the rest she felt was most definitely the searing pain that rushed through her leg as she jerked up with a scream.

"Calm down!" She recognised the wolf's harsh voice with barely a conscious thought as one massive paw held her down.

Only after a moment, her swirling vision began to clear, slowly she began to distinguish the leafy canopy of the forest waving gently up above her from cold night breezes as moon rays filtered in from a silk black sky, as she lay there covered by a travelling cloak, her feral figure shadowed and defined by the light of a flickering camp fire.

Every inch of her body felt as if it were burning in that same campfire before her as she forced herself to look down as her bandaged form lay on the ground, the wolf hunched over her leg and moving about it, she realised as another chill wind blew under the cloak that if it was not for this simple cloth, she would be wearing nothing but bandaging.

It was a horrible feeling to lie there, too pained to move, too hurt to think clearly, and to have your last shreds of dignity protected only by nothing more than a foul smelling, bloodstained rag.

Slowly, his massive left paw retracted from her sternum and she could see his face as she swivelled her head to look, his face still set into that ceaseless frown, a furrowed brow that came into view, with dried blood still decorating parts of his lethal muzzle while other areas still dripped water that had been used to clean it.

"I don't know what I'm supposed to tell you," the wolf confessed as he still felt about her leg, and she heavily grimaced at the touch of his heavy grip on the tender limb. "I think I would be stating the obvious just to tell you that you were severely injured. Broken leg, aside from that just a few slashes to be found here and there, in all honesty you were lucky. Creatures like the ones you met are sick individuals. If I had been but seconds later you would have been dead, and your body, well, that's a matter left untold to ears as young as yours."

As he kept moving about, toying with her leg, she could do nothing but lie back, biting into her muzzled lip, trying not to yelp with every twinge and spasm that fought it's way up through her body and into her head.

"You're lucky as well that you slept through most of this. Just setting your leg now. Last thing I have to do. Then? " Every word seemed to be excruciated by the tightening of her leg, as if it were in a vice and with every syllable that came from his mouth, the vice crushed down and inward on her leg, tightening as he audibly winced from the strength he was using.

All she could do was lie there, and as she bit so hard down onto her lip, she visibly drew blood in the process. She just lay waiting there with her eyes closed tight shut and trying to will this all away, make it leave her as if she could wake up from a horrible nightmare in her little straw filled bed, in her home, where her mother could comfort her and reassure her all of this had never been real.

And with one last agonising squeeze, the wolf's voice released a long, weary sigh. "You can open your eyes now young one."

She remained silent as she opened her eyes, looking at him meekly with a tired, dulled look held within them.

He looked back at her, examining her with a stern look all over. "You have a fine lot to tell me young one, after all; this whole situation provokes questions by the dozen; how you came to get in this situation for one thing? I don't even know you're name." He snorted.

She tried to turn her head away slowly, the lips of her muzzle trembling slightly.

But his paw-like hand reached out and took her cheek, turning her to once again face him, as slowly his face softened maybe just the slightest, still kept in that same frown, but it was not so savage as much anymore. "Questions can wait until later, first thing comes first, you've been through a great deal more than most at your age, you can claim rest before I will begin feeding my curiosities." Slowly he let go of her cheek and rose up stiffly, before moving off towards the other side of the campfire where other items lay, a knapsack partly open, his bow and arrows, a skinning knife, a bloodied leather jacket.

She willed herself to look away again. When finally she spoke. "You said you would kill me."

The wolf straightened, ears perked and just as silent as she had been moments ago, turned to look at her, keeping an impassive frown over his face like a mask.

"You said you would kill me to kill the human."

"Aye, and my bluff won, did it not?" He sat himself slowly, watching her turned away from him as he took a small pitcher from the ground, as he comforted himself sitting on a slightly large ruin of a tree trunk.

It took several minutes for her to formulate her question as they lay there, the fire's crackling between them. "Would you have shot me if your bluff hadn't worked?"

And in turn, it took him moments before he would say anything; letting an empty pitcher fall to his feet. "If I knew that there was no way to save you young one, aye. It would have been a far better way to go than what that human had in mind for you. I would not allow him that kind of feeling."

Several more minutes of tense silence followed as this digested into the vixen's tired, pained mind, everything seemed to be just swimming around her head, unable to piece together, she had to force them to join, think hard about what she wanted to say, make it the right thing to say. This wolf would have killed her to stop her suffering. Or was that he would have killed her to stop Janus' pleasure? Either way, she was alive and to be thankful to him.

"Diana?"

"Mmm?" He mused, not looking up from his fire as he began poking it, having thrown something in to fuel it's hunger.

"Diana Orora..." She spoke in a whisper, and at that, her voice was still trailing off. "It's my name. I thought you would ask me that, so it seemed the best place to start. I just thought you'd like to know."

It was quickly to be responded by his gruff laugh as he shook his head slowly, looking back at her, his face changing to a smile, but with his lupine features, at best his face could have resembled some demon who beheld a wicked grin.

"Then I believe I should be just as courteous to you young one. My name - if anything - you can call me Orion."

"Just Orion?"

As she strained herself to turn her head again and face him, she was met with another slight scowl as he took his pitcher back from the ground, examining if any contents were still to be found hiding inside. "Names, useless things in this world if you ask me. I don't even know why I told you my name was Orion."

"I wouldn't say that." She grimaced as she pulled out her bandaged left arm from under the cloak, lying it on top, over her chest to keep the blanket over her. "If we didn't have names, how would we tell each other apart?"

"We look different."

"Well, what do we call each other?"

"Brother? Sister? Friend?" He shrugged off, finding just a small dribble within his pitcher, he chose now to jam it back into his knapsack, keeping his gaze from her awkwardly as if he couldn't bear her sight.

That was a hard point for her young mind to argue against as she still felt her mind dull, and instead, turned her gaze upward, looking up through a hole in this waving ceiling of foliage, up into the twinkling night stars. She barely recognised the wolf's sudden laugh come again.

"Funny, thinking of names, when you haven't even realised something slightly ironic?" No response. "Me, Orion - named after the mythic hunter of the clear night sky - you, Diana - Goddess of hunters."

"I thought you said names were unimportant."

"They shouldn't be." He slowly snarled and then relaxed just as gradually. "Only, the facts must be accepted that they are, it's nothing but a habit the flesh-mammals passed onto us."

"Is it okay if we don't talk about humans?"

"You may be young, but you do realise that omitting them from our conversation or trying to forget them will not make them go away, don't you?"

There was a long silence between them, as cold night winds blew between the pair, chilling to the bone.

"No," She finally replied to him, quickly speaking again, "but I don't have to think about them, what they did to me, or what you did to them."

"What I did to them - what I do to humans."

It was like those cold night airs froze between them, so slowly turning into a wall of ice, creating something that was blocking them from one another as the moments passed.

"Then I'm sorry for saving your life." Orion growled from deep within his guttural throat, rising again and slowly moving away from the campfire.

"I'm thankful, don't get me wrong," She said in a much more timid voice now, "I just think that you didn't have to kill them, you could have-"

"WHAT!?!" He snapped, whirling and glaring down at her with a burning hatred held within his eyes, regarding her there and weighing her up for what creature lay presented to them. "What else could I have done? Scared them away with the Big Bad Wolf face? Do you honestly think they would be running to cover under some bush? Oh wait, NO! Do you think they would be here apologising for their oh-so-mean behaviour?!" He kept that fiery dark glare upon her, his ever word sharpened to a bitter point. "Can't you get it through your head that humans are evil?!?"

She had recoiled heavily from his blows, unsure what to say in the face of such bitterness and age old grudge, long planted with seeds of a long forgotten feud - long planted with the seeds of a long forgotten war, words that she had heard time and time before, but she could at least piece little thought together in her tired mind. "They're not evil, no-one - fur or human - is really such a thing as evil, if it even exists?"

He stood silent, and his eyes squinted, almost unsure if he believed what his ears told him she had said. "You've been put through a living hell, tormented by sick, twisted monsters who broke your leg, slashed you all over and then intended to kill and Great One above, probably have raped you before or after just for the kick of it. Yet here you are, telling me they aren't evil?"

"Yes - I mean no," She kept her gaze skyward, as stars above burnt brightly to light the darkness all around, piercing through the cloak of shadow and black like little daggers, light glinting upon their metal blades as they were left there. "No-one is evil, no-one is a bad person. I only believe there are people who have good hearts, and those whose hearts are weak. Weak hearts and strong influences. No such thing as bad. No such thing there is."

Finally the wolf sat himself, his expression softening slowly, as it had been every second he had listened to her speak, she had heart if anything. "I'll apologise for my outburst." He sighed, and followed her gaze, looking up into the heavens above, what was it she saw there that caught her attention so. "When you become a casualty in war, you forget things, you forget the strength in your heart that allows you to be close with others, to understand other creatures." Another sigh was given from him as he slowly shook his long maenad head.

"You are not the first casualty, and I would not pretend I am either. Yet I grow older, and my heart slowly closes over ever so slowly every day I am alive, and so it will do, as day by day, the chapters of my life are slowly reaching their climax, where they will then droop to become my end, and my story will be over, but you, you are a young creature to this world yet, tell me what happened to you Diana, how did you become involved with the human Janus?"

"I didn't, he got involved against me." She shrugged as best she could, thinking back to the beginning of that day. "I only come from a village a few miles back, out through the forest again, my mother works as a healer. She just sent me up the forest to find her some herbs for her medicines. I crossed my path with Janus, and he found some reason to call on his friends to get me. Then all this." And she visibly grimaced to look down at her leg, from it being broken, to lying in the ditch, now to lying there as she finally saw her leg, lying straight out, held splinted by two thick branches that had been cut down and smoothed, bound to her leg by innumerable amounts of tight bandaging all it's length down to her foot. The breaking, where it had lay at an unnatural angle before her. Now, after the setting, made her stomach churn to imagine the manipulation and the warping of the bones out of proportion to straighten it from what the leg had once been.

"Well, sometimes people don't need reasons to act like that." He laughed, shaking his head, turning his gaze from the stars back down to her. "I think someone long ago once said 'The path to a warrior is a thousand miles, yet the path to being a bully is but a single step'. Some people find in life, the only way to define themselves is by the suffering of others, that they must kill and destroy to make their name, become feared and gain power by the fear they hold over creatures, that's how Janus managed to obtain his cohorts. Both of them were afraid he would become strong, so they joined with him to become immune to his wrath, and to grow fat in their own delusions of greed."

Once again, several more minutes were passing between them, as neither could think what to say to the other. For Diana, her mind was weary, with everything that had happened to her, she felt ready to let go and drift off back into some form of sleep, even with the pain that wracked her all over.

For Orion, thoughts flooded through his mind that had been pondered, reviewed and rehashed so many times that it seemed like a second nature to him to recall it all and for one more time. Perhaps, he could review it one last time, this time he would not be just telling his thoughts to himself, maybe he had someone here who would listen.

"Diana, you know how all ferals came to be, don't you?"

That was followed by her nod, no feral could live without knowing the tale of their past. "They were experiments, things brought about by humans, that's how it began."

"Human greed, human lust for power, that's how." He nodded back at her. "Genetic experimentation. Yet, do you know why the original ferals were created?"

Slowly she looked back at him silently, he had her attention.

"Darwin's theory, if you believe it, in the idea that creatures slowly evolve through time, becoming more intelligent, more powerful, that they change into new forms to adapt to a growing, dynamic world. As the dinosaur's of millennia long ago became birds and reptiles to survive, apes became humans to rule this planet, a change of power, as one dominant species faded away, a new one came into existence to grasp that power."

"So, what did that have to do with ferals?"

"Scientists a few hundred years ago are supposedly to have found the missing links in Darwin's theory, their missing link's discovered and the final parts of a millennia long puzzle complete. So they began their experiments on animals, and discovered what their theories dictated. Although humans had progressed and would continue to do so, so too were animals brain cells became more developed, even with small skulls, the animals they tested showed a genetic improvement of records taken long ago, so they began to worry, how long would it be until those animals made their final step? A fully sentient being? One who could think, plan, scheme? How long did humans have left as the dominant species of planet Earth?"

She could only lie there in awed silence, listening to this. "It was an inevitability that we were to evolve." He slowly raised his massive paw, turning it over and slowly opening and closing his fist, absorbing himself in the clawed fingers that he moved. "To end it would mean they needed to destroy all other life from the planet until only they were left, and there was no way they could possibly go through with such an act, the public of normal humans would not allow it, and they realised that instead of slowing it down, why not control it? Why not speed the flows of evolution up so that we could think and speak, walk on two legs, why not?"

"Why?" She repeated for him.

He looked into her wide eyes, tiredness forgotten as she lay watching his every facial expression, every word that he would allow to pass out of his lips.

"Because Diana, when they controlled our evolution, they could dictate HOW it turned out." He shook his head with a laugh. "God, that's all they played at, being God. They made the original ferals, and forced them into lives of impudence, working as meagre slaves, the only payment they received was the lives that they were spared to keep. Segregation it's called Diana, they created our species to be different, and they used that difference to their advantage. Look at us, we squander in little villages built upon old marsh, while they lounge in the almighty buildings of glass, metal and blood that they have put so much of their lives into. Cities" He snorted, "Nothing but a giant cloud of dark rain, producing an endless supply of pollution, poison and death, and more humans."

"But for their credit, there are ones out there young one, who worked against this, for the humans their history is nothing but an endless waltz on and on, as they forget the past, they move on to the future only to repeat those mistakes over and over again, war, massacre, dictators, segregation, all of it has happened before, and now is in a cycle that revolves over and over in one forever moving dance. Until the humans recognise their mistakes entirely, they are doomed to go on forever like that."

"There are those who stop it, but no-one lives forever. So no one person can end humanities problems. To learn to end these problems, they must learn from their mistakes as a whole, not as a minority." He looked slowly back down at her.

"Why are you telling me all this?" She eventually managed to ask him.

"It's principle. Those thugs who attacked you did so for the reasons I have told you, and I think it's important you know, before you waste your life trying to find those answers for yourself. People like them fight because they can, because they have the power to do so, they use it." His voice was slowly growing harder and rougher.

She looked uneasily away from him slowly. "You said I am not the only casualty, you were too, and I was wondering?"

"Why I am?"

"Well?" She thought of that question 'why he was', what did that even mean? Why he was a casualty? What made him like he was? Why did he hate humans so vividly? So many questions to ask of Orion, a mysterious figure who had saved her from death. How much she could she receive from one question from him? "Yes, why are you like you are?"

"Something long ago," He took a deep sigh and took a twig aside him, flinging it into the fire to let it burn from small cinders and rekindle itself. He looked at her, now, would she laugh at this? Think him an old, pathetic fool? Well, no more doubts left now, he had brought this on.

"For I was certainly a lot younger only so long ago, without the scars that cover my body today, with a home, not some travelling vigilante. I was a husband,"

She only let her eyes turn back to him, lying back, Orion from what he had shown himself, was no creature to be taken a joker, and this would be nothing but serious.

"Years ago, I lived in a small village like you did, near a forest very much like this one. And I was its leader, a kind of guardian physically and mentally for the others within my village, under my care. All of them, man, woman and child. Including my wife, Julia, a wolf like me, and a more, sweeter, kinder creature this world is never to see again." As he talked, he threw one after the other, small twigs into that fire, staring into its burning depths, a powerful light kindled into his eyes and he continued speaking. "She was pregnant, with our first child together, happier than any joy you could possibly imagine to give birth to a child, a child, boy or girl she didn't care, whom would be raised upon our love and one we could watch growing older together. Her silvery fur, her rounded ears, the flowers and feathers that she tied into the locks of headfur she hung down wildly, and red eyes, with a great wild fire within them that would never fade, a spirit and will there that shone so bright, a strength and passion that she would always use for good. I had never seen a creature before her so wonderful, so beautiful."

She watched, as his face tensed with every word, although they were words of happiness, there was that deep look of hatred again, that frown over his face and he kept his eyes clenched shut, hiding their reflection from the flames. "Something happened, didn't it?"

He would not answer her, but he would only continue, as instead of placing sticks into the fire, he now gathered them between massive heavy paws. "One day, I went into the woods to gather flowers for her. She loved them, the colour, the fragrance, the feel of a flower. I was gathering them for her as she would be entering the last few months of her life before becoming a whole woman, before she would give birth to a cub of our own. And what I tell you next," His face tightened again. "...Are but words from others mouths. I cannot reinforce them with what I saw with my eyes, but I can defend the honour of all who spoke this to me." There was another long pause as he thought long and hard there, his paw-like hands shaking visibly as he searched for words throughout a racing mind.

"Humans came?"

"A group of them, all of them came to the village, armed to the very teeth." Upon his belt that kept his cloth, his only real slither of clothing in place, was a pouch that he slowly pulled away and began undoing the drawstrings. "But it was not with swords and daggers. Or bow and arrow."

He slowly then overturned the back, and let it's contents fall to the grass, the first few objects landing with dull thuds, but the others landed atop the others, hitting with metal clinks and rolling away slightly before stopping, the dull metal forms lying there still after moments, crumpled little items of jet black colour. Some remained more true to their original form, little shafts of metal that coned towards a point, other were flatter than this, while others were crumpled into distorted shapes to complete alienation from their other companions as they just lay, such helpless, lifeless things, but with a hidden darkness, a death to each one and a blood long vanished from sight, yet still there nonetheless, remained to their shells.

"Guns," He mouthed venomously.

Her eyes widened slowly. Few nowadays knew what these things were, but there were still teachings of these little shadows of terror, as she let her paw feel over one shaking, and slowly withdrew from it. "Bullets."

"Little dark holes that tear through souls. Destroying all within their path. They break apart the body and crush bone, muscle, exploding from the inside, a more savage sound is one hard to find. As they rush out from a barrel, like an arrow from a bow, they release an almighty explosion, tearing apart all before them, the air, the skin, everything. I have seen the results of these things at first experience, bodies entirely dismembered by the rapid firing of these, limbs lying everywhere, with blood covering all and faces frozen into one last pained surprise. Nothing survives them." His paws began shaking harder and slightly more violently now.

"I heard the noises within the woods and ran for them. I knew no such noise could be of good in this world. What I returned to was not the little village I had left that morning, corpses lay in all manner of positions, some mothers who had ran to protect their children, the two entwined in one last embrace as a pool of blood surrounded their forms. Warriors who rushed headlong into the fray, their faces without trace, skulls and face entirely shattered and torn up beyond any recognition."

The sticks crumpled in his grasp.

"Julia," He let the word whisper from his lips, and his eyes still clenched shut, she could see the fire betray him as it's light was what made his tears glimmer, a few small pockets of water that spread out over his eyelids and dropped to the ground with only a small patter sound like the blood that had been spilled, on this day, and of the day that he spoke of.

"She was the first to be shot." He struggled now to hold his words integrity, pleading with his insides not to fall apart in the memory of all he stood for. "But, she did not die immediately."

"I came back finding her lying before our home blood around her, mixed with another fluid, they had shot her, and killed a second creature with their dark devices. She lay there in a sobbing wreck, not because she was dying, because she knew our child was dead, even before it had a chance to live! She could feel her insides being broken up as every moment passed. But that pain wasn't touching her, she was numb to it in the idea she had failed, she couldn't save our child, she couldn't even save herself!"

There was a ragged breathing sound as he battled within himself, trying to keep going. "I held her up, and as her eyes opened one last time, her eyes had gone away, the spirit they held within them had died, and the lens of her soul had faded to a grey mist, she looked at me, trying to speak beyond a mouth filling with blood."

"The last thing she told me, tears rushing down her face and mixing into the blood all around her, she told me, she was sorry, she told me, she told me to never become a victim, a casualty, and she left."

Diana could no longer think of anything of herself, without a conscious thought, a tear fell from her own eyes. Now she could only feel more helpless, to lie there as Orion poured out of his heart all his answers. None of this could be a lie, she could tell.

"No one survived but myself. The ones who were left told me of it all. Humans who came forward, asking to discuss business with the leader of the village, and when they met my wife their wanton manner was what was unleashed, and they let loose all hell upon my home."

Slowly, his eyes began to draw open again, his strength held in him, the deep fire reflected there, and they seemed red, as red as his wife's eyes, as red as the blood that stained his life now. "Now I've spent my life roaming to find the humans who kill, and erase each and every one of them." He took his paw and began feeling up his chest. "Every scar I bear has been placed there by one of them, and for each scar, I ignore it, the pain I feel was nothing like my wife's. I remember how she lay there, there is no pain beyond how it must feel to die believing you were nothing but a failure. Each scar, each scar has been returned by the lives of ten humans. I cannot count my scars, and as such, I've lost count of how many humans left this realm from my hands."

He then took both paws and collected the bullets, slowly sifting them back into the little bag once more. "For each bullet here a creature died, and I remember them in every day that passes. Guns are thought to have been eliminated long ago, but evil never dies young one, and I alone must remain there to hold it off. I may not be able to kill all humans from this world, but I shall become a bane to them that shall not easily be forgotten."

"Now you know my tale young one," He slowly tied the bag's drawstrings around his belt, letting it fall back into place with a dead clink.

"Ever since, you've kept travelling, just to kill?" She asked timidly, unsure where her mind lay anymore with him, still exhausted from her ordeal, yet had been forced to absorb his tale at lightning speed to accept all of what he had told her.

He nodded once and deeply sighed, unable to speak anything else anymore, taking a hand and feigning rubbing his eyes in his own tiredness, as he instead moved to wipe away the tears that he had spilled for his memories.

"Aye, but it has grown to be a late hour now." He spoke slower, much softer than before. "You and I both should rest now after what we have been through today. I will help you back to your village tomorrow, your mother no doubt will be worried for you."

She could only nod, as she watched him move away to tidy things up, she looked back up at the twinkling stars, each a blinking soul of light, there shone the North star, and her way home. She closed her eyes over now, her mind was unappeased with it's confusion, but her body commanded sleep, and as she closed those eyes, her body won as she drifted off into sleep.

At first, she was barely aware of things. A slightly throbbing feeling within her leg, the feeling of weightlessness, and she opened her eyes slowly once more. Now, she squinted as she looked up at a moving canopy of leaves, blinking against a bright sun that pierced through gaps blindingly at her.

"Awake then." She only needed to turn her head slightly and she was facing Orion, as kept his knapsack over his back, and looking around, saw that she was held carefully in his arms, her leg slightly twitching with every step forward, where the dull throbbing came from. They were walking, or rather, he was walking through the forest as slow and carefully as possible. "I'm just getting you to your village, and then I'll be off on my road again."

"How do you know where I live?" She asked hoarsely, her throat dry from lack of water.

He simply shrugged. "After you fell asleep, I went off to look, and I only found one nearby village, so, it seems the best bet for you."

She in turn began looking more carefully at where they were, there was a change in this scenery, where the other day, her speed made the trees merge together to seem like one long, continuous wall, here she could see things much more closely and critically. But this was the way home, she could tell, almost home. She let her head loll back in his hold, this was almost over for her. "Will I ever see you again after this?"

Now he just responded with his gruff laugh as he had so done before. "Diana, if our paths were to cross again, I think it would be a very far off chance, we were lucky enough to meet before, again would be nothing short but the hand of fate."

She sighed and just tried to lie there with as little movement as possible, the prospect of her dull home and a million tellings off by her mother seemed a blissful end to all of this for her, she just wanted it all to end as soon as possible. But if it meant never seeing this wolf again, she really wished there would have been more she could have done to thank him. Her attention was distracted when she caught the sight of green silk on her lap, on top of the travelling cloak that was bundled around her. "My dress?" "Aye?" He nodded, keeping his eyes ahead on where he was going as they kept moving forward. "I'm sorry I had to take it off, but you had quite a few injuries needing examined, you'll find a few pieces of old bronze in it. I saw how badly torn up it is, and you'll need to get a new one as it is." A final gruff laugh issued from him. "Well, call it a farewell present."

With a few surprised blinks upon the silk, she could feel on her stomach it was heavier than it should have been. "Thank you." Again, it seemed the only thing she could say in return. "You've done a lot more than you should have."

"You're to think nothing of it young one." He shouldered aside a long tree branch, sidestepping forward, to make sure she wasn't struck.

"No, really," She shook her head. "There's nothing I can do in return?"

"You've gave me enough, don't worry." He smiled cryptically before he spoke. "I only knew one other creature who believed there is no such thing as evil, just as strongly as you."

She looked at him then suddenly with a gaping expression to her face, and then just as suddenly swung her face away. For her it was awkward to answer to that, after all, she did fully realise without little hint who that someone would have been.

The conversation between them broke for the longest ever, as minutes went away, and within almost an hour of walking, they finally emerged from the forest; on a long grassy knoll Orion stood with her in his arms, gazing out at a high noon view down to a small little village, a glowing white within the shine of bright noontime sun. "Would this be your home, Diana?" He asked with a comfortable smile.

"Yes." A smile crept over her features as well, and she gazed over it all. "Yes, it is."

"DIANA!" A voice bawled up the hill at them, both their ears peaked, and although Diana's hearing was slightly less acute then her experienced friend, she recognised the sound off by heart.

"My mother," She gasped out, smiling wider and wider, the sun's shine being what glimmered her tears now, as her eyes watered in joy.

Slowly, she could feel herself being let down, and she looked back at Orion as he sat her down on the grassy knoll and stood again with not a gruff laugh, but a somewhat lighter one. "This is the part where I have to leave, if I stay any longer, your mother will no doubt start praising me to the high heavens, invite me for supper and all manner of things."

She smiled back at him for that and nodded. "Thank you, for everything Orion."

And he in turn smiled back for her. "You're more than welcome I said before." Slowly, he began about turning to face the forests once more. "And this is goodbye young one."

"Goodbye's never forever." She kept smiling hopefully.

"The Great One works in many mysterious ways." with a light shrug, slowly he began ambling forward, adjusting his back where his bow and quiver of arrows hung. "Goodbye Diana."

"Goodbye Orion, and thank you again."

He laughed once more, simply shaking his head in disbelief at her as he moved off, to be swallowed up in the foliage of the forest with a last wave. Fading away from all sight.

Slowly, she turned her head and yelled down the hill with all strength in her throat, leaning up and holding the cloak around her in place. "I'M HERE! I'M UP HERE!"

There was a slight clink.

And as she could hear the increased rhythm of feet against the ground rushing up towards her, she looked at her green silk dress; torn up alright, but as she had sat up, it had shifted, and whatever was inside had weighed it away, and made it drop, what she saw was a chain. Using her paw like hand, she pushed aside folds of the material to look and gape at the object there. Bronze was right, but Orion had never elaborated on what kind of bronze was there, in the form of a small locket. And aside it, a small scrap of paper.

Almost afraid to do so, she picked up the locket precariously and held it before her. Opening it slowly by an old, overused latch, she looked in with a silent awe and surprise at the faded black and white picture inside, Orion, what he must have been so long ago, sleek, long furred, unscarred, smiling. There was no doubt to the mind the female wolf smiling aside him was Julia, the beauty, the feathers tied in among her hair, the wild look within her slightly almond shaped eyes set her apart from any creature she had ever seen.

She couldn't believe Orion would give her this. She whipped her head back to the forest in hope of finding any sight of him, with none to behold.

Yet as she turned her head slowly back round, she could still hear her mother's footsteps up towards her, and clutching the locket close to her, she took the paper, and slowly smoothed it out, opening it up she looked at it, staring at the seven words scrawled upon it.

"THE FIRST CASUALTY OF WAR IS INNOCENCE."