Heya everyone,

A few months ago, Wes and I decided to change our fursonas. Wes is now a Knight Templar named Matthias von Brandenburg and I'm a Knight Hospitaller named Benjamin Martin.

Same species and everything, just different back stories.

Speaking of back stories, Wes asked me to write one for our new 'sonas. So I'm slowly doing just that. Here's a taste of what I've written so far.

I actually wrote this part first if you can believe that.

Enjoy.

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Like a man, dead on his feet and seeking to stay in his bed after a terrible night of unimagined horrors, the sun struggled to rise into the horizon; blazing a lazy orange over a kingdom of sand, rocks, and scorpions.

A gentle squelching sound follows Matthias as his footpaws carry over a landscape of hell; the very earth soaked in a mire of blood, piss, sweat, and spilled bowels. His proud lion’s mane is matted and clumped with the lives of others. All his life he has trained to wield a sword: to hack and slash, to hem and reap the limbs from foes, to steal the ultimate prize from the very fingertips of a flesh and blood opponent. Yet, no amount of physical or mental training could prepare for him for the hell of this day.

His tail drags.

His arms quake.

His knees threaten to buckle.

But it is not the great sword across his back, nor the mail armor over his fur that threatens to bare him down. No. Matthias cannot help but feel the greatest weight comes from the simple red cross that adorns his stained tabard.

“Deus Vult” he tries to tell himself, “Deus Vult”.

The words ring mockingly hollow in his mind.

Picking through the bodies of the slain, Matthias finds Benjamin seated atop a heap of Muslim corpses that have been piled by the sergeants for burial. To the Templar’s dismay his fellow knight is laughing hysterically.

Before a query can leave Matthias’ lips, the Hospitaller turns and begins to speak between giggles.

“You’re wondering why I laugh atop my makeshift throne, dear friend Matthias? Hehe ha hahaha…”

Leaning forward the collie beckons his friend closer, like a blushing housemaid bearing the juiciest gossip, with a paw stained black with blood.

“You see, my friend, now I can see the truth of the play! Heehe… I see it as plainly as the nose on your face! Hahaha! But no one else can see it!”

Matthias grimaced worriedly as Benjamin dissolved into a fit of giggles so violent as to leave him coughing.

“Benjamin, let’s get you into the shade with some water” Matthias began, his strong paw reaching out to comfort.

Benjamin recoiled from the touch as if it were fire.

“Don’t you see it, Matthias!? Don’t you see what I’m talking about!?” cried the knight. Gone was the macabre laughter; replaced instead by the cry of panicked cub lost from its mother in the dark.

Slowly, Matthias shook his head.

Clambering to the top of the pile of corpses Benjamin threw his arms open wide, tears streaming down his cheeks and a hysterical grin on his muzzle.

“Then listen my friend! Listen and hear the greatest joke in life!”

Benjamin paused for a moment before speaking again, his eyes never leaving the lion’s.

“I am hanging, over a dark and welcome chasm called madness, from a rope I hope is named ignorance. And from my treacherous vantage I can see the sick hilarity of life! It stares me full in the face so that I may know it wholely! And as I see it and know it’s truth it pushes me further down into the chasm!”

Drawing the war hammer from his belt, the collie thrust it over his head to resemble the rope from which he claimed to swing; doing so causing gore to drip from the as yet uncleaned weapon onto his ears.

“I look around and see the no one else sees it, but they can see me. They see me and shake their heads, muttering that I am going mad! Well I am going mad, Matthias! I am going mad!”

Slinging the weapon away Benjamin falls to his knees atop his carrion throne, tears once more flowing freely through the dirty fur of his cheeks.

“Matthias I can see the lies! I can see the totality of the false masks presented to us and those we present in turn. I can see the horrible truth that must lay behind the lie we’ve been fed by the Church!”

Though bone weary, Matthias’ fur bristled at his friend’s statement. Casting his eyes furtively about for any who might have overheard he whispered sharply, “Benjamin, your tongue is on the road to heresy!”

Benjamin’s eyes suddenly seemed to lose their spark and grow hollow. His voice barely escaping his throat in a whisper.

“We are all guilty of heresy, my friend. All our lives we have been trained to fight for the Church. Trained to don armor and spill blood. Trained to answer the Pope’s call and steal away life in the name of God. God wills it they tell us. God wills it…”

In no mood to listen any more the lion heaved a weary shrug. “What do you want, Benjamin?”

Leaping from the corpse pile, Benjamin grabbed the Templar’s filthy tabard with ferocious strength and pulled him nose to nose before screaming, “I want a God I can love! I want a God that loves me! I want a God that loves me in spite of my sins, not asks me to kill because of them!”

Gesturing to the landscape of corpses and shattered weapons he continued, “Is this what the Kingdom of heaven is built upon? Is this what Christ wants to return to?”

In that moment, canine eyes met their leonine counter parts and Benjamin heaved a heavy sigh.

“This is what the Church has raised us for and promised us. This is the truth I’ve been speaking of. Slaying for salvation. It leaves only two options, Matthias. Either they have lied to us and we have spilt blood committing heresy that no amount of ignorance can forgive, or they have taught us the truth and our salvation is assured. If the latter is the case, my friend, then that is not the God I want. I would rather be as far from Him as the east is from the west.”

Standing amidst the carnage of a lost Holy war, Matthias let his friend and lover’s words sink in. After a moment, he reached down and gently kissed the collie on his nose.

“Go get your hammer, Benjamin. We’re going home.”