Yes it is a re-submission. The original was written too quickly, and edited not at all. I wasn't really happy with the effort. Hopefully this makes it a bit more readable. As always comments are appreciated.

Promised Land
Chapter 4
By: Lu-Man

The wolf leads his two captives into the forest. They carried the crate between them, exchanging the occasional glance, but said nothing. Darkpaws attempted to hide the fear that was on his face, but scratch looked more bored than anything else. His tail had a small wag of nervousness, but nothing more. Grey followed at a distance, stepping over the occasional small shrub or around the tree, always keeping his charges in his site.

When they finally arrived at the ship, Darkpaws dropped the crate with a huff and rubbed his shoulder, slowly turning around to face the gunman. The ship itself had landed in a clearing in the forest, the sunlight warming up the fur on their faces quickly. It would have been pleasant if it weren't for the wolf with a gun waving it in their faces.

“Tell me,” Grey said, “Why shouldn't I just blast both of you right now and kill that ape?” Grey raised his lip in a snarl, as he slowly waved the weapon between his two charges. Scratch and darkpaws stared at the gun as if almost hipnotized.

“Oh, stop parading your kill.” Scratch said. “If you where going to kill us, you would have done so.” His eyes still followed the weapon, his focus betraying his bravado.

Grey pointed the weapon at Scratch but he could see the wheels turning in Darkpaws mind. He had to act quickly. “So,” he said swinging the weapon back at Darkpaws “Why shouldn't I just kill you three?”

“Because you would lose the island.” Darkpaws said. “And that wouldn't look very good to The Counsel.”

blinked as he tried to hide his surprise. He fought to hold his ears upright and swung the weapon back on Darkpaws. He lost the battle and his ears plastered to his head. “What are you....”

“You're not hard to figure out. You want to stand out. Lead the hunt. Bring in the kill.” Darkpaws spoke hard and fast, glared at the weapon shaking in his face. His fear was quickly being swallowed by anger now. He spoke hard and fast, his words now biting. “You want to hold the scent that we now have. The only way to get it is to steal it from us.”

The sound buzzed by his ear a few seconds after the light flashed next to his head. “I hold the gun. I still hold the hunt.” Grey growled.

“You kill us,” growled Scratch, “You lose the deal. You might as well turn that weapon around on yourself.”

Grey's fist shook just a bit as he attempted to continue to aim the weapon. “You'd be dead, I could make up any story I wanted too.”

Scratch grinned. “It wouldn't be believed. No matter what you do, you'd have two dead ship mates on Earth, a human who got away, and yourself holding the gun. No island. No island paperwork. No way to obtain the island. Just risked exposure with no reward.”

Grey growled to himself. He knew they where right. He knew that a while ago. He was hoping to keep them off guard long enough to steal the whole deal out from under them. “How where you going to present this to the counsel?” He growled.

“I was hoping to keep them in the dark on this until the deal was done.” Darkpaws replied. “Then I would surprise them. Give them no choice but to take it.”

Grey grinned. “So you where just going to make the whole deal and hope that they'd go along with it. You're a fool. You've upstaged them. If you presented them this island like that, they'd reject it out of spite.”

“Well then, what's your plan genius?”

“Simple. You make it think its their idea. Sell them on it, and conveniently already have it done so they can make a quick settlement. They'll think you're a much better salesman than you are, and you're rewarded accordingly.”

“Well, then. I guess you've already made the connections you need?” Darkpaws grinned. He felt he had turned the entire thing around. The difficult part now would be keeping it that way. Grey smiled at him. “I know a couple people.” Darkpaws hid an ear smile by quickly flicking it, almost as if a fly buzzed it. Grey completely missed the tell. “Well then, I guess we need each other equally, don't we?”



They boarded the ship and took off without much comment. As the ship left Earth's atmosphere, loud yelling slowly faded into its intercom system. “Where the filth are you!?!”

Darkpaws quickly pressed the intercom button. “We lost coms for a bit. Got separated from the pack.” 'Got separated from the herd' is a slang term used in their group. It essentially meant the same as dead in the water.

“We didn't even have you on the playing field!”

Scratch hastily replied “uh...We had a communications malfunction sir that shorted out the entire ships radio function. We could see you, but not hear you. You couldn't see or hear us. I had to re-wire a fried panel.”

“Its fine. Just fix it when you get back in here.”

As the sound died out, Darkpaws turned his head to Scratch and glared at him. “What did you...”

Grey made a shushing motion to both. “They will still be listening.” he whispered. “Talk about the communication problem.” Scratch looked at Grey and nodded. “I'll have to replace the whole module when I get back.” Scratch continued to babble about what sort of technical read outs and things he would need to fix the problem. He began to remove panels, pulling wires. He crawled beneath the console and began twisting wires together. Sparks flew from underneath the control panel. Lights flickered, and then grew dark.

“We're under command's control now. They're pulling us in to dock.” Scratch said. “Apparently the repair signal didn't go through when communications died.”

Grey nodded, but didn't say more. Scratch had verified their unverifiable story. Without him they may have been killed. Now they wouldn't be scrutinized too hard by the counsel. But his stench was palpable. Did he refuse to bathe out of a sense of duty? Scratch made Grey's skin crawl, but he had a purpose, at least for now.

Not another word was spoken as the ship finally docked. He hid in the back, while Scratch and Darkpaws left. He waited several hours, well until after the exercise was over before he left the vehicle himself.

Scratch and Darkpaws walked in silence for several minutes. It was Scratch who spoke up first. “He will betray us.” Darkpaws merely nodded. Scratch felt his anger well up inside him. He grabbed Darkpaws and drove him to the wall. “Stop with the ape gestures. You're not human. You are Grensho! You have started a very dangerous game that could get us all killed. I only went with it because I felt you where right. I do not wish to die from it!”

Darkpaws ear grinned at him. “You went along with it because you felt you could profit.” Scratch growled inaudibility but didn't reply. “He has ties to the counsel. We need him for now. We have to be extra vigilant.” Scratch growled louder. He released Darkpaws stormed off.


It was almost dusk on the ship. The ship kept real time according to their new world's rotation. So that meant 24 hours in a respective day instead of the usual 26 hours or so that it translated it to usually. Many of the bedrooms lighting would be low lit on one side, to simulate sunset. The hallways would be low lit as well, to help simulate night time. It helped to keep their biological clock on track.

In Darkpaws and Sunshine's bedroom dim light faded down from two ceiling panels in the corner. Darkpaws and Sunshine laid back to back, curled in a sleeping position. The bed they laid upon was circular, large enough to hold 3 or 4 of their people. It had no blankets but a gentle heat could be felt radiating from it.

After the third or fourth growl, Sunshine rolled over and embraced her husband, nuzzling him gently. “That's the fourth time you've growled in five minutes. What's wrong?”

“That damn soldier. He has contacts with The Counsel he claims. But he pulled a weapon. I don't trust him. But I have no other options.” Sunshine nuzzled gently and asked. “Start from the beginning. Tell me what happened.”



The computer monitor's light flickered over Julia's face making her look much older. She typed in several words into Google and deleted each and every one of them. “How do I sell an island to someone who doesn't actually exist?” She asked allowed.

The hostilities and confusion had left her head spinning. The cooler sized box with the gold had been taken with them, but the down payment was left. The chunk weighed at least two pounds. Two pounds of solid gold. She didn't know the conversion, but that was a couple hundred thousand dollars, at least. It was more than enough to make the down payment.

Julia had two actual problems. First, none of the aliens actually existed to any government on the known planet. So she couldn't actually sell the island to any of them: in truth they didn't exist. The only known way around that law was to set up a corporation and sell the island to the corporation. The problem with that was corporations required the people setting them up to be alive, living beings.

It really was almost more trouble than it was worth. Julia kept thinking about that box full of gold however. Gold. That much gold surely meant that the island was being sold for well above market value. The commission would be the biggest she's ever gotten.

The idea started as a tickle in the back of her mind. What if the island was sold to someone who did exist, but gave them control over it? Annexing it wouldn't be that difficult. The government wouldn't claim sovereignty over the island, more than likely they wouldn't even bat an eye lash over them asking to pull away. So that leaves the question of who gets to own it while they pay for it?

As she chewed it over, she came closer and closer to a solution that actually might work. Key word was MIGHT. There was no actual way to tell until they tried it. She pulled up a few forms and began inputting the information on her screen. The problem was that it really was a shell game, and the government right now was looking real hard into shell games in the real estate market.

She worked the forms a bit longer, then attached them with a few instructions and sent them to the Email address given. “Julie old girl” she said to herself, “You're either going to be very rich or in deep trouble.”





As Darkpaws finished his tale, Sunshine smiled gently and nuzzled Darkpaws. There where many things that Sunshine could do to alter Darkpaws mood. One of them was the nuzzling. She had been Darkpaws mated partner, or wife as we would call it, for more than 3 years before this trip even started. She knew what would relax him.

As she gently nuzzled, she slowly scratched him between the ears, in the magical place that would cool his white hot anger. It was working. In a few minutes, Darkpaws had gone from growling in frustration to gently murring between statements. When he finally finished his story, he continued to murr gently, tongue almost rolling out of his mouth.

“I should be angry at you.” She said finally. He parted his eye lid just barely and looked down at her. “Why?”

“Because. You told me you would be careful. But you haven't been careful.”

Darkpaws tilted an ear at her in confusion. “How have I not been careful?”

Sunshine continued scratching in the magic spot as she answered. “That wolf would have never been able to get that far if you'd have thought things through better. Also he is right. You can't spring this on the counsel without the counsel themselves first executing you for treason, and second just stealing the island in the first place. They wouldn't see it as securing our future home. They would see it as running with the other pack.”

Darkpaws sighed and leaned into her scratching. “I suppose you're right. But what else am I supposed to do? Two of us where supposed to be involved. Now we're talking three? And maybe more before the counsel gets wind? What am I to do now? What's to stop the rumors and lies spreading and making our prey bolt before we have a chance to bring it in? What's to happen?”

Sunshine sat up and looked at her mate. Her husband. The love of her life. “You are to bring it in.” She said. “The mighty deal hunter. Stalking the big game. Don't catch false scents. And don't chase your tail. Just stay the course. If that soldier really wants in on the deal, then you must control it, and his part.”

Darkpaws gently nuzzled Sunshine. “You're right. I will.” He said. He didn't see the cloud of doubt forming in her own mind. She kept them pinned down. She knew him and loved him. She would follow whatever trail he led. Even if that trail resulted in their death.