Motherhood In The Beast World

Ch. 21 The End of The Battle

(A/N: Dear reader, there is a warning ahead in one of the paragraphs. You can skip it without fear of missing anything.)

"How did they get so close?" Growls out Vick as he raises his hackles at the tiny red dots pertaining to the eyes of ferals.

"Cover them!" yells a bat beast as he and his clan surround the area where the females kneeled trembling with their cubs firmly held in their arms. As for the males saved by these females, they stood on their two feet near their females ready to defend them or to take them away somewhere safer.

"There's way too many," whispers one of the females in shock as she watches how the trees and dust fell behind the monstrous beasts.

"There's no choice," mutters Vick as he watches how their outer defense fell from the feral tide. "Onto the next plan!" yells Vick to the bat leader as he silently huffs in frustration that they won't be able to take in anymore of the possibly rescued females. After the command, the rest of his comrades gave the females long pieces of cloths to tie in the smaller cubs to them. Quickly both bats and geese beasts were placed onto their backs a female, some of their cubs and either their male or a comrade to tie them in. As they lift to the air, Vick gives out another roar for the horse and raptor leaders to send in their defenders to the group of females in flight.

(A/N: Trigger Warning Ahead, it's okay to skip)

Unfortunately not all females made it to the sky safely despite the warriors sacrificing attempts to keep them free. As if everything slowed, Vick's eyes dilated and he blanked as he watched how one of the flying beasts fell from the sky, landed crudely on the ground, and how the female screamed her anguish at being unable to move. Unfortunately she was too far and the other living male with her was only one. The ferals, aware of their win, shredded into the carcass of the beast and later tore her male away in order to get to the sobbing female. In a few seconds screams of agony were heard as a feral harshly grabbed onto her. Yet ferals being ferals, they did not like to share, soon silence was heard as the female was no more.

(A/N: END of this scene)

Listening to the quietness of the lost female, Vick felt his body tremble as he began to remember those familiar noises and screams from a time long ago. Suddenly, a searing pain on his ear brought him back to the present. Immediately, snarls from his comrades were heard as well as the very close deafening voice of a shrieking female.

"Vick, we need to go!" screams the frazzled green-haired mermaid who was past laughing at the battlefield. At her feet lies the tip of a bloody torn round ear that is now seen and scented by the stupefied black bear beast.

Did you just...? Before his own eyes could glow and growl out his fiery temper at the audacity done to him, the female glows her round golden eyes at him and yells angrily back, "suck it idiot! We need to fly now!" She then attempts to pull him to one of the hovering bat beasts.

Shaking his head from his vision going half way red, Vick rationalized that this isn't the time to argue and definitely wasn't the time to ask about sucking what. Thus the black bear beastman morphed back into his two legged form, quickly took her into his muscled arms with blatant disgust and jumped onto a flyer to get out of there. Since she was the last female being brought to the sky, other males who were part of the ground defense group jumped on the rest of the hovering flyers to get away as well.

As they hover far up in the sky, the bat beast leader yelled, "Clansmen, for those who do not carry, you can now fulfill your true thirst!"

If Suki were present, she'd definitely start thinking twice of how hot and specially benevolent her beloved Badrick is, for as the sun was beginning to slowly rise, shrieks of horror could be heard as the bat beastmen eyes glowed a fiery red and showed their true slaughterous selves.

Back to Vick. At first he was baffled as to why they didn't start that attack from the beginning. However, in a few minutes from the start of this odd attack, he now knew why since the beginning each male was ordered to bump shoulders many times with the bat beasts. For when the bat beasts swooped down, it was clear that they no longer cared who was enemy and who was an ally unless the scent smelled like them.

Way way below, the croc beasts who were fighting with their enemies suddenly stilled. To the bizarrement of their foes, the crocs speedily fled out of the lake and crossed shoulders with the waiting bat beasts that weren't in their berserk state. They didn't run because they were afraid, but instead it was all due to survival. For instance, they are aware that depending on the number of marks they had, their skin and teeth could heavily help in defending themselves from those beasts, yet they knew it wasn't worth fighting and gaining injuries from irrational beasts that could also become good at snatching away prey from the water.

As for Dash and his group, a couple of them left limping out of the huge den where the headless Ape Leader's body lay. Suddenly they stiffened to the incoming blood-curdling shrieks.

"Everyone, quickly put on the cloths given from the Bat Clan!" yells Dash with labored breathing as he coughs out blood.

"And do not morph into your beast!" warns Casper as he covers his papa with the much larger cloth and then himself. They then huddled together as they began to pick up pace to move to one of the higher places where they hoped the munching bat beasts were rational enough to carry them to safety. As they carried on upwards, they suddenly stopped to listen to a cub crying to his papa to get up. From the physical traits of the beast they could tell it was a cougar male, and as for the cub, he appeared to be about Sanvi's age. Dash sensing his own family's grown cub's anxiousness to want to save the cub ordered him, "go."

"But," responds Casper as he bites down on his lips at the fear he has for him. Coughing, Dash repeats, "as your Leader I order you to go!" With startled eyes, Casper stops holding his papa up and sprints towards the lonely cub. Just as he arrived to pick up the cub, rolling away on the process and finally staying still in a crouched position, Casper felt a harsh wind passing them. With hair raised at the near death experience, he looks out from the cloth covering them while grabbing the fighting cub into his arms and notices that the cougar's body has disappeared.

Feeling a tiny claw tearing at his arms, Casper tensionaly mutters underneath his breath, "stop if you want to live, little cub, we're going to safety." He then searches for his group and seeing them at a higher ground, again uses his energy, forgetting his own pain, to sprint back to them. As he passes the back side of the group, he quickly gives an acknowledgement to a wolf comrade for helping Dash.

- - - - Back to the Clear Lake Tribe - - -

"The battle has been won!" growls out the Tribe Bear Clan Leader as the rest of the males rejoice at the news. As the growls die down, he adds, "our warriors have fought bravely, some lost, some alive but are heavily injured. We're asking for males from our tribe and allies to travel to them and help our warriors get back to their dens safely."

Immediately the single males whose blood kin went to fight shouted, "I'll go!"

Nodding their heads in approval, the Tribe Wolf Clan Leader announces, "we rejoice in our warriors wanting to help out, but also remember that this tribe's defense depends on all of you. Think it through tonight for tomorrow we'll be leaving before the sun fully rises."

"What do you think?" asks Leo as he and Radu walk back to Healer Liam's class that should be over now.

As they walk back, the skunk beast looks around and mutters, "my fear lies in what Badrick tasted last night." Pruning his tail, Radu goes over in his head what the Leaders told them about the battle. What if the ferals worked in a group and decided to split? And what if what happened last night is a sign of these ferals waiting for this opportunity?

A sigh breaks him out of his thought process. Leo mutters with a toothy smile, "and I was starting to like that feisty snake."

Raising an eyebrow at Leo's strong desire to play with his prey, Radu smiled assuredly back at him. "Relax Leo, he may not be with them but he may know more than he thought. His information could be valuable in who gets to go and who gets to stay in the tribe to defend. And," glancing behind them at the two alphas, "I got a feeling Leader Axel and Leader James are aware of them."