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Conall

What the hell? I thought as in awe I watched Lee traipse quickly off stage. That song - good God - I wish he would've told me about it sooner. I'd never seen that side of Lee: bare, open, passionate...in turmoil. He'd left the audience completely reeling from the emotional backlash of his performance, and not a soul moved as he fled.

No - scratch that - from the corner of my eye Rudy, who'd been standing next to me during Lee's song, turned in a rush of red fur and pin-stripes and took off, too. Then, as I began to walk on stage to try and snap the rest of the crowd out of their melancholy stupor, I squinted out through the spotlights and...oh shit.

He was the only zombie I'd seen that night so it couldn't have been anyone else, and I didn't know anyone else besides Sasha who could run so fast. He'd stood in a rush and taken off after...

I stopped dead. Awh hell, I groaned inwardly.

I knew the audience was still in their pseudo, trance-like state and staring right at me as I was directly center-stage, but I was immediately thrust back into my senses as the jumbled tidbits of information I'd been observing and deeming unimportant for a week and a half just sank into place at the sight of Sasha running after those two boys.

I said I'd never seen Lee so distraught before, but that was a lie. The night we found Sasha beaten half to death had brought about the same kind of feelings in him. I'd thought it was just because they were friends, but the way I'd catch the Shepherd watching Sasha in class made all the more sense now. Everything made more sense now, the song especially. But...oh, God, Rudy's performance did now too, his and Sasha's closeness earlier that day as well. I didn't have to think too hard as to why the husky had left in such a huffed rush.

FUCK! I bellowed in my head, my teeth clenched so tightly together that I felt my jaw bone pop. Not now! This can NOT be happening NOW!

Then the world, it seemed, went pitch-black. The spotlights on stage popped as every one of them went out, and - as if choreographed - the lights around the clearing where everyone was sitting followed suit and shut off.

I fell to my knees as a wave of disorientation sent me wobbling at suddenly losing my sight, and then the crowd went mad in terror. The screaming and hollering quivered the air, but then that was all washed out as the speakers and monitors that fed us the previous, tear-jerking music began to shriek with a squeal that could bloody your ears. I clapped my paws over mine and ducked my head between my knees as it seemed to split in two, and flashes and pops of neon colors shot through my eyes clenched tightly in agony.

The terrible sound seemed to pierce and rattle every bone in my body, and it still rang in my skull even after the sound-guy had shut the sound system off. Honestly, I didn't even realize he'd shut it off until I felt a paw on my back. I reluctantly opened my eyes, and I had to squint through the haze of darkness to see Clint standing over me. I could barely understand what he was saying, but his mouth was flapping quite fast in panic so I don't think I would've been able to understand him had I been able to hear.

"Someone attacked Roderick!"

"What!?" I gasped.

"Our system technician!? Roderick? Someone snuck up on him, knocked him out, and screwed up the lighting and sound boards!"

No, no, no, I panicked. It was happening; things were blowing up in my face.

"GAH!" I screamed as the lights suddenly switched back on. My sensitive eyes burned like coals in my head.

The crowd had calmed now that everyone could see again, and - to my astonishment - some were laughing. I think they thought that whole scenario had been planned as a means to scare them. It was Halloween after all, but...I looked out over everyone, looked to see if I could see the kids, but they were long gone. I could see the whites of every fur's eyes in the audience, and they were all aimed at me. Then the worst realization so far struck me directly in the chest.

Sasha was alone.

I jerked my head toward the table where the judges had been sitting. Mindy was peering around in bewilderment as she tried to figure out what had happened; Rutledge and the female cop were doing the same, and...

Corbin was gone. Corbin...was...gone.

After Crowley had enlightened me to the fact that he believed it was the Doberman's scent that had been on Sasha's jacket, and likewise spread around the entire festival on the football equipment his team was wearing, I'd had no doubt that it was him who'd done it. It was part logic that made me believe so - as the evidence was there - but it was part prejudice as well. I hated Corbin. He'd hurt Mindy, and it wouldn't have surprised me at all if the cops found him lurking around in the woods out here. How surprised was I when he suddenly showed up as a backup judge for the talent show? Quite astounded, and not in a good way. What had happened to Trace I didn't know, but, with Corbin there right in front of everyone, it made it hard to both nab him under the suspicion that he'd attacked Sasha as well as prove that he was the one running around in the woods with a vendetta. Either he was insanely stupid for revealing himself, or he wasn't the one we were after.

But now he was gone. He'd used the commotion as a cover to escape, or...

My eyes stung as they nearly popped out of my head.

He was going for it. He was going to do it. Sasha was out there alone and completely vulnerable. We had to stop him! I couldn't think of anything else to do. I just hoped he'd hear and understand.

"CROWLEY!" I yelled in panic, my voice being amplified again as the sound had been turned back on and my heart jerking painfully with each rapid beat. I could barely form the words. My throat was about to clench shut. I felt like I was submerged in a nightmare and unable to find my voice to scream for help, that trembling, surreal terror engulfing me from the inside out. "STOP HIM! HE'S GONE! YOU'VE GOT TO GET HIM!"

Lee

I ran. I ran and I didn't look back. I couldn't afford to try anyway as it was already hard to see through the tears I was shedding. I didn't mean to start crying while I sang, but the sadness from what I was conveying just crashed over me like a tidal wave and I couldn't hold it back anymore. I hadn't even felt the true weight of my despair it seemed. Singing like that, singing for Sasha - for myself - it didn't come from my head as everything normally did, but it came from a part of me that I always seemed to take for granted: My heart.

It was no big surprise that I always over-thought everything I did. Growing up with parents like mine who would sooner crucify their child than try and understand what I was going through made me overly cautious about everything that I did and about how I behaved. I figured out that I was gay before I even knew what the word meant. I was just a child - innocent. I hadn't known any better, so when I asked my parents what it meant that I liked boys like they liked each other...well...I didn't eat for almost a week, and I couldn't go out without wearing heavy clothes to hide the bruises. I didn't understand what I'd done. I hadn't done anything but ask a question about why I was the way I was, and in return I got the message that the way I was would never be accepted, at least not by my parents who I thought would love me no matter what.

That destroyed me. It was just the one incident, but it ripped my heart out and tore the trust I had for my devout mother and father into scrap. They'd hurt me, and I have never forgiven them for it. They pretended like it never happened, and I didn't bring it back up out of fear of what they'd do. I became miserable in my own home. I didn't feel welcome there. They noticed and tried to fix me by forcibly getting me involved at our church, but trying to understand how I was "loved" by a God who had condemned me to prejudice from the start only made me more confused and raised even more questions that I knew I couldn't ask.

If my uncle hadn't offered to try and help me when my mother and father's religious beliefs couldn't cure me, then I...well, I'll just say that I owe my life to Arthur. He turned it around, and he gave me everything that my parents didn't. Love, compassion, understanding, acceptance, honor, morality; I hadn't known what any of it was until he showed it to me, until he taught me to live by it and use it to help both myself and others.

Unfortunately, no matter how much better I got, I still didn't trust my parents any longer. Uncle Arthur had given me the wisdom to see that I was who I was - in body, mind, soul, and every space in between - and I accepted that I was gay and didn't try and fix myself. He accepted me, too. I let my feelings go as they would, and I just dealt with mother and father, not bringing my social life back into the house. The way they lived - so secluded and boxed off from the world and other outside beliefs - it was hard for me to understand. My uncle taught me that, to make life easier, I should adapt to any situation. So I did, and in doing so I unknowingly took up the mannerism of closing myself off to others so as not to give away how I was feeling, something I'd never liked about my parents. I'd had to do it to get by around them, though.

In the end I suppose it did more harm than good. I was sure regretting it now.

I was also regretting running like I did. I don't know why I took off. I think it was both a mixture of embarrassment and fear at what I'd done. I had hoped to just let Sasha understand what I was going through, and I did. However, once that emotional wall came tumbling down I couldn't stop myself from just letting it all out, and when I stopped and saw everyone in tears I knew I'd gone too far. I'd done more than I intended, and I knew I was probably going to suffer because of it.

As troubled as I was I did feel lighter and unburdened at getting so much out. As I ran out of breath and stopped to rest and wipe my eyes, though, I heard someone running after me and I knew that the weight that had been lifted from my shoulders was about to be replaced by something else.

I'd abandoned the paths in my maddened dash and I found myself in the middle of the woods. As dark as I thought it had been when looking in from the outside, I found that there was quite a bit of moonlight seeping through the canopy of pine trees above. That made it easier to see Red sprinting toward me and kicking up dried pine needles as he did. His footfalls were heavy and jarring, the fedora he'd had on long since lost, his tail curled and erect and his nostrils flaring as he took quick, tired gasps of breath. He slowed as he drew closer to me, hopping to a stop about ten feet away as if afraid to come any nearer. He just stared at me. Through the blue veil of night surrounding us he seemed a specter come to haunt me, and - even though I never would have - my gut panged and I felt the urge to run away from him.

The way he just looked at me without saying anything unnerved me more than how threatening I knew he could be if he was pissed off. Rightfully, I couldn't say anything if he was angry. I'd take whatever he wanted to dish out. I didn't care anymore. I just sighed and leaned back against a tree, and his ears flicked up as I sank down and just sat there in the dirt where I belonged.

He took a step toward me, stopped, and just shook his head and frowned. "Why?" he asked sharply. His exasperated voice sliced through the silence between us and cut me to the quick much worse than the sword at my waist could ever do. "Just...just why, Lee?"

I didn't answer him. How could I have answered him? Well, honestly, how could I make it worse? He knew after all. There were a handful of things that I could've said, but I wouldn't have gotten any satisfaction at letting the answers roll off of my tongue; I wouldn't have gotten anything that I had hoped for or wanted out of this. He knew, and there was nothing I could do about it.

"Lee?!" he asked distraughtly, taking an emphatic step toward me and shaking his paws.

I felt like no matter what I said we'd end up turned against one another, and I didn't want that. Red was my best friend. I'd betrayed him. His ears drooped and his jaw lolled open as I looked at him and my shoulders bobbed from a sob. I just couldn't stop I guess. I didn't even attempt to hold back the tears. I just sniveled, yanked the cloth mask I had on off of my head, and then I wiped my eyes with it and pulled my knees to my chest and hid my face from him. This wasn't like me at all. My passiveness and sensitivity had taken him by surprise just as much as it had me.

"I'm SORRY!" I shrieked, my head still pressed against my knees. My voice echoed through the silent woods around us, fading off into the distance like the wailing of a ghost. "I...I just couldn't TAKE it anymore! It was killing me!" The sobs were overtaking me now, and I could hardly breathe through them let alone explain myself to Red.

All seemed quite except for me squalling. My ears bobbed toward the sound of pine needles crunching, and then the soft thud of knees against the ground in front of me made me jump.

"That's why," I gasped, knowing he was leaning over me. "That's why..." I waited for my chest to stop heaving, and I just stared at the ground between my feet. "I've felt this way for years, Red! YEARS! Then you come along and sweep him off of his feet on your first meeting..."

He stopped me blathering on by slipping his paw between my knees and pulling my chin up. I couldn't look him in the eye, but he forced himself in front of me no matter which way I averted my gaze. When I relented and finally looked I saw that he was crying, too. I'd never seen him cry. I'd never known him to be the crying type, but - low and behold - tears were dampening the white fur around his eyes.

"I meant why didn't you tell me, Lee," he sighed. "Why did you wait until now? Of all of the opportunities you've had to say something you didn't..."

He dropped his paw from my face and scooted closer on his knees. "I...I was afraid to," I stuttered. "I've been afraid to ever since I started having these feelings, but it just got worse at seeing you two together." I blinked fat tears out of my eyes and peered at him. "I just...just couldn't take it. I was too scared to say anything to you because I didn't want you to get angry, and I...I know Sasha knows I care about him, but...but not..."

"Not as much as you want him to," he finished for me. I nodded, and he grimaced and looked down at his paws. "Well, I'm sure he does now. And, Lee, I am so sorry." He wiped his eyes and gazed at me again. "If I had known..."

Oh, here we go. "What?" I asked hotly. "What would you have done?"

He stammered and rubbed the back of his head. "I...I..."

"What!?"

His eyes pleaded for me to calm down, and he leaned back. "I wouldn't have gotten so involved with Sasha."

"Bah!" I scoffed. He flinched as I pushed myself up and walked a pace away from him. "I bet you wouldn't have." I sulked there with my tail between my legs. When he didn't say anything for a while I turned to see him still on his knees. He reminded me of earlier that week when I'd had my sword to his throat after he'd asked me to play while he sang to Sasha.

He shook his head, and the feathery tufts of his hair swayed back and forth. "What did I do wrong?" His shoulders sagged as he let out a ragged breath, and he just stared forward and off into the dark. "You're my best friend, but yet I couldn't get you to feel like you could trust me enough to open up to me." He frowned when he looked at me, with his lips and in his eyes. "Again, why? Why don't you trust me? What have I done?"

Was he actually trying to milk sympathy from me? Seriously?

A familiar, boiling heat was birthed in the pit of my stomach and slowly spread throughout my body. It felt like we were going full-circle to end up like we had been on my Uncle's practice field again. He was vulnerable and on the ground, and I was standing over him with nothing but anger and a sword; He had everything he could ever want, and it was everything that I wished I could have.

It wasn't fair.

"You want the truth?" I bristled.

He nodded glumly, his eyes still peering into mine.

Again I let the floodwaters of my emotions break free, and - again - I was probably going to regret it, but he wanted the truth and I was going to give it to him.

Red

"It's because I'm jealous of you," Lee growled.

The cold, hard earth digging into my kneecaps and sending sharp pains up my spine was probably more forgiving than Lee was going to be. I just hunkered down and braced myself for what was about to get thrown at me.

He trudged back and forth as he vented, his tail erect and his hackles raised. My eyes followed him as he went, and I couldn't help but tell myself that something had changed about him. The usually stoic, stone wall that was Lee had become a restless, shifting sea crashing against a shore. He'd never let himself go before, never let himself truly feel or express his emotions, and now that he had it was hard for him to wrangle them back under control. Not that it was completely his fault. I knew how his parents were, and I always just thought that their robotic behavior had washed off on him a bit, but no.

I was at fault here too, though. I'd considered myself to be a good friend to him, and I considered him to be my best friend, but yet I'd been clueless to his feelings. Even if he hid his emotions behind a mask I should've been able to see something. I mean, I did now. Him going to see Sasha so frequently, his reserved behavior when the arctic fox and I flirted and played, the fact that he nearly decapitated me after I'd asked him to play for me at the Haunt, it all made things so obvious and I felt like an incredibly insensitive oaf for being so dense.

"You have the seemingly most perfect life," he continued. "A perfect mother and father, perfect looks, perfect attitude, perfect talent, perfect personality." He groaned and made as if to tear out his hair. "You have everything that you could ever want - everything - but yet you manage to take the one thing for yourself that means more to me than anything else in the world!" His eyes were wide in anger, and he froze and glared at me. "Why, Rudy? Is it too much for me to ask why?"

"Lee," I said. "I don't know what you want to hear." I shrugged. "I just...liked him. I wanted to get to know him because of that, and once I did get to know him and know about what he'd gone through I just...liked him more." I shook my head and plucked apart a pine needle I'd grabbed off of the ground. "We just shared so many commonalities, and I just love being around him." I looked up at him and he could've been burning a hole through me with his mind. "That's how a relationship starts, Lee."

"What's that supposed to mean?" he growled.

I wasn't trying to poke him with a stick or anything, I was just enlightening him to the one thing he'd failed to do in regards to Sasha.

"You never told him." I shook my head. "You never told me." I shrugged and looked around. "You never told anyone. How was any one of us supposed to know how you felt? I'm not trying to tick you off, but - honestly - you can't get mad at me for doing what you've wanted to do if you never intended to tell him in the first place!"

Shit. That wasn't wise of me to say, as truthful as it was. There was a time for the bitter-truth, and now wasn't it. He bared his fangs and his pupils shrank into specks even in the darkness we were submerged in, and I'd never - ever - seen him so menacing and malevolent looking.

"You've no idea what my reasoning was! No idea why I never said anything!"

He was right. "No, I don't, and that's because you never felt the need to let me know!" I'd risen to my own feet as, friend or not, I didn't like having another fur bearing down on me with his muzzle pulled back into a snarl. "Lee, I told you that I was gay when I felt we were close enough, for God's sake! Because I trusted you! Because I thought I knew you well enough to confide in!" I peered around in anxious bewilderment, and he stopped where he was. "But apparently I didn't know you well enough, and - I'm sorry - but..." I bit my tongue. I wasn't about to say something else I'd regret.

"But?" he growled. "But what? We're being honest with one another aren't we? Don't back out now!"

I peered long and hard at him as I weighed the options of how he'd react to what I had to say. It probably wouldn't bring about a joyous revelation, but he needed to hear it I decided.

"You're acting like a child," I stated, standing a little taller. "Like a spoiled kid bawling over a toy his parents refused to get him." I stepped toward him this time. "I'm sorry, but you can't expect to get everything you want in life, bro." I jabbed a finger at him. "And - for the record - I do not have everything by any means whatsoever." He took a wavering step backward. "And the things I do have? I suffered through hell before getting them, suffered through so much shit to earn a right amount of all of that perfection you claim that I have!" Now I'd gotten angry myself. He knew what I'd gone through; I'd told him myself, but apparently it all wasn't good enough to justify me being with Sasha. "You can't get everything, and you had plenty of time to let Sasha know how you felt, plenty of opportunities to be together with him I'm sure. Hell, Vic and Nicki even thought that Sasha was with you before they found out it was me instead!"

"W...what?" he stammered, taken aback.

"Yeah," I nodded. "So you can't blame me, Lee. You can't blame me because you were too scared to take a chance for once and get something you wanted. You may have had feelings for him first, but I was the one who was there when it counted."

He snarled again, the rippling of his muzzle pinching up into a crazed grin, and he immediately puffed up and came toward me. "You weren't there when he needed you the most!"

"AND NEITHER WERE YOU!"

He came at me in a roaring, snarling blur of flashing teeth and mad fists. If he'd have been his usual self I probably would've been able to read his movements like his uncle had taught me to do when sword fighting, but...well, he wasn't his usual self. He was overtaken by rage, and that ever present control and finesse I was used to was replaced by unpredictability and unrelenting fury.

I blocked a hit to my stomach only to have stars explode before my eyes as he cracked a fist into my skull. I threw up my hands to protect my face and he went for my stomach and knocked the wind out of me. Hit after hit after hit made contact, and with every blow he grew more infuriated. I couldn't expose my face, the one hit he'd gotten there had all but blinded me, and I didn't want to risk another black eye. So, instead of using my sight, I relied on my ears.

The air was thick with snarling and grunting, huffs of breath and the thud of physical blows. Pine needles and dried leaves crunched and ruffled as he forced me around and around, the scent of musky earth and fresh blood - my blood - stinging in my nostrils. I was too focused on defending myself, and I couldn't get a hit in edgewise. I gritted my teeth through the onslaught of sharp pain, and just waited for an opening. Lee had agility and stamina, but I had power and endurance.

His breathing became ragged, and his hits grew weaker and farther apart. He hooked a punch into my taut side, and - like a coiled spring - my right arm shot out with the full weight of my shoulder behind it. It struck him square in the face, and the blow cracked like a splintering tree limb through the trees around us. It knocked him clear off his feet, his head snapping back as if he'd walked slam into a brick wall, and he bashed onto his back in the dirt and leaves with a wet grunt. He didn't get up. He didn't move at all.

The punch was so strong that I'd jammed some fingers, and I groaned savagely as the agonizing pressure built up in my hand and stabbed down my forearm. I hobbled forward a step to see what I'd done, and I nearly got sick. I thought I'd killed him. Blood was dribbling steadily from the flesh of his nose, the black pad split right down the middle, and it was slowly trickling out from between his clenched teeth and at the corners of his mouth. I think the hit had made him bite his tongue when it made contact. I began to tremble. What had I done? What the fuck had I done?

A knot lodged tight in my throat as I rushed over to him. All of that previous anger was gone. All of my rage had turned to regret and shame. It's the most terrible feeling in the world having your head clear of the fog of bloodlust and seeing the aftermath sprawled on the ground in front of you. Everything changes because, you know deep in the pit of your stomach, that what you had will never be the same.

"Goddammit," I sniveled, wincing as I knelt beside him. "Dammit, dammit, DAMMIT!"

I'd overdone it. It was like all of my pent up rage had been jammed into that one punch. He was out cold. Was he...please, for the love of God be breathing. I cautiously put my fluttering ear next to his mouth, and I heard ragged breaths and felt them tickle across my fur. They were wet, and it sounded like he was gurgling.

"Shit!" I gingerly pried his jaws apart to see blood pooling at the back of his throat. I turned his head and it poured out onto the ground.

I couldn't believe it had come to this. It couldn't have been real. This had to be a nightmare. I'd gotten into a fight with my best friend and laid him out. I'd caused harm to someone I cared about, and...

I clasped my paws over the end of my muzzle as I saw his right arm, a wave of nausea rushing through me and knotting my gut. He'd fallen on it when he'd hit the ground so hard, and - as limber as I knew Lee was - that limb wasn't supposed to be twisted in such a way. I groaned through a sob and - as gentle as with a newborn pup - I lifted his limp body off of the arm and pulled it out. I knew it was broken when I'd seen it, but it cracking as I straightened it drove the realization home.

I'd maimed him.

That was his sword-arm.

"No...no, no, no," I sobbed, peering at my broken friend. "Why!?" I coughed as I choked. "This isn't fair! Lee...please wake up...please, please, please!"

The only reaction I got from him was a sputtering breath and the same steady trickle of blood running down his face.

"GODDAMMIT!" I roared, slamming my fists into the ground. The pain from my jammed fingers burned like molten rock up my right arm, but I didn't give a damn. The pain in my heart trumped it immeasurably. I wavered as I pushed myself up, and I walked blankly around the area we'd churned up in our scuffle. I smacked the trees, broke dead limbs, kicked a boulder until my leg went numb, and I hefted a tire-sized rock over my head and - bellowing like a mad fur - I chucked the sucker off into the dark. I expected to hear an immediate THUMP but the only sound that followed was a drawn out silence and then the crashing of the rock through foliage as it tumbled away from me. I took a weary shuffle forward and gasped as my foot went off into empty space. When my eyes adjusted I saw that I was standing at the top of an old, steep switchback trail eroded and barely visible.

"Holy hell..." That was close.

I gasped as a sharp, precise pain flared from the center of my back. It was cold, and it jabbed against my spine like the point of a knife. I didn't move, swallowing hard in panic as the pain dulled and the point of a sword slowly inched by my face. It slapped hard against my cheek, but I still stood still, and it was retracted and found another spot between my shoulder blades. My heart was beating so fast that they all seemed to run together into a hum. My eyes quivered in their sockets as I stared forward and down into the abyss of black at the bottom of the switchback. I tried to back away, but the sword in my back just drove me forward again.

"L...Lee, please, what are you..."

"Walk the plank, dog."

And with that a heavy foot struck my back, knocking the air from my lungs, and - like the rock I'd tossed before - I tumbled head over heels down the side of that hill. The world meshed into a chaotic whorl of darkness and rushing air; I'm sure it hurt, but the shock and overwhelming sense of motion was all I was focused on as I bounced around. Then the chaos was forced still for the briefest of moments as if someone had paused my fall, and my head was clouded by a numb pressure as every sense I had was knocked from me. Then I resumed my tumbling, the tree I'd struck receding quickly into a thin line as I went.

I knew I wasn't going to get out of this unscathed, even through the turmoil of what was happening. After what I'd done it wouldn't have been karmically proper for me to not be injured it felt. Still, though, as I quickly rolled toward the bottom of the hill and saw the rock, I instinctively did my best to avoid it.

I tried to brace myself into a stop by grinding my legs beneath me and into the ground, but that only forced me to flip backward due to the momentum I was carrying. I glimpsed the rock again - the very one I'd thrown in anger at myself - just an arm's length away. I hit the bottom and slid, grunting and bracing myself for the inevitable. My body was wrenched into a sideways stop. My left leg briefly flared in agony as if every muscle in it was being stretched thin like taffy. There was a sharp, muffled POP! And then my leg radiated a hot, numbing pressure from my femur that quickly spread throughout the entire limb.

If I'd wanted to move I wouldn't have been able to. I felt disembodied. I just lay there akimbo with my one leg jammed beneath that rock. It was the strangest feeling. I knew I should be hurting, and I knew that I should be sickened by the fact that a once whole part of me was now two, but...I just wanted to sleep.

I was so tired.

I couldn't fight it.