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Back in the sky, Eren propelled himself downward. His alien biology compensated for the g-forces that would have turned a human to paste. The wind scream became a shriek, then fell away entirely as he approached and then shattered the sound barrier. A visible cone of condensed vapor formed around him, glowing faintly in the moonlight. He was a silent (to himself) spear descending on its target.
Faster. Need to be faster than its body could react.
The Vulpimancer, sensing a sudden, terrifying absence of pursuit, risked a glance backward. Nothing. Had it lost the winged threat? Hope, fragile and desperate, flickered in its animal mind. It slowed its frantic run, panting, its heat aura dimming slightly as the parasite struggled to regulate the catastrophic energy expenditure.
It never looked up higher.
Eren didn't need to. His visor locked onto the target with inhuman precision. At the last possible moment, mere heartbeats from impact, he flared his wings; not to stop, but to arrest his dive just enough to convert his suicidal acceleration into controlled, devastating attack speed.
He charged his eyes—and now, instinctively, his tail. Green energy built, humming with power. He channeled the neuroshock energy, but he didn't release it. Not yet.
"Checkmate." Eren buzzed.
The Vulpimancer's parasite finally sensed it. Not through sight or sound, but through a sudden, violent distortion in the local energy field directly above. It screamed a psychic warning.
Too late, Eren struck first and faster.
Triple beams lanced out converging on the beast. It tried to phase, but the neuro-shock hit true, slamming into its flank like psychic lightning. The market square lit up as if for a split second with a colored electric green. Every shadow was banished. The cobblestones themselves seemed to glow.
The effect on the Vulpimancer was absolute.
Its nervous system didn't short out; it blue-screened. Every muscle locked simultaneously in a full-body spasm. The blazing sigils along its body didn't just flicker; they went dark as if switched off. The intense heat aura vanished with a sound like a giant sigh, leaving the air suddenly, shockingly cold. The parasite in its chest gave out erratic pulses of white light, then dimmed to a dull white.
The beast stiffened mid-stride, like a statue, then collapsed forward with the solid, final THUD of a felled tree. It plowed a deep furrow through the cobblestones, scattering the empty stalls of the produce market, before coming to rest on its side, a smoking, silent mountain of fur.
Silence.
Eren back-winged hard, landing twenty meters away in a crouch, his talons scraping stone. The only sounds were the distant, fading crackle of fires being contained, and the low, resonant hum of his own breathing. The square was devastated, but the monster was down. The rampage was over.
Slowly, cautiously, he let his wings fold tighter against his back and took a step forward. The Vulpimancer was a mountain of bruised purple fur, its once-blazing sigils now dark, the parasitic glow in its chest a dull, dead gray. It looked… smaller. Defeated. Just an animal.
A low, guttural sound vibrated from the creature's throat. A warning growl. It was weak, wet and choked; like the sound of a dying horse. One of its five good eyes flickered open for a second, a slit of terrified blue before it slid shut again. The growl died, becoming a pathetic, wheezing exhale.
Eren stood over his prey, looking down at the creature that had been a weapon, a former victim, a calamity, and now... a problem.
It couldn't fight. It couldn't run. It couldn't even threaten him.
His filtered voice was quiet, etched with exhaustion and grim triumph.
"Now... what to do with you?"
He couldn't leave it. The Garrison would be here in a matter of time, more of them would be drawn by the light and sound and he's just stalled a group of them earlier. They'd cage it, dissect it, or worse, the Knights would retrieve it.
But…is it all that bad?
Eren's resolve wavered. The image of the scorched cadets flashed behind his eyes.
'This thing is a murderer. It deserves whatever comes next.'
But another image surfaced: the psychic scream of betrayal.
CUB PACK. YOU LIED TO ME!!!
The raw, confused terror when it saw Obsidian, thinking he was the merchant who sold it. The simple, feral logic: Hurt-back.
His three digit clawed hand hovered over the beast's flank. The fur was matted with ash and blood. Beneath it, he could feel the faint, irregular thrum of a heartbeat, fast and thready like a trapped bird.
Wait, what am I doing?
He didn't know. Some part of him, for some reason, felt pulled to do so. His clawed fingertips brushed against the hot, coarse fur. The moment his skin made contact, the Omnitrix on his chest erupted.
A jolt of pure, concentrated information shot up his arm into his mind. It was like dipping his brain into a frozen river of data.
The device blazed, painting the square in pulsing emerald. A voice spoke inside his head—clear, genderless, utterly alien. And once again familiar.
SCANNING…
A schematic exploded in his mind's eye. Bones, sinew, a powerful sonic-based nervous system. Then the corruption: a luminous, worm-like structure woven through the spine, tapping into every nerve cluster and organ. Invasive. Artificial. A grotesque graft.
ANOMALOUS LIFEFORM DETECTED. DNA CORRUPTION IDENTIFIED.
SOURCE: XERXATHI GRAFT. PARASITIC/SYMBIOTIC ENHANCEMENT PROTOCOL.
STATUS: CRITICAL FAILURE. GRAFT IN SEVERE FEEDBACK LOOP. HOST SYSTEMS FAILING.
…Xerxathi. The word Grandpa Arlet had whispered with such gravity. The thing that made Titans too.
DNA CORRUPTION PATTERN DETECTED PREVIOUSLY.
REFERENCE: TITAN BIOMASS SAMPLE. CORRELATION: 94.7%.
ANALYSIS: GRAFT UNSTABLE, CONSUMING HOST FOR SURVIVAL. TERMINAL CASCADE IMMINENT.
Unwanted images flashed: the Smiling Titan's chaotic voices begging for help. The Vulpimancer's graft, though different, shone with the same sickly, unnatural signature. Cousins in damnation. Both infected by the same cosmic cancer.
A new prompt. Not a statement. A question.
DETECTED GRAFT IS MALFUNCTIONING AND TERMINAL.
OMNITRIX PROTOCOLS ALLOW FOR CORRECTIVE ACTION AGAINST FOREIGN GENETIC MANIPULATION.
ATTEMPT GRAFT STABILIZATION AND HOST DNA REPAIR?
WARNING: PROCEDURE MAY RESULT IN POWER DRAIN.
REQUEST USER AUTHORIZATION.
Eren jerked his hand back as if burned. The light dimmed slightly, but the voice lingered, waiting.
He stared down at the Vulpimancer, his mind reeling.
Fix it? The Omnitrix wanted to fix the thing that had torn through a cadet corps and half of Trost?
The conflict was a physical pain. Every instinct screamed NO. Let it die. Let the Garrison finish it. It was a weapon. Too dangerous.
Even Armin had realized it was a lost cause now!
He heard Grandpa Arlet's weary voice. "The Xerxathi… a planetary-scale genetic time bomb."
This creature wasn't the bomb. It was a piece of shrapnel.
The Omnitrix pulsed again, gently.
AWAITING USER AUTHORIZATION.
But the omnitrix…could fix this problem, can't it?
Shouts echoed, closer now. Two streets over. The thunder of organized boots…Soldiers were coming.
He was running out of time.
He swallowed hard, the motion strange in the new alien's throat. His voice, when it finally came through the filter, was quiet, hoarse with an emotion he didn't know an Aerophibian could feel.
"Do it."
He placed his hand back on the Vulpimancer's side, firmly this time.
AUTHORIZATION CONFIRMED. INITIATING XERXATHI GRAFT STABILIZATION PROTOCOL.
COMMENCING HOST DNA REPAIR SEQUENCE.
The Omnitrix's glow intensified. A column of solid green light shot from the symbol on his chest, enveloping his hand and spreading over the Vulpimancer's massive form. The light was cool, humming with impossible power, seeping into fur, skin, diving deep into marrow.
Unbestknown to Eren, his back flared as well, igniting with the same eerie shape of a centipede glowed around his spinal cord. Then the world dissolved with a flashbang.
The pain was a constant, burning song in its chest. A few days had passed since the Cerebrocrustacean—the clicking, cold-voiced one called Psychobos; had grafted the writhing, white thing into its sternum. The procedure was agony, a violation that went deeper than flesh.
Now, it hung suspended in a crackling plasma cage in a sterile, white room. Its body thrummed with unfamiliar power. The graft; the Xerxathi Parasite; pulsed in time with its heart, a foreign rhythm that was slowly becoming its own.
Psychobos clattered around the lab, his massive single eye swiveling with manic delight. "E-Excellent! Assimilation parameters within acceptable t-tolerances! For a p-primitive sensorium-based predator, your b-biology is surprisingly... adaptable." He tapped a data-slate. "The Seedling is integrating w-well. Stabilizing. Now, to t-test the new ability matrix..."
The Vulpimancer understood only fragments of the clicking speech. But it understood the tone: the cold curiosity of a child pulling wings off a fly.
Psychobos was called away; a communication chime from elsewhere in the facility. "T-Tending to other matters. Do try not to expire, s-subject."
The scientist left. The Vulpimancer was alone, the hum of the plasma cage the only sound. Worry, a deep, pack-bond worry, gnawed at it.
Mate. Pup. Where? It had heard their distress calls when they were first taken, but now... silence.
Then, chaos.
Alarms blared; a harsh, electronic shriek. From outside its cell door, shouts. Guttural, disciplined voices it recognized as the Grafters; the armored enforcers of this place.
"Perimeter breach! Specimen Containment Zone 7!"
"Multiple subjects loose! They're using their new abilities!"
"Contain them! Psychobos will have our skins!"
The Vulpimancer's head snapped up.
Loose?
The heavy door to its cell hissed open. A Grafter guard; a hulking, root-like humanoid in segmented gray armor; came tumbling backward through it, his plasma rifle skittering across the floor. He hit the wall and slumped, stunned.
Standing in the doorway was...one of its pack-brother.
But changed. Horribly changed. It was bigger, its fur a sickly pale yellow, patchy in some places and overgrown into thick, coarse mats in others. Its eyes held a frantic, pained intelligence. The same white, segmented glow pulsed under the skin of its chest.
<
The changed Vulpimancer looked at the cage, then at the controls on the wall; to the creature it looked like a confusing panel of blinking lights and alien glyphs.
<
<
The changed brother stared at the panel, confused. The machinery was incomprehensible. With a snarl of frustration, it focused. The air around it shimmered. The Grafter's discarded rifle lifted off the floor, then crumpled like paper. Then the control console itself groaned, panels buckling, wires snapping in a shower of sparks. A show of Telekinesis.
The plasma cage flickered and died.
The Vulpimancer dropped to the floor, free. It nuzzled its changed brother briefly.
<
<
They burst into the corridor. A handful of other Vulpimancers were there, all warped by their own Xerxathi grafts. One had crystalline spikes growing from its back. Another seemed to blur at the edges, vibrating. They snarled at the escaping pair, eyes glowing with feral rage and pain.
Its pack was here…but some were still missing.
<
No familiar scent-echo returned.
<
A Grafter squad rounded the corner, rifles raised. One of the changed Vulpimancers; the one with crystalline spikes; let out a defiant roar. It curled into a tight ball, and with a burst of unnatural speed, became a living battering ram, barreling into the lead Grafter. The impact was colossal, sending both crashing down the hall, buying precious seconds.
The pack fled. They moved as one, a unit of broken, empowered fugitives. They reached a dead end; a solid wall of strange, metallic alloy.
The vibrating Vulpimancer didn't stop. It focused, its form becoming a blur. With a sound like a thunderclap, it body-slammed the wall at hypersonic speeds. The metal cratered, then gave way, revealing a service conduit beyond.
They were getting close. The Vulpimancer could smell outside air; cold, sterile, but free. They scrambled through the conduit, emerging onto a high, exposed gantry overlooking a vast, star-dusted void. Freedom was in sight.
A chill descended. Not of temperature, but of pure, draining cold.
Descending from above, a figure landed gracefully on the gantry before them. She was tall, sleek, with pale blue skin and curled wings of frozen vapor. Her eyes were like chips of glacier ice.
One of the warped Vulpimancers growled.
<
The female creature didn't speak. Instead from her mouth came a wave of freeze breath; flash-freezing the air, the gantry, and the fleeing Vulpimancers in a tomb of instant, solid ice. They were trapped, mid-stride, eyes wide with shock.
Grafter reinforcements arrived, weapons trained on the frozen block.
Psychobos clattered onto the gantry, having been alerted. "T-Timely as always, Agent Glace!" he chittered, inspecting his frozen specimens. He tapped the ice encasing one of the Vulpimancer.
"S-Smart. But not smart enough. My lab-rats cannot be let l-loose." He turned to the Grafter captain. "Take them b-back to High-Sec Containment. I will have to d-double the perimeters. And I use the term loosely."
NO.
The thought was pure, undiluted terror. Not back to the cages. Not back to the pain. Not without my family.
The Vulpimancer focused on the graft in its chest. On the pain. On the fear. On the desperate need to be elsewhere.
For the first time, it didn't just trigger the graft's power. It commanded it.
Its form shimmered. The ice around it didn't crack; it became insubstantial as the Vulpimancer did. It phased, becoming intangible, and stepped through the solid ice as if it were mist.
Psychobos's single eye widened. "Oh d-dear."
The scientist grotesquely revealed its brain, crackling with telekinetic lightning. Bolts of purple energy lanced toward the phasing creature.
The Vulpimancer flickered in and out of reality, the bolts passing through its ghostly form. Agent Glace turned intangible as well, swooping in to grapple it. But the Vulpimancer was stronger, fueled by primal desperation. It solidified just enough to grab her arm and hurl her into a support beam with a sickening crunch.
Seeing their chance, the other Vulpimancers began using their own graft-powers to break free. Crystalline spikes shattered ice. Telekinetic force peeled it away. The Grafter line faltered.
"Stop this m-madness!" Psychobos screeched. "D-Do your jobs!"
The Vulpimancer turned its burning eyes on the scientist. It didn't think. It acted. It lunged, phasing through a final blast of lightning, and its jaws closed on Psychobos's main operating claw.
"Eeep! N-Not the claw! I am a d-delicate genius! Surely you c-can't be interested in such a scrawny—"
The Vulpimancer didn't let him finish has he shook him violently, like a terrier with a rat, before flinging the shrieking scientist into a console. It turned to its pack.
<
They didn't need telling twice. They fled past the stunned guards, out into the terrifying expanse of the Null Void access bay. The Vulpimancer made to follow, then stopped.
<
<
<
"F-Foolish beast!" Psychobos wheezed, picking himself up. He saw the lone Vulpimancer dash past. "G-Guards! After that one! The others can w-wait!"
The Vulpimancer ran on memory and scent. It evaded patrols, its phasing letting it slip through sealed doors. It found the holding area; rows of smaller plasma cages. And there... there they were.
Its mate. Its pup. Alive! Unchanged! They pressed against the barriers of their separate cages, scents flickering with hope and fear.
<
A new voice, dripping with smug malice, spoke from the shadows. "Well, well, well. Look what the Mawgnutt dragged in."
Another agent stepped into the light. He was stout, with mottled green and yellow skin that glistened with bio-electricity. A hybrid: part A Gimlinopithecus (Or better yet a Shocksquatch), part something brutish.
He glanced at the cowering Grafter squad that had followed the Vulpimancer in.
"Agent Volt, thank God you are here, we-"
"Let the prime specimens escape, I can see that. Just great." He cracked his knuckles, electricity arcing between them. "At least we can handle this one properly."
The fight was brutal, desperate. The Vulpimancer phased, dodging arcs of stunning electricity. It swiped at Volt, but the agent was strong, shrugging off blows and retaliating with thunderous punches that shook the room. The Vulpimancer backed toward the control panel for the cages, trying to shield its family.
In the chaos, a stray energy blast from a guard, a desperate swipe from the Vulpimancer, and a counter-blast from Volt all converged on a strange, humming device in the corner of the room—a Null Void Projector, used for emergency specimen transfer and transportation in and out of this hellish dimension.
It overloaded.
A vortex of red and black energy, silent and hungry, erupted from the device. The gravitational pull was immense. Cages were ripped from their moorings. Grafter were yanked off their feet.
The Vulpimancer dug its claws into the floor, reaching a desperate talon toward its mate's cage as it was torn away.
<
Its mate's face met its own, full of love and terror. Then the cage was sucked into the swirling portal.
The Vulpimancer's grip failed.
It was the last thing it saw; the faces of its family; before the darkness swallowed it whole.
"Guh—AHH!" Eren gasped as he staggered back, breaking the connection. The glow on his back flared once, brilliantly, and then receded, sinking back into his body, leaving a tingling numbness in its wake.
He was on his knees in the market square, his alien form trembling. Tears he didn't know the form could produce welled at the corners of his visored eyes and dropped to the ground.
He understood now. Every kill, every moment of rage, every panicked flight. He had felt the Vulpimancer's entire damned existence in a span of heartbeats.
But the cost was immense. Eren felt a deep, draining fatigue. The brilliant green of the Omnitrix on his chest began to flicker, dimming. A warning chime sounded in his head.
ENERGY RESERVES CRITICAL.
TRANSFORMATION SUSTAINMENT FAILING.
REVERTING TO HOST'S BASE FORM IN: 5... 4...
"No, not yet!" Eren gritted out. The process wasn't complete. The Vulpimancer's form was still shimmering but its body was shrinking slightly, losing the grotesque, mutated bulk.
3... 2...
The green light from the Omnitrix cut off abruptly.
The transformation collapsed.
Where the sleek, red-and-black Aerophibian had knelt, now crouched a ten-year-old boy, clad in slightly torn, soot-stained clothes. He was human. He was vulnerable. A wave of nauseating emptiness washed over him, a void so profound it felt like his bones had been hollowed out. The Omnitrix on his wrist was red, its usual soft green glow completely extinguished, the dial cool and inert against his skin.
Every muscle screamed. Every joint felt unspooled. But worse was the deep, cellular exhaustion; the price for the supersonic dive, the neuroshock blasts, restless rescue and… and whatever the Omnitrix had just done.
He lifted his head, vision swimming. The square was a disaster zone of shattered stalls, scorch marks, and the deep furrow torn by the Vulpimancer's collapse. And there, in the center of it all, lay the beast.
But it was… changed.
The titanic, mutated horror was gone. In its place was a creature still large; larger than any natural wolf; but no longer a mountain of inflamed muscle. Its swollen proportions had receded. The bruised, angry purple of its fur had faded, softened, bled through with a warmer, earthier hue. As Eren's blurry eyes focused, he saw the transformation solidify. The fur settled into a dense, healthy orange, the color of autumn leaves at dusk. The blazing, malevolent blue-white V-shaped patterns along its spine and legs had dimmed, their light cooling into a deep, dark orange.
It was the color of… of Savage.
A final, visible pulse of green energy; a last echo from the Omnitrix; traveled like a wave from the base of the Vulpimancer's skull down the length of its spine. Where it passed, the last traces of sickly purple sheen vanished, and the dark orange patterns seemed to seal into the fur, becoming natural markings, not glowing sigils.
Then, at the creature's side, something moved.
With a wet, tearing sound, a shape pushed itself out from between the Vulpimancer's ribs, as if being forcibly expelled. It was the Xerxathi parasite. No longer a glorious, internal centipede of light, it was a shriveled, pulsating worm of phosphorescent white, about the length of Eren's arm. It writhed on the cold stones, its leg-like filaments scrabbling uselessly as its light flickering in erratic, dying spasms. It seemed to be searching, blindly, for a new host, for the warmth and energy it had been leaching.
The Vulpimancer stirred.
A low, shuddering breath rattled from its chest; a clear, deep sound, devoid of the constant, pain-filled wheeze. Its flank rose and fell in a steady, strong rhythm it hadn't known in… in forever.
It pushed itself up.
The movement was not the explosive, heat-hazed lurch of before, but the powerful, coordinated rise of a large predator. It shook itself, a full-body tremor that sent a cascade of ash and loose fur flying. Then it went still, as if listening to its own body.
The pain… was gone.
The constant, screeching feedback loop from the graft; the hunger, the agony, the drive to burn and consume; was silent. For the first time since the white room, its mind was its own. The silence in its own head was terrifying.
Tentatively, it raised a massive forepaw to its face.
Its senses painted the world. The sonic tapestry was crisp, detailed, but not blurred or screaming. The heat signatures were clear, not overwhelming. It felt… its own muzzle. The smooth, eyeless dome was still there. But the five burning orbs on its head? They were closed. The milky, regenerated sixth was dark.
Nothing.
A different kind of panic, clean and sharp, lanced through it. It was blind. Truly blind, as its species was meant to be. The graft had given it those terrible, burning eyes. Now they were sealed shut, leaving it in the familiar, comforting darkness of vibration and scent.
It was… normal. It was itself again.
Then its sonic sight detected the writhing, dying thing on the ground beside it. The scent hit it; a sterile, metallic stench of violation, of the white room, of Psychobos's clicking laughter. The source.
A low, guttural growl built in its chest, a sound of pure, undiluted hatred that had been buried under layers of pain and fear. It took a single step forward, lifted its paw; not with frantic rage, but with deliberate, final purpose; and brought it down.
CRUNCH-SQUELCH.
The sound was hideously final. The parasite emitted one last, piercing psychic screech; a sound of pure negation that echoed in the minds of every living thing within a hundred yards; before it was flattened into a pulpy, luminous smear on the cobblestones. The white glow sputtered, fizzed, and died, leaving only a fading, bioluminescent stain.
The Vulpimancer stood over the remains, breathing heavily. It was done. The thing that had made it a weapon, a monster, a furnace of pain, was gone. Exterminated by its own host.
Its head swiveled. Its sonic sight painted the scene: the destroyed square, the distant, panicked vibrations of the city, the approaching, rhythmic thump-thump-thump of many two-legs on horseback, their metal and oil scents sharp. Danger.
And there, a small, weak heat signature a few yards away. A two-legs. Not standing. On its hands and knees. The scent… it was complex. Fear-sweat, exhaustion, blood. But underneath… ozone, crystal, musky pack-brother. It was the scent of the crystal merchant who wasn't, of the orange-furred cub who spoke, of the winged hunter who struck from the sky.
The Vulpimancer took a slow, cautious step forward. It lowered its head, its smooth dome hovering just above the small figure. Its nostrils flared, drinking in the contradictory signals.
'Cub-pack?' The thought was instinctual, born of the brief, fragile connection with Savage.
'No. Two-legs.' That was reality.
'Hurt-me.' A memory of terror and green light.
'…Saved-me?' The absence of pain, the return to its own body, the death of the parasite.
The boy; Eren; was trying to stand. He pushed against the ground, his arms trembling violently. A low, desperate mutter escaped his lips, barely audible.
"N-no… Gotta move... gotta get to Mikasa... Armin... Hannes... can't... leave..." He had to get to them; he needs to know if they have made it out safe and sound along with the others.
His eyes, wide and glazed with exhaustion, swayed in their sockets, struggling to focus on the massive orange form looming over him. He saw the dark orange patterns, the healthy fur, the absence of that terrible inner glow. He saw understanding, not rage, in the tilt of its head.
Then the darkness at the edges of his vision surged inward. The last of his strength, spent on the fighting, the transformation, the chase, and the catastrophic energy donation of the Omnitrix's healing protocol, vanished.
His arms gave way.
His eyes rolled back and he collapsed forward, unconscious, his cheek hitting the cold stone.
The Vulpimancer flinched back slightly at the sudden movement. It nudged the boy with its muzzle. No response. The small heat signature was stable but faint. Vulnerable.
The thump-thump-thump of garrison horses was much closer now. Shouts echoed down adjacent streets.
"The square! It's in the square!" "Surround it! Ready rifles!"
The Vulpimancer's survival instincts screamed. Run. Hide. Now.
It turned, muscles coiling to launch into a sprint for the dark alleys and the wilds beyond the city.
But then it stopped.
Its head turned back. Its sonic sight locked onto the small, still form on the ground. Left here, the two-legs with weapons would find him. What would they do? Cage him? Hurt him? He was… connected. He was the key to the pain ending.
A conflict, simple but profound, warred within it. Self-preservation versus… something else. Not pack-bond. Not gratitude as a two-legs might understand it. Acknowledgment. A debt to the force that had scoured the invasion from its body.
With a huff that was almost a sigh, the Vulpimancer moved. It didn't pick the boy up gently. This was not a creature of gentle gestures. It bent its head, opened its jaws with careful precision, and closed them on the thick material of Eren's burgundy jacket at the scruff of his neck.
It lifted him. The boy hung limp, a small, rag-doll weight in its maw.
One last time, the Vulpimancer turned its smooth face toward the entrance of the square, where the first mounted garrison soldiers were now appearing, fire torches held high, their faces etched with terror and battle-fury.
For a moment, human and beast faced each other across the ruined market. The soldiers saw the Demon Dog, now a giant orange hound with strange markings, holding a child in its mouth like a prize.
"MY GOD! IT'S GOT A KID!"
"HOLD YOUR FIRE! DON'T HIT THE CHILD!"
"CUT IT OFF! DON'T LET IT ESCAPE!"
The Vulpimancer's muscles tensed. Then it was moving, a burst of pure, grounded speed that was terrifying in its silence. It didn't phase. It didn't glow. It simply ran, a streak of orange vanishing into a side alley so fast it seemed to blur. Its agility giving it an advantage where the garrison were unable to maneuver from.
It carried its fragile, unconscious burden away from the fire, the noise, and the weapons of the two-legs. It ran deep into the labyrinth of Trost's outer districts, past the burning edges, past the last outlying farms, and into the welcoming, silent darkness of the wild forests beyond Wall Rose. Where no two legged can easily chase it down.
Back in the square, Sergeant Bauer skidded his horse to a halt, staring at the empty space where the beast had been, at the glowing, dying smear of the parasite, and at the deep gouge in the earth.
"Report!" he yelled hoarsely. "Where did it go? The child!"
A young soldier pointed a shaking finger into the darkness. "It… it took him, sir. It ran that way. It was… it was orange."
Bauer dismounted, walking slowly to the center of the square. He knelt by the strange, bio-luminescent residue, poking it with his ODM sword. It was already crumbling to inert dust. He looked at the path of destruction, the evidence of a battle between titans, and the chilling absence of both.
He rose, his face grim. "Send word out to all units. The 'Demon Dog' incident is confirmed. It has abducted a civilian child. And it has… changed." He took a deep breath, the order tasting like ash. "Find that thing and the boy…Someone is missing a son tonight."
The hunt was no longer for a mindless beast. It was for a sentient creature that had taken a prisoner. And somewhere in the vast, dark territory of Wall Rose, Eren Yeager slept, utterly helpless, carried into the unknown in the jaws of the very monster he had just saved from itself.
Chapter 28-31 are already available on Patreon.com/Weeb Fanthom.