Wild Tiger Chase - Chapter 63: Chapter 63

— Léon —
A cold breeze shook the tree leaves, making them rattle⁠—snakes ordering invaders to go away.
Léon looked up to the canopies above, then at the mango trees in the center of the clearing. The sickness' tendrils had already reached them.
They would die too, and it wouldn't take long.
Jackal seemed to notice that. The white shadow connecting her to Toni dispersed, and Jackal's muscles relaxed. Her shoulders sunk, her stance grew smaller, and she closed her jaw as well as she could.
Léon's stomach dropped a few inches. Eyes widened, he looked from Satina to Toni, watching the small changes in the latter's expression. Toni blinked a few times, slowly as if processing Satina's order.
"I said—give back all the powers you stole," Satina repeated.
Toni raised his trembling hands and covered his face.
With a dull sound, Jackal freed the claws in her right hand from the tree trunk. Her shark eyes, wide, black, and bottomless, were trained on Satina.
Shit.
"Rob!" Léon shouted.
Rushed steps approached with the odd tempo of a hurt person. Léon tugged his scythe backward, trying to keep Jackal from biting Satina, and Rob reached her in time to hold her arm and stop her attack.
As the breeze intensified, Jackal muttered under her breath, "You chose the first option. You'll kill him and deny me what I want."
"Will you honestly tell me you want to save him?" Rob said in a strained voice. His boots grated the ground. He grunted and supported one foot on the tree, trying to hold Jackal back.
"I do not—but I have a deal, and I always fulfill my part in a deal!" Jackal shouted.
The breeze turned into a gale, sucking leaves and blades of grass towards Toni.
"Shit. What's happening?" Satina mumbled.
Léon dug his heels and leaned back; he doubled his grip on the scythe and shut his eyes. Moments before, this was his attempt to save Satina. Right now, as Jackal bit down the snath and arched forward, this was his attempt to save himself.
"Just hold on tight!" Léon shouted.
Rob's foot slid off the tree trunk. He cried out as the windstorm pulled him; Jackal managed to lace her arm around his waist and stop him from being dragged away. She udes the strength of the wind to impale her claws on Rob's stomach. Rob wailed in pain, and his cries were accompanied by Léon's desperate shouting.
Finally, the wind slowed down to a stop. In that short moment of calmness, Satina slid her arms away from Jackal's neck, Léon dematerialized his scythe, and Rob stumbled a few steps away, trying to stop the bleeding with one of his hands.
The four of them shared a confused glance... and started to fight again.
It would have been funny if Satina's blood wasn't smeared all over Jackal's face, if Rob didn't look like a sack of wounds and broken bones, and if Léon's rage wasn't already threatening to consume him again. From afar, Rafa tried to throw long, thin crystal needles that stuck on Jackal's arms, back, and legs, but that wasn't enough to slow her down—and Rafa was getting tired.
They all were.
With a loud roar, Jackal threw Rob across the clearing and used the momentum to break the crystal needles pierced into her right side. She gave Léon a hard punch in the stomach and stepped away to gaze at Satina. There was something in her eyes. Something that went way beyond honoring deals. Was it fear? Desperation, maybe? What pushed Jackal to keep going?
Rob hit the floor and rolled to a stop, leaving a trail of blood and a small cloud of dust behind. Jackal's reasons didn't matter anymore. Léon needed to reach his man.
He grunted and huffed as he tried to recover his breath. As Léon approached, Rob tried to get up, but his arms and legs couldn't hold his weight anymore.
Then, Toni wailed.
His voice grated its way out of his mouth, and the windstorm started again, but this time stronger. It reversed its path, pushing things away from Toni and the crystal cell.
Léon crouched and crawled the final meters towards Rob. He tugged him closer, his hands coated with blood, and brought him to a nearby tree they'd use as shelter from the windstorm.
"You should seriously cut your relationship with your ex, Bhalu." Léon sniffed. He tried to keep his voice light and joyful, but more blood pumped out of Rob's wound.
Toni looked down and stared at his own hands. On his torso, arms, and legs, slits and old scars opened. One in specific, near his left hipbone, made Léon shiver.
"Watch out for the crystals," Rafa shouted. "I can't unmake them!"
The cell wasn't strong enough to hold the violence of that gale, whatever it was. As the wind increased, some of the plates tilted outward and quaked, trying to resist it; one of them fell with a loud bang, making the ground tremble.
Purple-red liquid ran down Toni's body and pooled around his feet. Some of it sunk into the ground while thin tendrils of liquid Life Force crawled in different directions. They poured inside the dark trails of the sickness and continued their path. Some disappeared through the trees, but three of them ran towards Léon. The one on the right swerved to find Rob, the one on the left traveled towards Rafa, and the remaining one ran faster the closer it got to Léon.
In a reflex, Léon shrunk away from the liquid, pulling Rob with him, but the windstorm didn't give him much space to maneuver. The tendrils of Life Force climbed up their legs, hips, and chests until they smeared, cold, against Léon's and Rob's hearts.
As the power was absorbed again, an old presence invaded Léon's mind...
And as quick as it came, it disappeared.
Léon's lips trembled.
"No. No, no, no... Lampee," he mumbled, his eyes welling up.
Rob's eyes widened. "What happened? Is he back?"
Léon sobbed and shook his head no. He opened his lips, but his voice didn't pass through the knot forming inside it. He pressed a hand on his mouth and hid his face in Rob's bloody embrace. As Léon's shoulders shook and the tears streamed down his face, warm and silent, the wind stopped. As well as he could, grunting and wincing, Rob pulled Léon for a proper hug.
"I'm so sorry, my love," Rob whispered.
With a sob, Léon opened his eyes. He let Rob dry his tears with a thumb, then kiss his cheeks, holding him so close, their breathings mixed. Léon knew that Rob reserved that brown, sad, adoring gaze only for him, so he thanked his bear with a tiny smile of his own. But it was Rob who needed help right now.
"We'll find a way, Leo," Rob murmured.
Léon nodded. A deep pang of pain rippled through his entire body. Rob moved in for a kiss, but... something gave him pause. Eyes widened, he swallowed hard and let his sight fall to his chest. The claw marks on there were slowly healing.
"Bhalu? What happened?" Léon brushed a lock of dark hair away from his face. His eyes widened. "Your tattoos. Did they...?"
Rob bobbed his head. Why did he look so miserable? "It's okay, Tiger. And don't worry—we'll find a way to get Lampee back." He caressed his cheek. "Okay?"
"Nothing's okay, Roberto!" someone shouted.
Léon's shoulders jumped. He looked in the direction the voice had come from, half expecting to see Toni alone. Rio couldn't still be worried about him; he couldn't still be trying to help a living and breathing monster...
But there he was, messy locks of dyed blue hair bobbing from right to left while Rio walked towards Toni. Worse than that was the black-haired kid at his side.
"Pipo," Leon mumbled. Something twisted inside his stomach, and Léon furrowed his brows. "Stay away from my brother!" His voice was a roar, loud and dangerous as his rage threatened to be. "Pipo, come here."
Pipo blinked a few times and looked from Rio to Léon. "I should be in the hospital. I'm helping Phillip."
"Pipo, come here!" Léon insisted.
The little child had barely finished his first step when Rio rested a hand on his shoulder. Instead of saying anything, Rio smiled at Pipo. In a chilling, distant tone, he said, "You did say you wanted to help Léon, didn't you?" Then, he reached for something at his back. "We just need to find the right tool for that."
Léon took in a sharp intake of air.
The gun.
With whatever remnant of strength Léon had, he spotted it among the grass and raced to it. Léon took the gun and was about to dash into the forest when Modraniht and Sissy approached through the trees. Shit, shit, shit.
"Yeah," Pipo mused, scratching his chin. "I want to help Leo. But I want to help Phillip too! He's hurt."
Something crossed Rio's expression, and Léon wasn't sure if that was caused by Pipo's words, or by his stealing the gun.
Rio straightened his back, freezing cold in the snap of a finger. "Well, Pipo, you don't have to worry about Phillip; he'll be all right." He cleared his throat and looked at Léon. "Do you recognize this?" Rio showed the syringe in his right hand. The liquid inside it was transparent and thin, but something about it felt dangerous. "Don't you remember what happened in Toni's undimension? I gave you one of these." Rio raised his chin. There was a small tremble to his lips, his left hand balled at his side. "You reacted so well. I thought to give one to your brother too."
Léon's eyes widened; he shivered, grabbing the fabric of his t-shirt. The sickness. This is what made him lose control! His teeth started chattering, and Léon wasn't sure if it was anger or sadness making his chest hurt so much.
What would happen to Pipo if Rio injected him with that damned syringe?
With a scoff, Léon opened and closed his lips as if looking for an answer. He could fight. Maybe Satina could control Rio and stop him; Maybe Rafa could block him like she had blocked Toni. Maybe Rob could...!
He looked around the clearing.
Rafa was kneeling, her eyes widened and unfocused. Amma was standing near the treeline, watching the scene with horror, and Satina was grimacing and pressing a hand on her neck wound.
Wait. Was that... a trail of gold running through Satina's fingers?
Léon tried to get up, but pain hooked the muscles in his abdomen and sent him back to his knees.
Fuck. Fuck! It was so fucking ironic that, after everything that happened—everything they did, everything they risked, everything they lost—to stop this madness, the only person who seemed fully pleased with the result of that fight... was Jackal.
She was there. Standing in the center of the clearing and spreading a hand on the old wood of the healed mango trees. She let out a piercing, hysterical laugh. Maybe she found the situation ironic too.
Her laugh died down to a tired chuckle as Jackal reached for a mango. Her family was safe; Léon couldn't say the same about his. She bit down on the fruit, orange-red juice running down her chin. They were all wounded, spent, or threatened by the very person who should be helping them.
But of course, in the end, Jackal got what she wanted.
Léon shook his head. Now... what could he do to fight?
Sissy and Modraniht left the thick trees and approached Rio with widened eyes.
"Gregorio, what the fuck," Sissy said. "Threatening a kid? This is not you. And—whatever the fuck you're thinking—I said we should go. Now! You too, Jackal. This whole experiment is over."
"Well, look who's here. I thought you two would be long gone already." Jackal sneered.
Modraniht and Sissy shared a look while Jackal offered them an ugly smile. Rio did nothing but ignore them as Léon's eyes crossed Modraniht's; the older man averted his gaze.
"You know what I want, Leo," Rio said. He gestured at Toni's gun, then stared at somewhere above the mansion. "There's a pocket dimension that way—it should be more than enough to keep Toni from dying and to complete whatever Jackal wants."
"Rio! Listen to yourself!" Rob said.
"You don't want to be on her bad side, Roberto. And..." he scoffed. "You don't know me! All right? None of you do. This is who I've always been."
Satina let out a mirthless laugh. "What kind of mushrooms you're on, Rio?" She grimaced and groaned, leaning back to rest against the tree behind her. "Cause let me tell you; they're not doing you much good." She coughed. A thick, golden liquid poured out of her neck wound. Soon, thin trails of blood tinged it. "Aw shit. What a time for this fuckery to stop working."
"I'm very disappointed in you, Gregorio." As if a spell had been broken, Amma finally moved. She started in Satina's direction, muttering words too slow to comprehend. She took off her lab coat and ripped it while her eyes met Léon's. Her order was clear: help your brother.
For the first time in a while, Rio seemed really hurt. He swallowed and pursed his lips, hardening his voice. "I saw his progress, and I know I can help him, Kali. I'm like you; I won't lose another patient." His chest heaved, his forehead wrinkling and smoothing; a battle raged inside him. "Besides, I know what happened in the other pocket dimension that Cae broke. Your friend fixed the damage, didn't he? He can do it again."
Anhangá. That's right, he had closed Caidara's pocket dimension after the Barbarians invaded... but he wasn't around anymore. He couldn't help them.
"I don't think you understand what you're doing, Rio," Rob said. "Toni is the one behind what happened in Aíbetama; not Léon. He's been using and manipulating people for decades. He believes something evil is coming, but.... I mean..." Rob opened and closed his hands, maybe trying to grasp an idea he had just discovered. Instead of saying it with words, he just gestured around him, both to the hurt people around them and to the signs of the battle they'd been fighting.
"He's improving, Roberto. You had your chance to redeem yourself. Phillip had, too. Even Rafa and Léon did. But Toni? Toni could barely speak until two years ago; how do you think he can get better if—"
"And look at him now!" Rafa spat. "Helping to destroy the world and everything. What a bloody champ! If this is the first thing he does after coming back, I dread to think of the rest." She grimaced and grunted as the crystal formations spread over her skin, helping her to stand straight. "I don't think you know this bloke that well, Gregorio. Ask yourself why you're doing this. Is this really about Toni? Cause if it is"—she scoffed—"bloody hell, you're a piece of shite yourself. I mean, a bigger one; I already knew you're a daft after what you did to Pheels."
"Pheels?" Rio raised an eyebrow. "Well, I don't think you know Pheels that well either. He's nothing but a sad excuse of a—"
"You shut that mouth, or I'll shut it for you, mate," Rafa growled.
"No, I won't!" Rio sneered. "Don't you understand? I'm giving you a choice. No matter who, I want one of you to shoot that damned pocket dimension. If you don't want to, Léon's brother will... after I inject him, of course. With this!" He shook the syringe in his hand and grinned. "So tell me, mate. What will it be?"
Maybe to prove he was serious, Rio brought Pipo closer and raised his needle, letting it hover on his neck.
"Well?" Rio insisted. "Let me hear your answer. Now."