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Chapter three: Encounters

"Everyone, we have a new teammate." Christina said, pacing before her team, "A dragon, believe it or not."

The other five of Infinity team stood at attention. Their eyes followed Christina's movement as she paced, her tail held low as she walked.

"I'm warning all of you, he's going to look a bit scary at first." Christina warned them, "Maybe even so far as demonic. But I assure all of you, this guy is one of us and could turn the tide of this war from what I saw yesterday."

"I'm sorry Ma'am," Melody interrupted, "but I need to go back a bit...did you say a dragon?"

Christina nodded, "That's right, a dragon. His name is Tobias."

William looked to Christina with a glare, "A new team member? Christina, Infinity is up to full strength. Taking on another team member could break us."

"Or strengthen us even more." Calvin noted, "Dragons are supposed to be really powerful in battle. I say we see just what this dragon can do."

Christina nodded, "I'm sure that Tobias is strong. But he is deadly accurate from what I've seen already from his assessment, although I haven't seen him in battle. I have a feeling our new number seven will do the job just fine."

Serena and Melody stayed quiet, trusting fully in their leader's choices. So far Christina had gotten them through many missions alive with minimal lose of lives to other troops or civilians since the team had formed. Their team had been wounded, near death, and wanting to give up, but Christina had pulled them through. To all of them, Christina's choices were the ones to follow without hesitation. So if she thought this dragon would make a good teammate, they believed her.

Christina nodded to her team, "Alright team, let's move. I'll give you all the details on our mission once we reach the drop off point."

The rest of the team saluted and followed Christina to the transports, a group of trucks specially designed to move soldiers in and out of hot zones with maximum protection without sacrificing speed and maneuverability. While loud, the trucks were well armored with a foot thick armoring installed on all sides of the vehicles, holes cut for the machinegun crews that rode along to fire at any demon who got too close. Many of the other vehicles were currently in disrepair, many of them damaged from ambushes along the routes and escort missions for supply convoys.

Christina and her team boarded one, each one taking up positions as William grabbed a machinegun turret, checking it before loading it with the belt of ammunition. As the team's heavy weapons expert, Williams job was simple. Keep the truck in one piece by keeping the demons at a distance with LMG fire. The rest of the crew took up the back and sides of the truck, each one checking their weapon.

As the crew readied for combat, Serena looked over everyone in the truck, noticing that none of them looked like a dragon.

"Christina?" Serena asked, the collie looking to see if she missed anyone, "I don't see anyone new here."

Christina nodded, looking over the team herself, "Hmm, the science team must have something else in mind for him now."

Serena looked at her, "What was that?"

Christina shook her head, "Nothing Serena, don't worry. I'm sure he'll either get aboard or meet us at the drop site."

The truck started up with a grinding sound. She knew that it was only a matter of time before this transport, like many others, was scrapped and stripped for useful parts. Due to the attacks, fuel and resources for repairing the vehicles were getting lower and lower each day, older or destroyed vehicles being ripped apart to repair others.

Hopefully this truck wouldn't give out on them on the way to their destination.

* * *

As a truck drove into the town, a dragon watched from his perch inside a destroyed building, the darkness inside hiding his form as the dragon watched for the transport truck. Having been briefed by the science team that created him, the dragon had been told to simply arrive in Hayder before the team and secure a safe place for them to disembark from the trucks. After finding such a place on the outskirt of the town, the dragon had called back to the base to confirm that he had a location for the team.

Quietly, Tobias checked both handguns the dragon was carrying. Both weapons were specially designed for him, carrying twenty, armor piercing bullets. The barrels were slightly longer than other pistols to give the guns a good range. But Tobias knew he was made for close combat.

Recognizing the truck to be one of theirs, the dragon leapt off the perch, diving downward as his wings spread. Gliding just over the top of the truck, the dragon flapped hard twice, landing easily and turning to face the truck as the back gate opened. As the team climbed out, all of them looked at Tobias with a combination of emotions. None of them, with the exception of Christina, had seen an actual dragon before, let alone one who looked like Tobias.

The dragon stood silently as Christina spoke, "Team, meet Tobias."

The dragon bowed his head, "Ready for orders ma'am."

Christina sighed and nodded, "Tobias, just call me Christina. I don't like members of my team addressing each other by rank or title. It takes away from the ties we've developed in battle."

The dragon nodded, "Yes Christina."

William nodded the driver, an order to remain at his location until the team returned. With a return nod, a gun crew took positions to defend the truck. Once they were set up, William walked back to the team, looking over Tobias as the others had, but there was doubt in his mind that this creature would help them at all. To him, everyone one the team was battle tested and ready to fight. Tobias had yet to prove that merit.

"Alright, Our mission is fairly simple." Christina explained, laying out a map of the town she had been given before leaving the base, "We lost contact with a convoy and it's escorts while it was travelling through this town. The convoy was carrying a rather large ammunition cache from a base up north that went dark two weeks ago and was confirmed destroyed. With our ammunition depots being constantly drained just trying to protect our own base's borders, we need anything we can get, including that cache."

Calvin looked over the map, "I'm guessing that the Valdye had a different idea, huh?"

"Pretty much. They struck the convoy here before it went dark. We have no idea where in the town it was, but we do have some communications that put the convoy about here when it went dark." Christina said, tapping the map near the opposite edge of the town, "And we need to get there and secure a clear path before we can call in the trucks to retrieve the cache."

William studied the map for a minute before stating, "We'll take these two main roads. If we can be sure one of them is even remotely cleared we can bring in the gun truck we rode in on to escort."

"Or use it to blast our way out." Serena commented, "After all, do we know if the Valdye are still even here?"

"That's exactly why we'll be splitting up to take both these main roads." Christina explained, "We'll use two teams; one with four, one with three. Keep in radio contact at all times and sound off if anything happens. I don't care what it is. If you engage enemy forces call out your target and position. We all know the danger the Valdye, especially if we get separated."

The others nodded as Christina tapped an 'X' on the map, "This is where the we believe last communication came from before the convoy was lost. Mark it down on your TAC-COMs. We'll regroup there if we don't find anything. You all know the drill."

"So what are the teams?" Calvin asked.

Christina rolled up the map, "Same as always. You, Kelsey, and Melody take eastern main street. Tobias, me, Serena, and William will go west and move up from there. Stay out of the buildings unless you need to move through them, many of them are probably in danger of collapse or probable ambush spots."

"Understood." William said as he cocked his LMG, the heavy weapon now ready to fire, "Let's move out team."

* * *

After the team had separated, Christina led her small team towards the western main street. As she did, the princess kept an eye on their new teammate. The dragon seemed oddly at ease, his wings held loosely to his body as his eyes scanned each building they passed. But that was not what was one her mind. In the back of her mind, she knew that she had seen Tobias somewhere before. He looked familiar to her, although she couldn't remember how or where.

Soon, Christina shook her head to clear it, thinking to herself, "Snap out of it Christina. You have a job to do. You can wonder later."

"Why do you think the demons would hit a supply convoy here?" Serena asked, her shotgun slung across her back as they walked.

William poked his LMG into a broken window, sweeping for any sign of the demons activity, "A better question is why do they always seem to know just where to hit our convoys? They hit this one in a town where it took us a good half hour to get here at top speed, plus there are so many places they could hide. They knew we couldn't get reinforcements here in time when they hit."

"The Valdye are getting smarter." Christina agreed, "They're learning our weaknesses more and more everyday, including our timings of response to their attacks."

Tobias remained silent, the dragon simply examining the buildings around them for any sign of demon activity. Although he only seemed to glance over them, his mind was already formulating a way out of any situation and how to take down demons from various positions.

Suddenly, William heard something and turned his weapon towards a building. The building was mostly collapsed, most of the roof collapsed in on itself; rubble and debris lying around it.

"You hear that?" William asked, keeping his heavy weapon focused on the building.

Christina listened for a minute, hearing a sort of scrapping sound from inside the ruined building, "Yeah, think it's a demon?"

"It might be, but then again this town did get hit in the opening days of the war. It could just be unstable." William replied.

Christina nodded to Serena, "Go check it out and don't engage. If it seems too unstable just get out."

The collie nodded and pulled her shotgun to her shoulder, slowly walking up the building before breaking the glass of a window on the first floor, pointing her shotgun barrel inside.

"Clear." She called.

Christina nodded and walked over, examining the building herself. As she did, Serena lowered her shotgun, cradling the weapon in her arms as she watched her team leader. Christina found the door to the building, taking up a position on it's left as William moved up, standing at it's right. Christina put up three fingers, dropping them to zero before kicking the door open!

The door flew back as Christina kicked it open; snapping off it's rusted hinges with ease and clattering to the floor inside the ruined building. Christina took a step inside, her weapon raised as the vixen's eyes glanced around inside the remains of the building. Most of it looked burned out, sections of the roof collapsed inside and crushing anything they had fallen onto. Sunlight poured in through the holes in the collapsed roof as Christina nodded and walked out.

"Clear for now." Christina stated, "Let's keep moving."

The others nodded and followed her, but Tobias felt something. The dragon looked back at the building, examining the rooftop carefully. Something wasn't right; he could feel it as a chill that travelled down his spine, the feeling of hungry eyes tracking his every movement.

"What's wrong Tobias?" Christina asked, looking back at the dragon.

Tobias's gaze didn't shift, "We're being watched."

William adjusted his grip on his weapon, the LMG moving up against his shoulder, "I don't doubt it. That convoy was attacked two days ago. These bastards are bound to still be around."

Christina nodded, "So keep an eye out and remember to call your target if you see one."

Serena nodded and stayed near Christina as William kept his eyes on the rooftops. Tobias stayed back from the rest, his pistols holstered, but his tail was raised up to his shoulder, the blade hanging over his shoulder as if it were a scorpion's stinger.

Suddenly, a roar sounded out from one of the buildings! Christina whipped around to find a pair of glowing, blood red eyes staring out from the ruins of one of the buildings, the eyes moving closer as the creature stepped into the light, revealing it's hardened, armored body. The Scout growled heavily, it's powerful clawed feet digging into the floor with every step as it grew closer.

"Scout, my left!" Christina called out, raising her rifle to fire!

But as she did, Serena cocked her shotgun, calling out, "Two scouts, my right!"

Christina backed up, keeping the Scout in her sights as it advanced. It was moving almost carefully, not exposing its weaknesses in it's armored hide. But then it made its mistake.

The scout moved left to try to intimidate Christina by a slow circle strafe. But, as it did, the vixen smirked and moved her iron sight right over it's now exposed neck. She squeezed the trigger, the gun recoiling as the armor piercing rounds were fired from the barrel of the rifle! Blood erupted from the Scout's neck as it fell back, the bullets ripping through it's exposed flesh as the demon let out a bloody cry of anguish!

As it fell the ground, the other two Serena had called out attacked! The Scouts rushed towards them as William opened fire, his rounds pinging off their hard armored hides! Serena moved in close, opening fire with her shotgun as the Valdye roared at her and charged forward towards the collie. But as it did, Tobias moved quickly, his tail blade flat out behind him as the dragon grabbed one of the two scouts by the shoulder! The demon stopped when it felt Tobias grab it. The Scout looked back at him with a bloody roar, it's eyes staring him down as the dragon's tail unleashed the power within its coiled muscles, the blade flashing faster than the eye could track! The demon's eyes dimmed as its head hit the ground and rolled, it's body slumping lifelessly as Tobias threw it down.

Tobias pushed the body aside, his tail blade now coated in the demon's blood. As he did, the dragon raised his pistols, opening fire on the last Scout to draw its attention away from William. As it turned to face him, the raccoon unleashed a volley of LMG fire, penetrating the demon's leg and forcing it to its knees. The Scout roared in frustration, forcing itself back to it's feet as William ran at it, knocking the demon onto it's side as Serena racked a shell into her shotgun. The collie walked over and pointed the shotgun at the Valdye's exposed underside and fired! The demon roared in bloody fury, it's blood pouring out from its freshly gaping wound as Serena drew a knife from her hip. The collie slit the demon's throat quickly before it could react.

Christina looked at the dead demons, the vixen cradling her rifle in her arms after reloading. Tobias holstered his pistols, the dragon's eyes calm as he looked to Christina for orders. At first, Christina was a bit disturbed that the dragon was calm after just beheading a demon on the spot, his tail blade still dripping the demons blackened blood. But as she remembered Tobias was designed for this, Christina sighed and touched a microphone that was attached to the collar of her vest.

"Got some bad news guys." The vixen said into it.

"Let me guess, we have Valdye confirmation?" Calvin replied, almost sarcastically.

"Yeah, how'd you guess?" Christina asked.

"We just took out four of the buggers." The tiger stated, "No injuries, but they're definitely still around. Looks like they weren't happy just hitting the convoy, they wanted the retrieval team too. It's like they were waiting for someone to come after this cache."

Christina nodded and looked to her part of the team, "I wouldn't jump to that conclusion just yet. They may just be looking for anyone to kill, not one of our teams in particular. After all, we still don't know how long they've occupied this city. Keep an eye out for ambushes and call in if you encounter anything strange."

"Will do Christina." Calvin replied, "Over and out."

Christina nodded and looked at William, "It's confirmed, we have hostiles in the town and probably more surrounding the area where the call came from."

Serena sighed and nodded, "So...what do we do?"

Christina looked down the street, checking her magazine, "We keep moving. We need that ammunition cache if we're to hold out in this war."

William nodded as Serena agreed. They both knew the stakes when they had gone in, and they both knew it was too late to turn back without that cache. So, with that in mind, the team kept moving, Tobias taking a moment to wipe his blade off on one of the dead Valdye demons.

Christina looked back at him as Serena walked past her, the collie checking the streets before waiting for Christina to take the lead. Christina nodded to her and took the lead, walking carefully down the dangerous streets of Hayder.

* * *

"I don't like this." Calvin stated, watching as Melody looked into a sinkhole, the hole having opened long ago before the demons first arrived.

The sinkhole took up the entire street, some of the buildings having partially fallen into it, leaving the insides of the ruined buildings open. Wreckage of cars and sections of the ruins lay within, most covered in dust and grime from the years since the war against the Valdye had begun.

"We're going to have to find a way around." Melody stated, standing up, "This hole's too big to put a makeshift bridge across and too deep for us to jump down safely."

Calvin looked around, spotting what looked like an apartment building on the edge of the sinkhole. Portions had fallen into the hole, but the building looked stable enough and extended the length of the sinkhole.

"There. We'll go through this apartment building to get around it." Calvin explained, "Close quarters so be on your guard."

The tiger walked up the steps to the door, giving it a hard pull. The door refused to budge. With a low growl, the tiger put on foot against the door's frame, pulling on the handle as hard as he could. Still the old door refused to open, giving up a groan from its worn and rusted hinges and lock.

Kelsey rolled her eyes and walked up; pushing Calvin out of the way, "Let me do it. I have a way with these things."

Calvin stepped back, "Be my guest. That door's stuck tight."

Kelsey smirked, "Oh trust me for once, will you?"

With that, the cat examined the door before taking up a weapon from her hip. The sawed-off, break action shotgun was small, only good for two shots at a time before needing to be reloaded, but easy and light to carry. Kelsey loaded two shells into it, flipping the action shut. She pointed it at the door's edges where she knew the hinges were as her finger squeezed the trigger of the weapon.

The first shot destroyed the first hinge, splintering the wood back as it shattered the silence in the town, the echoing boom spreading out as Kelsey raised the gun again and fired a second time. The close range weapon's shot literally blew through the door's wooden build and frame, the steel pellets shredding it and its worn hinges. With the, the cat lowered the shotgun, smoke wafting from the barrels as she raised her boot. With a grunt, the cat kicked in the door! It fell with a boom, the wooden door falling easily after the hinges were destroyed.

"After you." Kelsey said with a smirk to Calvin, gesturing inside.

Calvin stepped inside the apartment, raising a revolver as he did, "You know, one of these days that's not going to work."

"The day it doesn't is the day I'll pay your tab at the bar." Kelsey replied.

"I look forward to that day then." Calvin smirked.

Watching them, Melody smiled to herself and followed Calvin inside, slipping her pistols out of their holsters.

* * *

As Calvin glanced around inside the apartment building, the tiger noting the long corridor they would have to walk down to reach the other side of the building. Along it were the remains of doors, many of them presumably destroyed when the demons first attacked the town. Calvin guessed that the demons had seen the inhabitants flee into the building for safety. He did not need to guess what happened next as the tiger glanced inside one of the apartments. He knew that the Valdye did not leave survivors.

Inside the apartment room his knowledge was verified. Though dry, the blood coated walls and floor told the tiger all he needed to know. The furniture was ripped to shreds, coated in a layer of dust from being left unattended after the attack. Whoever had been inside was dead for sure, a dried blood trail leading from the pools of blood and out the destroyed window.

"I bet it's the same story in every one of these apartments." Kelsey said as she walked past Calvin, "Just like in every other town we've been to."

"Not every town." Melody stated, "Remember there are other survivors out there who don't believe that the military can win this war so they survive on their own or in small groups."

Calvin nodded, "Yeah, we know. But any smart survivors will be a distance out from a major attack point. None of them are stupid enough to be close to a place like this."

Kelsey glanced into another apartment, stepping inside, "But we don't know how long the demons have been here since the initial invasion. It could be a recent occupation. Maybe they followed a group here and then killed everyone they saw before the convoy arrived."

Calvin nodded as the cat stepped back out, the two both glancing back down the corridor to be sure they were not being flanked. But as they did, a soft growling sound was heard nearby. Calvin signaled for Kelsey and Melody to stay close and quiet. The two nodded as Calvin crept up to a closed door, the growling getting louder as the tiger drew closer to it. He placed his hand on the knob, turning it slowly as he carefully pushed the door open, his revolver barrel poking inside.

As he looked inside, the tiger saw a Scout inside, the demon clearly distracted by something it had found. The tiger backed out immediately, knowing that even a single scout could kill him in a heartbeat. Instead, Calvin nodded to Melody and Kelsey, the two nodding back as Kelsey took up a position on the opposite side of the door, Melody getting behind Calvin.

Under any other circumstance they would have left the demon alone. But, with even a single demon behind them in this close quarters environment, it was a risk they could not take. They would have to dispatch it quickly before it could attract attention to the rest of the demons in the building.

"On my mark." Calvin stated.

Calvin raised his hand, four fingers up. Kelsey and Melody watched as the tiger dropped one finger at a time until he was down to none. Once it was, Calvin moved, kicking the door open!

As the door opened, the demon turned to them with a bloody roar! It's eyes ablaze with a heated, primal fury as it charged towards Calvin. The tiger leapt aside as the demon reached him, Kelsey hoping skillfully over the charging demon to get into position to flank it. Melody backed up in the corridor, her pistols tracking the demon as it turned towards Calvin.

Calvin smirked, his revolver up and firing as the demon leapt for him again, exposing it's underbelly to Kelsey. The calico flung herself to the ground, opening fire with both barrel of her sawed off! The Scout let out a blood-curdling roar as its underbelly was torn open by the shotgun's blasts; severing it's spine before blowing out the back of it's armored back. Blood flowed from it's body as the demon howled in fury, collapsing to the floor. Calvin put the revolver's barrel to the Scout's neck as the demon looked up at him with blood filled rage, it's wound too severe for it to survive as it's own, black blood pooled under it.

"Say hello to your overlord for me, you son of a bitch." Calvin smirked before pulling the trigger, the demon's black blood further coating the floor under it as the gun went off.

"One down." The tiger said, replacing his revolver in it's holster.

As he did, several echoing roars met the team's ears, as if the building itself was angry. Calvin looked to Melody who was still in the corridor.

Melody raised her pistols again, aiming them down the corridor, "Only a building full to go! We need a way out of here fast!"