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Late evening in October, stormy skies as usual, another typical night in the Blackburnadeaux family homestead. Harper drinks himself stupid once more, though quite excessively lately, for he is incapable of dealing with the stress and grief of his youngest son's untimely death. Regardless of his feelings for the little twerp even while Jordan was still alive, Harper can't shake his indelible feeling of hatred toward Maxwell, the gouging whim of denial for why that troublesome little jerk-ass shep-coon couldn't have died before his precious beloved baby boy. Why one son over the insignificant other? Suzanne lies weakened in the bottom of the small bunk-bed the two boys once shared during happier times. She holds a framed picture of her youngest raccoon cub against her bosom, wrapped in her arms, wailing aloud. Her world is crumbled under her very own foundation at the loss, though she also feels for her oldest. She feels for her husband as well, even for the man who initially and tragically ran his vehicle right into her child, the man who is now currently doing time behind bars for his intrepid act of involuntary manslaughter behind the wheel - or is it cub-slaughter? Maxwell sits outside on the home's porch, his shep-coon butt nestled against a sharp edge of wooden floorboard, staring into nothing. A hundred thoughts and memories circulate through his mind all at once, apt to drive him mad with winded exhaustion: his ride back home upon that fateful early morning, the way his father threw a punch at the deputy in charge of telling his parents that their youngest son had been struck and killed by an out-of-control vehicle on his way to the bus stop, how mom folded down upon her knees and screamed, eyes open and frazzled, lips trembling and snot running from her nostrils in rivulets. Max considers the possibility of what could've happened if he'd been struck and killed outright instead of his baby bro, his little buddy, his salvation and servitude. The young shep-coon considers the possibility and sheds a tear of dawning realization - knowing he'd never have another mutual friend to call silly names or to stage running races. He'd never handle another blonde head of hair and he'd never engage in rough-housing antics and wrestling matches, nor would he ever gain help from another while building sofa-cushion homes. He'd never yearn for his mother's attention alongside another, for that other child is now dead. His brother; dead and buried, cremated, kept frozen in a morgue, whatever. He's freaking dead. Dead is dead as dead can be. Maxwell had a brother named Jordan and he received a terrible early invitation back into the Lord's care. At this point, Max has reason to believe that there isn't even a Lord, no God in the sky or Devil under the soils of the earth where he walks and sings and cries and sleeps. Max couldn't possibly invest his faith and belief into a deity who could be so utterly and indiscriminately cruel enough to take Jordan with such an amazing and dastardly show of unfettered haste. Son. Max jumps, startled at the deep, abrupt voice. Hey there, young'un. Max cuts his thoughts clean at the tip and whirls around to look behind his back, peeking over his shoulder, stifling bitter tears. Harper exits from the house, tipsy and inebriated, weaving on his two flimsy foot-paws, his eyes watery and hazy, not entirely level on an awakened, conscious level. Max sniffles and wipes a stream of tears free from his eyelids, regarding his drunken dad. Harper slumps himself down upon the step which Maxwell had been sat upon and puts a thickened arm around the shep-coon's skinny shoulders. Max smells the stench of hard liquor and gags, careful not to express himself too adamantly in front of Harper, angering his father. Harper breaths deep and raspy, as if he'd been stifling tears of his own, afraid to break down in front of his family, taught at a young age to be a man and to never show emotion, no matter what, lest one shall live and die as a fat pussy. As Max wraps his arms around his dad's chest to hug him, Harper surprises the young shep-coon by weeping bitterly. The adult shepherd-man bows his head and touches his chin against his own breastplate, blackened lips curling down in a grimace, hand-paw pinching at his eye sockets. They say that it's never easy to lose a child, especially at such a young age. Losing your parents, that's just one thing that happens with everyone, a bum-rap inevitability. But your kid? Your baby boy? Max, he didn't need to die so soon, so goddam fucking soon... oh, why? Why? Max can't vouch for a suitable answer to deliver unto his father, so he remains silent, instead letting the grown-up vent his frustrations through the nearly-forbidden act of crying aloud, something Max never imagined he'd see his dad do in all his young life. The sight of his father pitching his lungs for breath and the sound of his pained, grief-stricken groaning remained intact all throughout his youth, one factor that never could be forgotten, even worse to see and hear than his own mother's outrageously visceral weeping frenzies. Harper sniffs deep, wipes his eyes dry and pats Max's back, a loving fatherly gesture. Something is very wrong. He tells the young cub to get ready for bed soon, tomorrow is another day for another dollar, a saying he'd held true for a good long while. Max agrees and follows his dad's order, standing up, helping his father up from the porch, walking him back into the house. Suzanne falls fast asleep on Jordan's bunk, framed picture still nestled upon her chest with dried liquid runnels, phantom relics of unending tears that streamed down her cheeks. Max and Harper sit in the front room, watching late-night television with limited interest. Max watches many commercial ads regarding phone-sex operators on the line now and sweet deals at a local Dutch Brothers near you and great zero-interest vehicle purchase rates all throughout Halloween. Max wonders what Jordan would dress up as this year if he'd lived longer, maybe Frankenstein or Captain America. At the thought of the two brothers skipping and laughing between houses, begging for candy in small plastic pumpkin buckets but refusing chocolate for their own health concerns, Max feels a strange sensation upon his belly. He looks down and becomes immediately reviled at the sight. His father, Harper Canasia Blackburnadeaux, on his knees in front of his son, licking at the boy's navel. Max whimpers and begins to ask his dad what he's doing when the shepherd-man reaches up and cups his large hand-paw around the boy's mouth, clenching Max's muzzle shut. Max squirms and struggles to breathe, for both his mouth and nostrils are covered, muffled breath, cut-off air circulation. Harper yanks his belt free from his pants and wraps it tight around Max's young shep-coon muzzle, careful not to jam his whiskers in its leather folds. Max gazes at his dad, unbelieving and frightened, confused and uncertain, questioning Harper with silent demeaning. Harper tightens the belt-loop around his son's muzzle and places his index finger-paw against his quivering lips, shushing Max. He then winks, hiccups and reaches down to unbutton his son's pants, pulling them down around his shep-coon ankles. Harper tickles at Max's exposed belly, tiny bristles of fur covering his underdeveloped abs, his skinny chest, his hair-bristled dog-nipples; Harper loosens Max's sweatpants and pulls them clean off. Max wants to ask his dad what he's doing, what he thinks he's doing, why he feels whatever he's doing seems like an okay thing to do. Even as Harper slides his middle finger-paw into Max's clenched-shut mouth, dampened with his alcohol-tainted saliva, Max squirms and whimpers, incapable of making any louder noises for fear of passing out or being slapped or punched by his father, a drunken mess far beyond repair but not with alcohol, for this anthro-man is beyond heavy drinking. His inebriation is way more severe, more potent, more incriminating. Harper is drunk with forlorn lust, a strange untapped passion. Is this how he'd always felt about his oldest son, though he could never manage to express his most palpable attractions for fear of his youngest son tattling on him? Max is both horrified and disgusted at his father's advances. Harper lubes him up and grabs Max's thighs, spreading them wide and propping them up against his hips. Harper chuckles softly beneath his liquored breath and licks his shepherd lips greedily, eyes frowned in a greedy sneer. Been waiting for this moment for what seems like forever, kiddo. Now hold still, daddy's gonna make this real quick. Max whimpers and squirms, praying he could be anywhere else right now. Oh, and one other thing, Max. Harper grips Maxwell, finger-paws curling tightly around the young shep-coon's neck, snarling with a gritty voice, seemingly possessed by some unforeseen demon. If you ever tell anyone about this, I'll fucking kill you and bury you right next to your retarded little faggot of a brother, do you understand? This stays our little secret, no matter what. Your bitch of a mother can never find out, nor can anyone else, ever. You comprehend? Max nods, sheds a single tear, breath hitching from tiny sobs of fear. Max's mind is distraught with afflictions of bitter resentment against his dad, worse than any form of grief he feels for his dead brother. Good boy, that's a good little bitch. Now rest easy, the pain only lasts for a little bit, but afterwards you won't even notice. Maxwell feels his dad poke against him below, a strangely painful and cruel, moist sensation. Max cried aloud, muffled by his dad's belt. Oh, Maxwell. You are as good as I always thought you'd be. Maxwell, I love you. Always have. Maxwell. Oh, Maxwell. Oh, fuck yes. You are so good to me,

(Maxwell.)

Oh, that's my good boy. Oh, that's my good boy. My dear, sweet boy. My

(Maxwell!)

How's it feel to get loved so hard, honey? How's it feel? Do you like it? I bet you do, little slut. Jordan never let me go this far with him before, so that makes you extra-special to me now. Hold still while I finish up and remember our little secret, unless you want me to strangle you to death. Do you want that, Maxwell? Hey, you hear me? You still awake? Maxwell? Max? Can you hear me? Maxwell. Maxwell. Wake up! Hey, Max! You little fucking bastard, Max! Wake up! Max! I'll fucking kill you right here and now if you don't wake the fuck up, you little prick son of a bitch! Maxwell! Hey, Max!

"MAXWELL!!!" Everett hollered at the top of his lungs, piercing the haze. Maxwell flinched and awoke from his night-terror in a flash of an instant. He glanced upon a forest. Disfigured trees loomed all around him, gnarled and dead. Moonlight glared through a large thickened copse of dead tree branches, possessing a dark and mildly eerie atmosphere. His vision was blurred and his head felt like a bag of nails ripped wide open, jostled in a child's bounce-house. He closed his eye and rubbed his eye and socket mercilessly, trying to make sense of things. The air was swampy, murky and stale. Max felt humid as a husky in Haiti. He panted and coughed, mouth drier than sandpaper, deprived of all comforts. I awaken from a goddam nightmare to this place? Jesus, talk about a bad fucking trip.

"Couldn't agree with you more there, pal." Everett said. As the shep-coon began to comprehend what in the hell happened, Max felt a dampened cloth press against his lips and he grabbed at it, sucking it dry of its moisture. Sweet, cool water. Brisk and refreshing. Thank the Gods for that much, at least. Max cleared his throat and opened his eye once more to the sight of Everett the fox-anthro, stern-faced, leaning over the shep-coon. Max turned his head and tried to move, crumpling a pile of dead leaves with his dreads. He quickly realized he'd been nestled in a bed of thickened ferns and cushioned moss, surrounded by darkened purple mushroom caps. Everett made an earnest effort to cushion his head with a nature-made pillow of sorts. Max groaned, rubbed his cheek and felt a welted bruise where the same fox who now tended to his aid had punched him earlier, in Monty's dressing room that had been. Max couldn't begin to comprehend where that building could possibly be now.

He frowned and pushed Everett away. Max hoisted himself up to his feet, feeling a brief rush of dizzying light-headedness. He maintained himself as best as he could and shockingly laughed aloud, despite all that had happened. Everett gazed at him, uncomprehendingly wondering what could possibly be funny at a time like this.

"Well, that was awesome! Thanks again for beating the crap out of me, you jerk! What happened to us? What, did that moronic night-club owner throw us out or something? Where the hell are we, anyways?" Max asked furiously, looking around for any signs of life. Everett cleared his throat and stood up with calm complacency. He brushed a small patch of dirt free from his shoulder and smirked knowingly.

"We are nowhere near the nightclub now, obviously. In fact, we're not even in your world anymore. If you could just cool your jets and relax, I can explain to you where we a-"

"Like hell! What in fuck's name happened, man?!" Max yelled, arms raised above his head, palms held up and out, a questioning gesture. "I know I'm totally stoned right now, but please tell me I only hallucinated a woman splitting in fucking half and birthing a random fucking freak, spewing forth nonsense about God-knows-what and tearing open a great big damn hole in the floor and then? Sha-blam!_Whoops! In we go! So what, did that fucker throw us into goddam heroin-tainted Oz or something? _What the HELL is going on and why the HELL are you so goddam calm about all of this?! For fuck's sake, we've been thrust into some... some hell-bent place in the middle of butt-fuck and God-Knows-Where! Jesus fucking shit-stained Christ-nipples, now what do we-"

Everett walloped Maxwell in the face with a strong and quick left-hook. The shep-coon tumbled to the ground in a daze, moaning with pain, rubbing his nose. Everett huffed and exhaled a quick sigh, creaking his neck and popping his knuckles.

"Sorry, man, but you were raving. Also you took the Lord's name in vain, something I don't entirely appreciate. If you'd gather your emotions, I can explain what happened. Where you are, where everyone else may be, what happened and what must soon commence in order to set things right." Everett sighed, rubbing his chest and looking up into a thickened copse of mangled branches. "If only Utalga didn't take my talisman, this would be so much easier. I suppose even some of the biggest challenges have their rewards hidden in store."

"Did you have to... ugh... hit me so fucking hard, you jerk?" Max said low, barely above a growl, laying upon his side. He gathered dirt and debris upon his ringed tail. "Why does it smell so weird here, anyways? Where exactly is 'here'?" Max looked up at Everett and pointed condescendingly. "You've got some gosh-darn explaining to do, mister." Max said, making a determined effort not to take the Lord's name in vain, almost slipping up.

"That's better, more respectful." Everett said, cracking a smirk. He knelt down and held his hand-paw out to Max. Maxwell sneered and reached up to Everett to be helped off the ground. Everett brushed dirt off Max's butt, back and tail. "The scent you smell right now is infection. This place isn't exactly... healthy."

"Yeah, I figured that much already, judging by how well-nourished that motherfucker was who brought us here to begin with. What's your story with him anyways? You guys have some sort of history or something?"

"You could say that." Everett mused, eyes full of recollection.

"He - or it, perhaps - seems like a very sweet creature to acquaint with." Max replied sarcastically. "I mean, it obviously adores nature." Max looked up into the trees and noticed a substantial lack of leaves... no green whatsoever. Instead there were birds, dead birds hanging from thin twine cords. Some by their necks, others by their small bristly feet; feathers, bones, twisted beaks, gouging eyes. Max reviled at the sight and cast his attention back to Everett. "Like birds. See?" Max said, pointing upward.

Everett glanced up, nodding. He fished upon the ground for something. "Help me look for a long stick, the thicker the better."

"Why? We gonna go fishing for two-headed trout or something?" Max asked with a bemused grin on his face, shrugging.

Everett regarded Max with avid annoyance.

"Okay, okay. Y'know what? Hang on, I've got this." Max winked and crouched down, hand-paw placed gently upon the cool, damp surface of the ground. He closed his one good eye and hummed quietly, low at first and gaining pitch, gradually becoming higher and higher. The ground eroded beneath where his hand-paw touched and he raised his arm upward slowly. A corona of mist protruded from the spot he touched down upon and a large wooden staff grew to fruition before Everett's very eyes. The fox watched with silent fascination as Max conjured a meter-long thick rod of oak seemingly out of thin air, orange eye-patch glowing with a purple effulgence. When he'd finished, he picked up the bark-covered stick, twirled it in the air like a color-guard student in a Veterans Day parade and held it out to Everett. The fox grabbed the large branch and tested its durability. Solid oak. Max stood firm, fists placed upon his hips.

"How do you do that, exactly?" Everett asked with pondering curiosity, swinging the large branch through the air, whipping the sound barrier.

"Not sure. I mean, I have a sneaking suspicion, but... I'll tell you later. Right now can we just get the fuck out of this forest? Its making me trip balls uncomfortably, like we're being watched." Max shivered.

"You'll feel that all over the place, and way more often than now. That's Utalga's curse, always active, always intact." Everett said matter-of-factly. Max shook his head.

"Fuck." Max said, frowning. "Fucking fuck. Here I thought it was just the drugs running their course. Or maybe I'm still high and this is all just a terrible trip I'm having?"

Everett shook his head and waved the large wooden branch to his right. "This way, shep-coon. And believe me, you aren't tripping, for I too see exactly what you see. We'll find our way out of this hell soon enough. Come, follow me."

"Lead the way, Fox Armstrong." Max said. Everett looked at him with a questioning glare. "Y'know, like Stretch Armstrong? Don't you remember those toys?" Max asked, wondering what rock Everett was born under. Everett shook his head and proceeded to walk onward, tailed by Maxwell, who snickered beneath his breath, covering his muzzle like a Japanese schoolgirl. The crazy thing was that Max had no idea what he found so funny, exactly.

~

The building was enormous. A monolith of grand proportion, even in the depths of the pitch-blackened forest they traveled through, there was no mistaking the mansion. Max noticed a single candle-lit lamp perched upon the front door's awning, complimented with a paisley-adorned glass shade. From the awning's gutter hung more animal corpses, strung up with twine. He winced at the sight and Everett poked at a dead cat with the staff, stifling a gag.

"Jeez, gross. I wonder how long they've been hung up like this." Everett asked himself, plunging the staff down into dampened soil, stepping cautiously up creaky wooden steps, leading onto the large mansion's front porch.

"Beats me, amigo, but I'd rather not stick around to ask whoever hung 'em up." Max said. He felt gooseflesh prickle up beneath his fur and stifled a massive shivering reaction.

Everett regarded Max with a sly grin. "C'mon, man. I think this place is abandoned."

"Are your senses accurate?" Max asked.

"My what?" Everett replied to Max, slightly confused.

"You know! Your senses!" Max clarified. Everett stared at him, drawing a total blank. "Ugh, okay. Look, you were able to predict my telekinesis earlier, right?" Everett nodded. "Okay, so can you detect any signs of a presence or a life-form of any kind in there?" Max pointed toward the large wooden infrastructure, a villa nestled within blackened trees and accursed spirits, surrounded by the flayed corpses of numerous animals. Ravaged carcasses of deer, foxes, birds, bears and mountain lions lay scattered in disarray with flies buzzing somnolently around the corpses, aged with dampened rot.

Everett closed his eyes, holding the staff in place before him, lightly trembling as if possessed by demons of his very own. Max watched as the ground rumbled beneath Everett's feet. The single flame from the lamp upon the building's awning flickered rapidly, sparking blue and green flames, even though Max felt no breeze. He watched in disbelief. Everett breathed fast, panicked and upset. Within twenty seconds or so, his hyperventilating subsided and the candle settled to a dull burn, flickering yellow again. Everett opened his eyes wide, looking up at the single source of light. "Not as accurate as I'd wish for, but that's the curse up to no good. I don't think we-"

"Look!" Max shrieked, looking up at a broken window. Everett's eyes followed Max's pointing finger-paw pointed and he caught a brief glimpse of a silhouetted head in the window-frame. A single relic, a life-force, staring down at the anthros, a pair of green eyes burned dim, flaring in recognition. The window cracked and the shadow disappeared just as fast as it appeared. Max and Everett exchanged a sordid glance. Somewhere nearby, a shrill cry echoed out into the woods. A bird, a groan of pain, uttered by an unforeseen entity.

"Shit... it appears as if we're not alone after all. What is this place, I wonder?" Everett asked to himself, arms crossed, deep in thought. Max brushed at a wooden sign hammered with sloppy haste into a pillar upon the porch, smothered in dead ivy. HUNTING LODGE - CONSERVE AMMO!

"Oh Christ, so we get sucked into some asshole demon's nightmare world and the first place we arrive at is a goddam hunting lodge. A fucking hunting lodge! Great! Does this mean we're the hunted and what-the-hell-ever that thing upstairs is..." Max gulped audibly, throat clicking, shoulders slumped. "...is the hunter? That's right, isn't it? Goddammit, we're fucked if you think we have to go through this Jesus goddamned fucking Christing buildi-"

Everett flicked Max's earlobe, hard. The shep-coon wailed painfully, ducking his head into the cusp of his hand-paw.

"Ow! What the fuck was that all about?" Max yelled, frowning at Everett, rubbing his tender ear.

"For taking the lord's name in vain again, you goofball. What'd I tell you about that?" Everett said with a whim of impatience.

"Seriously? Okay... I'll try to restrain myself. Sorry." Max rolled his eyes. Everett snickered.

"Good. Just don't make it a reoccurring habit, that's all." Everett asked kindly.

"You really are touchy about that, aren't you?" Max asked, smiling with a crooked brow.

"Pal, you have no idea." Everett said calmly. "But you'll find out soon enough, I suspect." Max sneered questioningly at the fox as he walked up the porch steps, approaching the large front door to the accursed building that spelled out imminent doom.

~

One knock led to two, then three. Everett turned a gnarled wooden knob and pushed the front door open. A latch fell free upon the porch, landing with a clunk. The surface of the door was splattered with blood-stains - that or a shitty half-assed paint-job. The air reeked of mildew and dampened rot with a touch of decaying cadaver. The door creaked on its hinges, squeaking abruptly. This sound coursed through the open air with a sizable echo. Not a peep from within. Dust motes floated, glinting in the dull moonlight coursing through the open doorway.

"Hello? Anyone there?" Everett spoke aloud. No response but the sound of his own voice. He looked inside, turning his head left, right and upward. He even caught a glimpse behind the door. Nothing.

Max brushed past Everett impatiently, took a deep breath and cupped his hand-paws to his muzzle. "Greetings! Avon calling! You have a telegram from the living, care to reveal yourselves?" Nothing. Everett sneered at Max, who continued. "You've won a million dollars and a lifetime supply of hookers! Care to claim your prize, fuckers?!" Dead silence greeted Max's fantasy prize. The shep-coon shrugged his shoulders and looked back at Everett. "See? Nobody. Can we get the fuck out of here now?" Everett brushed past Maxwell without acknowledging the shep-coon, taking pity upon his incredible ignorance, actively scouting out any signs of life, both past and present. "I'll take that as a no, then. Shit." Max looked back at the opened front door. He half-considered leaving on his own, then figured he wouldn't last but ten minutes in this dilapidated hell without Everett to guide him along the way. Judging by how confident the fox carried himself, he knew what the fuck was going on. Max exhaled a troubled sigh. "Fucking figures." He shut the door closed tight, drowning out the glaring moonlight. "Whatever." As the latch clicked back into place, the single lamp-flame perched upon the porch's awning flickered out, spewing forth a tiny plume of smoke.

~

"Smell anything funny?" Max asked, reeling from a pitifully rotten stench, a swampy infestation of a smell that coursed through his sinuses, making his one good eye water relentlessly.

"Other than your smelly ass? Not at all. This place is as dead as the rest of this accursed world." Everett said, brushing away overgrown weeds and animal skeletons. "Watch your step, bud."

"Oh, ha ha, haven't heard that one before, smart-ass." Max replied with sarcastic wit. Everett turned his head back and winked. Max cocked his wrist at the fox and kicked at a bundle of dirty clothing leading into the foyer. "Say, what do you suppose this is all about?"

"What?" Everett asked.

"The clothing, man. There's all this damn messy dirt-smeared clothing lying everywhere. Dirty as fuck, too. In fact..." Max crouched down and his knees popped, causing Everett to wince. "Don't worry, they sound worse than they feel. Doesn't even hurt, like popping big-ass knuckles. Ha!" Max said, smacking his knee. Everett shook his head and approached a large grand piano, tarnished with missing keys. The shep-coon reached down toward a sweatshirt, a pink long-sleeved one, big enough for a child. There was a Mickey Mouse emblem upon its front surface, a home-made iron-on. Both sleeves were darkened with maroon splotches. Max smelled a strong, cloying scent of iron and dampened pennies, sickly-sweet. He dropped the shirt and jumped up, brushing his hand-paws against his pants with disgust. "Oh my... dude, this is blood. These clothes... they're all bloody!" Max shrieked.

"I wonder how many people were led into this place throughout these many years, centuries even, with not even a remote chance of escape." Everett said, wondering to himself.

"I'd be more concerned about who - or what - never even left, if I were you." Maxwell replied promptly. Everett cast a glance back at Max, his blue and purple eyes visibly disturbed.

~

The deeper the anthros walked forth into the lodge, the stronger the scent of dry-rot became. Max tried to plug his nose with his thumb and finger-paw, to no avail - tasting that nasty wallowing air was far worse than smelling it. Everett cleared his throat and asked Max for illumination.

"What?" Max replied, gagging.

"You have an eye socket that glows, fucker, use it!" Everett said. "Give us some light, please and thank you." Everett dragged a pile of clothing free from where he stood.

"Oh, right. Okay. Here, you arrogant bastard." Max removed his eye-patch, stuffed it into his rear pocket and tensed up. Everett placed his fists against his hips and cocked his shoulder down, a pose of pure spite. Max's empty socket flickered with an inner-glow that reminded Everett of a neon lamp on the fritz, soon to burn out completely. Max groaned and grit his teeth, yelped and cocked his head rapidly to one side. This was his way of flicking an internal switch, for his eye socket poured out a fantastic ray of light like a vehicular fog-lamp in a thickened mist.

"Impressive." Everett said, nodding his head satisfactorily, head slumped, still posed in his smarmy-bitch stance.

"What? My fucking eye GLOWS in the dark, and that's all you have to say? 'Impressive'?! Holy shit, man."

"Well, would you rather us try to march our way through this place in pitch black darkness?"

Max sighed, giving Everett a tired yet predominantly virtuous look. "Touché. C'mon, let's see what the hell that thing was, spying in on us earlier." Max cleared his throat. "Yeah, as if I'd really want to know." Max said uneasily, practically answering himself. Everett chuckled softly.

~

Everett saw the heads first, paying no attention. Maxwell saw them and wailed out loud, startling Everett. They entered a large community room. In the center stood a long rectangular table with wooden chairs lined up on both sides; a fancy dining room, save for the numerous animal heads propped up on both sides of the room, adorning the walls.

"Somebody got their kicks from taxidermy, evidently." Everett insisted, speaking uneasily.

"Yeah, tell the artist they're good at scaring the shit out of guys like me." Max said, non-glowing eye opened wide, staring at the heads with horrified wonder. A pine marten fighting with a jackal in one corner of the room. The heads of bucks, elks, a large moose, bobcats, eagles, weasels and numerous canines displayed against wooden plaques, hung as trophies by greedy hunters. Max looked at numerous heads and more full-bodied taxidermy subjects: wolves, foxes, jackals, even a goddam tanuki. His heart sank at the sight of it all.

"What kind of sick shit were these psychotic fucks into, anyways?" Max asked, visibly disturbed by the massive collection of stuffed animal corpses presented, eye sockets stuffed with glass oculars, mouths pried open wide, teeth exposed, noses rigid and stiff, devoid of all moisture.

"Who's to say that anyone ever even inhabited this place? Or worse, even still do?" Everett replied, giving Max a start. "Besides, this isn't all that bad. Did you know that taxidermy is considered a religious rite in some Native tribes?" Max cleared his throat, shaking his head. "It is. You know, some ancient civilizations regard the process as a sort of mummification, a way to preserve loved ones. Egyptians, Norwegians and those from the first Chinese dynasty, for example." Everett said with an aura of teaching influence in his voice.

"Yeah, well if my family ever had me stuffed, I'd come back as a ghost and fuck with their heads as a way of extracting revenge against them for making such a shitty decision with my dead-ass body." Max said, coughing up a wad of phlegm, spitting it against a nearby wall, between two perched owls mounted upon wooden poles. "But my family is mostly dead, so there's no chance in hell of that ever happening." Max said, shrugging his shoulders. C'est la vie.

"What happened to them?" Everett asked. Max looked at the fox with clarification. "To your family, I mean."

"What fucking business is it of yours, anyways?" Max said to Everett in a perturbed fashion.

"Sorry, my bad. I didn't mean to offend you. You're right... they're none of my concern. Forget it." Everett surveyed the room silently, refusing to say another word about Maxwell's family.

~

"Well, okay. Since you asked, my dad flipped a bitch and tried to attack my mother while under the influence of heavy drugs. He got really bad after my younger brother died from a hit-and-run accident." Max recalled, interrupting the blatant wave of silence that settled over the room. All the while, he felt the dead eyes peering at him - through him.

Everett shook his head, pausing momentarily to hear Max out. "Wow, man." His eyes bore sympathy with a crease in his brow. "Sorry to hear that."

"Yeah, thanks. For what it's worth, I'm over the worst of it now though." Max said, brushing a finger-paw against the surface of the large dining table, collecting a clump of dust upon his paw-padded palm. "I think between Dad's crazy lashing out in anger and my resentment of him for having molested me as a young cub, I just... snapped." Everett's eyes opened wide in response to that avid confession. "It's kinda fucked up and stupidly funny, really. The courts all ruled my actions as self-defense. I didn't really want to shoot the man, but I did want to see him die nevertheless, somehow. Just never knew I'd be the one to drop his ass, y'know?" Everett nodded. Max chuckled with dry humor, sounding ridiculously false, even to himself. "Of course my mom was beyond anguish, so she took to heavy drug use to cope with both the losses of her husband and youngest son. When I was in a detention facility for delinquent, juvenile anthros - pre-cubs if you will - she overdosed on the same thing my dad was high on the night he tried to attack us." Max sighed. Everett saw a tiny twinkle in the corner of the shep-coon's eyelid. Of course he'd been driven to tears, reflecting upon his own sordid upbringing. Everyone breaks down after enough exposure to extreme stress. A perfectly natural reaction. Everett possessed a new-found respect for the smart-mouthed shep-coon punk.

~

Somewhere in the lodge, a door creaked open and a thudding sound echoed through its hallways. Everett froze, then loosened up and gave way to Max, urging him to keep going, to not stop. "Since then, I've been traveling far and wide, bunking with anyone who'd welcome me into their company. I thought I had it made when I met the man who I mistook as my mentor and salvation from the badness. His name was Sciorrenzo and he treated me like one of his own sons." Max said with a snarl, becoming more enraged. "That fat fuck didn't really care for me or my well-being though, he was only interested in one thing and that was his own profitable gain. He used me to brew drugs regularly and never shared any cuts with me. I was his fucking puppet, his little bitch-slave, his regular Jonesy-on-the-side. Then this happened." Max pointed at the left side of his face, regarding the corroded fur, the eye socket, the severed earlobe, the permanent scarring. "A meth lab exploded, damn-near killed me. The partner I was working with received heavy acid scarring that mangled his face permanently, very Freddy Kreuger-like in appearance. Hell, I think he might've died later on that same day. I can just barely recall paramedics saying how lucky I was to have at least part of my vision intact, since the blast was so strong that my left eye was blown right out of its socket, dangling by an optic nerve, bouncing against my cheek. Fucking crazy, right?" Everett nodded, visibly grimacing. "Of course, all that shit gave me a new and profound respect for life and the fragility of it all. I also took a clean outlook on things and met new people, cleaner people than those who I'd been hanging out with since a very young age. I was misguided, but I wanted to learn from my own mistakes, enough to benefit from them and make better life choice, better decisions to justify my future."

"Sounds like you learned a lot in a small span of time, Maxwell. More than anyone else could have ever imagined." Everett said with a modus of amazement intact.

"You can say that again, pal. So what's your story, anyways?"

Everett held his hand-paw up, silently asking Max to hold still, be quiet and no more noise.

"Huh? I said what's your sto-"

"Do you hear that, shep-coon?" Everett asked, whispering quietly, interrupting Maxwell. He shrugged, nodding his head.

"No, what gives?"

Everett's eyes grew wide, frightened and startled beyond comprehension. Max craned his neck curiously, wondering what got the fox so damn spooked.

"Get down!" Everett whispered loudly. He pulled Max down to the hardwood floor blanketed with tattered clothing. The fabrics projected swirling dust-motes. Max began to ask Everett what the fuck his problem was when a deep-throated bloodcurdling groan pierced the stale air.

~

Max twitched and averted his one good eye to the doorway from where the two anthros had entered, before Max relayed his brief past synopsis. Something entered through the same doorway, something with no legs. Even still, it had no problems with moving around. A mangled human corpse frayed together with numerous animal parts lumbering upright walked crookedly into the community room, breathing deep and raspy, gurgling out of whatever sort of a throat it had left - fleshy bits that hadn't been pecked by crows, consumed by vultures, overrun by maggots and rats. The corpse's abdomen split down the center, opened up wide. Flaps of skin and flesh hung loose, shriveled at irregularly-shaped tips. What limbs this... thing may have once had had long-since been replaced with spare animal parts; the left arm of a large dog (maybe a Saint Bernard), a skinny, lanky right arm of a Saluki, legs patched together from scraps of flesh and fur, scales and rustled feathers. The thing was a hellish abomination that would make Frankenstein weep with joy - a sloppy under-developed half-assed attempt at re-constructing a human being from numerous fragments of wild animal body parts.

And it looked extremely hungry.

Max tensed up, damn-near pissing his pants. He was on the verge of screaming aloud when Everett wrapped his large hand-paw around the shep-coon's muzzle, silencing him. Max just sighed weak and exhaled miserably. The hellish entity stumbled into the large community room where Everett and Maxwell stopped to collect themselves. As they watched its advancing strides, Everett's head began to pound. The demon was attempting to enter his mind, casting out wicked thoughts, attempting to infiltrate Everett's senses. The freaky bastard was attempting to tap into the fox's thought processes... perhaps to unveil their true location, even their deepest intentions. Maybe even to instigate murder in the first degree. First the shep-coon, then himself. A clean sweep.

"Close your eyes and don't move a fucking muscle, Max. Just think of something far away from here." Everett whispered into Max's ear, careful not to speak too harshly so as to disturb the shambling corpse near them. Max obeyed Everett's suggestion and went home, home to Brookings, home to a beautiful forest, teeming with fog-drenched rays of sunshine, eternal organic lights illuminating a broad coastal redwood forest, peppering clumps of pine and shrubbery, leaves of oak, bark strips of eucalyptus, ridges of fern, splotches of dampened moss, orb-shaped patches of mulberry - sea-scented and as natural as can be. Max got lost in his dreamscape while the demonic thing composed of numerous body parts sniffed the air, pig-nose puckering freely, issuing loud grunting and snorting as it licked the ground with a fanged kimono tongue, tasting the presence of fresh meat - canine meat. Warm and recent. Delicious.

A loud crash interrupted the creature's approach, causing it to twirl around and lunge through the door again, snarling madly... which in essence sounded more like a mad-man's chuckling laughter. For now, Max and Everett were left alone in the demented dining room, the trophy collection hall.

~

Everett opened his eyes, irises flashing candlelit reflections from the chandelier hung above their heads. He looked around, listened closely... then let go of Max's muzzle.

"I think whatever that was, it's gone... for now." Everett said softly.

"Okay... seriously. What the... fuck... fucking fuck... what the hell in fucking shit... was that?!" Max asked, trying to maintain his volume levels but slipping up ever-so-slightly. The taxidermy-frozen animal heads all seemed to look down at the two anthros, silently judging their every move. Their stone-cold peering gazes weighed down on Maxwell's sanity.

"Gosh, you have a real potty-mouth." Everett said, followed by a snicker.

"Oh, excuse me for acting out of line, especially with Franken-furry walking around out there! What in hell's name was that fucking thing, for fuck's sake?!"

"Not sure." Everett said, scoping out the doorway, hoping whatever the hell it was, that it wouldn't come strutting back into the room anytime soon.

"And what was it doing, just walking around like that? Did you hear it smelling around? Sniffing and s-s-seeking out its next meal?!" Max stuttered, scared beyond his years. His one good eye was practically beady from bulging and his socket glowed with a dark indigo hue. Everett presumed this particular shade to represent fright but refused to ask, so as not to trouble the shep-coon any further than he already was.

"It must be working with the same bastard who stole my talisman. Yanked it clean off my neck, so it did. Same with my mates... wherever they may be." Everett said, frowning.

"What, you mean that cross necklace of yours?" Max asked, remembering seeing the small ornamental charm dangling from Everett's neck in the dressing room of Monty's place, which now seemed like eons ago.

"Yeah. That walking patch-job must be working with Utalga. Why else would we have arrived here, if not to meet one of its scourge face-to... well, remains of a face?"

"Evidently." Max replied. "You think some blind, unforeseen force actually wanted us to come in here and meet up with that damn thing?" Max asked Everett, who replied with a shrug. He honestly didn't know, telepathy or no telepathy.

"That's a distinct possibility. I think I might know where it might have gone to. Come on, follow me. I'll lead us out of here."

Maxwell felt uncomfortable leaving the fate of his life to this random fox asshole, but he knew he had little to no choice, and no way in hell would he try to navigate the lodge by his lonesome.

~

Max saw it first and jolted upright, fur standing on end, polarized with a high-pitched wail. Everett flinched and pushed Max irritatingly, berating the shep-coon for startling him so heavily. When the fox also saw what Max witnessed, Everett also freaked out, heterochromiac eyes staring intently with a rictus of terror frozen upon his foxy face.

One of the larger heads, the lone moose, craned its neck toward the anthros. It swung its massive antlers through the air, brushing against the chain of the dangling chandelier, causing it to swing and sway. Shadows danced wildly in the room as Max and Everett froze in place, watching the moose head. Its fake eyes popped out of its sockets and large beetles swarmed free from its two eye-holes, chittering and squeaking. The moose's oversized jaw dropped open and spiders festered from its mouth, protruding from its oversized snout, crawling free from its nostrils. An elk head fell free from the wall facing the opposite side of the room, behind Max and Everett, startling them awake from their frozen stances. It uttered a horrible cry of anguish and used its antlers to drag itself toward the anthros, prodding at clothing to pull itself closer. Max saw one of the elk's eyes had been cracked. From the socket, small droplets of blood leaked free, weeping crimson tears. Everett looked up at the discolored space from where the elk once hung and saw a large tear in the wall. In the tear, a bundled mass of eyes and fingers moved constantly, peering out from the torn gash; living tissue and flesh covered by thin wallpaper. Fingers bent and curved, poking at blood-shot eyeballs, drawing oozing bile and milky-white ocular fluids. The animals on display were all coming alive, attempting to free themselves from their dormant states of being. The owls spun their heads around and around deliriously, crying out with high-pitched hooting that sounded tortured with pain. A line of canine heads growled and yapped, barking and snapping at each other, yellow teeth bared in snarls, beady glass eyes rolling madly.

"We need to leave this room immediately." Everett managed to say, despite his utter shock and dismay. Max remained dead-quiet, incapable of any form of response. He'd seen dead bodies twitch long after meeting their gruesome end, but this shit was way beyond anything he'd ever experienced. Everett placed his hand-paw upon Max's shoulder and the shep-coon spun around quickly, meeting Everett's eyes with polarized fright. His empty socket burnt out, becoming dark and hollow. What little light they now had was cast down from the elegant chandelier that swung in rotating circles from the community room's ceiling. A large hawk attempted to leave its perch, fluttering with obscene madness, feet tied down thoroughly to a wooden rod with metallic twine. It squawked aloud, making an abrupt scene, feathers scattering in a cloud, piling up in a cluster on the hardwood floor. Everett grabbed for a nearby ashtray and threw it at the hawk, severing its beak into fragments and ultimately shutting it up. The hawk hung free and limp from its wooden rod, wings dangling nearly to the ground below. A blood-curdling howl barreled out loud, echoing from downstairs.

"Max, that's our cue to leave, like right now. C'mon!" Everett said.

Maxwell shook his head, snapping out of a daze and grabbed for another ashtray that had been placed neatly upon the surface of the table. Max and Everett left the room in a hurry. When they re-entered back into the hallway, framed paintings jostled and shook, some coming loose from their hooks and nails, falling to the wooden floor, splintering into fragments. The taxidermy animals raised a ruckus. The community room had become a makeshift zoo, Noah's ark reflected in an abysmal undertone of madness. Max held the ashtray tight in his grip, ready to swing and clobber at whatever may jump out at him and Everett from the darkness, from a nearby room, from a shadowed corner, through the ceiling. Max kept his guard up ten-fold and followed Everett through a seemingly endless hallway, nestled in the heart of the corrupted hunting lodge. At the end of the hallway, Everett kicked down a thin door and passed through a new opening, walking into a small room with a large spiral iron-grated stairwell that led down into the main lobby space... hopefully, at least. Max hoped to all things holy it didn't lead down into the basement. The last fucking place he'd want to be in this shit-hole was trapped in its goddam creepy-ass basement.

~

Maxwell heard a chuckling sound, a youthful giggle from behind him. He turned and looked back toward the community room at the other end of the hallway and saw a young raccoon-anthro cub, standing nude, wearing a stuffed timber-wolf's head like a Halloween mask. The young fur held onto the decapitated taxidermy head, keeping both hand-paws attached to its thickened neck fur, a rugged pelt. The head toppled and fell loose from the young anthro's head and Maxwell reeled back, aghast at the sight of his young brother. Jordan held the wolf's head in one hand-paw and pointing at Maxwell with the other. Max dropped the ashtray, jaw agape, eye wide with terror.

"You made me die early, fucker! I blame you for my death! It was all your goddamned fault, you prick bastard! You raced me and outran me and I couldn't catch up since I was out of breath and I got hit by that careening asshole and you lived and I died and it's all your fucking fault, jerk-wad! Come over here and I'll kill you so we can break even, you motherfucking pussy faggot!" Jordan yelled, not sounding like his youthful self. Max could hear another voice, lower and croupy, speaking behind the sweetly elegant pre-adolescent range of his brother's voice.

"Max, this is the demon's doing. He will try to get into your head and abuse your heart by using untimely methods of provocation. Ignore its advances and carry on. Please, we must get going! My senses have pinpointed a way out, if we can only just get to it, we can-"

"Curtis." Maxwell said, absently. He averted his gaze from his brother and looked at the fox in a dead-pan stare, devoid of expression.

"Huh?" Everett responded. Max blinked his eye and nodded, as if in confirmation.

"That's not my brother down the hall... that's Curtis Deton."

"Who the fuck is Curtis Deton?" Everett asked impatiently.

"My worst nightmare." Max said simply, bearing a single smirk from one corner of his shepherd lips.

Everett glanced down the hallway and saw nothing but darkness and busted picture frames. Ceiling insulation rained down upon the hardwood floor, leaving small dusty piles of pink fodder in its wake. Electric outlets sparked and flashed brightly. An orange glow emanated from inside the community room. Smoke billowed out from the doorway opening. Apparently, the chandelier didn't stay hung from its chain for very long. That, or one of the animals bumped into it, causing a candle to fall off and make contact with aged, musky fur. A lodge fire? Oh, fucking great. What more could possibly go wrong?

"If we leave here, he can't follow. The sooner the better. Quickly, we must go now, right now!" Everett insisted, holding his hand-paw out to Max. The shep-coon gave a single querulous look back, then averted his gaze and slapped his hand-paw into Everett's grip and the two anthros proceeded to trample down the rickety, squeaky stairwell with blazing-fast speed, hoping to be free of this corrupted place and all its evil intent.

~

Maxwell's wishes didn't come true. Instead of arriving at a wide-opened lobby with large windows and a steep, arched ceiling, they walked into a dirt-smothered tunnel. Cool to the touch and musty-scented. The fucking basement. Upon exiting from the long narrow spiral-shaped stairwell, the anthros cut a path through pitch black darkness until they arrived at a large chamber, illuminated with candlelight, erected with meticulous detail. Everett was reminded of an occultist's chambers. Pews lined in two rows, facing a large black podium with a shrine erected behind it. The altar was decorated with bones - human skulls, animal jawbones, dismembered limbs of all sorts, all kinds of shapes and sizes; apprehended from numerous species that had fallen prey to the scourge of hatred present in this evil place, fallen to their doom, killed and made into decorative trinkets. In the center of the large room, a black silhouetted presence lingered. Upon staring wide-eyed for a moment's time, Maxwell's heart slithered into his throat and his knees gave out, causing him to nearly trip over himself. Max and Everett had come into contact with the most heinous nightmarish presence ever known.

Everett, meanwhile, simply watched the spider-demon closely with profound interest.

Curtis Deton gobbled up decapitated body parts, belching and smacking its ragged mouth aloud. Its eyes blinked and contracted in the dim candlelight as the split wolf's cub head gorged and consumed. Its large, black, spindly legs held its mass upright. All at once, it saw the two anthros and dropped a chunk of human thigh free from its spider mandibles. The demon laughed aloud, cackling merrily, polarizing Max's heart. Everett and Max watched as its legs shriveled up and sucked back into its body, watched as its abdomen imploded upon itself; they heard liquid squelching complimenting snapping bones and tearing flesh. Its chest mended up in a time-lapse portrayal, a large gaping hole molding together, sewing sinew and skin together like a realistic Claymation portrayal in effect. Everett held off a vomiting spell with determination as Curtis Deton transformed from its original form into a falsely identical derivative of Utalga.

~

"Everett Draven Bloodclaw! Why, to what pleasure do I owe the good graces of your pleasant company in such a place as this?" The demon asked, hovering in mid-air, rippling the walls with visible surface-waves, spewing out clouds of dust and grime. Everett's stomach quivered as he tried to prolong a massive sensation of nausea. Maxwell, meanwhile, stared in a hazy-eyed trance at the floating entity. He didn't see a paste-white demon. Max saw his father, drunk and belligerent with a fresh shotgun wound blown through his midsection. Bruised intestines and chunks of severed organs protruded in a gory mess from the fresh pellet-littered critical wound. Harper licked his chapped, bloody lips while winking sultrily at his son, beckoning him to come closer, to approach, to forget all about his troubles and frustrations, to be redeemed at last.

"Max, don't be swayed by what you may think you see. This is Utalga's meddling, forcing you to hallucinate something that really isn't there." Everett whispered at Max, visibly disturbed by the shep-coon's aghast expression, understanding with complete comprehension.

"And who is your scurvy young friend, may I ask?" The demon questioned Everett, gazing down at Maxwell through cat-slit eyes that glowed bright with greenish-orange hues, swirling radically. Its claws extended outward, scabbed skin and razor-sharp misshapen talons jutting free from both sides of its deformed hips. One of its legs twitched, then twisted mercilessly, snapping and jerking with violent aggressiveness. A single tentacle burst forth from its kneecap and slithered outward. The slimy protrusion approached Maxwell like a snake hung from a tree's limb. Upon the very tip of the tentacle, a bulging mass grew outward and opened wide, revealing a large cyclopean eyeball, round and filmy. A large eyelid slid across the ribbed surface of the tentacle. The sight reminded Max of a foreskin pulled back on an uncircumcised penis. Tiny hooks jutted free from the large eyelid and prodded into Max's flesh, drawing him closer to the eye, the all-seeing eye. "Never mind, I'll find out for myself!"

Max heard Everett yelling out at him, telling him not to look, to turn away and ignore the gaze, to fight the urge to stare. Everett's voice was muddled though; distant, soft and hazy, as if cast in an endless dream. Maxwell was absorbed into the demon relic's huge black tentacle-legged iris, the large plus-sign-shaped pupil that illuminated a broad, blinding flash of light. The shep-coon felt warmth, a tingling sensation in his limbs, numb beyond comprehension. He drifted away into a slumber and his breathing became labored, nearly non-existent. Max, much to the dismay of Everett, at last came back home.

~

Maxwell Blackburnadeaux stands upright on the old home's front porch, watching his father slap and punch his mother, fueled with drug-induced rage. His emotions run wild, comprehending what's happening, realizing that he's a direct and literal witness to a horrific display of parental abuse, domestic abuse, spousal abuse; physical abuse. Always the fucking abuse. Harper is slugging Suzanne square in her face, her beautiful raccoon woman's face, the face that sang Max and Jordan to sleep every night, that leaned in to kiss their cheeks before leaving for school, who cradled them in her loving arms when they fell and hurt themselves, the face the boys abided in when they didn't easily understand or comprehend the big, scary outside world. All that love and compassion, only to witness his father, his dearly devoted dad, beating the living breathing fuck out of his mom. Are they arguing over Jordan again? Maybe this time, the circumstances are a bit different. Whatever the case, Max isn't going to stand for this ridiculing behavior any longer. Fuck his father, fuck his brutal disciplining. Max certainly doesn't want to mop his mom's blood off the floor or see his dad get shot in the back by cops trying to apprehend him. Max smells a sharp pang of amphetamines from the home behind him and understands all too well. The way Harper is shivering and screaming at the top of his lungs, Max wouldn't be surprised to see a bit of PCP laced into the shepherd-man's speed. Angel dust blues, indeed. Max screams at his parent, screams at the top of his lungs. Why do you motherfuckers argue so much?! Please be quiet and stop! I'm so fucking sick of this shit, of hearing and seeing you hate each other so much, why can't we be like we were before?! Suzanne weeps tears soaked with blood, rubbing her palm against her lip, caressing the bruises. Harper stands upright, leaning back to allow his back to pop and creak. You. Stay out of it, pup. This is between me and your fucking cunt of a mother. Harper says, slugging Suzanne in her gut, causing Max's mom to fall to the grassy knoll of their front lawn in a wheezing daze. Dad, stop it!! Motherfucker, I said stay out of it. You don't know what you're doing though! You'll kill her, dad! Please! Yeah, at least she'd be reacquainted with the little pipsqueak motherfucker, wouldn't she? I bet she'd love that, then we can have all the time in the world to get better-acquainted with each other. Suzanne peeks up from the ground, face buried in blades of grass, attempting to comprehend what Harper is saying. Max feels a burrowing pit of burning-hot rage sweltering in his chest, forcing his heart to throb relentlessly. Max stomps back into the house and proceeds directly into his parent's bedroom. Come back when I'm talking to you, little fucking faggot! Don't goddamn do anything fucking stupid, you little cocksucker! Maxwell pries open his parent's bedroom closet door, slamming the knob against the wall, forming a large dent in the drywall. He reaches up and pulls down numerous knick-knacks and trinkets, collectibles throughout a multitude of years. Some good, most bad. Max finally reaches what he'd gone for initially. He pulls it down and cocks its pump, holding onto its onyx-blackened shaft, loading a single fresh round into its chamber. Max holds the shotgun against the nook of his shoulder and storms back outside. Harper sees Max brandishing his favorite weapon and his eyes widen deliriously. No doubt, dad is fucking furious to see his own son threaten him with a gun. Then again, what does Harper expect, beating his son's mother within an inch of her own life? Suzanne is on the ground, recuperating slowly, regaining her breath, coughing up blood and puke, hair dragging in the moisture of the grass-blades. You will put that fucking thing down right now and apologize for even thinking about picking it up. Max's eyes remain cold, distant and icy as stone. Max stares into Harper's eyes, dawning realization creeping up in concurrent strides. Harper's teeth are grating and his eyes are jittery, unfocused, hell-bent on beating Max's goddamned motherfucking face to a bloody pulp. Suzanne beckons to Max to put the gun down, please put the gun down, please don't do anything stupid honey, please God no. Devoid of neighbors, the Blackburnadeaux family home, reclusive as ever, is boiling with fiery tensions. Harper laughs aloud to break the silence in half. I always knew you were a fucking punk bastard. You aren't my son. Not my real son. Not when you pull this pussy-ass shit. If you wanna prove yourself, come over here and face me like a real man. No guns needed. Max trembles but remains still, keeping the shotgun aimed at Harper's chest. Max's face is firm and unflinching, yet a single tear leaks free from his left eye. Well, at least you don't have a problem licking my cock, don't you, little bitch? Suzanne gasps and stares at Max with uncomprehending eyes, one battered and bloody from repetitive punching and bruised with a swollen socket. What is he saying, Maxwell? Oh, sure! Go on! Tell her what we do in the comforts of privacy, Max! I'm sure mommy would love to know how daddy fucks you like a filthy little cunt-whore every goddamned fucking chance he gets, wouldn't she. I bet mommy would just love to get in on that action, wouldn't she? You aren't a real man, fucking little bitch. Any real man would've pulled that fucking trigger minutes ago. You just can't face reality, can you? Dad? What?! Maxwell sobs and sobs. I love you. Like hell you do, little motherfucker! Harper runs toward Max, ready to charge him, ready to punch his teeth out, ready to strangle his oldest son to death. Max wastes no time. He pulls the trigger. A fantastic burst of blinding white light flickers from the business-end of the shotgun's barrel. Pellets rip and carve a massive hole into Harper's mid-section, ejecting his guts and a few organs and chunks of shattered bone and rib from his back. The shepherd man hitches, cocks his head crookedly to one side, and utters a nightmarish gargle. He slumps down to the ground, falling into a pile of his own torn intestines. Suzanne wails and screams, crawling over to her husband's crumpled corpse, bleeding profusely. Steam rises from the fresh gouging wound in the chill of the night's frigid air. Max holds the gun upright a moment longer, breathing fast, panting, hyperventilating. A smell of gunpowder emanates within his nostrils, triggering him to sneeze, but he stifles it. He can't feel his face. Max's entire body has grown numb and unresponsive. He always wanted to shut his stupid fucking father up but he never imagined he'd have to kill the perverted bastard in order to do it. Now that he had done just that, he watched his mother cradle and rock against Harper's body, holding one of his stiffened hand-paws in her grasp, spewing forth tears, weeping her heart and soul out onto the ground beneath where they now both lie, one dead and the other wishing for death. Max finally drops the gun to the porch and plops down on his butt, bending his legs up to his chest, wrapping his arms around his shins and cradling his muzzle between his knees, ringed tail curled up against his waist. He's dead. My God, I killed him. I didn't even mean to kill him, but I did. He was coming right at me. He would've probably killed me first, had I not reacted when I did. No.

(No! Let go of him, you bitch!)

No. This isn't happening. This can't be happening. This isn't happening. I want to die. I want to kill mom and myself. Then we can all be reunited. I don't want to live anymore, so fucking tired of all this misery, so fucking sick of it all. Dad, you bastard. How could you? Why? No. God help me.

(I said let fucking GO!)

Dad, he came right at me. Self-defense. That's what they'll call it. Self-defense. I love you, dad. I'm so sorry I had to do what I did, but if I didn't, you'd have done the same to me or mom, maybe even worse. No, this isn't happening. Can't possibly be happening. Now what's going to happen to me? I couldn't have fucking killed him. I'm gonna puke. Fuck no. No. N-

Maxwell fell to the ground of the hunting lodge's basement, spitting up a plume of dust. Everett's hand-paws wrapped tightly around the neck of the demonic entity, the first thing Max noticed upon re-awakening back into the land of the living. His distant memory stirred, choked up, knowing damn-well that whatever had happened, that fucking tentacle triggered the traumatic moment he'd locked away for so long. The thing absorbed his deepest thoughts and worst memories of Max's life. It had revised his deepest fears with vivid clarity.

"Let go of him!" Everett growled, struggling and clamping down tightly around the demon's flabby loose skin, pulled taut, hideously gangrenous. As it jerked and yanked the fox clear off its back, Everett flung to the ground with his talisman within his grasp, chain tailing from his hand-paw deftly. The demon screeched and yowled insanely like a traumatized child would after witnessing its own parents devoured before its very eyes by rabid hyenas. A flash of light and a pulsating rush of hot air flowed through the cavernous chambers, knocking Max to his knees. He reached up to his neck and rubbed at a sensitive spot, feeling raped of mind and body. When his finger-paw returned to his vision, he saw that he was bleeding profusely. Whatever that bastard's leg-tentacle did to him, it also dug its talons rather deeply into his neck, severing his jugular perhaps, judging by all the damn blood. Max blacked out and the world faded to grey as he fainted in a dead heap, falling to the ground like a limp corpse. Everett yelled aloud to get Max's attention, to no avail. The demonic entity shivered and broke in half, exposing a teeming range of guts and muscular sinew, shifting and squirming relentlessly, coated in maggots and beetles. Eight spindly legs protruded from this fleshy pulped mass, snapping and jerking with lethal strides. Everett slipped his cross-chained necklace upon his head, slid it past his ears and let it fall around his neck. When the cross touched his breastplate, his eyes blazed with a righteous inner-glow that could wreak hell asunder for a millennia. He snarled and screamed aloud, light protruding from his gaping maw. As he knelt down into a fetal crouch, resting upon his knees, the demon assumed the form of Curtis Deton once more, this time skittering towards Maxwell. It reached down and hoisted the shep-coon, limp and unconscious, up into one of its tenebrous hairy arms, snickering deviously, filmy white drool leaking from its horrid mandibles, two split ends of a decapitated wolf cub's skull smiling with avid excitement.

"HEY GORGEOUS!" A voice cried out from behind the spider-demon. It froze in place and one large eye sprouted open from its abdomen, possessing a plus-shaped pupil, light hazel in color. It saw a fox anthro with rippling muscles holding a fairly large katana blade up in defense, the sharpened tip of the sword pointing directly at the demonic oculus. "Put him down before I ruin your day."

Deton laughed aloud, swaying and jittering. Max's limbs swung along with its movements.

"Oh, you precious little queer! I think you'll make a wonderful chaser, after I'm finished devouring this grimy little shit-stain of a shep-coon, that is! Stay your approach, for soon I shall feast upon that body of yours and savor the taste!"

"You leave me no fucking choice." Everett whispered. He tapped his forehead, chest and both shoulders.

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee; blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of death. Amen.

Everett leaped into the air and twirled toward the spider-demon, front-flipping with ease. When he was on the verge of landing, he swung the blade downward and cut the large abdomen-eyeball asunder. It split easily in two, like a knife plunged through a bowl of Jell-O. Acidic yellow bile spurted free from the wound, leaking to the ground, sizzling upon contact. The katana flashed a righteous and holy beam of light from within the bastard's belly and as Everett landed his flip, he pried the blade downward, through its abdomen. Curtis Deton screeched aloud and threw Max's body aside. Everett saw the shep-coon land against a nearby pew from the corner of his vision, for his focus was entirely set upon the ugly bitch in front of him. The spider-thing spun around with extreme haste and charged toward Everett, teeth gnashing wildly, black eyes bulging and jittering. Everett jumped upon its head and carved away, chopping off one side of its head, penetrating eye after eye, spewing forth runny yellow bile by intrepid bucket-loads. The demon screamed and screamed, practically weeping with pain and hatred, a sound that would scare anyone stiff, had Everett not been in a demi-god state of being, immortal once again, thanks to his returned talisman. His cross dangled and swung with ruthless persistency as the fox carved a number of holes into the demonic entity's body. When Everett stepped fast and prepared to swing down and deliver the final blow, the wolf cub's head reformed and lashed out at him, ready to bite the fox's face clean off. Everett's talisman sparked and a ray of light shot forth, penetrating the head. The holy force of the blast caused the wolf-cub's muzzle to disintegrate, rather than explode. As the head snapped back, it fell limp, along with the spider-demon's body. Its body twitched relentlessly and the wolf cub yelped and screeched aloud as the spider's body writhed and crumpled into a pile of dust and ash. Everett landed softly on his own two paws, barely audible, touching down into the dirt. The demon was now half-spider. It craned its pale, ivory head upward and made direct eye contact with Everett. The fox saw that one of its own eyes were severed, punctured and leaking a gelatinous fluid free from its socket.

"You shall never reach Utalga. You shall remain trapped in his accursed domain until you either wind up dead or insane. You and your... cohort... shall suffer... the worst fate... imaginable."

Everett said nothing. He spun the blade into the air and knelt down to deliver the final blow, decapitating the demon. As its head plopped from its wretched body down to the ground, it too began to sizzle and diminish, evaporating into thin air, leaving behind only a small puddle of some ungodly fluid in the dirt.

When at last it had evaporated completely, Everett sheathed his blade and ran towards Maxwell, who was now waking up, though extremely weakened.

"Is it dead?" Max asked, voice slurred, neck chapped with dried blood.

Everett nodded. "Yes, I made sure of it."

"Far out, dude." Max nodded out again, falling limp. Everett reacted upon pure instinct and hoisted the shep-coon onto his broad shoulders, lifting him up from the wooden pew he lay against. He carried Max towards the long, narrow hallway that led back to the stairwell. Before he left the cavern behind for good, a single gust of wind blew through its depths, extinguishing every lit candle, snuffing out all sources of damnation. The walls were cobblestone once more, for Max's feeble, troubled mind had merely envisioned a ghastly flesh temple strewn with body parts of numerous victims.

Everett, however, knew better.

~

When they'd arrived back into the hunting lodge's wide open lobby, the morning sun gave way to the blackness, cutting rays of light through the canopy, illuminating the tattered roof, pouring fresh warmth through the lodge's dirty, grime-smothered windows. Everett placed Maxwell down on the firm, robust surface of a sofa and closely inspected the puncture wounds on the shep-coon's neck. Luckily they weren't far too deep, but still posed a problem if not tended to immediately. Everett could compress the wounds with a cold cloth and enough applied pressure to prevent further blood loss, but he was incapable of providing ointment of any kind. Max seemed to hear Everett's thoughts, for the shep-coon awakened slightly and looked down to the carpeted floor beneath where he lay sprawled and dormant. He reached down and touched the ground once and a small bunch of thin, spindly leaves grew with amazing speed before Everett's very eyes. The leaves were thick and spotted with tiny ridges of thorns jutting from their edges. Aloe. Max used his powers to create a sprig of aloe. Everett grabbed for a leaf, tore it free and scooped out a pulpy mass of flesh. As he dabbed it into Max's neck wounds, the shep-coon flinched and groaned painfully, but kept his one good eye opened and fixated upon the fox's face, staring with consent. Everett saw betrayed innocence and emotional conflict in that one single eye, enough to break his heart into pieces. After the leaf had been expunged of its contents, all of Max's wounds treated, the shep-coon raised his hand-paw upwards and caressed Everett's cheek.

"Thank you." Max said admiringly.

"Of course. It's the least I could do for you." Everett replied.

"Tell me about yourself." Max asked him. "You were about to, until Franken-furry cut us off. You can talk now without facing any further interruption. Tell me about yourself, I wish to know."

"Well, it's a bit sordid."

"Oh, and my story wasn't?" Max said. Everett flinched uneasily. "Come on, man. Your secrets are safe with me. I want to know more about you. Please." Max grabbed Everett's hand-paw, calmly embracing it. "Please tell me."

"Okay." Everett sat cross-legged on the floor beside the sofa, inhaling deep, preparing himself mentally.

~

"Much of what I tell you may seem unlikely, maybe even impossible, but I can assure you that it's true. Every word of it. So, then. I was born precisely eleven years after the Lord Jesus Christ, but on a sister-planet, another earth, located in a different sector of our galaxy."

"Oh, here we go." Max said with a breath of raw sarcasm, rolling his one good eye.

"Will you hear my story or not?" Everett asked Max impatiently. Max nodded, silently apologetic. Everett nodded and cleared his throat. "So like I was saying, I was born in eleven A.D., born into a royal family. My family consisted of a father, mother and five other siblings. An older brother and sister, two younger twin brothers and a beautiful baby sister. I shared nothing but love and admiration for my family, couldn't have asked for a better one to be born into. Along with my family, we also had a group of twelve appointed elder guardians, gentlefurs who were charged with the responsibility of upholding the law and virtue of my family heritage and our home, a place called Vulpesaria. It was a marvelous home for a strapping young fox-lad like me, truly. I made many friends there, also a few enemies." Everett chuckled to himself fondly, regarding memories of better times passed and savored. Max paid strict attention, listening to Everett with determination. "It wasn't until the night following my twenty-second birthday, an accursed night to end all other evenings, that Utalga came into the picture of my life and my world. Born as an immortal, I can recall leagues of memories. This one was the worst for me though, personally. Two of the twelve elder guardians were swayed by Utalga's influence and they turned against both my family and the entire kingdom. Vulpesaria as I knew it fell, crumbled at its core foundation, taking almost everything I've known and loved along with it."

"Holy fuck." Maxwell said, grimacing with pain at the severity of Everett's sad story, letting the fox continue without further interruption.

"My home was destroyed and most of my family were killed, snuffed outright. Mom, dad, my twin brothers and baby sister, all fell under the blade. I felt lost, beside myself, incapable of going on. I cursed my immortality, condemning it as a form of heinous damnation, a cruel joke laid upon me by those who reside upon high. Of course, grief and denial can cause anyone to say a wide range of absurd nonsense, for I knew in my heart and mind that there was but one true God, one alpha and omega, one deity that reigned supreme. I finally came around and devoted my life to the pursuit of justice in His name. As a result, He honored my devotion, chose me to become the second savior of the galaxy entire and preserved my devotion by encapsulating my beliefs and righteous splendor into this talisman." Everett grabbed the cross emblem that hung around his neck, holding it up to Maxwell proudly. "I wasn't the only one either. There were roughly seventy others, including our elder guardians, who sought out in an effort to bring justice and peace to existence. Others just like me: anthro, human, alien, all sorts of inter-galactic beings, all of whom were chosen to fight the forces of evil that pervade our galaxy in the hopes that we as a whole can live to see the dawn of peace, at long last."

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but does that make you some sort of holy entity? A righteous right-hand knight of God, fighting to preserve our very existence?" Max asked Everett. When the fox nodded simply, Max scoffed. "Holy hell, cool story, bro. I think I may need another hit of weed pretty soon, since I've obviously haven't had enough to listen to your story."

"Don't mock me! Don't contradict my past and my present state of being!" Everett shouted aloud. Max flinched away from him. "You know all about loss, don't you? You know all there is to know about loss since you've been directly exposed to it, much like I have."

"Well, duh. No shit, Sherlock. What the fuck does that matter to you, anyways?" Max hollered back, struggling to catch a breath, still winded from his wounds.

"What you don't yet realize is that I too have endured another form of loss. Not just family, either. No, not quite. I had..." Everett sniffled deep, lower lip trembling. Max reviled with shock at the sight of seeing the fox began to cry. "I had a lover once, years, even decades ago. A mortal lover. He was beautiful. I was extremely gifted to have courted his affections. We were inseparable, he and I. Do you know what happened?" Everett asked Maxwell, stifling back tears of pain. Max shook his head, face stern and frowning with concern. "He was mortal, that's what happened. He wound up living to a very old age. He..." Everett craned his head and wept bitter tears, then he drew in another deep breath and sat upright, staring directly into Max's one good eye, vision blurry with tears. "He died. Peacefully. In my arms. I comforted him until he became cold as ice, frigid, a mere corpse. I held him in my arms and kissed his graying fox muzzle as he looked up at me, breathing his last dying breaths, never looking away from my own eyes. I loved him dearly as he loved me and the cruel fate of mortality... stole him from me. I could've granted immortality to him as well, but such abuse of my powers is strictly forbidden by the one true God, most unfortunately. Fucking tragic. A cruel, despicable joke." Everett broke down and began to cry pitifully, hitching his breath and trembling with anguish. Maxwell sat up and placed his hand-paw upon the fox's back to comfort him.

"Everett... I... I'm sorry... I didn't know..." Max whispered, feeling a lump forming in his own throat.

Everett reached up, grabbed Max's wrist and yanked it back down to the sofa. "His name was Renard and not a day goes by that I don't think of him, of his loving embrace, of his natural beauty and handsome charm. I loved Renard like no other, Maxwell. Truly I did."

Max nodded, further consoling Everett's shivering body, propped up against the sofa, knelt down even still. Tiny dust motes swirled and swayed in orbital patterns, suspended above the anthros, illuminated by beaming rays of sunlight cutting through numerous gaping holes in the lodge's roof. Everett breathed deep, sniffing back further tears. When he raised his head, his face possessed a profound look of excitement. Max raised his eyebrows in response.

"Another thing while we're on the subject of my own past and history, shep-coon. My older siblings, they survived the onslaught attack, along with the remaining elders, the other ten. They've all traveled near and far, across the galaxies, seeking out the two wretched traitors of Vulpesaria and Utalga itself, fighting hard to sway the forces of evil that live to threaten the galaxy as we know it. I have no clue where they may be today, or even if they're still existent. Even now, I'd say it's been roughly twenty-five years since I've last seen them. They probably often separate from the group when they feel the compelling need to, but my heart tells me that they remain true to the cause, still traveling with the immortals and the elder guardians, the ones who weren't swayed by Utalga's bidding. I do wish to find out soon though, one day, before the world capsized upon itself and Utalga swallows us all whole. I'd rather die before seeing that ever happen, if God wills it. And that, Maxwell, is my story."

~

Max attempted to sit up and Everett kept him down, pressing a hand-paw against his chest, insistent that he remain calm and relaxed, especially after all he'd been through. The fox sniffed deep and wiped at his cheeks, drying them of his liquid emotions. Max simply brushed the hand-paw away and struggled to reach upward towards Everett's head. Everett leaned down and came close to Max's face, expecting the shep-coon to whisper a something into his ear, a word of comfort, a sympathetic apology or perhaps to issue a quick bout of prayer. What he didn't see coming was Max's quick kiss to his cheek. When he caught a better glimpse, he noticed that Maxwell was dutifully aroused, judging by the sizable bulge in his pants, now ripped at the knees and dampened with earthen moisture. Without a single word uttered, save for the remarkable scope of silence present between the two anthros, Everett lowered his head closer to Max's muzzle and retuned the kiss with one of his own upon Max's snout. Maxwell reacted immediately and reached up to wrap his arms around Everett's neck, pulling him close, locking muzzles together in a luscious, fiery-hot, passionate kiss. Way more than a mere smooch to the cheek this time. Everett's tongue swirled and slid against Max's tongue relentlessly. Max's hand-paws dragged across Everett's back, against his neck, across his broad shoulders and down his chest. Everett reached to his pants and unbuckled them, removing them quickly, exposing himself to the shep-coon in mid-kiss. When their muzzles parted, Max looked with dubious desire into Everett's face, then averted his attention down to the fox's groin. He reached over and grabbed Everett's hips, pulling him close. Everett didn't show any form of struggle or resistance. Maxwell poked at Everett's sheath with his nose and began to sniff it, lick at it, press against it. Everett moaned softly and reached down to caress Max's belly, dragging his hand-paw down Max's abs, past his navel, below his waistline and beneath his ruined pants. When Max had finally revealed Everett's fox-girth, he sucked with greed and lust, unaware of the world around him, only that the fox had saved his life more than once, saved him time and time again. Max intended to repay the favor somehow. Everett moaned and gasped, lavishing the rigidity of Max's mouth, the firm texture of his lips and the bristly moist softness of his tongue rubbing against Everett's veiny shaft. Max in turn drowned in the fox's deeply potent musk, his seeking hand-paw fondling at Max's junk, stiff as a metal rod buried in snow. Max unbuckled his pants with one hand-paw while his other caressed and cupped Everett's testicles, rubbing and massaging the sperm-filled orbs, providing further arousal, enough to force a tiny hint of pre-cum down Max's throat. Max kicked off his jeans and spat Everett's cock free from his hungry maw. The shep-coon sat up and perched his butt down upon the edge of the large piece of furniture, spreading his legs, beckoning Everett to come close to him, to help him forget all about the evil that had transpired just below where they now joined together, where they made sparks fly and hearts beat sporadically. Everett knelt down and pressed his cold wet nose against Max's taint, proceeding to rim with definitiveness. Max moaned and shivered, tickled by Everett's whiskers, triggered into a state of sustained pleasure by his tongue lashing deep within his sphincter, prodding teasingly at his prostate, begging for a cum-shot. Before Max incited the urge to jizz upon his chest, Everett removed his muzzle from between Max's thighs and sat upright, pressing against Max's puckered tailhole, preparing for a full-on penetration.

"Everett?" Max said calmly.

"Yeah?" Everett replied with equal tranquility.

"Thank you."

"No, Max." Everett said as he pushed himself into Max's anus, shoving his girth balls-deep, knot and all, into the shep-coon's internal orifice. "I should be the one thanking you."

"Is this wrong of us? Are we committing... adultery?"

"Yes... and no. We're cleansing the damnation from this unholy place. Purifying it, if you will. I don't intend to tell my mates about this, if you don't intend to share what we are about to engage in with anyone else."

"I won't tell a soul."

"Swear it." Everett said, clenching Max's muzzle tight again, staring into his one good eye ferociously. "Swear to me you won't ever tell anyone about what went on here today." Everett loosened his grip from Max's muzzle.

"I swear upon the graves of my family."

"And the Lord shall forgive you of your trespasses, my son." Everett tapped Max's forehead, chest and his two shoulders. "In the name of the father, the son and of the holy spirit. Amen."

Everett nodded, humped and thrust himself into Max with splendidly rough aggressiveness and blazing-fast speed, causing Max to holler aloud, to bark and yelp, to gasp and pant and moan with excited pleasure. Everett dragged his hand-paw up Max's chest, rubbing his abs, his pectorals and his shoulder. Max's legs locked tightly around Everett's back-side, ankles tethered under his tail. Before the two anthros shared a blissful bout of sheer orgasm, Max clamped his grip down upon the edges of the sofa and forced a myriad of greenery to blossom and bloom with incredible vibrancy.

As Everett tensed up and ejaculated deep into Maxwell's tight shep-coon asshole, he looked upward at a dense forest, teeming with vines of ivy and thickened bunches of ferns. The fox averted his bright, glowing eyes to the floor and realized that they were surrounded by hundreds of flowers buried among leaves of oak and blades of lush green grass: flowers of gardenia and hibiscus and carnations and roses and tulips and bellflowers and black locusts and cockscombs and gladiolus and lilacs and more, colors swirling and blending together, all blossomed, all fresh and fragrant, spreading light and love into a place that had long-since forgotten such virtues. The love that Max and Everett made helped usher life and spirituality back into a forbidden place of evil, a house of demons and hatred, of death and carnage. In the dining hall, the taxidermy-heads and bodies all trembled and fell silent, the demons residing within their husked carcasses dying off one by one. The walls assumed their true form, cement and drywall plaster, no more flesh and bone. Everett hollered aloud and sprouted angelic wings from his shoulder blades, transparent and beautiful, fluid and vibrant, possessing a million, trillion different colors, swirling and shifting and blending with active energetic intensity. Max gazed upon Everett's holy angelic wings with awestruck amazement and pure wonder. As he ejaculated, his semen squirted in ropes upon Everett's chest. Upon initial contact, a small cherry blossom bloomed and flourished from beneath Everett's fur. Everett rubbed at Max's punctured wounds and they healed miraculously, quickly, like magic. Max looked back up into Everett's face and wept a single tear of joy. The anthros made eye contact, winded from sex yet dually satisfied in the climactic aftermath of their shared orgasms. Without a single word uttered, Max craned his head up and kissed Everett on his lower lip, tail swaying between the fox's legs, grinning with a sultry edge in his one good eye. The scent of wildflowers and arousal intermingled as one and wooed Everett into oblivious bliss, even as he remained knotted inside Maxwell. His wings dissipated into thin air, uttering a single angelic cry of grace, barely audible.

~

After they found fresh clothing from an abandoned dresser in one of the lodge's many guest rooms, Everett lit a single sprig of sage and lemongrass, waving them in the air, eyes closed and humming to himself. Maxwell watched the fox with keen interest, until he saw a large chunk of the lobby's nearby wall break away in front of the lodge beside the front door, crumbling into a torrential pile of debris. Sunlight glared through in a vast beam of brightness that illuminated a million swirling dust-motes, reflecting color from the flowers that blossomed upon the floor.

"The great Deity hath spoken, thy will be served. We must exit this foul place of abandon... through that path." Everett said, pointing to the fresh hole in the wall.

"Sure thing, dude. I'd rather not stay in this shit-hole another moment longer."

"Yes, I hear you. But you gotta admit..." Everett said, regarding the beauty and splendor of Max's quintessential flora-flourishing touch-ups. "This place sure looks much better."

"Yeah, and it smells nicer too. Almost like your big fat dick." Max said, winking with his tongue jutting freely from his lips in a snarky grin.

"If you insist, perv." Everett said, preceded by a light-hearted chuckle. He cleared his throat and proceeded to straighten upright, becoming very serious in his demeanor. "I can now grant us a way out of this place."

"Yeah, I saw it. That new doorway. Let's go before anything else tries to come at u-"

"No, not just that. I mean out of this world, this entire environment. We can find our way back into Monty's place, in our own being, not in this possessed hell-hole that Utalga established to get at us. Mainly, at you."

Max looked at Everett with an awestruck eye. "How the fuck do you propose to do that?"

"I'll show you. Follow me." Everett said calmly.

~

As the anthros crested a nearby hilltop that rolled free from the demonic hunting lodge, Max witnessed the forest in daylight and realized they weren't just in any typical forest - this place was a fucking jungle. An extraterrestrial haven of absurd flora and fauna, unlike anything humanity had ever been exposed to. Max hoped to all the Gods that this place remain separate from human inquiry, lest it become another run-down tourist trap, suggesting the evil relics didn't make a banquet out of those brave enough to attempt to inhabit this place.

"Are you ready, then?" Everett asked Maxwell, wrapping a meaty arm around the shep-coon's shoulders, bracing him down tightly against the fox's body.

"You bet I am. C'mon, let's go get reunited with our band-mates." Max said with swift determination. Everett smirked at the shep-coon's will and wondered why he'd ever felt any sort of resentment against the scurvy little prick.

"Okay. Close your eyes and hang on tight." Everett instructed Max. The shep-coon obeyed well enough, grasping hold of Everett's waist and hanging on for dear life. Everett grabbed his cross-shaped talisman and whispered softly, prayers from another realm of existence. Soon enough the world around them blinked out of existence and Max and Everett were surrounded by a warm, white light that lasted an eternity, free of the scents of pine and cedar, free of the sweltering heat, free of the lingering sense of dread that weighed down upon their souls.

Maxwell hoped with all his might that he'd be able to reach his band-mates and touring manager before their fates came crashing down upon themselves far too soon.

Everett hoped they still had a chance to save the lives of everyone else before Utalga's demonic offspring could consume them whole, alive and screaming.

END