Mal leaps away from the group, her front paws landing on a raised boulder to give her some height, then lifting her muzzle, she lets out a commanding howl.
In the distance and all around, the sound of rogues yelping in response rises through the forest.
Does this mean ... could it ... do we stand a chance?
Jasper nudges me again, his head nuzzling into my neck.
“Ask how many of them there are,”he says.
“Agatha, do you know how many rogues are with you?”
She pads back and forth a little like she’s thinking. “Well, we didn’t count ’em. We just took along everybody who answered the call. But if I had to guess, I’d say around five thousand.”
Five thousand! That puts us nearly equal with Walter ... maybe. I let Jasper know.
Mal trots back over.
“With your help there’s a chance we can win this,”I say.
“We better,”Mal says dryly.“We came all this way. And saying that, don’t you think we should go help out?”
Jasper, despite his injuries, is already scratching at the ground, ready to get back to fighting alongside his wolves.
“You’re right,”I say, nodding toward the camp for Jasper’s benefit.“Let’s go.”
The four of us take off running, heading in the direction of camp.
Jasper takes the lead, knocking Axis Pack wolves out of our way like bowling pins. Just behind me, Agatha has managed to get her pipe in her mouth and blows more of those darts with pinpoint accuracy, taking out wolves as she jogs to keep up.
At one point an Axis Pack wolf jumps into Mal’s path and I turn, ready to help her out, but she doesn’t need my assistance. She’s bigger and stronger than most of the Axis wolves and with one swipe of her claws she sends her opponent spinning.
I do my best to reach out and render as many wolves immobile as possible, though it’s hard at speed.
“Max,” Jasper says as we enter familiar territory.“We need to regroup. I need to know where our troops are so we can send help where it’s needed. Can you do a lap and let me know what you see?”
“On it!”
Like a bolt I break off from the group, sprinting faster than ever before and thanking the moon gods for my speedy legs. As I do I try to survey the forest in my mind, though it’s difficult to concentrate and run at the same time. I’d find a quiet spot to concentrate but all around me wolves are squaring off, battling fiercely. To stop now would be suicide. Luckily, I am fast enough to evade pretty much any of the enemy’s attempts to come for me. So while it’s patchy, I manage to reform the bio-map of the forest.
It doesn’t take long for me to find Salazar. His battalion is beleaguered by Axis Pack wolves, the rogues haven’t quite made it to him yet. I send out a signal to Jasper and Mal, letting them know to assist. As rogues are diverted to help, I continue on, passing more of our troops and instructing Jasper how best to reform our defenses.
At the base of a familiar waterfall, I find Omar and Aisha. From the look of things, the volunteer civilian battalion has been completely disbanded, sent to all corners of the forest by the Axis attacks. Omar and Aisha are all that’s left.
They’re standing at the base of the fall, water up to their bellies, with Axis wolves surrounding the basin of water on all sides.
I skid to a halt and reach out with my mind. Like clockwork, the Axis wolves fall, one by one, until they’re all writhing on the ground.
“Come on!”I shout, and my friends leap from the water to my side.
“Thanks, dude,”Aisha says, shaking out her sopping wet fur as we run.
“Did I hear Mal’s howl?”Omar asks, water dripping down his face, his limp less severe than before.
“Yes,”I say, smiling as much as a wolf can.“The rogues are here. We can win this.”
Buoyed by this knowledge we speed up.
The bulk of our wolves have been driven back to the campsite, so that’s where we head. By the edge of the forest Mia and Olivia are fighting back-to-back, each as fierce as the other. Olivia is strong and ruthless, her strikes are quick, and she knocks out her opponents with one fell blow. Mia on the other hand has less brute force, but she makes up for it with her lithe speed and agility. I watch in awe as she jumps from the back of one wolf to another, nipping at their necks until they’re completely discombobulated, and finally, while they’re spinning in dizzying circles, she swipes with a single claw at their throats.
