Remarkably, you arise unscathed.

Well, perhaps unscathed is improper terminology- your leg is a bloody disaster and your wing radiates in a dull throb, but despite your clumsy footing you have no new injuries to boast. Indeed, if anything it seems you have injured it - a thought which, though upsetting, ignites in you some new degree of stupidity.

You are distantly aware of Lucius, of the way he has attacked the beast from the very first, taking talons to the stallion who he must (you assume) very much love. And with the limited mental capacity of your terrified mind, you think, hey, maybe he has the right idea. Maybe I just have to shake Mesec out of it, and he'll be okay.

It may not be the best idea, but it's the only one you have. You cannot run away from the beast, not with your leg in its current state. You cannot fly- something you regret on a constant basis, but never more than right now. You cannot talk him down- you have already tried that, and, well, we all know how successfully that ended.

With Mesec, your friend, trying to kill you.

But he hasn't killed you, not yet, even though you know he could've- could've easily torn into your viscera with wicked teeth, could've torn off your wing and bitten into your flesh. He could easily have stomped all the light from your sunbeam eyes, if he really wanted to. But he didn't - he didn't do any of those things, and so you begin to hope, because hope is your cancer, your disease, your drug: you cannot shake it, cannot be cured, and sooner or later, it will be the death of you.

Sooner, if you carry on like this.

You leap away from the beast as soon as you rise, narrowly avoiding the swipe of massive claws (another sign Mesec's in there! you think), and run, darting out ahead of the monster, the pain in your left fore igniting a network of protesting neurons, the ache of your wing dulled beneath the adrenaline rush that keeps you moving. You do not run far - you can't, and you know it - but rather sprint some four or five strides before darting to the left and pulling to an abrupt stop. Your ears spin backwards and you wince in pain, though your hind legs and right fore take the brunt of the impact. You count on your small stature and speed to save you- ideally, the large, lumbering beast will be taken by surprise. He will not stop, at least not immediately, and you will wind up behind him.

That's the plan, anyway.

You are not still for long. Though you throw yourself alongside a tree, this is not an attempt to hide. This is an attempt to surprise, to scare the monster out of Mesec, the same way your Ma once told you hiccups could be scared out of your throat (it didn't work, but you opt to forget that detail (and, fuck, now you're sad again)). You bunch up tight before bounding forward and right, toward where you think Mesec the beast might be. Ideally, your strong, muscular rotator cuff will collide with his left something (hip? Side? What do weird demon wolf things who used to be your friends even have, anatomy-wise?), and the impact will be enough to wake him up and put an end to this whole affair.

Or, you know, he'll move faster than you and you'll crash into a grinning mouth full of jagged teeth. If this happens, you do not have a contingency plan. You are not a military tactician. Hell, until this moment, you have never even been in a fight. You are just a boy, lost, confused, and very much afraid, trying to save your friend from himself before he manages to murder you.

[2/??, 645 words]