[Avery!]

I don't know why I never posted this. Avery and Echo's battle with Rannoch.

---

Her body burned hot and her jaws exhaled breath like steam. Slavery was hell, and it swam like a school of biting fish in her vessels. Slavery was hell, and it disfigured her lip on the left side, twisting and wrinkling the skin into a sneer. Slavery was hell, it was atrocious, it was unforgivable, and the fuel spilled into her like the arterial blood from Alistar's throat was set aflame by her charge... toward those that kept it happening in the world.

Avery never saw Rannoch coming; she'd actually been zoning in on the white coyote seemingly tossing out orders to the mob. If it was their leader, she would seize it up and snap its scrawny neck from the word go. But when the firebird heard the shout, so loud to the ears of the beast in battle, she seemed almost to halt in midair for a fraction of a second, head swinging wildly left, before two different males bashed into her like mallets. What's black, and red, and white all over? These three, apparently.

Scrambling to her paws, determined not to be caught on the ground, Avery snarled low and vicious when she saw it, a big old male biting deep into Echo's flesh. You didn't have to do that, she thought absurdly, and aimed teeth high, for Rannoch's face.

[Avery!]

Echo knew there would be pain, he expected it, he knew there was always a retaliation for sacrifice. But he didn’t expect it to be so forceful, so berating and violent. He grit his teeth upon the impact of the slaver male, and through those teeth was a stifled growl, along with the breath escaping his lungs. Rannoch collided with him, and in turn they collided with the Cavalier. And then with the ground. Teeth dug deep into Echos side, he could feel the teeth ripping and tearing both skin and muscle, the force of which he landed winded him and rendered him useless for a fleeting moment. Seeing both stars and blood- but it wasn’t blood- it was the Cavalier. Avery had regained her footing without hindrance and went for Rannoch, and with her charge forward- Echo turned his head while on the ground to wreck any damage he could on the slaver male.

~

He didn’t hit his intended target, but he hit something and that would have to do for now. Unfortunately it had now painted him as a target to two of these do-goodies. Luckily, one was wounded, Rannoch made sure of that, and was able to move his head out of the way of the camouflaged male, but the other, the red one, had been able to grab ahold of his cheek as he pulled away, but in life and death, what was the cost of a cheek? With all the rage he had before, the fear of failure- of returning to the clients empty handed caused more fear in him then the hands of death. So losing a cheek was nothing- and so it was ripped away from the red woman, and was returned with a forceful lunge of his own.

Right back at the red woman’s face.

[Avery!]

The old male was vicious and weathered and without honor or sympathy. Who knew how many encounters just like this he’d seen in his unscrupulous life? But Avery was not some helpless damsel or greenhorn fighter, she was the jackdaw whip, the peacekeeper captain. This fight if not for Echo’s presence could have been very evenly matched as two warriors tested the other to find their opposition still going strong.

Echo’s presence — oh, what a wound the camouflaged wolf had taken for her. It made her all the more furious, like someone kicking the ribs of a tiger, like a hot poker rustling the glowing embers in a fireplace. Avery uttered a throaty snarl and paid Rannoch back with interest, tearing through the tender flesh of his cheek and drawing back with a mouthful of dripping red meat. She had time only to spit it roughly out before he was upon her in revenge, drilling through the raw pain almost as if he didn’t feel it.

His jaws fastened around the side of her head, teeth carving hot lines into the skin that wept copiously. They were so close to her eye; with it she could briefly see down the slaver’s throat before he bit her again. Half-blinded by the resulting sheet of blood, Avery panted and shook her body wildly, trying to dislodge him.

She was the fire; he was the smothering dirt.

[Avery!]

Echo struggled to right himself, the wound in his side leaking and oozing with every movement he made to try to get back into the fight. It took him three tries, three painful attempts to get back up, and it seemed it was in time, as he stood on shaky legs he heard the Rip and tear from Rannochs cheek, and saw more red pour to the ground, but this time it was his Cavalier that had her blood spilling into the otherwise green grass, staining it permanently. He took a step forward, but his body would not cooperate with his will, and he fell back to the ground. Letting out a snarl, he crawled instead and reached out with his fangs and took hold of Rannochs rear leg, high up, tearing into the flesh of his flank. Doing as much damage as he could- if only he could do more- if only.

If only...

~

Flesh was nothing to him- others- his own, but he could not help but think he had bested his opponents- both of them, when his fangs scraped against the red womans skull. He’d left her comrade broken and bleeding out on the ground, without hope of recovery, and had her head in his mouth, biting and squeezing the very life out of her. Though she struggled and panted- and thrashed. He did not loosen his grip, he was going to crush her skull between his fangs, he would make sure she would never interfere with any operation again.

But the sudden pain and weakness drew his attention from the red lady to the corpse he thought he left behind. He shook his head once violently, attempting to throw th red lady aside for a brief moment while he assessed the menace in the rear, tossing her aside violently, Rannoch turned on Echo, and struck a well placed hit across Echos snout, causing the camouflaged male to let go momentarily, and Rannoch took the chance to pull his leg away and kick backwards, hitting Echo across the eye. Before limping away from the wounded male, turning back to the red woman who posed more of a threat-

What was another wound to a man who did not fear death?

[Avery!]

She could die here. It was oddly unaffected, that passing thought. But thinking and feeling are two different animals; adrenaline sped her movements up as it seemed also to slow time. What was she, but savage as Rannoch and far less at peace with her misdeeds? Was this really how she’d have liked to spend her final day? It didn’t matter. Dying to spare some young lives the same fate she’d suffered... would not be too bad. That seemed like the sort of deal she deserved.

Rannoch locked his jaws and tore her face and eyelid. Her gushing head swam and throbbed terribly; her struggles worsened the pain and found her no escape. She could feel the points of his teeth against her skull. She thought of Serrate, the morning after Tauro died, the cracks in her face.

Avery howled, high and chilling, the cry of something shot out of the air. When the slaver cast her aside, she fell and twitched and did not move to rise until he’d turned back to batter poor Echo.

The firebird faced him, her eye (the one not swollen shut now) bleeding liquid gold. Her mouth was open and panting and working up a nice froth. Her bite was a creature of its own and slavered for blood. She dove under, leapt up, and snapped for whatever flesh it struck. The Old One has come again.

[Avery!]

The sound that escaped the Cavalier was enough to send a wave of anger through his body, and caused him to bite and tear even more ferociously as before. Shaking his head as hard as he could, ripping into the slavers leg, tearing the muscle, the tendons. Whatever Echo was doing seemed to have worked, as Avery was finally freed of certain death, the slaver came at him again, and his reactions were slowed, he was becoming weaker as time went on, the adrenaline slowly giving way to exhaustion and blood loss, and so Rannochs teeth met their mark and grazed against his muzzle, leaving deep wounds as Echo pulled away, he was sent sprawling by a sudden kick to the face, and for moments he didn't move- for moments- he couldn't.

~

The wounds left by these righteous rescuers, these vicious vigilantes stung. The pain throbbed through the old male, but they were not enough to stifle the fear that still coursed through his veins, it was like adrenaline. Mixed with adrenaline it made it nearly impossible for the old male feel any pain, though he knew it was there- the scars that riddled his body was an attest to his skill. Eyes peered backwards momentarily to see that the camouflaged male had finally been snubbed out- all that was left was the red woman who would have been dead had he only a few more seconds earlier- a few more seconds and he could have found Vito and taken at least one product back-

A mistake was made when he gazed back to Echo- one he would regret, as the red woman, the one who should have been dead, a corpse at his feet, was now at his feet, but very much alive. Too late he was to move- too late to get out of the way before angry, red hot teeth grasped onto his lower neck. They were like swords, piercing, and slashing, and Rannoch let out a mixture of anger and surprise at the ferocity and quickness of the attack. He turned his head to try to get ahold of something, anything she gave him, snapping and drooling, twisting and turning to try to get out of her grip.

She should be dead- and yet she was not. She should be dead

He had evaded death for too long, far too long, and death had finally come for him it hovered in the corner , waiting, and sent its hellhound-

- in the form of a fire-red phoenix.

[Avery!]

You can’t, she had no time to think. Stop, no voice ever urged her before her own berserk genes flung her from her body. Like a baleful polymorph, she transformed from Avery into nobody at all, just the concepts of rage and fear and hunger.

It could not be killed or abandoned. As one wolf cast it from its eye, leaving a blue flaw behind, it hunted for more troubled waters, for another set of teeth, for something else to devour. Tear meat from bodies, break bones, obliterate completely, burn your enemies and swallow down the ash.

It’s no hellhound. It’s no phoenix. It’s fire itself that burrows into Rannoch’s nape. Her head throbbed with hate; it clanged in her ears like a set of dizzying cymbals. The blood on her tongue burned like acid. Queerly, she felt that far more than the slaver’s vicious counterattacks, none of which missed. He bit, clamped, tore, bled her like a stuck pig, the ground beneath them a seething, slippery biohazard.

Wide gold eyes seemed to stare at nothing, their pupils blown out and unfocused. She snarled and slobbered, wetting his coat, and offered nothing but pure offense, overwhelming but unguarded. The wolf that had been Avery worked her jaws, trying to slide her bite down to the old male’s throat. Her teeth ached with need for it. With the need, repressed but there in her waking life, to stomp out every last slaver she could find. To undo what had been done to her. Or even to redo it.

Slavery. Is. Hell.

[Avery!]

It was in those moments, those still moments that Echo lay there, where he gathered the momentum to get up. With each heartbeat, his vision blurred, seeing the red and the brown swirl together into one, massive beast. The sounds of slop hitting the ground reverberated in the male's head, eyes blurred, and trying to focus. He took a step, and another, closing in on the pair of snarling savages ripping each other to shreds. A sudden shift in movement- and the slaver pivoted near to Echo, in which the camouflaged male took it upon himself to help the Phoenix one more time. With a vicious bite, Echo sank his teeth into the rear end of the slaver, rendering him unable to shift any further in movement. Echo pulled, and shook his head violently until he slipped on the alarming amount of blood covering the ground, all his weight plummeted towards the ground, Rannochs injured rear leg giving out to the weight, and his entire back end falling to the ground. Echo did not let up though, moving his way from the flank, to the leg- ending up between the slavers thigh and stomach, ripping it open, showing no mercy- and no signs of fear at Averys berserker rage (although he had no idea what she was going though at the moment-)

~

The slaver had rage, the slaver had anger, the slaver had fear burning inside of him- but none of the above matched the rage that had taken over the fire red phoenix that carried his death certificate in the form of burning red fangs. The knowledge that he was not going to live through this encounter burned in his mind- through all the years and all the missions- he knew the day would come that he would meet his match. One day he would stare death in face, and it would stare right back.

Except it didn't stare- it tore and it fought and it wanted blood, and blood and blood. Rannoch fought with everything, his fear and his hate bubbled up to the surface, striking everything he could- but when he felt his rear end slip and fall- his will to fight went with it.

He wouldn't say it was an honor to be slain by these two- but they had given him the most glorious ending. To fall in the heat of battle by two wolves far more skilled then he- Vito would laugh, and scoff, but then again the coyote would also run away, tail between his legs before he'd die in such glorious fashion. No. Vito would laugh, and so did the old Slaver, he laughed until the jaws of the red phoenix tightened around his throat- until the blood gurgled up through his larynx, until he could see the tunnel begin to shroud his vision.

He laughed until the blood gurgled up through his parted jaws, until he began to choke on that very liquid, the laughter then turned to fear- he thought he did not fear death, but he had been wrong- he did not fear it until it was there, squeezing the life out of him like a vice, oh yes he feared death now. He struggled weakly as the last of the life left him, as the blood ran down his neck, dripping onto the ground mixing with the rest that had been spilled. His head fell limply to the side, the life drained from his eyes- Rannoch had been the dirt that had attempted to snuff out the Fire.

-but the fire had exploded and raged, and burned the dirt to ash.

[Avery!]

and i need to write one more post but avery gives rannoch a nice throat-ectomy

then she turns and starts toward echo but passes out and flops over halfway there

presumably someone helps these two out lol