Chapter 4 — First Hunt
1182 Words
Chapter 4 — First Hunt
The streets of Amari County looked dead.
Storefront gates were shut tight. Broken traffic lights flickered red against rain-covered pavement. Smoke drifted between buildings while distant gunfire echoed across the city like thunder.
Boston no longer belonged to normal people.
It belonged to fear.
And tonight, something worse was hunting inside it.
The Pack moved across the rooftops silently.
Well…
Almost silently.
Tony landed hard on an air conditioning unit and nearly crushed it beneath his weight.
CLANG.
Marcus looked back immediately.
“Bro, be QUIET.”
Tony rolled his eyes.
“We giant wolves jumping across buildings and YOU worried about noise?”
Omar crouched near the roof edge scanning the streets below.
“Somebody’s running.”
Everybody stopped moving.
Below them, three civilians sprinted through an alley while looking over their shoulders in panic.
A man.
A woman.
And a little girl.
The girl cried while the woman pulled her along.
“PLEASE HURRY!” the man shouted.
Something growled behind them.
Deep.
Animalistic.
Wrong.
Darnell stepped toward the roof edge.
“What the hell is that?”
Then it emerged from the darkness.
A massive creature slammed through a dumpster hard enough to send metal flying into the street.
The civilians screamed.
Tony whispered:
“…yo.”
The creature looked like a tiger mixed with a lizard.
Its body was huge and stretched unnaturally long. Black scales covered parts of its skin while orange-striped fur grew across the rest. Its mouth opened too wide, revealing rows of jagged teeth dripping glowing saliva.
Its eyes glowed Red.
Night Crawler.
The creature sniffed the air before locking onto the civilians.
Then it charged.
FAST.
The little girl fell.
The woman screamed.
Darnell’s eyes flashed magenta instantly.
“MOVE!”
The Pack jumped from the rooftop.
They crashed into the alley almost at the same time.
The Night Crawler skidded backward, hissing aggressively.
The civilians stared in horror at the giant wolf-like figures standing between them and the creature.
The man grabbed the little girl protectively.
“What ARE those things?!”
Tony cracked his neck.
“The good guys.”
The Night Crawler roared.
Its spit hit the pavement—
and exploded into flames.
Marcus’ eyes widened.
“That ain’t normal.”
The creature lunged.
Darnell moved first.
He slammed into the Night Crawler head-on, driving it through a brick wall.
BOOM.
The alley shook from the impact.
Tony grinned wildly.
“Oh NOW we talking!”
Tony charged next, tackling the creature across the street and smashing it into a parked car.
Metal folded inward instantly.
The creature clawed across Tony’s chest—
but barely cut through his skin.
Tony laughed.
“That all you got?!”
The Night Crawler roared and whipped its tail across Tony’s body hard enough to launch him through a storefront window.
CRASH.
Tony stood up inside the broken store smiling.
“…okay that actually hurt.”
Marcus raised both hands.
Blue energy spread across the ground.
Ice exploded upward, freezing the creature’s legs in place.
The Night Crawler snarled violently while trying to break free.
“NOW!” Marcus shouted.
Omar vanished.
Shadow energy swallowed him completely.
The civilians looked around in confusion.
“Where’d he go?!” the woman yelled.
Then Omar appeared above the creature.
Purple energy covered his claws.
“Shadow Strike.”
He slashed downward.
The Night Crawler screamed as dark energy ripped across its back.
Black blood splattered across the ice.
The creature broke free instantly and swung wildly.
Omar disappeared again before the claws could hit him.
Darnell watched the fight carefully.
Not random.
Not emotional.
Strategic.
The wolf instincts inside him sharpened everything.
The creature’s breathing.
Its movements.
Its weaknesses.
Darnell realized something.
“THE THROAT!”
Tony climbed from the broken store.
“Oh I got you.”
The Night Crawler charged Marcus.
Marcus froze part of the pavement, causing the creature to slip sideways.
Tony hit it like a truck.
BOOM.
The impact lifted the monster completely off the ground.
Darnell moved instantly.
His claws ignited with glowing red energy for the first time.
The air around his hand crackled.
Tony noticed.
“YO!”
Darnell didn’t stop.
He leaped upward and slashed across the creature’s throat.
“BLAZING CLAW!”
Red energy exploded across the alley.
The Night Crawler crashed into the street hard enough to crack concrete.
Then—
silence.
Smoke rose from the creature’s body.
Its glowing eyes slowly faded.
Nobody moved for a second.
Tony looked at Darnell.
“…you ain’t tell us you could do THAT.”
Darnell stared at his own glowing claws.
“I didn’t know.”
Marcus slowly lowered his hands.
“The powers are evolving.”
The civilians still stood frozen in fear.
The little girl stared at the Pack with wide eyes.
Especially Darnell.
The man slowly stepped backward.
“Stay away from us.”
Tony looked annoyed.
“Bro we literally saved y’all.”
The woman pulled the child behind her.
“You’re monsters.”
That word hit harder this time.
Monsters.
The Pack went quiet.
Omar stepped back into the shadows.
Marcus looked away.
Tony clenched his fists.
But Darnell understood something in that moment.
No matter what they did…
people would fear them.
ACPD sirens suddenly echoed nearby.
Marcus looked toward the intersection.
“Cops.”
Military vehicles rolled into the street moments later while floodlights scanned the buildings.
“EVERYBODY GET DOWN!” an officer shouted through a megaphone.
The civilians immediately obeyed.
But when the floodlights hit The Pack—
everything stopped.
One officer lowered his rifle slightly.
“…what the hell…”
Another officer panicked instantly.
“OPEN FIRE!”
Bullets exploded across the alley.
The Pack scattered immediately.
Tony roared.
“ARE YOU SERIOUS?!”
Bullets bounced off his arms and chest while Marcus created an ice wall for cover.
Darnell grabbed the civilians and threw them behind safety before ACPD accidentally hit them.
“STOP SHOOTING!” Darnell yelled.
But the officers couldn’t see monsters as heroes.
Only threats.
Omar appeared behind a police vehicle silently.
“Too many.”
Marcus nodded.
“We gotta go.”
Tony looked furious.
“They shooting at US after we saved them?!”
Darnell grabbed Tony’s shoulder.
“MOVE!”
Military trucks pushed into the alley while spotlights filled the streets.
Then something terrifying happened.
The dead Night Crawler twitched.
Purple eclipse energy suddenly spread through its body again.
Its eyes snapped back open.
The creature ROARED.
One ACPD officer screamed.
The Night Crawler slammed into police lines instantly.
Chaos erupted.
Gunfire.
Screaming.
Explosions.
The creature ripped through armored vehicles like paper.
Darnell stared in shock.
“It’s regenerating…”
Marcus looked horrified.
“The eclipse energy…”
Omar narrowed his eyes.
“It’s keeping them alive.”
The Pack looked at each other.
Then back at the chaos.
Tony cracked his knuckles again.
“So what now?”
Darnell’s eyes glowed brighter.
“We finish it.”
And for the first time since the transformation—
The Pack charged into battle together as one.
- Writer
