CC Round One: Demons 1-1

Scourge of Pripyat, Scene One Act One: Beyra's Hunt

"Marx, wake up! Beyra's talking and it's important!"

Marx groaned as Piba's voice cut into his nightmares. Surely enough, the Scourge was barking about something – it just added to the irony irony ruling Marx's life: the fact that he woke from his nightmares to find the only living subject therein right before him, in the flesh. Angrily pushing the thought away, Marx shoved himself to his paws and padded closer to Beyra, so that he could hear her better.

"... as little association with your home packs as possible," Beyra was saying as Marx slid next to one of the more normal-looking competitors – a male California dog with golden-brown fur and a nervous look in his blue eye. "From now on, you take your orders from me and my helpers."

Marx's body jerked at the thought of taking orders from Beyra. He supposed it was to be expected, given the circumstances, but the idea caused a revolt in his mind. He was grateful, however, that her first order had no bearing on him.

My pack's all here, Marx thought fondly, with a trace of a smile on his muzzle, as he looked at the round-eyed Piba and the stone-faced Trinity.

"Oi!" a bull mastiff snarled, padding up with his lip curled. "Wipe that stupid grin off your mug and pay the Scourge your attention, whelp!"

Marx pressed his lips tightly together, resisting the urge to tug them back and bare his fangs. "Fine," he growled. The larger dog snorted, muttering, "What the old runner-up's brat's doing here, I don't even know."

Marx growled in fury, clicking his teeth shut before he could say something he would regret.

"... A hunting party." Marx looked up as Beyra continued; he was surprised to see that the Scourge of Pripyat was glaring right at him, with her golden eyes narrowed. She rattled off a lengthy list of about half the dogs, ending in, "... Vendel, Cryus, Adele, and Marx."

The dogs Beyra had named rose to their paws, turning and walking toward the woods. Annoyance made Marx's claws itch – the other dogs were able to laze around, while Marx and the rest of the hunting party had to chase scrawny squirrels and rabbits in the woods. He wasn't the only one who was annoyed – several of the hunters were looking back at those not chosen, glaring angrily and muttering amongst themselves.

"Looks like you have to go," Trinity told Marx with a note of resignation. "If you didn't hear, she said to be back by midmorning. You only need to catch one piece of prey."

"Okay, thanks," Marx replied. He paused, then said, "You know what; why don't you two stay here? There's no real point in having both of you come – not if I only need to catch one measly piece of prey."

Piba looked disappointed and Marx instantly knew he was in trouble. "But what about me, Marx?" Piba asked. "I know how to hunt – you showed me!"

Marx hesitated. Piba was far from a good hunter – she was noisy, slow, and impatient. Bringing her along might scare off all the prey in the woods. Marx looked at Trinity for help, waiting for her to explain in her calm, gentle manner that Piba was best to just stay here, because that way she could relax and keep Trinity company. But no help came. Trinity was silent as a stone.

"I know that you can hunt," Marx began cautiously, "but your skills aren't very... developed yet – and that's partly my fault for not helping you more! – but I don't have time to teach you today. I need to actually... catch the prey, you see."

As soon as the words were out of his mouth, Marx knew that every single one of them was a huge mistake. The look of hurt on Piba's face was sufficient proof.

"Okay, Marx," said Piba in a sulky, petulant voice. "I'll wait."

"Er," Marx felt as awkward as he felt he could feel, "thanks, Pibs."

He shook his head and began to trudge toward the woods – when he suddenly heard pawsteps on pavement. Marx turned, thinking for a moment that the dog making the sound was Piba, but no dog her size would make that much noise. Instead, it was none other than the great Scourge of Pripyat herself, heading unmistakably for Marx.

"What?" Marx asked in a rude tone. He knew it was a bad idea to wind up such a powerful – in both brute strength and in influence – dog with insolence, but Marx felt that it was justified in every way. Beyra, however, was too distracted to notice the breach in respect.

Beyra didn't beat around the bush. "I came over here to tell you to stay out of trouble. I'm picking up waves of malcontent from your direction, and that spreads in small groups like the one I have here.  It doesn't help you at all that your daddy was a star competitor, either, because it seems to me that that just makes you less likely to listen. Especially to me – which you definitely need to do, unless you want to be out on your arse without a tail or a future."

Marx curled his lip, but he managed to keep his anger somewhat in check. In the most sincere and compliant voice he could muster - as close as he thought he could get to mockery - Marx said, "Yes, Lady Beyra." Beyra snorted. She turned to walk away, then looked back, adding, "And keep that wretched bird of yours away from the other dogs! I don't want that Sickness spreading!"

Marx snorted. Beyra, the only wretch around here is you. Shaking his head, he turned and trotted toward the woods, feeling a gut-churning mix of anger and sad memories burning in his mind.

---

Beyra was seriously annoyed. When she had spoken with Percy's friend, the wolfdog had expressed doubts about Marx's compliance, but she hadn't expected a dog who refused to use deference, which in this case was synonymous with common sense. There was a disturbing aspect about the situation as well: the dog looked almost like an exact copy of his father, except smaller, and with blue eyes rather than amber-gold. The ability to dredge up memories, combined with his bad attitude and his grudge, Marx wasn't a dog Beyra wanted in her Tournament. However, what was done was done. She walked back to the Ferris wheel and leaped up on the platform.

"Listen up, runts!" she barked.

She proceeded to tell all of the remaining competitors what their first challenge was: to steal the prey of a dog whom Beyra would pair them against. As she told them, any dog fit to pass its genes on had to be able to catch prey for themselves, or defend it from attackers.

"And don't think," warned Beyra, "that you can fool me by just catching a random piece of prey and bringing it here. Your prey must carry the scent of the other competitor."

One by one she sent the dogs off, each with a name in their heads. The last one to approach her was that bi-colored freak, Orthros, who had tried to kill one of the other competitors right off the bat. Beyra had only one competitor who had no hunter...

"Marx," Beyra growled out loud. "That's the dog you'll be hunting. He's a black-and-white border collie, and fluffier than most. He's got a long scar down his shoulder. Know him?"

"Yes, I've seen him," said Orthros, sounding uneasy, "he was next to me when you were speaking."

"Good," Beyra replied. "Now go." Orthros nodded respectfully, then padded away.

Beyra began to pace on her platform, feeling desperately bored and fed up with her duties that bound her here. She stopped dead when she saw that one dog, that

Her mind wandered to the dog she'd sent after Marx. He was a skilled fighter, Beyra had seen at the beginning – perhaps not as skilled as herself, but still. She wondered why she had chosen Orthros. Was it just coincidence or was it something more? She knew that she wanted Marx out of the Tournament as soon as possible. She could see him causing problems, being a hassle, et cetera. But was she specifically trying to kill him? Possibly, perhaps subconsciously. She should have just done it before – she had been justified in every way. He had been stupid enough to attack her, and he was lucky to only have that scar to show for it.

Beyra lifted her muzzle and stared at the sky. It was a sunny day, which Beyra always found ironic. Why did the sun bother to shine down on a city so bleak as Pripyat, where mankind had fallen and where dogs survived only by ruthlessness and by their own bloodied fangs? The day she was thinking of – the final day of the Tournament – had been dark with clouds and approaching rainfall. Suitably dark, dreary, and dramatic for the day the new Scourge emerged.

Beyra shook her head. She hadn't thought of her old Tournament run in seasons and she preferred not to live in the past. Instead, she looked toward the present and most specifically the woods, wondering what was happening in there even as she thought about it. She thought about the matchups she'd made, some odd, some lopsided – there was no way for all to be fair – and almost all virulent. She wondered what the death-count would be today.

She also thought about the tasty prey that the dogs would be bringing back and decided that she was better off focusing on that than on any Tournament, now or past.