© 2008 Ian Gilbraith.   The events and characters of this story are works of fiction (durr), and do not represent the author's personal views or opinions. 

	The tree's bark was warm and damp with the coppery smell of death, the tantalizing scent of a former life penetrating the wolf's nostrils and flooding his throat with saliva. The predator absorbed the scene before him in a nano second--the clawmarks on a lower branch, the crushed leaves ground into the reddish-brown mud. Something had died there. Or at least, had been wounded and dragged away to die somewhere else. There were scuffmarks in the dry dirt surrounding the base of the tree, signs of a struggle making themselves evident. 
	The wolf drank the scent in even deeper, pressing his nose so close to the bark that it soon dripped with the sticky warmth. Every shred of physical data about the victim was interpreted through the blood encoding to the wolf's brain and downloaded to his olfactory memory banks almost as fast at it registered that this was indeed blood he was sniffing. With this new kernel of information, the wolf (alias Tillman) raised himself up into a crouch and let his MG-48C "Barracuda" submachine gun swing down from his shoulder and under his arm, the grip pressing itself into his gloved paw. Tillman licked the blood from his nose and swirled it around on his tongue, keying his jaw-mike and whispering "Sample found" into it. 
	It wasn't long before he heard the deep and methodic breathing of a packmate nearby, followed by the sound of two claws tapping on the barrel of a weapon. This was Blackie, the pack leader. Keeping his head low, Tillman slunk through the underbrush, between the thinly sparsed trees, pressing himself close to Blackie's side. 
	The Alpha leaned in closer. "Present it." 
	Tillman tilted his snout upward and offered his open muzzle to his Alpha, the larger wolf suckling on his subordinate's tongue in what appeared to be a display of homosexual affection, namely a kiss. This was not the reason for it, of course; the blood Tillman kept on his tongue was passed to Blackie, the blood-data being transferred to be analyzed by a secondary source. Blackie filtered it between his own teeth for a moment before swallowing it down and speaking quietly into his own mike. "Physical anomaly has been detected, presence of a hostile being within the immediate area confirmed. Chevy and Howards, circle around and form up on my six in...seven minutes; Tillman and I will cut NNE, north by northeast. That leaves you, Omega, you're the delivery boy. Regroup in seven point one, follow up behind Howards and Chevy ten seconds after them." 
	There was a muffled sigh over the channel, one that could have passed as background noise. "Yes, sir..." 
	Blackie tapped his mike. "Be a good boy now, earn yourself a real tag. We go in cold, boys, no slip-ups." 
	Going in cold meant no lights, no infrared, no radios. They had to rely on naked eyesight and acute hearing. Three sequential acknowledgements from each team member echoed over the radio, and both Blackie and Tillman cut their mikes. Seven minutes and ten seconds of radio silence. 
	The pack leader patted Tillman's muzzle. "Always were hot for me, weren't ya?" 
	Tillman sucked a tooth and spat. "Not as much as I am for your mother, sir." 
	"Asshole," Blackie muttered. 
Both wolves raised their weapon sights and advanced forward, disappearing into the inky blackness. 

	It was a dead forest. Every tree was stripped of its leaves with lumber as brittle as tinder. Not a single insect or bird was heard, the only sound being that of a dry wind, passing through the decayed wood with the dirge of some broken and wounded animal. The seven minutes had passed, all the packmates with the exception of the Omega having converged on a small rise that overlooked what appeared to be an abandoned boathouse. It wasn't unlikely; there very well may have been a river flowing through here once. But it had long since dried up, leaving behind little more than a murky creek and the decrepit shack. Physical anomaly number two; a manmade obstruction subject to search and clearance by Blackie's team. 
	Blackie motioned for Tillman to hold his position on the hill--Omega hadn't appeared yet--and inched his way forward, down the slope towards the boathouse. Tillman heard the soft padding of footpaws on either side, Howards and Chevy following the team leader in Orion formation. He raised his sights and looked through the small, square monitor installed atop his weapon, flicking the infrared on. Three identical orange-red masses of heat appeared several yards in front of him, the shed remaining cold. This didn't give any indication at all what could be inside the structure; from this distance, a heat mass would have to be nearly the size of an elephant to be detected. Tillman turned the sights off again and dug in, remaining completely stationary. 
	Minutes passed. The wind died down. He heard the breathing again. He clicked two claws against his weapon. 
	A second later--tap tap, tap tap. The Omega. 
	Tillman swung himself around to look--too fast--a command half formed on his tongue when his firearm impacted on a surface, hard. A tiny flash, an expulsion of flame in the dark, accompanied with a dull thud and a pained grunt. He lost his balance, falling forward to the ground. Cursing loudly, Tillman scrambled back up onto all fours, rushing over to where he had heard the body fall. 
	Even in the dark he could see it was bad--there was a shocking amount of blood, the bittersweet scent of it rising to Tillman. The Omega wasn't moving. Tillman felt his chest--barely breathing. He checked the neck for a pulse, and found the wound--a fountain of heat gushed over his paw, through his fingers. It was fatal. 
	He fought to keep himself from screaming his stupidity and anger. Contacting Blackie was impossible at this point; if they had entered the structure, making too much radio noise would endanger the entire team. His weapon was silenced, they wouldn't have heard a gunshot. He had only one option. 
	Tillman grabbed at his belt, searching for a small metal box--an emergency signal emitter. He flipped it on, and a barely audible pulsing filled his ears. It would send a high-frequency signal back to HQ and alert them of a FUBAR situation at his location. His other paw pressed against the bullet-wound tightly, trying in vain to stem the bloodflow, his eyes burning with tears. His packmate was dying, and he would be held responsible. The scent of his comrade's blood clouded his senses and masked that of a second source--a trail of crimson, leading away from the body into the forest, towards the boathouse. 

	The team had indeed reached the shed, and were currently working on getting inside without making any noise. Their path was blocked by a large and heavy wooden door, hinged on nothing but moldy rope. Howards was the handyman, carrying with him all manner of breaching charges and paraphernalia. Silence was manditory, of course, so most of it would not be used. A tiny pair of metal rings resembling a yo-yo was placed in the small space between the concrete foundation and the door. Howards pulled the pin from its center, and the device began rising and expanding, pushing the door up only a few centimeters--enough to keep the door from scraping on the ground. 
	Next, Howards pulled a small polymer canister from his belt. With Chevy and Blackie in breaching positions on either side of him, he placed the canister's nozzle to the lock. It was so rusted and warped that no form of key or pick would do any good. Pressing down on the nozzle caused it to spit forth acid, corroding and literally vaporizing the tough iron. A moment later the lock split down the center into two halves, which Howards caught and laid to rest in the dirt behind him. He placed a paw in the crack of the door and pulled back, the heavy wooden portal swinging open effortlessly. Howards waved to Blackie, who slipped inside. Chevy and Howards soon followed. 
	A single beam of light shone on the far side of the shed--a smaller metal door was left ajar. Even from that distance the wolves could see the small trail of dotted red. The smell of mildew and death hung thickly on the air--Blackie needed no vision to follow the bloodtrail, his firearm raised high and his head low. The scent grew stronger as the threesome advanced, the source somewhere nearby. Maneuvering through a maze of rotted tables, stools and equipment, they soon came to a wall--dead end. The odor was overwhelming. Blackie tapped his weapon once, and the three switched their infrared sights on. 
	Everything was bathed in a deep blue before Blackie's eye--everything but the wall. An almost blindingly red-hot splash of blood coated it, trickling down to a small puddle gathering on the floor. Death had come to the boathouse. 
	No sooner had this sight imprinted itself on Blackie's eye than the wall simply exploded outwards towards them. The soaked and rotted wood splintered and crumbled as automatic gunfire ripped through it, a halo of fire and a stream of reflective copper shells coming into view. Blackie howled in pain and fell back, two rounds having torn into his flesh--one high in his chest, the other in the shoulder. Howards and Chevy weren't so lucky. Hot slugs completely eviscerated the two wolves, eleven rounds a second, leaving twin masses of flesh prone on the floor, the clutter surrounding them completely drenched in liquid death. 
	The lone survivor coughed and writhed, feeling his life slipping away between his fingers, just as his subordinate's had outside in the forest not a moment earlier. His vision blurred, his chest tightening, Blackie saw the wall collapse into dust, revealing an impossibly young creature standing there. A smoking, silver model-18 Glock was clenched in his fist, the weapon spent. His fur was sanguine, the eyes burning yellow with pupils almost totally contracted, as if they needed no light to see. 
	It was a fox--a black fox with a bloodlust to rival any wolf's. The young vulpine dropped the empty machine-pistol almost contemptuously, stepping forward to view his work. Only the big one remained alive, but his struggles weakened by the second. He'd soon be gone. The other two had been snuffed out instantly, though. Pools of crimson gathered beneath the three bodies, spreading out to form one huge dark stain. The fox moved a trembling paw to his side. The wolf from the woods--his bullet had passed through the fox's side before it had hit the other packmember. His thigh was soaked, his flesh burning, his breathing quick and shallow. He made no noise to express his pain, but for all his calmness, only one thought hung in his mind--it was fucking painful. 
	The murderer gritted his teeth and limped forward, passing over the dying wolf without a second glance. He used the tables as balance as he went, pushing open the metal door and trotting off into the night forest. 
	The walls dripped. The red pool on the floor blossomed. The bodies were still. 
	Death had come to the boathouse.