Capítulo 540: CHPT 540: Dichotomy
Thursday Morning, March 26th. 2242. Location, Alphas Tower...
Waking up for Claude was never a peaceful process. But never had he woken up to the growls of his own stomach. And the beasts within. His eyes opened as he sat on his boulder with his back to the last wall he stapled to the steel skeleton of the tower.
He could feel his joints scream in discomfort at the horrid sleeping conditions. He looked around. All along the walls, Shifters sat atop their boulders. Leaning against the walls. Except for the crocs. It was the only way to avoid the burn.
He slept the whole night. The morning sun felt fake as it beamed down on his head. So bright, yet the tower remained dark as night. The monochrome walls reflected nothing due to the low quality sheen of the bumpy and dirty steel. The odd angles and lengths of the walls splashed dancing uneven shadows across the floor. They even moved as the Furnace waged a war on the solid metals at the bottom floor. Shaking the whole tower with each hot movement.
Claude was done sitting. He hoped up off his boulder.
"I guess the Silver Cursed need more sleep than Lupines." He thought to himself.
"[Partially explains why they heal faster, I presume.]" Arne commented as Claude looked down at his torn hands.
Hammering away at the walls and tugging the chain connecting him to his boulder for eighteen hours did him no favors.
"[Don't let too many know your weakness so soon.]"
"I'm going to need more croc ski—" He keeled over as the skin on his chest expanded and spit green flames.
RGHSHH!
He coughed up spittle onto the dirty steel floor, marveling at the fact that it wasn't spit. It was liquid shadows.
He turned his left hand over and found Ashe's eye looking at him through the marking in his palm.
"Ashe, Gil. Relax. I can't do what I need to do if you're both trying to rip your way out of me. You'll know when it's time…"
The eye closed and moved out of the circle as if she was walking away from peering through a hole in the wall. He could feel Gil angrily trot back to the safest recesses of his soul. Grumbling curses much like himself.
"So… Arne—"
FWSHHH!!!
"AHHHHHHCK!"
Claude watched the floor shake as his croc skin shoes began to steam against the heat.
Somebody else was burned. Probably the person that was just sent down yesterday.
Claude's ears flexed as everyone around him anxiously listened in. He didn't even notice them wake up. But now, their fear filled his nostrils in waves.
Claude waited to hear Alpha's angry outbursts. Nothing came.
"Where is he?"
"He's out getting chow." Tom said from beside him suddenly. "How are the shoes?"
"Fine."
"What do you mean by chow?" Claude questioned.
Tom pointed to the lowest rising wall behind them, "Go look."
Hesitantly, Claude headed over to the wall, weaving through the massive wolf pack as they sniffed and touched his tattoos. Once he was at the wall, he tried his best to remember the Lions techniques for climbing.
But there wasn't much. Strength and balance were the key.
He brought out his claws. Watching as his dirty chipped nails went oily black and extended a number of inches. Something that felt as hard as transforming on a good day with his weakened stats.
Urgently, he stuck his claws in the slim spaces between the nailed sheet metal. Instantly he realized the more experienced Wolves were purposefully nailing the walls in weakly so their claws could fit better.
It made the climbing easier.
SHNAP!
Until the chain went taunt.
He choked for a moment.
"Come on! Keep your neck stiff and climb!" Tom pressed him from below.
Claude clenched his jaw and hardened himself, reaching up to find the next groove. As soon as his claws slipped in, he pulled. Not just with his arms either.
The boulder whined. It felt like pulling a tree out of the earth. He had less trouble squatting tree logs for that matter.
"Come on!!! Pull harder!" Tom yelled at him, reminding Claude of Ursula and how she did the same when they worked out together.
He could feel his muscles tearing. His lats and biceps on fire as the boulder lifted and hit the wall he climbed.
"There you go! Keep going!"
The Shifters circled below.
Wall after wall, eventually he found his arms pulling him up over the last wall so he could peak out at the world below. His whole body felt full from his pumped and torn muscles. He ignored the pain.
Like before. Nothing but ocean and mountain. The waters were wild. Twisting, spinning, sloshing battle grounds of blue essence. The sunlight allowed him to peer into the depths, highlighting the submarine war below.
Massive grey skinned things raged and let out hideous whines that shook the water as they battled reptilian seabeasts. Even from so high up he knew it was a Mosasaur. Its black eyes breached the surface before a tentacle wrapped its jaws and pulled it down with the rest.
"What do you see!?" Someone yelled from below.
"Mosasaur….." Claude didn't expand as his eyes located a black shape at the base of the tower. The base was much bigger than the rest of the tower so the shape was quite a ways ahead. Even still, he recognized Alpha at the edge of the island.
The beast clutched something at its chest and erupted in pale blue flames.
"Lunar Artifact."
Alpha roared like a psycho and jumped easily a hundred feet into the air, arms raised as it rocketed towards the deep sea war. The last thing he saw was the ruffle of its longcoat before the waves consumed.
Blood and frothy bubbles rose as if someone dropped a piranha into the water. In glimpses he could see the StoneApe come up for air, wrestling a tentacle or pushing apart a pair of jaws attempting to swallow him only to plunge once more.
The battle was quick and bloody. It felt like it lasted forever from the strain on his arms and legs as Alpha swam back to shore. An Octolepid tentacle held firm in his jaws that slowly gave way to the creature in its entirety. He dropped it on the shore and roared at the ocean, beating his chest and helmeted head in triumph.
Immediately after, he slung the deep sea beast over his shoulder and began scaling the walls. Out of fear of being seen, Claude let go— causing the boulder to yank him back down to earth.
"OH—"
Before his spine cracked over the boulder, the gathering of Shifters caught it. Claude's reflexes kicked in, causing him to twist mid air and land soundlessly on the boulder before flipping off in a jingle of chain and flurry of limbs.
The Crocs dropped the boulder.
"Uhhhh…. Thanks."
The massive thick boned men and women held the same faces as everyone else around him. Eagerness. Urgency.
"Well…" Tom started, "What's on the menu?"
Claude froze for a moment. Even the Lions that were incentivized to dislike him, watched from a distance, "Of course. This is all they have."
"Octolepid."
A few people cursed to themselves. Two of which being Marcel and his sister, Gahija.
Even still, the undercurrent of anxiety remained for whoever was burned. It was a terrible environment. A nightmare, really. Slave labor, building a tower for a mortal enemy's plaything. Forced to build at the top while your packmates get sent below where you essentially wait for them to die. Only for the cycle to rinse and repeat.
Claude shivered.
Minutes passed and the scent of Octolepid became so clear it was overpowering. The ocean water on its skin. The Mosasaur blood.
WOO!
Alpha's silhouette shaped the shadows as he soared overhead, leaking salt water on their sweaty frames as they worked.
He landed with a heavy thud, followed by the wet plop of breakfast. Up close in more human spacing, the Octolepid was huge. An enormous— amorphous, wet blob with massive black eyes drained of life and a head full of organs and vessels circulating blood and magic. He could hear them slowing as he worked. Or maybe that was his own growing louder.
His stomach growled. All of their stomachs growled as they hammered away.
As if the dead Sea creature knew fear, its slimy splotchy blue green skin began to blend and camouflage with the steel floors. Turning it silver and brown in varying shades to hold the shadows.
"HOO HOO! NO!" Alpha spat and ripped off a bladed tentacle with a wet rip of sinew and blood. Immediately he began gouging the corpse, ripping and splitting apart the blending of its skin. The dead portions regained their original color which seemed to calm Alpha and rouse his Shifters.
When starved the call of blood is so loud it's impossible to ignor—
"[Claude. Get back to work. Now!]"
He blinked twice, realizing he'd stepped away from the wall, following his hunger. Ready to fight. Teeth bared and claws extended.
His boulder rolled and Alpha spun around to face him with the Octolepid blade held in its clawed hand. Like the claw of a giant. A sword with no hilt or handle, but a sword all the same.
Claude improvised, lowering his gaze and making himself look as small as possible as he spoke, "Alpha. Burned."
He pointed at the floor.
Alpha's nostrils flared from within his helmet as he sniffed.
"Hoo….hoo…." The beast nodded and tossed the bladed appendage to the floor before hop jogging down the stairs.
His eyes left the corpse after he found many eyes on him once more.
"[I see…..]"
"I can't do it yet. I feel like I'm meeting the Phantom Wolves again. Every move has a thousand meanings attached to it. I have to grab it while we eat. Or hope it's left after…. I doubt it though. Alpha's stupid but he keeps us nearly completely unarmed."
"What are you planning? Obviously an escape, but with what means?" Tom said from beside him with his sledge hammer slung over his shoulder.
Before he could say anything Alpha's tantrum began.
Tom sighed, "Another day. The Wolves can't take much more of this….."
"Me neither." Claude whispered to himself.
He got to work. Physically and mentally.
***
Twenty minutes— or what felt like twenty minutes passed in a blur of hammers, nails and Liquid Metal. Longer than usual. He knew why three floors before they arrived.
The Furnace workers were coming up to eat.
Alpha breached the floor first.
A myriad of smells followed him along with the wave of heat.
"LEASH!"
Wolves, Lions and Tigers all brought the unattended boulders over to Alpha.
One by one, women and young teens emerged. They smelled like fire and primal magic. Magic that made his hairs stand on end.
And one by one, he could smell the Shifters relief at finding their friends and family surviving.
Until the last person came up.
A child. No older than ten. Hair long and unkept like a dirty brown mop. Skin mottled with dirt stains and black ash. In his arms he carried the scorched remains of a woman left unrecognizable by sight.
"Dammit!" Tom cursed.
The other Wolves tried to bury themselves in their work and failed.
He didn't know which to question more. The child or the woman.
That was until it was time to eat.
They all sat around the Octolepid. He tried his best to get close to the removed bladed appendage but still it lay over the corpses legs at least a dozen feet away. Not to mention, Alpha stood at the center— on the corpse. Watching.
"[Alphas eat first.]" Arne reminded.
Alpha walked around the circle, beating his chest casually in the face of a few and snapping at others from within his helmet like a monkey dog from hell caught between varying primal instincts.
After a few seconds, he removed his helmet. Claude had seen StoneApe depictions plenty of times. If it wasn't already clear that Alpha wasn't just a StoneApe, his face added onto that fact. He didn't have the aggressively bulky brow ridge and deep set nose of the stone apes. You could barely tell he was an evolved species of Gorilla.
He had a snout. Like a wolf. Or a bear if length mattered. Blue ruffled skin ran along its length along with vicious scarring. His eyes were yellow pools in shadow. Humanoid despite their monstrosity.
He reached down for the Octolepid he stood on, digging dirty nailed fingers into the flesh. It made a wet squelching noise as he pulled a handful of brain tissue and skin up to his jaws and dug in.
Afterwards, he hopped off the corpses and leapt up to the steel scaffolding above. He crouched and let his thick knuckled hands hang like a counterbalance as he watched the sky.
Claude wanted to tie his intestines around the metalwork. But he needed to overcome a moral dillema first.
With the Alpha served, it was time to eat.
He looked down at the Octolepid tentacle snaking around him and swallowed. There was enough saliva to confuse it with water. And the smell. It was marvelous.
It agitated him.
"Fuck."
The skin still shifted colors as it dried and let off intense scents. Like a mirage of exactly what he wanted. Vibrance, blood, heat, fear—
SMACK!
Tom's hand hit his. All the Shifters silently growled at him as he attempted to reach for his share.
"What's your problem?" He silently asked them all.
Tom nodded in the direction of the boy who once carried the burned woman. Visibly the youngest and most worn. It forced an interesting physical dichotomy since it was the older Shifters that should've looked worn.
"He eats first."
Claude made a face that matched his brains failure to understand the situation.
"Guys. We don't have to keep doing this….. it starts fights." The boy said.
"Fighting is in our blood. It's inevitable." Marcel replied as he stared down Claude.
"Tara please calm your Pride members." Tom said without looking at Marcel. From across the Octolepid on the floor.
"There will be no calm here until balance is restored." The assumed Pride Alpha female sneered.
Tom sighed and looked at the boy who sat at the head of the Octolepid alone.
"Don, you will eat here first for as long as many of us are here…. However long that may be. It is the least we can do. Enjoy your meal, we will follow, young wolf." Tom said, bowing as he referred to the food.
The boy— Don, nodded and dug in with a level of hunger he'd only seen in animals.
"Don here has been building this tower longer than any of us. We don't know what pack he's from or whose child he is. We've never seen a WereWolf so young. Only Crocs have regularly birthed children. He's rare and he's strong. He's the most adept Metal worker amongst the furnace entrants. Alpha rules us, but in here, we follow him. He is our Elder within these walls."
Don came up for air finally, Octolepid flesh covered his mouth and chest. Blood soaked his fingers and hands. He smiled. "It's good."
Everyone dove in.
"Seafood. Like Ursula said. Sushi. It's sushi." Claude grabbed the tentacle and dug in.
***
Less than ten minutes past and mere scraps occupied the floor.
Claude was left in a stunned stupor for an amount of time he didn't follow. He was lost in the blood on his tongue. The tissue between his teeth. The flood of energy in his limbs.
"[The blade.]"
He snapped out of his state as the Shifters cleaned up the remains and got to their feet. Amidst the shuffling and movement, he raced, accidentally rolling his boulder into people and tying up chains.
But finally, he r—
"Ughf!" He bumped into a solid body, internally rolling his eyes at the thought of Marcel trying his best to become Samuel 2.0
Instead he scented Tiger.
A man of Asian origin faced him. Short and slim with dense muscle and a beard of black hairs that stood on end like a startled cat.
"You don't own us. When the fighting comes, don't expect us to save you just because you helped us."
"Cool." Claude rushed past him and placed his foot on the blade. From above, he looked like everyone else tugging their boulders along on leashes. All the while, his dragging foot held it. The rest were thrown over the wall as Alpha watched.
He made it back to his wall beside Tom and tossed the blade in his bucket. His heart racing as he unfurled his plan by tearing off his croc skin shoes and wrapping the blade sticking out of his bucket.
"You plan to sword fight Alpha? And here I thought there was something about you…"
Claude looked up at him. Desperation lit his eyes like embers in reverse, growing to flame.
"Give me your shoes."
Five minutes later and a roll of croc skin stood out of his bucket of tools right next to his bucket of Liquid Metal.
"Masking the smell is smart. But it's still too obvious." Tom commented in between hammer blows.
"That's why you need to keep it close to you. There's enough clutter here to make it work." Claude said.
"Me? When did I become your errand boy."
Claude stopped swinging and looked at him. "Who did you leave behind?"
Tom didn't answer.
"Don't say your pack."
"My cousin." Tom commented, "Sloane. Now get back to work."
Claude scanned his face again. Silver blond hair. Mundane features. Thick heavyset jaw. Brown eyes. Of course. Sloane becomes Alpha after her cousin disappears in an annual trade with Vampires.
"You've been here three months." Claude told him.
Tom stopped swinging, "Ho—"
"Some people have been here much longer. You'll help me because I need to get out of here. And if I get out, the rest of you will. Unless you get in my way."
Tom grabbed his bucket and placed it with his. "I take it you're not using your tools? What could you possibly not need them for?"
"I'm going to the Furnace."
Following Claude's words, Alpha hopped up the stairs.
"BURNED! NEED NEW! HOO HOO!"
Everyone looked away. Claude dragged his boulder as he approached with his eyes closed.
"Alpha. Take me to the Furnace."
[+6 Stat Points.]
"What the hell?"
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