When Hares Go Missing
When Hares Go Missing
~*~A Tale of the Long Patrol~*~
Starring:
- Tyree, a Long Patrol Major
- Corbeau, a young doe
- Taye, another Long Patrol Major
- Darklett, a legendary Patrol figure (retired)
- Deidra, a Halyard resident and friend of the Patrol
(Logger’s note: this is the beginning of a number of logs regarding this plotline, collected well after the fact. Those with additional pieces of the story are encouraged to post them if I’ve missed theirs.)
The Western Shore
The nondescript stretches of beach are sometimes Tyree's favorite. He likes to take long walks on the beach, unironically and purely for pleasure, when he's had enough of the constant whispers and shouts and noises of the mountain, and cannot be bothered to deal with the furious activity of Halyard. He's out of uniform, wearing a simple short-sleeved shirt and trousers with rolled-up legs, wanders in wet sand that clings to his fur, and generally looks the exact opposite of what he usually does. But then, these days, he has better reasons to be happy. Is that a ship on the horizon? Well, no unusual markings. Probably headed for Halyard's docks. Nothing to worry about.
Maybe Tyree started out where they did - Halyard, of course, though the conversational wanderings of Corbeau and Taye have taken them along the beach a little in the other direction, rather than following the usual route that would lead them back toward Salamandastron. Corbeau is comfortably dressed in a somewhat oversized jacket and absurdly long scarf that trails behind her along the sand, and the wind ruffles her two-tone hair. "So how /many/? 'A lot' doesn' mean jack, y'know, and m'mum's version changes accordin' t'how much she's been drinkin'..."
"'A lot' pretty much sums it up," Taye responds with a laugh. /He/ is dressed in uniform. Not exactly a civvies sort of buck, him. He shakes his head at the persistent doe, sighing out in amusement. "If you want to know all the gory details, read about it in the library. You know. /Readin'/. It's the thing you don't do in the trainin' room or the boxin' chambah," he teases her. He glances up the beach and spots Tyree, looking... very much not like Tyree. His head cocks to the side and he arches a brow. Then raises a paw, paw shaking from side to side in a wave.
"Eh?" Tyree grunts, looking up at the approaching duo. "Oh." He waves back. Hi there. Then he wanders over, paws in his pockets, and a little smirk on his face. "Finally found your way out of the infirmary closet, eh?" he asks Corbeau. "Taye. Good t' see you, as always."
"Pff, most'a that stuff's writ by hares that weren' nowhere w'in leagues when it 'appened. Y'were /there/," Corb reminds Taye, with a persistent cheeky grin, "and 'sides, th' library's all'a way back at th' mountain." Can't beat that logic! Her eyes shift from Taye's face forward toward Tyree, who gets a ready smile in greeting. To her credit, it hardly wavers at the other Major's comment, though her ears twinge somewhat. "H'lo, Maj'. D'know what y'talkin' 'bout, y'mus' be thinkin'a some other doe..."
Taye's eyebrow shoots up at the mention of a closet, but well. He really doesn't even want to know. "Considah it an assignment. Read up, find someone who was /actually/ there, 'n' compare the accounts." He smirks, and offers his paw to Tyree to shake. 'Cause why not? "Good t'see you, s'well."
Tyree takes Taye's paw, 'cause why? 'Cause he's a nice guy. "Tryin' to get an appreciation for the empirical sciences into young brains, eh? Probably a lost cause with this generation." He glances down at Corbeau and raises an eyebrow. "Believe me, young miss, I've been Major too long /not/ to remember the faces around the mountain."
Taye gives a firm shake, pulling Tyree in for a brief one-armed pat thing before backing off. He grins at the other buck, though the eyes give more an impression of a smirk. "So, 've you been takin' care of that sistah of mine?" Pause. Side-glance to Corbeau. "The /othah/ one, that is?" Such a troublesomely large family.
Corbeau is the picture of innocence. Really. Never mind that not-so-subtle smirk trying to wheedle in from the side of her mouth. "Oh, pff, 'm not memorable 't /all/. I look /jus'/ like every oth' private," she deadpans - because, yeah, between the two-toned hair and the flashy markings? Not so much. At Taye's question toward the other buck, her ears perk up. "Which--oh. /Ohhhh/. F'get 'bout that'n, sometimes."
The ship Tyree noticed has been approaching the shore while the three hares converse, seemingly headed toward Halyard's docks a little ways down the beach. It's a modest sized vessel, made for speed and agility, with a shallow hull that allows it to venture further into the shallows than most ships of comparable size. That is, now, exactly what it does, turning sharply so one side is roughly parallel with the beach, while a half-dozen assorted vermin hoist themselves over the edge, landing waist-deep in the water. They quickly and deliberately wade out toward the trio standing near the water's edge.
"You know I have," Tyree says with a little smile. "An' she's been takin' good care of me. Nothin' to worry about on that front..." But this ship may be something to consider. "Eh?" he wonders, and the moment he sees they're vermin, he steps in front of Corbeau, his expression flattening into a dead neutral. "Taye," he says. "Did ya happen to bring any weapons?"
He wouldn't be a proper Patroller if he didn't have /something/. At the question he turns, and zeroes in on the approaching vermin. His jaw sets and he steps up beside Tyree, also in front of Corbeau, and draws a dagger from his waistbelt. He presses it into Tyree's paw with an apologetic shake of his head for the small size of it, and unslings his bow. "We may want t'considah a hasty retreat," he suggests, and draws an arrow, which he quickly nocks to bow string. "Return t'yer ship!" he shouts.
Aw, drat. Banter interrupted by quickly approaching vermin. Corb barely gets a glimpse before she's blocked by the protective stance of not one, but /two/ bucks. She shoots a look at the back of their heads, something along the lines of: Seriously, guys? She, as it happens, does have a dagger of her own, which is tugged free from her belt as the doe sidesteps around to one side of Taye, to take a position next to him. "Aw, c'mon, we c'n take 'em!" she responds to her brother, cheerful as ever.
Another three or four figures can be seen on the deck of the ship, perhaps poised to join if necessary, or just spectating. None of the approaching vermin look the least bit deterred by the single bow aimed at them, and the only reaction is a gesture from one, which causes two carrying bucklers to shift around to the front of the group. Four rats, a ferret, and a fox - five are armed, and the last, a rat who stays behind the others, drags a bundled up net.
"No we can't," Tyree says under his breath. "Corbeau, you need to run. Back to the mountain. /Now./" When he sees the net he takes a few steps away from Taye - no sense in the both of them getting tangled up at once. "If you don't leave now," he says, "some of you never will." He points his dagger meaningfully at the nearest one.
As the vermin approach, Taye starts to back sideways away from the other two, pulling the bowstring taut as he distances himself from the other pair, so he risks no friendly fire. Before she can complain or object, Taye seconds Tyree's order, "Go, Corbeau, /now/." He lets the first arrow fly towards the group, nocks another, and lets that one fly also.
Corbeau hesitates, her body wired, eyes bright and intense. They cut sideways to the two bucks, ears twitching at Tyree's order first, before Taye seconds it. That's what it takes, and she steps back, turning to break into a hard run away from them down the beach.
Those two bucklers come up, heads duck, and the arrows pierce into the shields. The vermin are nearly upon them now, and in the moment it takes for Taye to reach for a third arrow, one of the rats lunges at him, swinging a club. It seems they primarily carry blunt weapons; between that and the net, this is no doubt a slaver group. Another rat and the ferret skirt around to one side, blocking the bucks from following the direction Corbeau is headed - and also blocking them off from the doe. One of the buckler-carriers, the fox, comes straight at Tyree with his weight thrown behind the shield, trying to knock him over. As they engage, the rat trailing behind with the net sharply changes direction and goes after Corb at an angle that quickly makes up for her head start.
The fight starts almost in slow motion. Tyree takes a few steps back, and as the fox comes Tyree waits until the very last moment before he bursts into motion, hurling himself to one side to avoid the fox, charging across the battlefield in a desperate attempt to intercept the rat going for Corbeau - his priority right now is that /she/ gets away before anyone else. "No you ruddy /don't!/" he shouts, hurling his dagger at the net-bearer's back. Leaving himself exposed.
Taye curses under his breath as the first two arrows are spent uselessly on shields. He may not have enough time to nock the third arrow, but he does have enough time to grip it as he pulls it free, and step forward inside of the rat's lunge and his swing, stabbing the arrow's tip deep into his eye socket, and brain tissue beyond.
Taye's arrow-stab is unexpected, and that's probably a lot of the reason it's effective. That rat makes a squeal when his eye is punctured, the sound cut off when the arrow pierces his brain. He drops, even as the buckler-rat steps in at Taye's front, taking more care than his deceased comrade and keeping the round shield between himself and any stabbing. Of the two that circled around to Taye's side, the ferret comes in from that direction, swinging a club at the back of his head. Tyree's knife-throw manages to nick the net-rat's leg, making him stumble, but he's already cast the net up and out toward Corbeau, now just a few strides behind her.
Corbeau spares a glance behind her as she dashes down the beach, kicking up sand behind her, which maybe keeps her from going quite as fast as she could. The way she turns her head puts the rat in her blind spot, with the angle of his approach. She sees Tyree's sideways lunge, the knife-throw, and then there's a net filling her vision in the moment that it surrounds her. The edges are weighed down, making it heavy enough that it stops her forward momentum. She trips and goes down hard onto her hands and knees, getting a face full of damp sand, then immediately struggles to right herself, lashing out with her legs and her knife. "/Taye/!" The kicking just tangles the net around her, and the interwoven rope is too thick for the small blade to slide through easily.
Tyree is already catching up the rat, going after him with a flying tackle. "I said get the /hell/ away from her!" he bellows, immediately bearing the rat to the ground and sending vicious punches into his gut and elbowing his face hard, until he hears something crack under the blows. He scrabbles for the dagger to finish him off, feeling a creeping sensation up his back that he's outnumbered, has his back turned to angry vermin, and really, really should have brought a sword today.
The arrow snaps off in Taye's paw as the rat goes down, and he tosses the stick away as the buckler-wielding rat approaches. As it worked before, he draws another arrow and backs sideways, even as he senses another vermin closing in behind. He's turning to face off with both of them, when Corbeau's call cuts through the air. It hits him with a pang that travels through his chest and into his stomach and he turns, seeing her there. Ensnared. It's that two or three seconds of distraction, that's all it takes, and the club hits him full on the temple. There's a sickening crack as his head is slammed to the side, like a pinata. He goes down bonelessly and without a sound.
"/TAYE/!" The second time she calls his name, as she sees him go down, it's not a shout. It's a /shriek/. A moment later, the ferret turns, takes a few strides up behind Tyree, and delivers a hard thwack to the top of his head as well. Corb absolutely spazzes, thrashing against the net, hacking into the rope and causing it to fray, though she's unable to do enough damage to even try to wiggle out before it's her turn. She's cuffed hard enough to go still, but not fully unconscious, her head swimming and vision lurching - sort of vaguely aware, in her dazed state, as the net is gathered around her, lifted, and she's hauled into the shallows toward the ship.
Tyree is too busy thrashing the snot out of the rat beneath him to notice the others coming upon him - there's hardly anything else he can do, anyway. He looks up and spits at them. "Ya /fu-/" he manages before the club cracks him across the head, and he goes utterly limp.
Despite the two they've lost, the remaining vermin look quite pleased, taking just a moment to collect themselves and assess their new captives. The netted kid is already being hauled off; that part's easy. With a few words of direction from one of them, he and the other two set about dealing with the unconscious bucks. Two begin to haul Tyree into the shallows and toward the ship, as Corbeau, now slightly squirming, is dumped onto the deck. She gets a sharp kick, causing her to whine and go still. The last, one of the rats, trots over to Taye, crouching to prod at him. He looks kind of /dead/, with how much blood is streaked down the side of his face, splotchy on the sand. "'ey, uh, think ye hit this'n too 'ard!" he calls back, glancing toward his fellows as they approach the ship with Tyree's slumped form.
Somewhere off away from where the slavers are looking over their latest catches, Darklett peaks over a dune. He'd been traveling between Halyard and Salamandastron and by pure chance he had timed his journey so he ran across this very situation. It only takes a few seconds to get a handle on exactly what's happening, and as he peers into the newly calmed melee, it doesn't even take him that long to stand up over the dune and take out a throwing knife, quiet against the crashing of waves against the shore. He takes a quick breath as he sets up his aim and he lets it out in a hard exhale as he hurls the knife, blade over grip, towards the chest of the rat crouching over Taye as he shouts to his companions.
There's a thunk as Tyree's listless form is bodily shoved up and over the side of the small ship, landing on the desk. One of the two who just carried him pulls himself up onto the deck as well, while the other turns, about to wade back to help the lingering rat with the last of their captives. They both go still, seeing Darklett in the moment that the black buck releases the knife. "'ey!" one of them calls out, in a belated attempt to warn the rat on the beach. The call reaches him just after the knife does, plunging into the middle of his chest. Eyes wide, he staggers a step back, sways, and crumples sideways. "Gor'ammit!" one of the slavers snaps, while the one still in the water hesitates - then turns back to the ship. He clambers quickly out of the shallows and onto the deck, even as the single sail is unfurled. "Dun' bother," another grumbles; they have two new captives for the three they lost, and no one argues the decision. The loosed sail catches a wind, billowing out, and the prow turns out toward deeper water. A distinctive blue banner ripples from the tip of the mask, showing a whiskered face with two long tusks. For a moment longer the side of the vessel is within view, 'WAYWARD WALRUS' printed in blocky letters - then the wind takes it quickly away from the beach, out toward the open ocean.
Darklett's feet carry him toward the shores as fast as he can, but he is nowhere near fast enough. Ankles splashing in the shallows, his paw falls away from his belt where he had grabbed his next knife. He mutters a curse under his breath -- he hadn't seen who it was that they'd managed to take off with. He does get the name of that ship in full view, then turns to scan his surroundings, looking for any straggling vermin that might still be around... But all seems quiet. He steps back and at least gets his boots out of the cold ocean water, jogging towards the fallen form of Taye. "Wayward Walrus," he whispers to himself as he does so, committing that to memory as he kneels down next to the major. "Taye," he whispers, a paw going to his face, then to the side of his neck to check for his pulse.
Deidra is headed out onto the beach, not to make the trip to Salamandastron, but to meet a certain buck after finishing up work at her forge. She crests a dune not long after Darklett, peering off into the distance one way, then swings her gaze around in the other when she doesn't immediately see Tyree. What she does see causes her to go still - a quickly receding ship and several slain vermin, with Darklett crouched at the side of a uniformed form. She moves forward, sand giving way beneath her quick steps as she descends the slope of the dune and hurries toward the retired Colonel. "Darklett..?" she ventures, before her approach brings Taye clearly into view. "/Holyfff/--... Taye!"
As Taye is lifted, his head lolls first one way and then the other, resting against Darklett's shoulder. The warm blood soaks into the Colonel's uniform from the deep split just above and to the front of his temple.
Darklett's ears perk at the sound of footfalls, and he turns his head to see who it is. Long ears... Good. As Deidra approaches, he recognizes her, turning to face her and holding Taye's limp form in his arms. "He's alive," he informs the doe first thing. "We need to get him help," he states, calmly, already heading toward Halyard. "Ship took off with a couple of other patrollers, don't know who. Can you run ahead and make sure there's somebeast in the clinic and a cot ready?"
The steady reassurance from Darklett helps Deidra fend off a moment of panic. She takes a breath, casting a quick glance around - still no Tyree. "Yes. Of course," she answers hastily, drawing back a step as Darklett moves forward, carrying the other buck with no apparent difficulty. She stares at the rather /not/ alive-looking Major for a moment longer, then turns back in the direction she came from, heading toward the village clinic with a flurry of windblown blond curls.
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