Ox yelped as the porcupine's teeth came down on his fingers. They were strong but full of nerves but Ox took the pain and pulled harder, waiting for it to get wide enough to stick his horns in and do real damage.

Nayeli let out several inhuman howls as she was given more cuts and turned her head to the side so that the pressure was on her neck muscles and would take longer to suffocate her. She started clawing without mercy at her girl's eyes, her teeth still bared and ready to chomp down on anything that touched them.

The bird arched his back and screamed in pain, spasming from the volts pulsing through him. The electricity, however, only made his muscles tighten and his feet dig deeper into the eel's skin.

"Not if you can't open your mouth," Lula hissed and threw the hook at an angle so that it looped around the gator's mouth and came back and latched itself around the wire. Then she gave it a good hard yank.

The wind was knocked out of Connor and for a moment he lost his grip and slid partially off, only his arm and one leg holding him on. He pulled himself up quickly before he could actually fall off and held his gun like a bat. "Looks like you've chosen door number two," he muttered, and aimed for the back of the centaur's head.

Spike made a face at the taste of the man's fingers, trying his best to pull his head back into safety. He realized that there were only two options at the moment, continue to bite and possibly be stabbed by the vicious looking horns, or pull his head in and hope for the best, "I choose life." He squealed and let go of the man, now trying harder to pull him head in.

The young tiger let out cries of pain when she was attacked, tears following from one bleeding eye and gripped as hard as she could, going into a death grip, knowing that her tiny muscles wouldn't last as long as the woman's.

The eel shook with pain now trying to pull him off as hard as he could, not caring if it was going to hurt him a bit more to get rid of the larger pain. He felt the blood oozing from his wounds and mixing with the slime that covered his body.

The alligator started to freak out, clawing and shaking his head, trying to get the lop off. He slammed his head against the wall, obviously he was only around for his muscles not his brain. He flung Thanatos away from him, wondering if it would help the problem at hand. He could only breath out of his mouth and now that that was closed he was losing oxygen.

Thanatos ran towards the bird girl, figuring that she had to be the less of both evils at least.

The centaur tried to swing at him again, wanting him off of his back. He hated how he felt he was being ridden like he was owned by the gazelle, "GET OFF OF MY BACK!" He shout once again.

Ox lifted one foot and started kicking at the opening. It made for an awkward balancing act on his part but he had no doubt it had to hurt.

Nayeli started choking as she was no longer able to shriek in anger. Her face began to turn red and as her brain began losing oxygen she turning to instincts alone. And her instincts told her one thing: bite and scratch. And she willingly obeyed.

He pulled his claws out and stumbled away from the eel to recover. His clothes seemed to be singed at the edges and his eyes felt like they were buzzing. "What are you waiting for? Kill him!" he called to Gabriele while the eel was still occupied with him.

Lula squeaked as she was nearly pulled out of the air by the thrashing gator. Once she saw Thanatos was free she folded up her fleshy black wings and knelt down. "Come on, kid," she coaxed, her large fuzzy ears swiveling like radars as she let out high-pitched clicks every few seconds to check for further danger even when her eyes were on the boy.

"As if," Connor sneered, swinging the gun with one hand so it only went around the centaur's neck and then grabbed the other end and pulled against his throat roughly.

Spike whimpered at every kick, not wanting to face what was on the other side of his spikes. Every blow to the head was extremely painful, making his head spin.

The young tiger held on through the pain, whimpering and crying. She didn't want to let go even though all the pain was becoming to great, she knew it could be worse if she let go.

The eel turned back to Gabriele and was shocked at what he saw just before there was a loud bang, his head exploded everywhere and all that was left was a bleeding corpse and the smoking barrel of a trench gun. The headless body fell onto Gabriele as she sat up, knocking her back down, "Get it off of me!" She growled, her wings were ruined from the eel and were bleeding horribly.

Thanatos's ears twitched at the clicks, "What are you doing?" He half whimpered when he was next to her. The gator was smashing his head against the wall, turning it into a bloodied pulp as he clawed frantically at the wire.

The centaur started to gag, thrashing wildly. He was losing oxygen, wanting to get free.

"Come on out, you coward. Fight like an animal!" Ox roared, kicking without mercy. He wasn't going to be satisfied until the porcupine fought back, ran away, or died.

Nayeli's head was spinning. Her tail was bristled and her eyes shone. She wasn't doing enough damage to get free so she began to panic, thrashing and twisting in desperation as well as ripping with her teeth and nails.

The black bird got to his feet and shoved the body away, wincing as jolts of remaining electricity escaped it every now and then. He turned to Gabriele and was about to say something, but when he saw her wings he shut his mouth.

"Hearing around the room for anything else bad," she said, scooping his up and flying up high enough that even a high jump couldn't reach her. "I got him," she called, focusing in her voice on Connor.

Connor looked up and nodded, loosening his grip just slightly in his distraction. That might have been his most fatal mistake yet.

"I am!!" Spike muttered, trying to roll the spikes into the ox once again.

The tiger let go after her arms were beginning to turn into shreds, jumping out of the way to lick at her wounds and ready herself to attack once more.

"Shred his shirt!" Gabriele told the bird as she grab one of her wings and tried to determine the amount of damage. She could see through to the other side in some spots and winced.

"Oh...." Thanatos nodded, though kept looking at the alligator a bit nervously, "Will he be alright?" He watched the alligator struggle with the wire around his mouth until he collapsed to the ground.

The centaur took this moment and swung down as hard as he could with his staff onto the gazelle's arms, hoping to break them as he started to bite anything near him with his powerful jaws, "You will die." He growled.

Ox humphed at the porcupine's reply. "Well, trust me. You ain't going anywhere," he said with another kick and an experimental, sharp stab of his horn. But when his leg came away it had many needles embedded in it and Ox let out a roaring groan of pain.

Nayeli gasped for air and clutched her neck in the time the tiger was taking to recover. As the blood escaped from her face she spun around and glared at the tigress. When it seemed she wasn't going to back down Nayeli dashed at her with teeth bared and claws at the ready.

He obeyed, pulling the cloth off the carcass and shredding it with his claws with a small cringe of disgust. Then he threw the pieces at Gabriele.

Lula paused and looked from the boy to the alligator. "Do you want him to be?" she asked gently.

Connor let out a yell as the bones in his arms splintered and he almost let go of the gun. But now, he decided he was finished with this and hoisted the gun onto his shoulder and held the trigger with a shaking hand. It was a blind attempt and a desperate one but he still managed to fire the gun.

Blood gushed from the wound caused by the horns and a muffled cry of pain could be heard as the porcupine tried to roll away from the man. Most of his spikes were gone, leaving him with only the hardened skin that was serving like a shell.

The tigress jumped up into the air and clung to the ceiling, trying to think of a way to attack before she dropped down a clawed at her again. Her arm was still bleeding, but it wasn't bleeding much anymore.

Gabriele caught most of the cloth and started tying them onto her wings, using them as makeshift bandages for now. She winced in pain from the pressure on her wings, but knew she needed to bandage them.

"Nobody deserves to die...Even if they are bad..." He whimpered a bit, hoping the alligator would be okay, even though the gator had attacked him and threatened to eat him.

The centaur collapsed to the ground, crying out in pain as the buckshot sprayed his back with shot. He tried to kick at Connor, not wanting the gun anywhere near him as hetried to see the damage to his back.

Ox's head was jerked sharply as Spike tried to roll away again. He hadn't been able to dislodge his horn on his own and was now being dragged as he braced against it and used all the muscles in his neck to pull loose.

Nayeli never took her eyes off the girl and whirled around with an angry snarl as she attacked again, using her own arms to defend herself from the oncoming claws.

The blackbird shoved the eel aside and went to work wrapping Gabriele's wings. His face was stern as he tied them tight to help stop the blood. He was one of the few amatuer medics in the group. Nayeli was another.

Lula nodded and landed close to the alligator. She cautiously moved forward keeping Thanatos farther away from the man than she was and freed the wire from his mouth before running back a safe distance and taking to the air. She looked around at her crew and the damage they were suffering. "Let's go!" she called forcefully, frightened by the bloodshed. She couldn't understand why they were still fighting when they had gotten what they had come for.

Connor started to get off the centaur as he fell but once he started thrashing Connor lost his balance and was given a sharp blow to the hip that knocked him down. He instinctively tried to land on his front, forgetting of his injuries, and yelped again when he suffered from his mistake. Again, like in the sewer, his vision was obscured by stars. He felt bile rise in his throat but swallowed it painfully and rolled onto his back.

"Get off!" The porcupine shouted as he tried to roll away from the ox, slowly dragging him around. He could feel Ox trying to fight back, realizing that the man could possibly cause him way more harm if he wasn't careful.

The tigress clawed anywhere she could, mainly aiming for the raccoon's face and arms. (blah...couldn't think of much...)

"Damn eel." Gabriele muttered crossly as she winced in pain from her wings, "Ow, careful please. I think they could be broken in a few places."

Thanatos watched curiously, "He's not going to hurt you...He's already unconscious by the looks of it." He called to Lula as he moved closer to them. He was glad she had helped the gator, and hugged her when she was finished, "Thank you for helping him."

The centaur tried to get up and run, but the pain in his back was too much for him to think straight, "What the hell did you do?" He demanded from Connor.

Phly ran back into the room, having collected a few things he had and what he figured they would need, including a medical kit, "Wow..." He was shocked at what all had happened.

"Well, stop moving, you dimwit! You're gonna take my horn off!" Ox snarled, pushing Spike away with his hands and twisting his head as far as he could to dislodge it.

Nayeli fell back from the momentum of the tigress and curled her legs up before pushing them into the girl's stomach.

"Oh yeah, they're shattered," the blackbird said with confidence. There wasn't much he could do now except stop the bleeding and pressure was needed for that. If they ever got out of here alive she'd need splints. "Just don't pass out."

"You're welcome," Lula smiled. She looked around and shook her head. "We got to get you to a safe place. I'm getting tired just hovering here." She glanced around for a safe place to land but it seemed the floor was pulsating with the fighting of the two gangs.

Connor sat up with some difficulty. "I shot you in the back, dumbass!" Connor spat with a roll of his eyes, as if that fact were plainly obvious. He spotted Phly out of the corner of his eye and got to his feet. "Phly, we need to get out of here!" he called, staring at his dropped shotgun hopelessly.

"I don't care if you lose your horns or not!" The porcupine growled and curled himself a bit to get a look at the surroundings. He tried to bite the ox's nose.

The tigress let out a oof and fell backwards, then started to scramble to her feet.

"Like I would." Gabriele laughed a bit forcefully while she pulled her wings as close to her back as she could manage.

"Why not next to Phly... He seems like he doesn't have any trouble next to him." Thanatos suggested.

"I'm not an ass, I'm a horse, get it straight!" The centaur growled and kicked at Connor. His staff had rolled out of reach and it didn't help that the centaur bleeding from his back wound.

"Yeah...I know a safe way out." Phly said, still a bit shocked at everything, "Where did Regis go?" He asked, referring to the lion.

Ox saw the teeth coming and pulled his head away. There was a snap and half of his horn was gone. It was the worst pain he had felt the whole fight and he tilted his head back and groaned in agony.

Nayeli had lost all consciousness of the world around her as she bounced up to attack again. She had done two things wrong in this fight: she had made it personal, and she had let her animal side almost completely take over.

"Just making sure," the bird shrugged once all the cloth was used up and extended his feathered, clawed hand to her.

Lula noticed the frog and assumed that was who the boy was talking about. She nodded and glided down behind him, setting Thanatos gently down beside her.

"You think I really care?" Connor snapped, kicking his own leg out to block it. When they made contact he felt the vibrations all the way up his spine. The force had been like jumping from a two story height and it stunned him for a moment. He blinked a few times before answering. "The cat? I think he escaped."

Spike's eye twitched as he heard the snap and quickly uncurled to check for damage, wincing when he felt the horn stuck in his shoulder, crying out as he pulled on it, trying to get it out.

The tigress pounced once again, aiming for her throat again, but was pulled out of the air by a long sticky tongue and tossed across the room.

She took his hand and pulled herself to her feet, "Thanks, though I think I'm going to need more than the bandages."

Thanatos looked at the frog as he shot his tongue out, helping out the raccoon once again, "Now where can we go to get away?" He asked curiously.

"You should, so you know what killed you!" Mule growled, kicking more at Connor, wanting to do great harm to him.

"He's not a cat... He's a lion, and a cowardly one at that." Phly said after he pulled his tongue back in and looked about, "Head to the opposite side of the theater, there's an emergency exit that is never guarded." He told the group.

Ox glared at Spike through bloodshot eyes, breathing heavily and pawing the ground with his hooves. He would have and could have finished it but someonce else took his attention away.

Nayeli started running after the girl to finish her off when something grabbed the back of her neck and kept her from moving. She let out crazed yowls, thrashing and writhing as though she were going to be killed. "Nayeli! Pull yourself together!" Ox roared, still keeping his hand firmly holding her neck. Slowly, the look of humanity returned to her eyes and she looked up at Ox, startled at herself.

"Definitely," he replied. "I'm Delmareve, by the way. Everyone calls me Reve though," although the words were meant to be cheery, the blackbird's tone was flat and matter-of-fact as it usually was.

Lula looked down the hall to get her bearings before she jerked her head at Thanatos to come with her. "Thank you," she called to Phly.

"Stronger fighters than you have tried," Connor said threateningly. But he was in no condition to take anymore damage so he backed out of reach of the centaur, glaring at him and then saw his staff. He ran over to it and kicked it up into reach of his hands. If it could break arms that easily, Connor was pondering what it could do to a rib cage.

Spike took the moment to dart as far away as he could, not wanting to be near the angry Ox anymore.

The tigress growled at the raging raccoon, but shrank away when she charged. She looked around for Spike and saw he left and whimpered, not sure what to do.

"Phly lead the way." Gabriele called to the frog, looking over to see him trying to pull the knife off of his hand. She looked around, "Come on, we got who we came here for, and Connor either bring the damn horse or put him out of his misery."

Thanatos nodded and headed towards the other side of the theater. He just wanted to be out of the territory, but froze at the sight of the gas-masked kid with the green stripe down the middle of his head. The striped hair boy tried to speak, but his gas mask made it impossible to understand him. He held an Browning in his hands and it was pointed towards Thanatos and Lula's direction.

Mule froze at the sight of his staff in the hands of Connor, "You know that I will take my staff and kill you with it."

Phly ran out after Thanatos, completely forgetting to mention that the boy at the end of the hall was friendly, not hostile.

Ox shook his head wildly at the tigress. "You should follow him," he growled, seeing her look around for her gang mate. He ushered Nayeli toward the others as she quietly licked her wounds.

"Yeah, nice to meet you too," Reve muttered to himself, always the sarcastic one. "You need anymore help?" he asked, the previous tone completely gone from his voice.

Lula spotted the boy and the gun and stiffened. Instinctively, she bared her teeth and raised her wings high over her head, making her look absolutely hideous. A low gravelly noise like nails on chalkboard rippled up from her throat. Unfortunately, she had left her weapon back in the other room.

Connor's ears tilted as he heard Gabriele and stared Mule for a moment. "No one would ever trust you anyway," he muttered, and in a split second of change of heart he brought the staff down toward the horse's head.

The tigress quickly followed Spike, not wanting to deal with the man and his dangerous horn.

Gabriele's ear twitched, "What? Need my name? Gabriele." She sighed and shook her head, "No, I'll be fine for now." She said before leaving after the group.

Thanatos let out a small whimper, afraid of getting hit if the boy was to start firing. Phly rushed forward, "No!! don't scare him!!! Whatever you do don't scare him!" He shouted to Lula, but it was too late, the gas-masked boy dropped the gun and the room started to smell horribly, the stench was horrid enough to make a normal human's eyes tear up and make them get sick. The boy was fine, for the gas mask was filtering the air for him. Thanatos's nose started hurting and he covered it with his shirt, though it wasn't much help, "Gah! A SKUNK!!!"

Mule let out a whimper, "Don't!" He whimpered, holding his hands above his head, hoping it would take most of the blow.

As Nayeli and Ox caught up with the others, the smell hit them and the hair on Nayeli's tail fluffed out. "Good God!" Ox exclaimed, coughing. "What died?!" Nayeli picked up the shotgun Connor had dropped near the door. "How do I get him to stop?" she demanded from Phly.

Lula gagged as the smell went down her throat. She tried beating her wings to ventilate the place but it did little good. "You could have warned me!" she gasped covering her mouth and nose with her arm and trying to take as shallow breaths as possible.

"Mkay," Reve said with a shrug and took to the air himself. At the sound of the others' words he decided to stay out of the hallway for the moment until it was safer.

Connor stopped just before he made contact, wincing at the searing pain in his arms. He was trembling, not from the pain or the anger, but from the urge to kill this man. It was not an emotion he had been born to feel and it was torture. Finally he let out a disgusted roar. "I don't have time for this!" he yelled, tossed the staff to the side and ran after his friends.

"You can't get him to stop anything, he only does it once something scares him and normally that's enough. Now run through the door, but don't light a match!" Phly commanded and covered his mouth and nose, grabbing the gas-masked boy and ran through the door he was guarding for them. There was a breeze outside that blew strong and whipped at everything, but the stench wasn't outside of the theater.

Gabriele gagged at the smell, but forced herself to keep from letting the bile that was building up to escape. She rushed forward and scooped up the small fox, pulling him back away from the stench while they allowed everybody else to leave first. "Gabby!" Thanatos hugged the girl that grabbed him and looked around, "They helped save me. We should invite them to the place..."
"Shhh, we'll talk about all of that later, I promise." She smiled and kissed the top of his head.

Phly ushered people out and looked to see who all had made it, "What happened to the horse?" He asked, hoping his friend wasn't killed or mortally wounded.

Nayeli stepped aside from Ox, now past her insecurities. She was the first to get out the door and let out her breath in a whoosh, facing the wind so she wouldn't have to smell that stench too much. The others who followed her had similar responses as they were able to breath again.

Lula smiled when she saw Gabriele and Thanatos, now fully understanding why she and her friends had been called for help.

"Reve, come on," Connor called and before he could blink a flash of red and black flew past him and out the door, trying to get out as quickly as possible. Connor looked at Phly. "He's back there. Still alive," he said bitterly as he trotted through the door.

Nayeli turned to look at her gang mates. "Holy crap. We look like road kill!" she said, with wide eyes although she was grinning. Her own scrapes were just oozing blood now. Connor nodded. "Yeah, no sh-" Before he could get it all out he was forced to turn away as he finally puked his guts up. The mingling smells of skunk and blood were overwhelming. It was only a quick scene and everyone kindly looked away to let him keep his dignity until at last he straightened up and wiped his mouth on his shirt.

“Thanks for not killing him.” Phly smiled set Gasket down, taking the large gun from his hands, “I'll carry this....I think you have enough of a weapon.” He laughed and set the gun in his satchel, “Okay...Where to now?” He asked the group. “Can we join your group?” The muffled question came from Gasket, hoping his accident didn't affect the possibility of being allowed to join the different gang.

Gabriele finally walked out of the building and Thanatos finally saw how wounded she really was, “No....” He half whimpered and looked about at everybody else that was wounded, “This isn't fair...Everybody got hurt because of me....” He could stop the tears that started to flow, burying his face in Gabriele's arms as she comforted him, “It's fine dear, wounds heal.”

(the horse might follow after a bit... just so I has a few more characters if I need them...If I don't end up needing him, then I won't even mention him in the future posts...If that makes sense...)

At the boy's question, everyone glanced nervously at each other. "You'll have to ask our Alpha," Connor replied darkly. Several people's eyes turned to the ground in unspoken discomfort. "But I don't even know if he'll let us back in, considering we picked a fight with another gang behind his back," he added, a bit shifty. Then Lula spoke what everyone else was thinking. "He's going to be really mad."

Nayeli walked up and patted Thanatos's head. "It's okay, buddy. We'll be fine, I promise. We've had worse than just a couple scratches."

Ox cleared his throat as he yanked out the quills from his hands and leg. "Regardless of what Cade may or may not do to any of us, we need to get away from here before they come back with reinforcments. We're in no condition to keep on fighting so let's figure this stuff out when we aren't in mortal danger, shall we?" He turned and began walking, with a slight limp, toward the border of the two territories.

(That makes sense. You can bring in whoever, whenever. It doesn't matter to me.)

"Wouldn't he accept that you guys were helping friends in need?" Gasket asked and lifted his gas mask and set it in his small messenger bag, "I mean you guys were saving somebody, doesn't that count for something?" He looked over to Phly, "Can I...?" The frog looked confused for a second and then shook his head, "No, you make enough of them as it is."
"But this one is my favorite...please?"
"I said no."
"But..."
"No buts"
"It's a great form of transportation and you know it." The skunk crossed his arms and looked a bit upset.

Thanatos smiled and grabbed one of Nayeli's arms, "Tigers are very horrible creatures...You need to get antibacterial stuff on every scratch. I read that they can kill prey with just a scratch because of all the bacterial that lives under their claws...And I'm sure that girl has that attribute as well." He told her and was looking for infection as well as he could.

"Thanks for helping me save him...and...err... sorry for earlier..." Gabriele apologized to Nayeli, not used to apologizing that often.

"We are not using that thing! It's made completely out of junk!" Phly shouted as he was trying to pull the knife out of his hand, which was still glued there.

"It was metal and not junk, parts thank you very much." Gasket growled and pulled out a remote and hit a large green button. There was a rumbling sound as a large bus that looked like it could survive being shot at came into view. The bus was covered in sheet metal and anything that could be used for protection or as a weapon.

"He's kind of...strict," Connor replied. "And paranoid, and just overall not right in the head," Lula replied, again saying what everyone else was thinking. "You have to understand. He wasn't a born Anthro, and he tried an experimental version of the stuff that makes humans into us rather than the stable one 'cause he thought it'd be better. So yeah, he's not right," Reve explained calmly. "So not right that he killed our old leader in cold blood." Connor visibly winced.

Nayeli smiled as she was lectured by the little boy, surprised at his knowledge. "I'll get it cleaned as soon as we're home," she assured him. She looked up at Gabriele. "Hey, it's totally cool. You don't need to say sorry. We get over stuff here really quickly. If we didn't how would we stay together?"

"The hell is that?" Ox asked as all eyes turned to watch the strange bus drive up.