ENEMY

He was forgetting himself. 

The light filtering in from above was beginning to dim. Not evening, surely - Calen didn’t think it was possible to have lost that much time. It was late afternoon at most, he hoped - but he had never been one of those types who could look at the angle of a shadow and know the precise time of day. Joaquim could, though. And as Calen thought of the affable man, he was reminded just how lost he had gotten between Elkali, his injury, and his personal investigative goals.

If he disappeared, David would give him two hours before they gave up searching for him. Disappearances were as common as fatalities, if not more so. Joaquim had told him all about the team members that wandered off, or vanished when they had been right alongside their colleagues. Look away for a few seconds, no more than even a minute, and they would just be gone when you turned back. Whether they’d been whisked away by beasts or fallen into something, or perhaps walked through a portal to another world - as Joaquim liked to joke - there wasn’t much ceremony in response. Those that joined these teams were usually considered disposable.

Calen was new to the team. And while he’d yet to make David angry, he hadn’t really ingratiated himself to the man, either. He doubted David would even give him the full two hours. Or any manpower. He’d just make the statement: John Smith is missing and has two hours to meet at the rendezvous point. Maybe he’d spare a member or two to collect Calen’s equipment. The only person that might come looking for him was Joaquim.

When Calen directed his focus back to Elkali, he noted that he was standing quite still. His ears were swiveling, and he was orientating himself towards the hole in the ceiling.

“Elkali? What is it?”

The monster swung his gaze back to Calen. He gave a sharp click, tail swishing around him.

“Is it another monster?”

Elkali demurred. Calen furrowed his brow. “Is it dangerous?”

Elkali indicated that it was not.

“In that case, would you be willing to lift me back out?” Calen pointed to the hole. “I need to return to the rest of my team. They will leave me here if I don’t return on time.”

He could sense the reluctance in Elkali’s body language as Calen suggested leaving. His ears had flattened, a mild furrowing evident in his brow. But he turned to Calen, all the same, with his arms open. He would help Calen ascend.

It was odd, but Calen could understand the sentiment. He had, despite his better judgement, actually enjoyed himself in the monster’s company. “... I’ll be back, Elkali.”

Elkali’s ears perked up. He chirped at Calen, as if asking for Calen to reaffirm his assertion.

“Yes,” Calen spoke softly, enjoying the way Elkali’s many eyes brightened. “Not right away, but… I can come back. The investigation teams operate daily. David - he’s the one I answer to - will want another team out here tomorrow. To - ah - investigate you.”

Elkali cocked his head.

“Yes, you. We’ve been following all of the… Pieces you left. I don’t know why you were pulling off parts of yourself, but are you able to stop?” A sense of relief coursed through him when Elkali nodded. “Okay. Very good. Don’t do that, then, okay? I need you to stop.”

Elkali didn’t protest, shuffling his wings in response. God, did Calen want to touch them. They looked so glossy and soft…

“El-”

A sound cut across the tangle of his thoughts. A cry, echoing in wild, desperate tones. It was a human voice, and one that he recognized.

“John! Are you out there?!”

Joaquim.

Calen looked to Elkali, who was cautiously surveying the sound. Ah. So that was what he had been hearing. Sharp senses, and all.

“Elkali. That’s one of my team members,” Calen whispered, “It’s alright, but I need you to get out of sight.”

Elkali flared his wings indignantly.

“Go - please? He isn’t dangerous. I just don’t know how he’ll react to seeing you. Remember how I reacted?” Calen shooed, gesturing to the shadows. 

Elkali slunk away, though he didn’t go far. 

When Calen was certain he wouldn’t be seen from the hole, he called back to Joaquim. It took a few tries, and Calen had to stand in the direct centre of the hole on the pile of rubble.

When Calen’s voice finally registered, Joaquim cried out in surprise. “John?!”

Calen cupped his hands over his mouth to amplify the sound. “Joaquim! The hole off to the right side of the room. Careful! The floorboards are sinking!”

There was a curse. “You're down there?! Are you okay?!”

“Yes, I’m-” Calen spared a wayward glance at Elkali, who had started to creep closer. Calen gave his best intimidating glare, but the monster just snorted at him. “I’m fine! Or as fine as I can be, given the circumstances.”

Dirt crumbled into the hole as Joaquim moved around upstairs. “What the fuck happened?! Did you fall?”

In a sense, Calen thought. “Yes.”

“You’re fucking stupid!”

“... Yes.”

Couldn't argue with that.

There was anger in Joaquim’s voice - but even more than that, Calen could hear the worry and fear. He wasn’t sure how to feel about that.

Joaquim’s face appeared in the sky. “Are you injured?”

Calen was grateful, in that moment, for Elkali’s impromptu cleaning. A massive bloodstain would have made this whole situation even harder to explain. “Not really, no.”

“Not really or no?” Joaquim pressed. There was no mirth in his voice. He was serious and to the point, assessing the severity of the situation.

“No.”

Joaquim nodded. “You look awful.”

There was the mirth, faint as it might be. Calen folded his arms. “Yes, well, I feel awful.”

“How in the hell did you get yourself down here? How do you not see a hole like this?”

“I just… Tripped.”

Joaquim raised a brow. “You tripped. Just found the only hole in the floor and tripped through it?”

“Yes, ceiling man. It was unfortunate, it happened, and now I am here.”

“That what you plan on telling David?”

“What I plan on-” Calen narrowed his eyes, “Why would I tell David about any of this?”

“Oh? You don’t think David’ll want to hear why all of his equipment is damaged?”

“I didn’t bring any of the equipment down here with me.”

“No,” Joaquim ducked out of sight, rummaging through something, “You just smashed it all good before you found a hole to fall down.”

“What are you talking about? I didn’t smash anything.”

“Yeah, you did John. All of my stuff, the whole kit, is completely broken. What did you do, sit on it?”

Calen would have remembered something like that. “No. Of course not. I just.. I heard some strange noises in the corridor. I put your equipment down - I did not sit on it - and I came to investigate. I missed the hole in the floor, fell through, and that’s all.”

“So you didn’t tear up my entire notebook, then?”

“No!”

“Well, that’s great news, John.” Joaquim’s voice indicated it was everything except great. “Because that means someone else is in the building with us. And tampering with our equipment.”

Calen spared Elkali a wayward glance, who was tilting his head. That didn’t make sense, though. Elkali had been down here with him. “You’re certain it was tampering? It couldn’t have been a monster of some sort?”

“I’m certain. Monsters don’t bother with small stuff like that. And when they do-” Joaquim grunted, and there was a shuffle of rocks, “-They’re intelligent. So either way it’s someone in the building. Which means we’re getting you out of here as quickly as we can.”

Calen mulled over the idea. 

He didn’t fancy that the chances of another Elkali-like creature were particularly high. And Elkali hadn’t indicated that there were any other monsters in the area, like him or otherwise. It wasn’t outside of the realm of possibility for there to be humans in the area. Plenty had abandoned the cities, and there were supposedly people out in the wilderness who tried to stake out their own lives living off of the land. The reports that Calen had been privy had described lives filled with misery. Between monsters, disease, and general scarcity their lives were ‘solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short’ - as it were. Interactions with them were typically said to be unpleasant and confrontational.

Joaquim waved a hand over the hole. “I’m going to fasten a rope to something up here. I’ll be back in a moment. You stay where you are.”

“Why are we using a rope? I could try to find another exit.”

Joaquim’s voice came from a ways away. “We’re using a rope, Dr. Smith, because there’s someone else in the building. You want to run into a potential hostile? No, you do not. Won’t be so tough if you meet a monster, either.”

Elkali snuffled behind him, and Calen pinched his mouth shut.

Joaquim continued. “And! It’s an unsafe practice to run around a collapsed building.”

“Hey!” Calen protested, “You entered the building first, Joaquim! As I recall, I was the first one to say that this could be unsafe.”

“Ah ha! The difference is that I am a professional. You are just a professional hole finder.”

Calen muttered something low and unintelligible under his breath. Hole finder was the very last thing he wanted to be referred to as.

"... Do not call me that."

"Call you what, hole finder?"

Calen grimaced. He was not going to get into it with Joaquim. Knowing him, that would be Calen's new nickname for good if he did.

After a bit of shuffling upstairs, a rope was tossed through the hole. 

Joaquim called out from above. “You’re going to test your weight on it first, eh? Then we’ll pull you up. Ain’t going to be easy, though, Doc. You don’t have anything to repel against, so it’s going to just be me, you, and whatever upper body strength you got.”

“Very well.” Calen gave a resigned tug on the rope, testing its security. “Do you know if my equipment was tampered with as well?”

“No idea. It’ll be nice not to get chewed out by David with a full kit, though, eh?”

“You can have it. My kit, I mean. We’ll swap. It’s on the west-side, just beyond the escalators.” Calen paused. The nightmarish sequence of events that had led him up until this point flared through his mind. The head. The thorn. The escalators. “Joaquim. Whatever you do, do not touch any of the plants on the escalator. Better yet, once I’m up we’ll need to find a way around them.”

“Eh? I don’t need your equipment.”

“That’s not what’s important,” Calen pulled sharply on the rope, “Don’t. Touch. The. Plants. Did any of them cut you on your way up or down?”

“Are we talking buttercups, or-”

“-Seriously, Joaquim! They’re deadly.”

“Deadly?” There was a pause. “Doctor.”

“Yes?”

“Your gloves. You changed them earlier. Did you touch these plants?”

Calen silently cursed Joaquim’s seemingly preternatural ability to sense things that were out of place. If he were even a touch dumber, he’d be far easier to handle. He wouldn’t probe or figure things out. “Uh, no. I saw an animal touch it.”

“Oh yeah? And what happened to this animal?”

“It died.”

Joaquim grunted in response, but he didn’t sound particularly convinced.

Calen pressed. “Did you scrape yourself or touch any of the plants?”

“Can’t say I did.”

“Okay. That’s good. I’ll check you over once I’m up just to be sure. And Joaquim? Keep an eye out for thorny plants. It’s a red vine that’s all over the escalators. But stay away from any thorns just to be safe.”

Calen busied himself by testing his weight against the rope. It held, but he was swaying from side to side, scraping against a pile of rubble to his left. Joaquim was right. This was going to be a bit of a challenge. Calen had muscle definition, but it was the result of necessity in surgery; while it wasn’t his area of expertise, he was often called upon for physically demanding musculoskeletal surgeries, manipulating and stabilizing joints, bones, fractures. It only seemed to make him heavier as he hung from the rope. 

He pulled himself up, bit by bit.

Joaquim poked his head over the hole to observe. “Holding good?”

“More,” Calen puffed, “Or less.”

“Good workout.” Joaquim was smiling. “Wrap the rope around your leg. No, not like that. Let the rope fall outside of your leg. It should hug your thigh. Yes, more like that. Now, use your other leg and step on the part that’s falling on the first leg. There you go, Doc! Secure it in place. Next you’re going to reach up as high as possible and get a grip.”

Calen held the position in a stranglehold. “And then?”

“Squat down and then stand up using your legs. Keep repeating the process, reach high, squat, and stand up to climb higher.”

Calen felt a bit like an inchworm on a stick, squatting and standing, but the method was a markedly better approach to just trying to scale the rope. He heard Elkali chirp at him softly from the shadows. Calen shook his head furiously, hoping that Elkali would take his meaning and stay hidden.

Joaquim misunderstood, and cheered him on. “There you go! Up, and up! We’ll have you trained for the military in no time, eh?”

“Hardly.”

There was a long pause as Calen shuffled his way up the rope. When Joaquim spoke again, the merriment in his voice had died. “John.” There was something strange when he spoke. He said the word softly, carefully, padding around it like it was something sharp.

Calen squinted up at him in confusion. “Yes?”

“How quickly can you scale the rope?”

“Uhhh, not very. Thought we’d established that. What’s wrong?”

Joaquim gave a long, drawn out breath. “Stay very still.” Joaquim was whispering now. His eyes were wide behind his mask. The eeriness of his tone made the hairs on the back of Calen’s neck stand on end. “We’re going to speak quietly, yes?”

“... What is it?” Calen lowered his voice as much as he could. His arms shook as he held himself on the rope.

“Calm, John, calm.”

“I’m calm.”

“Yeah, you’re calm? You’re not going to panic. You’re going to stay nice and quiet and still.”

“I am, what’s going on Joaquim-”

“There’s a monster down there with you, John. Calm. Keep scaling the rope. You’re almost in arm’s reach.”

“A monster-” Calen trailed off. Oh. His eyes darted to Elkali, who was following their conversation intently. Elkali had gotten too close, clearly curious about their banter. Just his luck that he had a creature on his hands who couldn't sit still.

A relief that it wasn't anything else.  A rush of giddiness flooded his senses and almost had him laughing. “I’ll be up there in no time.”

“... Yeah.” Joaquim was still speaking in that low, intent way. He didn’t look Calen’s way. “I’m watching it. It isn’t moving towards you yet. I think it’s one of the ones we’ve been finding. A healthy one.”

Calen made a noncommittal noise.

“It’s definitely seeing you. But it’s staying still. There are monsters like that out there. Big fuckers that mind their own business.” Joaquim kept chattering quietly. It occurred to Calen that he might be trying to keep Calen calm. “We don’t know what this guy is. But you’re almost there and-”

An explosion rocked the lower floor, sending Calen crashing to the ground. The force of the fall knocked the wind out of him. Sharp, stabbing pain punctured his chest as he struggled to take in breath.

“Shit!” Joaquim was recoiling, a string of curses tumbling from his mouth. “John! Keep low to the ground!”

Calen took in a harsh gulp of air. 

There was another explosion somewhere behind him. 

Elkali’s snarls echoing in the background. He threw himself onto his stomach, scanning the room. Clouds of dust filled the air. Elkali had disappeared somewhere inside of the space.

Calen scrambled to his feet. “There’s-”

“Shut up!” Joaquim’s harsh command issued from above him. “Don’t draw attention to yourself! Get your ass back onto the rope!”

That sounded logical. It was logical, except for the fact that Calen was worried about Elkali.

“I-'' Calen frantically searched the darkness for signs of the monster. He could hear him somewhere out of sight, deep, outraged sounds ripping from his throat. Debris and office supplies were being knocked loose all around him.

“John!”

For a moment he caught sight of Elkali’s wings as they flared. There was a smaller figure with him, nimbly dancing out of arm’s reach as Elkali swiped at them.

“For fuck’s sake! Grab the rope!”

He grabbed the rope. Should he leave? Stay? Could he even help Elkali as he was? He didn’t have any weapons on him. He didn’t dare call out to Elkali, for fear of distracting him as he tangled with - whatever was attacking him.

He let go of the rope. Joaquim was cursing and berating, and just generally raging against him. He was afraid. Calen was, equally. But he wasn’t going to abandon Elkali. He fumbled around for a sizable brick. It was like a touch of deja vu. He just hoped that this brick would serve him better than the other one had.

It was hard to make sense of what was happening in the shadowed hollow of his environment. He circled around the debris beneath the hole in the ceiling, moving perpendicular to where he had last seen Elkali. He had no intention of tripping the monster up or startling him into lashing out.

There was a partially collapsed stairwell across the room. For a moment, all Calen could see was Elkali’s back, one wing flared while the other hung limply at an odd angle. The monster was compressed against the opening in the wall, thrashing violently. 

A blast of heat and light exploded from within the stairwell. 

Elkali shrieked and stumbled backwards, black blood splattering the walls. His dark skin bore open holes that quickly healed and disappeared.

As Elkali fell away, Calen made out a shape wedged into the stairwell.

He was tangling with a human.

The figure, dwarfed by Elkali’s massive size, was absolutely loaded in weaponry. A dark helmet was pulled over their face, body obscured in a hard, fitted exoskeleton. He recognized the make and mark of it. Standard issue for the suppressive team. They were the only ones licensed to carry armaments as intensive as this individual had. 

Calen’s heart dropped. 

This was precisely what he had wanted the suppressive team to do. And yet it was all so terribly wrong. Not like this.

Close quarter combat was disadvantageous for Elkali. His immense size meant that he couldn’t squeeze through the debris to reach his assailant. Their weaponry could reach him, but his rapid healing meant that he recovered almost instantaneously. The human adversary opened fire, a deafening staccato of gunshots reverberated through the air. The shots punctured Elkali’s flesh, his body rippling with the weight of every blow. Black blood splashed the crumbling concrete and rusted car parts.

Calen wanted to run. 

Whether that was forward or far away, he had no idea. He did neither of these things. Brick in hand, he inched his way closer to the conflict. 

He hugged the pillars of the parking lot, eyes darting to and fro to keep watch on the battle. Neither Elkali nor his assailant were paying Calen any attention. 

Elkali’s feathers were slick and matted in his own dark blood, but he pressed forward again and again, clawing and tearing at the human that was just out of reach. The closer he got the more deafening the noises of their skirmish became. The human would pause and Elkali would pounce, scraping against fallen metal and concrete. Then the human would reload their weapon and unload into him.

A deep, horrible gurgling built in Elkali’s throat. 

Calen threw his hands over his ears just as an inhuman scream tore from Elkali. 

The assailant was stunned, just as Calen nearly had been. He knew how painful that sound was up close. Calen took advantage of the moment. Not ideal, and he was further away than he would have liked. But as the assailant was reeling from Elkali’s shriek, Calen slung the brick. The brick glanced off the raider’s helm, but the detritus found its mark. 

The raider recoiled immediately, cursing as gravel stung their eyes.

Elkali pounced the moment the raider faltered. In a whirl of chaos, he descended on his foe, claws gleaming as they shredded the raider’s exposed limbs. Bladelike talons found his leg, and a horrifying cacophony of ripping flesh and agonized screams filled the air. 

The limb was mangled and splattered with blood, torn until little but tattered scraps held it together. Screams became wails, the raider’s voice faltering in disbelief as he grappled with a leg that was no longer there. He pawed at his mutilated flesh, hands coming away wet and dark. He moaned and sobbed, repeating “No” over and over again.

Calen’s years of training screamed at him to attend to the man. This, too, was deeply unpleasant for him. But Elkali was already pulling on the man’s other leg as he screamed, dragging him out of the stairwell. Calen was reminded for one, horrible moment of a similar exchange between himself and the monster. How different it could have been. There would be no healing this time. Not by the miraculous monster, at least.

“Elkali!” He called out, just as Elkali dropped his face to take the man’s shin in his mouth. He turned, taking the man with him. The man hung loosely, wailing and thrashing as his body was contorted. Calen could see his mangled leg fluttering like wet paper. He grimaced. “Elkali… Please put him down.”

Elkali did. 

But not kindly. 

He let the man fall on his head, silencing the screams and cries. Calen rushed over, fearful that there might be severe head trauma. As he approached, Elkali emitted a low growl. C

alen stopped in his tracks. His breathing quickened. Elkali’s ears swiveled towards him.

“Elkali?”

The monster hissed. His feathers stood on end as he pointed a long claw at Calen. No, not at him, Calen realized. Behind him. Towards the rope. Telling him to go.

“I couldn’t just leave you here!”

The answering snarl indicated that Elkali felt he very much could. Calen ignored his outburst, even as his instincts told him to flinch or lay low.

“Will you allow me to check him?”

Elkali paced, obviously agitated. His tail struck the ground, making bits of debris rattle under his strength. But, eventually, he relented. With low vibrations, he stepped aside.

Calen breathed a sigh of relief. He rushed to the downed man's side, checking his vitals. He was in a bad way. Elkali had stopped just short of killing him. His leg was irreparable - Calen didn't even need to assess it up close. It would need emergency amputation.

Behind him, Elkali twitched. Eyes falling on the far corner of the room, he sniffed at the air. And stepped carefully way, focused on something Calen could neither see nor hear.

No time for that. Calen's head spun with all the things that would need to be done. All the steps to save a dying man from his fate, years of medical training kicking it.

So it was that he didn't sense the threat until she was pointing a gun at his temple.

"Don't move."