A Nightmare with Fangs

The pain Leonardo feels is one he will never forget. Even though his senses are numbed, the scorching headache is unbearable. He could barely open his eyes, and a buzzing sound that breaks his mind prevents him from thinking. Then…

“This world is in danger, you must save it.”

He heard an ethereal voice say in his head in a calm but commanding tone. Half a minute later, but what felt like hours to him, an excruciating pain from the stomach returns him to his senses.

“What the hell do you think you're doing? Get up, come on!” a deep voice commands Leonardo.

Regaining the composure to think, he notices that he’s lying in wet mud. His eyes, red and teary from the pain he felt a few minutes ago, are blurring his perception of what seems real.

A dirty muddy street, houses made of wood… just where?

“Where… am I?”

“You're playing dumb, huh? Obviously you escaped from somewhere, scum!” Then Leonardo receives another kick that leaves him on his back. From there, he is able to see his attacker from the floor.

W–what?

To Leonardo’s eyes he looked like some kind of anthropomorphic boar, a bizarre creature standing upright like a human, but with clearly defined fangs protruding from his snout. It is wearing old, worn-out, totally impractical medieval-style armor.

“What– the hell?”

“You're testing my patience!” The beast said as he tried to step on his head. Leonardo quickly dodges and tries crawling away from him while looking around. To his left he sees his rifle, lying on the ground, completely covered in mud.

“You're not getting away!” The boar shouts behind him, and then he feels a sharp, stabbing pain in his right leg. That beast had attacked him with a spear.

“Gaaah!” He lets out a ferocious scream and turns around, desperately patting his body in search of his gun. When he found it, he aimed it with a trembling hand and—

BANG!

A flash of light blinded them for a moment, then the bullet hit the guard shoulder, piercing that poor excuse for armor as if it were cloth. Confused, the beast backed away.

“Dahg! What—what have you done!?”

Still pointing directly at it, Leonardo grabs his rifle and slings it over his shoulder.

“Back off!” He shouts as the guard approaches, and as it doesn't stop, he fires again. This time it goes straight into its torso, and the animal drops the spear, grabs its wounded stomach with both hands, and kneels in the middle of the street.

“W—Witchcraft! This slave’s a sorcerer—need... reinforcements...”

Finally, he falls onto the filthy muddy street. Looking around, Leonardo sees terrified faces, but he’s even more terrified, because they all are people with animal features, some with horse faces, others with cat faces, others with dog faces. Some have bird wings, others have bull horns.

I am in a dream, surely, obviously, there is no better explanation. Two minutes ago, I was in Malvinas, fighting a losing war and this, no doubt, is not real… it cannot be...

“There he is! Kill him!” The terrified animals shouted to some guards who had come running, probably after hearing the shots.

I have to get out of here.

Now, Leonardo is running without knowing north from south, while anthropomorphic animals easily catch up to him. They are all very fast, and of course, with Leonardo’s injured leg and his equipment, which is not precisely light, he has no chance of escaping. Suddenly, he stops dead in his tracks, aims with his 1911, and fires once, twice, three times. He kills one, and the others give up their pursuit. As he flees, those who are standing on the side of the street watching, begin to move away as if he was some kind of monster, and the occasional “brave” one throws a rock at him, only to then run away.

Suddenly, he feels like it was hit by something, or someone. He felt like he had been hit by a car.

“Your journey ends here, little one.” said a man with a bull's face, very tall and very burly. Facing the minotaur himself, Leonardo backs away in fear while preparing his rifle, then he points it towards him, but does not fire when he pulls the trigger. Meanwhile, the minotaur is still approaching, and with each step he takes, the floor rumbles at his hooves. After cleaning the mud off the rifle and unjamming the cartridge that was inside the chamber, Leonardo fires a burst of six shots, confirming hits from the torso and up to the shoulder, which makes the bull spit blood.

“Leave me alone!” Leonardo shouts as he gets up from the ground and walks with difficulty. Having run for so long, he manages to spot an exit. It is a gate located in a stone wall, which is about five meters high. Some soldiers stationed at the exit see him approaching from afar and begin running. One leaves, while the other runs toward the crank with the intention of blocking the wounded soldier's path and trapping him inside. Faced with this, Leonardo stops and kneels down. The distance between them is about thirty meters, and he needs all the stability he can get if he is going to take the shot.

BANG!

He misses the first shot, too far to the right. He has to correct a few degrees to the left. However, before he had time to adjust, as the guard was startled by the nearby impact, he ends up moving right where the bullet had passed. So he fires again and hits him in the collarbone area. Lying on the ground, the guard begins to stretch out his other arm to reach the crank, but is stopped with another accurate shot. With difficulty, Leonardo gets back up and continues walking, dragging his wounded leg, to the exit.

Being about ten meters away, he hears screams coming from behind him. Looking back, he sees more guards approaching.

D–Dammit! How many? five? six?

They are all wearing chain mail armor and carrying swords, nothing his rifle couldn't handle, but before he could raise his rifle against them, an arrow grazes his face and ends up stuck in the mud. Archers had arrived and were shooting at him from atop the wall.

There is no hope; I cannot defend myself against both of them at the same time… it seems… The nightmare has come to an end…

With his head down and eyes closed, he accepted his final fate.

But out of nowhere, a giant shadow, covered in dark cloth, steps between the arrows and him. With a large, solid wooden shield, he intercepts the arrows that would have buried themselves between his eyebrows.

“Are you okay?” asks the husky man in a deep voice. Two fluffy ears stick out from his head, which is covered in rags.

“No...” Leonardo replies with a hoarse voice.

“I'll buy you some time, you take care of the archers,” says a female voice behind him. It is from another person covered in cloth, but two long fox ears stick out from her head as well, and with animal speed, she charges at the guards.

“Use that thing of yours and take out the archers.” Commands the bulky man.

“On it.” Leonardo replies, raising his rifle once again. After hearing the sound of an arrow hitting the shield, he peeks out to the left and opens fire on the archers. The difference in fire rate is overwhelming.

I almost feel sorry for these guys, it feels like I'm cheating. But again, my dream, my rules, now you get to be on the receiving end.

When only one archer remains, the rifle runs out of bullets. He quickly drops it and switches to his pistol, which, unfortunately, is also empty.

“What's going on?” asks the man covering him.

“Nothing, just give me a second,” He replies as he grabs one of the extra magazines he has on his belt. After ejecting the empty magazine and dropping it on the floor, his trembling hand causes him to bump the fresh magazine against the gun a couple of times until it finally goes in, the bolt is released and it snaps forward with its distinctive “click,” then he leans to finish off the last of the archers.

After sighing, Leonardo is grabbed by the man and puts him on his shoulder. Carrying him like a sack of potatoes.

“We're on your side, we're going to get you out of here,” he says as he notices that Leonardo has been surprised by his sudden movement.

“Asla! Let's get out of here!” he shouts to his partner, who is busy dodging and blocking each attack from the guards. Against so many, no matter how agile and fast you may be, they won't let you find any openings. If she were defending them any longer, they would have killed her.

As they make their escape, the man crosses the wall at a fast trot. His partner, slender and considerably shorter, catches up with them in the blink of an eye. However, the guards are still hot on their tails. Seeing this, Leonardo reaches for one of the grenades attached to the Velcro on his chest, removes the pin, and throws it onto the road.

“Hey! Can't you use your magic to get rid of them?” the woman asks, and in the next instant, the squad of guards is blown up by the grenade explosion. The woman pulls up short, and the man slows down to a halt to look at the small crater left by the explosion.

“Who are you? Where am I?” Leonardo asks them. His question goes unanswered for a few seconds, until the woman with long foxy ears gives him a serious look, then takes the lead and continues on her way.

“This is not the time to talk. You will have your answers once we are in a safe place.” says the man who is carrying Leonardo on his shoulder. In silence, as they continue on walking, they end up straying from the main road and entering a lush forest.

The loss of blood, the feeling of safety, the unbearable heat, and the chirping of birds makes Leonardo want to fall asleep, he is losing consciousness once again.

In this heat, we are certainly not anywhere near the Malvinas…