The day began as it always did: I had to get up and perform my daily responsibilities.
It was a dull life, but at least there was some safety in it compared to going solo and ending up with a life full of experimentations or perhaps death.
It was reassuring to be a member of a community that was not only made up of humans who were similar to one another, but also managed to maintain the social aspect of humanity within it since, at the end of the day, even if we had changed into monsters, we still had the same mindset as everyone else.
Because of my ability to hide and leave in risky situations if fighting became difficult, I was generally assigned to reconnaissance duty. There was also the fact that I was short and small, which improved my ability to move and hide, making me the ideal candidate for reconnaissance.
A very faint sound of fighting was heard when the day seemed to be coming to a close, right before the waking of the night in the evening. As I returned to others to report my observations, I found that they, too, had observed the sounds. It appeared to be coming from a distance, but not distant enough for the noises of the battle to be muffled.
The sounds were not those of guns or modern equipment, but of battles that had to be fought with one's bare body, exactly like us, which meant there was a decent probability that there was someone like us there, which meant we had to check it out.
Since most of us came to the same conclusion, Kalen, our group's leader, ordered us to be divided into groups to scout the situation. The logic was evident because we had participated in such efforts for rescuing and gathering other chimeras like ourselves in our organization.
Our numbers were relatively adequate as of today, but we needed to gather even more to ensure that people did not discover us. We referred to ourselves as chimeras because we had no idea what had happened to us or how it had happened.
We were to split into two parties and proceeded in opposite ways, searching for the source of the battle sounds for three days before returning to camp. The logic behind this was to limit our communications utilizing modern technology such as radios in order to reduce the possibility of being discovered.
Another reason was that even if we didn't find anything, it would be useful to have some knowledge about the present state of the environment beyond our camp's position.
I was assigned to a group with my brother, Archer, an eagle chimera with keen eyes that, when combined with his flight ability, gave him a good chance of discovering anything he desired during his scouting trips. Archer and I were a party of two due to his extensive usage for scouting and our connection, while Kalen, Beatrix, and Owlvin decided to search in the opposite direction.
'After two days, Archer and Tito had experienced no conflict that indicated the existence of another chimera, while the other group had already discovered and returned Leigh to their camp of more than 50 other chimera.' The conflict and bloodshed caused by the bear and Leigh drew the attention of the government because of the large number of casualties it left around the camping site.
As the sun shone down on the forest, casting shadows of objects on the ground, ten soldiers could be seen marching through the forest plains. The events that occurred following the deaths of several people in a campsite by a lake were the polar opposite of what Leigh and the chimaeras expected.
Because of the large number of deaths and the fact that no one escaped, the humans reasoned that a bear was not the only assailant. It appeared to be the work of humans. Because of their lack of information about the world and the folly of people, they misinterpreted the event as an attack by an organization with an unknown objective.
That led them to investigate the forest surrounding the event, hence why a certain number of authorities and soldiers were present in that location.'
As our expedition approached the third day's night, Archer and I opted to rest before returning on the fourth day because we were fatigued and couldn't scout the forest due to my inability to see in the dark and Archer's ineffectiveness in scouting at night compared to during the day.
I climbed a tree to relax and watched as Archer approached a tree in order to land on a branch, but the sound of a gunshot rang out in my ears as I saw Archer struggle to hold his balance on the tree, forcing him to tumble to the ground in pain.
When the incident occurred, I was in a state of shock and forgot everything I learned about dealing with such circumstances. My mind was racing, which didn't help matters. Because of my erratic breathing and movement as a result of my anxiousness, the troops were also aware of my location, which was a few trees further away from Archer.
The flash light was directed at me, but I didn't want to run or hide for two reasons: one, I couldn't hide because it was too late and they had already seen me, and two, I couldn't run and then hide because I couldn't leave Archer alone knowing that something bad would happen by the time I got help from the camp. To avoid being shot at, I was compelled to surround myself.
The soldiers surrounded me and approached me with gun barrels directed at me, disgusted at the shape and appearance of my body, yet some of them were perplexed and surprised at the situation in front of them, at the creature in front of them.
I couldn't think of anything to do while the soldiers tied me and Archer up until the soldiers enquired about a massacre at the precise area Kalen and the others went in. At that point, it occurred to me that they must have slain a bunch of people in order to rescue the other chimera, resulting in the current predicament.
Although Kalen was justified in fighting others, I couldn't tolerate losing my brother and suffering as a result of him, so I decided to reveal the location of the camp to the military and include some lies about a strong individual.
The soldiers were initially suspicious, but after learning that Archer was my brother from my explanations, they agreed to listen to me and devised a plan to bring out the strong individual while they reported the situation on a radio because they knew I would not abandon my brother to save myself, and even if I did, it didn't matter because they had discovered some information.
Even though I didn't entirely trust the soldiers in the same way they didn't trust me, I had to give it a shot. I didn't care who I brought with me as long as it could have rescued my brother, whether it was a child or Kalen.