The haram was surrounded with arm men with grenades. They wore flashlights fastened to their foreheads like that use in mining pits. The night was still as death.
The Alpha and Tiana had contemplated all day on their way here. Finally, they did work up a plan that looked reasonable enough.
Agna's intentions are clear enough. He is enrout to Aljamian, instead of Balkass with his fleet of ships.
On water, the bastard had the advantage. Going after him now by sea, is a mention impossible. No ships at shore either, even if he wanted to track the man down.
But that too is not what lead the Alpha back to this haram. With Magnam and his rebel army on their tracks, Kuga and Tiana had no option than to lead the threat back here, where another enemy awaits...
Nature has it that a man pressed by need is the shrewdest. The Alpha played the angle so well. He deliberately lead the apes here to pin them against the gunmen of Kanka and Rygna, Who now had his home under their control.
The gorilla warriors of Magnam didn't know they were being lead into a slaughter. That granted the Alpha and Tiana the acumen to save themselves two troubles with one nimble move by pinning one enemy against the other....
"Are they ready to charge at the harem?" The Alpha asked.
"Yes, but the soldiers with their flashlights is what is keeping them at bay. They probably think the soldiers are your men..." Tiana replied...
"Good, I'm counting on that. Time to stir some chaos." The alpha said, and picked up a sizable rock. He targeted the closer soldier on watch, ready to cast...
"When I cast this stone, they will start shooting in this direction, causing Magnam and his men to charge at the haram from this side..."
"You're using us as bait?"
"Yes, when I cast, follow me closely." The Alpha Answered Tiana's question on the move.
They heard the cries of a man in distress however. Whaling, and shouting "the bastards kill him! They killed Nebulous!"
One name came to the Alpha's mind. "Kogna!"
Squatting in his hiding position, the Alpha stood up like a robot. His blood had gone congeal. He walked stiffly towards the front gate of the haram.
"What are you doing?" Tiana rustled wrathfully, trying to stop him but he pushed her aside with a force she didn't expect from such a little act.
The force threw her back against a tree close by and she coughed out blood. What is the man doing? He is walking to his doom. She tried to remain down and find a way to escaped under the cover of the brushed.
But she found herself standing up. She followed him towards the raised guns and flash lights of Rygna's men at the gates.
"Put your hands up. Show your hands. I wouldn't say it twice!". A gaurd bellowed and open fire into the sky.
The Alpha walked on. The soldiers were about to shoot him. But, an order came from within the middle of the courtyard of the haram.
"Don't shoot, its him!". It was Rygna.... The soldiers obeyed their master as they circled around the two Intruders....
The soldiers closed in on him with their guns on high alert. The Alpha sees none of them. His mind was focused on one thing, walking, putting one leg in front the other. He felt nothing. Absolutely no emotion, his blood had turned frozen blue.
His internal radar lead him on. Rygna didn't stop the hybrid, he just follow with his men to the grand hall where the massacre of Nebulous was still evident.
The gunmen tighten the circle around him and the tall raven hair warrior woman, Tiana.
The bloody head on a spike with the long grey logs was the first thing he saw. He stood before it silently, gazing into the expressionless eyes, that use to be vibrant eyes of his grandfather.
Why had he pretended not to know him, even when he is one person he had remembered so well, after he did turned to a hybrid panther, an Alpha?
No, everyone can die but not this man, Nebulous can't die, his mind didn't have a place to acknowledge that. Yet, it did happened. The vacant eyes staring from the decapitated head, shows no sign of life in them....
He lifted the head off the spike and walked to the headless body lying in the pool of blood on the smoothen Rocky floor. He sat in the thick red congealed mass and place the head to the lifeless body of 'the misty-one', he who walked in the skies, his grandfather.... 'Damn!' Kuga swore gruffly. He never called him grandfather, when the oldman was alive.... Now, he wanted to call him just that...
He believes if he attach the head to the body, the dead man will probably give him one of his cocky smiles one last time...
He laughed, when he saw no smile. The soldiers looked at each other in bewilderment. Tiana found her eyes leaking in grave emotions not for the dead old man she never met, but the pain from the living one she had come to know, the Alpha.
His concealed pain was so fierce she felt her kidney would burst with the tension. 'oh, he is in so much pain," Tiana cried inwardly.
Kanka appeared in the hall, and ordered; "lock him up in his own dungeon, with the woman…"
Kuga didn't know what was happening anymore. He watched as they shackled him in chains, along with Tiana.
He walked as the soldiers dragged him on. "Why not kill him, father?" Rygna asked Kanka.
"We are not animals, Rygna. Don't lay a hand on him? He has gone insane, something worse than death. Let him rot in the dungeons in his own misery."
"I feel bad about this. The man is unpredictable and very sly. What if he is creating a mirage to throw us off, father..." Rygna paused...
"His torture begins tomorrow, Rygna" Kanka said curtly.
*******†*****†*********
Kuga smiled at Rygna, who was now standing outside the iron gates of the cell.
Rygna grinned broadly in reply.... " You can act crazy all you want. Ah! a mad mans pain amplifies under torture. Believe me hybrid, I know. I torture them every day.... Oh, what a pleasure to have you here as a sample for torture laboratory...."
Kuga sniggers good naturedly, " Rhymz, Rhymz... music to my ears. Why not tell me what you really want... Your problem with me is personal man. yes, yes... I know, you were me...."
Flabbergasted by this, Rygna asked in agitation, " What the hell are you talking about...?"
"Stop acting naive, Rhymze or Rygna or whatever the hell you choose to call yourself. You've always wanted her. You were with her before I even met you two at Wodmax LTD... I took her away from you, possessed and own her very being. She had been mine till the end... you hate me for that. I took your food from your mouth, and made it mine, and for that, you will never forgive me I know...."
"Shut up your stinking mouth, you flesh eating scum.... You killed Mike and D'mick, two panther Prince's. Now you killed two panther Lords. Do you know why you are still alive?" Rygna spat scornfully, opening the iron gates in fury. The chain rattled and clatter....
"Why? I'm I still alive, if not for the damsels? Without my blood, they will probably not last another night.... That's how precious, I am Ryhmze...this too, eats you alive, right?"
Having no more patience to spare, Rygna assailed Kuga with a brute force, amazing himself. He didn't no he could hate one man so much.... He clawed at his face like a starving puma.
Had the gaurds not come on time at the command of Kanka, Rygna would've rip the shackled man apart. He had no fighting chance in his sitting manicled position.
Some damage was done nonetheless. Kuga bled now from numerous cuts on the face.... but the smile on his face was infectious enough to send Rygna into yet another frit... The gaurds held on to him, as he struggles to break free...
"Let him go!" Kanka ordered, stepping into the cell. "Don't ride on your caprices, Rygna. Now is not the time or place". The gaurds released the fuming Rygna.
"You despicable vile thing. You never deserved her. You couldn't even protect her.... Ruby deserved better than a wimp like you. Where is she now? can you answer that?...."
Kuga's eyes turned deadly cold.... at the mentioned of Ruby in the present tense. He didn't want to know what happened to her dead or alive.... because he didn't know his reaction to either one....
" Where is she? Where is Ruby!?...". Kuga asked violently. His body shakes like a faulty vibrator on test repair.
" Somewhere, you will never find her..." It was Rygna's turn to chuckle with glee.