Shadow Gun Arc: One

Mara had difficulty running with a baby strapped to her front. She held on tight to her little Omega son whom she hadn't even named yet. They weren't fortunate enough to have the privilege of naming their child, not when they were constantly being chased after by members of the Apex Pack. 

She wanted to look back; she wanted to look for her husband. There was just a sinking feeling he wouldn't be behind her like he was when they first started running. He had said he would hold them off and with how tired her legs were, with how much she was wheezing, that was probably more than thirty minutes ago. 

Everyone was a betrayer in the eyes of the Apex Pack. They expected the ones who didn't conform to the social rules of the pack to live off to the outskirts across the tracks, living in poverty. The humans offered more opportunities but if the wolves earned positions on the council within Red Woods then the treatment wouldn't be much of a difference. 

It was Jerix who suggested they go to Nadia; Nadia had opportunities. Nadia would assist them because it was well known the Apex Pack was one of the most aggressive and ruthless wolf packs in the northern region of Canas. 

Mara rested on the trunk of a tree, holding her son even more tight. When she looked at him in the blanket he was wrapped in, she could see his defined features. He literally was half vampire and half werewolf. One half of his face was the characteristic traits of a wolf such as fur running down the bridge of his chin, light patches. One eye was golder whereas the vampire side hadn't any fur nor hair, his eye was red, both ears pointed. 

She smiled at him-

"MARA, RUN!" 

She quickly got up and saw her husband in his werewolf form jumping toward her. He grabbed her arm, her slinging over his back as he glided them through the woods. Jumping from branch to branch. She held on tight with one arm around his neck and the other around her infant. 

"We're close to the border. I need to get you across to Nadi-AAH!"

An arrow sliced through Jerix's neck. He fell to the ground. His wife and son landed on his back. He pushed them off, pushed them toward the border. He brushed his wife on but she stayed, putting the pressure on the wound. His blood soaked out. 

She pulled the arrow out and looked at it. Wolves didn't use arrows…but the elves did. She wouldn't hold it against them to ally with the wolves. The wolves of the Apex Pack had a habit of forcing others to join their cause and if not they would kill them. Species like elves and vampires were easy to bully but the wizards, warlocks, witches, were a bit harder because of their powerful use of spells. 

Jerix got to his feet and took the arrow from Mara and broke it in half. The growls were low and their eyes gleamed in the night. He looked up to see the moon, a simple crescent not a full one. He waved Mara off and she slowly took her steps. 

"I love you, Jerix." She told him. And while he stood before the wolves who were in the trees ready to pounce, he turned to his wife, stuck out his tongue and pulled down his left eye lid. 

When he felt his wife was out of ear shot, he charged his ex-pack members and they charged forward as well. He started out with slashing the chest of one Alpha , breaking the neck of an Omega. He slammed the head of one onto the ground, and used a large boulder to splatter its head. The skull broke with matter sneaking out. 

A kick landed on his back and he tripped forward. One wolf grabbed his arm and another slammed onto the elbow, breaking it. With all of its stretch, the wolf tore the limb off. He did his best to continue to fight with one arm. As he swung, another wolf landed on his back and sunk its teeth into his neck, next to the arrow wound. The wolf chumped down hard on the neck. With its mouth closed, it pulled out the entire neck artery from Jerix's neck. 

Jerix fell to the ground-dead. The wolves proceeded to pull the limbs from the wolf, wanting to leave nothing of the wolf. They pulled his organs out, hollered and howled, proud of their defeat. To them, the betrayer was dead. And one wolf in particular, took the intestines of Jerix…and ate it. 

Mara heard the howls had she crossed the border and checked in with the border control. The woman border guard was an Alpha wolf herself. Mara was frightened when she saw her. But the woman smiled at Mara. 

"In Nadia," the woman said. "The wolves are different. We're not like the Apex Pack. We have our own history with them filled with bloodshed." She learned down and whispered into Mara's ear. Her bosom added an extra layer of warmth to Mara and the baby. "Many of us would give anything to annihilate that pack that caused the death of many. Atlas." 

Mara had learned that those who run from the Apex Pack are automatically granted asylum in the southern region of Nadia. She didn't know much of the geography of Nadia. She had no idea just how big the country was, how many provinces, or cities. She simply sat in the office of the immigration facility holding her son and answering questions for an officer who was doing her paperwork. 

"What is your son's name?" 

Mara looked down at him, still sleeping. "Shadow," she answered. 

"And his surname? Is it going to be yours or the father's or sire's?" The officer asked. 

Mara thought for a moment. "Father's. Gune. Shadow Gune." 

Mara was placed into an apartment building filled with other victims of the Apex Pack which included vampires, a lot of vampires, wolves who were deemed betrayers, and interspecies persons or what Apex called-mutts. She was worried at first, thinking she would be all alone with her son but the vampire community and even the wolves were inviting her. With time, they became her new family and helped raise Shadow. 

The village they were in was called Thornside Village, next to Usapolis, one of the biggest cities in the nation. The province was Uriah. It was a lot to take in and remember but slowly but surely, Mara was learning about this new country and she hoped she would be able to explore more of it as she got older but for now, she wanted to provide the best upbringing she could to Shadow.

She was young, twenty-two, and she never had a formal magical education so it was the patriarch of the vampires that suggested she enroll in Hacate's College, find a major to study in and then a profession. Mara hadn't known what to study so the first thing he suggested was portion. Apparently portion makers were in need within the medical industry within Nadia. There was a shortage. 

At the age of ten, Shadow came home with a bloody nose.

"What the hell happened?" Mara asked. Now thirty-two years old, they were able to move out of the apartment complex and into a modest house in one of the districts with a sizable vampire population. 

His black uniform was torn and he had mud in his hair. He wasn't crying though and seemed really proud of himself. He rubbed the blood away from his nose with the back of his fist. 

"I got into a fight with an Alpha. He said I needed to submit to him because I'm an Omega so I popped him one." 

"Oof." Mara let out. She looked at her son perplexed until she smiled wide at him, eventually succumbing to laughter. She ran to him and hugged him. 

"Jerix would be so proud." She whispered but he didn't hear her. He pulled away from his mother and kissed her on the cheek.

"He punched me. I punched him back. I told him 'just because I'm an Omega, don't make me no punk, bitch!"

"Oof, where are you learning this language?" Mara asked. 

"Monica."

"Who's that?"

"My best friend! She's an Omega like me. But she's mixed with witch and wolf." 

Mara smiled and turned her son's face in her hands. His fur was really growing on his face, on the wolf side of his face that is. 

"Do you want to shave your fur?"

"Why? It's fine. I'm not ashamed of that part of me. I'm not ashamed of Daddy." 

Mara engulfed her son into another hug. She was blessed and one of the lucky ones who was able to escape from the Apex Pack. She would give anything to disband that entire pack. Take it out, all the way up to the Alpha. Completely surprised how one pack could be so hateful and murderous. It wasn't in the cards for Mara as one Voodoo Priestess had told her, one she met in college. It would be for another. 

Shadow was now in his late thirties and he and his mother were still very close to one another. She was one of the head professors in the alchemy department at Hacate University. He was so proud of his mother; oftentimes when he came to the bar after work to get a good mug of beer, he would think of his childhood. He was lucky. He was very lucky considering what he heard from his cohorts who had to deal with interactions with the wolves of the Apex Pack. They were growing in numbers which could be deadly as time went on. 

He placed his empty mug down on the counter and took the two glocks that were on his gun belt off. He took his rifle off his back and began to make sure each weapon was filled with silver bullets and ready to fire if needed. 

His work kept him busy and it paid well. Many of the wolves from the Apex Pack were making their way across the border to go after their targets, they're "betrayers" as they call him. 

"Hmf, not on my watch." Shadow said to himself pushing the magazine back into the gun. Oh! How he loved his guns!