See what I've become?

Somehow, Eldra began to feel...alienated. She was involved, sure. Ambitious, loyal, dedicated.

​Since they had gone to track the brazen woman in the mountains, and turned up empty pawed, the woman felt like a failure, of sorts. Regardless of if she hadn't been told so or been humiliated by @Vengeance for it, like she had been in the past...

She felt almost...lost. Even so, she put on a brave face and continued on. Patrolling, training, briefly pausing to eat, sleep, and do it all again. 

Lost in her mind, the titaness almost missed the scent of the cougar.
Stopping, Eldra sniffed the air in deep inhales. Catching the trail of the feline, the soldier sprinted in pursuit. 

It was getting deeper into the Reach. Looking for food, perhaps, but Eldra wanted to make her mark, make Vengeance and @Caligula proud above everyone else. 

Seeing the puma ahead, Eldra forced herself to run faster, faster, as fast as she had run when Caligula drilled her for stamina. And with an air-splitting battle cry, the Valkyrie slammed into the cougar, teeth flying against other teeth and feline claws as the two species brawled. 

Life or death. That was the way. It is the only way in this world. 

Fight or die trying. 

Eldra snarled and roared louder than ever before, as she continued to fight the cat. Logically, no wolf could take on a cat by themselves, and yet here she was. 

Eldra wrestled the mountain cat to the ground, only for it to violently thrust her backwards with strong legs. 
The titaness too, then, was wrestled to the ground by her opponent. 

Deep wounds everywhere, some fatal, others not, blood all around, hers and not.

as the cat yowled and went for her throat, Eldra let out a guttural, thundersome noise and arced her teeth in brutal retaliation, catching the puma by the eye in a streak of dumb luck. 

The cougar screeched and peddled back, yet Eldra threw herself up and forward to chase, teeth fully bared ever still, even as she was losing so much blood. 
​​​​​​Too much blood. And yet she raged onward. 

Lightning cracked in the background and thunder rumbled in chase within a dark sky. 

The mountain cat screamed more as Eldra kept coming, snapping and snarling savagely even as the feline clawed her stomach and sides so deeply, so desperately, that her organs began to peek out. 

And finally, the soldier was able to latch to the cougar's own tender windpipe, and she bit down with all the force she could ever possibly muster, and she didn't let go. Flat out fucking refused to give as the puma choked on its lack of breath and fought with blind instinctive fear, ripping Eldra's stomach open and freeing her innards completely as its last strong move, before the feline's body weakened and eventually, finally, stilled.

Eldra still clung tightly to its throat, blood and gore from both beings pooled all over the area, and especially where both creatures now lied. 

As her bloodied sides heaved, Eldra finally became aware of her own damage, the overwhelming agony from her wounds, the bites and claw marks, the disembowelment of her own stomach. 

Even still, her fangs still clenched the viciously caved in windpipe between her jaws, even as her body grew heavy and she grew tired, and the figure of a starry, transparent wolf appeared in her dulling eyes...she held on to the damn jugular. 

The starry wolf gazed upon her, smiled something that seemed...forgiving, and suddenly, Eldra felt light. She stood, free of pain, free of gravity, and the cosmic wolf bumped their head to her fur in some sort of welcome. 

And skyward they went, without wings, without worry. Eldra didn't look back, didn't look down. 

For down on the ground, where flesh was only flesh, Eldra's body lay lifeless with that of the cougar. Glazed over eyes of poison amethyst unblinking, body unbreathing. 

Gone. 

And yet even after death, the soldier died with a permanent look of loyal, protective savagery; with a mountain cat's crushed windpipe still in her jaws.
the staff team luvs u

Caligula did not have many friends, if any. The Nightwalkers were not the type to express any kind of companionship with one another outside of using and abusing, so he had quickly grown accustomed to the isolation. Vengeance certainly did not view him as anything other than a competent soldier and as far as the rest of the pack was concerned, well.. he was but a general. The only one to have upset that balance had been Eldra, whose lifeless body he now stared at from afar.

Caligula knew when a body was too still. He knew what death looked like, and though she had taken down a mighty foe in the process, he could not help but grieve for the closest thing he'd had to a friend in his brief stint as Vengeance's lackey. The ghost moved towards the woman, grabbing her by the scruff to finagle her onto his back. He knew Vengeance would disrespect the body by desecrating it somehow, and if he bore witness to such an act there would be no returning from the edge. Caligula moved silently away from the territory, Eldra flung across his back, as he made to bury her somewhere she would not be disturbed by even the warlord.

exit w/ eldra's body ?

the staff team luvs u