Love's Bad Side

 LOVE'S BAD SIDE

Episode Ten, Season Four, of Rise.

Enjoy <3

Love's Bad Side
Vicky is hard to fight. I regret not actually spending more time with Nightshadow to learn proper moves. It’s been a few moons and my fighting skills are still the same. Terran is exceptionally better than me, but from his grim face I can tell he’s fought Vicky before, with Karina, and he hadn’t been able to beat her.

I join him, despite his insistence that I stay back. “This is my fight,” he tells me over and over, “Vicky and I have something to settle.”

“I can help!” I insist, “Let me help. Forget settling an old score.”

“Bryce,” Terran pushes me away, “If you knew who your parents’ killers were and you were fighting them, would you want to fight them alone?”

Suddenly I stumble back. Terran looks apologetic, but he keeps fighting regardless. I stay back for a moment. He’s right of course. If this was my fight for something that mattered to me, I would want no interference.

But this was Terran. I couldn’t let Vicky kill him.

~

“I hear they’re getting you pardoned,” Calypso smiled at Presidia. She had just been to a meeting with Nightshadow and Feathershine. The leaders had decided that could trust Presidia, despite the threat she had put on Bryce’s life. Aleric was a definite no.

Calypso didn’t care though. She only wanted Presidia pardoned because she loved her. Presidia would help Bryce if Calypso asked her to, and there was no point in keeping her locked up after that.

But Aleric was something else. He was something dangerous and Calypso was sure they would regret letting him help.

“Are they?” Presidia looked mildly interested, “They’re quick to forgive, aren’t they?”

“Maybe that’s why Bryce chose the Coalition,” Calypso pointed out, “She’s met all three sides.”

“Yeah, in terrible ways,” Presidia sighed. “She lived in the Twolegplace all her life, only to see her family die around her. Then she was taken prisoner by the Vipers. Only the Coalition had been kind to her.”

Calypso knew that, but in her heart, the Twolegplace would always be home. Being away from it hurt too much. She didn’t understand how Bryce, Terran, and Karina did it.

“Do you think that one day, when this is all over, we’ll be able to return to the Twolegplace?” Calypso asked hesitantly.

Presidia didn’t reply for a long moment. “Depends on how long we wait,” she finally answered, “We’ll have to wait for all the Blood Army members to be gone. Plus there’s the whole threat of Aleric…I don’t trust that tom.”

“Who does?” Calypso asked on impulse.

The cream colored she-cat gave a sigh. “Bryce seems to trust him a little…”

“She has no choice,” Calypso reasoned, “Aleric holds the answer to so many of their problems.”

“That’s another thing,” Presidia shook her head, “Aleric can be too cunning for his own good.”

Calypso didn’t know what else to say to that. “Maybe we should still leave,” Presidia offers up again. “Maybe it’s not worth staying since we already gave Bryce the information she needed.”

“No way!” Calypso said adamantly, “We won’t ever go home unless we help Bryce. Plus, we were her friends, remember?”

Presidia gave a little sigh. “Do you really think she still sees us as friends?”

Calypso could only shrug. “Promise me you’ll stay. We have to help her.”

The cream colored she-cat’s eyes softened. “All right. But I’m only staying for you.”

~

Karina didn’t know why she had returned. She was standing in the darkness of the prisons again. She hated this place; it reminded her of unpleasant times of doubt that she and Terran had done the right thing by breaking Bryce out of Viper prison.

She took a few deep breaths before pulling the screen open and stepping in quickly. To her surprise, Aleric was fast asleep, his chest rising and falling in a steady motion.

He looked so peaceful, his face relaxed. It was as if Karina was staring at an innocent tom instead of the terrifying assassin.

She watched him for a long moment before Aleric jerked awake, sensing her presence. He sat up and bumped his head against the top of the tunnel. He let out a curse and rubbed his head with his paw.

“What are you doing here?”

“Light sleeper, aren’t you?” Karina arched an eyebrow, “I haven’t moved since I came in.”

Aleric gave a shrug. “In the Blood Army, you always had to be alert.”

“Especially with your job right?” Karina said a little too bitterly. “I can imagine you were always alert for cats who wanted revenge for what you did.”

Aleric narrowed his eyes. “Don’t tell me you’ve never done something terrible on orders.”

“I didn’t say anything like that,” Karina said hotly, “but I’m not a murderer.”

She flinched the moment she said that. She and Bryce hadn’t talked about Ruby since Karina had come back and the dark gray she-cat didn’t want to be the first to mention Bryce’s little sister.

It had been the plants…not really Karina, right?

Aleric watched her carefully. “Everyone has their own demons,” he said gently, “sometimes you just have to embrace them.”

“Is that what you did?” Karina snapped, pulling away, “Did you ‘embrace your demons’ and kill whoever you were ordered to? Have you ever regretted your choices? Those cats had families.”

The brown tom’s eyes were hard. “Of course I have,” he flattened his ears and Karina could see deep hurt in his eyes. A memory of extreme pain and grief. Aleric turned his head slightly so she wouldn’t see it. “Why are you here?” He asked again, his voice rough.

Karina knew from the way he had responded to her silence after her outrageous statement that he knew about Ruby.

“I wanted to ask you again why you’re helping Bryce.” Karina stared at the brown tom, “I don’t get you.”

“Nobody does,” he replied.

“Who is ‘Aleric’ then?” Karina sat down. She might as well make herself comfortable. It seemed like she was going to be here for awhile. “Who are you really?”

Aleric didn’t respond for a long time. Karina almost gave up completely because the silence had started to become unbearable when he spoke up. His voice was hoarse, as if he was choking on tears.

“I don’t know,” he lifted his eyes and Karina wanted to look away from the intense stare of his green eyes. “I don’t know who he is.”

Karina was taken aback from that answer. From the moment she had met him (such unpleasant times…she only remembered the way he had threatened to hurt Terran), Karina had found him obnoxious and terribly confident. He had seemed so sure of himself and his abilities to do whatever he could.

Not here, crouched in the shadows of the prisons, Aleric looked haunted. The brown tom shook himself out.

“You shouldn’t be here,” he curled up again. “Bryce will decide when she wants to see me again but I’m positive that doesn’t give you rights down here.”

“I just want to know,” Karina pleaded, “I need to know.”

“You’ll live without the answers.”

“When Bryce comes in and asks, you’ll have to give her a straight answer anyway,” Karina pointed out, “Why can’t you just tell me?”

Aleric hesitated for a moment, looking up. Suddenly his head whipped around and he was scrambling to his paws, moving to rip off his brambles. “Bryce and Terran are in danger.”

“What?” Karina panicked, “How do you know?”

“I just do!” Aleric held up his paws. “Please help me untie these. I need you to help me escape too.”

“Escape?” Karina repeated, but she was already unraveling the brambles. “What are we going to do?”

“Not us,” Aleric corrected, “Me.”

“I’m coming with you,” the dark gray she-cat said stubbornly, “Terran is my idiot brother and I’m going to make sure he doesn’t get terribly hurt.”

Aleric shrugged and led the way out with Karina following. She could only hope that he had a real plan and wasn’t tricking her into letting him go.

''Surely if he wanted to escape he wouldn’t need me. Aleric is capable to such maneuvers himself…''

Karina could only shake her head and continue after Aleric, praying her brother would be all right.

~

I’m out of breath but Terran still needs my help. No matter how hard we fight against Vicky, she knows our moves. She knows Terran from moons of being in the same group as him, and I just really don’t know how to fight.

Terran is bleeding in several places, his old wounds opening up. But the fire in his blue eyes hasn’t died out yet and he’s still holding on.

“Bryce,” he says roughly, “stay back!”

I stumble a few steps away, but I try to come back anyway. I’m not going to let Terran die.

But he turns completely, his eyes showing his frustration. “Please,” he says, “I need to do this alone.”

He forgets about Vicky entirely for the moment and I open my mouth to scream. Vicky is grinning and she leaps straight at me. Because Terran’s back is turned, he doesn’t see her in time to stop the blow.

I lift my paws in a futile attempt to save myself and squeeze my eyes shut.

There’s no sharp pain of claws, just the tickle of fur against my nose as someone brushes past me.

I open my eyes and see a familiar brown shape in front of me, fighting Vicky. “Aleric?” I blink a few times, trying to suppress my shock.

He turns to me, not even breaking a sweat. “Come away now,” he orders, “let Terran fight his own fights.”

He guides me away and Karina hangs back with us, though I can see the torture in her eyes as she watches Terran continue the spar against Vicky. “Don’t just make me stand here,” I turn to them, “he’s going to die if they keep this up.”

“Have faith in him,” Karina says firmly, “Terran will do it.”

I look at the she-cat for a long time, and the tension is practically tangible. I can tell Karina wants to tell me something, but I ignore her. These things could be settled later, if at all.

For now, I watch Terran anxiously as he knocks Vicky down, his eyes alight with fury. “You’ve ruined enough lives,” he hissed, bleeding rather heavily now. “And I won’t let you continue your heinous actions.”

“You’ve never had the guts to kill,” Vicky sneers, “even your sister can do it better than you.”

I feel anger roar through me and I’m jumping up, intending to give Vicky a piece of my mind. It’s her fault that Ruby died.

Aleric pushes me back down. “Stay put.”

“This doesn’t have anything to do with you,” I try to move him aside bodily, “you don’t understand.”

Aleric shakes his head. “You underestimate me, Bryce, and plus, I think Terran has in his paws now.”

Vicky is exhausted too. She doesn’t have the energy to fight back against Terran, and if he decides he can’t do it, either Karina or I will jump after Vicky. And heck, if we don’t make it, I’m pretty sure Aleric would just chase her down and kill her (I mean another murder won’t be anything for him).

“You’re right,” Terran agrees, “I don’t want to kill you.”

“Old habits die hard, right?” Vicky smirks, “Still falling for this she-cat?”

Terran’s eyes hardened. “Sorry to disappoint you, but I got over you real fast. You may have proper looks, but you have a rotten personality.”

“Yet you stuck with me for so long,” Vicky suddenly looks too young, “That’s something you can never put down, Terran. You chose me all those times.”

“And then I chose someone else,” Terran informed her, “and I’m going to choose her again.”

Vicky looks like she wants to say something else but Terran doesn’t let her. “This is for everything you’ve done.” He bares his teeth and lets his claws plunge into her neck.

The she-cat jerks for a moment before lying still. Terran carefully steps off her and turns away from the dying she-cat.

His eyes find mine and then I am running towards him, feeling as light as a feather for the first time in moons.

Love had a lot of bad sides, I decide, but in the end, love had its worth too.

The End.