Waiting to Die

Astarte flees with Tirea without looking back.

Stefan falters when Senthose goes down and falls to his knees himself, reaching over and grabbing his shoulder and shaking it.

Th"Wait!"

*Thiera starts to turn back, but Lilith grabs her & keeps going. Senthose is shaking slightly, but does not seem to be aware of his surroundings. Soon the beast is upon them, & takes a swipe at Stefan.*
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*The others, meanwhile, are trying to fight their way through the bushes, especially difficult in Lilith's case since Thiera keeps fighting to get away.*

Th"How can you just leave the behind?!"

Astarte does not care what Thiera says or does, and keeps going.

Stefan lurches away and onto his face.

*Eve glares at Thiera as she runs*

<How do you expect us to fight that thing armed as we are? We should have left before, now two of our group are most likely dead.>

*Eve takes a deep breath*

<Look, that was really rude of me. I'm sorry.>

Azuma: "By not wanting to share their fate. We can't do anything if we're all dead."

*Thiera has gone fairly limp at this. Astarte is whacked in the face by a tree branch.*

L"Ugh, will you come on!?"

Th"What's the point? There's nowhere we can go that isn't a trap."
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*The beast steps on the gun, still in Senthose's hand, so it remains out of reach. It promptly grabs Stefan's leg & pulls him back, swiping at his spine with the claws of its other hand.*

Astarte doesn't give a fuck.

Stefan twists and struggles.

*Eve grabs Thiera's arm and starts to pull her forward*

<You need to keep going, or going back there will have been utterly pointless.>

*They're now in the woods in the dead of night, house far from view, with no idea where they're going. They do, however, see a pair of headlights coming up what is presumably the road.*

Th"It's a trap!"
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*So now Stefan is slashed across the stomach instead of the back, blood & whatever else pouring out. Roatha approaches from behind the beast, shotgun slung over his shoulder.*

R"Hold the wound closed & drag him into the garage. I'm not done with him yet."

Astarte kept moving with Tirea.

Stefan grabbed his own head at the chin and the base of the skull and twisted hard.

<You're probably right!>

*Eve shines her flashlight in the direction of the approaching headlights*

*She catches a glimpse of a car, completely unrecognizable partly because of the thick forest & partly because why would she recognize a random car. Not suspicious at all, the car pulls over & they can hear the door opening.*
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*Stefan succeeds in really hurting his neck & looking like a dumbass. The monster digs its claws painfully into his stomach & drags him after Ira towards the garage.*

Hiding in the woods, totally on edge.

Astarte finally stopped and listened.

*Eve quickly turns off the flashlight*

*They can hear someone traipsing through the forest towards them.*
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*Once it gets Stefan into the garage, the monster hauls him up to the work bench. Instead of reaching for the tool box, however, Ira produces a first aid kit from his backpack.*

R"Right, then. First thing is to stitch your guts in place. Wouldn't want you dying too soon, now would we?"

*As he speaks, he sets it on the table, opening it to take out the needle & stitches.*

R"I had a lot of practice with this in the Great Wars, y'know."

Astarte yelled, provoked by the tension, "Who's there?!"

Stefan kicked or slapped at the bag.

*Eve remains motionless. Tirea is still clutching Astarte*

Azuma: "Idiot, don't shout."

*Though the woods are relatively sparse, they can't really see due to the lack of light. They do, however, hear the figure keep approaching before suddenly stopping, & they REALLY hear the shot that rings out, shattering a tree stump near Astarte. Thiera & Lilith are already off running, diagonally forward & to the left, before Lilith can shout, "Shit, RUN!"*
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*Stefan doesn't quite reach it, because trying to reach up that high causes a searing pain in his stomach. Ira calmly threads the needle & sets it down, picking up the hammer instead.*

R"Well, I guess we'll have to take care of that first, won't we?"

*So he raises the hammer & grabs at Stefan's forearm, but seems to space out for a moment.*

*Eve runs after Lilith as fast as she can. Tirea does whatever Astarte does*

Astarte let go of Tirea immediately and ducked right down to her haunches, twisting around behind Tirea and taking off at a run in the vague direction of the others.

Stefan grabbed his forearm in turn and tried to heave him down towards himself with the intention of biting his jugular.

This probably could not have been avoided because reasons, so they run after the others.

*Cracking brush can be heard as the gunperson chases after them, firing more shots, presumably in the vague direction of their footsteps. Then, for a while, everything is calm. Eventually, they find themselves on a dark, empty expanse of road.*

Th"Is he still after us?!"

L"I don't know!"

*They can see another car approaching, & it illuminates the Shadow standing on the edge of the forest. It stops in front of them as Dr. Schreiber yells out the window for them to get in. In the rear lights, they can see that the Shadow has seemingly disappeared.*
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*He succeeds in pulling him down, until Ira snaps to awareness, & headbutts him, knocking out some of his teeth. He then rubs his forehead.*

"Sorry, multitasking's a bitch. Shall we continue?"

*Having grabbed Stefan after Stefan grabbed him, he twirls the hammer in his wrist & swings it like a baseball bat right into his elbow, dislocating it with a wet crunch.*

*Tirea runs in the vague direction of the others, tears again streaming down her face for some reason. When they arrive at the car, Eve helps Tirea in before getting in herself if it's possible without running into the Shadow*