"No idea Amber, she didn't seem to be using it much when I last saw the place back near the end of January."

"You know," Ariel said thoughtfully. "Those spirits may well be on her side. We might be better off by far killing them before we face her...or else we might have them AND her to deal with all at the same time."

"After all, she's 'feeding' them, right? If they understand that, and understand what we're up to, they'll fight to protect her."

Moss shakes his head at Ariel, "Sorry Ariel, they may be on her side, but more likely just attrected by what she is doing. Either way they are on the Shadow side, and given their nature they would probably have already crossed to attack us here if they could. That means we'd only have to face all of them if we fought her in the Shadow."

"Yeah, but think. If you were Swara, and you knew you were being stalked, where would you want to fight? All by yourself in the real world? Or with a handful of friendly nasty spirits in the Shadow?"

"There's more than one locus in town, after all. We probably won't be able to stop her from crossing over at will."

Sarah couldn't help but quirk an eyebrow at Ariel's unexpected stance. Brow still firmly quirked, she cast a look at Amber, accompanied by posture that gave the unmistakable if unspoken message: You took Alpha; make the call.

"That's the problem we're going to have no matter what we do, unless we catch her away from a locus. Sarah, you've been hunting her the longest. What can you tell us about her habits? How can we find her?" Amber asked, giving Sarah a wolfish grin. "Time for a full debriefing, little wolf."

Did Amber just call me... a wolf? If circumstances hadn't been as grave as they were, Sarah would have grinned as big as a jack-o-lantern. Instead she launched into a detailed rundown on her experiences so far in pursuit of Swara-Ann.

The grim fact were quickly established. The fallen Uratha was faster than she had any right to be, even in her human form... a form she wore less and less often. More often than not, she was seen in on four legs, with occasional diversions into the near-man. At times, Sarah had spotted her in the full battle form, and holding it far longer than she had any right to do. And invariably, it was one step ahead of the vampire, never spotted until in a position to escape. Whether it was mockery or something else remained unknown.

The uncontrolled beast had ranged far and wide; from almost all the way to the coast to East Hollywood, and all the way north to the foothills of the Santa Monica Mountains. The tracks weren't easy to follow - she had an apparent and seemingly random love for shifting - but a few hotbeds of activity had been found. The campus saw a fair bit of attention, and on more than one occasion Sarah had found sign of her around her old dormatory, almost as if she was circling her previous home. And to Sarah's unending frustration, she'd attacked patrons from the Red Dragon on the edge of the Dead-Wolf's territory, dumping remains in park trash cans and dashing north to use (and apparently contaminate) the Grotto locus. And for reasons unknown - possibly ignorance of the danger, Sarah speculated - Swara-Ann had shown no fear of the bizarre monstrosities that seemed to hold Griffith Park and the Zoo.

Her tastes were well-established. Every one of her victims found so far had been male and athletic... and from the look of them, they'd fought back even in their terror. It was almost as if the Broken Soul was looking for some punishment before dealing out her far more deadly own. And yes, all of them for the past few weeks had been missing a fair bit of meat, ripped away by cruel fangs.

"So that's what we're facing," Sarah wrapped up. "So where from here, Amber?"

Amber rotated her neck. "We need a good place to ambush her." She looked to Sarah. "You're close to the mages. Can one of them look into the future and tell us a good point to find her?"

Half-blushing despite her lack of active circulation, Sarah considered her reply. "Close" was, after all, something of an understatement to her relationship with Lucien....

"I'm close with one of them," she finally answered, "and know of another. In fact, that other used to be Swara-Ann's roommate in the dorms. I don't know if they can pull off divination of that sort, though; most of what Lucien's shown me is the truth of things present and past." Like the fact that I'm still me, she restrained herself from adding.

"But for all I know, maybe they really can pull it off. I'll talk with Lucien, and see if he or the other one can do that sort of thing."

Moss looks grim, "Other than that it sounds like I might have to play at being bait for a while. Going jogging near the campus, or perhaps along that route she takes seems like a fair bet to draw her out."

Amber shook her head. "Let's save the bait idea for later," she said. "Sarah, go talk to Lucian. Ask if he can find out where she's going to be at a place where we can ambush her." A light came in her eyes. "And ask if he can do anything about her being a broken soul, or her meat-eating tendencies. We'll see if the mages can do anything."

She looked at the other Uratha. "We're going to nose around her and Shadow-side, see if we can get her scent. Questions?"

"Will do," was Sarah's succinct reply. She shifted in that strange non-Uratha fashion into a wolf, and tore off north along the fence line, veering west and out of sight after clearing the length of it.

The hour was getting very late indeed, and the first pink starting to show on the eastern horizon when the Dead Wolf returned, racing in on four legs and shifting to two only at the last moment.

"Lucien knows where she lives," Sarah said without preamble, "and he's willing to take a shot at fixing her if we can grab her. Anyone know where we can score some chloroform? And maybe a couple tanks of halon?"

Amber thought. "Lemme make a call," she said, turning and walking away from the group. She pulled out her phone, dialed and waited.

Theodore answered. "Yes, dear?"

Amber felt a warm smile cross her face. "Hey, Theo," she said. "What's up?"

"I'm fine, Amber, but you called me," he reminded her.

Amber flushed. "Right, I was wonder if I could ask a favor."

"You can always ask," he told her.

"Could you get some chloroform and a couple of tanks of halon for me?"

"I confess to surprise," he said, chuckling a little. "I'll make some calls. When do you need it?"

"As soon as possible," Amber said.

"I'll call soon."

Hanging up, she turned back. "We might have some soon. Until we know, let's assume that we'll need another source of it. Anyone else have a way to get either of those?"

"No time to go through legit channels," Ariel grumbled. "I assume."

"If we're not in TOO big a hurry, it's pretty easy to make though. Chloroform, that is. Halon might be trickier, especially in that quantity. Some fire extinguishers use it, but usually not portable ones I don't think."

"OK," Sarah said with a nervous look toward the gradually growing light in the eastern sky. "The basic plan I have is this."

She sat, her back against the fence and eyes trained eastward. "We'll need to get Swara out of her lair. Best thing there is if we can spot her somewhere, but a lure might be needed. Regardless, I need her out and away from there. While she's out, I go in with the halon.

"For those of you who are unaware," she explained, "halon displaces oxygen, makes the stuff unusable. That's why it's used in fire supression," she noted with a nod toward Ariel. "And it makes it impossible to breathe very, very quickly. A couple tanks should take care of even a big basement, and she's been holing up underneath the old Church of Christ south of campus.

"Basic idea is that I wait for her to come home and get well and truly deep in, then I open the valves. Nuts or not, she needs to breathe... and I don't. Might have to scrap with her until the gas takes hold, might not, but I should be able to hold my own on the short term." I hope.

"Once she's out cold, I drag her out of there before she dies, and the pack helps to keep her contained as she comes to, using the chloroform if needed."

The light was growing from pink to golden through the trees, and the Dead-Wolf knew her time had run out. "I need to get under. So hash it out, and when I come up tonight let me know if this plan has any huge-ass problems." A bright ray finally pierced the trees to the top of the fence as Sarah sank once more into the soil and Gaia's protecting arms.

Amber looked to the others. "We have a day to plan and get supplies together. If you see an issue with the plan, we need to know now, before we waste a bunch of time getting stuff we don't use." She glanced at the two Uratha waiting for them to speak.

Moss nods, "Plan looks ok to me, although I'd rather Sarah wasn't stuck taking the thing on herself. Let me know if there is anything else I can do to help with the prepartions."

The three werewolves agreed to massage their contacts to find the supplies they needed and meet back here at dark. For Amber, the day was spent hunting down and talking to Kryze, who would poke around but didn't have a lot of hope for any Halon. He did think he could get some chloroform, and if she wanted roofies, he was there. After that lovely statement, Amber went home, got a few hours of sleep and went back to meet the others.

"Got chicken," she grunted as she thrust a bucket of deep fried death at the other two werewolves. With a leg in her hand, she asked, "Is she off feeding, or is our little mosquito still sleeping?" As Amber spoke, the ground shifted silently, and Sarah rose, just in time to catch the 'moquito' comment. Amber saw their expressions change, and she said, "Aww, she's right behind me, isn't she?"

"Yep," Sarah said.

"Right, hi, Sarah!" Amber said, turning around and grinning. "I might have a lead on chloroform, and I expect to hear from Theo about the halon, now that he's had the day to have people working on it. Anyone else have news?"

Sarah didn't grin in response to the greeting. She did give something partway between a "Hmph" and a growl beneath lowered brows. But the look eased as Amber mentioned the possible lead on chloroform.

Her look shifted back to a touch of darkness at mention of Theo; the last thing in the world the Dead-Wolf really wanted was a reminder that her cousin was working for leeches. But it was a short-lived glower, replaced by a sigh and a nod. The sad truth of the situation was that Amber would do what Amber would do; if that included working for some Machiavellian elder, there wasn't a damned thing Sarah could do about it. And hell, he might just prove to be useful if he came through with the halon... and if his price wasn't too steep.

"No news here," Ariel said comfortably from the tree she was leaning against. "If you can get the chloroform then I don't have much to add to that."

"As for the halon, I did some research as far as getting some legitimately. The stuff's expensive and heavy, and it's been illegal to use in new fire suppression systems since 1993, so it's not fast to get. There are companies that recycle halon from old systems though and reprocess it to recharge existing halon systems that are grandfathered in. So we can buy it. Better for our purposes, but more expensive, are open market bids from companies that sell reprocessed halon. They can deliver it faster, since they're usually liquidating inventory, but there's some luck involved finding someone who's selling as much as you need."

"As far as working out how much we need, that depends on how big the room is. Sarah, how did this plan work again? How big an area did you want flooded with this stuff?"

Moss just shrugs, "Sorry ladies, not a lot of oppurtunity to get that kind of stuff in my line of work. I'm mainly here for the lifting and fighting I guess. Oh, and sealing the room so you don't loose too much halon before you can use it."

"Well, I'm waiting for Theo to contact me," Amber said. "I'm expecting him any-" Her phone beeped and Amber grinned. "Speak of the devil and he texts you." She read the screen silently, then aloud, "'A, can get pie you wanted, will take time depending on size. Plz txt me ASAP when you have dimensions.' Nice." She read a bit more and then snorted. "Sarah, you're to blame for this bit: 'Working with M to get enough to flood our basement with pie - should keep ants and other pests away.' This is completely your fault."

Despite her dire words, Amber was amused. She put the phone away and said, "We need to find out how much we need. Sarah, that's up to you. I think that you can get closest to her without alarming her to your presence. She'd spot one of us immediat-" Her phone beeped again and Amber pulled it out. She looked at the screen, then laughed and typed out a three-letter response. Still chuckling, she put the phone away. "Sorry," she said, "Theo just sent me a joke. Anyway, Sarah, that's your second task for tonight. Find the dimensions of the room and how much we're going to need. Moss, Ariel and I need to case her place from a distance and get a sense of her schedule, so we'll work that out. But..."

An eager grin crossed her face. "Since we won't get the Halon tonight, let's go spirit-side and take out the cannibal spirits. We'll have time to recover before going to meet Swara-Ann, so we might as well get rid of them now. Moss, look spirit-side for us and let us know what's up before we cross."

"Sure no problem Amber."

With that Moss closes his eyes and concentrates briefly, when he opens them the left has turned into a night-scene of the sky, black with stars moving across it.

"Theo... just sent you a joke?" The words weren't really directed at Amber, and came out at a half-whisper just before Sarah shook her head. Her disdain for her own kind was near-legendary; frankly, the dead girl deserved a T-shirt with "Self-Loathing Vampire" stenciled on the front. But in this particular case, she was almost more surprised than angry. When exactly in our shared existence together did Amber start joking with leeches?

Still, the problem at hand remained. And as much as the Dead-Wolf didn't want to admit it, Amber's unfortunately friendly relationship with her undead boss might have started lightening the Rahu's attitude toward her undead cousin. Rorx's report that there was at least enough safe space for transit meant that the little team was going to go a-hunting. And that put the barest hint of a grin at just the very corner of Sarah's faintly blue lips.

"So, willing to give your spiritually-challenged and life-impaired former cousin a lift to the other side, Amber?" The delivery was dry, but that little quirk at the corner of her mouth and a raised eyebrow let onto the vampire's attempt at humour.

Amber reached out, grabbed Sarah’s collar and stepped sideways. Ariel and Moss followed after them without hesitation. Once across, Amber released Sarah, and without hesitation, started to shift. Within seconds, Amber was shaking her Urshal coat out. With a grunted, “Find trail,” in First Tongue, she stuck her nose to the ground and started to hunt for the spirits they were hunting. Until she found their trail, she wasn’t sure what a cannibal spirit would smell like. The others joined her in alternate wolf or wolf-like forms, and they all went hunting.

It took a bit of hunting, but they were thick in this area, and soon, they found a path that smell of meat, blood and wrongness. Amber paused, her muzzle rising into the air as she sang of the hunt. Around her, Ariel and Moss joined her, their deep Urshal chests producing a powerful cacophony. Sarah’s wolf form’s howl almost lost in their siren song; nevertheless, around them, the spirits shuddered as Father Wolf’s hated children went on the chase.

They had left Sarah’s territory before they saw their quarry. Despite having been running for a couple of hours, when they saw their prey, the werewolves – and vampire in wolf’s clothing – picked up their speed. The cannibal spirits turned as the canines approached, their teeth bared at the sight of the silent, charging wolves.

The Urshal slammed into the spirits and for a moment, there was only chaos as the spirits attempted to face off against the charging wolves. Their first attack was strong; two of the spirits were damaged so severely that they couldn’t maintain their shape, and they disencorpulated. After the first barrage, the spirits returned the favor, tearing and biting the Forsaken-plus-one.

The spirits quickly changed tactics, focusing their attacks on Moss. As the biggest, they assumed he was the most dangerous, a mistake they learned when Amber turned out to be the fiercest fighter. Ariel was no slouch, fighting wildly. She felt strangely free to be Uratha in this world, as if because the spirits were real here, she could meet them on their own ground, as a half-spirit werewolf.

Moss was concerned about getting swamped, but Sarah dodged to his side and drove a wedge between him and the spirits, granting him some breathing room. Soon, Amber shoved herself forcibly between him and the spirits mauling him on the other side, and the Itheaur found himself able to fight more effectively in the shelter of his pack, temporary as it was.

Amber was alive. There was no other term for the feeling that welled in her as she entered battle. She was returning the balance to the world, removing spirits that were throwing off the balance. She bit and tore, clawed and slashed violently, rending the spirits with the fervor of a full-moon. This was her element, and she was alive.

It was less clear for Sarah. But she fought at the side of her cousins – for if Amber was her cousin in blood, she was no less her cousin in spirit, just like Ariel and Moss. But her long-denied Gangrel blood still darkly exalted at the destruction of her enemies and her Beast howled with the joy of battle.

The last spirit fell, and the four stood, bleeding and panting. “All good?” Amber asked in guttural First Tongue, looking around at the others.

"Good enough" replied Moss, "Any others to track down, or do we think that was all of them for now?", he continued looking to Amber and Sarah.

Sarah tried to speak... and only managed a few yips and howls. With a canine sigh, she shrugged and shifted smoothly up to her native form. Then she had to deal with the ignominy of getting a translation by way of Ariel. Only then could the sole non-Uratha present join the conversation.

"Good question. Hard to get a clear scent here; way, way too much blood - or what passes for blood with them, anyway - in the air." The Dead-Wolf had already found her regrets on that note; while animal-spirits had proven to have something sufficiently bloodlike for consumption in the Shadow, the same did not hold true with more conceptual spirits such as these. The fight hadn't been easy or without injury, and Sarah was notably more pale than usual.

Ariel shifted human and wiped at the spirit-ichor that was still staining her lips and fingers. She didn't like trying to speak First Tongue...it sounded crude and caveman-like in her ears due to her purely instinctive fluency. Silently she decided to actually study it and try to learn it for real.

"The spirits probably wouldn't stray far from the locus, right? This is where they eat, and eating's all they are."

She paused on seeing Sarah's predicament, then steeled herself and said, "You okay, Sarah?"

The vampire gave a very pale thumbs-up and nod. "I'm intact. Just burned through a lot of my reserves shifting and healing, is all. Kinda need to refuel before doing much more." Multiple rips through her jacket and jeans - and the unmarred skin beneath - were mute testament to just how much healing had been involved.

She looked around the shadow-world, gazing north toward the mountains that fringed the bowl that held the spirit reflection of Los Angeles. "You know, I'm betting there's some decent game up there - spirit deer and more. I've hunted them before, up in Sonoma, and they're blood works just fine. Rest of the pack took the meat for essence. You folks up for a dinner hunt?"

Moss also shifts back to his human form, also showing rips and rents in his bike leatehrs, "Sounds good to me, I could do with a recharge myself after healing that lot up."

Ariel looked out towards the hills, conflicted.

"I don't know," she said, "is that really how this is supposed to work? I mean, these spirits were a clear danger. But a deer spirit...what's it a threat to besides spirit grass? How is hunting and killing them maintaining any kind of balance?"

"We are spirits, and we are predators," Amber grunted as her frame finished shifted to near-human. "There's nothing more natural than hunting prey spirits. And we're not going to trash the balance by killing a billion. But unless we do the Rite, it's just calories for us, which we could get from a hamburger."

Sarah was cheered by the prospect of a group hunt... right up until a round of questioning found that nobody actually had the required Rite to make yummy spirit-deer meat into yummy spirit-deer essence. Amber and Ariel started making preferential sounds toward the idea of a drive-thru instead of dinner on the hoof, and the Dead-Wolf watched the hunt dissolve in a wave of urbanity.

No-Moss was still up for something a bit more vibrant and clean than a hamburger though, and that restored at least a measure of Sarah's equivalent of happiness. "OK, in that case you folks may as well get some chow back home; Moss an' I'll get something with a bit more life in it. Assuming you don't have a problem giving me a lift home afterward," she added; Moss replied with a nod, and the group broke off into separate dinner parties.

As Ariel and Amber headed back to the locus, the remaining hunters headed north through a surreal landscape of trails and trees, half-present houses and a variety of spirits endemic to suburbia. But as the land began to rise, that urban tidiness gave way to more wild lands... and with them, wild spirits. A rabbit-spirit broke from cover, darting off to a hidden den as the two wolves - one half-spirit, the other berift of life altogether - stalked through the underbrush, seeking larger game.

They would not be disappointed.

The deer, when found, was a big one. It had thrived on plant spirits of all sorts over the years, and its antlers were sharp. But in the end, it was no match for the two predators, and after a chase that tore across miles of increasingly rough terrain, it went down with Moss tearing at the flank and Sarah's jaws latched tight around its throat.

Both the living and the dead fed well in the primordial land; blood went to one, meat to another, and aside from the bones not a thing was wasted.

It was only a few nights later when the bubble burst.

Sarah was up in a tree, watching the old church beneath which her prey called home. She'd already confirmed a few handy details. A lack of windows and what seemed to be a well-sealed door certainly made the halon idea more viable; even though it would be more of a hassle to vent out later, at least she didn't need to worry about a coastal breeze ripping through badly gapped windows and sweeping the oxygen-displacing gas before it could do the job.

A sudden vibration in her jacket pocket was a very welcome sign; sure enough, the number on the screen was Ariel. They've spotted her out somewhere, and I can finally get this scouting done, the Dead-Wolf thought happily. Flipping the phone open, she quipped in a pleased tone, "So how far out is she?"

The smile dropped quickly. "Then why are you calling me?" Neutrality shifted to a frown. "What problem?" The frown became a glower. "Really? How long?" A sigh. "Eight minutes, huh?" Another sigh. "Well, shit. So much for the halon."

Years of unlife had taken a bit from Sarah, and one of those things was consideration that breathing wasn't exactly a constant process for the living. Ariel's experiment had determined that it could be even less constant for one of the People. And if Swara-Ann could endure the gas that long, this wasn't going to work unless she was asleep through the whole process. Sarah couldn't count on that.

"You know I still need to go in there, right?" Flinching, Sarah suddenly thrust the phone out away from her ear; protest could be heard clearly by birds in the next tree over. "Because," she finally said after the worst of it was over, "it's the best chance we have of catching her without it being on the street or someone's camera or actually getting some poor slob caught in the crossfire. Do you really wanna go in there blind?" A moment of waiting, then: "Just one. And just me. Less chance of her catching a scent that way." Another moment passed. "I know. I will. And yeah, if I'm not calling you back in an hour, let Amber and Lucien know. Take care."

Closing the phone, she started to pocket it... then as an afterthought, turned off even the vibrate mode. Only then did the vampire slip down from her perch and move like a shadow in the night toward the church.

Streams of silvery moonlight mingled with unsettled dust in the air of the abandoned church through long neglected spots within the high ceiling above the floor of the main chapel. Papers, old cans of food and various assorted liquor bottles lay upon the floor all over along with abandoned mattresses and rusty, blackened oil drums the homeless once used for fires.

The sense of irony wasn't lost on the redhead as her boots crunched the grit of years of neglect on what was once a soft red carpet as she looked upon the massive crucifix far in the back beyond row after row of overturned pews. The night's moon beamed down upon the man nailed upon its surface and one had to wonder if he wept a silent tear for her damned soul.

The basement entrance was not difficult to locate, in fact, the floor plan she obtained from the interwebs gave her all the information she needed to guesstimate where she was currently located, and where Swara might be most likely to be 'lairing'.

Nothing could have truly prepared her for what her eyes took in. Although in the stages of ruin that reminded her of some post-apocalyptic Mad Max movie with papers and debris scattered everywhere along the sides of walkways the wall were spray painted with random graffiti as one could expect in an abandoned L.A. building. The stench of death quickly assaulted her heightened senses while her keen eyes noticed writing over the spray painted messages.

She stepped warily into the fellowship hall, a huge octagonal room that had been made the center of Swara's broken dementia. Claw marks decorated the walls, ceiling and floor showing the brunt of night after night insane rage filled tantrums. If there was any furniture in this place at one time she'd smashed it to splinters long ago. Some sections of a concrete wall, on the far eastern end of the chamber, were smashed out with a massive hole and several feet of re-bar protruded upward, broken and mangled that seemed to lead out and connect with a main sewer passage. Perhaps this was how Swara was able to slip and out most times without being seen...


Slowly Sarah's eyes made out the scrawling upon the walls, all of it seemingly scattered about at random but it didn't take her long to discern its order. Her Kindred nose quickly detected that all of it was written in blood...

Lord Jesus, please take my pain away...

Hungry... feed... flesh... kill...

I'm not this... I can't be this... kill me, oh, God please kill me.

Hunger. Mustn't eat. It knows! It knows! Power in flesh. POWER!

All things happen with a divine purpose... even fallen angels. Right?

YOU WILL EAT! YOU. WILL. EAT!

Fuck off!

The rancid stench of vomit filled the air as Sarah noticed several places along the chambers walls where the yawn of a thousand colors had redecorated the place. All of it was pinkish if not completely stained a vile crimson. She was sure that had Swara not been able to regenerate she would have permanently damaged her throat and body many times over... then again, maybe her ability to heal was the only still keeping her going. The mental and physical fortitude of werewolves was second to no other creature, live or dead.

Alone in the dim lighting of the fellowship hall Sarah was left with a puzzle to piece together.

She fought against her fall, Sarah thought to herself, caught in the horror and pain and despair of this accursed place. Might even still be fighting, given how fresh some of this still is.

Technically, the scouting mission was done, aside from the leaving. Sarah knew the ways in, how Swara-Ann was bypassing the doors, and where she havened.

But in an entirely different way, it had all just begun. This was a side that the Dead-Wolf hadn't seen in the park or the half-dozen quick cat-and-mouse encounters in and around the campus. No, this was something else entirely. There was, amid the chaos and destruction, a struggle for self happening here, one not completely unfamiliar to the vampire; so many of the dark words scrawled across the walls seemed echoes of her own Beast and its relentless call for blood and death.

Did werewolves have an unspoken Beast of their own? Was that the force behind a Rage? If so, it was such a tightly-held secret that she'd never heard whisper of it in her entire life (and unlife). And Sarah doubted it was something she could ask the pack and survive the asking.

With a whole new mystery and no answers to be had, Sarah gave the tortured words one last look, then silently made her way back up the stairs.

The hellish cry tore the air, and Amber looked up from her casual inspection of the church. She was on top of another building, not too far away from the building that Sarah was currently inside. That wouldn't have been Amber's choice, but sometimes, you didn't have good options. Sarah had been right in that choice of tactic; she had the best chance of getting in and out without leaving a scent. Swara Ann's return was going to ruin Sarah's caution.

She pulled out her phone and quickly called Ariel. "I'm going to draw her away. Get Sarah out of there, somehow, without alerting Swara Ann that you were in there. Yeah, I know, I suck for being so unhelpful. Be careful."

She hung up without really giving Ariel a chance to argue. Amber had the best chance of surviving toe-to-toe with Swara Ann, if it came to that. Hopefully, she could just lead her on a merry chase for a bit, after which Swara Ann would get bored and give up.

Yeah, Amber wasn't exactly counting on that, either. But the omega wouldn't be left high and dry against that thing. Normally, Amber would think, no way would she let the omega get killed by that thing, but well, that wasn't accurate in this situation.

She hustled downstairs and stood just inside the doorway, letting it shadow her. Dropping into wolf-form, Amber tipped her head back and howled. It was a howl that said, "Hi, I'm all up in your business. Come here and make me stop." Tensely, she waited to see if Swara Ann would come and investigate the intruder. She should but Amber didn't really think she was sane enough anymore to do what she should, only what she did.

Mangy snow white ears perked up in the bitter black of nearby alleyway...

Yessssssss....... The child barely made a sound louder than his whimpers as his neck snapped, crushed slowly by the vice-like jaws of its captor. Limply the precious soul struck the pavement and in a flash the beast was en route to its challenge.

The scent of death and carrion assailed the air she drew closer and Amber's keen senses could detect he arrival of the soul broken young werewolf...

The first blood-curdling cry caught Sarah's ears as she'd just reached a landing halfway up a stairwell, stopping her dead in her tracks; the second - a more familiar sound - came only seconds later. If Sarah's heart could beat, it would have raced.

One of the problems of not knowing First Tongue, she would take the time to lament later if she survived, is that you don't know what your allies are trying to tell you. In this case, Sarah chose an interpretation all her own: *Get the fuck out while you can!*

Forcing vitae to and through her skin, the vampire rippled and changed... not into her beloved wolf form, but something much, much more apt for her intended act of fleeing. Moments later, the falcon burst from the top of the stairwell, striving for altitude as fast as wings would take it and looking for a way out.

For a moment, Sarah thought she was effectively trapped; the heavy old church doors were closed and there was no way she could shove them open like this. Hiding amongst the rafters looked to be the best option, until she wheeled around through a side vestibule and nearly ran into a dangling rope. Hope surged anew as she darted upward through the blackened shaft, dodging a massive old bell before escaping the church with a shrill falcon's cry of freedom.

With eyes far sharper than they had any right to be, Sarah searched from lofty heights for werewolves, both ally and enemy.

Moss swore under his breath as things obviously went to shit. He quickly moved away from the window of the abandoned building half a block away that he had been using to observe the church from and ran as quietly as he could for the fire escape and made his way down until he was only one floor off the ground. The last drop and dash he would make once he had a better idea of what was going on, or if he heard the fight starting.

Amber bolted; there was no shame in running if running had been the plan. Of course, part of her raged at turning tail and being chased, but the part of her that was more than wolf - and more than human - knew that this was the right tactic.

Right!

The voice was suddenly in her head. A human would have freaked; Amber might have freaked had she not had god-knows-how-many-pounds of angry werewolf on her heels. That kind of pressure doesn't allow for much in the way of consideration, and as a werewolf, Amber was used to following sudden, inexplicable urges. So she ducked right between two cars, and then between two buildings, bounding over a gate without hesitation.

At first she thought she'd just trapped herself in a back yard, but the voice came again. Under the roses. She ducked under the flowers and found a wolf-sized hole in the fence. Wiggling through cost her a couple of steps, but it slowed down the slavering Swara Ann more.

On it went, Amber dodging and ducking through a convoluted course. She noticed that when they hit brief straightaways, Swara Ann was able to close distance. If it hadn't been for her mysterious mental guide, Amber would have been run to ground already.

Still, she'd run out of steam soon. Amber grimly began to consider the possibility that she'd have to stop and fight, or die tired. If she was going to get caught, she'd rather do it on her terms. Her golden eyes began to size up potential defensive positions for a possible stand. Hopefully, it wouldn't be her last stand...

Moss heard the commotion as the two of the ran off, Christ Amber I hope you know what you are doing. Moving back up the fire escape to the roof he does his best to follow the chase, keeping an eye on the time as he does so.

Having lost track of where the chase has gotten to he reverts to clock watching and hopes he can guess it right. When the clock reaches 15 minutes from the start of the chase he quickly makes his way down to the street and changes into his wolf-form and copies Amber's idea of howling a challenge to Swara, in the hopes of drawing her away from Amber.
#Hey, nice stuff in your lair. Want to come make me give it back?#

The Fish and Wildlife Service has this to say about a peregrine falcon's dive:



Halfway into her dive, Sarah Dead-Wolf had this to say about the phenomenon:



It may have been a good thing that she lacked the vocal capacity to actually utter the words. As it was, she dove from the night sky on silent wings after having spotted Amber and her predicament amid the fences and shrubs of backyard L.A. And despite her near-panic at the rapid approach of terra firma, Sarah had one advantage: of all the things Swara-Ann could have expected, a diving falcon with claws as deadly as silver knives was completely off the radar.

The undead raptor tore so deeply into the mad wolf that it actually pulled up with muscle still clutched in red-stained talons.



Of course, there was one tiny problem with this tactical air support: surprise or no, the bird-form of Sarah was now within her prey's reach... and that prey was a track-and-field medalist.

Hearing Swara's cry/howl of pain Moss starts a long string of swearing in his head as he turns and sprints for the sound of the injured werewolf.

Ariel hung up her phone and hurried up to the church's front door at a brisk walk. One hand was in her jacket pocket where her gun was small comfort against the forces arrayed against her this night. She didn't look around furtively, though part of her desperately wanted to. Guilty people acted guilty. She didn't want to seem that way, just in case.

Of course, she had no idea how to stop a wolf from smelling her, but it seemed reasonable to open the door with her hand in her jacket. Surely that would be less smellable than touching it with skin, leaving some of herself behind.

She edged into the church, into the cool, dark air that stank of mildew and ancient stone. Try not to sweat...try not to sweat...sweat stinks...

"Sarah?" Ariel called in a stage whisper. God, let her be using her good ears. "Sarah, if you can hear me, you've got to get out now!"

No response. Fuck.

Alright, maybe the vampire heard the same thing Amber had, and she'd already gone. But she couldn't leave it to maybes. She'd have to make sure.

So Ariel waited a second for her eyes to adjust, then moved forward into the old chapel.

She'd chased Amber all the way into an old junkyard by the time the falcon descended down upon her. As the beast's flesh was torn deep and it cried out in bitter, hate filled agony. Bones snapped and muscle popped while the already massive beast contorted into something even more brutal.

Sarah's intent to inflict grievous, incurable harm upon the frightened girl only drew out instincts more fearsome than anything the vile spirit that rode her consciousness could ever have hoped to kindle. Sarah was a blessing in disguise it seemed, kindling the girls' rage and giving her that final push over the edge she needed to really do some damage.

Those who caught sight of her in the dim moon light and scattered fading streetlights saw an impossible transformation. Although her fur was possibly the purest shade of white one could imagine now it was unkempt and a sickly gray with mangy patches of rash covered skin. Physically she should have been dead; her body was so emaciated from hunger that her flesh was pulled taught over her bones. Sickly blackened claws extended from each of her digits as a slimy thick saliva coated her blackened gums and wickedly jagged teeth dripping down in long strands that refused to break.

Amber knew the urshal form well, but what Swara was now was not an urshal. It looked like the from but there was something far more primal about it. She now stood nearly eight feet at the shoulder (a full three feet taller than an average urshal) and her eyes carried with them a gleam... a reddened gleam that bore into Amber heart and told her exactly what sort of power Swara had called upon...

...and it scared her.

The Beast arched her head and bayed loudly...

For miles and miles the cry was heard and rung deep in the ears of everyone that heard her cry. It was twisted and wrong in the ears of the Uratha who heard it but otherwise they seemed unaffected if only slightly agitated at this mockery of the People. But Sarah, Sarah was a different story. Deep within the recesses of her mind, deep within the dormant halls of what vampires called 'memory' rest a spark from when she was once alive. The howl triggered somewhere deep within her that primal fear all humans once held for wolves and their kin the Uratha.

With a mighty swipe of her paw Sarah's falcon from was struck from the sky where she tumbled across the ground in a bouncing splash of feathers.

Fear knotted up her chest and Amber's hackles rose immediately, but she didn't hesitate. An explosion of power from within her feral heart resulted in an external explosion of fur, muscle and bone. Amber would later thank Luna that they were concealed among the detritus of humanity, but she quietly admitted that might not have stopped her. Swara Ann had crossed a line, forcing Amber to follow her over it.

Silently, Amber's Garou form slammed into Swara Ann's transformed side. The old plan was gone to hell, which was ok on some level to the Rahu. This was comfortable.

And if it was her day to die, it was her day to die.

Terrible claws ripped into Swara Ann's exposed side, rending fur from flesh and flesh from bone. Amber finally broke her silence with a defiant howl that preemptively declared victory - and graciously allowed for surrender. Rage from the Garou form and natural arrogance was a beautiful thing in battle.

Sarah's Beast had one and only one thing in mind at the moment: flee in terror from that thing that swatted her to the ground like an errant fly. There was a significant chunk of what remained of her human side that wanted to join it.

For good or for ill, what portion remained was made of sterner stuff. And it wasn't about to leave her cousin to the devices of this horrific monstrosity.

With precious blood, the Dead-Wolf shifted, feathers falling way as she struggled to her feet as her namesake, trying to shake off the worst of the blow and gather her wits and nerve to take on Swara. But the sight of Amber in her war form - her true form, in a way, a perfect blending of body and spirit - put pause in Sarah's step. Her Rahu cousin's mighty roar put some steel back in her spine, and - shaky or not - Sarah started forward again, teeth bared for battle.

Growls and snarls were met in kind as the massive albino beast staggered from the impact and visceral fury of Amber's onslaught.

With speed faster than Amber could have anticipated the huge beast spun around and clamped down hard upon her leg, yanking her off her feet and with a mighty sway of her neck threw her to the ground in front of her with an earth shattering gasp of escaped air from shattered ribs. with a savage fury she gored and clawed at the fallen Uratha warrior as sprays of blood and shredded organs filled the 'arena' in a grisly crimson mist.

Not all of it was Amber's, as she rended her foe so to did her foe rend her and primal growls and roars filled the night air.