Behind The Mask

Going Back

     Without warning, Humdinger and Helga came through the door and once they saw Chase awake on his bed, they quickly ran up to him with Helga quickly pulling him into a hug which surprised the shepherd.

"W-What happened?" Chase asked in a soft voice.

"You passed out, you really had us all worried." Humdinger chuckled a little bit, trying to lift up the spirits.

"What about Arya and Maya?" Chase asked, once again in his soft tone.

"We're here." Two voices spoke.

Chase watched as Arya and Maya emerged behind Humdinger with worried expressions directed towards him. Maya quickly ran up to her big brother and hugged him on his side, glad that he was okay which made Chase smile. He then looked up at Arya and sadly frowned a little bit.

"H-Hey," She nervously greeted. Of course, she didn't know that the women she worked for tortured the pup in front of her, so Chase had no reason to hold anything against her for it.

"You...You don't work for her anymore, right?" He asked, with a somewhat hopeful tone and Arya nodded her head side-to-side, answering his question.

"Are you feeling better?" Helga asked as she pulled from the hug and studied the shepherd to make sure he looked okay.

"Yeah, I feel fine." The shepherd sighed as he slowly got off from the bed which surprised the rest of them.

"Woah, hold on, shouldn't you be getting some more rest?" Humdinger asked with a worried tone, hesitant on letting Chase out of bed already which made Chase chuckle a little bit.

"Heh, don't worry, I'm okay. But there are way more important things right now." Chase spoke up which made Arnold frown a little bit at that sentence, putting other things before his health. He wanted to stop him, but knew that talking to him wouldn't be any use.

Chase looked at Arya once again. Again, this news was just all...crazy to him. And the fact that one of the dogs that he saw as family worked for the woman that has tortured him. But now, she doesn't. And he could trust Arya now.

"I know who you used to work for." Chase admitted, but it wasn't easy. That sentence made Arya look at Chase with a surprised and confused expression.

"Hold on, so you know Lady Keres?" Helga asked, saying her name as if she had trouble getting it right. Chase nodded his head.

"A while ago, I did." Chase answered.

"So, you used to work for her?" Arya asked.

"No, I never did. I don't really wanna talk about it, either." Chase sighed a little bit, earning understanding nods from everyone else. Seeing how Chase reacted to hearing Lady Keres's name, it seemed that he had a bad history with her and knowing that it wasn't smart to push him.

"Alright, so how much time do you think we have until they have a full out war between the two of them?" Humdinger asked as he turned to Arya, seeing that she might be the only one who could provide the most information.

"I'm not sure, but they are raising up armies of their own. If they fight each other, so much damage will happen and so many other people will get hurt." Arya explained.

"A whole lot of people." Chase whispered out and lifted his head to them.

"So, what do we do?" Maya asked, wondering with all of this information, what her new family was going to do. Everyone thought about it for a second until Humdinger sighed a little bit as he came up with an idea, but it wasn't something he was gonna like, or Chase would like.