Paw Patrol: The Call Of The Hound. (Interactive Story)

Part 16

As long as the wolf could see him, Kevin stood zero chance. Sure, it had its other senses to rely on, and particularly its smell was probably just as good, if not, better at finding him than its eyes, but he had to gamble that temporarily blinding it would be good enough.

Gripping the knife in his palm and feeling the sweat slowly drip from his hand, he stood firm as the wolf leaped into the air. At the last second, Kevin side-stepped, narrowly avoiding the massive claws extending from its paws. 

'Too close,' he thought to himself as he quickly circled behind it to try and find an opening. 'Can't let it get that close again.'

Growling fiercely, the beast quickly turns around to face Kevin. It was not going to let him dodge its next attack. Thinking quickly, he grabbed a pebble on the ground as it began to run up at him. Before its paw reached him, he tossed it at its eye. Yelping, the creature fell to the ground, blinking rapidly from the pain. It was distracted and Kevin had his opening.

Not wasting any time, he swiped his blade at its left eye. This time its cry of pain was ear shattering and Kevin reactively covered his ears from its screech. Oh, he got it good alright. However, it seemed even more pissed off than before.

'Just need one more,' he told himself, mentally preparing for the next attack. It was not messing around anymore. It opened its jaw, revealing the fresh blood coating its teeth from the kills it had made today, and quickly sprinted over to Kevin. He barely had time to react as he ducked and rolled to the side before it leaped on him.

He landed next to one of the men that was executed, clutching a hand pistol in his hand. It wouldn't be enough to pierce its skin, and his hand was too shaky from the adrenaline, but it should have been enough to stun it. Grabbing the pistol with his empty hand, he took a shot at the approaching wolf, who flinched in response. Perfect. He swiped at the other eye, resulting in the same cry of pain.

He waited a couple of seconds to see what its response was, but it continued to stand there, whining from the two injuries. Kevin figured that the thing was probably in too much pain to chase him, so seeing his chance, he opted to make a break for it back to the entrance.

The trail that they were walking on was not difficult by any means, especially for Everest, but she was struggling to continue down the path. Not just because she was exhausted, though they have done a heavy amount of traveling in the last 20ish hours, but also because her mind was racing with horrible, gruesome images.

The fact that Raven, at least someone who sounded like him from a very far distance, was still here supposedly looking for her meant that hopefully backup was supposed to be here searching for her and Marshall, but after the very obvious screams of pain, she was unsure if anyone could help her. Even Ryder would struggle due to Marshall's missing his pup tag and Everest's dying after they fell into the river.

Which meant that Marshall and Everest would have to get out of here by themselves. Not an impossible task technically, but they already got way too close to dying too many times with how much they encountered the thing. Would Chase and Ryder even survive an encounter with whatever that thing was? Well, regardless of if they do or don't, they had to focus on their survival first.

"Everest?"Marshall called out, with the husky glancing up upon hearing the Dalmatian calling her name. "Looks like we got a split in the path here."

"Oh," Everest mumbled upon seeing the trail split into two with a nice, large map standing in the merge point between the two paths. "Where do they lead to?"

"Well, looks like the one on our left goes to some sort of information center and community place before continuing to the entrance. The one on our right doesn't have any landmarks, but it follows the river all the way back to the entrance too."

"So, they both lead back to the entrance, but the way we get to it is different."

"Yeah, seems like it. The river path is pretty straightforward and should take shorter, however, it is in the open. The information center is halfway in the path and it looks longer, but it looks like it goes pretty deep in the forest. We should have less of a chance to encounter that wolf-thing if we take it."

Everest considered those options for a second; taking the right path was going towards where she heard the human screams earlier, which meant that the creature would be nearby when they reached that location, but it would be much faster than the left path. The left path, meanwhile, looked as if it would take double or maybe even triple the amount of time as the right path, but they would not be going anywhere near where the creature should have been. Plus, they would have the natural protection of the lush forest to cover their movement.

Although they had time to think for a bit, wasting any more sunlight could prove to be lethal. Where should Marshall and Everest go?

Go down the left path; (Will take longer, but less dangerous).

Go down the right path; (Shorter, but riskier).

When Kevin saw Jeffrey standing by the squad car that he took along with his two partners, he should have been upset with him, but considering the fact he hadn't even recovered from the loss of one of his best friends, he chose not to harass him about his choice to wait for Kevin to get out safely before he drove off.

"Kevin? Get in, quick!" Jeffrey, upon seeing Kevin full-sprinting out of the entrance, signaled for him to get in his car. Of course, Kevin had his own vehicle that he brought, but it was further away and he did not want to risk wasting any time. He didn't even bother buckling up as Jeffrey began hitting the gas and reversing quickly.

Finally having a moment to catch his breath, Kevin relaxed his shaking body and took a moment to process what he just did. He was very, very close to death, and he knew it. But he was alive, and no one else would step foot in that-.

"Oh, shit!"

Snapping out of his thoughts, Kevin saw what Jeffrey was yelling at; the wolf, with its eyes having shallow wounds around its sockets, was now standing in the middle of the street, standing firm and blocking the path. What was it doing?! It was going to kill itself!

Panicking, Jeffrey began to swerve violently, shaking around both of the passengers inside. However, the wolf stayed put, unphased by the now erratically moving car. Jeffrey, only now stabilizing the car, realized he only had three options now; he could keep driving straight-forward, but it was clear the beast was planning something. It wanted them to keep driving into it. If they kept going forward, they would be driving into its trap.

He also could swerve to the right or left, but he was guaranteed to crash if he did that. On his left, they would be driving off the edge of the cliff the road was on and possibly even into the lake that lay at the bottom. It was a long fall, but the right path wasn't much better. The forest on their right was particularly dense, and running into a tree was almost a guarantee. 

Should they risk falling into the wolf's trap? Or should they test their luck in swerving away from it and off the road?

Keep driving forward.

Swerve to the left.

Swerve to the right.

Short chapter, but doesn't mean the choices are any less impactful; the danger has only just begun.

Voting ends June 14th. Good luck.