115 Tide 3

He would not be stopped.

Doom stood atop another lonely hill as the Beast Tide swept all before him.

He saw the airships of man rain down death and destruction upon the Wilds partaking of the Tide.

So be it. The destruction would be paid back in full. He was not a protector of Wilds themselves, but of nature, and the Wildlands. Wilds died every day; save for a precious few that he cared for, he would not seek to save them all.

"Hey, can we talk about this?!" Remian yelled at him from the Tug above.

"NOW you want to talk? Where was this desire to talk when you felled the forests and raised smoke into our air?"

"We can do something about that smoke, if you just gave us the chance! And we replanted that forest! Or at least, we tried!"

"The replanting is the only reason why we are sparing your lives! Now, begone!"

"Begone? But we live here! These are our homes!" Remian tried.

He saw the settlements of man and the mines they tried to dig.

After today, they would dig no more. Not even graves. Doom intended fully for them to leave these unspoiled lands.

"Why did you think I did not bring flying Wilds, did not seek to strike down your airships? You would need those airships to leave!"

"Surely we can come to some sort of agreement…?"

He saw camp after camp trampled. He saw the Encles' wall collapse, and the shrieking evacuees fleeing to the mines. He saw the houses and the fishing docks all wrecked in minutes.

"Maybe now you would understand what it feels like to have your home, your entire community destroyed in a day! How many birds lost their nests? How many creatures lost their forests? They were beyond count!"

"But we managed to live peacefully with the Wilds…"

He saw the humans barricade themselves in the mines.

"Maybe now you understand what it was like to fear to walk in the sunlight, to have to live in hiding, in dark caves because only there were they safe!" Doom retorted. "You claim to live in peace? What then of all the dead in your wake? What then of the destruction of the lands and the skies at your hand! And for what? For greed!"

He saw the Tide flood the town. The fastest ones brought fear to the streets. The slower ones brought screams to the people in the structures. The largest and slowest ones to follow brought those very structures down. The people fled; some tried to fight, but one look told them it was hopeless. They fled, and the Sky Fortress went to work evacuating the workers of the industrial zone.

In twenty minutes, only the church was left standing in all the town.

"Why spare the church?" Remian had to ask.

"It is out of respect for the priesthood." Doom told him, a wistful gaze in his eye.

Remian's own eyes narrowed. "You were a priest?"

Doom did not answer. Instead, he ensured the absolute destruction of the entire town, all the way to the desert's edge, and then turned west.

"Please! We can do better!"

"I don't trust you!" Doom shot back directly.

"Does 'you' mean me, specifically, or all humans?"

"Both!"

Doom marched on westward.

"Stop! Enough already! There's nothing there but the Guild Hall, the hospital, and the farm! Please, stop!" Mindy yelled.

But he would not be stopped! He would… he would…

He stopped.

Ten feet from the farm, Doom's feet and fury alike stopped cold.

He stared. For a long minute, he stared. Then, tears filled his eyes.

"This… this is what I wanted to see. For so long… this was the scene I wanted to see!" Doom cried.

Remian blinked.

In front of them were the wolfcats, some lynxmice, half the hive of Feelo-wasps, and a pair of humans. Some of the cubs and the wasps were playing with a little boy, yipping, laughing, heedless and without a care or fear in the world. The adult wolfcats were lounging around, fearless of the human in their midst. The adult human was playing a pipe, fearless of the wolfcats surrounding the boy. He merely sipped mead.

Odd as it may seem, the pair of humans seemed completely oblivious to the destruction going on less than a kilometer away from them.

"D-Darrian? And Wulfgar?" Remian trailed off wordlessly.

"What are they even doing there?" Mindy asked, blankly.

A Saber-Cat snarled, itching for the Tide to go forward and wreak havoc as they did in town, but Doom stretched out his hand to block it. "Stop! Nobody harms them! Nobody set one foot onto that farm!"

Querying growls rose up on all sides.

"Enough! We will see the humans leave on their airships. We are done here." Doom turned around and walked away. While slow, a single step of his somehow carried him ten feet ahead.

Before anyone could do anything, he was in the farm. In a single swoop, he picked up Darrian, and then dashed away toward the south.

"Wait!" Remian yelped, but Doom did not wait. None of Remian's words could or would stop him. He dashed forward and vanished into the wilderness before Remian could do more than protest. "Put my brother down…! DUDE!!"

But it was too late. Doom, and Darrian, were both gone.