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"Ah, that sounds like good fun." V noted, taking in the beauty of the nature around him. It was something he had always liked back when he was young. "I'm Vesuvius by the way, but you can call me V."

((No problem AoTE!))

From the underbrush, Araeberous's voice shot through the forest.

"Number two! My vote is number two!"

He slowly lifted himself to his feet; that was two more ribs gone... However, this wasn't the time for weakness, and certainly not the time to give in; it seemed it was time for a bit of bull-headed stupidity. He glanced over to Ever and offered a fiendish grin.

"I suggest you vote number two as well. Don't worry, I'll get your arrows back; leeeeeet's G-g-g-g-go!"

His voice distorted choppily as his eyes flashed a gleaming red, his body accelerating it's twitch reactions again. He sprinted forward and slid under the beast as it made a grab for him. It barely missed, but it was all the opportunity that Gregory needed. As soon as he slowed, his feet came to rest against a tree and he kicked against it ferociously, lifting his body off the ground and sending it on a low angle toward the wolf's back. He twisted in the air, grinning maniacally, and thumped onto the massive creature's back, his hands finding the two arrows that Ever had shot into the beast. He let out a chittering cackle, and shoved the arrows into it's body and twisted. The were-wolf reared up and sank it's claws into Gregory's shoulders, but it couldn't seem to dislodge him. Suddenly, Gregory's hands left the arrows and grasped the beast by the elbows, yanking it back into a somewhat humerous version of a full nelson hold; it had the additional effect of raising the creature's ribcage slightly, and tilting it back a bit. Decelerating, Greg called out.

"ZAI! EVER! NOW! Aim for the heart!"

Zai Hana raised the gun with both hands, and fired three shots in quick secession to raise the chances of her hitting it's heart, although her aim was very good, a moving target is never easy. The gun made no noise as she fired it, and the bullets she had made to explode upon impact inside the body, releasing incredibly toxic poisons, meant to kill any vampire or otherwise it came into contact with... One of her personalized weapons. Even a second after she fired, she kept her gun raised and steady.

The wolf thrashed against Araeberous's grip, but the doctor held on with a maniacal grin. However, the beast's writhing did allow it some degree of mobility, so it became a bit harder to hit. In spite of it's best efforts, the wolf couldn't avoid all three bullets, and with Araeberous' assistance, all three struck: the first shattered a rib and pierced the monster's lung, filling it with toxins. The second bullet skipped off the beast's sternum, chipping it and drawing a pained howl from the werewolf, though it's toxins didn't have time to get inside. The third, though, was the charm: it struck the spot the second had chipped, and splintered the thick bone with a sound like a gunshot. The beast's chest seemed to heave as it's ribs displaced without their anchor: werewolves had very unstable anatomy, it seemed. The bullet buried itself in the beast's heart, and unleashed it's lethal payload, saturating the wolf's blood with a thick gel of hideous venoms. It gurgled a bit, still holding it's feet, but Gregory wasn't having any of that: the beast was distracted, and it was time to strike. Like a coiled cobra, the doctor's knife struck with perfect, surgical precision: the blade flashed in and out of the beast's back at perfect intervals. The hideously sharp edge bit into the thick muscle of the werewolf, and sloughed it aside like a unused coat, darting deeper and piercing the narrow target of the spinal cord. Before the creature had time to react, Araeaberous worked his way down the beast's back like a razored jackhammer, splitting the spine into seperate vertebrae. There was no chance for the creature to survive, and it crumpled to the ground, motionless. It wasn't dead yet, but it may as well have been: Zai Hana's vicious poisons coursed through it's veins and filled it's lungs, and the doctor's knife had rendered it instantly quadrapelgic. Still shivering and panting, Gregory finally began to slow down, his fevered acceleration ceasing in time to gather a bit of the wolf's blood on the blade of his knife. It sank in, and the blade seemed to glitter for a moment before returning to normal. Straightening up, he glanced over through the tree line to his two companions with a wry smirk.

"I've haven't seen something fight that hard for a mouthful of me since the last time I was in the city."

Thais found the forest after resting her head for a few moments. She walked through the forest, not a shred of fear in her head. The air was fresh here, but very close. It didn't feel like fresh air should. Suddenly, she stopped, and peered around the trees of this wood.

She heard voices. They were close but only just. The wood could have distorted their distances, however. She began walking faster, almost running, then she realized her boots made too much sound on the floor. Damnit, that's why I hate these stupid things... she thought as she grabbed for them to remove them. Once she had them off, Thais haphazardly shoved them into her small pack. Her feet were much more familiar to the ground. Most steps she took, she could feel the soft carpet of the forest. Moss. It comforted her, a feeling that had long lost since she had to put those damned obstructions on. She followed the voices.

Once she was close enough to see figures, she moved behind a tree and began to silently scale it. Once she was over the Y in the tree, she crouched for a second, now clearly viewing the scene. There were two people and a third crumpled figure lay motionless on the ground. What the... Wolf? Are they hunting for food? Her feet pulled her closer to them along the branch of the tree until she was maybe twenty or so feet from them lengthwise. To her human ears the voices were still lightly muffled. Funny how this place affects your senses so strongly...

She raised an eyebrow as she looked up at Greg, taking time putting her gun away in her bag. Another game of play along. "Nothin' unusual... After 'bout two hundred years in the black market, ya get use to dealin' with everythin', yeah." Zai thought it was amusing how he always assumed she was high... Well, anyone who didn't realize how altered her body was, down to her eyes, even the way she talked and presented herself... It was a logical conclusion most people she dealt with came to, and her name did not help with that. Besides, she preferred people, including Greg, to think this. Ha, better for them to think she was breathing in some new drug she made through the gas mask rather than realizing it was an inconvenient necessity. "Downer. Oy, ya know how I get when I'm clean, yeah... Never good." She sighed out through the mask.

Araeberous smirked, shrugging his shoulders; he couldn't win all of them, as much as he would like to think he could. However, he'd gotten what he came for, which pleased him considerably; when the Altar was happy, so was he. It was a sick bit of codependance, and he knew it, and the fact that it was to an inanimate object only made it that much worse. As with all things though, there were upsides; he wouldn't be able to do half the things he could without that basalt b***h's help, and it gnawed at him a bit. He frowned for a moment before waving away the cobwebs before replying to Zai with a grin.

"Well, you know you're welcome at the office anytime. I keep some morphine handy, just in case. Just don't forget the operating fee."

Araeberous' office worked on a rather strange system. The office consisted of a multistory apartment complex devoid of life except for him. The front door and wall of the apartment complex had been replaced with what appeared to be a blast door from some kind of bomb shelter welded and cemented into place. The other entrances were unlocked, but led into some sort of death trap; he changed the configuration almost daily, depending on what suited his tastes. On the rare occasion that the traps didn't kill their victims, at very least it made them look like a reject from the House of a Thousand Corpses; needless to say, Greg didn't welcome intruders.

Guests, on the other hand, were always welcome, and patients even more so: a doctor needs injuries, and people always seemed to have them. The system to getting them fixed is what really baffled people though. For a flat rate of twenty bucks, the Doctor would fix any injury, no questions asked. While there were limits to his skill, he retained an almost Aesculapiun talent for saving lives. People with broken legs walked out of the office, people with broken arms signed themselves out, and blinded patients drove themselves home safely. This rule also applied to cosmetic surgeries, gender swaps, and even transplants; for those though, you had to supply your own raw materials. However, an appropriate gift would be able to sway his opinion slightly. The price never changed though: Gregory Araeberous was the dollar store of doctors with twenty times the quality.

Suddenly, a loud plunk echoed through the dark forest, and Greg whirled to see what it was. The darkness of the forest obscured the creature, but the sound was still evident; now it was fleeing. Gregory's killer instinct flared for a moment, urging him to run the creature down, but he thought better of it. Instead, he sucked in a breath, restraining himself: as much as he would've loved more blood for the blade, it was still satiated for the moment. He exhaled slowly, and felt his instincts die down a bit. He glanced over to Zai with a wry smirk, and offered a shrug.

"Guess I can't help but scare things without even trying. So, other than the usual, what's new in your world?"