Teamwork

Vana froze when she heard the roar of the monster from her nightmares. She had seen it once before. Witnessed its terrible power. Nearly been destroyed by it. It had haunted her for years, having crippled her and left her on the verge of death, and those who she had been working with had discarded her. She had lost faith in humanity. Tried to move away from civilization, build a new life with nothing to do with the one she had had before.

But a boy had come along who remembered her, and changed everything. He had saved her when she didn't want to be saved. Introduced her to people who could help her and love her, and he had never abandoned her. She had thought that maybe she could go back to how things had been. There was a small part of her, pushed way back behind the pain and misery, that wanted to be a hunter again. But she had been too scared to admit it.

She was in the field again. She hadn't been fully back to how she had been, but she had been improving again. Regaining the muscle memory and endurance necessary for hunting down and slaying monsters that were torturing and aggravating the people and wildlife around them. She had thought maybe she could go back to how things had been. But now it was back. Coming for her.

She looked over her shoulder, barely able to breath, to see that giant, hulking white dragon charging towards her. She wanted to run, but her legs wouldn't move. The crippling pain came back instead, and she fell to her knees with an agonizing scream. She was going to die. She was going to be crushed by the beast's jaw, filled with darkness that would explode out from within her and decimate her.

She closed her eyes and waited. The sound of those feet pounding, claws digging, and that rage fueled roar kept getting closer until it was just on top of her.

And then there was the sound of steel slamming down on scales, and the monster roared in pain and anger, and turned its focus away from her. Vana could feel her heart beating out of her chest, but she would not open her eyes. She was dreaming. She had to be. In her final moments, she was hallucinating the possibility of being saved.

But she kept breathing. Her heart kept pounding. She was alive.

She opened her eyes to see the monster rolling along the ground, pawing at its face in obvious pain. She looked around, lost and confused, and then Moris' hand was on her shoulder, pulling her up onto her feet.

She looked into his eyes, terror apparent in hers, and calming care in his. "Deep breaths," he told her quietly. She gulped for air, and tried to relax. He held out her hammer to her. She had dropped it, and he had used it to beat the beast down just long enough to protect her. "We're gonna make it. You and me. We're taking him down. Keep telling yourself that. Don't stop repeating it until it's true."

Vana nodded silently and gripped her hammer. She saw the beast getting up behind Moris, but before she could tell him, he was already turning and pulling his massive axe off of his back. "Let's prove that before was just a fluke."

And then he was running off, hell bent on destroying what had nearly destroyed her.

She could not have loved him more than in that moment.