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Fight or Flight... — Description
TK felt that curious mix of utter, primal elation and terrible exhaustion which only a hard-fought battle for freedom or survival could bring. It wasn't a feeling she enjoyed - often as she'd experienced it in her eventful life - but it was its own odd sort of reward. Still, the burden of fatigue which lay upon her was so heavy it felt like it would drag her into the floor, and that little detail snapped her back from that dubiously victorious mental place to face cold reality. Just a half-heartbeat before a radio-borne voice put the final nail in her joy's coffin.

"Y'still there? Hello?" Sonya asked, sounding genuinely quizzical, but still a hair too "upbeat" about the situation for TK's tastes.

TK growled at the walkie-talkie, then stalked over and snatched the thing up, crushing the "send" button beneath her thumb hard enough to make the stiff plastic creak. "Yeah, I'm here, ya loopy witch," she snarled.

"So ya are!" Sonya chuckled with something that sounded almost like admiration. "And all free, too! Gotta say I didn't figure on that. Maybe I shoulda left you on the bed for a while longer. Doesn't seem like ya wore yourself out quite as much as I hoped. Ah well... I'll remember for next time. And there's gonna be a next time... Real soon, by the looks of ya!"

The question of just how Sonya could know how TK looked wormed its way through her brain for a moment...just before her eyes caught a glassy glint within the plastic grillework of the radio's speaker. Like a magic painting coming into focus, she saw the dime-sized camera lens looking back at her, and the furious tigress could practically feel her vile nemesis' gaze reaching back through the device in leering amusement. At least she now knew how the sinister villaness had been able to observe her; and why Sonya hadn't known for sure that TK was free, after she'd kicked the radio away.

"Oh, if you could see the look on your face!" Sonya laughed maniacally. "Just hang around there, will ya? I want a crack at ya when you're all worked up like this!"

Rage flaring within her, TK hurled the radio at the floor hard enough to make it bounce and let out a sharp crack. She pursued the fallen thing and slammed a heel down on the crackling device, shattering it into a thousand shards, finally silencing its mocking transmissions. "No you don't," she growled softly, but with great feeling, letting the little flush of petty satisfaction which followed the taunting box's destruction roll across her heart unhindered.

"Better get runnin', little kitten!" TK heard without the benefit of artificial transmission, the voice echoing from somewhere among the tunnels at her back. Sonya was close - close enough for TK's sharp ears to detect anyway - and that was not good. "'Cause I'm in a lot better shape than you are... Gonna be bad for ya if you're still hangin' around when I get there!"

A low rumble of anger rolled at the back of TK's throat and her shortened claws dug into the palms of her hands as she turned that statement over in her mind; though she loathed to agree, Sonya was right. The weary young heroine was in no shape for a face-to-face fight just now, not without the chance to take a little breather first. Her heart hadn't even slowed down from the battle against her latest set of bonds, and even the nigh-indomitable tiger-girl knew she didn't have another round in her just now. The fact that this weariness had been engineered - and all-too well - only made the fact more galling. But a fact it was, and so with a silent vow to turn the situation around as soon as she'd bounced back sufficiently, TK did the only thing she could. She headed out into the mad huntress' "play-land", moving away from the direction of Sonya's voice, every sense alert for the dangers which she felt certain awaited her...

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Continued in 'Hunters', part one - "Off and Running..."

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And so ends "Act 1" of this story. Act 2, with the over-arching title of "Hunters", should pick up by the end of this week. Apologies to any who feel left hanging or let down by where this one left off, but I decided to break this story down into "acts" so that it would be easier to manage, and to help avoid burning you folks out on TK's little escapades. Also, wanted to allow myself a chance in between to work on some other stuff I've been neglecting (most notably, finishing and posting the next Cody story ). Hope you'll come back for the rest: TK's troubles with Sonya are far from over, and there are some (I hope) fun surprises awaiting both of them in the chapters ahead...

Besides: Nobody really minds cliff-hangers, do ya?