Lidiya absolutely skedaddled. Honestly, she knew Alpha Cooper was coming for her to get he ass handed to her - like, it wasn't like for the past year or so she had been on quite the rebellious streak.

"We'll finish this off in a moment." Off he then went to get Dev, the elders, and everyone else hiding in the safe space. And Kodak gave a yelp of pain as Jeremiah shoved him like a sack of wheat.

"Oh, and Lidiya?" Alpha Cooper turned around, suprising Lidiya for a second. "You're in charge of the mongrel that you decided to spare. If he escapes..." his lips curled back in a snarl, "you'll regret it."

Lidiya made a show of looking down submissively. "Yes, alpha." Not that... she had absolutely no chance of following that order.

Kodak was getting out of here. Right now, before Alpha came back later tonight and questioned him. She had seen the results of "questioning" before, and it hadn't been pretty.

It also had happened during the small hours of the morning. So she had until then, then Kodak's thoat would be ripped out no matter what she did. And she just couldn't let that happen - to Kodak or anyone.

Digging up one of her fresher kills near the food stash - a relatively fresh rabbit - she loped over to where Kodak was lying in one of the empty burrows they had appropriated as "dens", and looked almost as if it was going to cave in on itself.

There was a reason why they hadn't actually inhabited this one, after all. It looked... rather unsafe.

Lying there, Kodak didn't look like the wolf that had proudly led his pack into battle, or the wolf that she had almost bluffed he way out of fighting, or the wolf that had chivalrously warned her of the attack.

He just looked alone, and so painfully vulnerable. And the huge gash he had - he was injured, too. And it wasn't like she could call their healer into here - in fact, they probably had explicit orders to not come in here and let her, the assigned guard, deal with it.

Well, she could deal with it.

"Kodak?" She dropped the rabbit in front of his muzzle, and her protectiveness then got the better of her - she couldn't help it, but she began licking Kodak's wounds. They just looked so bad -

She was also acutely aware that they were now definitely alone, and hopefully no-one was overhearing them.

"Kodak?" she repeated as she licked the blood off of his wounds. "Are you alright?"

He'd have to be. Because she was getting them both out of here, else he'd be dead by sunrise.

Lidiya stopped cleaning his wounds long enough to look at him, finding his golden eyes already locked on hers like a heat-seeking missile. "I don't have to do it." The sides of her mouth quirked up slightly. "Since when has that ever stopped me?" She dropped her gaze and spoke to the gash in his side - it looked slightly better now, but still, a wound was a wound.

"Eat something. You'll feel better with it in your stomach than outside your stomach." She probably sounded slightly bossy - and Kodak had more dominance than her, so she really shouldn't be sounding like such - but it was hard not to when he was completely prone in front of her with a bleeding wound. She licked it a few more times, then, after assuring herself it wasn't going to bleed much more, she sat down on her haunches and looked at him - a difficult position, she realized almost instantly, as that put her quite far above Kodak. Sliding down on her front paws slightly so that she was the same level as Kodak's raised head, she quickly looked at the entrance to the den - nope, no-one there, and from the sounds of it the rest of the pack was returning - and she whisper-hissed the next few words to him.

"They'll send an enforcer in to here to essentially keep you captive. I'll be sent out the front, guarding the entrance. Two hours after dusk - " she hoped that was enough time for them all, " - I'm going to come in, and we both need to disable the enforcer. Somehow." Please don't kill them. "After that, we both need to get the hell out of here. Both your pack and mine will be after us, but the alternative..." her voice caught slightly at that point, "... the alternative is that you'll be dead by sunrise."

She had to admit, it wasn't a very watertight plan. But it was all they had. Get the pack to sleep, take out the big wolf that the alpha would no doubt send in to just glare at him for the next few hours, and absolutely book it.

She had to just hope it worked.

Lidiya nodded. He had enough dominance to compel her into ordering her to allow him, but... he had asked for her opinion.

There was nothing wrong with that.

"My pack..." she stopped for a moment. "Alpha won't forgive me for setting you loose. If I try join your pack, they'll instantly reject me, and they'll think you're a collaborator." She shook her head sadly. "But if your pack knows that you're alive, and with me... they'll come after us too."

Really, if she had any sense, she'd have left Kodak to die along one of the many points that he could have. But clearly when it came to Kodak she didn't, because here they were, plotting his escape and her exile from the pack.

"We're just going to have to go somewhere. Become loners, I guess, until - if - we find somewhere else that we can go." Some of her fellow packmates had done exactly that recently. But this time, they had something they were running from instead.

"And it should be fine. As long as they don't send your entire pack after us, we should be fine." One pack chasing them down was bad enough - she didn't want two. "I trust that they won't, though."

"Does that sound alright to you?" She wanted his opinion - this was his life they were also dealing with. And while it did have a lot of holes, it was probably the best they could get right now.

And she wanted Kodak's approval, strangely enough.

Lidiya wasn't expecting Kodak to lick her cheek, and tensed slightly as she felt it, then relaxed. It was Kodak. Somehow, wierdly, they trusted each other. And they had to, after all.

Lidiya smiled shyly at Kodak, but before she had a chance to reciprocate, pawsteps sounded outside on the grass that edged around the den. Lidiya hurrreidly scurried outside, and briefly blinded by the sun afte being in the den for so long, she didn't notice Jeb brushing by her as if she was as insignificant as a fly, with a target - Kodak, who's wound and thankully stopped bleeding and had begun to scab over.

"Jeb... he's hurt." Lidiya's words were brushed away as easily as he had knocked Lidiya to the side as he had entered the den - Jeb was big, an enforcer, and definitely short of brains.

Which made him a good Alpha's acolyte. And rather hard to talk to.

Ignoring Lidiya entirely, he focussed his one good eye on Kodak, still lying on his side with his head turned up. All traces of the rabbit she had brought him was gone, thank gods - if Jeb had noticed she'd fed him, who knew what he'd do.

"Wolf." Jeb didn't even know his name - in fact, Lidiya suddenly realized she was probably the only one in the pack that did know it.

No way in hell would they ever get it out of her.

"You are to stay here until we come and interogate you. You are not to move. You are not to try inteact with any wolf that you see. You are not to try to escape. Faliure to obey will result in... a punishment." Jeb's eye flashed with menace as he said that - as if he'd take pleasure in administering the "punishment".

"I will personally ensure that you do not go anywhere. That she-wolf -" he motioned to Lidiya, finally acknowledging her presence, "- will ensure no-one else comes in and gets you. And should you evade me, you will have her and the rest of the pack to deal with."

Not that he knew that Lidiya had no intention of summoning the pack if Kodak "evaded" Jeb.

"You do not need to know my name. I do not need to know your name. You don't even need to learn her name." Once again, he motioned to Lidiya. "You ar our captive, after all."

"Understood?" Jeb's challenge came with another eye flash, and Lidiya silently willed Kodak to nod his head without speaking. Because she feared what would happen if he did.

(Kodak's reply might have to be a bit short, and I apologize for that. But he needs to be able to do something ar the moment, and I can't just timeskip over him)

It wasn't until dusk that Lidiya did something.

The alpha, of course, had left the three of them here with orders to just stay and guard the prisoner. In fact, she hadn't seen him once since the battle.

She was acutely aware of the time slipping away. She had to time it perfectly - while the majority of the pack would be asleep and only a skeleton night watch would be awake, but before the Alpha came over and started interrogating Kodak. Else, they'd have to deal with her entire pack, and with Kodak's wounds, she didn't think that'd be possible.

Cracking her neck - holy gods, it had been so long her entire body had stiffened up, she moved for the first tim in probably hours, stretching a bit and making sure her muscles were nice and loose for what she'd do in a few minutes.

She could only hope Kodak understood the meaning of her getting up and stretching after not moving for so long. That he'd get that it was soon or never.

"Going somewhere?" Jeb's oily voice had a taint of amusement in it as - apparently - he observed her from behind. It was the first time that he had directly addressed her after brushing right past her on the way in.

Wasn't it also a bit creepy to be observing her from behind too?

She used this excuse to look at Jeb, however, eyes downcast so he wouldn't see the challenge that flashed in her eyes briefly. That also meant that she could look at Kodak and - damn. She could honestly only hope.

"Just looking forward to when I can get out of here and leave the prisoner to someone else." She kept her voice light, although considering she hadn't moved or spoken in hours, it was a bit difficult. And there was Kodak, to the left of her vision.

His wound seemed to have nicely scabbed up in the hours leading to now, but she could only hope that it didn't start bleeding again and leave a great big trail of blood for everyone else to follow when the time came to it. Or that Jeb would cause more wounds to them, enough that they'd be injured as they ran.

Her pack didn't take kindly to runners.

She silently turned back to the entrance, the sight of Kodak imprinted in he mind. Could he move before Jeb crunched down on his throat? She could honestly only hope.

The plan's holes were now coming back to bite her. But then it was the best that they had had, no?

From behind, where Jeb was doubtlessly still staring creepily at her, all he could see was that she was resuming the pose that she had occupied for the past few hours. But now she was searching. Scanning the camp with her eyes and not her head, marking down everyone that went into their dens and didn't emerge.

In fact, from this vantage point, she had a pretty good view of the dens. Not only was this little den small, and look like it was on the vege of collapse, it was also more removed from the main pack's dens, and closer to the treeline.

She had to take all the advantages she'd get, after all. They'd have to both take down Jeb - a wolf that might have been Kodak's equal if Kodak wasn't heavily injured and lying below him - and run for it before anyone else caught them.

There. Alpha Cooper went into his den. and Lidiya inwardly marked it, and the position of the setting sun. Now that the Alpha was in his den, he'd likely not emerge until the small hours of the morning, where he'd come over here for the interrogation.

The pack fell asleep too slowly, in her opinion. Or maybe, it was just because for the first time ever, she wasn't looking forward to falling asleep. And she was counting every minute, fully aware that every minute that she waited waiting for the wolves to fall asleep, she had lost anothe minute to get Kodak out of here and away from Jeb's jaws.

Jeb yawned. Lidiya's ears instinctively perked at the new sound before realizing what it was.

Jeb was sleepy. Why else would he have yawned, breaking the silence that had lasted so long? Lidiya marked the sun - barely visible over the horizon now.

Five.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One.

The first thing that Lidiya did was prick her ears. Normal, for her.

Her head swished around, looking at Jeb - whose eyes seemed almost half-closed with sleep. Honestly, Lidiya couldn't blame him - he'd been up since the crack of dawn, then engaged in a bloody battle, and had to stay up all night as a reward.

"Now!" she barked at Kodak. Not really caring about the noise anymore - they had to both move. Now.

With that, she got up and jumped.