As one of the few non-Goblins, Sandra stayed put, watching with mixed feelings how the remaining Goblins in her squad walked away and lined up without so much as a wave. Sighing, she put them out of her mind and looked at the Kobolds standing behind her. They were all roughly the same size, but to her surprise, they were smaller than she was. Barely reaching her shoulder, they had green and brown scales. Sandra felt a sudden sense of superiority surge from a region of her mind she had never noticed before. Shaking her head, she repressed the feeling with a grunt.

"Form up and tell me your names. We might be stuck together for a long time, so let's get to know each other."

The Kobolds quickly followed orders and their well-coordinated, but somewhat shaky movements showed her that they had retained more of their former selves than the Goblins. Glancing over her shoulder at the wiry green beings still trying to form a line all the while hitting and slapping each other, she wondered how they could have changed so much.

Motioning her new squad forward, she moved to the side of the larger group, trying to keep her distance from both the Goblins and the uncanny insect people. Although the Goblins annoyed her, it was like a juvenile delinquent would annoy her. The insectoids made her think of Hannibal the Cannibal, and she instinctively knew she needed to be wary around them.

The four Kobolds behind her had named themselves, and she had ordered them to walk double file behind her.

"Sarge, why did you decide to disobey orders?" Denson, the largest of the four smaller kobolds asked.

Sandra, ignored him for a moment thinking off a better answer than, 'I overheard two scientists and it seemed like a better idea at the time' Eventually she sighed to herself and forced out a small chuckle.

"Because I heard that amongst lizards, the females are the strongest! Now pipe down and keep alert."

A roar made her jump, and she looked at the dark, gloomy jungle a few hundred meters away. At the edge, an enormous bull-like creature was scraping at the earth with vicious-looking clawed hoofs. Raising its head, it roared again, and from inside the jungle similar roars answered it. A loud crashing noise followed, and the trees started shaking, leaves falling everywhere. Moments later, a group of ten more of the beasts bursts out of the dense green and purple undergrowth. They slowed a moment when they saw the large group in the distance. Then the first bull-beast began galloping towards the lines of soldiers, roaring again, and the rest followed him.

"Are you joking me?" Sandra whispered.

"Everybody fire at the… AH FUCK. Get ready to fight. Spread out and get your knives ready. Aim for their legs to bring them down!" The two master sergeants began shouting orders and contrary to what Sandra would have thought the Goblins followed them without a hitch. Faster than the Insectoids, Fiends or even she and the other Kobolds, the Goblins were arranging them self in a spread-out pattern most with knives at the ready.

Seeing the incredible speed at which the Goblins gave and followed orders, Sandra knew she could not underestimate them. Seeing the Bull-beasts close in she signaled the others to get ready. Moments later the earth started shaking, stones rolling about as the bull-beasts got within range of the first of the Goblins. Lowering their horned heads; thick boney lids slid across their eyes. The first of the goblins jumped out of the way, but the bull-beasts were much more nimble than normal bulls. Using the talons on their feet, they made unbelievably sharp turns spearing three goblins before they could evade. Death wails like none that had ever been heard before on earth, startled everyone for a moment as the Goblins screamed.

The other Goblins watched silently, appearing mesmerized by the sight of their kin bobbing up and down, impaled on vicious horns.

"RAHHH HAHAHA" A loud laughter drowned out even the death throes of the goblins and the roars of the bull-beasts drawing everyone's and everything's attention for a moment.

Running forward with a knife in each hand, Peltmans covered ground faster than any human sprinter could have done before the change. Reaching the side of one of the fast-moving bull-beasts, he jumped forward and rammed the knives home. Using them like climbing equipment, he held onto the beast that started bucking, and with a mad glint in his greenish eyes, he climbed onto its back. Reaching its neck, Peltmans began chopping into it just below the ear. Purple blood splashed across him, and the bull-beast screeched in terror, shaking its head to remove the assailant. Holding on with surprising ease, an insane and high pitched laughter filled the air while more and more blood spurted out. After a few more meters, the bull-beast stumbled to a stop and dropped to its knees. A geyser of blood spurted upward followed by a soft unwilling moan, and then it was quiet for a second.

"ATTTACCKKK" Peltmans, covered in purple blood, screamed as he pointed his blades at the bull-beasts that were still rampaging around. He didn't notice the brown and green, dimly glowing, lights floating away from the corpse behind him and disappearing inside the ground.

As if injected by drugs, the Goblins began screaming in response and without regard of their own life they rushed forward swarming the bulls; ten or more goblins each. The Goblins quickly took down four of the bull-beasts, ignoring those amongst them that were impaled or trampled. Under the insatiable hacking of Goblins, the superior bulk of the bulls seemed useless.

From the side, Sandra and her pack looked at the frenzied Goblins. Only a single bull-beast had attacked them, and they had easily dodged it.

"Listen up. We are going to back away. Those guys are completely out of their mind, and I have no idea what is wrong with Peltmans, but he is freaking me out." Sandra said, as soft as she could while at the same time, walking away from the battleground. A glance around showed her that the Insectoids were standing around a bull-beast corpse. They weren't paying attention to the Goblins at all and had their heads buried inside the body. The slowly increasing size of their stomachs told the tale of what they were doing.

"Ow fuck, what are they doing?" Denson muttered, his brown and yellow lizard-like eyes widened as he looked at the Insectoids.

"Feeding and laying eggs." A soft voice answered him.

Startled, Denson looked at the origin of the voice. Standing next to them were three of the fiends, huddled together their eyes glued to the insectoids.

"How likely is it those crazy fuckers will attack us next?" Sandra asked the female Fiend in a commanding voice while pointing at the Goblins.

"I don't know for sure. But an educated guess? Very likely. That big one seems to be an evolved form or a higher rank Goblin, and from what I can see he is going to be in command when this is over. I don't think we want to stay and wait until they are finished."

"Sarge, we might be too late." Blakely, one of the two Kobolds covered in green scales, hissed from the side as he pointed to the Goblins.

In the middle of the sand, soaked by purple blood, ten steaming carcasses lay on the ground. Roughly twenty small and unmoving green things lay scattered around them. Goblins were still chopping at nine of the corpses, seeming in a frenzy.

The last corpse, the one that was ravaged by the Insectoids, was abandoned. Sandra looked around in a rush, wondering where they had gone.

"Sarge, over there." Blakely, apparently paying attention to everything that was happening, pointed towards the jungle. Halfway there were a few figures, moving at an insane pace.

"They are going to hide." The female Fiend said.

"Isn't that jungle dangerous?" Sandra said, looking at the looming dark jungle.

A loud screech came from the Goblins and looking to the side Sandra saw them glaring at her and the others. Their eyes seemed to be almost glowing, and they were slowly heading their way, purple blood still dripping from their knives. Behind them, Peltmans was standing; holding the neck of one of the master sergeants in a tight grip.

"That jungle looks great right now..." The Fiend whispered, before turning around and running after the Insectoids.

"Follow her!" Sandra shouted before turning around and sprinting after the Fiend.

"KILL THEMMMM" A loud shout from behind got her moving as fast as she could.

She quickly found that running was hard; something about the tactile resistance of her feet on the ground just felt wrong. But she was used to hardship, always had been, and after stumbling a few times, she started using the new tail to keep her balance and pick up speed. Within seconds she was outpacing the other Kobolds and the Fiends, only occasionally losing her balance.

Taking a quick look over her shoulder, and almost tripping in the process, Sandra saw the Goblins were moving fast and gaining on them.

"Move it, soldiers, unless you want to become Goblin chow!"

Her yell got the Kobolds attention and looking across their shoulders, the sight of the incoming Goblins spurred them on. Copying Sandra, they began using their tails and quickly began outpacing the Fiends.

The Fiends, probably out of fear of being left behind managed to squeeze some more speed from somewhere, their arms pumping and their mouths wide open, taking large gulps of air.

A many-throated roar from behind made it evident that their increased efforts had not gone unnoticed.

Going full speed for an entire minute, Sandra still wasn't half as out of breath as she should be, and she could feel her heart beating rapidly. Wait. Was her heart on the right side now? Trying to ignore the changes to her body, she put her full attention on the jungle. She had seen many woodlands, forests, and jungles, but she had never seen trees and plants like this. The dark green trunks were all bent out of shape and looked more like large climbing plants. The leaves where mostly darkish green with purple highlights that seemed similar to the plants covering parts of the ground. In between them, there were smaller pointy leaves with weird edges. Taking a closer look at them, Sandra was astounded she could see every detail even from this distance. Small yellow leaves, reminiscent of blades, were attached to a silvery center leaf.

Getting an ominous feeling as she looked at the edges of the leaves, Sandra decided not to get to close to those.

As she reached the first of the trees, she found that they seemed much more imposing than they had from a distance, and some of the leaves were so big she could probably stand on them. Grimacing at the thought of the yellow, sharp-edged leaves she looked over her shoulder. Behind her, the Goblins were slowing down, stopping at the edge of the jungle. As she rushed in between the widely spaced trees, she saw the undergrowth getting denser in front of her.

"As soon as we enter the jungle follow me, we will hide and see what those bastards do. We aren't going in any deeper than necessary, and the others don't seem to feel like going in."

She got no response and worried she looked behind her. The others were far more out of breath than she was, even the other Kobolds. They were panting and struggling to keep up. Worriedly she looked at the edge of the jungle.

Seventy Goblins were standing at the edge of the jungle, leering at her and the others while the two master sergeants tried unsuccessfully to regain some semblance of order. Peltmans was standing in front of them, almost inside of the jungle, glaring at her. Seeing her look back, he pointed at her puffing out his green and muscled chest.

"You got no place to run to Saarrrggggeeee. Times have changed, and I am the boss now! If you come outside, I promise we won't kill you."

Still out of breath, Sandra and the others moved deeper into the forest.