The screen blinked off. Tobias slowly turned to look at Kimona who was stood next to him. She was still looking ahead at the screen.

“Are you sure you want to stay with us?” he asked earnestly.

“...Yeah.”

“But why? Who are you avoiding?”

Kimona hesitated to answer. “It… it’s complicated.”

“It’s not because you think I’m just a kid and you don’t think I’ll understand?”

“What? No, no.” She turned to look at him finally to reassure him she was telling the truth. “Besides, you’re hardly a kid. No, it’s just that I’ve not exactly told the person I’m mad at why I’m mad at them and avoiding them, so I feel it’s just best that I wait until I’ve spoken to them first about it.”

“When will you do that?”

“I don’t know. I guess soon. I’m in no rush to.”

“Do I know what it’s about?”

“You’re a nosey kid aren’t you?” Kimona laughed, putting her hand on his shoulder.

“You told me a minute ago I wasn’t a kid,” Tobias said cheekily.

“Well I take it back now.” She smiled at Tobias.

"Can I ask something?"

"Sure," Kimona said.

"Why would you not talk about it with that person?" he asked. "Like, you surely don't want to be mad about things?"

Kimona sighed. "Ok, you got me there buddy. I don't want to be mad about things or mad at people, of course not. It's just, well... when something happens, I suppose sometimes it just takes a while to want to speak to that person who may have caused you to get upset."

He considered her answer for a moment. "Isn't it just easier if you tell me what it was, because you're being vague as hell."

She burst out laughing. "No, I won't tell you. Look, shall we get on and get this place drained? I’m going to need your help.”

“Sure, whatever it takes.”

“Good. Can you make a wooden dam around the entrance to The Lodge stopping the water coming in as I drain the water down there back into the lake?”

“Hell yeah! I’ll summon extra beavers too. We’ll get it up in no time.”

“Good. Let’s get to it.”

***

It was the day after and Tobias and Kimona were sat on folding camping chairs in the main hanger of The Lodge, the types of chair that had a net pocket for drinks, looking up at the contractors who had been called in to repair the roof. George lay on his back on his big bean bag with his paws behind his head. Nova sat perched on his stand. The warm sun beat down through the open doors and the sound of pop music from the worker’s radio could be heard in the back ground.

They were relaxing after a hard night of sorting the lake out and making The Lodge semi habitable again. Tobias had summoned hundreds of beavers to construct a wall to keep the water away from the broken doors and Kimona had manipulated the excess water out into the forest somewhere, to the benefit of the fauna. Once the roof hatch was fixed, they’d be secure again.

The alarm went off through the PA system.

“Ugh, really? Don’t they know we’re recovering from an attack yesterday?” Tobias huffed, not moving from his chair.

“Well are you going to go and receive the message?” George asked.

“Did your legs stop working or somethin’?” Tobias snapped.

"I'll take that one, because I know deep down you're struggling with Anton's involvement in everything, but I won't be spoken to like that again," Grizzly George warned, quite seriously.

“Well don’t look at me, I don’t know how things work round here,” Kimona said, shrugging innocently, raising her hands.

“And don’t expect the bird to be able to do it either,” George said.

Tobias tutted and got out of his chair. “Fine. You can at least come with me and learn how to use the system, ‘specially if you’re sticking around for a while,” he said to their temporary addition to the team.

“Yeah, that’s not a problem,” she happily said.

Tobias led Kimona down to the War Room where the control desk was for receiving comms and call outs.

“It’s loud isn’t it?” Kimona had to shout.

“Yeah, Ulrika had it turned up because I slept through it once. Like, it’s suddenly a huge problem after one time?” He swiped on the screen killing the alarm. “See, it’s easy as that, then you press the flashing message to see what it says,” he explained.

“Thanks buddy. What’s it say?”

“Park Rangers in Wharton State Forest, New Jersey report hundreds of vultures circling within a small radius in the Pine Barrens,” Tobias read out. He pressed another button, “Grizzles, Nova, meet us in Kim’s Merlin-One jet, we’re heading to the Pine Barrens.”

“New Jersey isn’t far from here, right?” she asked.

“Correct! Let’s go!”

"Do you think you'll apologise to George when we get to the jet?" Kimona asked.

"Do you think you'll tell who you're mad at, that you're mad at them?" Tobias shot back.

"Damn, you're angry kid, aren't you? I get it, but my thing and your thing just now isn't the same thing."

Tobias tutted. "Yeah, I know..." He sighed softly in defeat. "I'll do it when we get back."

"Nice one. You guys are a team here, you gotta treat each other with respect. If you're angry about something, then say so and talk it out, but don't take it out on others." Kimona smiled warmly.

Back in the main hangar, George and Nova were waiting by Merlin-One, their usual Woodland Warrior branded jet out of commission after the attack. Tobias and Kimona went their separate ways to quickly change and made it back to the hangar themselves at the same time.

Strapping on his vest, Tobias bought the other pair up to date.

“The Jersey Devil hangs around those parts,” George gravely warned.

“Don’t be soft. If it was real, we’d have come across it by now,” Tobias countered. “It must be something else.”

“Hmm, we’ll see.”

***

Agwé hovered the jet nearby, as they all leaned over the cockpit to look at the circling vultures for themselves.

“Holy moly, there really are hundreds of them.” Boy Beaver said.

“Why would that be?” Agwé asked.

“Death,” Grizzly George muttered in disgust. “They’re scavenging off the corpse of something.”

“There’s just so many…” Nova whispered in awe, taking human spirit form.

“Can you go out there, get really big and just scare them away so we can get down safely?” Grizzly George asked.

“Yeah, sure.” Agwé opened the side door and Nova flapped his wings, flying out towards the vultures. After a few seconds, Nova grew to his unnatural size, and Agwé watched in awe as the humongous crow squawked, so loudly, sending the vultures scattering in different directions.

Once the jet had landed, the trio, as Nova was still overhead, spotted a familiar face.

“Bao!” Boy Beaver cried out with excitement, running over to give the cat a hug. Bao returned the hug with a warm, purring snuggle. “It’s good to see you. Thanks for your help yesterday.”

Hello, it is good to see you too. I’m glad you’re all safe.

The group took a moment to survey the scene in front of them. A large part-carcass of something black and hairy lay at the base of some pine trees. A red stain was smudged in the mud leading from the dead beast. Around fifty metres away, the stain weakened and a mass of the same black hairy stuff was discarded.

“What… what is it?” Agwé asked walking towards to it to investigate.

“It’s the Beaman isn’t it?” Boy Beaver asked, looking over at Grizzly nervously.

Yes, I believe it is.

“We fought the Beaman last year. Nothing major, just enough to warn her away from eating children on a school trip,” Boy Beaver told Agwé.

“She? She’s huge,” Agwé said, looking at what remained of her. “Did you kill it?” she asked Bao.

No. She was killed by something else. I just felt the death and came here.

“What’s big enough to kill the Beaman?” Agwé asked her new team.

“Nova,” Boy Beaver answered with a laugh. “But it clearly wasn’t him.”

“The Jersey Devil, I warned you about,” Grizzly George said seriously.

Bigfoot.

Boy Beaver nodded in agreement. “Yes, actually! Bigf- Hey, do you know if it was Bigfoot?”

Yes.

Grizzly George and Boy Beaver looked at each other with concern.

“How big is Bigfoot?” Agwé asked.

“Beaman was thirty feet. Bigfoot is about forty,” George said.

“Yikes,” Agwé said. “Then how do we track it down and hunt it?”

“We won’t hunt it,” Boy Beaver said. “Much of what we do in the Warriors is about preservation and balance of the forests. We take action against those who threaten it, like Silva Stalker did, but most of what happens here is… nature. Bigfoot beat down Beaman. It’s unfortunate, but it happens. Like, if you came across an ocean beast, what would you do?”

“Well when you put it that way, it makes sense. And if an ocean beast was in danger of hurting people then I’d do what I can to stop it, but if it was just out there surviving…”

Nova came zipping through the trees at normal size and came into land at the feet of his human beaver hybrid team mate before morphing into his human spirit form.

“I’ve followed the trail of… body parts… and it’s-”

“It’s the Beaman, we know Nova. We were only fighting her off last year...” Boy Beaver said sympathetically.

“No, I know that. What I was going to say is it’s Bigfoot-”

“Yeah, well we know that too,” Boy Beaver said defensively.

“Just let me finish, child!” Nova snapped. “Bigfoot is heading towards the town of Brescon!”

“Oh right, well now we’re hunting ourselves a Bigfoot,” George announced.

***

Nova was overhead, leading the group on the ground towards Bigfoot in the hope of cutting him off before it got to the town. Brescon had a population of roughly six hundred and was situated on a river that eventually led to the Atlantic Ocean.

A squawk signified that the crow had Bigfoot in his sights.

“Nova, swoop in and get it's attention on us.”

Nova squawked again twice.

“Is it once for yes and twice for no? Or the other way round? I can never remember…” Boy Beaver grumbled as they continued to run through the forest towards it’s edge.

Nova squawked again, but this time he was in unnatural size and the sound waves were strong enough to shake the trees. The group cleared the forest and looked down across the town. It was too late.

Bigfoot had already made it to civilisation.

“Something’s wrong…” George whispered.

“Yeah, there’s a forty foot… gorilla in that town. Is it a gorilla?” Agwé answered.

“Well yes, but Bigfoot is a legend. Rarely sighted, but now, it’s in full view for everyone to see,” Grizzly George explained. “This has never happened.”

“Well,” Agwé said, “I’ll promise to be gentle.” She ran down the slope towards the town, wearing her trademark fish scaled blue and silver ombre wet suit. As she ran, she raised her hands, bringing the water of the river that separated the two halves of the town up in a swirling mass of watery vines.

“We just need to get Bigfoot back in the forest? Ok?” George said to Boy Beaver.

“Got it, Grizzles.” Bear and beaver kid ran after Agwé. “Nova! We need to get Bigfoot back in the forest. Minimise harming him! George and I will get out on the streets and make sure he gets there!”

Agwé’s water vines grew out from the river, extending across the small town towards Bigfoot, who had out of curiosity, stuck it’s arm through the front window of a third storey window rummaging around as if it was playing a game of ‘feel what’s inside the box’.

The vines of water jabbed annoyingly at Bigfoot, who with his one free arm tried to swat them away. Agwé kept them coming, with a new one replacing the one he tried to get rid of.

Movement on the street near Bigfoot’s feet caught Kimona's eye. The owner of the home Bigfoot was fumbling around in had come out, aiming his shotgun up at the beast.

“George, man with shotgun about to shoot Bigfoot!”

“I’m on it!” the bear replied. He was running on his four legs, bounding down the middle of the road as scared people ran from their homes and the way George had come from. He roared loudly, getting onto his back legs and making himself taller. The home owner with the shotgun turned and cried out in visible fear.

“It’s ok!” Boy Beaver said, appearing behind him, swiping the shotgun out of his hands before he realised what was happening. “Just run!”

“But my kid is up in that room!” the home owner cried, clearly scared and angry.

“I’ll go!” Boy Beaver volunteered, running straight into the house.

“Nova, help Agwé with some more forceful ushering!” George instructed. Bigfoot pulled out his arm, and with it, part of the external wall around the window. A young child screamed from inside.

Bigfoot roared and looked down at Grizzly and the worried home owner, who had hid behind George. George stood and roared back, showing as much dominance as he could over something four times his height. Nova came in quick, beating his twelve metre wide wings to distract Bigfoot from George, and allowing Boy Beaver to jump from the hole in the house with a screaming child in his arms.

Handing the kid back to a relieved father, Boy Beaver led them both up the road to safety away from Bigfoot.

Nova persisted in flapping his wings towards Bigfoot, creating enough wind to bother the legendary beast.

Meanwhile, on the hill, Agwé watched as Boy Beaver jumped from the building with the child and Nova beat his wings at Bigfoot, but it wasn’t working. She’d relaxed the water vines while Nova did his thing but it was obvious they needed something else.

“Can you do anything?” she asked Bao who was sat regally next to her.

I could. But not yet. I’m just supervising.

“Well what do you think we should do?”

Whatever it takes to get Bigfoot back in the forest. The stress on it will be taking its toll.

Helpful, Agwé thought to herself. “Nova, can you try moving towards Bigfoot whilst you do the wing thing, and herd it towards the forest?”

Nova obliged, and tried doing that, moving toward Bigfoot slowly, but in it’s annoyance, punched out at Nova’s exposed belly. Nova squawked in pain and banked off to the left.

“Nice try Nova, don’t worry!” Agwé assured.

Bigfoot stomped off down the road, further into the town. Local police had made a check point and were aiming their guns at Bigfoot as it approached. George was doing his best to go after Bigfoot, but it’s strides were too big.

“Will their bullets kill Bigfoot?” Agwé asked Bao.

They’re not going to do him any good.

Agwé brought a huge column of water out of the river and arched it over the town at the officers on the checkpoint. “I hope this works…” she said as she released the water, making it cascade down on the group of six officers. The force of the water threw them across the floor and washed them down the road a few metres.

Bigfoot halted in his tracks as he saw the water column erupt. “Nice one Agwé!” George called out. “Can you keep doing that at his feet, and lead him that way?”

“Yeah!” she agreed, sending another column of water arching across part of the town and landing with a gigantic splash at its feet. It jumped back and moved away from it. “It’s working!”

“Keep doing it!” George said, running back out of the way.

And that’s just what Agwé did, bringing water column after water column crashing down at the feet of the Bigfoot, chasing him as he ran from it in the direction the Warriors needed him to go.

Eventually, when Bigfoot was clear of the town, and out in wide open space, Nova came swooping in again, this time from above and grabbing Bigfoot by its shoulders with his claws. Bird and Bigfoot hanging in the sky flew towards where Agwé, Bao and now Boy Beaver and Grizzly George were waiting.

Bring him down in front of me, Bao instructed.

Nova settled Bigfoot down gently and flew off before Bigfoot could take a swipe at him again.

Bao the tiger, the Life of The Forest, The Keeper of Peace, Enforcer of Balance and Restorer of Order, calmly prowled forward towards it.

Bigfoot remained still and looked Bao in the eyes. Not a sound was made between the two as they appeared to just stare at each other until Bigfoot groaned loudly and skulked back into the forest.

Bao turned to the Woodland Warriors. That was an apology from Bigfoot.

“What did you do?” Boy Beaver asked.

Got the message across that the forests were for Bigfoot and he was to stay within them.

“Wow, that’s amazing,” Agwé gushed. “But couldn’t you have done that sooner?”

Probably, but because I’d eaten well not long ago I’m still a bit lethargic. But mostly, I also wanted you to see the way of the Woodland Warriors is not to kill or hunt, but to keep balance. Which is what you helped to achieve.

“Lesson learnt, thank you.” Bao approached Agwé and rubbed against her as she circled her legs. Agwé giggled and gratefully gave the big cat a rub between the ears.

Well I’m going to make sure Bigfoot sticks to my instructions. It was a pleasure seeing you again Kimona. Bye all.

“See ya, Bao!” Boy Beaver cried out enthusiastically.

“What do we do now then?” Agwé asked.

“We go and help clear up in the town and go back,” Boy Beaver explained. “We do what we can to mend things we might break.”

Agwé looked at Nova questionably.

“Except Nova. He’s a bird of course.”

***

The next day, the team were chilling out on the lake above The Lodge in the glorious sunshine. Tobias was splashing around in the water, fighting off whatever manipulated water creation Kimona threw at him. George lay on his back in the shallow area and Nova waddled about in the part where water met with land.

Tobias in his trunks, with his tail out, laughed and screamed as he ducked and dodged water vines, climbed up never ending moving water stairs and leapt through doorways made of water.

After a while, the exhausted teenager lay on his back and allowed himself to float in the direction the water took him.

Kimona watched as he got quite far out. "Did he apologise to you when we got back?"

"Ah, was that your doing?" George chuckled. "Yeah he did. Took me by surprise. Usually Ulrika forces him to do it and it never feels like an apology. But this time it actually felt like he meant it."

"He just needs a gentle nudge in the right direction sometimes. He's a smart kid. He knows when he's been a douchebag but he's just at this angsty hormonal age. It's not always easy to admit. Do you think he gets lonely, being the only human out here?”

George considered it for a moment. “What? The only human? Well, Ulrika's a human, but I suppose she's not really on Tobias' level is she? So yeah maybe, but he’s never said. I think because he knows he’s different, he just shies away from interactions with people and doesn't seek it out. He seems more comfortable around animals!”

“Was he born like that?” she asked.

George rolled over and got onto all fours to get in a sitting position. “No.” He looked out to see where Tobias was. “Ok, he’s asleep, I can tell you.”

“How do you know he’s asleep?”

“Because he would have heard what we’re talking about, and he doesn’t like to miss conversations that are about him.”

Kimona laughed.

“So, he was nine…”

To be continued in Woodland Warriors #5 ‘Birth Of The Beaver'.