The night wind chilled Gabbi down to her bones, but the young Grubb merely braced herself against the cold and kept pace as best she could beside her comrades. Their ragtag group was mostly Mudokons and Grubbs, hailing from tribes and clans all over Mudos. She herself was here with several of her kin, sent from Mongo Valley to aid the rebellion in the east. She already missed the Mongo's winding caverns and canyons--the eastern end of Mudos was far too open for her liking. The endless expanse of cloudy, roiling sky above them made her feel jittery and exposed, like a rat that had strayed too far from its burrow and into the shadow of the buzzard.
She jumped slightly and tightened her grip on her axe as the train was spotted. On unspoken command, the rebels quickened their pace. The gangly Mudokons loped easily across the rough terrain, though she and the other Grubb struggled to keep up. The final sprint to the chain-link fence surrounding the depot was made in silence.
While the Grubb caught their breath, the Mudokons present clustered near the gate, held with a massive, rusty padlock. "Well?" hissed one to another, who was fumbling with the lock with an equally-rusty set of tools.
"Gimme a moment, would ya? This ain't exactly easy."
"We don't have a moment!" shot back the other, his voice never rising above an angry whisper. "That train's gonna be here any minute!"
While they tried to get the gate open, Gabbi looked over her shoulder through the fence, searching the telltale red glow of slig visors. They were currently hidden in the shadows, and nobody had seen them (yet) but once they got in, things were likely going to get very violent, very quickly. She swallowed, keeping a white-knuckled grip on the handle of her tomahawk. Gabbi wasn't afraid of death. With no family left, there was nothing for her to live for but the rebellion. It was dying, whether it be getting shot in the gut or ripped to pieces by a slog, that she wasn't looking forward to.
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