Chapter 5 - The Fury Unleashed
The air in the stable ignited in a blinding flash of orange and yellow light as the intruder hurled a Molotov cocktail straight toward the wooden hayloft above the center aisle.
Flames roared upward instantly, licking greedily at the dry timber and raining burning embers down onto the straw-strewn floor.
"Run!" Vance shouted, firing a single warning shot that chipped the concrete pillar inches from the intruder's head.
The second tactical operative drew a silenced pistol and fired back. The bullet slammed into Vance’s shoulder with a sickening thud, spinning the inspector around and sending him crashing hard against the feed room door.
"Marcus!" Clara screamed from inside the half-open doorway, pulling Leo tight against her chest as heat and smoke began to billow through the corridor.
The masked men advanced down the aisle, ignoring Vance as he struggled to raise his weapon with his left hand. Their target wasn't the inspector. Their target was Ranger’s enclosure.
"Open the lock!" the lead operative hissed to his partner. "Burn the beast inside the pen so the coroner thinks it died in the accidental fire!"
The partner stepped up to Ranger’s gate, raising a heavy crowbar to smash the iron bolt.
He never got the chance.
Ranger didn't roar. He didn't bellow the theatrical, artificial snarls the rodeo promoters used to pump through the arena loudspeakers to hype up the crowd.
He emitted a deep, bone-rattling vibration—a sound born of pure, unadulterated fury and three years of systematic torment.
As the operative raised the crowbar, Ranger slammed his massive, two-thousand-pound frame directly against the reinforced steel bars of the gate. The heavy iron posts groaned, bending outward like wet twigs under the unimaginable impact.
"What the—!" the operative shrieked, stumbling backward as the second impact shattered the latch completely.
The gate flew open.
Ranger exploded out of the stall like a black thunderbolt. He didn't hesitate. His horns caught the first intruder squarely in the chest, lifting a two-hundred-pound man off his feet and hurling him twenty feet down the burning aisle into a stack of heavy wooden crates.
The second operative panicked, raising his pistol and firing three frantic shots into Ranger’s thick shoulder.
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The bullets grazed the bull’s hide, only serving to fuel the animal's unstoppable momentum. Ranger wheeled around with terrifying agility, his powerful hindquarters pivoting on the slick concrete, and charged.
Leo watched in spellbound horror from the doorway of the feed room as the monster everyone had sworn was a mindless killer swept across the blazing aisle—not to destroy everything in its path, but to protect the people who had finally remembered his truth.
