"C'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon..." Phil grunted under his breath through gritted teeth. "Anywhere... just... anywhere!"

"Problems, Sparky?" came the eerie voice of Reilly behind him.

"Not at all," Phil piped up, notably perturbed. "Just - y'know - trying to find a place to land to keep you alive!"

"It's a big piece of land," Reilly said, feeling around and sliding into the co-pilot's seat. "How hard can it be?"

Phil's eyes narrowed as his hands tightened on the steering column. "It's not exactly the easiest thing to do. There are a lot of factors. Finding a piece of ground that is level enough. A that is long enough so that we won't hit anything on the way down. Then, there's our current velocity, wind conditions..."

A loud THUMP! broke Phil's concentration, a slight yelp escaping his lips, as a member of the Raptor Corps bounced off the windshield of the jet. Icarus Sidewinder soared by, gun-arms firing almost wildly, though miraculously hitting their intended targets. He grinned wildly as he caught Phil's eye, letting out a loud, "WOOOO!"

Reilly merely grunted, heading toward the back of the plane, amazingly able to keep his balance.

Richard Merrick, on the other hand, was not so lucky. Clinging to a bulkhead, his eyes were clamped shut and his jaws clenched. Still, his lips moved as though in silent prayer. Smirking slightly, Reilly slid beside the relative stranger.

"I'm pretty sure there is no God, y'know..." he said coolly.

His eyes suddenly opening, Merrick turned to the assassin. "Excuse me?"

"I'm just saying," Reilly said, "praying won't do you much good..."

"I'm not praying," Merrick said, curling his lip in contempt. After a harsh stare at Reilly, his eyes clamped shut again. "I'm trying to summon them... but it's so damn hard..."

"Summon...?"

Merrick's eyes snapped open. Turning toward his window, they widened. "Them..." he said, pointing.

"Uh... you're gonna have to help me out here," Reilly said numbly.

"Oh," Merrick said, noticing Reilly's bandage as though for the first time. "Right. Sorry."

From the cockpit, Phil cried out, "What the hell...?"

"The Ghost Dogs," Merrick said in hushed awe. "I... I can sometimes summon them, though, admittedly, I'm not so good at it."

Outside, the spectral canines appeared as though from the ether. They began to scatter, tearing apart the members of the Raptor Corps.

Suddenly finding himself face to face with a snarling canine, Icarus Sidewinder, having just bested another member of the Corps in a head-on game of chicken, faltered... and found himself suddenly falling once again, a pack of rabid apparitions in hot pursuit.

"Merrick," Phil called from the cockpit, "something you'd like to tell us?"

Merrick's eyes, however, were locked on the falling form of Icarus. "They're going after the pilot... what was his name?"

"Icarus," Reilly said.

"The Ghost Dogs," Merrick said again. "They are going to kill him."

"So stop them," the assassin shrugged.

"I can't," Merrick said, rising unsteadily. "But I know someone who can."

"Oh?" Phil yelled back. "And who might that be?"

"...the god of the Wilde!"

No sooner had the words left his lips than Merrick began to transform. Where feet had once been, hooves now stood. Claws emerged slowly from where his fingernails were, blood dripping from them as though from nowhere. As he grew in stature, his own antlered helmet appeared on his head. Once there was Merrick. Now, only the Wild Huntsman stood.

If Victor Reilly could have seen it, he might have even been impressed... though he would assuredly would have told you otherwise.

"M-merrick?" Phil called, looking over his shoulder.

Without saying a word, the Huntsman leapt from the plane, a Ghost Dog appearing beneath him as his steed.

"That man is insane," Phil said, turning his attention back to his piloting.

"Then you're gonna hate me," Reilly said, a quick chop forcefully landing directly atop one of Phil's major nerve cluster, effectively knocking him out. Pulling Phil out of the pilot's chair, Reilly assumed command of the small plane.

Switching to infra-red, Reilly now beheld a bevy of activity. Red blobs flew in and out of his field of vision as Icarus and the Huntsman continued battling the Raptor Corps.

Then... he saw it.

A large red spot. What he'd been looking for.

The Raptor Corps' airbourne base of operations.

"If you want something done," Reilly said, pulling up on the controls as the red spot grew larger in his field of vision (such as it was), "you've got to do it yourself..."