FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

I returned to the mess with the bunny's request of food, and as I entered, the whole group were in there, Celiana and DAIN included. As I moved over to the dispensary, Silver piped up. "Let me guess, bunny ordered carrot stir fry?" "Close enough." I smiled, inputting the correct commands into the machine. Once done, I took my bowl of stew from the table, and put it back on the dispenser's opening, which was basically a warming oven in itself to keep food hot for longer.

"Going to get to know the bunny better?" Acheron guessed shrewdly. "We're just going to eat lunch together." I replied. Samis and Silver looked at me in interest, as Acheron persisted. "That's good. The more people Caboose can interact with, the better." "Hang on, he interacts with me." Bel gave her brother a playful shove. "Wanting to turn invisible while holding a stilted conversation doesn't count." Acheron poked his tongue back.

I left the group playfully arguing with one another, carrying my stew in one hand and Caboose's stir fry in the other. Caboose thoughtfully came to the top of the ladder to grab both meals before I attempted a no handed ascent into the gunnery room, and we both sat down. Him in his chair, me cross legged on the floor.

"So, what would you like to talk about, uh, Ramon?" the bunny said, slowly. "Well, I thought you'd feel more at ease picking the topics." I replied, tactfully. The bunny paused for a second, chewing on his food thoughtfully. "Ok, what was that manouvere on approach that allowed me to see the planet through the rear?" "It's called a Cobra. It's a dogfight technique to shake someone behind you. Not so effective with heavy ships, but the Dolphin's no capital vessel."

"It was certainly violent. I felt several g pushing me down into my seat, even through the dampening systems. You must be a hell of a pilot." "Thank you, Caboose. I appreciate the compliment." This caused the bunny to flush, and he looked down at himself. "So, my foxy, uh, friend. What was your unit like?"

My unit. This time it was my turn to pause. Most of them I knew quite well, but they were much more into the army and fighting than I was. They would have charged into the fray in the same way they did in their sports. I could imagine it, a flotilla of three-man light fighters in formation. One fox flying and operating communications, the other two taking the top and bottom pairs of guns. The current gen fighter had a pair of laser cannons on top and on bottom of the main structure of the craft, which allowed four cannons to be directed front and back, but only two directly to either side. Better for direct assault and retreat.

So I told Caboose about it. My history with joining, the camaraderie between me and the other 255 in my unit. He listened eagerly as I told him about our routines, from early morning wake up and assembly, breakfast, then a morning of training in small arms and hand to hand. Lunch would then be followed with an afternoon of training in the simulators, or if it was our rostered turn for the month, a trip up into high orbit, and fly the fighters or bomber duty.

Dinner would follow the simulations, and after that point the unit would be dismissed for the evening, to socialise, play games, or in my case a quiet night of reading history books. It was for that reason that I had learnt about the prophecy and the history of the empire, and my promotion to Lieutenant, because I'd known the answers from the exams back to front. Caboose listened keenly as he ate, watching me like I was a fantasy tale, rapt to the core.

As I finished with my escape, Caboose looked a little sad. "Are you missing them?" I debated the answer, and had been internally ever since I left. "Yeah. I mean, you guys are all awesome. Even though Celiana doesn't like me, and I'm not really used to DAIN or the larger creatures, I really feel you guys are all worth helping and being friends with. But so many of my old friends are going off to war, and I wish I was able to help them."

"Well, hopefully what you're doing with us will help them, Ramon." the bunny got out of his seat, and sat on my lap, giving me a cuddle. For a brief moment, I forced back some tears, feeling his warm paws caressing my back, feeling his head against my shoulder. I wordlessly cuddled him back.

After this embrace, I felt I needed some air, so I politely took my leave, and headed through the engine bay, passed Silver who was monitoring some gauges, through the upper corridor, down the ladder, and into the entry bay. The warm air from the planet struck me across the face, the sun cycle very different to the Vulpini planet, the sun was still high in the sky. I walked down to the end of the ramp, sitting down on the edge of the metal, my hind paws kicking at the red dust.

I wasn't alone outside, two Dromantis were leaning against a fuel tanker that was busy charging up our planar engine, and Acheron had finished dinner and was sitting up on top of the craft, where the fuel line went in, but none of us spoke to one another, the wind and the humming of the spaceport all the noise that was going on.

For ten minutes, this remained the status quo, until Acheron and the Dromantis finished the refuelling. The tanker disconnected from the sleek craft, and the insectoid creatures piloted the slow vehicle back to one of the giant walls of the bay. Acheron jumped down, and saw me sitting there for the first time. "What's up, foxy?" "Nothing. Just needed some time alone." "Surely your conversation with bunny didn't go THAT badly, did it?"

I remained silent. Acheron paused. "Oh..." "Yeah." "Well, you're needed to pilot now. You up for that?" "Yeah, I'll get on that." I hauled myself up, brushing dust off my legs, and headed up the walkway. Acheron followed. "So, what went wrong?"

"I don't really want to talk about it." I said, as I entered the lower hallway. Celiana was there, but I had my head down and I didn't meet her eyes as I climbed the ladder up. Acheron followed. "Come on, you can tell me, Ramon." "I'll tell you when I know the answers myself." I said solemnly. Acheron paused on the bottom rung. I heard Celiana ask him "What's up with him?" before I walked into the bridge.

DAIN was at his usual seat, tail swishing back and forth as the draconic mechanical worked, but as I entered, he turned. "Ramon, the co-ordinates have been plotted, the terrain at the location seems to have a flat section on top of the temple for craft landing." "That sounds like Kraven's planning." Samis entered behind me. "What's the weather outlook?" "We have about an hour and a half before the wind picks up. We're looking at a small dust storm coming from the north. "

"Ok, Facilier, shall we get going?" "Ready when you are." I said quietly, getting down into the pilot's seat, buckling up and started the powering up sequence. Samis dropped down into the captain's chair, and Celiana entered to take her seat. "Crew, prepare for takeoff. This should be a twenty to thirty minute flight with a tricky landing on a mountain side, so have everything braced."

I tuned it out, flicking the final switches, and heard the engines fire up. The craft vibrated, eager to be on it's way. I clenched the controls and spoke. "Dain, we good?" "Launch clearance confirmed." the robotic voice replied. That was all I needed. The Dolphin's engines blasted furrows into the ground of the dock as it rose up, and barely had it cleared the top of the bay, I throttled forwards. The acceleration pushed me back into the seat, and the Dolphin powered towards the distant mountains at low level.

We got about a kilometre at about 100 metres before DAIN interrupted my concentration. "Facilier, a little higher, please. The Dromantis want us on their radar." I blinked. "Could you repeat that?" "A little higher. Their radar systems only go down to five hundred metres, and they're beginning to get suspicious." "Oh. Sorry. Vulpini radar goes down to sea level, force of habit." I commented, and pulled up a little until levelling out at eight hundred.

The flight to the mountain in question was brief enough, and finding the place wasn't difficult at all. In the middle of a small valley between two great mountains was a four tipped temple with a large landing area in the middle. It was actually larger than the dock's own bays, and while the approach was tighter, it was much easier to land on. I even indulged myself in a rather showy landing, rotating the craft 180 degrees in the middle of the landing sequence.

The Dolphin landed gently on the roof, and we quickly shut the craft down. I lay back in my seat as the vessel hummed down into idling. "Excellent work, Facilier." "Thank you, Captain. What is your plan now?" "I will head down there to allay the worries of the priests, and tomorrow we'll go history hunting. There is apparently a secret tomb not even the priests know about, and the more of us searching, the quicker we can find it."

"Very well, sir. With your permission, I'd like to go to bed." I got out of my seat, and turned to face the others. Samis looked at me thoughtfully. "Granted, Facilier. Get some rest." he said, and nodded. His shifted his wings slightly as I shuffled between him and DAIN, before heading down to my room. I lay down on my bed, paws on my muzzle, looking up at the ceiling. I felt intolerably lonely, my first night without sharing bunk room with half a dozen other Vulpini, my friends and squadmates. It felt horrible, knowing they were all off to die in this pointless war, arguing over the same bit of turf in a repeat of what countless generations had done before.

"You know," said Acheron," I used to be part of a pretty great crew myself." I jumped, backing against the wall, going for the rifle in instinct. But as I got a paw on it, my brain was back in control, and I realised who it was.He was by the door, tail flicking, arms folded, looking down at the ground. "I talked to Caboose, and guessed the rest. Would you like to cuddle with me?" I released my grip on the rifle, and relaxed, looking down.

"When Samis told me his proposition, I thought it was a stroke of luck." I said, as Acheron approached," I wouldn't die, and we could stop the war, and everything would be better. But talking to Caboose brought back the family back home. All those foxes, each with their own stories and quirks, and they're all going to die, before we can save them. We don't even have the first Sword yet, and refitting a capital ship will take months. Even if everything goes to plan, we won't be ready for a year or more. How many units of Vulpini will we lose? Will there be anything left of mine?"

Acheron wrapped one hand around my back, holding me gently, in a soothing fashion. I saw a flicker of shadow in the doorway, but Acheron shifted gently, turning to look, and the shadow went away. "Ramon, despite what you might think, wars don't start overnight. The amount of manpower to move, and ships to shift into position will take weeks. Your friends are in no immediate danger until strategy has been drawn up, and that will only happen once all the ships are at the front. And by then, we might be able to do something about that."

"What do you mean?" I asked. Acheron smiled. "If we can at least find the Swords, Samis wants to cause doubt in the minds of his cousins, by announcing the presence of a third armada, wanting to claim the throne for himself, under an assumed psuedonym. Our intention is not a stealthy back stab, but more the welcoming of a glorious revolution over both brothers. And if we can do that, then they might hesitate at sending their troops against one another, and wait for this third fleet to make itself known."

I sat there, agape. Samis was planning that? He was willing to try a strategy like that against BOTH fleets of the Empire. And then it hit me. "Wait. The prophecy is the universe's worst kept secret. If he appeals to the public, he'd be claiming that he was the one the prophecy spoke of." "Now you're getting it. Rise up, ye masses, and revolt against the draconic leaders you have. Fight for your freedom, and you shall have it. Hopefully, that will cause considerably upheaval, both amongst the civilians, and the military. Then the military would have to calm the civilians, which means less at the front, and thus less to fight with us and each other."

"I see." I nodded, and the cat's embrace tightened a little. "So don't despair, my sexy fox. We are all working for that same goal. Work hard with us, and you might get to see your unit friends again." I nuzzled into him. "Thank you, Acheron. You have given me hope and a little happiness. It means so much." "I also have some more happiness to impart." "Oh?" "The medi-bay has completed it's diagnosis, you are in no risk from playing with any member of this crew, except for DAIN."

I giggled a little and blushed. "Well, toxicity perhaps. Still not sure I'm physically ready for Samis or Silver though." "Don't underestimate yourself, I'm sure you'll make a great bondage toy for us." he teased, and immediately laughed as I pushed him back on the bed from the cuddling position and pinned him down by the chest with my paws. "I think a kitty needs to remember who he's playing with." I grinned roguishly. "There is little chance I'll forget. You've got such a spankable backside, I can't wait to introduce my kinkier side to your ass." "Oh, and is there a submissive section of that kinkier side lying about?" Acheron stuck his tongue out. "You'll have to find out. Later. Right now though, we have to sleep, we've got work tomorrow."

I nodded, but bent down and gave him a kiss on the lips anyway. He returned it, his tongue extending through his open lips to caress mine. Our tongues entwined briefly, before I broke off. "Thank you again, Acheron. And sleep well." I rose off him, and he gave me one last cuddle before leaving the room, closing the door behind him, leaving me alone once more with my thoughts. But this time, I had a more positive outlook.

The next morning I was awoken by Samis' jocular voice appearing on the intercom. "Rise and shine, my pretties. Today we're turning archaeologist, so grab a pair of twin pistols and your nearest laptop." We assembled, Caboose excepted, in the mess. We ate breakfast, while Celiana and Bel started drawing out scanning devices and calibrating them, speaking a long series of technical gibberish. Samis brought us up to speed.

"The priests are considerably less xenophobic then those in the city. They don't use technology themselves, and are appeciative of Kraven and his reforms." "Well, that's something. I'm not a fan of walking into a church where the priests dislike me. Religion has many bloody examples to it." Silver replied. "Are they distrusting OF technology, sir?" DAIN asked. "No, you should be fine, DAIN. Just don't make too much of a fuss." "Fuss sub-routines have been switched off accordingly, sir."

I snerked into my coffee. DAIN clearly had a sly sense of humour. Samis just smiled and leaned back. "So, Acheron, forcibly drag Caboose out if necessary, but we're all to be at the ramp in five. Caboose did not resist whatever Acheron did, and so was there by five, as were we all. I had my laser rifle over my shoulder, and a small leather bound diary for any note taking I needed to do. Silver had a relatively small toolbox, Bel, Celiana and Dain were the technical side of the team, the rest of us were just extra minds and eyes.

We walked down the ramp. Despite the solid several hours of sleep we had all got, the planet was still in the middle of the night, and a thousand stars twinkled above us.We followed another ramp from the temple roof to the main door, and met one of the Dromantis priests. He was a brilliant green colour, but did not vary in features to the normal mould. He wore a long dusty red robe, and bowed politely. "Good morning." he chittered. "The other brethren are asleep, so please do not attempt to be too loud. If your enquiries require you to be in the bedrooms, I would most appreciate it if you waited for them to wake up naturally." "Of course." Samis replied, giving a return bow. "We shall not disturb their sleep."

We followed the priest into the main room. Fifty metres in length, a reasonably low ceiling, with dark oaken wood benches for the congregation, and a black stone altar at the front which was covered in a red sheet. Candles were lit everywhere, and crude drawings were painted in frescos along both walls. The altar was surrounded by a circle of black line, "Ok," Samis said quietly, lowering his voice in this room of religion. "Thoughts, people?" "Altar is my first thought." Caboose said, beating me by a second. "The black stone is definitely out of place compared to the rest." Celiana added. "It's definitely not like any mineral I've seen here."

The priest stepped forwards. "I don't know much about what you're looking for, but the altar's top is covered in hundreds of little squared hieroglyphics." We followed him to the altar, crossing over the line. He removed the sheet from the altar, and behold! There were indeer hundreds of symbols, each separated from the others as buttons. "Combination lock?" Acheron ran his paw over the top of several of them, wiping away the dust. "Please be a secret door, please be a secret door, please be a secret door." Kitty clenched her paws together, giggling in excitement.

"The structure of the altar appears to tip to one side, my scans indicate some sort of hinging mechanism, and a hole underneath it." DAIN added. "Yay." Kitty added happily, very quietly. Celiana ran her scanner over the device. "The device, does indeed have a six button combination, but it is resisting my attempts to discern the buttons in question. None of the symbols seem to be of Dromantean design. Samis, does any of this look familiar to you?"

The dragon blew a jet of air over the buttons, causing a small dust cloud and revealing the symbols more effectively. He spoke slowly. "In the diary, the password is simply name. And there are indeed some Draconic letters in the, keyboard, as it were. None of the letters I recognise appear more than once, and there are a bunch of symbols that look like Draconic, but are red herrings, presumably to make this more difficult to piece together for a creature who hasn't studied our language."

He looked over the board of buttons for a full minute, before he reached out, and pressed one. The symbol in the middle glowed, and he quickly pressed the remaining three. All four glowed briefly, and then faded. The altar failed to move an inch. "Ooook. Name is not the password." Celiana spoke "What if it's asking for an actual name, sir?" Samis thought about this for a second, and then pushed six buttons in quite sucession. The six glowed, and then disappeared again. "Not Kraven either." Samis reported.

"What about the name of the ship? Is it listed in your book?" Acheron guessed. "None of the ships have only six letters. I'm pretty sure the one this leads to has eight." Caboose spoke quietly." Samis, what if the name is the name of your father? Maybe Kraven made him the password on the basis that he was the one who retrieved the book." Samis punched in the appropriate buttons, and sure enough the buttons glowed, and then the altar grinded, and hinged upwards to one side, revealing a dark and dusty stair case.

"Give that bunny a carrot." Samis smiled," Good work Caboose." Caboose flushed, and we followed the dragon down the steps, lit by DAIN's eyes, which lit up with a pure white light, a flashlight that Acheron had been hiding on his belt, and two candles that the priest was carrying at the rear.

We descended four flights of narrow stairs before we came to an old wooden door, which had survived the centuries remarkably well, but the hinges had not, and the rust meant that Samis' attempt to push the door open resulted in the door merely falling forwards into the room with a clatter. "Sorry!" he said guiltily to the priest, who just shrugged. "Age is not kind to anything, be it living or dead."

The room beyond was a small chamber, containing three chests, and a large mural. The mural was an overhead picture of the super cruiser, which had eight symbols underneath, the draconic name Samis had alluded to. Around the border of the picture was a series of dots and dashes.

-..- -.-. -..-. .. .-- - -..-. -.- -.. .- .-. .--. -.-. -..- .-. -..-. --. - ...- -..- -.. -.-. -..-. -.. ..- -..-. -..- --.. .--- --. -..- .--. -..-. .. .-- - -..-. .... .-.. -.. --. ... -..-. .... .- - - . ....

"Oh boy." said Silver, looking at the room. "Kitty, Caboose, Acheron, search the chests. DAIN, Celiana, we need to find out what the border means." I spoke quietly. "I think I can help you there, Captain."