FSE

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formerly SoFurry search engine

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The dull yellow light of the handheld torch cut through inky blackness like a broken, rusty knife through a stick of moldy butter, the weak beam barely even did anything to illuminate the cobweb ridden walls of the metro tunnel. The owner of the flashlight stepped around the bend of the metro tunnel not a few moments later. The man behind the weak light was a young looking anthro wolf, no older than nineteen or twenty. He was tall, lanky, he almost looked to be starved. The slate grey hoodie he wore just barely managed to hide his starved frame, the dirty black jeans he wore just about blended in with the usual darkness of the tunnels. There was a Glock holstered at the scavenger's hip, and a worn H&K 416 holstered at the side of his big green backpack, along with a makeshift pneumatic rifle that fired 15mm ball bearings. Ammo for the rifle was expensive, but ammo for his pistol and pneumatic rifle was much cheaper. Even though he was using poorly made, reloaded ammunition in his pistol, he managed to take out four mutants he'd encountered in the tunnel with just 10 bullets. Their fleshy, irradiated bodies were no match for a 9mm round to the head. He let out a soft sigh as he tugged at the straps of his backpack, hearing all the junk and scrap he'd collected shift around in his pack. The wolf felt exhausted, but he had to press on, he began to let his mind drift as he slowly trudged on down the tunnel.

The darkness that inhabits the broken metro system under Moscow smothers all that it touches, like the black blanket of death being laid down over an old man as he takes his final breath. For the people who were lucky enough to escape the nuclear fires that engulfed the once great metropolis of Moscow, every day is a struggle to get by. They cower down in the bowels of the city, throwing together ramshackle abodes and doing their best to cultivate crops in the horrid conditions underground. Creatures that shattered the laws of nature had been spawned from the radiation on the surface undoubtedly controlled it now, but sometimes, they lurk in the darkness just beyond the light of fires down in the tunnels. Men and women keep their backs to their bonfires and grip onto their firearms tightly as they gaze off into the smothering blackness, ready to shoot at the slightest movement in the inky, palpable blackness. In the four years that have passed since the war, some have turned to an honest life of toiling away at the mushroom farms for a pittance, others have taken to scurrying up to the surface to grab essential supplies from the city they used to rule, the ones who come back are seen as gods in the eyes of their fellow survivors. Some have become hired guns, drifting from station to station to solve people's problems for a hefty price. Worst of all, some have taken to slaughtering and robbing others to keep themselves going for another day. As far as the Muscovites knew, their beautiful old world was dead, and they were it's survivors. Whatever god may or may not have existed beforehand either grew tired of trying to wipe them out of existence, or simply laid down and died. Against all odds, the former occupants of the great Moscow lived on in the Lenin V Metro system, saved from the toxic air and frozen world above by the airlock doors that hermetically sealed every metro station away from the harsh world above.

A good fifteen minutes passed before the wolf made it to his home, and with a loud sigh of relief, he opened the weathered door to the maintenance room he called home and walked inside. He quickly closed the door behind him, locking and barring it, he'd grown quite paranoid about mutants breaking in during the night as a result of witnessing the gruesome aftermath of their attacks. The wolf sat down on the freshly made bed by one of the cold concrete walls of the room, rubbing his eyes and taking off his beanie, pushing his long hair out of his eyes as he let out a loud yawn "I'm gonna have to use up some of that canned food this week if that bitch lowballs me on this scrap again..." The wolf sighed and flopped down on the bottom bunk of the bunk bed that he slept on, he just kept boxes of supplies and clothes on the top bunk, along with an FAL he'd stolen from Rizhskaya last time he took a trip into the rest of Moscow's expansive metro system. He tossed his beanie up on the top bunk and sighed, closing his eyes "You really have screwed yourself over, Jessie..." He muttered to himself quietly, thinking about how he'd managed to survive for the past four years, begging and stealing and trying to scrape out a some kind of living in this harsh new reality. On the day that the world was plunged back into the dark ages, he and tens of thousands of other people had found shelter from the nuclear holocaust outside down in the Moscow Metropolitan Metro. As the wolf laid there in his bed, he wondered about what had become of his home country, England. He quickly shook his head and closed his eyes, as, he didn't want to imagine the decomposing corpses of his family members as they were stuck in whatever action they were doing when they died. He wasn't even sure that Liverpool had been hit with any bombs, or the UK entirely. He groaned quietly, rubbing his head as if he was trying to coax the thoughts out of his mind. He soon felt his fatigue wracked body yearn for rest, and he couldn't help but sigh as he gave into his body's demands. He closed his eyes, and he found himself fall into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Jessie woke up sometime later, letting out a loud sigh as he threw the warm bed sheets off of his body and got out of bed. He walked over to the couch in his home and plopped down onto it. The wolf pulled his backpack up onto his lap and opened it up, taking a look inside to see what he would try to sell at Alekseyevskaya station. He took out some of the scrap and other useful items that he found on his trip through the tunnels, and he quickly got geared up for the expedition out to the neighboring station. He got a few magazines for the civilian grade HK416 that he'd found in the hands of a dead survivor, and he walked towards the exit of his cozy little home. He stopped as he held his rifle, remembering that the only ammo he had left for it were the three magazines in his pockets. He sighed softly as he looked at the double barreled hunting shotgun in the corner of the maintenance room, he begrudgingly stowed his rifle in the gun cabinet and put the ammo up as well. He grabbed the shotgun out of the corner and got out a half empty box of twelve gauge ammo. He unlocked his door and walked back out into the familiar darkness of the tunnels, intent on making it to his day job.

He arrived at the station about 10 minutes later, the guards at the entrance to the station let him through without question, as, they recognized him as another guard that chose to live outside of the station The marketplace had just opened up in the station, but most people were still asleep. Jessie walked up to the scrap shop that had been set up in the station's old ticket booth, and he knocked on the metal shutter a few times. He heard the female wolf who ran the shop groan quietly, so he just sighed and waited for her to open up the shutter. He heard her yell something in Russian, but he assumed that she wanted him to wait. When she finally did open the metal shutter of the ticket booth, it looked like she had just rolled out of bed a few minutes ago. She was about to ask him something, but Jessie took his backpack off and emptied it's contents down onto the counter, and she simply sighed and shifted around behind the booth. "What are you going to try to gouge me for this time?" She asked in an annoyed tone with her thickly accented voice. Jessie just let a wry smile spread across his face, before he shook head and chuckled softly. "Oh, I'm sorry, so now I'm suddenly the one overcharging people? Didn't I see you marking what you bought from me up by at least three times the original price?" The wolf let out a low growl, Jessie could tell she didn't want to deal with this while it was still this early in the morning, but he wasn't about to get swindled by her again. "And I have a little sister to take care of, do you want to see her go hungry because I can't earn enough to keep up both alive?" Jessie rolled his eyes, sighing quietly as he looked down at the shop owner. "I've seen all that furniture you've been buying, and warm blankets, and canned food... Compared to most people, you're living in comfort, and I'm still your biggest supplier." She scoffed, taking a step or two back before she leaned up against the counter. "Yeah? You're probably the biggest prick in this station too." Jessie grumbled quietly as he looked down at the wolf. "You know, a traveler from the VDNKh told me that you were almost out of copper wiring this morning. I think you can cough up sixty rounds for a days supply of merchandise, you're gonna make it back in an hour or two anyways." The shop owner growled in protest, before she sighed and let her shoulders slump down "Fine... But don't expect me to let you strong-arm me into paying you more every time..." She said with a loud huff, before she walked back into the room for a brief second to collect the ammunition. She walked back out with a small pouch and handed it to him. Jessie took the pouch and checked inside, two thirty round magazines of military grade, 7.62 rounds. He smiled as he put the pouch back in his jacket pocket, he couldn't wait to get back home and add these to weathered metal box that he kept his valuables like Rubles and military grade rounds in, along with his stash of weed. Jessie promptly turned around as the shop owner sorted the scrap Jessie dumped out into various bins and boxes. He walked out into the rest of the market to see if he couldn't find anything he needed or wanted.

He watched the other guards closely as they wearily trudged on through the station, they were probably wishing they just could've slept instead of working the night shift. Being a guard at the station himself, Jessie knew when the shift changes occurred, and he knew that these guys probably wouldn't be too vigilant towards the ends of their shifts. He proceeded to help himself to whatever was left out in the open. There were a few cans of food, a small box of green tea packets, a few loose batteries that might have still had some life left in them, along with an assortment of loose rounds, but he couldn't find any weapons this time, not that he would be taken anything else. He made his way over to his usual drop-off point, a drain pipe in one of the disused shower rooms that was always filled up with water. He lifted the grate of the drain up and shoved his small dry bag full of stolen items inside, making sure it was submerged before he closed the grate and walked out of the shower room. Since that was taken care of, Jessie let out a sigh of relief as started walked back down the Southern tunnel, where a few of the guards at Lubyenka station lived in old maintenance rooms that lined the tunnel. He stopped at the second door he passed and knocked on it, sighing softly as he waited for it to open or to at least get a response, but the door was pushed open a few seconds later. Jessie was greeted by the sight of a massive ten foot tall wolf with brown colored fur, he raised an eyebrow as he looked down at the much smaller wolf below him. "Jessie? What are you doing here so early in the morning?.." The wolf asked in a deep, but soft voice as he yawned and rubbed his eyes with both hands. Jessie just shrugged sheepishly and slipped his hands into the pockets of his jeans, trying to ignore the fact that Taras was only wearing a pair of boxer briefs. "Oh, not much really, just wanted to stop by and maybe chat a bit before our shift." Taras nodded, stepping aside to let his friend through. Jessie slipped in and stretched his back out as his friend closed the door behind him. "Mhm, but really, why drop by so early in the morning instead of sleeping for a while longer?" Taras asked, since Jessie would only drop by his place maybe once or twice a week. Jessie sighed and shook his head as he looked up at Taras. "I stayed up all last night searching for odds and ends to sell to Larisa, but... I guess I was just getting pretty lonely, but that's my fault for not putting enough effort into learning Russian..." Jessie finished his statement with a soft sigh as he walked inside and looked around at the place he'd become quite familiar with ever since he'd befriended the rather remarkable wolf. Jessie sat down on the creaky old couch in the bottom right corner of the larger room in Taras's two room. He put his feet up on the coffee table and brushed a few papers away gingerly. Taras had taken a while to think about what to say, but he instead just walked off into his bedroom. "I'm always willing to help you get better at it, Jessie. You're one of the few people that I can count on to watch my back. He heard Taras call out from the other room, Jessie let out a quiet sigh as he laid down on the couch near the kitchen. "I know, I know, but it's just so damn hard trying to find the time with everything else that's been going on..." Thump, thump, thump, thump. Jessie opened his eyes after hearing Taras's heavy footfalls approaching him, the massive wolf was looking down at him, he gestured for Jessie to move over.

"Come on, scoot." Jessie sat up and moved to the other side of the couch, he cringed at the creaky squeal it made as Taras sat down next to him. He sighed softly as he leaned up against the wolf, who was now wearing a warm, but small gray hoodie and a pair of athletic shorts. "Have you tried bolstering this couch up with strips of sheet metal or something? Because I'm gonna laugh my ass off you break it while I'm here." Jessie said quietly, giving Taras an innocent smile as he looked up at him. Taras chuckled softly and leaned back on the couch, he yawned once more as he stretched his arms out. "Mhm, that'd take too much work to get another year of use out of that couch. And it's not like I've had too much spare time between work, scavenging, helping you move stuff around, and tending to my own personal needs..." Jessie laughed nervously, he scratched at the back of his neck as he looked away from the wolf. "Yeah, sorry about that... But hey! I'm only gonna need you to help me carry out a few more heavy things before I can finally settle into the other rooms in my place." Taras just gave him a dismissive, but reassuring wave as he glanced down at him. "I'm not mad, I just can't find the time in my day to try and fix up an old couch." Jessie nodded slowly, leaning back into the couch and looking down at the papers on the coffee table. He sighed quietly as he picked one up and examined it, trying to decipher it with what Russian he knew.

"So... What're you writing?" Jessie asked, giving Taras a soft poke in his side with his elbow. Taras looked down at his smaller companion, his eyes seemed to light up as he noticed the paper. "Ah, those are just some notes on a few schematics I tend to think up when I'm trying to fall asleep." Jessie grinned, giving him another poke in the side to try and get some more information out of him. "What are they about?" Taras couldn't resist but to let a small smile spread across his face, it was like a ray of sunshine poking down through the cloudy English skies for Jessie. "Well, since there's plenty of metal piping that isn't really being used anymore, I thought that I could try to make a water heating system.." Jessie shrugged, smiling to himself at idea of a hot shower, that he wouldn't have to start a fire under a bathtub and wait for an hour before the water had cooled to a bearable temperature. "That's actually actually a really good idea, Taras..." Jessie said softly, Taras's smile only turned to a grin as he noticed the goofy expression on Jessie's face, and that beaming smile his foreign friend would occasionally flash his way. "Yeah, I thought you'd like that." His work partner laughed softly, but it still sounded fairly loud and deep. Taras picked up another paper and placed it down into his lap. "And I was thinking that I could make a reloading bench for the station, so those idiots under the weapon manufacturing plant don't have a monopoly on reloaded ammunition." Jessie nodded quickly, smiling up at the big brown wolf. He smiled sweetly as he looked at the moisture glistening off of the canine's wet nose in the candlelight. Jessie let out a soft yawn and shifted around to his back, he laid down on the armrest of the couch and put his legs up on Taras's lap. "So.. other than being extremely busy, how have you been lately?" Taras shrugged, leaning back into the couch as his friend put his legs up in his lap. "Well, I'm finally starting to make enough money to give myself a proper three meals every day. So that's a big improvement.." Jessie smiled, nodding as he laid his head back on the armrest of the couch. Taras could easily eat twice the amount of food that Jessie would in a single meal, and even then, he still might be hungry for more. But this was to be expected from someone as large as Taras. "Hey, I'm glad to hear that..." Jessie murmured under his breath softly, but he already felt like he already wanted to doze off for a while. He didn't get that much sleep last night. "Hey, you look like you might aswell get some rest. I think I'll just cook breakfast this time and wake you up when it's ready..." Jessie let out a grumble of protest, and he took a slow swat at Taras with his paw. "Nnnnooo... I need to help youuu..." Jessie mumbled under his breath softly, shifting and wriggling around on the couch to try and get comfortable. Taras just smiled and shook his head, he brushed Jessie's legs away gently and stood up with the Brit. Jessie groaned in protest, but he didn't really feel like opening his eyes or doing much of anything. With a soft whine, he let his body relax, and he felt himself slip into a light sleep.

Jessie awoke to the sound of something metal clanging against the floor, he quickly sat up and looked around for the source of the noise. The room he was in was pitch black, so Jessie blindly fumbled around in the darkness to try to get an idea of where he was. Between the beating of his own heart and his heavy breathing, Jessie could hear loud footsteps coming from somewhere ahead of him. His hand bumped into something that felt like a lamp, and he hurriedly flicked it on. Light flooded the room, Jessie cringed and squeezed his eyes shut, they hadn't been able to adjust to the light quickly enough. He covered his face with his hands, and he just barely cracked them open to see what room he was in. He let out a loud sigh of relief when he realized he was just in Taras's bedroom, he groaned quietly and laid back on the bed, mentally scolding himself for overreacting at what could have been a pot falling. Taras must have picked him up and moved him in here while he was sleeping.

Jessie sighed softly and laid down on his side, looking around the room rather slowly. Right across from him, there was a weathered wood dresser with some various knick-knacks and a few pairs other personal items on top of it. There was a dirty white clothes hamper next to dresser, but Jessie was mostly paying attention to Taras's plate metal suit of armor that was set up on display next to his bed. Jessie blinked a few times as he noticed a picture frame on the nightstand beside the bed. He sat up and picked up the picture frame, pulling the lamp a bit closer so he could actually see it. It seemed like a picture of Taras from when he was much younger, because a massive man who must have been his father was holding him. Taras, who couldn't have been more than a year old when the picture was taken, looked tiny in his arms. He was almost too busy gawking at how massive his father looked that he didn't notice the mother standing next to huge wolf, her arm around his side as they both smiled at the camera. Jessie just sat there for at minute or two, letting his mind drift, before a seemingly random thought entered his mind. If their family would've had a daughter, and not a son, she probably never would've been able to get a boyfriend. Hell, when Jessie had hooked up with his first and only girlfriend at the age of 15, he was nervous as hell when her father was watching him like a hawk the dinner at their house, and he wasn't even that big of a guy. Most people would be shitting their pants if they had this guy glaring daggers at them. Jessie shook his head, and he put the picture frame back down. He groaned as he stood up and cracked his back, letting out a soft huff of relief as his vertebrae popped and cracked. He walked towards the bedroom door and slowly pushed it open, trying to ignore the small armory Taras had amassed at the other corner of his room in a few old lockers. He poked his head out of the door and glanced over to the kitchen, Taras had just taken three steaks off of his stove and pushed them onto two plates. His ears twitched when the door creaked open, and he looked over at the door. "Good, you're awake."

Jessie smiled upon hearing this, stepping out of Taras's bedroom and closing the door behind him. "Yeah... You didn't have to put me back in your bedroom, y'know." Taras shrugged, walking around the worn dining room table and sitting down on an old wooden chair. "You weren't going to get any sleep while I was cooking and moving around." Jessie was going to tell him otherwise, but he just closed his mouth and smiled. No matter how many times Jessie told him not to, Taras was going to prioritize Jessie over himself. "Yeah... Thanks, Taras.." The brown wolf smiled and nodded, before he turned to his meal and started to hungrily gobble it down. Jessie wasted no time in trotting up to the table and sitting down next to him. Jessie stabbed into the cooked slab of meat with his fork and ripped a chunk of it off, Taras just picked one of his steaks up and took a huge chomp out of it. Jessie just laughed softly as he ate his own steak, he took his time to savor the taste of something other than canned food. He didn't mind that it was a little burnt. The two didn't say much of anything during their meal, but that didn't mean that Jessie wasn't thinking about Taras. After the two got finished with their meal, they both made idle small talk as they got ready for work. When the time came for them to leave, Jessie walked outside of his work partner's home and set out on the short walk for Alekseyevskaya station, trying to ignore the clanking noise the metal plates on Taras's armor made.

The pair both arrived at Alekseyevskaya station a few minutes later, and after logging their names on the board in the guard shack, they made their way over to their respective posts at the entrance to the Southern Tunnels, the pathway to the rest of the metro. Jessie and Taras both sat down at their respective posts with another guard, who was stoking the fire and keeping it fed with enough fuel to burn. Taras immediately started up a conversation with the other guard, but Jessie didn't bother partaking in it, he had no idea what they were saying. Time just seemed to crawl along during his shift, and he just couldn't wait for it to end. If it hadn't been for the fact that this job gave him a few hours to be with Taras a day, he'd probably go mad from staring off into the darkness of the tunnels with nobody else to talk to. Alekseyevskaya station had never been attacked anyways, the only disputes Jessie had to settle were drunken brawls and tracking down sweet roll thieves. Traders and travellers came and went all throughout the day, mainly people from VDNKh, and a few people from Rizhskaya. When it was finally time for the next shift of guards to take their places, Jessie got up from the bench he was sitting on and walked into the market with Taras, hoping to get a decent deal on 9mm ammo, maybe some 5.56 ammo if he was lucky. It took a long time, and a lot of bickering between him and the shop owner, with Taras translating. But in the end, Jessie managed to get a weathered box of 9mm ammo and a full STANAG magazine of 5.56 ammo for twenty six cartridges. Jessie was happy to have gotten such a good deal, he gave Taras 4 cartridges for the trouble he went through translating for him.

As the two made their way through the barricade to the entrance of the Southern Tunnels, Jessie jabbed Taras in the side with his elbow gently. "So, I guess we're gonna to be scavenging down south today?" His work buddy chuckled softly, looking down at him. "Yeah, I thought you'd like the extra protection." Jessie smiled, rolling his eyes, before he flicked on his flashlight to illuminate the path ahead of them. The two didn't say much of anything as they walked down the tunnels, but they did stop to check a few of the rotting bodies that hadn't been given a proper burial. The two stopped dead in their tracks as stumbled upon a caravan that had come to a stop on the tracks, this must have been the caravan that hadn't arrived on time today. Jessie raised his shotgun up to a low ready position, and Taras turned the shutoff valve of his makeshift flamethrower to the side. The two slowly approached the stopped caravan, freezing at the sight of blood leaking out onto the ground from the floorboards of the caravan. Jessie looked into the carriage to see several bodies piled up at the bottom, their clothes stained red with blood. Jessie looked up at Taras with wide eyes, the wolf standing across from him met his gaze with a rather calm expression on his face. "Fucking bandits..."

Jessie nodded slowly, taking a step away from the bodies. Taras sighed quietly as he looked further down into the tunnel. "If the bandits managed to ransack this entire caravan, they might still be around. I heard this one was supposed to be carrying a bunch of building materials, for whatever reason." Jessie sighed, and he nodded slowly. He let out a soft sigh as Taras led him down the metro tunnel, he still had a tight grip on his shotgun. As they were walking, Jessie heard a quiet whispering coming from a half opened door to his right. He glanced over at Taras, who was still walking along like he'd heard nothing. Jessie quietly slipped through the door and turned his flashlight off. There was just a bit of light coming through the door at the end of the small passage. Jessie poked his head through the door and looked around. He tensed up as he saw a bandit just a few inches away from him, the man had his back facing towards him. Jessie quietly unsheathed his hunting knife, he pulled his arm back as far as he could before he plunged the serrated blade into the back of his neck. It killed the man instantly, and he dropped to the floor like a sack of potatoes. Jessie pushed the door open and slipped through, he yanked the knife out of the back of his neck, he sheathed it again and rolled the man's body over to see what he had.

The man was clutching some kind of makeshift shotgun, Jessie grumbled quietly when he saw that the man only had 20 gauge shotgun rounds on him. Other than a small bag of potato crisps and a silver pocket watch, the man had nothing on him. Jessie was about to stand back up, but he nearly jumped out of his skin as a group of people who had appeared seemingly out of nowhere began to scream at him in furious Russian. The three people were all aiming AK's at him, and Jessie could do nothing but watch as they slowly approached him. They must have known the man Jessie had just killed, because they all looked furious and mournful. Just as Jessie was about to lose all hope of survival, he was knocked to the ground as the door behind him swung open. Jessie hit the ground hard, banging his head against one of the metal rails on the train tracks. As Jessie slowly slipped into unconsciousness, he could feel an immense burst of heat that flew over his body. The last things he heard were gunshots and screaming as he drifted off into the blackness...

(If I managed to hold your attention throughout this chapter, I'd ask you to please go ahead and vote on it, press the little star button before you head onto the next. If you're feeling _really _generous, go ahead and tell me what you feel I did right or wrong on this chapter, if a particular scene made you feel something, or if you just wanna say that you like the story. I appreciate every comment and vote and read, and I'm suprised that this story has gathered a small following since I started. Anyways, thank you for giving this chapter a read, and I hope you'll stick with me as I continue to write and update this.)