FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

A lone ship, barely big enough to be a classed a frigate, was orbiting a solitary gas giant with its discharge vents extended. Every so often, flashes of electricity jumped between the ship and the atmosphere of the planet, as the static charge built up by its drive core was vented. Its angular design and swept back wings glinted in the faint light of the system's main sequence star, while its occupants busied around with maintenance and repairs.

The bridge was a flurry of activity as people busied to and from the command centre. Yet one remained, amid the bustle of work; the closest thing that she could be likened to would be a bipedal fox. She had the pointed muzzle and ears of a fox, with a pair of short, backward swept horns tucked among her back-length mane of dusty brown hair.

Her pelt was a similar shade, broken only by the tips of her ears coloured a deep burgundy. She was wearing a pair of loose, slightly armoured pants, matte black and patterned with hexagonal stitching, which revealed her bare, three toed feet underneath. She wore a black dress coat, edged in silver and parting at her waist, with a plain black, fur-tight shirt underneath. She leaned on a railing overlooking the main bridge area and tapped her foot on the ground behind her while she ran through the ship diagnostics on a holographic display in front of her.

She reached out with a gold-furred arm that faded back to brown at the elbow and swiped at the display with a clawed paw, switching it from a report of the life support system to one of the drive core, noting with disdain how slowly it was discharging. Her purple-hued irises danced back and forth as she scanned through lines upon lines of data.

"Cap'n Feo?"

She whirled around to see one of her crewmates, a stocky canine, similarly dressed, standing behind her. He was shorter than her by a fair bit (which was saying a lot), and came up to barely her stomach. He was covered in golden fur and had a decently sized pot belly. His blue eyes shone out from underneath his bushy eyebrows, as his lip curled in a smirk. He was the best mechanic she knew, and wouldn't trade him for the world.

"Yes Raalic, what is it?" she inquired, dragging the display with her and watching it out of the corner of her eye.

"Ah have the drive core report yeh requested," he replied, handing a small tablet over to her, "It's not good. The core is operating at fifty-three percent capacity, and ah number of our discharge vents have been damaged by our last encounter with the Hunters. We'll be ready to jump again in about five hours, but we need proper parts desperately. Ah can't keep patching 'er up like this, or she'll be a ticking time bomb!"

She sighed and nodded, "Thank you Raalic," she said softly, scrolling down through the tablet, "Hopefully we'll be able to evade them before too long. But if you don't think you can hold it together, let me know, and I'll set the direct return course myself."

Without warning, alarms started blaring across the bridge. Feo immediately turned back around and brought up the sensors manager, prompting her heart to sink like a stone. She keyed the ships PA system, "We have five hyperspace apertures opening at 275-mark 13-positive, all hands to combat stations!".

Instantly, secondary lighting flashed red as klaxons blared out. Five more people joined the vixen as Raalic hurried back to Engineering, before taking up positions at the various consoles around the bridge. The vixen vaulted over the railing she had been leaning on and sat in the command chair, quickly bringing up multiple holographic screens with taps of her claws in mid-air.

"Do we have a heading, Captain?" a green reptilian asked from the front, manning the helm.

"One eight zero-mark 5 negative from those apertures now, Mister Jinser!" she yelled as she brought up the scan of the system they had made shortly after arriving.

She keyed the ship's intercom system, "Raalic, please tell me you're able to give me something? Even a short-range jump would be useful here!"

"I'm sorry ma'am, but if we engage the core again without letting it vent at this level of charge, it'll detonate!" came the worried reply, eliciting a frustrated growl from the poor captain.

Proximity alarms started going off at the conn, as five very large, very imposing ships emerged from the hyperspace apertures around them, close enough to the fleeing ship that their shields momentarily made contact.

One of the other officers turned to face the vixen, "Captain, we're receiving hails from the lead ship, should we respond?" she asked.

She sighed and stood up, "I guess we should," she replied, crossing her arms, "Make sure we're audio only, though."

The image of a scowling, snake-like visage filled the screen in front of the bridge, "Attention fleeing ship, I am Commandant Eloash of the Sabre Hunter Fleet. We have detected a synthetic lifeform aboard your vessel. This is in breach of the Galactic Non-Proliferation Treaty for Artificial Intelligence. If you hand it over, you will be allowed to go free, with only minor sanctions placed upon your persons. Refusal will result in your destruction. You have five minutes to reply." At that, the transmission ended, and a tense silence descended upon the bridge.

Feo grimaced and slumped back into her chair, before glancing around at her bridge officers, "Any suggestions?"

Jinser up at the conn looked back at her, "Well, other than handing it over, I don't see much of a way out, ma'am. I'm not suggesting we do, but I'm just putting it out there."

Silence fell once again as the grim reality of their situation made itself apparent, before a small, soft voice piped up behind them, "Ma'am, there's a habitable planet in this system, isn't there?"

The vixen blinked and glanced back at the white-furred feline sitting at the main sensors console, "There is, but it's almost fifty lux away. We'd never make it at sublight, and you heard Raalic, we can't make a short-range jump without detonating the core!"

The feline smiled a little, flashing her white fangs briefly, "You're right of course... But what if we detonated the core ourselves and slip away while they're blinded by its EM flash!" she countered, "We push our sublights as hard as we can towards that habitable planet, then kill all our systems, everything, and just drift the rest of the way there! If we grab the emergency respirators too, we should have just enough atmosphere to make it to the planet!"

Feo blinked a few times, stunned by the ambitiousness of the plan, if nothing else. She then chuckled softly under her breath, "My, my, Sari, I never expected such a dangerous and risky plan from you! I love it!". She keyed her comm, "Raalic, I'm gunna need you to prep the core for dump and detonation, and get your team ready for emergency repairs.". She pulled back from the comm and started barking orders, and once again, the bridge was a flurry of activity, "Reinforce the structural integrity fields! Prepare emergency forcefields and bulkheads! Milian, calculate how long we'll have undetected, and make sure our shields are set to screen that pulse. At this point, it doesn't matter if we'll lose kinetic protection, if they open fire upon us, we're dead anyway."

She stood up and strode over to the conn, "Jinser, set a drift course for that planet, it's the third one from the star." she instructed, leaning down on the back of his chair to look over his shoulder, "We need to make sure to avoid its water, aim for one of the northern continents." The reptile was already far ahead of her, his hands whizzing across the holographic screen and projection of the planet.

Before long, Raalic hurried back onto the bridge, his face sweaty and red under his golden fur, "Fer the record, ah think this is a bloody stupid idea, but everything is prepped, an' everyone is standing by."

Feo nodded, "Alright then, I guess it's time to deliver the good news. Sari, open a channel."

The feline obliged, and instantly the viewscreen was filled with that same scowling snake.

"This is Captain Feopre Asilion of the Eoburus scout ship Gladius," she began, her arms crossed as she stood, "And we have considered your offer."

"Eoburus, you say?" came the hissing reply, "That's interesting, because to be quite honest, we have never seen a ship like it. It certainly doesn't bear any resemblance to any Eoburus ship on record. But that is beside the point, what you claim your ship to be, is of little consequence. Are you going to hand over the synthetic? Or be consigned to oblivion?"

Feo growled deep in her throat, "Me and my crew, we would all rather die than hand them over to you! Raalic! NOW!"

"Sir, we're detecting a build-up in their drive core, they may be preparing to jump."

Commondant Eloash turned his scaly head towards the offending deck officer who dared address him, his slit eyes narrowing on the smaller reptilian.

"But why? They know that their core is at too high a charge... Right? Why wouldn't they just hand them over?" another piped up.

Eloash rolled his eyes; these fresh recruits were starting to grate on his nerves. Too soft for his liking, "They know that. They're likely either hoping that they reach their destination, or they take us out with them," he growled, scowling at them.

At that, a blinding flash of light appeared on the screen in front of them, followed by the flickering of the lights above as the EMP passed through the ship, then the shuddering of the blast wave that followed it.

"That's that, then," he remarked, almost thoughtfully, "Signal the fleet to prepare for the jump back home. Scan for wreckage, I would prefer confirmation that the synth is dead,"