FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

To be absolutely disloyal, but force others into trusting you--that is the ultimate goal of the Furfaros. Be fearful, but not enough to paralyse the enemy. Be strong, but just enough to make them suffer. Anger may in time change to gladness... but a kingdom that has once been destroyed can never come again into being.

He was like a vicious beast storming through the building, his shirt sleeves pulled up over his elbows. He smashed through doors and chucked paper off desks as he slid his paws over them furiously, knocking paper into the air and pencils rolling across the floor. He scowled unremorsefully at anyone who crossed his path. He grunted with a snarl, his voice vibrating with rage. He punched walls. He kicked chairs. He shoved an employee out of the way of his march.

My father was in a fury. His suit was scruffy; his tie was awry, and the knot was clumsily falling apart, something he would never normally allow to happen. The way the sweat poured over his purple cheeks was like a gladiator in the Colosseum about to kill the lion for good. His sword was raised high above his head, ready to unseam his fierce opponent.

There was, however, another similarity between my father and the ancient warrior besides anger--both were propagated by fear. The power of the unknown is immeasurable; even the wisest sailor will be caught by the rogue storm. Underneath his abrasive gaze and wrathful stance, my father was afraid.

"Get your things, son. Look, over there is all your stuff. Get them. Now!" he roared as he shoved me into his executive suite and pointed towards a tarnished collection of corporate documents and childish drawings that he had stashed into a corner of the office. I walked over and began packing my few things into a box as he prowled around his own possessions, deciding which to salvage and which to scrap. He spent a lot of time in this room--it was dense with paperwork and filings.

A crumpled piece of scrap, a picture of me in my disgusting bow shirt as a child, a few crayon drawings and a mouldy chocolate bar--I decided to leave those behind. As I searched around more, I found some precious items: my first pocket watch, a little tie, a pet rock I had taken from Italy and snuck on the plane home, and then, a picture of my mother.

"Dad?" I said feebly as I held up the photo of her.

"What, boy? We're in a rush, you know..." he said as he threw a clump of files on the table, sending a plant pot flying. He turned to look at me, gnashing his teeth, but when he saw the photo, his ears fell flat against his head.

"Oh... our honeymoon," he said softly and took a step closer to take the photo from me. She was wearing a beautiful dress that was a muted berry shade, long and flowing as it framed her body majestically. She was wearing white gloves that had stitched flowers at the end, matching her bracelets perfectly. She adored making her jewellery out of nuts and seeds and whatever she could find in the house--this one had cleverly been fashioned to say Karl with a love heart at the end. He was just out of the shot, but you could see his tail and dark stripes across his calves at the edge. His fur was lighter; younger. She was staring at the camera with the most curious of expressions: a happy smile and a furrowed brow all at once.

"I miss her. I'm sure I'll see her soon," he whispered under his breath. He paused for a moment then tugged at my wrist. "Come on, Fritz, we need to get going."

"Alright," I replied meekly and picked up my box with my free hand. He led me back through the office, with the same determination upon his face but less anger. He looked simply like a businessman in a rush, and nothing more. He had a blank expression on his muzzle as if he had just been shot. He led me outside to the car, and after I stowed away my things in the back, I sat in the front this time. I did my seatbelt up as we pulled away back along our journey, heading home.

"What's all the urgency for, dad? Why did we get our stuff?" I said feebly as he revved the engine.

"Listen, son, things aren't going too well in the adult world. The oil giants aren't happy with one another, and they aren't happy with me or you either."

"So, we're going into hiding?"

"Hah, my boy, Furfaros never hide! No," he said but his face went morbidly serious and his tone fell into something of a hushed whisper, "we're going to the bunker for a while. For safety. I don't think we have long."

"What? What do you mean, bunker? Dad?"

"Just shut up Fritz, and it will be fine. I can tell you everything when we are safe. But for now, shut it."

We followed the road back home, twisting and turning as the sharp corners of the city became rural, unkempt roads. My father continued to drive at extreme speed and now with his complex stature, I felt myself panicking as I tried to extrapolate what exactly was going on. We passed by our house, taking a left at the junction, the mud and dirt beneath the tires squelching as we drove more offroad, the bushes on either side closing in tightly. Through the leaves, I could see the back of some familiar houses--the same houses from the night I ran away! My heart skipped at the idea and my tail wagged, despite everything, at the thought of seeing _him_again.

"Just a little further," said my father as he slowed down. The road was more open here, like a field, and there was a concrete outhouse fortified with metal bars and heavy sheets of iron over the walls. A few other stragglers were making their way into the structure, each and every one of them dressed formally as if it were a cult.

Just a few metres away, my father stopped the car, and we hopped out. We began walking towards the big door and I was huddling close to him out of trepidation. It was so close, and the mystery of it all both excited me and terrified me constantly with every plod of my paws against the mud and soil. I was apprehensive about it all as I realised, I may never leave this bunker again. What if this was the end?

A loud voice interrupted my worries. I turned around to follow the source, my ears pointing straight in front of me. My father tugged on my arm, pulling me into the shelter.

"Come on Fritz, just get inside, hurry!" he said desperately. I took a step closer.

"Fritz!" yelled the voice again. It was so real, so legitimately emotional, I knew I wasn't hallucinating. It sounded familiar... a gruff tone that croaked with a brilliant brass vibrato, embedded with fear. "Fritz, please, help me! They said there's gonna be a bomb... help!"

My jaw dropped in horror. My eyes widened. My tail fell slack. It was the wolf, the wolf from the night at the swimming pool! He looked battered and bruised, and he limped towards me with a horrible look of agony on his face. My eyes watered at the thought, and I wanted more than anything to run after him, pin him down, and hold him close. I wanted to tell him everything: how I felt, how I loved him, how it was all going to be just fine.

"Fritz, boy, come on! Come on!" said my father angrily as he yanked my tail harshly. He tried to force me inside, but I clung to the doorframe, gazing out at the fields with anxiety and shock.

"Come on dad, we must let him in! He's injured! Please, dad," I begged my father as he kept pulling me deeper inside.

"No boy, he's not on the list. We cannot allow everyone in here, boy, it wouldn't work. Think of the rations, be logical!" he replied.

"No! No! Wolf, run for it! Come on, you can make it!" I belted out in the wolf's direction. His deep grey fur looked exactly as I remembered it: soft, fluffy, and well-brushed so that it twinkled like starlight. He smiled hopefully as he took another step towards me, wincing as he fell on his bad foot. He kept walking, and he was going to make it home to me, and everything was going to be alright. This was all I had ever wanted; my goal was at an arm's length away. Come on wolf, just a few more steps...

Destiny, it seemed, had other plans, for the wolf kneeled over with a yelp of agony, clutching his ankle as his eyes squinted.

"Ow!" he howled.

"Wolf! Wolf, no!" I screamed out, lurching towards him, but my father caught me and restrained me.

"Fritz! What has gotten into you? Leave the wolf there, get inside now!" he snarled. He clamped one of the heavy doors shut, and just before the other locked away the outside forevermore, the sky flooded a blood-red.

A mushroom cloud filled the horizon, the smoke billowing high and wide, smothering the sun, and sinking everything into a grey darkness. Time seemed to slow as the adrenaline and sadness soared through me, and I couldn't decide whether to scream or kick or curl up into a ball and die. The explosion that just happened, or the wolf limping over right before me, or my father's mania... I just couldn't process it.

The second door slammed shut as a particularly nasty shockwave billowed in my ears, filling them with a high-pitched ring that blocked out everything. My father dropped me, and I fell to my knees, yelling out after the wolf, after my love... after my first true experience of life...

***

The next few weeks in the bunker were hell. It was a hardly functional collection of bunks, mattresses, and sleeping bags spewed randomly across several rooms of broken brick and rubble. Pipes and wires were jaunting out at awkward angles, and I hit my head on them several times as I tried to navigate in the almost pitch-black hellscape, just candles and one actual lamp to light the entire basement. For a bunker belonging to millionaires, it wasn't very well maintained. The food was disgusting. The water was stagnant. The air was thick and clammy, and I could hardly breathe properly. I longed to break up to the surface and gulp down fresh water, swallow a huge lungful of clean, pure oxygen and run about endlessly. But I couldn't, for the outside was worse; a nuclear wasteland of fall-out and irradiated life slowly becoming hostile and more threatening with each passing day. The nuke had luckily fallen far enough to avoid any explosive damage, but the Geiger counter still screamed out if you got too close to the surface. It was a waiting game. A painful one.

I checked my little pocket watch constantly, trying to keep myself sane and alert of reality, but it was entirely superficial. It felt as though I was melting into madness, pure insanity, as my final sights of the wolf and his gorgeous looks, his handsome face, his pretty frame, his muscular figure and adorable fluff flickered through my mind. How could a thing of such perfection meet such a cruel end? It was unfair, and I sat on my bed, not eating, pleading for his safety, or at least for a painless death. I felt guilty. I felt empty. I wished that somehow, I could have saved him. I made it my plan to find him when I got out of this bunker, dead or alive. Either would settle my psychotic obsession with him.

I was sitting on my bunk, head in my paws, as the lights flickered gently with each surge of electricity. The shadows were long and foreboding and made everything a plain grey that hurt my head. I felt sick and hopeless. It was a good month later after the wolf incident and I still was adamant about finding him.

My father rapped on the door gently before coming in and sitting down next to me. He placed his paw on my leg and smiled awkwardly. "Come on Fritz, we're leaving for Europe. It's safer there. We can start a new life together, my boy," he said calmly.

I looked up at him. I looked at his eyes, those hazel eyes that had lied and fooled and tricked me a hundred times before. I looked at his fur, that soft fur that used to be my bed, that fur which I clung to, that fur which I had hoped would be there for me all my life. I stared at his snout and his scars and his wrinkles, I stared at his ears--I stared at the man who had wished I was never born.

"No, dad. I'm staying," I said firmly.

"What do you mean, you're staying? That's funny, my boy, real funny. You're squiffy, you know that? Now come on, pack up!" he replied with an amused grin, and he clapped his hands together as he got up.

"I'm serious. I'm done, dad."

"Come on boy, snap out of it."

"Dad... would you listen to me for once? Would you bother to be a father to me? Would you ever actually love me? Because look, dad, look where it's gotten us! I hate you!" I said angrily as I turned away from him.

A thick silence fell across the air. I could feel my heart thumping steadily in my chest. I could hear his shuddery exhale as he turned sharply on his feet, aghast. He made a squeaking sound as he tried to speak, but he just stood there, silently.

A good minute must've passed before he finally spoke up. His voice was quiet and calm, full of remorse. Sadness. Empathy. "My boy... you hate me?"

I said nothing and grunted, staring daggers at the wall. I felt his paw on my shoulder, but I refused to turn around. I took a deep breath of my own and tried to calm down, but every time I finally felt a peacefulness spread over my body, some memory of me and him filled me with rage once more.

"Fritz... speak to me, my son, my precious son..." he continued, choking on his words. His paw began to shake on my shoulder, and I heard a sniffle. Was he crying?

"Fritz. I know I have been a terrible father. I know that I was too strict, but how could I stop one day? I tried to be as lenient as I could, but you have to understand my boy, it was all for you. You were going to be just like your Papa and we would grow old together," he trembled and his paw dropped from my shoulder. I heard a howl and a gasp as he completely broke down. I turned around and looked at him. Those eyes, that fur, that snout and those ears and those scars. "If I leave you, boy, you won't ever see me again. You could die, or I could die, or..."

"I know."

"Don't do this, Fritzie, please. Don't do this to your father."

"I'm sorry dad, but I have a purpose here. I have to stay. I want to live my real life, not the one you constructed for me. Wasteland or not, I need to do this."

I paused as the true depth of my words processed in my head. I was never going to see him again, just for the mere prospect of finding that wolf or going for a walk. It felt stupid, but I remembered that night at the swimming pool and then I realised something: that yearning feeling was never because of the wolf. No, it was because of the freedom I had. Because something was pulling me into that city. I had ignored my fate, and here I was paying the consequences.

I felt myself being pulled into a tight cuddle as my father squeezed me close to him. I felt his warm breath ripple over my cheek and his damp eyes made my fur wet. He took big breaths but let out that little half-sigh with each one as he blubbered silently into me.

"I'm gonna miss you, my love," he said sadly, "but I understand. I love you, boy."

He held me tight for a few more moments as the bunk creaked beneath us. I felt empty, I felt guilty, but I felt a certain clarity come upon me too. "Goodbye, dad," I replied. He kissed my forehead with a long, upset pout before he turned to leave. He quietly plodded along to the door, gave me one final look and a weak smile, his eyes filled with tears, before shutting it behind him.