FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

The fox sat at his desk, gazing wearily into the dim glow of the holodisplay. He'd been feeling nostalgic lately, recounting long aged memories from what seemed like thousands of years ago. He smirked for a moment, thousands of years is exactly what it had been. He'd been alive since before what was long ago labeled the 'dark ages' by historians, surviving in the background, laying low, not drawing too much attention. He'd been considered a mage back in those days, not just any mage, but the foremost magician in all the world. His name was still published in books today, though, they were all titles labeled 'Fantasy'. He decided to access one, bringing the text up on the display, it only took a few minutes to read through, he didn't even have to stop what he was doing to finish the whole thing. He'd always been very smart, extremely smart, as a matter of fact, and with the augments that had been installed in his body reading took only a little more effort than accessing a file on a computer. However, all the way back when he'd first been taken on as an apprentice all those years ago, it was mere months before he rose to the rank of archmagus and had already begun to pioneer his own magical arts. Within years, even the Masters stood in awe of his knowledge and power.

All of that had long since changed. It was around the time that he was reaching his late eighties the he'd discovered he stopped aging around thirty. Nobody had ever discovered the secret to immortality, not even him. How was it he was not aging? Over the next several hundred years, he did nothing but research this strange phenomenon. He got no closet to understanding then he'd been before, but he did discover how to use the powers of both space and time to his advantage. The only clue that he ever found, was a strange flux in the magical ley-lines right around the time he'd stopped aging. He was driven on for hundreds more years, only seeing the same thing happen a handful of times, each one slightly stronger than the last.

Those days were long gone. He'd turned over to living his life and trying to stay out of the way, well, mostly. He'd been getting bored sitting back and watching the years progress. Technology, as it had come to have been called, had progressed past his wildest dreams of magic and then some, so naturally he took interest. In this day and age, he lived as a research scientist, creating and advancing new technologies. He was somewhat well known in the industry, which was no surprise to him, having proven several theories and created several new technologies. Everything had his name in it somewhere, from the newest nano-swarms(clusters of small machines that could be programmed to do a task), to the first model intergalactic stardrives that were being fabricated in his work lab right now. He'd even discovered an eternal source of energy that worked purely off of the cosmic background radiation. Needless to say, he was living life to the fullest in his own right.

As he ticked away at the lightly glowing keypad, the display scrolling through the numbers for the intergalactic FTL drive he was designing to make sure everything was correct(such things were actually no longer necessary, with the advances, some of which he made himself, in neural interfaces. But, tactile response was something he always enjoyed, so he kept it around.), he was snapped out of his reverie by a small blinking notification in his own PDA. He glanced at it, almost not giving it a second thought, till he remembered what it had meant. The phenomenon was happening again!

He tapped a few keys, storing the contents of his current work onto one of the secondary processors and bringing up his own scientific suite. He tapped a few more keys, bringing the deep space sensors that his team had been planting throughout the galaxy online. It had been over two thousand years since the last time this happened, he was going to be more than ready this time. The displays were ready within seconds, all readings nominal.

He watched with greatly renewed interest, his faintly glowing green eyes unblinking as text scrawled past, text written in a language that nobody today would even hope to translate. He'd written the code to display the languages of old, the only languages that had words that could describe what was happening. Moments went by, then a map started to appear. The map showed a network of varicolored lines. Some may think that they were part of some communication network, but they were in fact a map of the very flow of magical energy itself. He'd modified the sensors specially with spells to detect such things.

As more of the sensors reported back, he started to see something he'd never observed before, and it startled him. He expected that there ley-lines that travelled between planets, but nothing like this. There were huge networks, lattices, he could even comprehend structures among the magical flows of the universe, but something seemed wrong. There was no more time for his research, things were collapsing, "The events must have been..." he muttered to himself out loud. It was the only explanation. Each time the phenomenon happened, it was like another crack, and now the proverbial glass was shattering, crumbling apart.

The foxes ears now stood straight up as he ticked away quickly at the keyboard, he couldn't believe what he was seeing. The very structure of the universe was collapsing. He checked the program. It was set up to run simulations, to predict what was happening. He silently prayed that he was wrong, but the error on the screen confirmed his fears. A small box that displayed the words 'Unable to end simulation: Life feed enabled.'. He stared for several moments, watching things progress.

The program continued to do it's own work, and only after he blinked did he realize that it had displayed a timer. He checked the display more closely, it was the time until it reached Earth, and it was only 17 seconds away. He sat there, a cold shiver running through his body. He did the only thing he could think. Standing up and holding his right paw into the air, he summoned his last resort. A bright glow filled the room, and just a couple moments later, he was holding a long staff. At either end, a very large crystal that glowed, brimming with energy. He summoned up ancient words that hadn't been spoken in millenia, planting the staff on the floor with a stonelike sound that echoed as if it were hundreds of times louder. A ring of magical energy and light burst from the foot of the staff and suddenly all was still. The display on the holoscreen read 1.702 seconds and was frozen there. The fox let out a deep breath and closed his eyes.

Holding the staff, he walked out onto the patio of his home office and looked into the blackness. The time bubble that he'd surrounded his house didn't actually stop time. It hyper-accelerated everything within. Everything outside the bubble was moving so slow, that not even light could flow through the barrier, causing everything to turn black outside.

He stood shocked once more, then broke into a run. His worst fear had been realized right then. The edges of the disturbance were so close and so powerful that they were eating into the bubble. He ran through the room, gathering everything that he could. He placed many of the objects into a small bag, which he slung over his shoulder. He started to run to his bedroom to collect the last of his things, collecting a hat along the way, but was met by a wall of blackness. He skidded to a stop, cursing to himself. It was accelerating, getting even worse. He sighed, forgetting the rest of his things. He'd already begun muttering under his breath, a language that seemed to echo through the confined space no matter how loud he spoke.

He got as close as he could to the center of the bubble he created, already he was starting to see the edges of blackness creeping forward. He closed his eyes, steeling himself, and continued to chant. This wasn't just a difficult spell, he was making it up on the fly after hundreds of years of being out of practice. Both stones on the staff started to glow, surrounding him and his things in a globe of pure light. The blackness continued to encroach on the smaller bubble of light.

The light wavered for only a moment, but just before the time bubble collapsed, a bright flash occured. The foxes last conscious thought was 'I have to fix this...' as time returned back to normal. The light had barely faded before the terrible force ripped through the solar system, vaporizing it all as though it were nothing before continuing on. However, had anyone been there to observe, the fox was no longer there.