FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

(edit: I apologize sincerely for the copy flood of this story. It was a problem with my browser not telling me it had submitted and me trying different ways to make it submit after a similar problem had in fact _not_ resulted in a tremendous number of copies. Hopefully, the copies have all been destroyed. Won't happen again.)

Well, I hope you've enjoyed this. We've finally hit the last chapter. This is the... I think second series I've ever managed to end. Last one had seven chapters, too. Huh. It's also the first for which I'm just gonna come out and say it: I feel very proud of this little story. It caught me up in its message and practically wrote itself.

If you have any questions at the end, feel free to private message me or, preferably, comment, because then everyone can see your question. If you see a massive flaw, I will happily address it.

Umm... I don't think there's much else to say, except look out for the full one-post of this, which will be slightly revised for fluidity.

t3h p05t, 4 j00.

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_Beasts in their major freedom

Slumber in peace tonight. The gull on his ledge

Dreams in the guts of himself the moon-plucked waves below,

And the sunfish leans on a stone, slept

By the lyric water,

In which the spotless feet

Of deer make dulcet splashes, and to which

The ripped mouse, safe in the owl's talon, cries

Concordance. Here there is no such harm

And no such darkness

As the selfsame moon observes

Where, warped in window-glass, it sponsors now

The werewolf's painful change. Turning his head away

On the sweaty bolster, he tries to remember

The mood of manhood,

But lies at last, as always,

Letting it happen, the fierce fur soft to his face,

Hearing with sharper ears the wind's exciting minors,

The leaves' panic, and the degradation

Of the heavy streams.

Meantime, at high windows

Far from thicket and pad-fall, suitors of excellence

Sigh and turn from their work to construe again the painful

Beauty of heaven, the lucid moon

And the risen hunter,

Making such dreams for men

As told will break their hearts as always, bringing

Monsters into the city, crows on the public statues,

Navies fed to the fish in the dark

Unbridled waters._

"Beasts," by Richard Wilbur

Deep in thought, Fae frowned at the ceiling, twirling a joint in his fingers while the soft sound of techno played from his computer. The synesthetic experiences washed through him as always, but he was ignoring them. Everything was ready, and had been for weeks. Jeck hadn't made his move, though. He hadn't tipped Guin over the edge, like he should have. The squirrel shifted against the couch, watching the purple haze over him sift lazily through the air. Maybe he was wrong.

Then again, he couldn't be wrong. He had analyzed everything, and he knew that only once in his life had he ever been wrong, at least about something like this. Jeck was preparing that fox for a psychological meltdown the likes of which could take innocent lives in its murderous wake. It was up to the two of them who knew what was happening to control the blast area, and each of them would try to channel it at the other.

He went over everything again. Guin's reasoning would be simple. He had been used from the start, and his mad, confusion-driven anger would fire, naturally, at Fae, the simplest target, once he was pushed over the edge. Jeck would do everything in his power, as Fae's "friend," to convince Guin, as indirectly as possible, that this original assumption was correct. Fae would just have to be more convincing. Jeck would tell Guin to shoot him instead of the squirrel, having done something earlier to convince Fae that it was in fact Fae who should take the bullet. He laughed bitterly to himself. Guin with a gun, in the first place. God, he'd probably miss the first few times and end up killing someone who didn't deserve it. There was really no good way to control that explosion.

Fae would, of course, fail to come in on cue, leaving the trembling gun still pointed at the human. Desperate, Jeck would say something that would accuse Fae, probably irrefutably, knowing the kid. The aim would shift, but Fae held the trump card. Fae knew who had started all of this. He knew, beyond a shadow of doubt, that Guin would have to recognize that he had been pushed and prodded by his human "friend" from the beginning of this whole, twisted game. That would be the end of it. Once Jeck had been shot, the only thing to do was clean up the psychological mess.

The only thing that troubled Fae was Jeck's motivation. Yeah, Jeck was an elitist prick. He was arrogant, his conversation centered generally around himself, he rarely seemed to listen to other people's problems, Sarabi appeared to basically be an ornament, and the grin of achievement he flashed with every person he aided, the grin that had been especially prevalent when Guin aced that very first quiz, was an undeniable mark of selfishness.

It was just... Fae had said that Jeck was the coldest bastard he knew, and corrected himself. At the time, he had considered both Razor and himself to be probably more cold-hearted than the human's words. But even so, as an elitist, Jeck should find strength and comfort in numbers. He should seek out those who understood him. In that light, even Sarabi's presence by his side made sense. The girl was an academic genius. If Jeck couldn't cultivate a desire and a will for change in her, no one could.

But... there was no other reason for Jeck to be pulling Guin's strings the way he was. It made no sense unless Jeck wanted Faeram dead, whether for security or for the glory of achievement. And so Fae had to kill him.

The squirrel's ears perked up at the sound of someone knocking on the door and his mother's warm-hearted answer. Well. Step-mother's. The voice that responded to her made Fae grin to himself. A series of mental jumps sparked their way through his brain. "So this is it, then, is it?" He took a long pull at his joint with a slow, confident smile. Bring your worst, Jeck. I'm holding all the aces, whether you're the dealer or not.

"Fae?" he heard.

He spun around and sat up, bringing the blunt to his lips and schooling his face to pleased surprise. "Jeck? What are you doing here?"

Jeck stood in his room's doorframe, his figure silhouetted by the light from the hallway and black in the dim light of the stoner's room. The boy's face was devoid of emotion. Fae grew cautious, but nothing could prepare him for what came. "I'm listening, Fae."

Fae's joint slipped from between his fingers and smoldered on the carpet while his mouth hung open in shock. The music, the haze, the air - everything left him. His entire world fell apart.

Jeck watched his friend's reaction carefully. For a full minute, Fae didn't move, just blinking as he stared. He had wondered if this might happen. Slowly, carefully, he took a step inside and closed the door behind him. There was a stillness in the room that was not easily described. It was like... like Emily Dickenson's stillness. She sat behind the walls of her house for her entire life, watching people die, and published seven poems before she, too, succumbed to the old reaper's icy hand. Later investigation revealed more than a thousand works largely regarded as the greatest of their time. It was that kind of stillness, the motionlessness of someone who has hidden something for so long that once it is discovered, they no longer remember how they had planned to respond.

Of course, Jeck no longer knew how he was to respond, after meeting Razor. Even walking there, even standing there, his plans were shifting back and forth between one ultimate finale and another. Razor had shown him that it was nigh impossible for two of their kind to truly understand one another and help one another and as a result, he was tossed back into his original quandary, suffering indecision the likes of which either meant Fae's terrible death or the squirrel's devastating life.

"Fae?" he queried. The stillness persisted. The human moved forward and took up the dying death stick, then took a seat in a soft, mouldering chair across from the couch. Colors didn't seem to matter too much. The smoke in the room made it all a peripheral thing.

"I have waited six years to hear someone say that," Fae whispered. His fingers had remained at his mouth. All of a sudden, he flicked his eyes over to the friend-who-was-not-a-friend, who was in fact a challenge nearly equivalent to the one who had dragged his life down for six years, ever since he had made his first mistake. "So, it's all out in the open then, is it? Who we are? What we do?"

Jeck nodded, slowly, his gaze unfocused. "This late in the game, I figured it was only courteous. Between players, I mean."

"Why do you play, Leif?" His eyes were hard, searching, enigmatic.

The human shifted his feet, not meeting those lancing pupils. "I want to build a new world, of new people and new philosophies. I'm tired of where we live, and I'm only seventeen years old. Can you imagine... living the way we live and hitting a mid-life crisis? It's suicide not to play, Fae. It's all we can do for ourselves." The focus of his words was still himself. He lapsed into contemplative silence, his chin held in his hands. "Why do you play?"

"I play... I play because before you, the only person I knew who could play was playing for the wrong reasons, and I wanted a teammate. Still want a teammate, it's just... It seems less and less likely every day."

Inwardly, always inwardly, Jeck winced. Fae couldn't know, then, that the only reason he played was dead. That was too cruel, despite his intentions. Razor wanted Fae to die with nothing, but Jeck would not let that happen.

"So when is the final phase coming?" Fae continued. "That one's your call, and I've been waiting for it. Before Christmas? I sure as hell hope so. I'd hate to play during winter break; that's just unsportsmanlike." He grinned softly, and Jeck matched it.

"It'll be before Christmas, that's for sure. It had better be, anyway. If our delivery boy's not up to snuff, I'll just scrap the whole thing and start over in the spring."

"Maybe you should get him up to snuff,' you know? Could speed things up. I've got some, if you want to borrow it."

The glint in Fae's eyes and the smell of the smoke throughout the room got Jeck to laugh, to honestly laugh. He relaxed in his chair, grinning. "I can't believe we're even talking about this. I mean, here we are, trying to get one another killed, and instead of fretting about it, we're getting high on smoke."

Fae laughed back at him. "You know I can't get high. I'm too 'in control' of all this shit." He rolled his eyes. "You just think I'll give you my wallet again."

"Dude, what would I do with your wallet? You probably don't have anything 'squirreled away' in there, anyway." Jeck smiled slowly, then convulsed with sudden, quick laughter. "Squirreled away."

"You racist. It's not our fault our analogs are nut-brained idiots."

"Nut-brained." He cackled.

"Quit monkeying around, simian!" Fae shouted through a grin.

"Monkeying around!" Jeck repeated with a loud laugh. "You're doing it on purpose!"

Fae started giggling, his eyes closed tight against his mirth. It felt good, to let the drugs finally actually invade, for once. "You whities and all your 'oh, we're God's children, cause Jesus was white, meh-meh-meh.'" He made a face and stuck his tongue out.

"Man, everybody know Jesus'z black!"

"Bull! Jesus was a beaver. He was a carpenter!"

"A beaver in Israel? Don't even!"

"What, you think he was a camel or some shit? Jesus Christ all, 'look at me fasting for forty days' with a hump on his back?"

"'Cause Jesus not gnawing himself off the cross makes so much more sense! All chewing up the Spear of Longi... whatever it was, 'Arr, gimme that spear, mmm, looks like a chimichanga! I'll give ya a holey spear, ya Roman twits!'"

Fae was howling and almost fell off the sofa. "Jesus was... a-heh! Jesus was a Mexican pirate beaver?"

They fell about the place, laughing and giggling like hyenas, holding their sides and shaking and doubling over until both of them had hit the floor, tears of mirth streaming down their faces. "Ah-hah! Oh, that hurts, God-dammit!" Fae managed to choke out. They were facing one another, apparently stoned out of their minds, and laughing fit to wake the dead, still.

"Fae... Fae, what the hell is this crap? I didn't... ohhh... didn't think it could work that fast."

Fae nodded and tried to still himself. It was largely unsuccessful, and he curled up in a giggling ball, his tail wrapping him head to toe. "It's - it's - I only get the best stuff, man. Only the best. This shit'll have horses trippin', man." He covered his face with his hands playfully, laughing into them uncontrollably.

"Where you hidin', dude?" Jeck asked with a grin, grabbing his friend's tail and pushing it off his face, looking him in the red-veined, drug-lit eyes that peeked from between his fingers.

"Peekaboo!" Fae laughed, then abruptly sobered as his ears twitched.

"What?" Jeck asked, fighting to come down from the high. Fae would have heard better than him, and as he listened, he knew that the phone call he had made earlier that day was coming to fruition.

"Just... just thought I heard something." His face broke into smiles once or twice more. "Dammit, I lost it."

"Maybe I can bring it back," Jeck whispered, and suddenly grabbed Fae's cheeks, pulled himself in, and kissed him.

It was nothing like Guin. Nothing at all. Guin had been thanking him and simultaneously doing something for himself. He had been kind and grateful and had meant everything he did. With Fae, it lasted for less than a second and was the most hate-filled thing he had ever done. In the instant their lips touched, the blackness embodied in Fae condensed into a bullet so solid, so real, that he felt like it would come bursting through him and kill them both then and there.

The fact that the kiss didn't last meant nothing, though. Jeck held him there, faces pressed together, and yanked the unprepared boy's body towards him, pressing his against it and rolling on top of him while Fae's claws dug into him with their famous grip and nearly poked holes in his sides, struggling to toss the smaller boy off him. Jeck's hands were strong, though, and held his mouth closed so he couldn't speak, could do nothing at all.

And then the blackness broke into Fae's eyes, and an evil grin split his face. "Have it your way," he whispered, and latched his hands on the human's back, pushing them inextricably together. He relaxed the sideways jerking of his head and instead thrust forward and sucked the air from Jeck's lungs with the force of his kiss of death, not even opening his eyes as he heard the unmistakable footfalls of a fox draw near, the turn of the knob, the creak of the door, the gasp of horror, the slamming of the door, and the rapid retreat of those same footfalls. This was the final card, the final suspension in their twisted symphony.

Even then, their actions didn't end. They only grew less warlike as each began thinking about what it all meant. No longer tense and fighting, Jeck relaxed his muscles and fell smoothly onto his friend's chest before, in mutual silence, they drew away and went back to their seats.

The door opened again, admitting Mrs. Marshall. The sullen faces she saw as she glanced back and forth were more than convincing enough for her. "Well, God, no wonder he left like that! Fae, one of your friends comes over and you're in here smokin' like a chimney! Honest to God, I don't know what to do with you!" She flung glares at both of them.

Another voice, muted by the walls, cut in over hers. It was that of Fae's little sister. Tapping her foot angrily once or twice, the woman stormed out of the room to answer her step-daughter's call, slamming the door behind her. Without a word, Fae took off his shirt, lay down expectantly, and waited as Jeck, equally silently, likewise made himself bare, made his way over, and crawled on top of him. They breathed shallowly, smoke filling their eyes and lungs, dreams filling their minds, and bent forward and kissed again, meaning it this time. The oozing blackness was gone. Jeck tenderly rubbed the taller boy's shoulders, squirming softly against his bare chest. Fae held the back of his frend's head, kissing and pulling away and diving in again, loving him as Jeck loved him back, eyes closed, motions free and calm and wild and racing, with nothing between their bodies in the dim light of the misty, rippling room.

A song came on, one that shouldn't have been there. Both of them heard, and listened, but niether stopped. "Dancing," by Elisa.

_Time is gonna take my mind

and carry it far away where I can fly

The depth of life will dim my temptation to live for you

If I were to be alone, silence would rock my tears,

'cause it's all about love and I know better,

How life is a waving feather

So I put my arms around you, around you

And I know that I'll be leaving soon

My eyes are on you, they're on you

And you see that I can't stop shaking

No, I won't step back, but I'll look down to hide from your eyes,

'cause what I feel is so sweet and I'm scared that even my own breath

Oh, could burst it if it were a bubble

And I'd better dream if I have to struggle

So I put my arms around you, around you

And I hope that I will do no wrong

My eyes are on you, they're on you

And I hope that you won't hurt me

I'm dancing in the room as if I was in the woods with you

No need for anything but music,

Music's the reason why I know

Time still exists

Time still exists

Time still exists

Time still exists_

So I put my arms around you around you

And I hope that I will do no wrong

My eyes are on you they're on you

And I hope that you won't hurt me

So I put my arms around you around you

And I hope that I will do no wrong

My eyes are on you they're on you

And I hope that you won't hurt me.

They lay like that for minutes, breathing and shifting, moving lovingly, caressing one another. Jeck ran his hands down Fae's muscular sides and Fae brushed along the boy's broad shoulders and back and his slim chest, and they loved eachother, kissing noses, cheeks, eyes, lips it was deep and complete, and they rippled against one another, feeling more, and knew eachother. The blackness that had held them for so long was dissolved for those moments in time and somewhere, the image of them, meeting in a way that none had before, was taken and stored in the universe, a record of their touching, two nautili...

To anyone else, this meeting would have come almost as though from nowhere. It was true that they had been friends for several years, but never before had any romantic attraction to one another. Here, though, now that they could afford to recognize the power of each to move the world, now that everything was out in the open, they were inextricably drawn to one another and there was no better way to express themselves not in the universe.

Eventually, Jeck crossed his arms behind the squirrel's lithely powerful back and lay his head on his chest with a contented sigh, feeling the other boy's breathing, hearing, despite everything, the pure rush of living air through his lungs.

"Why are you playing, Leif?" Fae ran his hand through the human's hair, his fingers fiddling softly with the silky strands. "Why can't we play together? Why..." He swallowed a lump in his throat. "Why do you want me dead?"

"That's where you're wrong," Jeck murmured, and shivered as he felt the squirrel's long tail land gently on his back. "I don't want you dead. I want you alive. I want you... so alive..." he breathed, holding Fae closer, closer.

"But look at what you've done to me. I can't know if you're still playing me, at this stage. I can't tell when you're telling me the truth and when you're lying to me."

"I know. It'll be over soon. But I'll tell you this." He held himself up and looked deeply, into Fae's eyes. "Know that I'm telling you the truth. I swear to me and I swear to you and I swear to the future that these next words are real." He waited for the squirrel to nod, and then went on. "When it's over, you will know everything. Whichever one of us is dying, whichever one of us has to clean up after that poor guy we've been playing with, you will know everything."

Fae searched his eyes and could find nothing in their silver depths to make him doubt. "I believe you."

"I'm glad." He lay back down, but Fae lifted his chin with a finger and a curious look and brushed at his face, giving a perplexed sniff. "What?" Jeck asked.

"Just... an eyelash. Reminded me of something, is all." Fae flicked his fingers, and one of Razor's hairs fell to the ground.

"Oh," the other boy said, and fell slowly back down, pulling himself into his friend. "Even being who we are... can we just do this, for a while?"

Fae blew air through his hair with a snort. "Of course. What kind of friend would I be?"

They smiled and held one another close while the music and the haze and the drugs and the love washed through them, giving both of them a surreal calm while they fought off thoughts of the week to come. In those minutes, in that hour, into that night, the reaper was still a long way off, and his ripples were muted by something more powerful than his scythe could hope to carve.

Thoughts, before the end.

What if I'm wrong? I don't want to die.

Pulse-beat and rhythm-wind. Comatose petals falling, dying and detonating like meteors. Ethereality. I put my arms around you.

Everything I've worked for, breaking them...

Like a butterfly, gyrating as it drowns, still dancing, bringing tsunamis. Impervious to pain that would cripple normal men. Like LSD.

What if they die? It could all fall apart. I only have this one chance.

Palpitate pressure paralyzes, proliferates such dreams for men and beasts in their freedom, ripped mice in my talons...

I... might not be as eternal as I think I am.

Try to remember the mood of manhood. Sinking and shattering cities, Atlantis is weeping as earthquakes break her down, because a nautilus only feels ripples. I hope that you won't hurt me.

What if we had been born normal? What if it were all okay?

Such dreams for men... I'll be leaving soon... spin me through this razor-wind and give me a sail to navigate a purple haze.

We... are... incredible... You know me, I can't die. I'll never die. We're better than this, we can't just run away and be nothing! We're worth more. Time still exists. The darkest hour is just before the dawn. Don't let this go to waste. Ripples causing tidal waves and building oases in intellectual deserts, nautili in deserts making ripples in barren sands, all we feel are ripples...

"Man, I don't know how people get away with school shootings. What with cell phones and all, you'd think the police would have to get there before anything could happen."

"People all texting, 'plz help! He has a gun, lol! Liek, 911!'"

Fae laughed aloud at Stephen's comment and surreptitiously shifted his gaze a foot forward to where Guin was nervously twitching through the crowd at the door ahead of them. There was no way this chance would go to waste because of some twit with a cell phone.

"All right, class, here are your papers. I'm Mrs. Buckshire, your proctor for this exam, because Mr. Muller is still in the hospital from the heart attack and we don't want to stress him overly much."

Jeck caught the accusing glance Fae shot him and smirked down at his desk. That had been harder to organize, last week, but it turned out that a man that age could be given a heart attack and survive if the call was placed from his own home.

"Call the hospital, Mr. Muller. You're entering cardiac arrest and will die if you don't act quickly. Here's your phone." Jeck had waited with him, face hidden in a black scarf, until the ambulance came, then bade him farewell like any gentleman would.

Twenty minutes passed. Jeck knew he could kill Fae, if he wanted. It was necessary, by this point. If he and Razor had been cohorts, too much madness was possible if that one was left alive. He has to do it soon. Shifting eyes and shifting winds, breath rippling through the air, come on, Guin. Don't disappoint now. Now, of all times, sweating at your desk with that pencil, you're not even writing anything. Stop checking your backpack, it's still there. Panting ripples through sound, saliva drips on the paper, is this a heat flash, or what? I even told you what to do. Do it. Come on. Come on, you God-damned pansy, shoot someone!

"Jeck?"

It was the only voice Jeck was not prepared to hear. A small, metal, open-ended cylinder was pressed up against the back of his head. It took him half a second to understand. He dropped his pencil, slapped his hands on his legs with a disappointed sigh, and smirked while a collective gasp rose up from the class. "I would have expected a wider birth from your circumnavigating, you traitorous fucker," he said quietly, but loudly enough that the class could hear.

"Every one of you will put your cell phones against the wall or I will blow his brains across this entire fucking room!!" Fae's powerful voice bellowed through the classroom. There was a moment's hesitation before Fae changed aim and shot point-blank through Jeck's shoulder. The silencer made it sound like a toy gun.

Jeck grimaced and groaned loudly through his teeth as the bullet tore through his flesh, but he didn't scream, and he didn't cry. He had been ready for far worse than that if this went wrong, so bone shards ripping him from the inside of his shoulder were really not about to get him going. Panicked yells and shrieks echoed through the room, but they threw their phones against the walls as though they were burned by them. Jeck watched Fae's eyes as they blinked. He was counting impacts to make sure everyone complied.

A click resounded through the breathing that made it all stop at once. Mrs. Buckshire's voice cut through the solid sound-death. "Put the gun down, Fae." As ex-CIA, she had a silenced pistol trained on him. It didn't waver. "I've killed children like you before."

Niether did his as he slammed an iron grip around Jeck's neck with one hand and aimed the gun back at her. "All respect to you, ma'am, but I murdered my step-mother when I was eleven and I can guarantee you that if I don't kill you, I can take out five of these kids in the time my body takes to stop twitching."

Jeck spoke up, though strangled. He hadn't tried to fight, knowing it was a waste of energy, calculating what he could do to turn this around. "Don't doubt him, Mrs. Buckshire. I know him. Please." He looked at her imploringly and tried to tell her how sorry he was that it was ending this way, how serious he was about his friend's abilities - everything. Would it be enough?

She didn't lower the gun immediately, keeping it pointed straight at her student. In her bright red dress and old spectacles, the gun looked entirely out of place in her arms, but they were so steady that in a strange way, it worked. After a moment, though, she let it drop to the ground and sat back at her desk, arms folded as she glared at Fae. "I expected better of you, Faeram."

"This isn't about you, ma'am. Please be quiet." She started to open her mouth again, but Jeck shook his head to discourage her, and she stopped, trusting him. Fae moved the gun to Guin, still not letting go of Jeck, who was concentrating on getting air through his tightened airway. The fox looked at him with a desperation seen usually in rabbits chased by hounds. "Get up, Guin. Now, look at Jeck and tell him that you didn't bring a gun with you."

The fox stood, his hands up, shaking like a leaf. Jeck just stared at him darkly, his eyes shrunk to half their usual size. "I... I-I didn't bring a gun," he whispered.

"LIAR!" Fae yelled, and shot through Jeck's knee. Jeck sucked air through the windpipe that Fae subtly opened up for him. Jeck knew, then. Fae had as little certainty about how this would end as any of them did. He was attached to Jeck. Just as Jeck wanted, he was irrevocably bound to the human, and he was confused. It just didn't show. Or was Fae still playing him?

Stephen, a blond-haired human with a football-player's body, stood up. "Jeck, you knew this was going to happen, didn't you? What the fuck, dude?" Fae immediately switched direction and put a bullet through the kid's desk.

"Sit down," he ordered, and Stephen did as commanded, afraid for his life. Everyone was now looking at Jeck. He smiled again, and then laughed at their looks of disgust.

"Take me to the front of the class, Fae. I want to give them a little lesson. Some face-time before you blow my brains out. You God-damned mother-fucking twit of shit-headed cock-sucker. And Mrs. Buckshire, if you would, please take Fae's seat. I imagine mine is bloody."

Fae let him go and slammed the barrel of the gun against the side of his head. "Let's go, then." His voice was hard, cold, and quivering with rage. They walked slowly to the front of the room, separated only by a row of desks, connected only by the cold steel of the gun. Jeck was hopping on his good leg and leaking blood onto the floor, but did his best to keep his pain to a grimace. Mrs. Buckshire complied with a steely gaze.

Once there, they turned and faced the class, Fae's expression still as cold as Antarctic snows, Jeck still grinning and apparently about to burst into laughter at any minute. Everyone watching thought he was mad. Which, in a way, he really was. Most people are in the moments before death. Fae picked up the gun that Jeck had led him to. Mrs. Buckshire's. The squirrel pointed it at the students in general. Jeck started talking. "Okay, class. Today, we have a lesson in logic. Let's examine the case." His face was pale and his voice was a little weak, but other than that, he clasped his hands in front of him and bowed and moved like a professor. On cocaine.

"I'll start with the small things. First up, we have the bullet wound to my shoulder. This is a classic example of a failure of logical thinking. You see, when Fae pulled a gun out and told you all to throw away your cell phones, you hesitated. I don't know why, because I got rid of mine pretty quickly. When someone delivers an ultimatum, you should listen to them, evaluate the circumstances, and then act in a way most suitable to the situation. Such as: throwing away your fucking cell phones instead of sitting there like shit-tards and watching him blow a hole through me." He always had felt more comfortable cursing around Fae.

"Second, we have the bullet through my knee. This one's harder to see, but if Guin had examined all the material, he would have been able to avoid it. Fae told him, basically, to lie. However, Guin should know by now that Fae is not a fan of lying. He is, in fact, a fan of blunt and uncaring truth. In fact, he was so blunt to a girl once that she almost committed suicide. I don't know how many of you know Courtney who works at the coffee shop, but it was her friend's quick thinking and LOGIC that saved her life a few weeks ago. That's why Fae thinks I should die, rather than him, but we'll get to that later. So when Guin lied to him, even under duress of his life, he should have known that that kind of stupidity is the kind of thing that gets holes blown through people's knees.

"Third is the first actually entertaining case. Mrs. Buckshire, who is very cool, as she just demonstrated," he bowed towards her, "and I'm not shitting you, that was awesome - she recognized truth when she saw it, both in my words and in Fae's. She knew that Fae was willing to not only kill her, but control his flailing muscles as he died to murder several of you. So she put her gun down when he asked her. This is an example of logic put to good use, and we should congratulate her. So when this is over, you fucking congratulate her.

"Finally, the fourth case, and this one may take a while to explain, so I'll shorten it so that my oxygen supply does not get too fully depleted and you all end up with a poor explanation. That would be terribly rude of both of us." He looked to his captor, and Fae nodded. He spread his arms wide and smiled beatifically. "See? We're both reasonable people. Reasonably, I decided that one of us probably needed to die if the other ever planned on accomplishing anything in this world, because the reason both of us exert is, unfortunately, hindered each by our own little flaws. Fae caught on remarkably quickly to my plan to use Guinnevon's little, hidden homosexuality and said fox's own flowering concept of his own potential, combined with a bit of evil, social scheming from my side, to drive the fox entirely insane and get him to come to class with a gun, then shoot Fae's brains out because my own logical and emotional arguments would cause him to place the blame on Fae instead of me for his horribly muddled little mind." People looked at Guin in surprise, and he shrank into himself a little, crossing his arms over one another as he huddled down.

"There are three major flaws to the logic of this. The first comes from Guin. First, Guin believed that he could actually change things for the better by bringing a gun to school and killing one or both of his friends, and probably Mrs. Buckshire. In fact, Mrs. Buckshire is only here because I gave Mr. Muller a heart attack because I thought if I could disrupt Guin's concentration by placing it on her, first, then it would give me a better chance of getting him to switch aim to Fae. Well, Guin, look at this. It didn't help so much after all, did it? Do your best to salvage this when I'm dead, all right?

"The second flaw comes from me. I underestimated Fae. I thought that when I was talking to him about this two nights ago, I had convinced him that we would let Guin do all the faulty reasoning. We knew this was coming, both of us, and we were prepared to battle it out and see what in all hell would happen, because wouldn't you know it, I'm the only one, or so I think, who really knows what's happening. And don't worry: Fae thinks he is, too. I didn't think that Fae would pickpocket Guin's gun before class and take his own initiative to kill me before I could kill him. My mistake." He bowed accession and folded his hands before him, formal and resolute to the end.

"And lastly, there is Fae's flaw." Fae glanced at him quickly, then shifted his gaze, which had deadpanned, to the class again and froze in place at what he saw. "All of us do things wrong, see? Fae made the mistake of letting me come up to the front of the class and monologue. Now, while he's been zoning out because his mind got used to that from being a stoner, Guin has pulled out the extra gun he brought, because as a passive, rich-bred guy, he wasn't sure that one would really do the trick. And now, as you can see, it has all been made ready, and Guin really will be the one to decide all this. Either both of us die, or just me. See, class? Everyone makes mistakes. If all of us had been thinking clearly, none of us would be where we are now." He bowed deeply while the gun followed his head, then looked up from under his eyebrows with a vile glare. "So don't make mistakes. People die from mistakes, and you're about to witness that."

Fae turned his gaze to him as he straightened without even blinking while Guin's hands shook with the weapon he was holding. The squirrel didn't dare turn his extra one on the fox, not with him in that state of mind. "Did you really know he'd have another one beforehand?" he asked quietly.

Jeck slowly shook his head. "Made that one up on the spot." He raised his voice and addressed the perplexed class again. "Now, before dear Guinnevon here does something abnormally stupid, which would still not entirely be his fault because I targeted him specifically because I knew how little he had been trained in these particular arts, can anyone tell me what any one of the three of us could do that would most help the situation?" His eyes darkened and became penetrating as he challenged the students before him. "And this isn't ass-tard new wave' education, so there are wrong answers. And no, we didn't plan this, and yes, at least one of us will be dead before this is over. This is not a game. Not by your standards, anyway."

One girl immediately said, "Both of them could put their guns down! This is stupid!" Her eyes were red with tears.

Jeck glared at her angrily and exhaled furiously, like a bull. Red was staining his shirt and pants. "Fae, I'm going to move around behind Mrs. Buckshire's desk."

The squirrel cordially accompanied him back. Once there, Jeck slammed his fists onto the desk and shouted, "WRONG!" He ignored the piercing pain in his shoulder and the blood that flew out of it with the motion. "Are you stupid? Do you not have a brain? Did someone hurt you when you were little? Is that why you gave one of the stupidest answers you possibly could? When I say, any one of the three of us,' I don't mean, all of us.' Those are two different statements, and unless you have a hearing impairment, don't fucking give me fucking stupid answers! Christ, I wish I had a gun so I could shoot your finger off so you could never, ever forget what stupidity does to people! Does anyone have a reasonable answer, or should we just unfreeze this whole retarded tableau and let Guin figure out which one of us to shoot? There is more than one right answer! You can't all be wrong. I hope." With a disgusted sneer, he turned from the girl, who was now crying, and surveyed the class again. Tears were tracking down Guin's face and he had clenched his teeth at the psychological battering Jeck was giving him. "And Mrs. Buckshire, I'm only calling on you if you're the last one in here."

There was silence. Everyone's eyes were wide that were not closed, everyone's breath was quick that was not the slow and even breathing of unconsciousness, and everyone's mouths were hushed that were not sobbing into the dead air. Jeck slapped the table. "In ten seconds, I will do something that will force Guin to shoot one of us, whether you pathetic fuckers have learned your lesson or not!" He suddenly forced a calm on himself and breathed evenly while he spoke. He apologized: "I'm sorry. I don't usually curse this much. I'm stressed right now, and I'm trying to use my language to express that, and I shouldn't. I apologize. But I'm down to five seconds. Five. Anyone? Four."

"Someone answer him!" Fae shouted. All eyes shifted to him. "It's not that hard!"

"Two." Back to Jeck.

"Damn it, Jeck, don't be stupid!" Mrs. Buckshire yelled. To her.

"One." To him.

A hand shot up. Immediately, Jeck's eyes shot to it. "Yes, Fiera? And don't tell me you just did that to stop the count-down, because I swear to God-"

"Fae could put his guns down," the girl spat out in a rush. She breathed in and out quickly, chokingly. It was one of Guin's hangers-on. The ones from before weren't in this exam, but she was... tenth, Jeck seemed to remember, in the class.

"Surprisingly good! That is one of the several correct answers, and one of the better ones. Could you tell the class why it's a good answer?"

"It's... it's math," she said quietly, to herself, looking down at the desk. "If... if Guin shoots Fae, Fae will convulse and shoot Jeck and... and someone else, and they'll all be dead. If Guin shoots Jeck, then only Jeck will die. If Fae puts his guns down, only one person can die. From... from that instance, anyway."

Jeck's face lit up like a jack o' lantern. He was exuberant. "Yes! Yes, wonderful! You're not stupid! Congratulations! All of you should listen to her! What a good idea!" In his excitement, he moved his head out of Fae's line of fire before the squirrel could react and slammed his arm into the squirrel's, dislodging the one gun. Guin took advantage of the distraction as Fae swung his other around to Jeck and shot twice. One hit Fae's arm and the other grazed his neck, causing him to start bleeding profusely, rivers tracking down his side in seconds. It happened so quickly that few in the classroom could remember the order of events afterwards. Jeck was perfect.

"It was me?" Fae whispered, staring at nothing. "No..."

Jeck was like a bear separated from its mate, like a lion from its cubs, like a doberman from its master. Something animal, something feral, came out of his features and swung the entire front of the room into ethereal darkness. "You idiot!" he erupted, and violently snatched Fae's other gun from him before throwing him to the ground. "How stupid do you have to be? How stupid can one person be?" He locked the gun on the center of Guin's chest. "I told you the answer, and you ignored it! Kill me now, Guin, or I swear to God, I will take out you, Fae, me, and everyone else in this class!" Anyone looking at him was looking into the very eyes of Hell. Most of the students shrank from him, frightened beyond what fear they had ever witnessed before. "KILL ME, GUINNEVON LEARY!"

Guin shot. Pop. He didn't miss that time, or the next. Pop.

Two holes appeared in Jeck's chest. He looked down at them, still holding the gun, while Fae looked up at him from the floor. Jeck grinned madly. "This is the beginning, and this is the end," he whispered to no one in particular, then raised his voice. It was as though he didn't have four bullets in him. "That didn't do it, Guin. I feel fine. Shoot me again, I ain't dead yet! Shoot me!" There were screams from everywhere, including the teacher. Fae was watching coldly.

"I won't save you, Jeck," he murmured during the next two shots. He knew, then, that Razor was dead, and guessed that Jeck had done it. And no one deserved to live after that. He didn't have much time to think about it, though. Pop, pop. Crimson had soaked the whole of Jeck's chest, but he kept grinning and hopped out from behind the desk, gun still levelled. Only ripples. He was only feeling ripples. The one was silent.

"I'll kill you, Guin," he choked, knowing his eyes were losing their fire, and threw gasoline on them, burning everything with the ripples of his flame. "I'll murder you right now." Pop, pop, pop. Click. Jeck dropped his gun with a bloody laugh. "Clip's empty." The human fell to the ground, bereft of the strength that had held him for so long.

Fae immediately got up, stepped over to him, and knelt down by his ear, tears refusing to course down his rage-drenched face. "I win, Jeck. I didn't save you."

Jeck laughed again in a choke that spat globules of crimson life splattering onto the tile floor. "No you don't, you stupid fucker," he breathed out, finally calm. "Don't you get it? When I said I'd explain everything, I didn't think I'd have to actually do it. Dumbass." He breathed harshly, trying to suck in enough air to say what was necessary. Guin was frozen in his seat.

Fae's face screwed into one of confusion. He didn't usually have to do that. "What?"

"I just committed suicide," he said, loud enough for other class members to hear. "Faeram Marshall is not to blame! Guinnevon Leary is not to blame! I am the culprit!" His words slurred together from the blood foaming at his lips, but the class could hear them clearly, whether they chose to listen or not.

"No, no you didn't," Fae said quickly. "No you didn't. I just altered events. I just put things so that when you thought you had me killed, I wouldn't save you, and you'd die instead of me. That's how it went down, right? Are we telling the truth now, Leif? Come on." He held the human's head up, even with his wounded arm, and looked in his eyes. "Come on, Jeck."

Jeck smiled and shook his head. "No. From the beginning, this was the plan. I took those bullets so they wouldn't hit you. Because we need to break out of our little flaws, Fae. We're each one step from actually accomplishing something..." he choked on his own blood, and Fae held him up so he could cough it out. "But you're better at it than I am. You just let your guard down, is all. So I'm setting you free. You're free, Fae." His eyes hardened one last time and he clutched at Fae's collar. "Break this fucking world in half, Fae."

The squirrel watched the light in his friend's eyes fade again, and he knew it was all the truth. "No. No, Jeck! Come on, Jeck, you can still pull through! There's got to be some... some other way." He could feel the ripple of Jeck's unsteady heartbeat as the muscle pushed the ruby water of life out of the holes in its system. "You could have just told me, we could have done this together!"

"No. As long as we're in stasis, we don't... ripple. We don't do anything. We just... die." His voice dropped until it was barely audible. "But Fae! Tell Sarabi I really love her. Tell her she should- should stay with you. Lie to her if you have to to get her to work with you. She can be one of us, too. And tell Guin to... put the gun down..." He fell back with a sigh, gaze and heartbeat and lungs dead, lifeless. He didn't hear the final screams, and he didn't hear the final shot.

Guin swallowed a bullet from Buckshire's gun, but he wasn't thinking very hard. All he wanted was the bullet to sever his spinal cord, effectively decapitating him. He didn't think the bullet would fire through him, when Mrs. Buckshire tackled him, and lodge in Fiera's frontal lobe, instantly killing her when it threw him into a vegetative state. And as predicted, because not all things were considered, people died in that room that day. It just happened differently than they all expected.

And that was how it fell apart. While Fae tried desperately to keep everything calm, to control the situation so everything could go on like it should have, to spray the ammonia he had in his bag so there couldn't be easy evidence, someone got to a cell phone. Guin shouldn't be in a coma. Fiera shouldn't have died. The cops were called. Special forces took "control" of the situation, ushering the weeping, hysterical kids out of the classroom, evacuating the school. Parents were called, exams were rescheduled. Jeck shouldn't have died. Fuck you, Jeck. Fuck and fuck and shit and damn me to Hell and back. Fae was thrown to the ground and arrested while Buckshire looked on with tear-filled eyes. The parents, relatives, and friends of the deceased wept for hours on end, to be followed with decades of sorrow for the loss. And no one gave an accurate story.

Except one.

"Faeram Marshall is charged with the shooting deaths of three children in a massacre..."

"...at the school shooting when Faeram Marshall, a known user of LSD, heroin, and marijauna, attacked a classroom..."

"...unresolved gay relatonship..."

"...no video surveillance tapes are available..."

"No one has a ready answer for why the targets were chosen... students' stories range from double-murder-suicide to unintentional homicide to senseless violence... no one can make sense of this terrible tradgedy."

"Karin Buckshire, former CIA agent and math teacher at the high school, though she was the only adult present, has refused to comment until she testifies on Marshall's court date..."

"Some schools are thinking of putting video surveillance in their classrooms..."

"I would like the court to recognize that I am of sound mind and body," Karin Buckshire proclaimed from the witness stand. It was several weeks after the murders. Faeram Marshall was handcuffed, his tail was chained to his orange jumpsuit, and his eyes were brighter than she had ever seen them as he held his narrow gaze up at her. He did not appear to have suffered at all from withdrawal syndromes.

"The court has already testified to that, madam," the judge said patiently.

"I know, your Honor," she said with a voice strong and clear. "What I am about to tell you is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, which I have sworn by my God and to this courtroom to tell. Most of you will not believe it, because most of you, at this point in your lives, have lost faith in the youth of this generation, as all adults have always lost faith in their own children." Through her glasses, her eyes were stern, but when she removed them, the red corners, ugly and newly wrinkled from days of weeping, could be clearly seen. "I will tell you why this boy is not guilty. I will tell you that he is not responsible for a single death, and why he has refused to speak a word to any of you since that day."

"Ma'am, you are aware that he is not on trial for murder? He is on trial for inciting a riot with deadly consequences."

She fixed him with a teacher's glare before he could blink, and he backed down. "On that day, your Honor, two people attempted suicide, both by their own volition, and one unfortunate girl, through no fault of this young man before me, lost her life."

This time, the prosecution addressed her angrily. "You are aware that fingerprints and DNA evidence of all three were found on the guns, and that every student witness has testified that Faeram Marshall was the first to fire one?"

"Do not lead me, Mr. Jeffers. I am perfectly capable of telling the truth without you." He received the same treatment as the judge, who motioned him to take his seat. Fae let loose a tiny smile that Karin did not catch. From then, she proceeded to tell her story, from the day she brought Guin and Fae to her desk after class, providing every piece of information she had managed to gather. She spoke only facts, telling in exact detail what had occurred on the day of the deaths. When she was done, she also brought a tape recorder out of her purse.

"Jeck Gates left this on my desk before he died. It is a recording of every word that was spoken that day, and will show you irrefutably that he intentionally assumes all responsibility for all offenses."

"Ma'am, that is new evidence, we can't..."

A crackled voice cut through the courtroom as she held the machine up to the microphone. "My name is Kindelford Jeck Gates, son of Danielle and Harvard Gates, brother of Geoffrey and River Gates, boyfriend of Sarabi Chism. On December 16, 2010, I will cause the death, hopefully, of Kindelford Jeck Gates, son of Danielle and Harvard Gates, etc., that is, me. This is not the most obvious suicide you have ever heard of, but what follows is a recording of the day I died."

The first voices were muffled and chaotic, as though from a crowd. Then Mrs. Buckshire's voice came out clear as the sound died down: "All right, class, here are your papers..." It went on from there, and on, and on, and no one in the courtroom spoke a word until the last understandable words were spoken: "No. As long as we're in stasis, we don't... ripple. We don't do anything. We just... die." Then, a gunshot, followed by screams. It clicked off, out of tape.

"Now," Karin said, drying her eyes with a handkerchief, "is that something that a boy who had been murdered would do?"

Obviously, the courtroom detonated in sound and fury as both sides began arguing with one another. Karin and Faeram were led out and the judge declared a recess until the evidence could be verified as reliable. But, though they were on opposite sides of the room and facing away from one another, Fae and Karin shared a small, bitter, grim smile. Jeck had taken care of Fae, in the end. No one would be able to dispute the tape after it was analyzed. Fae would be free. He would be absolved. What follows is the speech he gave, when finally released.

"This is what happens when you don't think about what you're doing," he said, his voice scratched, but commanding. "Jeck knew. He knew what it was like to live in a world where people actually listened and actually cared about one another, but instead, he lived here. Here, where people are so wrapped up in themselves that they don't take time to think and end up killing someone else because of it. And innocent people die. Fiera, God save us for Fiera, was not meant to die that day. No one was, but she especially was innocent." He took a moment to breathe, and looked at the crowd with nothing on his face. "This is not Guin's fault, any more than it is anyone else's in this world. Jeck could have chosen any of you and you would have shot him in the end." His voice picked up strength as he went. "It's what he does, it's what he's good at. He can see all of your little flaws that you all overlook and he can grind cigarettes in them until you hurt so badly that you just want to kill something! He made Guin kill him so that all of us could see that actions have consequences. That is all he wanted to say, because so few people seem to get it. It's not a difficult concept." He was breathing quickly, clearly fighting back an emotion that would be inappropriate for the podium, then barked, "Is there anyone here who still fails to understand that, who has embraced their mental density so tightly that they refuse to grasp the meaning of his sacrifice? Because if there is, speak now! I will not have his death go to waste!" he snarled against the rest of them, and no one challenged him. "There is a moral and intellectual deficit in the workings of the world today, and he wants you all to see it and fix it!"

As long as we're in stasis, we don't ripple. We don't do anything. We just die.

May there be an epilogue.

_pulse

ripple

pulse

ripple

shake

pulse

ripple

pulse

pulse

pulse

pulse

pulse "Can you hear me?"

tap ripple break "Come on, wake up."

It's too cold. Why is it so cold? Just to oppose Hell?

light

kind of.

Standing up. Black face. Snake scar. Scarf? A smile. "Wake up, Leif."_

"How did you find me?" The voice was gone. The deed was done.

"I can cause... anything. Thanks for the scarf, by the way. I don't know when my throat'll heal, though, so I think I'll keep this for a while."

"We have to get out of here. Most people die when they think they're supposed to."

Grin. "I brought two shovels. Let's get this done, and I'll fix those bullet holes up nice and proper. You look fucked up to hell and back."

Jeck could still hear the words Fae had spoken over his grave. They made him smile, even as tears, fresh from the moisture of the earth above the grave, fell where he had lain. He mourned for Guin, and for Fiera. And Razor mourned with him, for Vice. They mourned for the dead, for the innocent, for the needlessly sacrificed, for those caught in the crossfire, for those unable to grasp what life had shown them was truth.

_"Do not stand on my grave and weep.

I am not there I do not sleep.

I am the thousand winds that blow.

I am the diamond glints on snow.

I am the sunlight on ripened grain.

I am the gentle autumn rain.

When you waken in the morning's hush,

I am the swift uplifting rush

of gentle birds in circling flight.

I am the soft star that shines at night.

Do not stand at my grave and cry-

I am not there. I did not die."_

---

This is the end, and this is the beginning.