FSE

Furry search engine

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After my little avian trip, with another huge battle under my belt, I was informed we were given a week off for recuperation. I will not say I had enjoyed being attacked by the trolls, but the fact those creatures were unable to harm me meant I was enjoying it a lot more than otherwise. I did miss Willowing though, he was sweet.At seven o'clock I bid farewell to Ryan Lewis as he went on his trip with Orion, Doran and Felicia, and then watched Sunrise and his brothers leave with Propani and Giancarlo.

I meandered down to the food store. Draco was on his home planet, Simba was as well. Salbar had taken an extended vacation, the lizard needed a break. Javid was back with his fellow wolves on his planet, so I was the only person from our party on Central. I entered the food store, and as everyone was leaving except those who were off duty this week or didn't go on planet trips (like Alecto), the place was reasonably deserted. Alecto and Gareth were talking in a corner about one thing or the other, Abigail was hinting at a new thing she had made and was dying to test out, and Silverine was relaxing with Thomas and Landon at one table, talking about the advantages of dual pistols.

Ryan Viper was also in there, and he was listening to this conversation. Silverine was not a dual pistol sort of person, he was well known for carrying around long powerful weapons, hence his halberd. His projectile weapon was the equivalent of a M95, the high powered 50 cal sniper rifle, and what's more he frequently shot it standing. I once fired Silverine's rifle, and the recoil damn near knocked me to the ground. I remember that day because he also fired my .303, with one hand.

I slid into a seat next to Silverine.

"Morning guys, what's the argument about?"

"No argument." Thomas replied innocently," I'm just suggesting to our Chief Scout that if he wants real firepower, he should have two hand guns, rather than that bulky rifle he carries around."

"And I'm saying that there's no hope in heaven," the Lupogriff added," Because my rifle is menacing by it's sheer size alone, and it's power is more than equal to his pistols."

"You should check out Takori's arm blaster.He's made some severe modifications to the charge he carries."

"He would." Landon rolled his eyes, and smiled. Thomas spun his pistols idly.

"What about you, Alduin?Are you content to carry that ancient museum piece forever more?" he asked me, with an innocent smile.

"This museum piece, as you call it,"I warmed up," is what got you out of the Great Hall during the Hunt, as I seem to recall."

"O.K., it's more powerful. But I can fire off two magazines in the space of you firing off one shot on that."

I was interrupted by Iris.

"Has anyone seen Khamsina?I put her down on the ground, and she's crawled off."

This was the signal for everyone to look underneath the tables, and I changed into bionic form. The baby dragon needed a tether of some kind, honestly. I noticed the door outside was open, so I got up and walked to it.

I looked out, and to my great relief Khamsina was crawling down the corridor on all fours, her tail dragging behind her.

"Runaway wyrmling!" I called, chuckling, and walked in pursuit of the baby dragon. I heard Iris sigh, and her her foot steps as she jogged after me.I reached down and picked the dragon up in my hands, and good naturedly dodged the resultant blast from the apparently miffed Khamsina. She wasn't angry at her freedom rights being infringed, again, but the impudence of the human who had picked her up.

"Only Iris is allowed to do that, isn't she?" I asked the dragon innocently. Khamsina rolled in my arms and latched onto my shoulder. Her head rose until she was looking at me eye to eye, and subjected me to an annoyed stare.

"Now, now, don't look at me like that, we don't want you getting lost." I said, as Khamsina came up.

"Khamsina, what have I told you about wandering?"

The baby dragon gave an embarrassed noise, and looked away from me. Iris took the dragon off me.

"Thanks, Alduin. I spent three hours looking for her last time." The elf began chanting in her mystical elvish tone, a song that had a soporific effect on people listening to it. If I paid attention to it, or anyone did, they could become drowsy, and I briefly remembered that Grant had once fallen asleep next to her.

Iris had been singing her song, and Khamsina was soon dozing, but it was when she stopped and everyone looked at her, admiring her voice, when we noticed the panther was leaning on the table, lying on his arms, a seraphic smile of innocence on his face. His slumbering form startled even Iris, and for a few seconds we wondered exactly what had happened, and then the penny dropped. Grant was carried back to his quarters by Propani, and Iris had to put up with the genial teasing of those nearby that she had put the panther to sleep.

I became drowsy at the lilting sound, and forced myself to stop listening to the musical elf. In fact, I knew exactly how. I turned on my heel and walked towards the Great Hall. The upright piano lived there permanently, I didn't mind playing to an audience while practising. Within a few minutes I slipped into the Great Hall. It was deserted save for Kodey, who was typing things on his computer at a table, and a solitary glower who was hovering near the dais.

Kodey looked up, and spotted me.

"Morning, Alduin. What are you doing here, not trying to sneak off by yourselves to a new planet by any chance?"

"I'm not that keen, Kodey. Just playing the piano."

He nodded, and went back to his writing. I lifted the lid on the keys, and as I pulled up the seat, played a quick scale. Perfectly in tune, as always.

I began playing. Fur Elise was my warm up piece, as it had been ever since I learnt it properly. Once I finished with that, I moved on to Hey There Delilah. I played Memory from the Cats Musical, and while my voice is not soprano range, I sung the words to it. I was made aware the glower was hovering directly behind me at the end of the song.

I paused briefly, drawing some music from the top of the piano. I left a copy of Primavera there, because it was a piece everyone had come to like listening to.

"Enjoying my playing, glower?" I asked politely.

"Yes, Alduin."it said softly," Some times I wish we could play such an instrument. But we could not. Our only way of making music is by singing."

The glower's sang? Well, we learn something new every day.

"I've never heard that before."

"Only Silverine has. Four of us sung to him once."

"How did he react to that?"

The glower pulsed in a way that suggested a smile."I will not say, you will have to ask him." It twinkled, and I rolled my eyes.

"Very well, I will. So what is your purpose in the Hall except for me?"

The glower pulsed once, this time uncertainly." I feel, uneasy, today. I do not understand why, and one of the others feels it too. There is something, wrong about today."

"Do you think something bad will happen?"

"I do hope not, but it's a quiet fear that tells me something will. It's, not prediction, exactly, just an uncomfortable sensing of something."

"Empathic."

"Something like that." the glower pulsed once in agreement.

"Well, "I smiled," Apart from making sure Arachno has a scanner activated in his room, we can only hope your worries are unfounded."

"I hope so too. But staying here, the centre of Central, and where all the transmissions pass through, we can listen to radio communications from what ever world coming to here."

"Handy." I nodded, and began playing. Kodey stopped typing, and sidled over, listening to the melodious piece.The glower was completely silent, and he even dimmed, as if he was feeling tired.I do hope I wasn't making him sleepy. But the piece unrolled, and I was coming to the end of the first half of the song when suddenly my head set activated, and a voice spoke.

"Alduin...." the voice said weakly. It sounded hurt, and worse, it sounded like Doran. I jumped, and brought both hands in a crashing discord.

"Doran, is that you?" I jumped up. I linked Kodey into the conversation, and the glower could hear naturally.

"Alduin, we've been attacked. I'm, I'm wounded."

"What about the others?" I said urgently, as Kodey began running towards the door.

"Felicia's hurt, Orion I don't know, and Ryan, Ryan..."

I turned." Glower, I need my gear, now if possible."

"Go." the glower said firmly, and my kit bag, full of iron rations, water and ammunition arrived in front of me, along with sword and rifle.

I grabbed all three, and then turned back to Doran.

"Doran, stay with me, do you have a scanner placement?"

"We walked some way from the scanner, but it's maybe two hundred metres.Help me, Alduin." the wolf whined, and my heart broke in several pieces.

I teleported on the spot, and after forty precious seconds, landed heavily in ankle deep snow. This place was quite different from the last planets I have visited, the trees were all leafless, and snow covered everything.

I looked around frantically, and grabbed my locator out of my belt. I turned until I found where they were, and began running through the snow, rifle fully loaded in my hands.

My breath heaved, and as the locator blip got louder, I saw what I was dreading to see.

"Oh god, no. NO! Doran!" I ran to the prone wolf. He was lying in a patch of snow, blood dripping from two chest wounds. The wolf was alive, but by the looks of things he had been run through by something like a sword.

He stirred feebly.

"Alduin, I'm dying, please help me."

I opened my communicator. No Hellbrew I had could fix the amount of blood he was losing.

"Arachno!!"I screamed,"You've got a very badly injured wolf coming your way!"

"I'm ready, the glower's alerted me." the spider replied in my headset, and linked at the same time,"Oh no." he said hollowly, looking through my camera at the wounds.

I took Doran's hand, and placed it on his teleporter.

"Go Doran, I'll find the others." he pressed the button, and vanished, leaving a puddle of blood in the snow. With a quick movement, I straightened up and looked around, my eyes traversing the area like a snake. There was a bang from up hill, and Silverine and Ryan Viper arrived. They ran towards me, while I looked at my locator again.

One was about two hundred metres away, and Ryan changed into his Aurora craft, flying low through the trees.

Four seconds later he landed in his tiger form next to the unconscious form of Orion. The entire area was blackened and charred by his fire spells, but he had also been stabbed. Ryan Viper grabbed the fox's hand, and they teleported, closing the interlink on us.

I opened a channel to all those who could hear.

"Felicia! Lewis!"

"FELICIA!" Silverine shouted, his voice booming out.And soon I was shouting.

"Up here..." the elf said faintly, and we looked up.Clinging to a tree was Felicia, her look one of terror.

Silverine leapt off the ground, and his wings propelled him in a fast rise to the level of the elf. Then he alighted on a branch, and we saw what had happened to her. Her leg was bleeding badly, pierced by two bolts, and Silverine began the delicate task of removing the long shafts.

"What happened?"

"We were ambushed, by what I don't really know. None of us were recording, although I think Orion managed to as he ran. Doran was hurt immediately, and Ryan was carried off by them. I began climbing, but they had bows, or something like them, and they shot me." the elf, said, weeping.

The glower had been right, something had gone wrong.Silverine opened his communicator.

"The situation is this,glowers. The party has been attacked by creatures unknown.Three scouts are accounted for, but Ryan Lewis is still missing."

There was a bang as Draco arrived, how the hell did he find out so fast? He stormed up to Silverine.

"Where's my goddamn boyfriend?" he shouted, furiously.

"We don't know yet, Draco." Silverine began.

"I swear, if he's hurt, I will kill everyone who hurt him, and...."

"Draco Kazuli." I said quietly," Do not think you care for him alone." Both dragon and Lupogriff went silent as they remembered my vow to protect Ryan while he was on Central.Blake arrived, with his own rifle. Landon and Thomas arrived, and all four of them were looking as darkly angry as Winslo. If it hadn't been for the fact I had been with them for a couple of years, and I wasn't so exceedingly mad myself, I would have been immensely frightened.

The bunny held his staff like a vice, and I noticed tendrils of ice were flowing along his staff from his hands. The other bunny, Billy Carlson, arrived with his great coat on, and as he shouldered his own gun, we all formed a circle.

"No one got any recording of what attacked them," Silverine began,as Takori teleported in, his arm in it's pulse cannon form immediately on arrival," we can only presume what ever did it is hostile and extremely dangerous." All the newcomers noted Felicia's leg. The elf was currently leaning on me, head on my shoulders, eyes closed.

"What of the technology?"

"Doran and Orion were stabbed by some kind of blade weapon, and what hit Felicia look like cross bow bolts." Silverine held up the two jagged arrows. They were slightly thicker than most human manufacture, and had barbs on the end, which must have been a nightmare to remove.Both were stained with the elf's blood.

"Well, we appear to have the advantage in weapons." Valmeero scowled.

"They apparently have numbers though, so we must be exceedingly careful." Blake replied.

Ryan Viper arrived, carrying my Eryx and two semi automatic rifles. A bag over his other shoulder held the rounds for the rocket launcher and a half dozen magazines for my rifle. His own were attached to his belt.I transferred the contents of the bag he gave me to my own, and stalked after Draco. Silverine and Valmeero took off vertically for an aerial view, along with Blake. Billy went the other way in case they had doubled back, and Winslo walked with him.No one except me went alone, in case there were more, and I cared not for numbers.

My Eryx was left unloaded, unlike both my rifles. The .303 was over my shoulder, the safety catch on, but the M4 was not in safe position, and I carried it with my finger on the trigger. Draco had not wasted time picking up Ryan's clothes, but was trying to follow the human's scent. I grabbed Ryan Lewis' bag, and began to pack his gear. His shirt and trousers were torn and ruined, his phaser discarded. His bag had not suffered any damage, but almost everything else had. And Draco was not entirely correct, Ryan was wearing his undergarments, but that wouldn't make much difference in this frost.

I stripped down to my sniper light shirt, my immunity to cold induced by Kohana was proving very helpful. Draco had been in his shorts when he had arrived, so angry was he that Ryan was missing in action, but the cold would not effect him at all either. I spent five minutes collecting Ryan's gear, put bag and all in my own bag, and set off slightly slower. I was carrying a bit of weight now, and my pace slowed. Draco was still following the tracks, and I didn't want to draw any more attention to myself by changing forms, because the Raptor and Tripod were too loud in this still and silent forest.

Silverine was flying off to the left, and I could see him slowly searching in a grid with every tool he could throw at the ground. Valmeero was doing the same on the right, and Blake was directly ahead.

Billy and Winslo reported in after about ten more minutes, they had found nothing and the course was slowly curving around. But the tracks were clear now they had come this far from the battle, it was all one way traffic, but they would follow in reverse in case they came to something first.Theoretically Draco and the two bunnies would eventually meet, as, if we guessed, the patrol walked in a large circle.

It still left many questions unanswered. What were these mysterious creatures? Why were they patrolling such a deserted area of forest? And why were they so hostile to my friends? Capture I could understand, but attempted murder of the entire party, where was the rationale behind that? Felicia was not a truly terrifying creature, neither the fox or the wolf. But they were set upon none the less. And why did they then take Ryan Lewis without harming him? It didn't make sense, none of it did.

I was not alone in thinking these thoughts, and Abigail was holding a discussion with Silverine and Valmeero on an open channel. Then she had a request, from me.

"Alduin, could you place down a scanner? In the quite likely case of you fighting, I want to test a prototype vehicle of mine."

"Based on what?"

"A Scorpion, from your planet. Mark IV, I believe. But with additional things."

Scorpion?What the hell was a Scorpion? There was no car or plane or skidoo called that on my planet. Rather confused, I set down a scanner, and took about ten paces back.

With a rather loud bang half a minute later, I found out.As my jaw dropped, I recalled I had seen this before.On Halo, of all things, a computer game I had showed everyone.It was about fifteen metres long, with four seperate sets of tracks. It's huge pulse cannon on the top rotated, but not at the moment, it was facing dead ahead. Modifications were the entire thing was black, Abigail had an addiction to that colour, and two banks of missile launchers, the size of me, on the turret. The tank had been idling, a steady rumble, but it roared now, the snarl of the two thousand horsepower engine sending shivers down my spine. For something weighing 68 tons, it sure did look scary.

Then Abigail voice operated the canopy, and it opened upwards so she could get out. She did so, and looked at me.

"Well, what do you think?"

"You actually built a tank, Abigail? Tracks and all."

"No, I stole one from a deserted army base, and fixed everything wrong with it." the lioness smiled widely,that was a complete lie, and I jumped up onto the behemoth. The Scorpion was very low built to the ground, yet with the huge tracks that made it possible to climb the most impossible terrain.

"No, you built one from the Halo game, Earth tech haven't made something like this." I looked at the four huge tracks.

"O.K., so I copied it off a computer game,"Abby shrugged,"It's about time someone did, it looks beautiful."I wasn't disagreeing, it was good looking, in a menacing way. Sort of like Silverine.

"Viper, you might want to check this out when you've got the time. Not right now, but she, well, wow. Can you give me a lift?"

"I was going after Draco, so yes." Abigail closed the canopy. The tank surged forwards, and I grabbed onto the side of the rotating turret to keep myself from falling off. Behind me was the banks of engines, lord knows what went in one of these, and with ion modifications, what it was capable of.

The weapons were fairly obvious. Sabre pulse round from the main gun, and it was a big fore arm sized projectile. Depleted uranium rounds had not been built for this, so it was merely high explosive instead of radioactive. Then the machine guns, two of them. One was meant to be operated from next to the canopy where the pilot was, where there was a small seat for a gunner, the other was internal. The other piece of armament were the missiles. This carried eight, and we were talking metre long rockets, heat seekers I guessed.

Well, while Abigail could control the explosive rounds, I was happy to be a machine gunner for now, and I scooted next to Abby's lowered form in the pilot's seat, and strapped myself into the rotating seat for the machine gun. The entire thing moved left or right by hand controls, and it was manual for small left and right, and complete vertical aiming. I began moving the gun around, aiming at various tree branches, getting myself accustomed to it. Now we had some serious firepower to help recover Ryan.Now normally the crew of a tank was about four, but Abigail had made the loading of the shell automatic and also the aiming, so without a radio operator( but then we all had interlink, so that was not applicable), and two machine gunners, she could do everything by herself.

Abigail came to a halt, and swivelled the turret to the left. The machine gun nest stayed where I wanted it facing, and I turned to see what see was looking at. The forest was not thick, she could go which ever direction she willed, providing she was careful.

Silverine spoke to both of us.

" There's something to your left, Abby."

"I saw it." she replied, and I quickly rotated until I was looking in the same direction, facing over her canopy.

"Alduin, beat the bush, please?"

The machine gun spoke in a rapid staccato. Spent cartridges began spewing from the machine gun as it's harsh crack reverberated consistantly. A hundred metres away, snow went flying in all directions, surprising the joker hiding behind the tree. A dark figure fell side ways, throwing himself on the ground, and Silverine landed. He made short work of capturing the creature, and then we got to see the creatures for the first time.

They were odd creatures. They stood six and half feet tall, and covered with a lightish yellow fur. They wore naught, naked as the spring, and had claws on their hands and feet. Their heads were half wolven, with pointed ears on the top and something of a muzzle.This one was also carrying a very odd looking weapon. It was like a sword, except at the top was a right angled piece of metal, so it looked like he was carrying an inverted L.

By now he wasn't carrying it, he was currently in a headlock being held by Silverine with both hands behind his back. Abigail showed perfect botanical preservation, and drove straight through a couple of bushes and came to a halt next to the struggling pair. Silverine slammed the creature hard against the tank's carapace, and the thing shrieked. I aimed the machine gun down and at the creature's chest. It stopped, seeing the .50 caliber weapon pointing at him. This was much like what the Humvee carries, with a good metre long barrel, and firing about five rounds per second.

"If you don't tell us where our friend is, I will hurt you."I said pleasantly.

The creature, in a large amount of pain from the pressure Silverine was applying on him, gasped.

"Please, let me go! I'll,I'll tell you if he stops!"

Silverine let go like a spring, and the creature fell into the snow face first. He got to his feet, shaking snow from himself, and whimpered as Blake and Valmeero landed, all pointing weapons at him.

"Now, you run ahead, and we'll follow. Try anything stupid, and we'll make it hurt." Silverine snapped. The wolf hybrid considered it's options, and pointed towards where Draco was still running, though we didn't know it. He walked past the tank, and began running. The tank churned around and drove after, while the three winged Centralites ran after.

These creatures were fit, he kept up a very reasonable pace. The tank trundled along behind, and the fear made him run a lot faster.

Draco spoke after five minutes.

"I think I'm near, there is a lot of milling around where I'm standing. There's a large rise on one side, but there's also two smaller hills, and the foot prints are so many."

"Activate your scanner, so we can track you against this fellow we've caught."

"You've caught one?" the dragon echoed, and I heard his grim voice again," Save some of the bastard for me."

"Draco, this one isn't for anyone, unless he misleads us. But be assured, you are allowed free rein on any you come across trying to hurt Ryan."

Draco's scanner popped into our direction finders, this creature was leading us dead on.Five minutes later, we drove straight over a rise and found the dragon standing in a small area surrounded by two large hills and one very large hill. All three were slightly sheer. Draco looked suspiciously at the creature we had caught, and then looked slightly amazed at the tank. Ryan Godsey touched down, and the two bunnies came around between two of the large hills, they had finally followed the footprints around.

The creature, no one had asked his name, was very fearful amongst all of us. He could feel the dagger gazes he was getting from all sides. He sunk to the ground, curling up in a protective ball. Silverine looked at the largest of the three.

"I presume it's that one. But how do we get in?"

There was silence, and then everyone turned back to our captive. Silverine knelt down by him.

"How do we get in?"

"There's a trapdoor. Then a device that lowers a couple of hundred metres into the cave, and then, the, the caverns."

"So where's the door?"

"I don't know, I've never worked it, just walked." Draco walked up to the cliff, and hammered his fist against it. It seemed perfectly solid.

"Abigail." I suggested. Abigail paused.

"Right, everyone, get a long way back. I do mean a long way, get behind the tank." Draco realised, and sprinted to our position. Silverine picked up the wolven creature, and Abigail levelled the rifled barrel of the tank at the cliff face.

"No don't stand directly behind me, haven't you heard of recoil?" she snapped, and everyone went back ten paces. I changed into my bionic form, and ducked down in my seat.

"Fire away." I shouted.

There was a huge noise. My hearing was blocked out by a wave of noise, and I felt the entire tank shiver backwards, jerking me a bit. Smoke rose in slight wafts, and I could taste it in the air. Then I looked back up to see if it was safe.

Bloody hell. The wall had been exploded, literally. A large passage to a lift was fairly evident, but it was also fairly evident that this passage no longer existed. The explosive round had gouged out about fifteen cubic metres of rock and scattered it about around the entrance. At the end of the tunnel was a flat circular area, with a large stand on button in the centre.

"Right," said the wolven creature, "I guess you don't need me any more, I'll just hide somewhere, shall I?"

A group stare of very annoyed Centralites explained this was not the case. He slumped, and walked into the lift. The thing was quite large,about fifteen metres in diameter, so the tank rolled forwards. It drove onto the lift, and stopped in the centre above the button.