DI-MAN: EPISODE 6
KITTENS AND CAT-NAPPINGS
by Kyle Johnson
1:
"Okay, where is it?" I muttered to myself. Flying blind through the multiverse is not really a good thing to be doing. All there is, is the inside of a big blue sphere with an occasional speck of gold where a portal has been formed. In the center of the ball is a core of energy that looks like a cross between ball lightning and a pulsar. So what am I doing flying through the multiverse with no clue as to where I am going. Simple, I am looking for the first portal I went through so I can get a clue as to where I am going; okay, not so simple.
You see, I have sort of been drafted into this job of dimensional traveler; and from the first dimension I landed in, I got this neat little device called a Scouter. What is a Scouter you ask, well a Scouter is a combination Heads-Up-Display, power sensor, and navigation unit that fits on the side of your head over one ear. On my last trip out of the multiverse, I became embroiled in a battle with a powerful demon named Lu Yueh. Lu was so powerful, that he overloaded the Scouter, totally destroying it. So now I have to find the first portal to get my Scouter replaced, now if I can only remember which portal it was.
As I try to make up my mind between the five golden tears, I see the one I am looking for. It's a bit larger than the other four and it's sort of off by itself while the others are in a loose cluster together by themselves. As I channel my powers to maneuver towards the portal, the sudden tug of gravity around my ankle stops me. I look to see that I am slowly being pulled towards the core of the 'verse. That means a new portal, I won't be able to get a replacement for my Scouter…unless… I maneuver around until I am lined up with the portal behind me, then dive towards the blazing light of the core. As I pass around the heart of this nexus, I just hope I Know WHAT I AM DOING!!
Going through a new portal is louder than a sonic boom. As the ringing in my ears subsides, I can see that my idea didn't work. If it had, I would be flying over a meadow; not racing through thick clouds in the sky, and I am still flying blind. Suddenly I break through the clouds and see that I am heading at a downward angle at about mach three. I seriously need to slow down.
I concentrate and let my powers manifest as a huge shockwave. "BLAST FORCE!!" The sound of the shockwave echoes through the air as I feel myself slow down some, but not enough to regain control of my descent. I let my powers rise once more and channeled them ahead of me. "BLAST FORCE!!" I had slowed down, but still not enough for level flying. As I tried to gather my energies for one final burst, I suddenly found myself lacking in power. "Jeez, I can't be out of power already," I muttered quickly, "C'mon, just one more little surge of power." As my arms tingles with my last few ergs of energy, my sight became filled with deep blue as I found myself over a lake. If I couldn't slow myself down, then maybe I could just change course and land there. I rolled over in midair and channeled my powers once more. "BLAST FORCE!!"
Suddenly, my angle quickly changed as I tried to head for the lake. So far, my plan was working. As I went down, I rolled over and spread-eagled my arms and legs to try and slow down even further. Then I could see that I was indeed heading for the lake, in fact I was about fifty yards from it. It was then that I realized that as a choice for an emergency landing, in my case...
SPLOOSH!!
Lakes suck.
A good ways from the lake, two large forms moved silently through the forest. Paws and hand paws picked their way through the underbrush. Leading the way was a large felitaur with an ocelot's coat, and thick bronze colored hair on hir head tied back into a ponytail. Following hir was a smaller taur, shi had a calico coat and a mop of likewise colored hair. Shi wore a pair of saddlebags on a pack harness with various pieces of equipment hanging off of D-rings and carabiners. In hir hand shi held the end of a leash in her hand.
"This is getting heavy, Silence," said the calico, "How much longer before we get there?" Chakat Silence stopped for a moment. "Another hour maybe," shi replied, "We can stop here and rest for a while if you want to, Patch." But Patch had already flopped down bonelessly in a thick patch of cool shade.
"Much better," shi said.
Silence padded over to hir sister and gently lay down beside Patch. As they rested, Silence looked over at the leash that Patch held in her hand; it was slack and lying on the ground. "What do you suppose shi's doing?" Silence asked. Patch shook her head and tugged slightly on the lead. "Last I saw of hir, she was stalking something," Patch said. Suddenly there was a rustle in a patch of grass at the end of the leash. In a flash a chocolate colored blur zoomed out of the brush and took cover behind Patch and Silence. A moment later, the blur's pursuer stumbled out of the brush.
It was a small two-legged bundle of quills with a long neck and a beak. The emu chick then wobbled unsteadily towards the two full sized chakats, looking for what it was chasing. A moment later papa emu came looking for the little bird and gently herded the chick back towards the rest of the brood; all the while ignoring the two chakats just ahead of him.
"Ahh the power of projective empathy," said Patch; with a little concentration, shi and Silence projected a sense of ‘We mean you no harm,’ all the time the big bird was present. An emu might be harmless under normal circumstances, but the big birds could be dangerous when it came to protecting their young, just as any other mother (or father) would be. Silence giggled as the little hatchling stumbled back into the woods. "How cute," shi thought.
Patch turned hir torso around gave the end of the leash a tug. "You can come out now," shi said, "Your playmate has gone home." Slowly a chocolate colored head with a mop of red hair peeked over Patch's barrel. Then, still just as slowly, the little chakat cub creeped around Patch to see that the emu was indeed gone. Shi was a chocolate colored cub with a pattern of gray wisps up and down her coat. It was this pattern that gave hir name, Firewisp. But due to her penchant for mischief, hir sisters called hir Imp.
Silence picked Imp up and held her tightly. "What's the matter dearheart," shi asked the cub. Imp looked down and picked up the end of hir tail and held it close to her. Silence examined the cub's tail, and found that part of hir tailtip had been pulled out. Now Silence understood what had happened, the emu chick must have plucked at Imp's tail and startled hir. "It's alright dearheart, he didn't mean it." Silence said soothingly. Imp licked at hir tailtip none the less.
Just then, "Silence, did you hear thunder?"
Squish… Squish… Squish… Squish…
That's me, with water in my shoes, walking along the lakeshore. I am holding my satchel by the straps in one hand, and a fish the size of a pike in the other. I am cold, wet, and I would like to find a place to warm up. The only good thing I can say, is that for some reason, the air smells like cough drops. If my luck holds, it will keep me from catching a cold.
The smooth rocks of the lake shore make it easy going, but the stuff in my backpack and my satchel do get heavy after a while; especially the coin bags, they are filled with gold and silver marks. I shouldn't complain really, it could have been worse. I could have landed on the rocks instead of in the water. Maybe instead of walking, I should have built a fire to warm up. However, there wasn't any driftwood on the shoreline to build a fire with. There were trees beyond the lakeshore, maybe some of them had lost a few branches.
As I stepped into the trees, the cough-drop smell became thick to the point of stifling. I knew the smell from somewhere, but I just couldn't place it. As I searched along the ground for wood, I found that the forest floor was all but bare, all I could find was leaf litter, and not much at that. "Maybe it's all hung up in the trees." I lashed out with a foot and kicked the trunk of one of the trees. There was a rustle in the branches as a gray bundle fell from a limb. I dropped both the fish and the satchel and raced to catch what ever it was, and hoped that it wasn't a wasp's nest. I snatched the bundle out of freefall with only a few inches to spare. As I tucked the whatsit into my arms, I looked down to find that I had knocked a koala out of the tree.
It could only mean one thing; I was in Australia. I don't know how I got there, but I was definitely there. I mean where else could you knock a koala out of a tree? "How the heck did I get to Australia?" I asked the confused bear. The koala looked a little dazed from its trip to the ground. As I was about to put the little guy back on his tree, a gray head popped out of a pouch on the bear's tummy. It seemed that he was a she. I put mama bear back on the trunk of her tree, and watches as she quickly climbed back up to the branches.
I picked up my satchel and my fish, and walked on; the sun was beginning to set. As I walked further into the woods, I found myself once again at the lakeshore on the edge of a cove. The trees on the side of the cove shaded much of the sunlight from me. I couldn't see a lot of the bigger rocks on the shore. About halfway across the cove I tripped and fell over something. I was about to pitch it a county mile when I noticed it was a log. I had stumbled onto someone's pile of firewood. Looking around I couldn't see a tent or a shelter, just a circle of rocks that was used as a fireplace.
I thought, surely they wouldn't begrudge a lost wanderer a fire if they were here, and if they came back I could share the fish. I set a good-sized log in the ring of stones and concentrated. With my powers as low as they were, it took a lot more effort for me to use them than it normally did, but eventually my hand crackled slightly with energy. With a trip of a mental trigger, a bright yellow beam raced from my hand and set the log ablaze.
"Okay mister fish, it's time to get ready for dinner."
"Just how did I wind up carrying all the equipment?" asked Patch.
"Hey, it was your quarter," Silence replied, "Next time you won't be so quick to accept."
"At least take the Imp."
"Alright," said Silence as shi took Firewisp's lead. Patch stretched out hir shoulders and repositioned the canteens. "I can't believe it," said Patch "We hike for hours and not one stinking euro. Are you sure this is the right side of the lake."
"I'm sure," Silence replied, "The fisherman who called the university said that there was a colony of wallaroos around here. He said the west side of the reservoir, just beyond the northern most cove."
"Humph probably a GPS junkie," complained Patch, "Never read a map in his life. This would be a lot easier without the Imp along."
"Well, we couldn't leave her with Sandstorm," Silence replied, "What with hir legs as bad as they are." Sandstorm was Patch's and Firewisp's mother and Silence's father, and one of the forest's more experienced rangers. While scouting a new trail, the ground gave way beneath hir and shi slid down a fifty-foot hill. The experience broke both "wrists" of hir hand-paws so badly, that a bone-knitter wasn't able to help hir. So with both forelegs bound in casts up to hir ‘elbows’, Sandstorm now had to walk with a pair of crutches to keep hir weight off of hir wrists until the small bones knit. Shi was not light, though; Sandstorm was well over seven feet tall and weighed just a bit more than a Siberian Tiger. It made walking with hir crutches a severe task.
Soot, Sandstorm's mate was serving a term in the Star Corps as a scout when this happened. Shi had gotten an emergency leave when shi had heard about Sandstorm's accident.
"When does Soot get back from the Corps," Patch asked.
"Two more weeks," Silence replied.
"Maybe we can come back here and try this then." Patch griped.
"Then we'd only get the college credits," Silence explained, "We wouldn't get paid, and we need the money now."
"You're right," Patch replied, "Just wish we had someone to look after the Imp, then this would be easier." Firewisp suddenly bounded in front of Silence, stopped, and looked at her sister. "M'ow," shi mewed.
"Uh-oh," said Silence, "Hir tummy tank is empty." Shi undid the clasp on hir halter, and took the Imp up in hir arms. Firewisp glommed onto Silence's nipple and slurped noisily from hir sister's breast. "Do you have to do this now," Patch griped, "You could have waited until we were back at camp." Shi then stalked off towards the campsite.
"Patch!" Silence called out, but hir sister was gone. Patch was often moody for chakat, and a sore subject for hir were hir breasts. Patch was nineteen, exactly three years younger than Silence; but when shi was twelve, Patch developed a hormonal imbalance that prevented hir breasts from developing. Medically, there was nothing wrong with hir, however part of hir physical maturity had been stunted and with it, much of her emotional maturity. After their sister 'Wisp was born, Patch became even moodier, especially around the Imp's feeding times. Whenever Soot or 'Storm would feed the kitten, Patch would go outside to brood for hours, broadcasting enough misery for even a non-empath to feel. That or shi would roar hir frustrations to the four winds until shi felt better.
The Imp released the nipple and declared hirself done with a short burp. "Shi's right though," said Silence to the kitten, "We should have waited." 'Wisp mewed and hugged hir sister's arm. Silence then picked the kitten up and let the Imp ride on hir back. 'Wisp purred with delight.
2:
Earlier that same day:
Sheba dragged Chalk through the Market with lots of vigor. "Easy Sheba," begged the Chakat, "We have all day to look." Sheba Ninetales switched her tail around with excitement. "I know, I know," the foxtaur replied, "But there is so much to see." Indeed there was, especially for the booth sellers, who had never seen a Chakat dragged through the market by a Japanese foxtaur.
"Sheba, slow down," Chalk repeated, "You're going to cause an accident."
"I know," Sheba replied, "But she's only going to be here for the morning and she goes back to California this afternoon." Chalk decided not to fight her. The booths of the market place became a blur as Sheba flowed through the market's patrons, without knocking anybody over. Half a minute later, they found themselves in the center of the market, and in sight of Sheba's obsession.
Her booth was set between a Navajo selling silver jewelry and an Aborigine selling hand-made didgeridoos. Her rich red tail swished slowly like a flag in the wind. Her green eyes contained a look of both love and wisdom. Hands that were still quick and nimble danced across the table as she laid out replacements to the garments she had just sold. This was whom Sheba had been waiting to meet ever since her friend Malena had told her about the artist, Purteshka the leather maker.
As the Sheba walked up to the leather maker's booth, Chalk could see that the two of them were complete opposites. Sheba had just turned eighteen, while Purteshka was probably a grandmother. Purteshka was cool and collective, while Sheba was as nervous as a long tailed…okay, maybe Chalk should have come up with a better expression. Then there was the most obvious, Purteshka was red, with black socks and gloves and Sheba…Sheba was blue! Not gray to the point of being bluish, Sheba's fur was a rich undyed Royal Blue!
Sheba hadn't always been blue; when she was twelve, her class field trip took her to a Starfleet museum aboard the USS Vega, a decommissioned deep space explorer. The children were being transported three at a time due to the older model transporters being used on the ship. Sheba being the only taur of any kind in her class had to be transported last due to her mass requirements. When it was her turn to teleport up, there was a small power surge in the pattern buffer. Everyone was surprised when the foxtaur appeared; the color spectrum of Sheba's fur had been completely reversed. Poor Sheba had to miss the rest of the field trip as the doctors tried to determine if the incident had done anything more than change her fur coloration.
"I'm so excited," Sheba said as Chalk followed her to the booth. Chalk had a sense of impending disaster as the two foxes' eyes met; however, it was when Sheba said, "Malena told me all about you." that the chakat knew that they would hit it off almost immediately.
"…they wanted samples of my works, so I decided to take the opportunity as a working vacation." said Purteshka as she poured Sheba a third cup of tea. Sheba drizzled honey into her cup and then reached for a lemon wedge. "Malena has told me so much about you, that I just had to meet you," Sheba repeated for the third time. She was still very nervous at having so close a connection to her friend across the sea.
"I am still surprised that such things as Internet chat rooms and email pen-pals are still so popular these days," said Purteshka, "I had thought such things obsolete." Sheba shook her head in disagreement. "It's still quite a necessity these days," she explained, "From a starship, you can't have a direct communiqué whenever you want one, so new forms of email and voice mail are used by family's to keep in contact. My brother, Taro, is the Ex.O. on the Potomac, Mother would go Screaming Yellow Zonkers if he didn't send a letter every now and then."
"Excuse me for bringing it up," Purteshka said, "But you have such a lovely fur color, how did you come by it?"
"Transporter accident," Sheba said, she told the leather worker about her mishap aboard the Vega. "But when I got to high school all the girls loved it. It was like I was a walking fashion statement. A few of the paler colored girls tried dyeing their fur the same color; I didn't feel so alone any more. It was like there was more of me around. High school's where I met Chalk."
"Chalk?" asked Purteshka, "Oh, your chakat friend. I have two in my family, my granddaughter's lifemate, Stargrey and their child, Nikol. They are such wonderful people. Better company than some foxtaurs even." The artisan looked around for a moment. "Umm where is your friend anyway?"
Sheba looked across the marketplace and saw Chalk at a booth selling mirrors. "There he is," said Sheba, "He's found a mirror to look at, he'll be there for hours."
"He?" said Purteshka slightly confused; "I thought chakats preferred shi or hir."
"It's just that he's not ready to think of himself like that just yet," Sheba explained.
"Uhh," said Purteshka, "I think I had better hear this story out." Then she put on another pot of tea.
Alexander Chalke stared at his reflection in the mirror. From the whitish blonde hair to the tawny white fur on his chest, then to the tuft of white hair on his tail tip, he took stock of his body. Four paws, two hands, two hearts, but he still didn't feel right in this body. "Better to feel odd in a new body," he said to himself, "Than lying in a hospital bed with tubes coming out every which way." A year and a half ago, he thought that his life had ended; he had been diagnosed with Lupus.
Chalke had decided to live to his fullest before he had to be permanently interred in a hospital, he wanted to go where life was always celebrated, even after you were gone. So, with a trust fund left to him by a maiden aunt, Alex went into space to find somewhere like that. The world of Chakona was just such a place. That's where he met Soot.
Soot was a chakat on an extended tour of duty in the Star Corps. Shi had been saving up hir leave time to spend an extended vacation with hir mate and cubs. Alex had met hir in a twentieth century style bar in Amistad, though he almost missed the shadow colored 'taur standing next to him. In the dimmed light of the bar, shi was all but invisible. The two spent half the night toasting each other with real Irish coffee, then telling and then retelling stories of their adventures and families and such.
"I thought chakats weren't happy until they had a house big enough to hold every cat and kitten in their families and still have room for all the friends and lovers they had made over their life." Soot almost snorted coffee through hir nose when Alex said that. "It's true," Soot agreed between giggles, "You wouldn't believe the size of some chakat families, and they are not all purely chakats. These days there are many dens with a mix of human, morph, foxtaur, and even the occasional wolftaur mate." Shi took a slow sip of hir coffee. "You should have been born a Chakat," Soot said, with a giddy giggle, "You would fit in well at any den."
"So," replied Alex as his mood swung to a low point, "I would still have the same problem, just more people to care about it." What Soot said next sent Alex's mood into orbit. "Chakats don't get Lupus."
Alex stood speechless for a moment and then ran back to his hotel room, after excusing himself from his chakat companion. He had read something in a magazine about transporters and shifting species when he had first gotten to his room. As he opened the door, Alex found the magazine, a dog-eared copy of Scientific Chakat that had been left under a couch, and leafed through the pages until he found what he was looking for. There was an article on a new procedure using a transporter for species transmutation. The article read that they were looking for subjects for the clinical procedures.
The next morning, Alex keyed in the number for a Professor Oceanwalker. A tiger-striped chakat's face filled the comscreen as the call was answered. "Yes," shi said. Alex held up the magazine. "Please ma'am," he said, "I am calling about the ad in the magazine. It said that you needed subjects to test your new procedure." The next day, Alex was at the building, filling out forms and getting his pattern scanned. "Shi must be special for you to do this," Oceanwalker said.
"What?"
"Whomever it is you want for your lifemate," the professor clarified. Alex put the form down and laid his pencil on top of it. "Professor, I'm sorry if I gave you the wrong idea," he said, "As much as I wish this was a matter of love, it's not. If this procedure is successful, you will have saved me from a long and painful death sentence." Alex told the professor of his condition, and shi agreed to his choice. "If this doesn't work; is there anyone, anyone at all, that you want us to contact?" Alex typed in an address on her touchpad "That's my grandfather's address on earth," he said, "His name's Gerald Halifax." Oceanwalker made a note of the name. "Anyone else?" Oceanwalker asked. Alex thought for a moment before he answered. "There's a chakat named Soot on the Star Corps ship Ivan Vasselli," Alex said finally, "Tell hir thanks for giving me hope." Then he gave the command. "Energize."
The world dissolved into a shimmer of sparkling dust as Alex was deconstructed in the transporter-beam. For a moment, the currents of the matter stream swirled and twisted around him before he faded back into reality. As the sparkles disappeared, Alex stumbled forward as the dizziness washed over him. Fortunately his new hindquarters kept him from falling over forward.
Alex examined his hands closely; the fur that covered them was a tawny off white like the rest of his body. His new tail had a tuft of fur on the end and his hair looked disheveled and ruffled like the mane of a lion. "Wow, said the professor, "Looks like you'll be able to keep you own name."
Now he was Chalk, not Alexander Chalke, but simply Chalk, a name that went well with the white lioness's pattern that he had been transformed into. He was thankful the procedure had worked; though he still didn't feel like a real chakat. More like a man in cat's skin.
Chalk felt a tug at his shoulder. "Excuse me miss," someone said, "Could you help me with my package?" Chalk turned. He was a medium-sized unobtrusive looking man, in his forties, he had a workers tan and a face that had been worn away with time. Beside him was a flat package that was almost as tall as Chalk. "I chust need your help to get it to my van around the corner," the man said.
"Certainly," Chalk replied. He took the front end of the package, swiveled his hindquarters around to let the package rest on his back, and then swiveled his torso around straight so that he could walk normally. Slowly, Chalk led the way through a side alley that lead to another street. "Right," said the old man, "It's the blue Novan." Chalk turned. "I see it," he replied. It was another block before he reached the van. As he approached, Chalk saw the tailgate of the van open up. The old man must have a remote, he thought. As Chalk started to put the box in the van, he felt a touch at the base of his torso. His body went stiff, then limp as he fell unconscious from the sudden shock. As he dropped the box, Chalk heard the sound of glass breaking; the old man had bought one of the full-length mirrors to keep up the illusion. That was the last thing he thought of before he finally passed out.
"I had hoped to see some of Goldfur's clan before I left," Purteshka said with some regret, "But business got to be too good. And tomorrow my flight home leaves, early in the morning. I do hope my next trip is longer though."
"That would be great if you could," Sheba replied, "I could show you our den and everything. I know Chalk wouldn't mind you being there."
"A tempting offer," Purteshka said, "But we shall have to see what the fates will bring."
Sheba nodded as she set her teacup on its saucer. "I had better find Chalk before I get too caught up in our chat." Purteshka smiled and replied, "And I have packing to do. I hope I see you again, Sheba."
Sheba waved goodbye and started walking towards where she had seen Chalk standing before. As she walked over to the mirror booth, Sheba saw a blue Novan drive down the street, from between the booths. By the end of the day, Sheba had found no trace of Chalk. He had vanished.
3:
The aromatic scent of the fire filled my nose as the fish cooked on its spit. As I cleaned my knife up in the lake, I realized that I needed to find out exactly I was capable of in this dimension. I knew that I could start a fire with my powers, but what else, I needed to test my control. As I tucked the knife away in my pack, I stood straight up with my feet slightly apart, and concentrated.
One of the flat river stones by my foot slowly began to rise into the air. It slowly bobbed up and down like a glob of wax in a Lava Lamp. Then another stone slowly floated into the air. One by one the rocks began floating in the air until I had seven or eight palm-sized rocks just hovering in the air. Still concentrating, I centered on one of the flatter stones and gave it a little push out into the lake. The stone sailed out like a Frisbee, it skipped on the water six times before plunking in the lake. "Not bad," I said, "Now for speed."
I stopped concentrating and let the stones fall back to earth. As they dropped, I lashed out and tried to grab them before they hit the ground. "One…two…three, four…five…six, sev-ah nuts." The last stone had drifted beyond my reach, and I couldn't catch it in time. Still, six out of seven isn't bad, now what next? I spread my hands flat out and ‘pushed’ against the water. The lake receded in a spoon shaped depression. I used my powers to push the water back as far as I could. The result was a fifteen-foot circle in the lake and a foot away from the bottom. My abilities were looking better. Now for one last test.
I set my feet together and balled my right fist save for the first two fingers. I swiveled my elbow around until my fingers pointed up. Slowly, I felt my feet leave the ground. I put as much power as I could collect into lifting myself off the ground. I may not be able to fly, but I could give myself a lift if I needed to.
As I slowly settled back to the ground, I could smell my fish starting to burn. I dashed back over to the campfire, and pulled the spit out of the ground. I pulled a hunk out of the fish's middle and found that it was hot all the way through. I bit into the meat, it didn't taste that bad; though I didn't think at the time fish-flavored cough drops would catch on in any way.
It was a half-hour before Silence caught up with Patch at the foot of the rise. "Patch I'm sorry," shi said, "I wasn't thinking." Patch seemed to be ignoring her. It was then that Silence noticed that Patch's tail was twitching back and forth. Something was wrong and shi was alert to it.
Silence padded up to hir sister and put hir hand on Patch's shoulder. The calico jumped at the sensation, causing the gear hanging off her harness to rattle. "What's wrong, Patch?" Silence asked. Patch looked at hir sister oddly. "You can't smell it?" asked the calico. Silence stopped for a moment and smelled the air. The scent of smoke and eucalyptus drifted past hir nose, there was a fire, not a big one tough. Like someone had left a campfire burning.
"We didn't leave a fire burning did we?" asked Silence. Patch shook hir head and shrugged out of hir harness. Shi then opened one of the saddlebags and pulled out an extinguisher and what looked like an old paintball gun. Patch then handed the extinguisher to Silence and then loaded the gun with a tube of white spheres. Silence then sat down and let the Imp slide off of hir back. Shi then unclipped the leash from the harness and looped it around a tree before threading the end through the hand-loop and then clipping it back on the Imp's harness. With the cub secured, Silence went over and joined hir sister.
Slowly the sisters climbed over the rise. There was a human cooking a fish, at their campsite. He was kind of average looking with a rugged appearance, not really handsome but not bad looking either. He was dressed in jeans and a denim jacket over a T-shirt. Some how he'd caught a barramundi from the lake and now he was eating it with gusto, for half of the fish was gone.
"It seems that our campsite has been raided," Silence said. Patch rolled hir mismatched eyes. "Duh," shi whispered sarcastically, "I told you we should have left the tent up. Now where are we going to sleep?"
"There," Silence replied, "He may just be there temporarily. Maybe he'll let us join him. He might share some of that fish."
"He could be one of those Earth Firsters that we've been hearing about on the vid', too," Patch whispered, "This whole trip could have been a trap to catch a couple of chakat's off guard." Patch aimed hir gun at the fire. "What are you doing?" asked Silence. Patch's gun coughed and a moment later the fire went out. The calico chakat giggled at hir deed as shi ducked back below the rise.
"Real mature Patch," Silence said with disgust. Patch's gun fired Extinguitabs, paintball-sized spheres that contained two liquids that, when exposed to heat, produced a set volume of carbon dioxide gas. Designed to smother fires, the spheres could extinguish anything from a small campfire to a small wildfire, anywhere normal extinguishers would do little good.
I was surprised when my campfire went out. Just one moment it was blazing merrily away, and the next poof. As I stood up to light the fire again, I breathed in a lung-full of something that made my chest burn. There was a taste like baking soda in the air. I coughed heavily as the wind blew the smoke from the fire and the mysterious gas in my face. Stumbling away from the fire, I fell to my knees by the lake and splashed the cold water into my face.
Once I had my wits about me, I stood upwind of the firepit before I attempted to relight the fire. Then in the trees beyond the cove, I heard it. A deep rumbling sound drifted towards the lake. It sounded like the growl of a big cat, but there were no big cats in Australia. "Unless I've landed in a wild animal park."
"That's not funny patch," Silence chided, "Cut it out."
Firewisp pulled at hir leash as she tried to get loose. The sun had gone down and there were all these scuttlings and rustlings out on the ground that hir kittenish curiosity was just begging to find out what they were. Unfortunately, the leash was too strong. As she flopped down in disgust, she felt something fall on hir back. It wasn't heavy, but it did have a lot of legs, they sent tickles up hir spine as it crawled along.
'Wisp tried to reach around and catch the Huntsman that was crawling up hir back, but the spider eluded hir grasp. Instead hir tiny fingers found the metal clasp that held hir harness to hir lead and wrapped around it. Shi pulled and fidgeted with the bit of metal until finally it came loose from the harness.
As 'Wisp looked at the shiny bit of metal, shi felt the Huntsman bunching its legs up on top of hir head. As the spider settled down on hir head, Firewisp wandered off into the bush in search of all the mysterious scratches and scurries that hir little ears would pick up.
"That was great," Patch snickered into hir hand. Silence shook hir head and sighed. "Your being childish, Patch," shi whispered, "Soot would even go so far as to say you were being a brat."
"It's his fault, what with taking over our campsite," said Patch indignantly. Shi then bent down low and began to creep around the rise through the underbrush. "Now what are you doing?" asked Silence, but hir sister was gone. Silence's night vision found Patch creeping along the tree line. Shi was slinking around to the end of the cove.
Silence turned around to go and fetch the Imp. As shi began to walk away, Silence heard Patch bellow with a full signal roar. Silence then gave a start at the cyan flare that beamed over the rise. In a heartbeat, Silence let hir worst fears take over hir instincts. "Powergun!"
I wasn't sure what the growl I heard was. I remembered that Australia had bitterns, wading birds with loud deep voices, but this didn't sound like one of them. I needed to get a better look at my surroundings. I needed to be calm. I let my powers rise up once more and concentrated them into a bea-
"ROAR!!"
It was loud, like a lion's roar of challenge to the pride leader. The outburst of sound made me lose my control over the power beam though. As I raised my hands to defend myself, the beam was loosed into the base of the tree line. The impact scattered a few rocks and sent up a puff of smoke, but I didn't do any real dam-
"ROAR!!"
Another one, over the rise. That or the first one had found a way to outflank me. In an instant, something bounded over the rise and was on top of me before I could do anything. I found myself having the breath squeezed out of me by a powerful pair of arms. Suddenly I was helpless. Whatever it was that had me rumbled with a deep growl and didn't sound too friendly. I must have startled it with my power beam.
I was beginning to have trouble breathing; I needed to get the creature to let go before I passed out. I ran the list of my techniques through my mind, and mentally crossed out the ones that might hurt the creature. A Solar Flare might distract it long enough for me to slip through the creature's arms; but I needed my hands free to use it, so scratch that one too. Finally, I couldn't hold my breath any longer. In that instant I made a decision, and I hoped it was the right one. "TATAIODOKEN!!!"
Silence rushed over the rise with hir hackles raised. Shi didn't know if Patch had been hit by the blast or not, but shi would make sure that this human wouldn't get another shot. Silence launched hirself into the air and tackled the strange human. As shi held him down, Silence wrapped hir arms around him in a tight bear hug and tried to squeeze him into unconsciousness.
Silence's captive turned out to be stronger than shi thought. He tried to slip out of hir grasp so he could breathe, but the chakat wouldn't give. Instead shi squeezed harder and tried to force him to exhale. As shi flexed hir muscles, hir quarry's lungs gave out. However instead of a wheezing gasp, the man called out something. A strange word that sounded Japanese. Was he calling for help?
In a heartbeat, Silence's whole body went pins and needles as a strange numbing sensation traveled through hir body. Suddenly shi couldn't feel hir hands anymore.
The technique is called the Tataiodoken. What it does is boost your powers at some point when you are short on energy, or faced with a more powerful opponent than yourself. What I didn't expect to happen was that the power boost would affect the creature holding me. Its grip loosened and I was able to slip through its arms.
Quickly I turned around and pointed both of my fore and middle fingers at my forehead. "SOLAR FLARE!!" The blinding flash allowed me to see what it was that I was fighting. She was a beautiful creature that resembled a feline version of a centaur. Her pelt had an ocelot's pattern. I thought she was a female due to the prominent breasts that hung from her torso. In shape and form, this creature was magnificent.
As she shook her head to clear her vision, I dashed to get my pack. The affects of the flare would wear off in a minute or two, and I didn't want to be around when she could see again.
"ROAR!!"
Another one. The creature burst through the trees and charged towards me. I dropped the pack and broke into a sprint. As I ran along the shoreline, I could hear the creature following me. Its paws landing hard on the smooth stones. It may have been a mate to the first creature, but right now I didn't care. I just knew that I had to get away. As I ran, I felt something brush against my pant leg. I looked behind me just long enough to see the feline raise its hand and make a swipe at my feet. It was trying to make me stumble so it could overtake me.
I suddenly remembered that I hadn't used the energy from the Tataiodoken; it was still inside me just waiting to be used. I just reached through my mind, tapped into the energies, and let them flow through my body. My aura ignited in a blaze of power as the stones beneath my feet were scattered into the air behind me. I heard the footfalls of the creature following me trail behind me, but I was unprepared for what lay ahead.
The bandicoot showed no concern at being followed by the cub. Firewisp loved finding odd looking creatures shi had never seen before. Shi bunched hir legs up beneath hir and pounced, landing just behind the odd looking creature. Still the bandicoot showed no interest in the cub. 'Wisp leaned over and on all six paws, shi followed the little thing through the woods. The Huntsman still on hir head scuttled its legs in slight protest.
A moment later, the bandicoot waddled onto the shore of the lake and was heading for the water. As the mouse-like creature dipped its snout into the water, Firewisp suddenly found that shi was thirsty too. As the kitten began to lap up the water from the lake, hir ears perked up at the sound of hir sisters roaring. 'Wisp turned to see a strange ball of light heading hir way. The little kitten was suddenly more concerned for the bandicoot than shi was for hirself. 'Wisp picked the little creature up and tried to run back to the trees; but the light was on top of hir before shi got half way.
I saw it long before I could do anything about it. A shadow in my path, a rather sizable one too. It could have been a log or a rock; until I saw it move. It was an animal, about the size of a small deer. At the speed I was going, if I so much a bumped it, it would probably be killed or injured very badly; and running at this speed, I couldn't turn or stop on a dime.
In a second I was on top of the little beast, the next, I was diving under it and scooping it up in my arms. With the warm, furry bundle safely in hand, I scrambled to my feet and took off along the shore of the lake.
Patch skidded to a stop to avoid being hit in the head with a stone. Shi watched as the blazing flare of light sped around the lake before vanishing into the trees. As Patch turned around to go back to the campsite, shi heard Silence cry out.
Patch stopped short of the fire ring. As shi paused to catch hir breath, shi looked around to try and find Silence. "Over here," Silence called out from over the rise. Patch climbed over the rise; Silence stood by a tree, holding the end of Firewisp's leash. "Where's the Imp?"
"Shi's gone Patch," said Silence, trying not to cry, "I can't find hir anywhere."
4:
"I can't find him anywhere," Sheba told the officer, "We agreed to meet back at the hotel at four if we got separated." The officer, a female panther morph, wrote the foxtaur's report down on a touch screen with stylus. "You know we can't do anything until he's been missing for twenty-four hours," said the officer, "What species is Mister Chalk."
"Chalk calls himself a quasi-chakat," Sheba replied. When the officer gave Sheba a look that reflected "crank", she told the panther about the procedure Chalk went through, though she left out the why. Chalk's lupus was his business alone, and not that of some smug panther. "I'd heard about that," said the officer, "Hey, maybe I can help you after all." The panther keyed up her vidphone and touched in a three-digit number. The phone ‘breeped’ a couple of times before someone answered. "Guma," a voice answered.
"Hey Gum, it's Sari," the panther said, "I gotta girl here-"
"Good send her back, I'm lonely," Guma answered. Sari covered her eyes. "This is business, Joe," she said, "She may have some information about your case in Sidney; the missing chakats."
Guma's voice took on a colder tone. "Send her back," he said. Sari nodded and then reached under the desk to push a button. There was a loud buzz from a speaker as the door to the back offices swung open. "Just go right in," the officer said, "Guma's office is the one on the far back right. If he's in, you can't miss him."
Sheba walked through the door and into the large room that made up the back offices. It was strangely quiet except for the occasion ring of a vidphone or the rustle of old hard copy files. Behind the desks were security officers in neat crisp uniforms: taking reports, interviewing witnesses, or booking suspects. As Sheba walked down the path between the desks, she saw the office she was looking for; and the occupant couldn't be missed if he had a cloaking device.
He was a large man, plump but not portly. His hair was a greasy black color that matched his olive colored skin. He smelled like herbs and spice. Instead of a Starfleet security uniform, he wore an old fashioned three piece suit with a button down shirt. On a tall coat rack in the back corner hung an old-fashioned trenchcoat. On the desk, encased in lexan, was an old NYPD badge.
"Excuse me," Sheba said, "But are you who I was supposed to see." The officer gave Sheba the once over and then leaned back in his chair. "Look lady," he said, "I am in no mood for psychic predictions, tarot readings, or whatever cup of tea you use to get your insights. Just say your piece and leave, I'm very busy."
Sheba was aghast; here she was to report a missing person, and this jerk blows her off before she can get a word out. Suddenly Sheba was angry; she snatched the lexan-shrouded badge off of his desk and threw it at the officer. The clear square just missed the officer's head, and smashed the glass on a framed citation that was hanging on the wall. Sheba then set her forepaws on the desk and then grabbed the officer by the lapels of his shirt. "Listen you fat slob," she growled, seething with anger, "I came here because my friend has gone missing. The officer at the desk said that you might be able to help find him. Now can you help me or not?" Sheba let him drop back into his chair.
The officer sat up and straightened his tie. "I'm sorry," he said, "It's just that this case has brought all the kooks and weirdoes out of the woodwork today. That blue fur color doesn't exactly give you an air of credibility."
"If you want some credibility, you can talk to my brother," Sheba replied, "His name is Taro Ninetales, he's the executive officer on the Star Corp. vessel Potomac. If you want the Comm. address, it's…"
"Alright, alright," the officer interrupted, "Look lets start over; Fiorrelo G. Guma, detective first grade New York Police Department retired. My friends call me Joe."
"Sheba Ninetales," the blue foxtaur replied.
Chalk tried to wake up but it was like his brain was shrouded in cotton. As he tried to move he found that his feet were hobbled. His hands were free, but they were so heavy he couldn't lift them. Chalk relaxed and tried to concentrate of finding out all he could and how he could get out of here.
"Have you fed za beast yet, Holt." Chalk's ears perked up, it was the old man. "Shi hasn't woken up yet Mister Van der Lyne," came the reply, "I think the stunner was set too high."
"No matter," said Van der Lyne, "Just feed it when it comes around, it will fetch a fine price from our customers."
"Yes, Mister Van der Lyne," Holt replied. Then once more Chalk fell unconscious from the effects of the stunner.
"I wasn't aware that the NYPD was still in operation," said Sheba, "I thought all that fell onto Starfleet security." Guma shook his head. "Cities like New York and Chicago are still mostly urban sprawl," he said, "They still need their own private police force to take care of the crime problems."
"Sounds like a dangerous profession," said Sheba.
"My old man thought so," Guma replied "He took early retirement, and he groused at me for wanting to be what he was, a good cop."
"Wow."
"But enough about me," Guma said changing the subject, "Tell me about this friend of yours." Sheba sat down and made herself comfortable. "His name is Chalk," she started.
"HIS name?"
"It's a quirk he has," Sheba fibbed, "He's about six feet tall, and about twice that long. Chalk's coat is that of a white lion."
"Yeah that fits with my information," said Guma, "In fourteen weeks, Six chakats went missing. They were all from different backgrounds and they had nothing in common." Guma moved a few sheets of paper off of his desk and revealed a touch pad. The detective touched a section of the pad and a small hologram of a chakat appeared on his desk. Shi had blue-black hair and a jaguar's fur pattern. In between hir breasts hir spots formed a heart shape "Chakat Heartwood, disappeared April 3rd, 2332." Guma narrated, "Shi was walking home from hir job when shi vanished. Next…" The holo changed; now a panther coated chakat stood on the desk she was completely black save for a star-shaped blotch of white on hir cheek. "Chakat North Star, disappeared April 15th, shi was dancing in a nightclub with a bunch of friends when a man came up and asked hir to dance. That was the last they saw of hir." Sheba listened to Guma's reports on all the missing chakats. The next three reports did not affect her, the last one did. "Chakat Lilybit," Guma said. Sheba winced. "Kami no," she prayed silently, "Not a cub." But it was, a tiny thing not quite a year old. Shi had a margay's coat, and mismatched eyes. Sheba's heart went out to the cub.
"Abducted June 24th, 2332. Two weeks ago," Guma continued, "They shot hir mother in hir primary heart with a needler. They then stole the cub right there in broad daylight. The only thing Lilybit's mother remembers is that they were driving a blue van." Sheba's ears perked up. "Was it a blue Novan?" she asked. Guma tapped on the touchpad for a few seconds. "Yeah it was," the detective replied, "Why do you ask."
"When Chalk disappeared today, I saw a blue Novan driving down the street," Sheba explained, "It must have been them." Guma tapped on his touch screen. "I must be part Japanese lady, cause you just brought me a peck of good luck," he said. A cube of text appeared in place of the holo of the chakat cub. Suddenly several bands of light appeared on random spaces all around the block. "Yeah, the third disappearance, Chakat Willow. One of the neighbors reported seeing a Novan drive up to hir house that night. She couldn't tell the color because the street light was out." The cube rotated to the left. "Chakat Heartwood, the first one, a witness walking down the other side of the street said that she stopped to help someone who was having car trouble. A young man driving a blue Novan. This is getting interesting. I can't believe that no one thought to get the plate number."
"What do you want to bet they have a new set of plates for every time they do this?" Sheba asked.
"Half of my pension," Guma replied, "But what I want to know is why they want with those chakats. Cause what ever it is it has to be-"
A tiny howl began to echo through the offices as Sheba saw Sari the panther weaving through the desks with a furry spotted bundle in her arms. As she entered Guma's office, the bundle slipped out of Sari's hand and scrambled behind Sheba for protection. A pair of mismatched eyes peeking over the foxtaur's barrel, made Guma laugh with joy. "Well, well, well," said the detective, "Might your name be Lilybit? Where'd you find hir, Sari?"
"Some campers found hir walking beside the road on the edge of the outback," the morph replied, "They recognized hir from the flyers we posted. We just happened to be the first police station they saw, so they brought hir here." Lilybit m'owed loudly, shi was Hungry. "Ohh," Guma cooed, "Are you starvakitty, ohhhh. Sari, see if there are chakats that are off duty that can give this little girl something to eat." As Sari left, Lilybit zipped around and glommed onto Guma's arm for a security blanket.
"Campers," Guma said as he fuzzled under Lilybit's chin. Sheba swished hir tail with revolt. "Your right," Guma said, reading her body language, "We're gonna need a lot more than campers to help us before this is over."
5:
My leg hurt like hell. I woke up face down in the dirt with a tongue load of sand. Right now my body ached too much to do anything about it.
Something touched my head; it felt like a tiny soft hand. I looked up in time to be licked in the face by a little tongue. As I slumped back down into the sand, I found myself the receiver of a cat bath by the little creature I rescued last night. I rolled over to see where we were and saw the sun just peeking over the horizon. Now if I could only remember what happened.
Let's see, the last thing I remember was running along after that she cat attacked me and then…nothing. As I sat up and waited for the sun to get bright enough, the little beast crawled into my lap and tried to snuggle. "Well," I said, "You're a trusting little thing. How do you know that I am not just going to up and eat you the first chance I get." The little beast just hugged my neck and purred.
As the sun came up, I saw what had happened. About twenty-five yards from where I was lying was a rock about twice the size of a basketball and beyond that were the tracks I made during my escape. I must have missed it in the dark and tripped over it when I was trying to slow down. No wonder my leg hurt like hell.
As the day got brighter, I saw that we were no more that two miles from the edge of the forest. The way my leg felt, it might as well be two hundred miles. I moved the beast off of my lap and leaned over to pull up my pants leg. My shin was bloody, but other than that everything seemed to be intact. I shakily pulled myself to my feet and tried to put my weight on my injured leg.
The pain that raced through my mind was enough to make me collapse to the ground and send my stomach into spasm. I covered my mouth and hoped that I didn't blow my dinner from last night all over the sand. After my stomach settled down, I rolled over on my back and covered my eyes with my arm. Right now I didn't care much about anything else. I then: sat up, pulled my jacket off, and covered head and shoulders with it. Maybe with the sun out of my eyes, I could get a little sleep...
"YEAOW," I shrieked. I suddenly sat up and saw the beast hunker down as though it was trying to hide from me. As I laid back down and wondered what had caused that jolt of pain; the beast slowly slinked up to my leg, stuck out its tongue, and- "YEEEEAOW!" Before it could bolt away, I managed to grab it by the tail and then grab the leather straps that were around its shoulders. I turned it around and waggled a finger under its nose. "No," I said firmly.
I realize that I shouldn't have scolded it. It saw that I was hurt and it was trying to help me. As I turned loose of the straps, I wrapped an arm around where its torso met its lower half. I stroked its tummy and tried to soothe the little beast. "What are you?" I asked the wide-eyed cub, if indeed that's what it was. It stared at me with a pair of the greenest eyes I had ever seen. It's coat was a chocolate color with tufts of gray appearing here and there, and it's head had a shock of fiery red hair that went down to its shoulders. As I examined it further, I thought about the harness that was the beast's shoulders. Was the little beast a pet, and if so who did it belong to.
Silence carefully followed the Imp's tracks through the woods. There was the scent of a bandicoot as well as hir sister's on the trail. Firewisp must have gotten loose when shi heard the bandicoot nearby and went to chase it. Silence followed the tracks until she came to the edge of the bank. Patch was waiting for hir there.
"God, Silence," the calico said, "He came by here all right. If Firewisp was here, he might have hurt hir or killed hir." Silence shook hir head. "Then there would be blood or a body," Silence said, "No, he took hir for some reason."
"For a hostage most likely," Patch said, "He shot at me with a Powergun, it that's not dangerous, I don't know what is."
"Where is it then?"
"Where's what?"
"The Powergun," said Silence, "I didn't see it back at the camp."
"He took it with him," answered Patch. Silence shook hir head. "Have you even held a Powergun?" Shi asked, "I have and they are not light. The battery-pack alone weighs two pounds. And if he outran you and had the Imp in his arms, he would have had to drop his weapon. I don't know what it was he was using, but it wasn't a Powergun."
"I wish Sandstorm were here," said Patch, "Shi could find them both before tea time."
"You know one of us is going to have to tell hir don't you," said Silence. Patch winced and reached into her belt pocket. "Call it," shi said flipping the coin into the air
"Holt you idiot!"
Chalk's ears perked up at the commotion; the old man, Van der Lyne, was upset. "How could you let hir get away?"
"I'm sorry Mister Van der Lyne," Holt replied, "I had to take hir out of hir cage to feed hir. I didn't know the hatch was open or I would have been more careful."
"Idiot, zat margay pelt would have brought us a fortune from our buyer," the Boer fumed, "And now our entire operation could be in jeopardy because of your bungling. I have just learned from the newscasts zat ze police have recovered our little lost lamb."
"So who's shi gonna tell?" Holt replied, "Shi's only a kitten."
"Holt, if you continue to think like that, I vill have to find myself a new assistant." Chalk played possum as the voices approached. "Za police have telepaths, they can scan the beast's mind for clues to our operation. Vhy are you bleeding?"
"Ahh damn it," said Holt, as he came into the room. Chalk saw the henchman roll back his sleeve to reveal a blood soaked bandage that was wrapped around his wrist. "So zat's how shi got away from you," said Van der Lyne. Holt opened a drawer near Chalk's cage. "Yeah, shi may have been small," said Holt as he took a medkit from the drawer, "But hir claws were sharp."
"You are lucky I still have need of you at zis moment," sneered Van der Lyne, "Bind up your vounds before you make a mess. I will find us a new location for us to set up."
Holt took a roll of gauze from the medkit and set it on the table. As he set the other things from the kit onto the table, he turned his back on Chalk's cage when he set about to repairing his bandages.
Slowly, the chakat measured the distance mentally, from the bars of the cage to the henchman. "Perfect," thought Chalk as he got to his feet, "He's just within my reach. Maybe he has the key to my cage, and if he doesn't, maybe I can get Van der Lyne to bring it to me." Slowly, he approached the bars and with the speed of a rattler shot his hand through the bars.
Half a heartbeat later the cage came alive with arcing electricity. Chalk's fur was singed as he was thrown against the back of the cage with a clatter. The chakat shook his head as he tried to get back up.
"Ha," Holt guffawed, "I knew you weren't asleep. Your kind has tried that before, so I fitted that cage with the zapper off of a Proximity Gate. It's been toned down a bit so you don't get hurt, badly."
A Proximity Gate, Chalk had seen one in a museum. It was a twelve-foot high duridium fence used in the days before forcefields were invented. They were designed to keep wild animals away from the colonies. If any animals got too close to the gate, a proximity sensor would activate a battery-powered tesla coil that would charge that section of the gate and either stun or kill the intruder. "Yeah, and I got the sensor rigged real neat, too," Holt babbled, "It's a one way deal, so it only keeps you from sticking your hands out." Holt stuck his hand in between the bars, and waggled his fingers in Chalk's face. "Nya, nya, nya, nya, nya."
Chalk reached out and touched one of the bars with his finger. The cage door crackled to life and sent Holt flying over the table. "Van der Lyne was only half-right," Chalk thought to himself, as he stuck his finger into his mouth, "The man is a complete idiot."
When I woke up next, my leg didn't hurt so much. My watch said that it was ten in the morning, and the position of my shadow agreed with it. The beast was leaning against my side, purring contentedly. As I stirred, the cub yawned and then stretched its back as it got to its feet. "Pur'row?" the cub mewed. It climbed up and rubbed against my chin. "What's the matter?" I asked. A slight growl rumbled from the cub's belly. "Oh," I said, "You're hungry. Well, I am afraid that you're out of luck. When your friends were chasing me, I had to leave my pack and other things back at my fire. You probably could have eaten some of my jerky if I had some."
The cub yawned, and I put a finger across its gaping mouth, ruining the moment. As the beast clomped down on my finger, I noticed just how sharp the cub's teeth were. "Milk teeth," I said, "You are a baby aren't you." If this creature still required milk for its nutrition, then we were in worse trouble than I thought. Meat I could probably get even with my bad leg, but milk would require a cow or a goat or something. Right now I had to work on how I was going to get mobile, I couldn't even walk much less fly in this dimension. How was I going to move about.
The beast snuck up on me and hugged me around my neck from behind. I didn't really know why it was being so sweet to me, after all I had put it through. "I have to find us a way out of here," I told the beast, "If I had four legs like you, this shin wouldn't be a prob…lem." I banged my head duh, and then checked the watch on my wrist. I lifted the watch face up on its hinge to reveal a small panel with a set of buttons underneath. In the shade of the watchface cover, the battery indicator light glowed green; that meant that the batteries were fully charged. "Here kitty," I said patting my lap. The kitten bounced around in front of me until I held it still for a moment. "Okay Kitty," I said, "Now just hold still for a moment." I pointed the face of the panel at the cub and touched a button on the side of the watchdial.
A beam of green light streamed over the kitten from right to left. It was followed by a similar red beam going in the opposite direction. The watch beeped a minute later as the process finished. "Okay kitty," I said "Just one more thing and we can get on our way." I tapped on the big orange key in the center of the panel.
A sensation like being dipped in warm honey flowed through my body. As the device implanted in my watch did it's work resculpting my form, I thought about how much less traumatic my use of the device, called a Transband, was this time. The first time I used it my whole body went into spasm, sort of a cross between constipation and a Grand Mal seizure. Now it felt almost natural, like it was supposed to be this way. I hoped that all my future transformations go this smooth.
As the sensations subsided, I opened my eyes to see what I looked like, and I liked what I looked like. The fur was a lot different than the Moonbeast's; his was coarse, this was soft, like a rabbit's. The color was sort of a black on silver-gray pattern that reminded me of a storm cloud. My hind legs and tail were bound up in my pants and underwear, so I turned around to try and slip them off. As I did, I noted how far I could turn around. With a little difficulty, I managed to get my pants off and folded them and my socks and shoes into a neat little bundle that I tucked under my arm. As an afterthought, I checked on my damaged leg; the transformation had healed the cut, but the bone was still sore. I couldn't put all my weight on it. Fortunately, most of my weight was on my new forepaws. I took a few steps to see if I could walk like this. I was a little shaky, but I could manage. Besides, if I needed it, I could get a little more help from the Transband if I wanted it.
I turned around to find the kitten staring at me oddly. I padded over and ruffled the beast's hair. As I touched its head, I picked up an odd sensation in my mind. It was like a hazy picture of a deep purple swirl in the back of my mind. It was weird. When I took my hand away the picture vanished. Then I noticed something, the beast now came up to my chest. I had shrunk. From what I could tell, I was usually about six feet tall, now I was about half that. As I thought about it, I realized that my mass must have been a factor in the transformation.
"Meow?" the cub looked at me confusedly.
"It's me," I said, "I just had to grow an extra pair of legs before I could go anywhere." She reached out and touched my flank. "It's me," I repeated, "Come on, let's see about finding some milk for your tummy." She "m'owed," loudly and was hot on my heels in a heartbeat.
6:
'Wisp was confused; first there was the strange human, and now there was a strange chakat who came out of nowhere. All this was making hir head hurt, and hir tummy was still empty.
"It's me," said the strange chakat, "I just had to grow an extra pair of legs before I could go anywhere." But 'Wisp still wasn't sure. Shi reached out to stroke the fur on the chakat's leg. The new chakat giggled. "It's me," shi repeated, "Come on, let's see about finding some milk for your tummy."
Milk! 'Wisp knew what that was; that was what made tummies full. Shi raced over to the chakat's side and started following hir. Shi didn't care who this stranger was now, 'Wisp just knew shi would find a way to fill the little chakat's tummy.
Patch swished hir tail back and forth as shi searched for the trail of 'Wisp's abductor. She couldn't smell anything except for a faint smell of ozone, from where that came from she didn't know. Patch skirted the shore of the lake where the strange light had gone. It made hir wonder if hir sister's kidnapper was even human. "Maybe I should have gone with Silence," Shi thought. Patch pulled the Imp's leash out from hir saddlebags, shi hoped to find a small comfort in the red length of leather. Patch then closed hir eyes and thought of hir little sister.
Confusion.
"What?" Was there someone there? No, no one shi could hear, or smell for that matter. There was nothing around other than a few animals. Well then what had she picked up with hir senses? Patch's thoughts returned to hir missing sister once more.
Yummy!
Patch's eyes shot open. "Yummy?" This was weird. It was like she was picking up the feelings of someone outside of hir range of focus. What the heck was going on? "I think of the Imp, and I pick up odd feelings and emotions," shi thought to hirself, "Hmmm." The Imp had some how gotten loose from the lead, but shi was still wearing the harness. The leash had been Patch's before the Imp started wearing it. "It can't be that could it?" she asked hirself. Patch concentrated on Firewisp intently.
Friend!
Yes, she could pick up the Imp's emotions through hir empathic connection with the leash. Now maybe shi could use this to find hir sister. Patch then wrapped the leash around hir wrist and started running along the lakeshore. "I'm coming, baby sister," shi said to hirself.
Sandstorm stirred hir broth on the oven. As the soup came to a boil, she opened the fridge with hir tail and grabbed hold of a couple of cans of biscuits. As she set the cans on the counter, shi laid down so as not to put any weight on hir forelegs. Sandstorm then put hir crutches aside and set about opening the cans. Shi pulled on the paper corner at the top of one of the cans. The cardboard tube popped open with a bang, like it was supposed to. Sandstorm unrolled the biscuits, placed them on a sheet of wax paper, and cut them into quarters before tossing them into the pot of broth.
Sandstorm loved cooking; she loved taking cookbooks from the library and adding hir own blends of spices to the recipes. Tonight, it was chicken and dumplings; Sandstorm scooted on hir belly, over to the cabinet and reached up to open the door. On the back of the cabinet was a three tiered spice rack. "Now then," shi said, "Where did I put the oregano? There it is." It was in the middle of the top tier.
Sandstorm reached up to get the oregano, only to find that it was out of reach by a few inches. She stretched hir arm out and tried to grab hold of the bottle between hir fingers. No good. Shi then put hir weight on hir hands and then pushed down on the counter top. The chakat lifted hirself up a few extra inches. Sandstorm then reached up with one hand and grabbed hold of the bottle. Suddenly hir supporting hand slipped and Sandstorm came rushing down to bang hir elbow on the counter top. Shi roared at the pins and needles that ran from hir funny bone.
"Chi chi chi." The noise had startled Rosey, Sandstorm's Galah Cockatoo. "Chichichi chichichichichichichichichichichichichichichi!!!" the pink bird chattered from the next room. Sandstorm set the bottle down and turned off the stove. "Rosey, I'm sorry," shi apologized to the fluttering bird, as shi grabbed hir crutches off of the floor. Sandstorm knew how high strung the bird was and didn't want her flying against hir cage.
As the bird calmed down, Sandstorm heard a key access the front door's maglock; the girls were home. "'Storm?" It was Silence. "I'm in here Silence," the elder chakat called out. 'Storm's daughter padded softly into the dining room. "I thought you three would be gone for another day or two," said Sandstorm. Shi turned and found that only hir eldest daughter was in the house. "Silence," shi said, "Where are your sisters?"
"Who would do this," Storm growled, "Who would steal a cub so young?" Silence put a hand on hir father's shoulder. "I don't think it was this guy's intentions to take Firewisp in the first place," Silence explained, "I think he took hir to keep hir from getting hurt. This human outran Patch, and I think he could have really hurt me if he wanted to; when I had him in my grasp, he did something to me that made my whole body go numb. He had me where he could have killed me, but he didn't."
"Then why did he take my baby," asked Sandstorm.
"When we were looking for hir, Patch and I found that the Imp wandered into our mystery man's path," Silence continued, "From what shi has told me, he was going at least twice as fast as shi was. If he hadn't taken hir, Firewisp could have been hurt or even worse. He could have kicked hir out of the way or stepped on hir back and 'Wisp would have been hurt beyond repair. So at least shi should be all right with him. And anyway Patch is following them, shi's as good a tracker she you are, so they should be found soon."
"You haven't seen the news lately," replied Sandstorm, "There has been a rash of chakat abductions. They are stealing us right off of the street, even our cubs."
"But that's in Sidney," said Silence, "Isn't it?"
"Vhat vas that commotion I heard a moment ago?" Van der Lyne asked. Holt sat done in his passenger seat and buckled his safety belt. "The sensor on the cage malfunctioned," said Holt, "I got to close and got zapped." Van der Lyne chortled into his hand. He had seen the animal get the better of Holt on his security monitor. The Boer then keyed in the ignition sequence to start up the ship's engines.
With a roar, six powerful VTOL engines were brought to life lifting the immense ship into the air. Van der Lyne had been ecstatic when he had found his ship. It was Kenjen C-46 Starhauler, a heavy built cargo ship designed by a Kenyan engineering firm in the last half of the twenty-second century; the company was trying to get in on the budding Low Orbit Cargo Hauler market with these easily modified ships. The Starhauler was so easy to modify that it found favor with the smugglers and cargo pirates of the time; the Kenjen Company went out of business due to the bad press alone.
The ship was two-thirds the size of a class two Quange hauler, yet was simple enough for a one or two man crew to operate. Inside was a cargo bay that was as wide as a semi-trailer was long. Van der Lyne had divided it into three rooms: the workroom, the garage for the van, and the mess. The whole ship was streamlined, it looked like a twenty-first century sports car the size of a tractor-trailer. But what had endeared it to Van der Lyne's heart were her engines.
The Starhauler was equipped with Royce Vectorburn hydrogen powered super-turbine engines. The Royce was one of the last pre-warp engines ever made, its air intakes could draw in all the hydrogen it needed to run from the air alone; therefore Van der Lyne's mobile base camp never needed a refueling station. However if the Boer needed to make an escape into space, the ship fuel system had been modified with full tanks of LOX and Liquid hydrogen for prolonged space travel. If they had to, they could make it to one of the hole in the wall strongholds inside the asteroid belt; but for now, all Van der Lyne needed was a brief retreat.
"Where are we going, Mister Van der Lyne?" asked Holt. Van der Lyne keyed in the coordinates on a small keypad. "Our buyer for the margay has a parcel of land in ze south- eastern desert, he agreed to let us use it if we retrieved ze item for him at a discount," the Boer said, "It's a few miles west of za forests of Victoria. We shall be there by sundown." Van der Lyne raised the throttle on the engine; he wasn't worried about the noise. Only a few old time haulers would recognize the sound of the Royce, to anyone else, it would be mistaken for thunder; and if they happened to be picked up on sensors, the ship's streamlined hull and exhaust would cause them to only be registered as a weather disturbance. They would merely be considered beneath notice.
We had walked all day until the sun went down. The beast followed me all the way; occasionally the kitten would pounce on my tail. I didn't mind, it let me know that he was still there. Despite being in the desert, it wasn't very hot; maybe it was winter here; that would explain it. At least the weather was pleasant.
When we approached the edge of the forest, I couldn't find the path I had used to escape the cat-taurs. So we turned north and headed along the edge of the forest until I could find an easy way in. Three hours later, we came to a small river, it must have either fed into the lake or somewhere near it. Right now I didn't care, right now I was thirsty. I leaned down on my hands and stuck my tongue in the water. It was easy, I just lapped it up like a cat. I looked over at the cub as it was drinking. It was doing it the same way I was, so I must have been doing something right.
Something was wrong. That odd sensation kicked in again. The "color" was different, a dull red that rippled like waves on water. This was still so new to me I wasn't sure how to read into it. Suddenly my now keen eyes picked something up in the water, a long sinuous shadow drifting along the bottom. As I leaned over to drink once more, the color picked up in intensity, brighter, more vibrant. The shadow stopped just short of where the kitten was drinking. The intensity came up, red again, but what was red. Love, and hate ironically, rage…
Suddenly the brightness of the red came to its fullest intensity.
…Lust, blood, blood lust...
Crocodile! There was a splash and flash of white. I lashed out, grabbed the kitten by the hair, and pulled it away from the jaws that closed with a resounding snap. The croc's head then snapped to the left and caught the tail of my T-shirt in its mouth. The reptile rolled over and over in the mud, the croc then lashed its head from side to side until it had torn my shirt asunder. The crocodile half-lumbered up the bank and snapping at the kitten's feet. Fortunately the cub had enough sense to back away from the snapper.
There was no time for tact. Summoning what power I had left into my cupped hands; I leaped over the back of the crocodile and brought the blazing sphere down on the croc's back. "BALL LIGHTNING BLAST!!!" The energy crackled along the crocodile's wet skin; it thrashed back and forth as the energy from the attack racked its body with spasm.
As the last of the energy dissipated, I finally got a good look at our attacker. I suddenly realized that he wasn't much of a threat. At the most, he was only seven feet long, and for a crocodile, he sure was scrawny. Maybe half of what he was supposed to weigh. There must not be much that comes to drink at this part of the river. I put my ear to its body and listened; it was still breathing and its heart was still strong. With a bit of effort, I managed to drag it back into the river. As the water came up to it's forelegs, I let go and went back to the kitten. It dashed out of a clump of brush and hugged me around where my torso met my lower half.
"It's alright little one," I said soothingly, "Are you okay?" I looked the cub over from head to tail, it appeared to be unhurt. Me on the other hand, I was feeling the beating the crocodile's death roll and the twisting of my shirt inflicted on me. I reached up to rub some of the stiffness out of my shoulder and felt something brush against my forearm.
"Hello," I said looking down.
7:
Breasts… I had breasts… I'm not sure how this happened, but I had grown a pair of breasts. They weren't that large I grant you, just under a C cup maybe, but there they were. I had to sit down.
"Okay Johnson, don't panic," I said to myself, "I'm sure there's a logical explanation for this." As I thought the problem over in my head, my eyes drifted over to the kitten. A sudden spark of intuition went through my head. "And the only logical conclusion I can come up with is, you're a girl." I reached over and fuzzled the kitten up and down its- no her- back and under her tummy. "Yeah, you're a girl kitty," I said as the cub rolled over to be scratched. She then rolled over and pounced on my tail.
The Transband must have read the kitten's DNA as female and restructured me as one too. Now I had a bustline and a slender form with curves and female plumbing. Great, now how do I take a leak?
Sheba tapped on Guma's touch screen. She was hoping to find some connection between Chalk and the other missing chakats. She went over the bios, the medical files, the finance reports, even their horoscopes, but there was nothing that obvious that connected the six missing chakats. Sheba ruffled her hair and tried to shake the cobwebs out of her head. She got up from the desk and went to get herself a cup of coffee.
Guma was in the outer offices, keeping an eye on Lilybit. He was rolling a ball of string across the floor and shi was pouncing on it; and getting tangled in the loose string. Sheba walked across the office to the break room and poured herself a cup of coffee from the pot perking on the counter. After stirring in the cream and sugar, Sheba brought the cup to her muzzle "YIPE!" Sheba turned, Lilybit had followed her into the breakroom and was now chewing on her bushy blue tail. "Hey! That hurts you know," the foxtaur exclaimed. The little chakat shied under the breakroom table. "With a little work though, you could be a real margay," Sheba chuckled.
As the blue foxtaur sipped her coffee, an odd thought crossed her mind. She could be a margay, from the waist down anyway. The more she thought about it the more sense it made, and suddenly a sickening needle of horror went through the fabric of her thoughts. Sheba threw her cup in the trash, scooped the little cub into her arms, and ran back into Guma's office. Rummaging through the detective's desk drawers, she found an dimensional scanner.
The scanner was a little box that consisted of a laser scanner and a digital measuring system. Sheba was scanning Lilybit's size and weight into the box when Guma came in the door. "You got something," he asked.
"Just a thought, Joe," Sheba replied, "Just a real sickening thought. Umm how do you input the readings from this thing into your computer?" Guma touched a button on the side of the touch screen, causing a gap to open in the side. Inside the gap was a section of holes that looked like a cross between a computer outlet and the cartridge slot on an Atari 2600. Guma took the scanner from Sheba and slotted the device inside the touch screen. "Okay," said Guma, "Now what?"
Sheba told Guma to call up the holo image of Lilybit from before complete with all her vital stats. "Okay," said the blue foxtaur, "Is this holo fully interactive?"
"Not quite," Guma replied, "You need a stylus to affect the image." The detective rummaged in his desk and came up with a silver stick the size of a thin pen. "Thank you," said Sheba as she took the device, "Now can you change the image from a holo to a two-dee front and side?" Guma tapped on the screen a few more times; what now appeared on the screen looked like a full-body, color mugshot of the little chakat. "That's perfect," Sheba said.
Sheba took the stylus and then drew a line across the front image where Lilybit's torso met her taurso. Next she drew a similar line across where the cub's head and neck met hir shoulders. After Sheba repeated the process on the side image, she erased all the data between the two lines, leaving a head floating over a disembodied torso. A quick cut and paste later and Sheba had the image she wanted. It was a crude frankenstein-ish picture of a feline with a head full of long spotted hair. "Okay Guma, now give me the dimensions on this holo.
"Okay," said Guma "From nose to tail, it's about a hundred and three centimeters long. It's mass, if a hologram had any, it about 17 kilos."
"Okay," said Sheba as she took the screen from him. The foxtaur then activated the screen's modem and then punched up an address after the screen finished dialing. A moment later, a second holo image appeared next to the first, and then slid over to super-impose itself over the first. "You want to let me in on the bit," said Guma. "The first one is the modified image I made of Lilybit," Sheba explained, "The second one is a picture a called up from the Encyclopedia Britannica. It's of a rare animal called a margay. One of the reasons it's so rare is because it's hunted for its fur." She then called up the missing chakat's images. "Look at them, Guma," she said, "It's the one thing they all have in common. Their fur patterns, they are all patterned like wild cats; tiger, jaguar, Black Panther… These aren't radicals, they're just bloody fur poachers who've found a new source for their product." Sheba's knees went jelly as a thought went through her head. "My god, what are they going to do to Chalk?"
Chalk relaxed and let his senses tell him all they could. The chakat had to learn all he could without Van der Lyne finding out what he was up to. Chalk's whiskers tingled as they detected the edge of the sensor field. He slowly leaned his body to the left along the edge of the field trying not to trip the electronic trigger. Suddenly the tingle was gone.
The field ended at the edge of the door. Chalk slowly leaned back the other way until he came to the other edge of the door. Like before, the tingle stopped at the edge; that meant that the field only covered the door. The sides of the cage should be safe to work with. Chalk carefully slipped his hand between the bars of the cage. The charge didn't ignite. The chakat gave a sigh of relief as he pulled his hand back into the cage. "Okay," thought Chalk, "Now what?"
The near white panic of fear racing through her mind caused Patch to go down on one knee. She had never been so scared in her life. The terror was so great, shi had to rip the lead off of her arm. Then shi dashed back into the forest and hid there until the sensations faded.
When shi could found she could breathe again, Patch slinked out of the trees to find the leash again. "Please be alright," shi prayed silently as shi concentrated on hir little sister. The feelings of fear were still there, but they were fading slowly.
Worry…
Someone else was there, with the imp. Patch was sure of it, it was their emotions shi was picking up, Wisp's and who ever took her.
Safe, relief…
Yes, it had to be him, these emotions were to complex for a kitten her age to be feeling. "At least he's taking care of her," Patch thought to hirself, "But just who is this guy and what is he doing here?"
8:
Thunder…
I hate loud noises. That's why I always wake up when I hear thunder. Now I won't be able to get back to sleep until it quiets down. I leaned up from the rock I was snoozing on and rubbed the sleep out of my eyes. The beast was still slumped against my barrel and purring her little heart out. Since I had the time, I decided to give my new body the once over.
My night vision was excellent. Everything was so crisp and clear, I could even make out fine details in the rock I was leaning on. My new hands were slim and dexterous looking; where the should have been fingernails, were a set of feline retractable claws. Except for those and the fur, the looked like perfectly human hands. The forelegs were another matter
The feet there had finger like toes that I could flex and grab hold of anything within reason. And the were strong too; I grabbed onto I latched onto the end of a stick with one of my hand-like paws and tried to pull it loose with both of my humanoid hands. The stick snapped in half right in the middle. Wherever these creatures were from, the were certainly well evolved.
As the thunder rolled, the beast woke up and rolled to her feet hungry. "Oh no," I said, "There's nothing in these that you want." She didn't care, she just wanted to suckle. The beast then pounced at me and latched onto a nipple. "Okay fine, don't listen to me ," I continued, "Just don't complain whe…" My eyes widened; there was a slight trickle of fluid seeping through the nipple and into the kitten's mouth… I was lactating.
As the beast continued to drink, I sat there stunned. It was either that or seriously freak out; I definitely didn't want to do that. So I just sat there. In a sense I sort of felt like a surprised victim in a vampire movie, with a strange creature draining the life force out of me. The thunder didn't help the feeling any either. Sure was a long roll of thunder though.
As I settled down from the beast sucking my bodily fluids out of me, something happened. It looked like the reflection of sunlight that you see in the mouth of a cave; only this was on the ground. I looked up to see a ribbon of light shimmering across the sky. An aurora, I had never seen one before. It was beautiful, its colors shimmered across the sky shifting from pearl pink to a peacock blue just hanging there in the clear bright sky.
Wait a minute…
The Clear Bright Sky?
Looking around I confirmed my thought, there was enough light from the aurora for me to see that there wasn't a cloud for miles. So where was the thunder coming from?
The cub released my nipple; so I took that as an opportunity to stand up. I found how handy it was to have directional hearing. I could rotate my ears around to pick up on which direction the thunder was coming from. I switched my ears about and found where the sound was coming from. The cub was after me for more milk, so I figured I would be able to keep her with me. Headed towards the sound and sure enough the cub started following me.
It looked like I was heading south, but I wasn't sure. I tilted my head and the sound grew louder. Looking up I could see a small speck soaring across the light of the aurora. A plane; no a spaceship. This must be some kind of future timeline or something. That's it, I have officially become Dr. Who.
As I watched the ship, I could see it begin to make a descent, it was going to land, and if it landed somewhere near here, then maybe I could find a ride to civilization. Then maybe I could get my stuff back and get a certain little girl back where she belongs.
Van der Lyne carefully set the Starhauler down on the hard packed earth. As the landing gear settled under the ship's weight, Van der Lyne shut down the engines. "Have we been detected, Holt?" he asked.
"No, Mister Van der Lyne," Holt replied, "Save for the weather satellites, we haven't been noticed."
"Good," the Boer replied, "Zen I will get down to the business at hand. Have you got our net broadcast connection operational yet?"
"That will take another fifteen minutes," Holt replied, "due to interference from the aurora."
"Well call me when it's up," Van der Lyne ordered "I need to speak to our clients about our latest acquisition. A white lion's skin should fetch a handsome price from the international market."
"Yes, Mister Van der Lyne."
After a long run, the beast and I found where the ship had landed. The ship had set down on a stretch of flat land that ran next to a deep arroyo. I was about to get a bit closer, when the beast chased something down into the dry wash. I dove after the cub and cut her off before she could get too far away. As I grabbed her by the arm, I felt something strange.
The colors in the back of my head suddenly went from bright to dim; like an orchid dying of dehydration. As we headed for the ship, the sensation got stronger. I didn't know what I was feeling, all I knew was I didn't like it. It was cold and dismal. I stood up on my back legs to see if I could see over the rim of the wash.
It took a bit of a leap, but I peeked my head over the edge of the wash. Stepping out of a hatch in the ship's side came a wiry man with skin like a worn shoe sole. He had a bundle of firewood under one arm and a coffeepot in his free hand. I watched as he arranged the wood into a pile and set it on fire with some kind of laser. A moment later, he had a pot of coffee brewing on the fire.
The sensations were coming from him. This dull rage I couldn't explain, and never hoped to encounter again. I took the runt by the paw and slowly herded her back towards the end of the wash where we came in. Something told me that creatures like us weren't welcome.
Guma tapped through the files on his screen muttering; "No, no, no…" Occasionally he would utter a "Maybe…", but for the most his thoughts were negative.
Sheba Ninetales was curled up on the couch in Guma's office, asleep with Lilybit tucked away in her arms. Guma looked up from his files and thought how natural it looked for the two of them to be together. As Guma reached for his coffee, he brushed against a small stack of folders causing them to fall to the floor. The commotion caused Sheba's ears to perk up and stirred her from her sleep.
"What's going on," she asked trying to stifle a yawn.
"Sorry about that," said Guma, "I didn't mean to wake you. I was just checking up on an idea I had."
"Whuzzat?"
"I was thinking about how you said they were poaching the fur from those chakats, and I had a thought," Guma explained, "You'd need a big location to keep something like that a secret. So I used a map of the city to try and see if there was a pattern to where they could be operating."
"Did you find one?" asked Sheba. Guma nodded. "All of the locations lead to a pattern that takes them outside the city," he said, "All that's out in that area is a landing strip for a freight company that went out of business twenty years ago. That means either my guess was wrong…"
"Or they had a ship," finished Sheba.
"Right," said Guma, "I've been going through these files looking for possible ships that they might be using; Quange Cargohaulers, dropships, surplus ferryships…"
"It won't be any of those," said Sheba, "Those all use either impulse engines or repulsor fields. They'd be too easy to detect by sensors. If these poachers put as much thought into this as I think they have, then they're using something else. An old pre-warp ship of some kind."
"You mean like a Vector Goblin," said Guma, remembering one of the more common EVA craft.
"I'm thinking of something bigger," Sheba replied, "Like a Renraku Usagi or a Tylo Pachyderm. Something like a light cargo ship so they could take their van with them. Usagis and Pachyderms use magnetic engines and they might be mistaken for an atmospheric anomaly."
"Yeah, said Guma "Something that's not quite as big as a Cargohauler but has old tech engines." Guma tapped out a staccato on his touch screen, then suddenly gave a cheer that woke Lilybit from her slumber. "I am good," said Guma gleefully.
"Why?" asked Sheba "What do you have?"
"Part warehouses."
"Huh?"
Patch rubbed hir eyes as shi washed them out with water from hir canteen. It was all shi could do to keep awake. An aurora began to ripple its way across the sky, displaying colors that are only found in pearls and abalone shells.
Pretty…
"There you are," Patch said. It had been a while since shi had picked up anything from hir sister. Patch concentrated on the feeling and found the direction hir sister was in. A moment later, Patch was into a full run and heading south.
"Guma where are we going?"
"I know someone who might be able to help us," the detective replied, "She's a real pack-rat, never throws anything away. Makes a good living selling engine parts, including parts for starships."
"I see," Sheba replied, "So we ask her if any one has been looking for parts for an Usagi or a Pachyderm, and if so who?"
"Right," said Guma. He pulled into the driveway of a huge Quonset hut type building that looked as though it had seen better days. "But why did we have to bring hir along?" asked Sheba.
"You'll see," said Guma, as he picked a sleepy Lilybit up out of the back seat of the car. Guma then knocked on the door of the Quonset hut and then stood back. The door opened to reveal canine taur with dusky yellow fur and pointed ears. She was wearing a saddle blanket over her barrel. For a moment Sheba thought she was looking at one of her relations but the newcomer's scent said otherwise.
"Nadira Quartzsand this is Sheba Ninetales," Guma introduced. Nadira wrinkled her nose. "You better have had a good reason for getting me out of bed Joe," she said, then she saw the furry bundle on his shoulder. Sheba's jaw dropped as Nadira's attitude did a one-eighty. "What do you have there," Nadira cooed. She took Lilybit from Guma's arms and took hir inside.
Sheba followed the suddenly affectionate taur up the stairs. As she went in, she saw Nadira wrap Lilybit up in a blanket and let hir snuggle into a big soft bed. "Shi's adorable Joe," Nadira said softly so as not to wake the kitten, "How long will they let me take care of hir?"
"Hir mother will be up and around in a couple of days," the detective said, "But shi will be in no shape to look after a kitten alone. Starfleet security has made arrangements for them both to move in with you, if you don't mind." Nadira's eyes suddenly sparkled as she hugged Guma tightly.
"Ha-dir ah kat bret whe ya du tha."
9:
Nadira flipped through her files on a large flat wallscreen. "So you think they are using an old pre-warpdrive ship huh?"
Guma nodded as Sheba poured coffee into his mug. "It was Sheba here who thought of it," the detective replied, "Something that could get through a sensor scan with out arousing suspicions."
"Well, let's see," said Nadira, "There are no Pachyderms around here, you usually find them in America. I did have an order for reentry plating for an Usagi, but I've known that pilot for years. Burt Reams burnt out a thruster on his Onibochi, I'll have to send away for those parts; and oh well this is interesting…"
"What is it?" asked Sheba.
"Someone in a very big hurry," Nadira replied, "I forgot to check my messages today after I got back from grocery shopping. Seems someone with a big checking account is looking for parts to an old Royce Vectorburn."
"I've never heard of that type of ship," Sheba said.
"That's cause it's not a ship, it's an engine," Nadira clarified, "It's the powerplant for a Kenjen Starhauler. They are very fuel efficient, because they collect atmospheric hydrogen for their power."
"Oh man that sounds like just the ship we're looking for," Sheba said excitedly, "Starhaulers are as big as a cargo ship gets before you get into the heavy-classes. They would have plenty of space to work and still have room for the vehicles and other things. And their engine exhaust would only look like some kind of abnormal cloud build up."
"So we can ask some one at the weather service if they have seen any unusual cloud buildup over the past few days," Guma concluded.
"Your going to have trouble," Nadira replied, "Weather anomaly files are now under a Grade V security clearance."
"Why?"
"Two weeks ago a security team broke up an earth first rally in front of the town hall," Nadira explained, "Someone left a briefcase there. When they opened it up, they found plans for acts of terrorism, including crashing a stealth-rigged, Class IV cargo hauler into the Brisbane airport."
Sheba mouthed a silent wow.
"Hello, the camp."
Van der Lyne looked up from his coffee into the darkness as a husky figure strode towards the fire. "May I come in?" the figure said.
"Chure," Van der Lyne replied. He wasn't very old, the Boer observed, maybe just out of his teens. Not as husky as he first thought, but certainly bigger than the norm. As he came towards the fire, the boy took a seat on the log Van der Lyne had rolled by the fire.
"Nils Van der Lyne," he introduced himself.
"Kyle Johnson," the boy replied.
"What brings you out so far into the desert, my young fellow."
"I'm on walkabout," the boy explained, "Well I was anyway." Van der Lyne took a sip of his coffee. "Vat happened?" the Boer asked.
"A rather large animal of some kind ousted me from my campsite," Kyle explained, "It took my fish, and made a shambles of my bedroll and my backpack." The boy held out his hands to warm them by the fire. Van der Lyne held out his cup. "Coffee?"
"That would be nice," Kyle said taking the cup. Van der Lyne poured the rich dark drink into a fresh cup and passed it to the boy. "Milk?"
"Yes, puh-lease."
"Never been a coffee drinker eh?"
"Is it that obvious?"
"Relax," said Van der Lyne passing the milk, "This is Kenyan/Chipinge half and half, tastes almost as good as it smells."
"Still," he said as he took the bottle, "Even the best coffee in the world needs a little sugar."
"This is true," said Van der Lyne, "But until I get some, this will have to do." He reached into his shirt pocket dug out a pair of little blue packets. As Van der Lyne passed them to the boy, a stray spark popped up from the fire and ignited the paper. Kyle cursed his scorched fingers and stuck them in his mouth.
"Are you all right?" the old man asked. Kyle nodded and then blew on the tips of his fingers. "I wanted to get warm," he said, "But this wasn't what I had in mind."
"I haf some more in the ship," Van der Lyne said, "wait right there." The old man walked up the catwalk and into the ship. He walked down the corridors and in to the galley "Now where did I put the sweetener?" Van der Lyne searched through the cabinets for a minute or two before he found the box of blue packets. He tucked a handful into his shirt pocket and headed to the door.
Well, so far so good. I really hadn't expected to burn my fingers when I did my trick with the sweetener packets, but then again…
I waved my hand and a clump of grass in the distance suddenly sprouted legs and dashed over to the log where I was sitting. The beast meowed softly as she saw the bottle I was holding. She wrapped her little hands around the neck to drink noisily from the container; when she was done her chin was covered with milk. She gave a soft burp, then her ears perked up. The beast dashed off and wrapped herself into a clump. I set the bottle on the log and ‘accidentally’ knocked it over, just as Van der Lyne returned.
"Dagnabbit," I said as I caught the bottle by the neck. I had spilled enough of the bottle on the ground, and in my shoe, to cover up the kitten's feeding. "I am sorry," I said, "I am so sorry."
"It's alright, it's alright," Van der Lyne replied, "There's another bottle in the galley." He took the bottle with the remnants of the milk, and poured some into his cup. He then took a couple of those blue packets from his shirt pocket, tore them open, and poured the contents into his coffee. He then passed me a couple and I did the same. I was about to ask for something to stir the sugar in with when I saw foam rise in my cup and then disperse. I sipped the brew to find it well sweetened. "Better living through chemistry," I thought.
Back in Guma's office, the detective flopped down on his old leather couch. "I thought we had something," the detective said, "It's gonna take me a week to get the kind of clearance we'll need to get those files."
Sheba sauntered over to the desk and called up the detective's phone on the touch pad. She tapped out a number and waited. The phone rang three times before it was answered. The response she got caused Guma to fall out of the couch.
"Admiral Halifax's office," said the receptionist.
"Yes, has the admiral gone home for the day?"
"No ma'am," the secretary replied, "Would you like me to connect you?"
"Would you please," said Sheba.
There was a slight buzz as the line was connected and a moment later the line was answered. "Halifax."
"Admiral, it's Sheba Ninetales," the foxtaur said, "It's about Chalk."
Asking for a way to communicate my problem with the rest of the world was now definitely out of the question. As I had my doubts about the old man; his hired hand clinched them for me. He, Van der Lyne had called him Holt, had come out of the ship to bring Van der Lyne a message of some kind. His face had a look about it that simply shouted dumb and mean; a combination that usually led to bad ends. Van der Lyne seemed a good judge of character; and if Holt was the kind of man Van der Lyne wanted for help, then something indeed sinister was going on.
As Van der Lyne went back into the ship, Holt stayed behind for a cup of the old man's coffee. He ran his eyes over me like a stoat would a fat rabbit; as he sipped the thick brew. If that's what he thought about me, I didn't even want an inkling about what he would think of the
Beast. I slowly began to bring my power to the surface, not to quickly; if I did that, then I might send up a sandstorm that would definitely give my nature away. Then I remembered; in this dimension, I was only working with a few dregs of energy. But even with these few dregs, any fight with Holt would be an unfair one, in my advantage.
It had been a long run, but Patch was now at a place where the scent of her little sister was strong. Not the empathic scent Patch was receiving through the lead; but the pure physical scent of a chakat kitten was on the breeze and it was blowing in Patch's direction. 'Wisp's; and another chakat's scent as well. Well at least shi knew hir little sister was in good hands, but why hadn't this other chakat taken 'Wisp to some place civilized?
Patch followed hir sister's scent until shi came to a dry wash with a large cargo ship parked next to it. There was a campfire a few yards away from the entry hatch, with two humans sipping coffee. One looked like he might have been on a rugby squad or a football team, while the other…
"Holy-," she started to say aloud, only to stifle hirself before hir words came within earshot. It was the human from hir campsite, the one who had taken Firewisp. What was he doing here, and where was hir sister?
"Oh man," said Guma "One little phone call, and we get all this. I should bring you in on all my cases, I'd get a lot more done."
"Don't push it," Sheba replied, "Chalk is Halifax's grandson; and the admiral loves him dearly. They are about the only family they have left."
"How does a Star Fleet Admiral, wind up with a chakat for a grandson?" asked Guma.
"That's Chalk's business, not yours," the foxtaur replied sternly, "If he wants to tell you, then fine; Chalk is very dear to me, and I would feel like I betrayed his trust."
"Fine," said Guma, as he went back to scanning through the sheaf of hard copy pictures Admiral Halifax had sent over.
"So why did you take Lilybit with us when we went to see Nadira?" Asked Sheba in return.
"It's not really a secret," said Guma "Nadira is thoroughly addicted to cute. She loves children, puppies, and kittens. That, and I felt safer leaving Lilybit there than anywhere security would place hir. Like I said, she's a pack-rat, collects anything that catches her fancy."
"Like kittens?"
"Like exotic firearms," Guma corrected, "We weren't in that part of her house, but Nadira has a license to collect weapons and she's well versed in their use. She even has a few things that could punch a hole in the hull of a starship. So if out poacher friends come looking for Lilybit, Nadira will have a few surprises waiting for them."
"Who is Nadira anyway," Sheba asked.
"She used to be Starfleet security," Guma replied, "I first came here after I resigned from the NYPD. My partner had gotten killed in a shoot out and I just couldn't do the job anymore. About three months later this job turned up and I jumped on it."
"You should have seen me on my first day; I was a complete klutz. I had no clue as to what I was doing. On my third day, my supervisor partners me up with this cute little taur. She's about half as old as I am, real sweet too; and she starts to show me the ropes. Everything was great for about a year."
"What happened?" asked Sheba.
"We were investigating a smuggling ring in the Emjay asteroid belt, when one of the small ones slammed into the side of our shuttle. One of the nacelles ruptured and there was a small plasma fire in the cabin."
"So the blanket she wears…"
"…Covers a shunt," Guma finished, "A set of cybernetic vertebrae."
"Oh my," said Sheba. There was a long pregnant pause in the air before she spoke again. "Chalk used to be human," the foxtaur said.
Patch was stalking low on all six of her paws. Hir ears were alert and hir eyes wide open. Shi slithered through the grass and around the berms. Patch's night vision wasn't that necessary due to the combination of the aurora and the campfire.
"I thought I saw something." That voice belonged to the rugby player. Patch looked towards the fire and saw the huge man get up off of the log. He slowly gazed over the terrain, but he didn't notice anything. "There's nothing out there." That was the stranger, the one from the lake. Patch slinked to a stop and let her pattern blend into the terrain. It might be wiser to wait for them to go to sleep and sneak aboard the ship. In the meantime shi would wait right there and hope hir little sister was alright.
Silence and Sandstorm waited in the police waiting room for hours before anyone would see them. Another two hours before they got through the paperwork. Then another hour before they got to talk to anyone. Silence was beginning to think that they should have just waited for Patch to call before they went to the police.
It was almost midnight now; Silence yawned and cat-stretched, shi then stood up and went to get coffee for the two of them. As shi returned with the coffee, a gray fox came up to hir and nearly made hir drop the cups. "Shir Before the Rains," the fox said, "There has been a development. We need to get you to Sidney. Would you please come with me?"
Silence and 'Storm were bundled onboard a small shuttle and flown to the shuttle pad of the Sidney police station where they were met by a police van that took them to the Sidney Security Office. A pot-bellied man and an oddly colored foxtaur met then at the station.
"My name is Joe Guma," the man said, "And this young lady is Sheba Ninetails. She has been assisting me on a series of cases involving missing Chakats. We have some questions to ask you."
"They're doing what?"
Guma had seen chakats in a rage before; but this one had him a little worried. To say that shi was huge could be considered an understatement. The truth was, this chakat was enormous. Despite the crutches shi needed to assist hir walking, this chakat would be a force to be reckoned with if shi caught whoever stole hir child. Guma was beginning to think that the only thing that would calm hir down was a stunner on full.
Beside the massive feline was a more normal sized chakat with an ocelot fur pattern; shi was sitting calmly on her hindquarters. Guma kept an eye on hir; if shi ever started to look nervous, then Guma would worry.
"They're kidnapping them," Guma explained, "Stealing all the wild patterns, like your mate's, and-"
"Daughter."
"Beg pardon?"
"Daughter," 'Storm repeated, "Silence is my daughter. My mate, Soot, is a scout with the Star Corp. Shi's off planet right now, but shi will be here soon."
"Detective, what is being done to these stolen chakats?" asked Silence.
"They are being poached for their fur," Guma replied, "They're being passed off as tiger leopard, they even tried to get a margay pelt, but shi got away."
"Margay," said Silence, "That means that they would have had to-"
"They did," said Sheba as she entered the open door, "Lilybit is a sweet little thing, but shi has a curious habit of mistaking swishing tails for chew toys." Silence giggled out loud, mostly out of the relief that at least one cub had been recovered. Sheba laid a stack of hard copies on Guma's desk.
"That still doesn't explain why my daughter was taken," Sandstorm explained, "Shi doesn't have that kind of pattern, she's just chocolate colored."
"Plus it doesn't track with what we found at the lake," Silence finished.
"What did you find at the lake?" Sheba asked. When Silence told the foxtaur what had occurred at the lake, Sheba's jaw dropped. "He managed to outrun my little sister," Silence said, "Do you know how fast he would have had to be running?
"Are you sure he wasn't using some kind of booster?" Guma asked. Silence shook hir head. "No," shi explained, "Patch and I went through his belongings at the lake. There was nothing to indicate a metabolic booster or anything like that." Just then shi remembered. "I still have his pack and satchel in the back of the van," Silence said with some exasperation, "I forgot all about them. They could probably tell us who this guy is."
"Then if you'll give us permission, and the keys to your vehicle, we can have the items sent here," said Guma.
"Right now that can wait," said Sheba; "I just got through sorting out all the weather reports. There was an unusual line of scud being blown to the east by the wind."
"Scud," asked Sandstorm
"Thin clouds driven by the wind," Sheba explained as she pulled a map out of the sheaf of papers, "According to the weather satellites the scud line ended about here." The odd colored foxtaur pointed at a mark she had made on the map. "This could be the Star-Hauler's exhaust trail. If we start a search pattern where the trail ends and work our way eastward…"
"We may find the poachers' ship and the missing chakats," said Guma. The detective thumbed a button on his intercom. "Mister Wumpindi," he said, "Prep the Tomohagne for take off."
10:
As the fire started to die out, I thought Holt would never go to sleep. As he did, I quietly got to my feet and sent out the call to the beast. In a burst of kittenish energy, she zoomed over to the other side of the log and sat down immediately. Now if Holt would stay asleep for the time being, maybe I could get some milk for the beast.
Van der Lyne said that he had another bottle of milk in the galley. But how to get into the ship? Using my powers to cut my way in would make way too much noise and take too much time. I wish I had been paying a bit more attention when Van der Lyne went back inside, but Holt might have become suspicious. For the beast's sake, I had to play it cool and keep quiet. Well, what was quieter than a cat?
After undressing, I opened the face on my transband and keyed the transformation sequence. I was getting to like the warm honey sensation that flowed over my body when I changed into this feline. I padded over to the stairs that led into the ship and stepped up them quietly. As my night vision adjusted, I found that where there should have been a doorknob or something similar, there was a keypad with numbers and letters on it. "Hmm," I thought, "Some kind of coded lock." I thought about touching the keys, but decided against it, as I didn't know what would happen when I did. I could smell the old man's scent on the keys, but not well enough to know which ones he touched. Hmmm…
Chalk thought carefully about his predicament. "There had got to be something I can do to disarm this stupid door," he thought. The cage was just big enough for him to turn around in. Chalk reached through the back bars and pushed against the wall. The cage moved forward a few inches. Chalk smirked as he hit upon a plan.
On the table on the other side of the room, was a gooseneck prybar. "Perfect," the chakat thought. Chalk turned back around in the cage and scooted it across the floor with his hind legs, while he held onto the sidebars with his hands and handpaws. A few seconds later Chalk was close enough to the table to lash onto the bar with his tail and slip it into the cage; now for the second part of his plan.
It took a bit of effort on his part, but Chalk managed to get the cage turned around and pushed the door flush against the wall. "I hope to heck this works," he said and then threw the bar like a spear into the plating of the outer bulkhead. As the point of the bar penetrated the plating, the cage door crackled to life with the energy from the Tesla coil. Chalk suddenly slammed himself against the back of the cage; causing one of the live bars to catch in the gooseneck. Now there was a direct current feed heading into the ship. Chalk hoped it would either short out something vital in the electrical system or cause the cage's to power source to meltdown. Either way, something was going to happen soon.
All of a sudden, the keys on the pad lit up for a moment and then just as quickly went dark as a plume of smoke curled out from behind the panel. Then part of the panel slid into the door. I carefully pushed it the rest of the way in to reveal a handle of some sort. I just reached in and grabbed it.
Push, no, pull, no, twist… The door gave a loud clank as a bolt of some kind disengaged. The door pushed in, and I found myself in a three-way corridor. I went up the center hallway and found another door with the twist handle. I pushed the door open, stuck my head in, and scanned the room. In one corner of the room was a white shape. I cautiously stepped into the room and walked towards the ghostly form. As I approached, I saw that the figure was in some kind of cage. It took another few steps before I realized what it was, another cat 'taur like the Beast.
The 'taur turned to look at me as I came up to the cage. I put a finger up to my muzzle in a hope that the beast would be quiet. It must have understood, it didn't make a sound. I looked and found that for some reason the door of the cage had been turned to face against the wall. I grabbed hold of the cage and turned the door so I could open it. As I latched onto the bars of the door, I received a shock of electricity. With a moment of concentration, I absorbed the stray erg of energy and used it to pull the door off of the cage. The new beast bounded out like a cat who had just avoided a trip to the vet.
Something bothered me though; all that noise. Van der Lyne hadn't come in with guns blazing, nor were there any alarms going off. If it were just Van der Lyne and Holt, then they wouldn't need things like that. On a hunch, I rapped a knuckle against the floor. The taps were barely audible. The room had been soundproofed. That made me more nervous; Van der Lyne must have put in a security system to make sure what ever was kept in the room didn't escape.
I dashed out of the room and into the hall to see Holt outside the outer door stalking the Beast. The next thing I hear is this thunderous roar; I can't tell where it's coming from, but as soon as I hear it I am barreling out the door as fast as my legs will carry me. For the next quarter of an hour though, everything else is a blur.
Holt's ribs hurt from the impact, he thought a few of them might be broken. He looked up to see what looked like a storm cloud in the shape of a cat. As he rubbed the dust from his eyes though, he found he was looking at another chakat, a tabby with silver and black fur. It was only slightly bigger than the kitten that had come to the camp. Its handpaws were red with fresh blood, probably some of his.
"Scratch me will you, you animal," Holt snarled. He pulled a shocker rod from his belt and thumbed the switch. The club crackled to life with electricity. As he swung the rod at the chakat, it sidestepped and sucker punched him in the ribs. It felt like a one or two had been broken. Holt charged the kat once more and tried to connect with the shocker's electrodes. The chakat blocked Holt's arm to one side and threw him like a martial artist. Before Holt could get to his feet, the chakat swung hir hindquarters around and reared like a horse. It lashed out with both feet and struck Holt's already injured ribs, sending him rolling across the ground. The chakat started to stalk towards the injured Holt when a flare of green cut hir off. Van der Lyne must have noticed the commotion and had manned the Pulse-Lasers. This was good, because Holt didn't think he could go another round with that little chakat. It was strange though; for a moment, it looked as though its fur was alive with electricity.
The ship is called The Tomohagne; the name comes from a river in Japan where iron was gathered to make steel for katanas. It's a Class VII security shuttle armed with a pair of fire linked medium lasers and directional phaser bank. In the right hands it is a force to be reckoned with; and its pilot is one of the few with those hands.
"Anything on the scanners Mister Wumpindi," asked Guma.
"Nothing as of yet, Detective," Wumpindi answered, "However, the aurora may be affecting our sensors."
"Keep me posted," the detective replied. Guma turned around and went into the back of the craft. "You didn't have to come with us, you know," he said. Sheba looked up from her pad. "I want to be there when you find Chalk," she said, "No matter what condition he's in, I have to be there."
"Oh for the world if it had a friend like you," Guma said as he ruffled her royal blue hair. Joe remembered many a long time when no one would come to identify the dead. However growing up in the ruins of the Bronx he could understand why. Even in this day and age, long after the Gene Wars, new ways to die still appeared out of the shadows of New York ; be it mutant, disease, or some thing that just crawled out of the dark.
"Detective!!"
Guma stormed up to the cockpit. "What is it Mister Wumpindi," the detective asked.
"My sensors are reading Pulse-Laser fire," Wumpindi explained, "It looks as though someone found them for us."
"Full speed mister," barked Guma.
"Five more minutes, 'Storm," Muttered a sleepy Patch. Sandstorm would always cut loose with a signal roar when hir family overslept. This time though it didn't sound like hir. More like the scream from an American cougar, real high pitched. Patch opened hir eyes to the light from the aurora, and then remembered where shi was and why shi was here.
About two yards away from the steps that led up to the ship's main hatch, was the human Holt. He was nose to nose with a runt of chakat with a silver and black tabby pattern. Between the two was… "Firewisp," Patch whispered
Suddenly the big human pulled a black club out of his belt and swung it at the chakat. Patch watched as the chakat dodged the big man's attack and brought him to his knees with a punch. The chakat amazed Patch as shi weaved around Holt's attacks and then kicked him in the side with hir hindpaws. As the strange chakat moved towards the man shi'd incapacitated, Patch saw a ball shaped turret emerge from the side of the ship and send a blazing green ray towards the tabby. The beam did a sweep towards the strange chakat, as though it were a spotlight; but Patch knew it was much more lethal than that.
Patch had seen a pulse-laser before, the sickening green from it's argon gas tubes was something shi remembered vividly from a class trip to a factory where hull plating was being prepared. Now that same green was being used to try to destroy one of hir kind, maybe even hirself, and definitely The Imp… The Imp!
Patch came out of hir daze as she realized that the sweep of the beam had missed hir little sister by a foot. As the beam followed the tabby, Patch dashed out, bundled the Imp up into hir arms and made a mad dash to the other side of the ship. After shi tucked hir sister in a safe little nook, Patch looked to see that the silver and black chakat had run out of places to run. Patch turned away so shi wouldn't see what was going to happen.
"Mister Wumpindi, fire!"
The Aborigine pilot thumbed the trigger and strafed along the hull of the freighter with the shuttle's medium lasers. A moment later the sickly green beam from the freighter's turret faded and died out. "First pulse-laser bank disabled, detective," said the pilot. Guma nodded and then looked at his own console. The sensors showed one, two, three, four chakats gathering on the grounds around the ship. Was this some kind of organized escape?
"Detective," Wumpindi called out, "They are powering up their engines."
"Shields up, Mister Wumpindi," Guma replied, "See if you can keep them on the ground.
Van der Lyne had begun the start up procedure for the engines when Holt stumbled into the cockpit. The big m