FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Love me? Hate me?

Sorry guys, I have no excuse. This chapter should be five times longer with how long I took to get it to you. I apologize profusely for the wait.

Disclaimer: Read the other ones damn you

Sorry again guys! :(

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Chapter 5: The Epsilon

The spade-shaped single-bridge of the Alakandor was in good repair. No longer gleaming, its original metallic coldness had long been replaced with a warmer and more comfortable feeling. The forward screen was displaying the view in front of the ship, the star field blocked only by the blue-green marble that was the Earth. Slowly, Atlas made a motion towards one of the terminals. "This console will let you access the antenna array," he informed. "You can relay off of one of the satellites and hack the facility's system's from here."

Beta looked at Atlas, and then up at Alpha with unease on his face. The pure white fox nodded his head, "Go on Beta. We cannot free our brother without their help. We might even find a way around their security; even rescue Epsilon."

The thinner, more intellectual fox nodded, his ears flicking as his red-brown paws rubbed together slowly. Approaching the console, he watched characters scrawl down the screen, and shook his head. "At least it's not some cryptic 22nd century algorithm.." he mused to himself, before his fingers started dancing across the panel laid before him.

--

Mathieu stared down at the table quietly, his ears drooping as his love sat across from him. Alraune, his curly hair tied up, watched him with worried eyes; he knew something was wrong.

"Mathieu... Are you okay?" the human queried, his left hand tiptoeing across the table and sliding around the Husky's. They shared a quiet look, and the husky's melancholy face changed dramatically. He had been almost angry before, but now he simply longed in silence for direction.

"Aura... I'm almost scared of what we're gonna find. Those brothers... they... there's something about them..." he muttered, sighing softly as he let his eyes dash upward and watch the face of his human, his love.

The man moved slowly to the other side of the table, dragging the chair up beside his love and pulling the husky into his arms. His face was comforting as he spoke confidently to his boyfriend, "I see it too, feel it even... something isn't right with them... But they're being helpful, so we shouldn't worry too much. Not yet at least."

"What if they betray us? What if they've got abilities like Axis had? They... remind me a lot of him..." sighed the husky, his ears falling as he turned his eyes away again. "What if they used dad's DNA to MacGyver a group of clones?" came the final addition.

"You're jumping to conclusions, Mathieu," was Alraune's dry riposte, his finger sliding 'neath the husky's muzzle to turn his eyes back up. "Until we know what's going on, we can't just blindly act," furthered the man with a frown. "Once we've got access to their computers we'll know what we have to do..."

There was a lapse of silence; uncomfortable noiselessness between the two lovers as they shared a gaze with an almost electric defiance in it. A look between them that carried every word they needed to say, and every thought they wanted to share. Their eyes were carrying a conversation in silence without the aid of a mental medium; without the aid of a neural link or telepathy.

Alraune pulled his husky closer, rubbing his cheek against Mathieu's. As the human's lips came close to the husky's aural canal, the primate spoke soft and gentle. "You know, I'm in love with you... Mathieu," he admitted quietly against the Sirian's furred ear. "Let me be here for you," he added with a lover's warm hold.

Mati's ears flicked and his hands wrapped around behind Aura. The world seemed to fall away slowly, like layers of an onion. First the sound of the people cut out, and then the people themselves faded away. The walls slowly fell, and all that was left was Alraune, the man he loved with all of his heart. "You are... always have been," he said, letting the words brush the man's cheek.

Alraune smirked and closed his eyes, just letting his arms stay like that. Slowly he stood and took hold of the Sirian's hips. The pilot picked Mati up, bridal style. He walked almost dazedly out of the mess hall, still lost from the people around him. He did notice Daemon in the corridors, who informed the pair; "We're going to try to hack the system again in a couple minutes. Atlas wants you two to head to the bridge." As the merc spoke he shifted his weight, standing crookedly with paw to hip almost as if he were scrutinizing the pair.

--

Golden furred Blaze bobbed his head in time to his music, played through a set of 'headphones' if you could call them that. Tiny buds of machinery thrummed out an ancient rock beat throwing back to the heady days of Earth's rich musical history. He sang along, silently, as he set about his work for the day.

"Taz, doll," came a feminine voice from across the way, and the Lyrii popped open his eyes and looked up and over to her. Very much like a deer in headlights, the man raised an eyebrow and twitched his ear. "Taz, I just sent you over a stack of mail. Filter them for our dear governor," sirened the she-wolf before she turned back to her own work.

"Right, M'iella!" his reply came, and he sat up to let his eyes dash through the words. Interplanetary commerce didn't have currency, but here on Sirius one still had to work to earn their way. It wasn't even money, as much as credit, redeemable points that could be used for necessities. It was essential in getting Sirius back together again after the war, so that people wouldn't be a needless drain on resources.

It was all carefully regulated by the governor, an instated official who approved large expenditures of resources. "No... no..." sighed the Lyrii, reading over one proposal. "Too much a triviality; auto-reply," he tapped the screen and sent the message to the mailroom. Opening another he nodded. "He'll want to look at this one at least," he affirmed to himself, sending it through to the governor's mailbox.

It was his job, right now. Boring, but it brought him in what he needed to survive. His 'husband' was off trying to find the Crag; his Son was in the Academy. He had to support himself and his daughter as best he could, and so he worked.

--

Back within the facility that housed Epsilon, a startled technician began to hastily and frantically type at his keys. "Sir!" called the man, "there is a malicious user in the system. Recommend aggressive hacking countermeasures."

His commander, his seasoned face creased with years of military service, nodded an affirmation and spoke, "Negative. Determine the point of origin."

The man at the keys nodded and began to tap at the controls.

==

Beta grinned to himself, as he saw their attempts to stop him. "Third line breached. I think I can tap into their surveillance now but I need more time to access the database," voiced the savant Sirian. "Bringing up a live feed, main screen," he added.

The forward screen did, in fact, show the interior of the facility. Many tens of cameras fed them visual information, from what looked like a break room full of technicians to seemingly unoccupied chambers with strange, cylindrical machines. Something caught Jasyn's eye, and he called out to the regular crewman assigned to ship operations.

"Bring up camera 32" he spoke quickly, his eyes widening as he watched the screen. Just as Alraune and Mathieu stepped onto the bridge the requested panel enlarged until it took up half the screen. Jasyn's breath hitched, and Atlas' eye widened in awe; both eyebrows raised high. Mathieu twisted his body and fell to his knees from Alraune's arms, stumbling forward mere moments later to support himself on the captain's chair.

The human stepped in slowly, eyes wide and jaw agape as he and every other pair of the rebels-cum-mercenaries' eyes. Mathieu was speechless as he looked to his love when the man had finally reached him. The man looked as if he'd seen a ghost, and by and by he could have said he had.

Atlas looked at Daemon, his mate's reaction no less aghast at the sight on the main screen. He was almost disgusted at the array of machinery and wires; but most affected was Jasyn... for Jasyn looked at Axis, suspended in a cylinder with conduits and wires attached variously to his body. His markings had faded, and the face was covered in a breather mask; but that face, that perfect face that Jasyn saw when his eyes closed, unchanged from the first time he awoke with him, was Axis.

The remaining brothers-Alpha, Gamma, and Delta-stepped down beside Jasyn, their eyes less wide but still awed, and looked at the peaceful figure.

"Your Axis?" spoke Alpha, letting his eyes regard the wolf to his right. Jasyn shook, visibly rattled with barely constrained anger.

The wolf's eyes clouded, he swallowed a breath, and his fists clenched tightly, as he allowed the growl to leave him. "Bastards... Human bastards!" he rasped, his voice gaining strength as he did. He didn't seem to even perceive the outside world anymore. A tear rimmed each eye, followed by another and another; Jasyn had not cried in waking for Axis in a very long time. His sleep brought forth tears, but when he was awake, he could not fathom shedding a tear any more; he easily shed them now, staring at what was taken from him.

==

The technicians input several commands in tandem, blocking attempts from this interfering user, but their biggest threat was much smaller than they had seen. "The user seems to have been trying to delete sensitive files. We've managed to block him, and we've isolated his access to a city in the Americas, Sir."

"Excellent work, continue to monitor the situation," smiled the commander, his pins gleaming as he turned from the computer room. Alarms were beginning to silence, and he welcomed the cessation of the noise.

Their best efforts would have fallen short, through the maligns' misdirection. Even the subtle blips of brain activity had been unseen.

==

The Sirian kit began to laugh quietly, and then more maniacally as he routed their fourth, and fifth walls. "I have access; their database is being torrented through seventeen different satellites; coming in through all antennas on the ship. We'll have all of their files in three," he said in triumph.

"Great work, notify me the moment they're done," said Atlas, his eyes straying to the view screen and the lifeless body of his younger brother.

"I'm notifying you, Cap'n. I meant three seconds," grinned the cocky little fox as he slid out of the chair. "Their systems won't be able to track us, hell the transmission wouldn't have even registered on conventional sensors. I don't think we'll have any trouble for awhile..." he added.

"I want every file related to this Epsilon sent to the briefing room. I'm about ready to find out what the hell is going on," ordered Atlas, his ears twitching agitatedly. He turned simply and left the bridge for the briefing room.

Slowly Daemon followed, along with the strange foxes from the Facility. Jasyn stared quietly for moments more, Mathieu nearby but so far away. The pair were held transfixed by their beloved dead.

'He looks so... peaceful...' thought Jasyn silently. 'He almost looks like he's asleep, like he'll wake up and kiss me any moment. Wake me from this awful dream..." were his added thoughts, before he forced his eyes from the screen and followed the others into the briefing room.

Aura and Mati were speechless, the younger on the verge of tears while the older slowly wrapped an arm around him. Why the husky had imprinted such a strong bond with the fox was well beyond the human-for as he knew it the two had only seen each other for a few months before their separation. The fact that was important was that the fox was important to his love, and he would do everything inside his power to help Axis find his much-deserved rest.

The human had to pull a bit, but eventually every Levi by birth, marriage and adoption that had taken asylum within the Alakandor had made way to the Briefing room to pore over the files that had been acquired. The brothers--Alpha through Delta--had joined them in hopes of finding a way of freeing their brother from the humans' grip.

--

The claustrophobic room was packed with people-seated and standing-looking over mountains of text and pictures. They had each taken up a console or handheld of some sort; logbooks, experiment notes; the working record of every activity within that facility from the mundane to the obscene.

They had been searching for more than an hour, but the group had been opening dead-end doors. The logs all detailed highly illegal activities, weapons research by way of genetic manipulation. There was the occasional failed attempt at merging machine with mammal, but often the subjects were kidnapped.

Jasyn's resolve was waning slowly; he had begun to doubt they were going to find anything relevant in these cobwebbed data files.

"Got another bit of proof here, nothin' about him though." Jasyn rolled his shoulders as he told them this, tossing the handheld to the ground with a cry of frustration. "By the time we look through this all we're gonna be old men!" came his distressed voice in a bare whisper.

The little device crashed to the ground, clattering and beeping its annoyance. It was built to survive, but that didn't stop it from being triggered by the impacts as it bounced, then skidded to a halt at the toe of Mati's boot.

The husky looked down at it, growling slightly as he looked back up at Jasyn. "Do you mind? I'm not here for target practice," the husky warned, leaning down to pick up the small piece of technology. As his paw passed over the surface it brushed another three buttons; passing it to Jasyn produced another pair of noises, before the silence of before was restored. Mathieu stood back against the wall, looking partway out the viewport as he tapped away at the little device.

Jasyn grumbled quietly, looking up at Mati with those ice-cold eyes. He sighed and pulled the screen back up. "Sorry," put forward the wolf, looking down at the handheld again with a distressed sound. The combination of button presses had opened another file, had sent Jasyn halfway through the logs, into a chunk of decade-old text.

'Subjects progressing rapidly...' read the wolf, skimming the base information. 'Accelerated growth... Gene splicing...' he mouthed silently, and his voice spoke up again as he read the next few lines:

"The raw genetic material we recently acquired is showing promise. We are transferring the source subject to the main facility for safety."

Another chunk of text from a few days later caught his attention, but Atlas looked up as the wolf began to speak. He spoke in his rasp, hope carried on his lips.

"The subject appears to be recovering from his extensive damage. I recommend that we prepare a cold-storage cell to prevent our source from blowing us apart." Jasyn grumbled softly and as he spoke, more ears turned to him. "The physical trauma to his brain has severed connections required for control and memory; thankfully we can scan the patterns and recreate the connections."

"Where are you getting this Jay?" asked Daemon, tapping through his directory. "Give me a time frame," he added, flicking his tail in agitation, almost excitement.

"Genetic 176, time frame..." Jasyn blinked and stared at the date for two moments, not speaking as he tried to piece the numbers together. "August Twenty-Third, Twenty-Two Thirty-Six," he muttered, looking up at Mathieu.

"Homecoming..." muttered the husky, glancing back up at Alraune. "That was the same week the fleet returned from the liberation, well some of the fleet," he added, glancing back over at the brothers.

"It's not concrete yet, but it's a start. Once we've got everything we'll send it through to the Earth Government an-" Commanded Atlas, but he hadn't the time to finish.

"Hell no Atlas, no way we're gonna do that. They'll do two things: Shit. Fuck. All. We've already figured out where this damn place is..." came a whisper and a growl. "We should take a few walkers down there, I know you have a couple custom jobs on this rust-bucket."

"We could be in and out in less than an hour, babe," admitted Daemon, passing a glance up at his love. "Depending on how long it takes to thaw him out..." he added nervously, looking around quietly.

Mathieu looked up and blinked a few times. "Come on Atlas, he's your brother. We can take a doctor down and we'll get him out of there..." suggested the husky hopefully.

They all looked at Atlas, his stoic features showing their age fully. The Fox was silent for almost too long, before he turned to regard Jasyn. "Don't call my ship a rust-bucket, wolf. Figure out that facility's layout and give me a plan. I'll inform you of my decision at earliest convenience."

Jasyn gawked a bit at the cold regard, and felt anger at Atlas' detached response. He hadn't a chance to respond before Alpha's voice spoke up. "That just won't be good enough, Atlas..." he said, breathing a sigh under his tongue. "That's our brother you're talking ab-"

"No. If that's my brother you're talking about; I'm the one in charge here." Atlas voice was bitter as he stared down the other white fox. His ears turning back angrily as he stood, he added, "and if it's all right with you. I'll decide how, if, and when this ship expends resources in some gods-forsaken attempt at a rescue. Do we understand each other?"

"Listen to you! Don't you care?" Delta slammed his hands on the table as he threw his accusation, knocking over a cup of water and dousing a surprised Alraune. "If you honestly believe that's your brother, why are you so hesitant?" he demanded.

"If that's your brother then that's my father, Atlas!" growled Mathieu, reinforcing the fox's argument as he and Jasyn spoke in tandem.

"My bonded mate!" repeated the wolf as a moment of silence spread across the room. "Atlas! If there's any chance that that poor fox is Axis--my Axis, my beloved--then I am going to do anything in my power to free him."

"Don't you think I know that Jasyn? Mathieu? That cannot be Axis, we all know he's dead!" shouted the fox sourly, countering Delta's slam on the table. "And as for you lot, keep yourselves in line or I'll turn you in. As long as you are on my ship, you will obey my orders."

"Then we'll be taking our leave if-" started Alpha, turning towards the door.

"Fine," grinned Atlas, standing upright and crossing his arms. "Dame, escort these men to the shuttle bay. Take shuttle three," he instructed, and the wolfox stood and nodded towards the door.

"If you'll excuse me," Jasyn said, standing and slipping out before the brothers even had chance at leaving. He was obviously angry, and despite Atlas' few attempts to halt him the wolf had his own agenda.

--

Jasyn crossed the bridge without a word and pulled a personal communicator from his right jacket pocket. Fitting the device into his ears and around his neck, he stopped in one of the three lifts. Using the keypad, the lift moved down a deck as he began to speak for the device.

"Hello, Flight regulation?" he asked, having set the connection as he was putting it on.

"This is the Earth Branch of the Trian Flight Regulation, how may we help you today?" asked a woman on the other end. Jasyn made way to his room as he spoke.

"I'd like to know the most recent flight plan of the Freebird Phoenix; Corona Custom," he asked formally.

"I'm sorry sir, Private flight plans are confide-" she began.

"Confidential from the general public," Jasyn finished. "Check the safe list for a Jasyn Emitt, Sirian, lot number four-eight-delta, one-nine-seven-three-sierra," he added with impatience, rounding the corner to his room but drawing a couple odd looks.

"It'll take a moment Mr. Emitt," she said cordially.

There were a few beeps from the other end, and Jasyn took the break in conversation to begin packing his things.

"Code accepted. The Phoenix is en-route to Sol. Arrival is slated for between twelve and fourteen hundred hours Torontonian. Would you like me to book you a seat on a shuttle?"

"No, thank you," the wolf sighed, looking around the room. He had left a few things here over the years; Atlas had always kept an eye on it all. As he looked around the room he recognized nothing he could not live without, the room was as if he hadn't been there except for the bedding.

The wolf shook his head as he turned around, turning out the lights as he crossed the threshold into the corridor again. "Comm., get me Mathieu," he spoke again, beginning his trek towards the hangar.

--

As he neared the hangar, Jasyn caught sight of Daemon and the brothers. He stepped quickly over to them and pulled Alpha aside as the rest of them were shooed away. Gamma was already in the shuttle bay, sitting on one of the wings lost in thought as the others entered.

"Get down from there," Daemon said, looking up at the fox. "Please," he timidly tacked on.

The red-tail slid down off the wing and landed lightly on the deck just as Alpha rejoined the group.

"What was that about?" asked Beta, twitching ears as he tilted his head in the slightest confusion.

"We've got plans later. Can we leave now? If I spend another minute on this ship I'm going to kill someone," admitted Alpha with a bit of a democratic sigh.

--

The Shuttle and the MPN left for the surface and through Jasyn and the brother's suggestion they managed to convince Daemon to set them down in one of the lesser-populated regions. He was quick to leave once his charges had been delivered, and that left Jasyn and the brothers alone on the surface.

They were in a wide field that had been reclaimed as 'natural' land, tall grasses bordered a rather apparent and what looked to be many years old tree line. There was some memorial plaque somewhere nearby about the people who had 'fixed' the land, but that wasn't really important for the Sirian group, as they began to walk from Jasyn's MPN to the trees.

They walked a short distance, still within clear view of the big, crouching walker but under the trees to shade them. Jasyn checked a chronometer--almost exactly like a watch--that was stowed in a pocket on his flight vest.

"Perfect..." said the wolf in a silent grin as the five took seat against a rock wall. The midday sun was high as they sat beneath a canopy of golding leaves. There was a magic quality to those golden rays, and Jasyn was happy to let it wash over him.

"Thank you for trying, Jasyn," Alpha was happy to say, though it was all over him that he would have rather had support. "We'll get Epsilon out some how..."

"I'm not done yet. If your Epsilon is my Axis then we've got a target in common, and that also means we've got some friends in common too..." the greyfur smirked slyly. His eyes closed slowly as he inhaled the warm air, just waiting for the brothers' reply.

"And I take it that's why we're sitting here," Delta's voice calm and in even meter. "... when I'd rather be blowing apart that place." As he finished that he flexed a paw and a small wisp of violet glowing energy fizzled above it, the fur around the paw shifting in a sudden, unnatural wind.

Jasyn glanced up and in a tone of slight annoyance at such a showy gesture said, "You know, you just caused a hurricane in Africa, a Tsunami along the coast of Novafornia and made a pet cat shed four strands of hair."

"What the hell are you talking about?" spoke the fox as he crushed the glowing, searing wisp. Turning his body towards Jasyn, the wolf saw just how muscular Delta was compared to his brothers. He could still easily outfight the Sirian Fox in a pure show of muscle, but he wasn't going to take that chance right now.

"Never heard of the Butterfly Effect, then?" the wolf shrugged, looking back down towards the rest of the scenery that lay beyond the field. Several tall hills to the east and a lake a ways off.

"Calm down, Sparky. We're only going to be sitting here another hour at most. It's not like the Phoenix to be late on a delivery, her Captain is big on keeping promises," a raspy Jayse affirmed, showing off his canines.

"But will she help us?" questioned the sceptical Gamma, his body twisted a bit as he started to stretch his lean muscles.

"How do you know that I'm talking about a woman?" Jasyn's smirk broke and he looked over at the stretching fox, those strange eyes looking back. It brought a pang of distress to the wolf's spirit just to see white fur stretching like that, but it was not the time for that.

As Gamma shrugged his shoulders in a roll and an answer, he looked up and made a neutral sound. "I got a feeling, that's all," brushed off the fox simply, truthfully not caring.

And the wolf just let it be at that, after giving a small nod. "Well... I was."

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Yes, you've all met this character before, this new captain person. You're gonna laugh at me.

Anyway; love it? Hate it? Tell me about it!

If you're reading this five weeks from June 6 08 and there isn't another chapter up yet, COMMENT and I MIGHT get back to work... I'm lazy like that :D

Anyway; I'm just finishing up a big publishing thing and I'm coming in to a stretch of a little free time. I'm HOPING Sirius will take a primary thought to me.

Anyways, Lots of loves!

With All Fondness

~WhiteArcticFox