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_Last Chapter- _

Alex goes undercover as a new hire at Counter Earth Cosmetics assisting the Knights of Wundgore and Sevren in investigating a threat that was made against the company. It was only after starting his day, meeting and getting to know his coworkers, that Alex, the knight core and those employees learned that the threats were very real....

Counter Earth Chronicles

Chapter 81: Misery, Pain And Suffering With A Side Of Bitterness. (A Grim Present And A Darker Future Part Two)

Day 250 continued

"ALEX!" Lady Ursa roared powering up the prototype.

She was on her way, but I was on my own until she got there. How do you stop about a hundred employees from walking off of a nine story building's roof?

I quickly realized that there was no way that I was going to be able to save every beast. But damn it, I had to try. I pushed and shoved my way through the crowd toward Chemar. He was a good friend whom I had shared a few adventures together with. I was not about to let him die here.

(But how do I save him?)

Upon reaching the junior knight, I reached for his service weapon. I quickly set it to the paralysis setting and started firing shooting as many beastials as I could. I hit him, Tyrannicus and four other beasts freezing them in their tracks before the weapon was out of shots and rolled over to the confusion setting.

I was able to hit six more causing them to walk into other employees who then fell down. The weapon then rolled over to the paranoia/oblivion setting and I hit six more before it ran out of shots in the nonlethal settings.

That was about the time Lady Ursa arrived. She fired two nets from the prototype which pinned down ten more employees who were about to take the 'leap' from the building. She hit several more with bola leg bands causing them to fall before the prototype ran out.

(OH NO!)

The walking stampede continued as employees stepped over each other making their way toward the edge of the roof and their end.

Thinking quickly, my warrior bear tried another tactic. She turned the prototype vertical so that the folded tires were aimed at the marching horde of beasts. She then brought the hover jets to full power blowing the remaining employees backwards toward the entrance door to the roof.

"ALEX TO ME!" She yelled as she landed the blue coupe in front of the toppled Counter Earth Cosmetics employees.

"What are we going to do?!" I screamed. "The are just going to get up and walk toward the edge again!" I said as I got in.

My she beast was silent as she quickly assessed the critical situation.

(All those employees marching to their deaths- how many were aware of what they were doing?)

"The static pulse." Lady Ursa said turning to me. "But it is made for disabling electronic targets one at a time not biological and not this many."

"We would have to adjust the yield and expand the target range to include everyone not just one target!" I said engaging the copilot monitor and keyboard.

(Damn, my mistress was so amazing.)

My she beast selected the static pulse from the weapons menu and centered the cross hairs on the approaching horde while I changed its dispersion range from one target to all targets.

"Hurry Alex!" She said as we observed those that weren't subdued stand up and start moving again. In a weird sort of way, they looked like zombies- beastial zombies.

"It looks like we are going to fry the pulse system doing this."

"Alex!"

"READY!" I said to her.

My lady bear pressed the middle toggle switch on the weapons console.

**Static Pulse Engaged**

Two balls of electricity fired from the side-pods and hit the zombified employees. Instantly the crowd on the roof fell down convulsing and writhing from the electrical shock. But at least they stopped their march off of the building.

"Alex what happened?" My lady bear asked me.

"While Tech was working on CAT, it mysteriously came back up. That was when everyone went zombified. I tried contacting the supreme leader and then Chemar and there was no response. After that everyone started walking toward the roof as if they were preparing to attend some grand assembly. That's when I realized they were going to do the lemming thing."

"If the facility was attacked. You can bet so was the other one." My bear knight said as she turned to her communicator. "Point two to point one. Biff, Looper, Dusty please respond."

"We're here." A black wolf responded.

"Are you three alright?" A white wolf asked.

"Not exactly. Site two was just attacked."

"Same here. The employees started acting weird and walking toward the roof."

"Thanks to your warning Biff, Looper and I were able to block the doors leading to the roof from the outside. We didn't have any casualties."

(Phew!)

"So you three were on the outside of the building when this happened?" I asked.

"Affirmative." Dusty said.

"Count yourselves lucky. If you were inside you would have joined the horde." I said.

"Why were they trying to get to the roof anyway?" Biff asked.

"To walk of it and fall to their death." Lady Ursa said solemnly.

"The attack was designed to cripple the company by killing their employees the beastial ones anyway." I said as the I noticed seven more employees- human ones walk out onto the roof.

My mistress started to leave the prototype. I shook my head at her.

"Better not I don't know what caused the staff to go lemming. If you or the wolf pack go into the building it could happen to you to."

Lady Ursa, Biff, Dusty and Looper agreed.

"We have to find out what caused this." My mistress said.

"We also have to find out how to reverse it."

"Also who is responsible as well." The wolves said.

"Biff, Dusty and Looper. I think it is had something to do with CAT, have Harriet look at its systems again."

"Affirmative and you two?" The black wolf asked.

"We are going to call for healers to help the injured." My warrior bear said.

"Every one step back into the building!" I warned.

"Alex what happened?" Lisa asked me.

"Someone tried to cripple the company by killing our colleagues."

"How? Why would someone want to do that?" One of the others there asked.

"I am not sure- but someone or some thing tranced our coworkers, causing them to stampede off of the roof."

"Look!" Another woman next to Lisa said gesturing to the incapacitated crowd. "They are getting up!"

(UH OH!)

I walked over to Chemar and the supreme leader who dropped his towel as he stood up.

"Alex what happened?" Chemar groaned.

"The company was attacked. How do you feel?"

"Like someone dropped a several large weights on me."

"Here sir." I said handing Tyrannicus his towel as I admired his perfectly shaped body, his abs, those muscles and that tight tiger butt.

"We were attacked?!" He said taking the towel from me.

"Yes sir. Everyone here was zombified and made to march off the roof."

"How many?" He asked solemnly.

"I don't know- we were too busy trying to save as many as we could." I said to him.

"Chemar, Tyrannicus what is the last thing you two remember?" I asked the cheetah and the tiger.

"We were talking in the message parlor." The cheetah began. "Then I started to feel very foggy."

"Foggy?!"

"Yes." The tiger continued it was like some type of haze had fallen over me.

"Yes, exactly like some opaque haze." The junior knight said continuing.

"There wasn't any thing in the room just something that hit my mind." The supreme leader added.

"It was maybe a minute after that I got up from my chair and left the room." Chemar said.

"For some reason I felt like I must go to the roof." The supreme leader volunteered.

"Yes, I felt that I must go to the roof as well. That there was something important I must do there." The male cheetah said to me.

"You mean like walk off of it like your fellow beastials?" I asked.

I received mixed looks from the two.

"Were you two aware of what you were doing- what others were doing around you?" My she beast asked.

"No it was like nothing else matter in the universe other than the roof." Tyranicus said to us.

"I don't think I noticed any of the other employees even as the crowds started marching over the edge of the building."

"That bears the resemblance of some type of suggestion or mass hypnosis. How did you manage to come out of it?" Lady Ursa asked.

"That was the weird thing about it. It just ended as suddenly as it began." The nervous cheetah said to Ursa and myself.

(Very, very odd indeed.)

Lady Ursa, Chemar and I quickly followed Tyrannicus to the ground floor of site two where we found the remains of our fellow beastials who had fallen to their deaths. Their bodies were strewn at the base of the building- twenty seven in total. The opossum, ferret, duck and bobcat from the Development Department, Tech, Tammy, Tia and Mandy from Marketing were there as well- their eyes still open, still in the trance that had caused them to walk off of the roof. Snowy and Ann were more lucky having landed on the remains of their coworkers- they had some broken limbs but would otherwise be alright. Leo also survived- Lady Ursa and I had stopped the leopard before he could walk off the roof.

The remaining employees both human and beastial, joined the supreme leader looking at our fallen colleagues while we waited for healers to arrive.

"I really liked Tammy!" A woman next to me wept. "She was very nice to me!"

"Mandy was my mentor!" A man said looking at the dead mandrill.

"Tia did not deserve that." Leo said looking a the deceased tapir. "Supreme leader was this related to the threats the company received?" The leopard asked.

"Everyone gather around." The tiger said assuming an authoritative tone despite his towel. Last week I received a communication, the individual or individuals said that this business was no better than Beastial Beauties- that we were actively experimenting on the populace like the previous company. As you know, I denied the accusations. The individual or individuals didn't bother to dispute the facts rather, they said they would destroy the company. That was when I got the knights involved."

"What did the individuals sound like?" Snowy asked glancing at the dead.

"It wasn't a face to face communication. Just a statement." Tyrannicus responded.

"Who ever is responsible for this atrocity- I want them found and dropped from a very high altitude with no net!" A man standing next to me said. That was when I realized that those who worked here at this company humans and beastials were more than just coworkers they were family as well.

It was then that the responders arrived setting up on the grounds of site two. They examined the beastials that had fallen from the roof. They couldn't do anything for the twenty seven that had died.

It would take a good couple of hours for them to examine the remaining employees of the facility all seventy three of them- both human and beastial. There weren't any lingering effects of the whatever it was that hypnotized every beast nor could they say what it was that caused it. In short they were at a loss for words.

Meanwhile Lady Ursa, Chemar and myself met with Tyrannicus. "This is no longer a mission of surveillance." My she beast said to the supreme leader.

"Agreed." The tiger said to us. "I want whoever did this found and punished."

"We are going to start investigating the remaining employees, how long they worked for Counter Earth Cosmetics, their technical skills, their likes and dislikes and affiliations." Chemar said.

"I see what you are getting at. Is it possible that this could be an inside job?" I said to the three beastials.

"Mr. Winter how is it that you know so much about this?" The tiger asked me.

"That's because he is with us." Chemar said.

"So you were undercover? On the inside?" The supreme leader asked.

"For what good it did."

(We were just as helpless to stop this attack too.)

"Our surveillance of the company was from the outside, inside and deep inside." My lady bear said. "If it hadn't been for Alex here many more if not all would have died, including you supreme leader."

"Thank you Alex for saving my life and adverting a massive tragedy." The tiger said to me.

"You are welcome sir but it is not over yet, the knights need to discover who is responsible for this."

Lady Ursa and Chemar set up in the conference room to interview the remaining employees of site two, calling in additional help from other junior knights.

So after an each employee was examined by the healers, they were whisked into the conference room to be interrogated. The wolf pack started conducting their own interrogations at site one in World Three- questioning all the employees there.

Tyrannicus and myself were in a room behind the conference room observing the interrogations. Since I was still technically undercover, I was not allowed to participate in the proceedings.

I also showed the supreme leader the footage the prototype had taken from the forward camera as Lady Ursa tried to stop the stampede.

Tyrannicus just stared. Seeing the image of himself and his subordinates with that empty disconnected look must have really been disturbing.

"We know this is going to be difficult given what happened today, but we must hear every detail of what you have experienced." Chemar asked the distraught owl from Marketing.

"What was the last thing you remember?" My lady bear asked Snowy.

She thought for a moment. "I was in the office with Tammy, Lisa and the others trying to resume my workload which we were finding very difficult because CAT was down. It was quite frustrating. Then CAT was restored as well as the other systems that were down. I remember everyone cheered as we started to return to work."

"And?" Chemar asked.

"That was also around the time I started to feel very foggy. Like some sort of haze had set in in my mind. It was all encompassing and made it very difficult to think. I kept feeling like I needed to go to the roof that there was something important I had to do on there. The feeling became overwhelming. So overwhelming that I couldn't ignore it; I walked out of the office, up the stairwell and to the roof."

"Anything else?" My she beast asked.

"The fog cleared just after shortly afterwards and that was when I realized that I and many others were not on the roof anymore.

"Snowy how long have you worked for the company?" Chemar asked her.

"Since its founding about a two months ago."

"What about prior to that?" My warrior bear asked her.

"I was in event promotions for the World One Museum."

"Ok thank you that will be all Snowy." Chemar said concluding the interview.

My mistress and the junior knight compared notes before moving on to the next interview Lisa also from Marketing.

"I know why you brought me here." The human female said. "You think I am in some way responsible for what happened?"

"We are here to get to the truth." My warrior bear said to the woman. It is very possible that the instigator of the attack on this company could be working from the outside or inside. We are trying to determine that and if it is an inside job are they still here at site two?"

"What is your name?" Chemar asked the woman.

"Lisa Riffel. I also work in Marketing."

"How long have you been working for Counter Earth Cosmetics?" Lady Ursa asked.

"About a five monts. I was one of the first employees to move into this facility when it opened."

"What about prior to that?" Chemar asked.

"I was a street vendor. I spent a good seven months looking for my first job out of school. No one wanted to hire a human. So I went into business by myself selling food. It was hard work, the hours were long and the profit was low. But everyone has to make a living some how. One day the supreme leader happened upon my stand. He observed my drive and determination- he realized that I could be so much more than just a street vendor; he offered me a job at his company not caring that I was human."

"Let's move on to to this morning." My she beast said redirecting the interview. "What did you see and when did you see it?"

"I was in the office with Tammy, and the others when CAT went down and the other systems shortly afterwards. We struggled to try to get our work done. Any work. Shortly after that Alex and Tech went to look at CAT's core and they were gone a few hours." It was around 11 AM when CAT came back up and every one was relieved. We started working again. But that was when my coworkers started acting weird- you know the beastial ones. They got up and walked out of the office. But the weird thing was that it was all at of them at the same time! At first I thought it was a animal thing so I let them have their time together. It was about ten minutes later when they didn't return that I started to get concerned. I walked out of the office and ran into Ken, Orville and Jessica from Accounting who had wondered what had happened too. That's when we discovered that they had gone to the roof where...."

"During this time did you notice any sights, sounds or smells? Anything out of the ordinary?" Chemar asked the female.

"No, not really." Lisa replied as her tracking chip was scanned.

The scan confirmed her story that she was a street vendor here in World One before Tyrannicus hired her.

Lady Ursa and Chemar interviewed the remaining seventy three employees- eight humans and sixty five beastials for the rest of the day. The stories the beastials gave were essentially the same- they remembered nothing while being spellbound other than an overwhelming desire to go to the roof of the building.

As for the human employees, the knights' investigation revealed that all were upstanding, tolerant of the High Evolutionary, the empire and beastials. However a few had some relatives that were in the resistance.

It was mid afternoon when we decided to hook up with Biff, Looper and Dusty at site One to compare notes in the supreme leader's office.

"So what are your findings?" Tyrannicus asked as Lady Ursa, Chemar, myself and our counterparts in World Three started the conference call.

"Exactly the same sir." The black wolf said. "We interviewed all the employees at site one and they reported the same urging need to get to the roof for some odd reason.

"The human employees did not experience the same things as their beastial colleagues- they observed them acting weirdly and behaving strangely." The white wolf said.

"Which is the same thing we experienced here during our interviews." Chemar said.

"What caused this attack?" The supreme leader asked.

"We have no further information on that either." The grey wolf said. It seems to have coincided with CAT's outage and then returning to service but we can't be sure.

"So you can't tell me what caused this attack?" Tyrannicus asked growing impatient. "Can anyone tell me if it was the one who made the threats against the company and if it is going to happen again?"

"We do believe that it was the same person or persons who had made threats against this company." Lady Ursa said. "Who that is we don't know and if it is going to happen again we can't be sure."

"Most disturbing indeed madam knight."

"But what if this is the start of something bigger?" I asked all of those in attendance. "I mean what if its not just this company?"

As the shock of my statement reverberated around the room, site one's CAT technician asked to speak to Tyrannicus.

"What is it Harriet?"

"Sir I found something."

"What is that?" Lady Ursa asked.

"While combing and dissecting CAT's systems-, I found a single message embedded within it."

"What was the message?" Chemar asked.

"Seven words. -N, but you can call me Neo." Harriet said. "That is the only thing I could find after hours and hours and hours of digging and analysis.

"Does that mean anything to anyone?" Harriet asked.

I looked at Lady Ursa and she at me. I was going to say something, but thought better of it.

"Thank you Harriet. Keep digging let me know if you find anything else." Tyrannicus said.

Shortly afterward, I decided to return to my office and let the knights continue their meetings. But after a day like today who could work?

As I entered, I realized that I had received some more errand requests probably after CAT came back online. One of them was from Development, they had left some items for me to ferry to Marketing. So again I went to the Development department on the floor above me.

As I entered the office. It was eerily silent; the desks of the employees there were unoccupied, left vacant as if they had just gone to some meeting. But in reality the department had been wiped out. The opossum, ferret, duck and bobcat had walked of the roof with twenty three other employees. I picked up the pads I was to take to Marketing. As I was about to leave, I took one more look at their desks. Each of the employees here, had families- mates, cubs and loved ones who would be affected by the events that took place today. I felt so so bad for each of them.

As I entered Marketing I realized again the extent of the damage that had befallen Counter Earth Cosmetics; I found the remaining employees there- Snowy, Ann, Leo and Lisa hugging and remembering the ewe, tapir, mandrill and donkey I had met only hours earlier.

"I can't believe Tammy, Tia, Mandy and Tech are... dead." The shy fox said breaking down. "What type of monster would kill such beautiful individuals?"

"I don't know Ann." I said to the shy fennec as I entered the department.

"Neither do I." Snowy said as she continued to hug her coworkers.

"I think I know." Leo said breaking the group hug.

Everyone stared at the leopard.

"I have my suspicions. It is most likely someone with a deep seated hatred of the company. Like a former employee or someone from the previous company Beastial Beauties!" The leopard said staring at me.

He was joined by the owl, the fox and the female human.

"Me?!" I said surprised at the accusations.

"I heard you were formerly employed there."

"Not willingly." I added.

"That would be the perfect motivation- revenge against those that damaged and hurt you!" The leopard said assuming an accusatory tone.

"Leo! How could you even think that!" I said to my coworker feeling very hurt.

But then I realized that I was not the only one hurting. These beasts had worked with each other far longer than I have so the pain was very raw.

"It can't be Alex." Lisa said stepping in to defend me.

"Why is that?" The owl asked her human colleague.

"Because he was helping the knights on the roof when you all snapped out of whatever had you."

"That's right." Snowy and Ann said. In unison.

"If not for him and the knights all of the beastials here would have perished." Lisa said staring at the leopard.

"Thanks, but you are giving me too much credit. If the tables were reversed, I know you would have done the same for us non-fur types without hesitation." I said glaring at the embarrassed leopard. "Anyway, these were the pads that someone requested I pick up from Development." I placed them on the counter and decided to returned to my office.

"Seriously CAT how could anyone think I was responsible for what happened today?"

"Alex, the company was attacked today, twenty seven employees are dead and the survivors are trying to deal with that loss. Outrageous accusations are just another form of internal grief."

"I guess you are right CAT." I said staring at my desk. "Despite that it hurt very much."

_"Alex, you have a visitor." _

"Come in." I said turning to the door. It was Leo.

"Alex. I wanted to apologize for my actions just now. We are all hurting after what happened today and will be for some time. I guess I wanted to blame the new guy." The leopard said extending his paw.

I took it. "Apology accepted. I know this was a horrible day for everyone in this company..."

"But thanks to you and the knights- you prevented it from being a far worse day." Leo said sitting down at my desk.

"Agreed." I said to him.

"There is a c-company wide message coming in." CAT stuttered.

"What is it?" Leo asked.

"The S-supreme L-leader has ordered that I be deconstructed and purged, so that whatever caused m-my system wide failures today w-would be eliminated."

"Looks like that announcement came at the right time." The leopard said to me.

"Why is that?" I asked Leo.

"It looks like it is happening again." He said staring at me.

We then looked at CAT as his holo projection started to fade to black.

"CAT how are you feeling?"

_"V-very sluggish Mr. Winter. It is like I am trying to run through t-tar..." _ The Counter Earth Cosmetics Access Terminal said falling silent.

"CAT are you ok?" Leo asked.

"CAT? It looks like he was down again." I said to the leopard. "It is a good thing that it is time to go home now anyway."

As I made that statement, the holo projection suddenly returned. But it wasn't CAT. It was a message from the instigator of today's events. Leo and I stared at each other in disbelief and then back at black image with white lettering:

*TEST SUCCESSFUL... ALL DONE.... FOR NOW.... *

To Be Continued....