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Alchedias Chronicles

CHAPTER ONE: STRANGERS(part one)

The pale crescent moon could have been seen if it were not for the dark storm clouds that engulfed the skies that late summer night. The rain finally stopped and the streets of the small port town of Kriabell were soon shrouded in thick fog. The fog fell like a theater curtain at the end of a performance, ending the day's many stories, however...

"All right, you lazy bums, move it!" the slim mouse of white fur, around his mid twenties, shouted from his megaphone. "We've wasted too much time as it is!" The mouse stood in the middle of port as the many longshoremen passed him by, unloading cargo from a large foreign freighter, following his obnoxious commands to the letter. It was easy for him to bark orders as he did, seeing as he wore a black suit and a pair of expensive dress shoes. It just showed that he wasn't going to lift a finger. Everyone on overtime that night continued to unload the heavy wooden crates from the ship, everyone except two that is.

"What the hell is that rat in the monkey suit think he's doing!?" asked an older, more muscular male tiger, sitting on top of a wooden crate along with a male fox of the same age.

"Well, he is the guy in charge for tonight, is he not?" calmly asked the fox.

"Like hell he is!" the muscular feline angrily responded. "That little brat shouldn't have the right to boss us around like this and do you know why?" It was apparent that the tiger was pissed to the point of no return, being a longshoreman for as long as he has it was hard for him to take orders from the uppity little mouse. The fox, on the other hand, quietly sat at his side and calmly took a sip of his coffee. He took the time to draw out a long sigh before speaking.

"It's because of his relationship with the boss, isn't it Gene?" asked the vulpine so matter of factly. Marcus, the fox, wasn't even giving Gene any form of eye contact. He simply sat there as he always did, staring at vast ocean while paying the other no mind.

"Exactly!" his friend loudly exclaimed. "I mean c'mon, do you honestly think that this little punk could actually get a job without his old man's help?"

"Of course not", the fox replied. "...but we've known the boss for a while now and he's a pretty busy guy. It's not surprising that he hired another supervisor to take care of things. Besides, fact that he's got the job means that has connections and that's more than I can say for us", disappointment lingered in Marcus' words. He took an even longer sip of his coffee. "The lucky bastard..." Marcus didn't realize that he'd let that last bit slip out, however Gene did.

"Wait, what did you just say?" Gene was undoubtedly shocked by his friends' words. It was actually something to laugh to. "Hell, in all my years working with ya I never hear ya curse!" he said without any effort in holding back his laughter.

"Why should that matter?" the fox asked, "and what's wrong with you anyway, your acting a little...different". It was obvious that something was wrong, quickly shifting from sour to sweet was never the tiger's strong suit. Gene usually never acted like this during work hours, which actually made Marcus concerned. He was beginning to become so irritably noisy that the others were eying the two slacking off in that corner and it wasn't long before the "rat in the monkey suit" started to notice too. "Alright Gene, you seem a little too happy for your own good, tell me what's going on". The fox sent a worried look towards Gene, but there was no response. "I mean you're usually not this giddy until you get so-", Marcus paused mid-sentence. 'Wait a minute...' the though quickly clicked into the vulpine's head. In that instant, Marcus swiped away the coffee cup Gene held in his paw. His grip was abnormally loose. With one sip, his mouth was filled with an awful, yet familiar taste. It quickly sent a burning sensation down his throat, which only meant one thing... "Aw hell, Scotch!"

"Hey! What the hell do you think you two are doing!?" The mouse was pointed his megaphone toward the slacking pair. Marcus' eyes widened as heard his voice. "Get back to work or else!" Gene lethargically turned in the mouse's direction.

"Or else what? Can't you see we're on our break?" Gene asked. A break? That pretty much got the others' attention, but it didn't really matter to them much, so as long as they're getting paid. Those two are always on their little "breaks". "And ya know what? If you didn't have such a huge stick up your ass and always barking orders, we'd let you join us!" the tiger cheerfully spoke with open arms, hoping that his superior would accept the offer. The other longshoremen who caught wind of Gene's inebriated offer began to chuckle as they continued to unload cargo from the docked foreign freighter as the mouse boss furiously marched towards the two furs.

"Who do those two goofballs think they are?" the well dressed mouse muttered to himself as grew dangerously close to his pray. "Oh I'll show them, alright. Nobody makes a fool out of Raymond Mcvouce!"

'Alright note to self, always check Gene's coffee before the beginning of every one of his shifts', that was the only solution Marcus could come up with at this point, however it was too late at this point. His friend could lose his job because of this, after all. Marcus jumped off the old crate and frantically ran towards the enraged mouse. "Listen sir, I'm really sorry for my friend", Marcus spoke too quickly and began to stumble over his words. All the while Raymond picked up speed as the fox continued to keep up with the bean sprout of a boss while walking backwards. "You see, he's not feeling so well and-", he was interrupted mid-sentence.

"Oh he's sick, alright. He's sick in the head!" the mouse started to glare at Marcus. "How old is he anyway, Fifty, sixty?" he chuckled to himself after giving it thought. "Maybe it's just his age catching up to him.", at that point that little smile of his grew larger by the second. "I think it's time for this old cat to go into retirement", that small chuckle instantly turned into a full-blown laugh. "Stand aside!" he demanded as he weakly shoved Marcus to the side. As Raymond approached, Gene, drunk as he was, attempted to awkwardly stand on his own two pads. It actually took him a few seconds to regain what was left of his composure before he could imitate the arms-crossed pose of a sober man.

"You listen here, you old geezer..." the mouse angrily stood too close to the drunken tiger. He stood at a height of 5 foot 3; however Gene, without the constant shifting and near loss of balance, stood a 6 foot 2. His glaring eyes couldn't pierce through the tiger's intoxicated, glazed-over look in his eyes. "What makes you think you and your friend can just slack off at a time like this? In case you didn't know, East Capital has been suffering a shortage in medical equipment for hospitals. Now we usually import the stuff from the De Lushian Empire across the western sea, but due to the recent acts of piracy in that area we're lucky enough to get at least one ship through without any trouble". He narrowed his eyes in seriousness, "I don't know who you are, but what I do know is that you work for my father so that means you work for me as well. His workers are my workers too, ya got that!" Raymond continued on, but the fact that Gene seemed unfazed by what he said threw him off a bit. He continued to stare at Gene, but he seemed unresponsive. In fact it didn't even look like the tiger was even looking at the guy. "L-look you, I can have you fired and send you back home in a heart beat, so ether get to work or go home!"

"No, you listen here, you little runt", those words carried a heavy amount of frustration as Gene continued to speak, his face getting closer the mouse's at each passing moment. Marcus just stood there in shock at what was happening. "I work my tail off working here for 37 years, that means I've been working the docks before you were even born and yet you have the gall to show such disrespect, such nonsense to me!?", Gene took a huge step forward and made Raymond trip over himself as he attempted to take a step back. The mouse was on his back, cowering as the muscular tiger awkwardly crouched down to send a lazy glare at his direction on eye level. The staring continued, never ceasing, never blinking. The tension was high, no doubt about it. One cowered in fear and the other started to giggle. Gene was really giggling to himself. Raymond couldn't help but feel confused and gave him a scared, quizzical look.

"W-w-wait, what?" he stammered. As the giggling continued, it quickly became a full laugh. The smell of alcohol on Gene's breath with each chuckle sent chills down his spine and a toe-curling scent down his nose.

"Man, you are so easy, and you said you were going to fire me?" the tiger rhetorically asked as he quickly rose to his feet. "Well I got your pink slip right here, kid!"

Marcus was speechless. He didn't know what to say about this whole mess, or how to even react. Before he knew it, thought, Gene was beginning to unbuckle his pants in front of his superior. 'Holy crap, what the hell's he doing?' Marcus thought.

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To be continued...