Fursonae X Machina: Episode 3 - Revelations of Honour by Klesk Vadrigaar

Fursonae X Machina: Episode 3 - Revelations of Honour

Klesk Vadrigaar, Bisexual, Fox, M/M/F, Raptor, Sci-Fi, Tentacles, Threesome, Violence (Not In Yiff), Vixen

WARNING:

This episode, just like the two previous episodes, carries a KVSSB adult rating due to scenes of graphic violence, language and M/M/F sex between a fox, a vixen and a velociraptor. All those who have successfully made it into the second decade of their life may read on and enjoy. Those who are still struggling to make it past their first decade are kindly asked to please stop reading now and go do something more suited to their age group.

NOTES:

Well here we are at the third instalment to what is fast becoming my most in demand story series yet. One thing I've noticed after finishing this and looking over my plans for the couple episodes, it looks as though I may have to backtrack a bit on my statement that episode two would introduce the rest of the cast. As it is I will in fact be continually adding new characters as I move along.

On a related note, I should probably take a moment to explain one other thing to avoid further confusion:

Several members of the main cast (namely Jason, Kryssa and one or two others) are formed from old fursonas which I've tried using at one point or another during my ventures into the furry fandom (hence the title of the series). The reason I'm bringing this up now is to explain why this story features a character with a slightly differently spelt version of my name, it's because that's the fursona I adopted before finally settling on my current Arctic Dragon self. Just thought you might be wondering.

Right now the standard fare. This fic and its entire cast are copyright Klesk Vadrigaar 2005 and may be used with permission.

If at the end you find you wish to send praise or have something constructive to say about what you've read, then please direct it to [email protected] (PLEASE!! I can't hope to improve without feedback).

Last but not least I'd also like to thank everybody for their patience. I'll try my best to hammer these out faster from now on.

Fursonae X Machina

Episode 3: Revelations Of Honour

Written by Klesk Vadrigaar

May 24th

11:46 pm -

*Let him keep going, he's coming after you now, just as you wanted him to.*

The thoughts ran through the hunter's mind as he watched his prey tear through one of the numerous rain swept alleys of Los Angeles.

Methodically he surveyed the ground beneath him, listening through the hyper-sensitive sonar receptors on his helmet for the occasional loud splash of water amidst the never ending pitter-patter of the rain that indicated where his prey was.

*He's angry and unfocused. No sense in making his last moments any harder. Just let him come to you.*

It couldn't have been more than an hour ago that the two morphs had been blissfully unaware of each other's existence. The one on the ground, a grey raccoon, had been half-way through a night shift on the streets with his partner while the eagle perched on the roof of a nearby building had just taken out another of his targets in the adjoining state.

Less than 45 minutes ago the coon had gone off to grab some coffee from a street side meka-vendor after receiving a heads-up that the LA branch of the C.S.F. was at last planning to raid the warehouse he'd been staking out for the last day and some after receiving a report from the Network that it was in fact one of thousands across the U.S. being used for some major league gun running operation.

30 minutes ago his partner, a female gallamimus, had felt a slight nip to the back of her neck as she sat waiting in the craft. It hadn't been painful, probably nothing worse than what an average mosquito might inflict.

Except there weren't any more mosquitoes around to bite her, well at least not on Neo-Terra.

25 minutes ago she'd begun feeling rather flushed and had decided to have the craft unseal her window so she could let in some air. It was a innocent enough move, the craft was unmarked, she wasn't wearing her standard armoured stealth suit or white trench coat and her carefully picked casual attire concealed all hints of the nano-mek augmented veins on her body. To any passing morph she'd have looked like every bit like another common civilian rather than an agent of the elite C.S.F.

20 minutes ago the coon had returned to find her head laying limply out of the window with smoke still wafting up from the flawlessly aimed laser bored hole in the centre of her head. Before he'd even had a chance to drop the cups he was carrying he'd also felt a slight nip to the back of his neck. Somewhere out of the corner of his eye, he'd just barely managed to make out the distant silhouette of something spreading its wings and taking flight.

Everything from then to now had just been one mammoth chase through the city.

*There was no other option. You'd never have been able to keep up with her or out distance her if she'd been allowed to start running.*

The eagle gave a nod and continued to listen as the splashes grew louder. His prey was at last getting warm after blindly trying to tail the avian and only succeeding in getting himself lost. Good.

The bird's helmet visors lit up with an eerie glow as he craned his neck to glance over the edge of the building and down to the street. Through his now active IR/Bio-filters he could make out the small form of the coon as he burst out of an alley and frantically searched his surroundings. He looked decidedly less steady on his feet; in fact his feet looked as though they were having extreme difficulty just supporting him at the moment even though there was no visible sign that they were injured. His eyes were also betraying an odd mixture of want for revenge and pained confusion as though something was happening in his body that he didn't quite understand.

*Perfect, he seems to be succumbing to the effects of the standard dosage quickly enough.*

The bird stood up and watched as the coon violently shook his head and leaned against a pipe as he felt over his badly wobbling legs, his bleary eyes radiating more confusion.

*Give it a while longer to work. He just has to die, no need for him to suffer through it.*

The avian crouched again and continued to watch his prey stumble about, clearly worsening by the minute.

Presently however he was jolted out of his concentration by the crackling sound of mono-wings hovering low over building tops nearby. With nary a flicker the eagle unfolded and draped his great brown wings over his form. The metallic sheen on the back of the feathers flickered momentarily before altering various aspects of its colour scheme until it blended in perfectly with its surroundings. Thus camouflaged, the avian bowed his head and calmly waited as the craft passed overhead, pausing for a moment to survey the premises before flapping its wings to gain some altitude and continuing on, having apparently found nothing of interest.

Knowing the raccoon must have also heard it, the eagle folded back his wings and stepped over to look down again. The raccoon had definitely heard it, but from the looks of things he clearly wasn't in any position to flag it down.

To his credit he did try though, which made it all the more sad when his legs chose that moment to finally give out and he found himself falling face first into a puddle.

*Enough, he most likely isn't feeling anything now. Get down there and make it quick.*

Standing up and stretching his wings out, the eagle allowed himself to fall over the side of the building, gracefully descending head first down into the murky depths beneath him before flipping over and using his wings to slow his fall, making a perfect, silent landing on the ground below.

With severe difficulty the coon attempted to raise his head and see his new visitor in a better light but his eyes seem to not be working properly any more, ditto for his paws as the avian easily kicked his U.A.P. out of reach. The raccoon didn't even put up a fight, just groaned and lay his head back down into the water, finally surrendering to whatever it was in him that was forcing his muscles to shut down.

*That's it, sleep now. You won't feel a thing.* The bird thought as he gazed at his paralysed target, glad that he hadn't had to fight him as he'd been forced to do with the first few agents he'd taken out.

The C.S.F. strike team would find nothing at the warehouse; his boss had been quick to see that the workers there finished up with the production of the guns and cleared out ahead of schedule.

All that remained now was to ensure that the last morph that might still be able to provide evidence to the contrary left the picture as quietly and discreetly as possible.

"May you finally find peace in the next life." The bird said quietly as he placed the barrel of the Rabban MB-85 Hyper-blaster rifle mounted on his arm against the head of the twitching agent.

Thunder soon roared out amidst the pitter-patter of the falling rain.

May 25th

12:32 p.m. -

"So let's see if I've gotten the facts straight here." Jason said as he studied his data tablet. "You woke up around an hour ago, while Network service drones were completing some standard maintenance work on your apartment complex's water heater, waited until you'd received notification that they were finished and then went to take a shower. Whilst in there you heard the front door to your apartment open and peeked out of the stall to see a morph walk past the bathroom but were unable to make an ID because of the steam from the shower. Ten minutes later you stepped out to find your wife lying dead on the floor of the kitchen and ran out the front door to see a brown bear matching the description of your next door neighbour running out into one of the grav-shafts. You then immediately contacted us. Have I got that right?"

"Y-yes sir agent." The wolf nodded as he rubbed his eyes as if trying hard not to cry. "I still can't believe this has happened, and Deus only knows how I'm going to find the will to keep living." He grabbed for a nearby box of tissues.

Jason nodded and patted the lupine's shoulder. "For what it's worth I'd like to offer up my most humble condolences for your loss."

>Then I must ask that you do it quickly Agent Dermont, Commander Cyan has requested that both you and Agent Sharon return to HQ immediately.< A familiar voice resonated in the vulpine's mind.

*Finally, some welcome news.* Jason sighed as he sent back. ~Copy that Pericles, we'll be there shortly. ~

He transferred a copy of the data from the tablet to his suit's wrist-comp and then tucked it under his arm. "I need to go back to HQ and file this with our administrator. A full team will be sent here soon to conduct forensics and the like. Till then the other agents waiting outside will be here if your neighbour returns." The red fox spoke calmly, trying to soothe the despairing wolf.

"Th-thank you, you're very kind."

"Just doing my job sir." He replied as he got up and walked out of the lobby, pausing momentarily to address the ring-tailed lemur and leopard spotted gecko standing at the door. "Make sure he doesn't leave the premises or go back upstairs. I'll have Pericles dispatch a full squad of meka-drones immediately." He looked back at the grieving wolf and then whispered "Don't feel you have to be gentle when it comes to the take down."

"I suspected as much. Okay leave him to us." The lemur winked at him behind the screen of her opti-visor. Jason nodded his approval and stepped into the grav-shaft to descend to the basement.

#"Ooh Deus only knows how I'm going to find the will to keep living." Yeah I'll bet the 85,000,000 solaris his wife got from her lottery wins should provide a most adequate means of helping him to move on!# The voice echoed mockingly through his cerebral link.

~Didn't fool me either Sharon, I just can't believe that he actually expects to get away with it this time.~ Jase sent back as he strode towards the patrol craft and got in.

"I told you, that's how this ring of greedy sickos operate. They find morphs with money, they marry the morphs with money and then they murder the morphs, pin the blame on someone else, and while we're bogged down in a wild goose chase they spread the money out into numerous on-net and off-world accounts and disappear into the body of society again." The blue vixen sitting in the passenger seat explained. "They've been going at it for nearly a year now in various places across the globe. Makes me glad we've finally managed to nail one of them before they themselves went off-world or skipped to another dimension." She crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair.

"Well assuming he doesn't get edgy or suspicious, I think we can safely assume things are about to take a very rocky turn for the worst for him and his co-conspirators."

Sharon grinned and nodded. "I tell you, if there was ever one advantage to pride, it's that it's guaranteed to eventually make you sloppy in what you do."

She reached over and took the data tablet from Jase to read through it.

"Geez, 'Victim could not make a positive identification because of the steam...' puh-leez, this alone could stand as substantial enough evidence to convict him."

"I'll say, no use making up an excuse as to why any images we retrieve from your retina will be too hazy to determine if you're not even going to try to hide the trademark lines where you've had your vision incapacitators installed." Jason tutted.

Sharon looked back at her partner. "Actually I was referring to the fact that due to the standard safety checks Network drones always carry out after performing any sort of maintenance work, the hot water should've come back on some time around...now." She checked the watch on her wrist-comp. "Well I hope he enjoyed his cold shower. Be plenty more where he's headed."

Jase accessed the statement on his opti-visor and scanned through it. "Oh yeah, that's also a legitimate point. Well spotted."

"It's why I'm so revered in what I do." Sharon smiled sweetly. "Shall we head back and see what Pericles needs us for?"

"Sounds ideal."

12:56 p.m.-

A brief span of time later both vulpines stepped through the entrance to the NY C.S.F. HQ still picking out flaws in the wolf's statement.

Good of you to make it back here on such short notice. - One of Pericles' remote probes floated down to greet the two.

"Hey my thanks to you for giving us a valid excuse to high tail it out of that place." Sharon hmphed and folded her arms. "I can't stand being around such depraved psychotics."

Then I would advise you get used to the feeling. There is a far more alarming situation developing which you must be informed of immediately. -

Sharon looked up at the probe, the frustration on her face fading to concern. "Why? What's happening that we need to be made aware of?"

Pericles dipped slightly lower. - It's probably better that Commander Cyan tells you in person. The other operatives concerned have already been assembled. Please report to her office now. -

The probe floated off down the hallway as Jase turned to regard his partner. "What do you think? Does this sound like another one of his little paranoia trips or something far more serious?"

Sharon was starting look decidedly more worried. "For once in my life Jase, I'm actually inclined to believe it's the latter."

The two hurried off after the A.I.

12:58 p.m.-

Cyan sat in her office, eyes closed, arms propped on the desk with her head resting on her folded paws, trying to hide the agitated and deeply worried look on her ground squirrel face.

Valerie sat on the couch to her left, her own features staring in frightened bewilderment and disgust at the data tablet she held in her paws while Kryssa, her vampire bat companion, sat opposite her contemplating something on the wall with her stern set violet eyes.

Into this unusually sombre atmosphere stumbled Jason and Sharon, both panting slightly as if they'd run all the way from the entrance.

"Cyan we're here. What's up?" Sharon asked, her foreboding sense of doom increasing when she saw who else was present.

"Oh, hi Bunny girl." She put on a somewhat forced smile as she unstrapped her SF katana sword from her back and sat next to the cheetah bunny.

"Sharon, Jason, please have a seat, I've got some bad news."

Jason quickly slid in next to Kryssa as Cyan placed her paws on the desk and looked up at the computer interface terminal located on the wall opposite her.

"Pericles, link up."

A slowly rotating white wire-frame cube with a CRO line inside (Pericles' preferred hologram form) materialised next to the screen.

"Bring up the latest confidential files you've received from the Network."

At once, Commander Cyan.-

A photo of a Chihuahua appeared on the left of the screen as his credentials, identifying him as an agent of the C.S.F's Antezuma City branch, were spelled out on the right. After a moment the file was replaced by one of a snowshoe hare from the same city, and then one of a chipmunk from the Phoenix branch in Arizona followed by a caiman from further down in New Santanas, then an elk from Washington and so on...

"These are the relative agents who were assigned to aid in the search and investigation of the other orga-gun manufacturing plants suggested in the information Valerie retrieved from the one in Brooklyn last week." Cyan explained as the display continued. "According to the latest from Intel they too located several areas that could possibly have been used to produce and ship those weapons. Only thanks to the information we supplied them with they were able to take extra safety measures while trying to confirm their suspicions."

"Great! Then we're that much closer to bringing an end to this sickening ordeal!" Sharon said enthusiastically.

That is before she looked across and noticed the still solemn features on her commander's face. "Uhh, right?"

For a while that appeared to be the case, Agent Lysan. - Pericles said. - Until around 23:45:16 EST on 19/05/34 when the Network was first informed of this tragic occurrence.-

The image on the screen changed to show the Chihuahua from before, only now he was lying on a medical bed and looked like he'd just gone ten rounds with a school of piranhas and then been plucked out of the water by some rutting rhino who had suddenly remembered he was due to compete in a rowing competition that day and was desperately looking for something to practice with.

Apparently the fictional rower had decided he didn't fancy the risk that the dog might tell others the story of his desperate act later on as in addition to the macabre design of bite marks, missing patches of skin, wrenched bones and bruises, the canine was also supporting a very visible hole through the centre of his head. The time of death and autopsy report appeared on the right, showing a disturbingly long list of injuries.

"It gets better." Cyan said forlornly as the image shifted to show the snowshoe hare, ears ripped to shreds with a frighteningly large portion of his chest blown apart.

Sharon felt someone grab her arm and looked over to see Valerie clinging tightly to her with a look of sickened fear in her eyes as the gruesome slide-show continued, showing that every last one of the agents previously named was now a member of whatever it was that inspired the Elder's notion of the afterlife.

I trust you see the reason for our concern. - Pericles said as the screen went back to displaying the normal variety of Network updates, video feeds from around HQ, news broadcasts and the like.

Sharon slowly turned to look back at the squirrel, her eyes betraying a sense of trying to look shocked but being hindered somewhat by a sheer blunt refusal to believe what she'd just seen. "C-Cyan, is, is this for real???"

"I'm afraid so, Sharon. So far every agent that's come anywhere close to actually uncovering another supply of orga-guns has been assassinated before they can produce anything concrete. One or two of them managed to get raids authorised but somehow whoever's behind this got wind beforehand and took the appropriate measures to ensure they never found anything incriminating. The C.S.F. has lost 14 agents in the last week because of this case and so far we've nothing to show for it besides your initial discoveries!" Cyan slammed her fists on the desks before leaning back in her chair and letting out a very audible groan of frustration.

"I had my suspicions that we'd be unleashing a horde of trouble by continuing to delve further into this debacle." Kryssa said in her normal pessimistic tone. "But I never had any idea the cost would amount to this." A very brief hint of worry crossed her face as she glanced over at the cheetah bunny.

"Indeed Kryssa, and that's why I decided it was best for all of you to not play any further part in the investigation until we'd gotten a better idea of what the C.S.F. was letting itself in for." Cyan folded her arms over her chest. "I may have to accept that there will be losses from time to time but that doesn't mean I'm going to blindly send my best troops in to be slaughtered."

Jason continued to stare wide eyed at the screen for several more minutes before turning down to his gloved paws and slowly clenching them into fists. "How could anyone on this planet possibly have the ability to take out that many agents in such a short space of time?? We're trained and customised to be able to stop small armies in their tracks, what could any morph without official military training or backing have that's superior!?" He sounded somewhat akin to a kit that had just discovered the comic book hero he'd idolised for years had been unceremoniously killed off by some third rate bad guy.

Sensing the growing tension in her partner, Sharon leaned over and took hold of his paw while she gently patted him on the shoulder. "Jase you know we're not invincible. Even with all our cybernetic augmentations, weaponry and elite military training we still have our faults. Someone, or more likely a group, has obviously just discovered how to exploit them to their advantage."

And despite what the majority of organiks may wish to believe we are not without our flaws either agent. Why else would all A.I.s of the Terran Network continue to unanimously press the notion that it is impossible for us to construct a perfect world or breed a perfect being? - Pericles added, bringing an odd cringe from Sharon as he did so.

"But I don't understand Cyan. If those other agents were killed for getting too close to exposing this operation why has no one tried to take us out yet?" Valerie asked meekly.

"Pericles and I can only assume they're trying not to arouse the suspicions of the general public. Everybody knows about what went on with your ordeals but high command made sure the others were recruited in secret. Aside from the few conspiracy nuts out there this whole string of killings would just look like a general act of revenge that could've been enacted by any major crime organisation." The squirrel huffed. "Or more likely just a long string of bad luck."

Sharon gazed over at the felapin who was shaking her head in sadness and put a comforting arm around her. "So then, what are we going to do?"

Cyan took a deep breath. "As of now my top priorities are ensuring your collective safety and doing what I can on my end to get to the bottom of this mystery." She again tilted her head to regard her agents, analysing each one of them in turn. "And from what I've seen over the past few days you all seem imbued with a cast iron will to protect your respective partners with enough drive left over to keep yourselves intact too. Added to that is the fact that you clearly get on very well with them as well as your ability to combine your talents with theirs."

She picked up one of the data tablets on her desk and studied it for a moment. "In fact I'd say the only way you four could be of any more use is if you worked in tandem with each other."

She put it back down and folded her paws. "Hence I have decided to make a rather drastic change to your assigned placements: as of now the four of you are to be combined into one elite team. I want all of you to work together to help solve this conundrum as quickly as possible."

Sharon contemplated for a moment and then cocked an eyebrow. "Uh sorry to bring this up right now Cyan, but don't C.S.F. directives clearly state that teams may only consist of a maximum of two agents at any given time?"

Indeed so Agent Lysan. But after hearing the Commander's arguments that by doing this we will drastically increase our chances of preventing the termination of any more morphs I have come to the conclusion that it may be best if I overlook this violation for the time being. After all, consider how much good Alex Murphy managed to do by going against the orders of OCP and the Detroit Police Department. - Pericles chimed in.

The squirrel nodded in agreement and looked over at cheetah bunny. "Valerie have you and Callista made any further progress with your study of the orga-guns we have?"

"Somewhat, we've been able to map out the mechanics of how they work as well as what their limitations are but I still can't seem to find a satisfactory answer to how they managed to acquire all those corpses so discreetly and, more importantly, how the hell they managed to get the necessary parts out in such a perfectly preserved condition." Val shrugged. "If I had one of the bodies to work with I could probably come up with an answer relatively quickly."

"I'll have the city morgue transport a few of them over for you. In the mean time you all are to stay here within the safety of HQ and see if you can come up with some new leads. Don't leave unless you feel you've got something absolutely solid to go on, understand?"

"Absolutely Cyan." Sharon said.

"We won't let you down." Kryssa nodded.

Cyan exhaled and smiled as her agents gathered their things up and left the office.

*Let's just hope they don't forget how to stay alive.*

2:17 p.m. -

"Very well then Mr. Starkot, I shall bring up your proposal to the board at our meeting tomorrow." the grey rabbit stated to the black bear on his holo-terminal.

"Thank you Dr. Brekken, this should more than help us through while we're recuperating."

"Merely trying to help." the lapin shrugged as the link went dead.

*Though considering how long you're going to be indebted to me after this you might as well just hand over your business now and spare yourself the despair and humiliation later on.*

Brekken sighed and gazed out of the windows of his office. While he could probably make use of the extra revenue this deal would bring in later on it still aggravated him somewhat that so many morphs still preferred to ask for a helping hand from acquaintances that they'd never be able to pay back fully in anything other than their own blood with the compounded interest.

*It doesn't take that much effort to stand on your own two (or otherwise) feet when the world is doing its worst to you. Show you've got the will to fight and others won't try to run you into the ground. It's what I did when times were tough, and look where it got me.*

Brekken contemplated the comparison for a moment.

*Then again most others probably don't have such an extraordinary 'gift' as me.* The doctor mused as he checked over the stocks of his company again. Everything was in the green and still climbing steadily, just like it'd been doing for going on four weeks now.

In fact, now that he thought about it, under his leadership the longest stint that the Telsnet Corporation had been in the red for came in at less than 28 days and even then it hadn't dropped by much more than 4.5%.

Brekken leaned back in his chair and relaxed. His dealings in the arms trade may not be quite going according to plan but seeing as his company was being its normal inhumanely successful self any damages he incurred would be smoothed over in due course.

*Nonetheless it's still a good idea to ensure that there aren't any further possibilities of hindrance while we're making the final transactions.*

Brekken activated the intercom. "Laura, I'm initiating a full audio and visual suppression field and shutting down all non-essential links to the Network while I take care of some personal business. Do not authorise any further calls or transmissions until I say so."

"Of course doctor." The young kinkajou on the screen replied meekly. "Uhh, sir may I make a quick request before you do so?"

"What is it?"

Laura waved her palm in the air and a holo-image of a document of some sort materialised. "Well, I hate to ask you this but could you please authorise this application so I can take a few days off?"

She swallowed and bowed her head as if in shame while Brekken looked her over.

"Send it through to me." He responded.

The kinkajou pressed something on the image and it folded up into a much smaller version of itself. This she slid into the screen of her terminal and cringed as she transmitted it to the lapin. "I'm terribly sorry. I know my needs probably don't rank very high on the company's list of priorities but it is kind of urgent."

Brekken brought it up on his terminal and quickly scanned through the contents. "This shouldn't present a problem. Consider it approved." He entered the necessary validation commands. "In fact contact JFK and tell them to ready my personal Lexflyer craft. It should get you there with far less hassle than normal registered transport."

On screen the kinkajou looked up surprised and then quite relieved. "Oh thank you sir, I didn't mean to trouble you with this."

"I believe heading off to check on a hospitalised family member constitutes as a fair enough request." He adjusted his glasses and looked back at the intercom. "Make sure they have the atmospheric filters tuned to your preferred scent as well as some of your choice of music put on."

"I'll return as soon as I'm sure the worst is over." Laura replied.

"Please do, the less time I have to entrust my work to some blasted mek-drone the better." Brekken scowled as he severed the link and then set about shutting down any system that connected his office to the vast expanse of the Terran Network as well as setting the windows to self-tint while also activating a sound suppression field around the room, essentially cutting off anyone's means of being able to look or listen in.

*There, that should keep out any prying computer eyes.*

For the first time that day, the lapin smiled slightly as he turned his chair around to face the wall behind him and flicked his ears towards it in an odd way.

As if on cue part of the wall vanished, revealing a hidden grav-shaft just large enough for him to stand in. Brekken's smile grew wider as he got up, walked into the wall and descended down to some hidden level below him.

*Greatest advantage to long ears, plenty of room for implanting activation chips.*

2:21 p.m. -

Brekken finally touched down in his private laboratory. Encompassing the size of two basket ball courts, it was stocked with a multitude of state-of-the-art research devices and specimen holding pens as well as numerous banks of computer terminals which were monitoring all forms of activity on the Network.

While it was all fairly standard in terms of design, there was the one odd factor that not a single piece of the machinery appeared to be automated or computer controlled and that the lab was strangely devoid of all the necessary meks and service drones that one would normally expect to find in such a hi-tech layout.

*Exactly how a proper working place should be, with the thinking left to those with an actual brain!!*

Nodding as the faint smile faded from his face, the grey rabbit strode over to a small enclave on the far side of the room which contained a single chair in the middle of a grid of mirrored surfaces adorning all of the three walls. Dusting off his pin striped business suit and straightening his tie, Brekken brought up the controls and entered several commands before stepping into the enclave and sitting down.

For a moment all was still, and then another wall slid into place behind him, shutting out the rest of the lab as the grid pattern suddenly lit up and then faded away, leaving the lapin sitting in the midst of a 'Matrix' landscape. Computer code swept up, down and across the brightly lit environment in long trailing lines as several disc shaped interface consoles materialised in the air around him in a semi-circle.

*Admittedly this may be a decidedly less reliable means of communication to use. But at least it's more private than the Hyper-Realm.* The lapin thought as he brought up a channel. Several moments past before the eagle assassin materialised on the console.

"Yes doctor, I am receiving you." he responded.

"Good, don't worry this channel is sufficiently secure to talk over. How are you fairing?"

"Almost all of the specified targets have been eliminated, save for the four in New York and two in Nephiran City. The other U.S. branches are now holding back until the Network computers give them the go ahead to start sending in replacements."

The rabbit groaned inwardly. *Typical modern day military logic, always have to go on the words of some machine rather than what your common sense tells you.*

"Then their hesitancy should buy me the necessary time I need to finish up the final stage of production and shipping for this month. Return to New York and monitor the activities there until I send you further instructions. Unlike the others they have my creations in their possession, and I have a feeling your recent activities will only strengthen their resolve. " Brekken narrowed his eyes. "You are to only observe for right now. Do not strike until it looks as though we have no choice."

The eagle nodded and the projection faded out as the rabbit contacted another morph.

"Allermaine, you've received the latest shipment of raw materials I trust."

"Yes sir doctor."

"Good. This time make sure you disintegrate the bodies after you're done with them."

2:27 p.m. -

"Alright, I better get back to work. Don't want to keep you waiting around here too long." Valerie said after grabbing some iced tea and a carrot and lettuce sandwich from the cafeteria replicator machines.

"Valerie the worst thing you could do right now is rush through your studies. Take your time and be thorough, we'll still be here when you're done." Kryssa assured as she leaned in and kissed the felapin on the forehead, much to Sharon and Jason's combined shock and astonishment.

"I know, but still, the sooner I come up with some new info, the sooner we can get back on the streets and deal with this threat." Val said before heading off to the lab.

Kryssa nodded and went to get something of her own while Sharon blinked her eyes in disbelief.

"Okay I'll willingly admit that was one of the few things I'd have never expected to see in my lifetime." The blue vixen said as she took a salad and some lemonade out of the fridge and went to find a table. "Though I suppose after hearing that she'd requested to be partnered up with Bunny girl last week I guess I should've expected something was up."

"Well considering we're going to be seeing a lot more of her you should have an ideal opportunity to ask." Jase replied as he sat down next to his partner with a tray of lasagne and some mineral water, causing Sharon to blink in surprise.

"My my, this certainly is an unexpected switch. Usually I have to come to your rescue after you've been staring forlornly at the buffet line for half an hour trying to decide what to have." She chuckled.

Jase smiled and shrugged slightly. "I'm employing a little trick a friend of mine once suggested. Instead of leaving the decision to the last moment I convinced Pericles to send me a copy of the menus for this week and then planned out my meals in advance using a system based on significant events in history and in my life. About five years ago on this day my sister tried cooking Italian food for the first time so hence I'm having the pasta choice." He explained as he forked a big cheese and tomato sauce drenched noodle into his mouth, trying not to scrunch his nose up too much at the strange smell of the omnosh food.

"I see. Well thanks for making the effort to improve yourself." Sharon smiled happily.

"Just doing what I can to make myself less of a burden on others." The fox replied as he wiped his mouth. "Though I have to admit, I find it a tad disturbing how easy it is to change our administrator's mind on something. Initially he'd wanted to hold off on giving me the info until he'd finished the Sunday options but after I told him that if I had it now I'd be able to get through lunch faster and more efficiently he was suddenly more than happy to spill all."

Sharon quickly put her lemonade down and held her muzzle shut as she tried her best not to snicker until she'd swallowed the liquid in her mouth.

"I know, he does have a habit of relenting if you put up a convincing enough argument." She reached over and patted his paw. "Don't worry, it just shows he trusts you."

Jase regarded the vixen in mild surprise. "Well then, that's a nice switch for me. The administrator in Cincada never made any attempt to try and identify with us. Made the occasions when we'd actually have to work with it that much more difficult."

Sharon nodded. "I'm willing to bet that's how Cyan was able to get the four of us formed together. Probably convinced Pericles that he'd be carrying out the Prime Directive of the Machines to the best possible degree if he let her decision slide."

"'Prevent the extinction of life and preserve it by whatever means necessary.'" Jase recited as he recalled the one rule instilled by the Elders which every single mekanik and computer on Neo-Terra abided by. A rather sad sigh escaped the fox's lips as he looked down at the tray in front of him. "Tell me Sharon, does this frighten you in any way? I mean the slaughtering of those other agents?"

The vixen put her fork down and turned to regard her partner. "Well, I admit I'm shocked and deeply saddened but I don't know if I'd say I'm frightened by it." She reached up to rub his shoulder. "Why, did seeing those files unsettle you?"

Jase leaned forward and rubbed the back of his neck. "I don't really know how I feel about this. I mean I of course want to do the expected thing and bring a swift end to this debacle as Cyan said." He sighed again as he tapped his forehead. "But just thinking about the ease with which those poor souls were taken out with. I mean how the hell do you manage a head shot on a C.S.F. agent? In addition to the bone the shot has to get through a quarter inch thick coating of duramantium metal. Even a .357 sniper round wouldn't do much more than dent that."

Sharon shook her head and moved over to embrace Jason. "There's always a way Jase. Like I said before we're made to be as durable as possible but still there will be times when that just isn't enough. I had to accept that when I first joined up."

Gently she slipped her tongue out to lick over his cheek before kissing it lovingly. "I feel bad for the deaths of those others as well as uneasy at being reminded of our own mortality but wallowing in despair and fear won't do anyone any good. The only way to ensure it doesn't happen to us or to any others is to find this menace and stop it."

*Plus it's not like this comes anywhere close to the horrors you had to go through previously.* The vixen thought sadly to herself while Jase gently gripped her paw.

"Even so, ever since I grew up I've always prided myself on being prepared to deal with any type of trial or problem that existence may throw my way. Now in this situation I'm afraid I'm not gonna know what to do and have to start ad-libbing again, something which as you know is not one of my areas of expertise."

Sharon pulled away from the fox and looked him over. Seeing how upset he seemed to be over the ordeal inspiration suddenly struck the vixen.

"Jase do you remember what I promised you the morning after our first night together? How I'd do anything for you at whatever time?"

Jason didn't seem to catch on immediately. "Yes I do."

"And would you say you probably need something to cheer you up right now?"

He thought it over. "Well yeah, but I don't see how-"

He broke off as his ears registered the unmistakable depressurising of a stealth suit followed by the equally distinctive sound of it being unzipped. Turning around the fox gasped to see his partner slowly opening the front of her uniform to reveal her large and incredibly beautiful breasts.

"Sharon what?"

"Shhh, I want you to relax Jase." She said as she gently took hold of his head and guided it down into the warm inviting confines of her mammaries. "Just enjoy the fact that I'm here and that for the time being we're both together and alright."

Jase could do nothing but murr softly as he laid his head on his lover's breasts, the intoxicating scent of the vixen helping somewhat to put his mind at ease.

"Uh Sharon, while I'm not complaining in any way about your desire to help me, aren't you at all concerned about the fact that we're in the middle of a public area?" He asked looking up at her.

Sharon smiled and gently ran her fingers through his red hair. "Not really, just means the other agents will have something nice to look at while they're having lunch." A chuckle arose from the vixen as she caught the wide-eyed stare of several other morphs who quickly averted their gaze. "Besides it's not like there are any laws prohibiting this kind of thing so I figure let's just enjoy the attention."

Jason closed his eyes and murred again as his paws slipped around his partner's waist to hold her closer to him. Her tits felt very soft and comforting against his face, and the soothing sound of her heart beating underneath told the fox that indeed for the moment he could relax. Tenderly he moved his head up and then slowly dragged it back down, letting his muzzle rake through the cerulean fur as he continued to breath in the soft scent.

"Mmm, feel free to suckle if you want." Sharon said, delighted to see her assets were having the desired effect. She felt so thankful at that moment, thankful for meeting Jason, thankful for the time they'd had to share together, and most importantly thankful for her body and how it so flawlessly combined the necessary agility, dexterity and adaptability to work in tandem with the nano-meks that coursed through it while still allowing for some nicely enlarged endowments that everyone found so attractive.

*Well if nothing else, at least fate was good to you in one regard.*

Sharon sighed as she felt Jason's wet tongue gently lapping over her nipple before gently taking it in his mouth to suck on it while one of his paws moved up to stroke through the radiant pink locks of her hair. A barely audible moan emanated out from the vixen as she leaned down to kiss him on the head, her sensitive mammary being alternately milked and licked by the much beloved vulpine which infused Sharon with a feeling of serene contentment, knowing that, even if for a short expanse of time, all was okay with the world.

Eventually Jason took his mouth off her breasts and moved up so he could kiss her lightly on the lips. "Thanks Sharon, you're right I did need that."

"Just doing what I can to maintain morale around here." She looked over towards the rear of the cafeteria. "Pity I can't spread it around though."

Jase followed her line of sight to see Kryssa sitting by herself in her usual place at the back. Every so often a morph would approach her table but after seeing who the sole occupant was they quickly turned around and made a bee line for the other side of the room.

"What's going on there?"

"This always seems to happen. Kryssa's built up such a strong reputation as the most ruthless and aggressive agent in New York everyone else is too afraid to get near her."

"Geez, that must suck."

Sharon shrugged. "So far I've seen no indication that she cares that much one way or the other. She's never been a sociable morph."

Jase continued to watch, his mind slowly debilitating on the most appropriate action to take.

"Well she's going to be with us for the remainder of this investigation so I think I should at least make an effort." He let go of the vixen and picked up his tray and water. "And anyway no honest morph deserves to eat alone."

Sharon looked up to regard her partner with a look that suggested she was amazed if bewildered at his action while at the same time wondering if he was quite right in the head for doing so.

"I...guess she'll appreciate that." She said as he smiled and patted her cheek.

"Don't worry, somehow after seeing her with Valerie just then I'm getting this feeling that there's more to her than meets the eye."

He walked off as Sharon zipped up and pressurised her suit while she watched her partner in admiration.

*Now there's a guy who's either stupidly brave or far too trusting.* She thought as she went back to her salad. *Whichever I don't think he's going to need to prove his courage again after this.*

Kryssa meanwhile continued on with her lunch in solitude, her eyes not really staring at anything in particular, just randomly gazing around the room as if taking inventory while her mind mulled over the morning's briefing. While she hadn't been as shocked as the others to learn that C.S.F. personnel were now paying the costs for their continued interference in the affairs of whoever it was in charge of the orga-gun operations, she'd admittedly found it a little concerning that the area of devestation had spread so far in such a short space of time.

*If nothing else, the perpetrators responsible certainly are efficient in their work.*

She hissed quietly to herself as she reached into her coat pocket and withdrew a vial of plasma serum.

The bat felt an oddly sharp twinge of worry shoot through her as she cracked it open and poured the liquid into her iced tea. Picking up a spoon, Krys moved the drink closer to her and stirred it slowly, her thoughts drifiting back to Valerie as the straw coloured serum gradually merged into the swirling brown mirth of the tea.

Valerie, the only morph who'd ever made a serious effort to befriend her since she came to New York ten years ago to try and finally out distance the ghosts of her tragic past. The only agent in the C.S.F. who, as meek and timid as she was, hadn't shuddered away from her or turned tail and run at the first indication of anger, like virtually all of the tougher morphs had done. The first ever creature she'd taken blood from and had treasured every time that she'd done so since.

Kryssa breathed deeply and curled her claws into fists; she was going to have to double her efforts to keep the hybrid safe now. The forces undermining the C.S.F. had gotten the advantage on them but she still wasn't going to let them get anywhere near Valerie, not while blood still coursed through her veins and electricity surged through the meks in her they wouldn't.

Feeling better at her determination, Kryssa picked up her tea and began to drink, noting that even if it was the same stuff she'd been living on all her life, the serum tasted distinctly better today.

"Excuse me, mind if I sit here?"

The bat looked up and noticed the fox she'd seen in Cyan's office standing on the opposite side of the table.

"I beg your pardon?"

"I don't mean to intrude but I figured since we're going to be working together, I'd like to say hello." Jase put on what he hoped was a welcoming smile.

Kryssa retained her stern gaze as her eyes scanned across the cafeteria like surveillence cameras, looking for any morphs exhibiting the tell tale signs of badly concealed grins or giggles that would indicate she was being set up.

Finding none she turned to look up at the fox again and cocked an eyebrow in bewilderment.

"You honestly wish to sit with me?"

"Well I admit I am still new around here so I'm not that sure about the code of conduct for these things. But if it's okay with you then essentially, yes, correct, affirmative, or whatever you prefer."

Kryssa blinked as if having difficulty comprehending what she was hearing but nonetheless she moved her drink and tray further down the table so Jason could slide in next to her.

"You're Sharon's partner aren't you? She called you Jase if I remember. "

"It's Jason actually, Jason Dermont." He replied as he twirled a large noodle around some meat on his plate. "But Jase is fine."

He forked it into his mouth and chewed thoughtfully for a moment. "Mind if I call you Krys or do you prefer Kryssa?"

"Krys is okay." She narrowed her eyes. "Why are you doing this?"

"Huh?"

"Why come all the way over here to the back of the cafeteria? What's wrong with sitting with your partner, especially after that particularly strong 'display' of affection?" She phrased the question to sound more like a confused query than a degrading snap.

Jase looked over at the bat for a moment and shrugged. "I hate seeing morphs being isolated from the circle of society. Regardless of how dangerous or deadly you may be rumoured to be I don't think you deserve to be treated like an exile around here." He put his fork down and propped his head on an arm.

Kryssa kept her gaze centred on the food in front of her, her stern expression never once faltering.

"How others treat me is their choice, and as long as it isn't outright harmful or offensive to me then I prefer to let them go on thinking whatever they want to think rather than stir up unnecessary trouble." She at last said.

Jason swallowed and pondered on the response. "Still, doesn't it bother you that everyone regards you in such abject fear all the time?"

"I have wrought much devastation, terminated the lives of countless morphs during my time here and generally proven myself to be a most overtly aggressive and violent individual." She said while sighing sadly.

"Yes so I've been told, in rather more than necessarily graphic detail." Jase remarked.

"Consequently it is only natural for others to feel the need to be extra cautious around me, and considering that via my actions I have done more to protect the inhabitants of this city than most others and probably saved twice as many morphs as I've killed, if fear induced isolation is the price I must pay then so be it." The bat concluded, earning a rather admonishing nod from the fox next to her. "Although I must admit it's rather surprising that you apparently haven't been drawn in by what's being said about me."

Jase shrugged and rolled his eyes. "Well I'll admit that when Sharon first told me about you I was a little perturbed." He took a sip of his water. "But I've always been one who prefers to take gossip with a grain of salt until I actually meet the individual its based on to confirm veracity so I didn't place too much faith in what I heard."

He turned back to the bat with a small smile on his face. "And I don't know if you remember but later that day when we were both in the med-centre I couldn't help but notice the way Valerie kept staring at you through the observation window while they were fixing us up. At times I swear it seemed almost like she was trying not to leap for joy that you were alright."

His smile broadened somewhat. "And considering how you two later applied to be made partners plus that rather interesting gesture you made to her a few moments ago I can only deduce that there's evidently another side to you that no one else has noticed yet." He folded his paws and awaited her response.

Kryssa took another swallow of her tea. "I can see you obviously are a vulpine who prefers to look beyond the surface and view an individual for who they really are, Jason." She traced a metal coated claw over the rim of the glass. "I must admit it's a surprise to finally get a morph here who's willing to make such a gesture."

"Hey, I'm merely trying to establish friendly relations among us."

Kryssa turned to face the fox, her expression having softened somewhat by his words. "You're the first male here who's actually made an honest effort to do so."

A brief silence followed as she watched for the fox's reaction, finding that he appeared to be more pleased with the way things were turning out rather than relieved that she hadn't tried to harm him yet.

Eventually she glanced down at his plate. "Don't let me keep you from your food though."

Jase nodded and resumed eating, content that if nothing else he'd at least managed to make a good first impression.

Agent Dermont, I apologise for intruding on your lunch hour but I've just received two net-com calls for you. The first is from your sister, Miss Ismene Dermont. I have so far been unable to identify the second one. -

Jase wiped his mouth and turned to look up at the probe that was now floating over the table.

"Fine send them through to the lobby, I'll take them there."

He stood and made to pick up his tray but found himself suddenly being stopped by Kryssa.

"Leave it; I'll keep it warm for you." She said quietly.

"Oh, well thanks."

Slowly the bat looked up at the vulpine. Though her face remained as stern and stoic as ever there was no mistaking the intention behind her nod of acknowledgement. "It seems the least I can do." she said.

Jase smiled and nodded back before walking towards the front of the cafeteria, passing by several faces that simply stared back at him in dumb shock as well as a most astonished blue vixen along the way.

"Wow Jase that was incredible! You just did what most other agents wouldn't do if someone was threatening to pour boiling hot tea in their ears and she didn't even leave a scratch." Sharon exclaimed.

The fox just looked down on his partner and beamed. "I've never met anyone who's nothing more than a single-minded morph hurter. Maybe now they'll have reason to get to know her better."

Sharon 'mmmed' in admittance and patted him on the shoulder as he left.

"Well, that certainly was a surprising revelation wouldn't you say Pericles?" She said.

Indeed. - The computer stated as it hovered down next to her. - Though in the interest of the general emotional stability of staff I would appreciate it if you could please refrain from revealing yourself like that during lunch from now on. -

2:46 p.m. -

Jase descended down to the lobby and went over to one of the public net-com booths.

Stepping inside, the fox activated his cerebral modem and waited as the receiver unit in front of him linked itself to his brain and scanned for the relevant neural ID signature. Quickly finding what it was looking for, the computer dropped a sound suppression field around the booth and brought up his list of waiting calls.

*Well, even if she is the only one left, at least I've still got some family out there worried for me.* Jason thought to himself as he selected the first one and smiled sweetly at the bright orange vixen that materialised on the screen in front of him.

"How ya doin Sunrise?"

"Much better now that I've finally gotten to see that loving smile of yours again." Ismene sighed in relief as she leaned back on the chair she was sitting in and placed her white furred paws behind her head. "May I assume then that you're at least finding New York more suitable to you than Cincada?"

"You may indeed." Jase replied. "Though to be honest I think most of the credit should go to my new partner for both keeping my hide intact during my first few weeks as well as helping me get used to this place."

Ismene cocked an eyebrow playfully. "Oh got you with a minder already have they? Tsk tsk big brother, what did I tell you about acting your age around your superiors?"

Jase's smile became decidedly slyer. "Well I wouldn't say that it's entirely a bad thing. She's turning out to be quite a, how shall I say, enthusiastic accomplice."

"She? You mean they let you have another one?" The vixen on the screen looked at her erstwhile sibling before clasping her muzzle shut in a fit of snickering. "Geez, some power that be in the universe must really like you for this to keep happening." She continued to snicker until she looked up and noted the increasing slyness of Jase's smile.

"Wait a minute, I know that look." The vixen leaned forward. "Oh by Deus, you mean it's gone beyond that this time?" Her expression instantly went from amused to incredulous.

"Surprised?" Jase asked.

"More like gladly relieved. You've been so down and mopey over the last few weeks, I think it's great that you've finally found somebody again."

Jase sighed happily at the sight of his sister's radiant face. "So how are things on your end?"

"Well right now I'm about halfway through choreographing this new cetacean group's latest vid-play. The theme is the relationship between water and gravity so what I'm essentially looking at is trying to train several blue whales in enough gymnastics to be able to do ballet through a multitude of zero-g suspended liquid bubbles."

Jase looked cynically at his sister before sighing. "Always gotta take on the most difficult jobs don't you?" He grinned. "Then again, you're probably the only morph I'd bank on being able to pull off a feat like that."

"Hey, the more I push myself, the better I become." Ismene winked. "That said however, I may have to put everything on hold after a little incident that occurred about three days ago."

"What happened?"

"I came into work while they had one of those old Whitney Houston songs from the 1990's playing on the radio. Had a nice sounding tune so I started singing along while I was changing as I tend to do. Then this feline diva from one of the other studios pops in to touch up her make up, hears me warbling away and decides I may just have another little gift that's now starting to blossom."

"Oh really?"

"Yep, she's bringing in her producers to hear me sing later this week, see if there's another avenue where I can make my name."

"Well that's great news; I wish you all the best of luck."

"Yeah well, if it doesn't work out then I can always include the experience in my memoirs." Ismene grinned knowingly.

"Right, well thanks a lot for getting in touch, but I'm afraid right now I've got another call waiting which I need to take."

"Okay Jase, glad to see you're doing all right finally. See ya soon bro!"

Jase's smile faded as the screen went blank.

*Yes Ismene, let's sincerely hope I do see you soon.*

He closed his eyes and sighed heavily, feeling rather bad about having to keep his sister in the dark on the assassinations and what their investigations were uncovering.

*Wouldn't have done any good to tell her right now. Besides things are at last looking up for her again so why wreck the mood with bad news?*

Shaking his head indignantly, Jase selected the second call and watched as some text appeared on the screen but no image, indicating that it was an audio only transmission.

"Hello, this is Jason." He said.

"Well hello there Foxy, seems we finally caught up with each other." The voice came through, smooth, silky and unmistakably masculine.

Jase jerked his head up upon hearing the caller, his previous feeling of downbeatness evaporating almost instantly.

"What? Sweet Deus is that who I think it is??" He at last got out.

"I highly doubt you'd ever let anyone else know you like being called by that name. Glad to see you made it out of Cincada with some of your soul left to spare."

Jase stood staring at the blank screen, absolutely flabbergasted.

~Pericles, can you get a fix on where this transmission is coming from? ~

>I will require another two minutes to pinpoint the exact unit being used Agent Dermont, but I can confirm now that it's originating somewhere in the vicinity of Amaloid Row in the fourth sector.<

Jason's jaw dropped. "You're in New York?"

A chuckle emanated over the line. "Yep and believe it or not I'm calling you from the newly opened branch of 'Optimum Bodybuilders Health and Fitness'." The voice paused for effect before adding. "That's MY branch of course."

Jason tottered backward and probably would've fallen over if the doors to the booth hadn't been closed.

"So, you finally succeeded in making it big?" The fox asked, still reeling somewhat from both the initial shock and the congratulatory euphoria he felt for the caller.

"Well not quite yet. There's still somebody else sitting on the top of my ladder of success but I've finally managed to climb up a few more rungs." The voice chuckled again. "Sorry that there's no image for you to swoon over, haven't quite gotten the transmitter unit properly set up yet."

"Hearing your voice is more than enough." Jason said. "So this is where you finally ended up, high tailing it out of one cess pool just so you could take a nose dive into another one?"

"Well there were a few other high-jinxes in between but essentially yes that's the case." The voice laughed. "Guess neither one of us learned our lesson seeing as how you're here too."

"Guess not." The fox replied. "How the schmed did you find me though?"

"Same way everyone else in this city would: I watch the news." The caller laughed again. "Gotta hand it you Foxy, you sure know how to make a lasting impression on morphs."

*Yeah but usually not with pleasant results.* Jase mused as the caller continued.

"Just thought I'd call to let you know that contrary to public opinion I am still alive and on my feet and also to see if there was any possibility you could find the time to tell me about what's been going on."

Jason looked surprised. "You mean you want to meet up?"

"Sure, if nothing else it'd give me a chance to apologise for just packing up and abandoning you like that." The caller's voice dropped a little in volume. "Seriously Jason, if my experiences over these last few months have taught me anything, it's that leaving you behind was definitely one of the biggest mistakes of my life." It paused for breath. "Look I'll understand completely if you're feeling raw at me, but I just thought I should at least make the effort to try and bring some sense of closure to your ordeal."

Jason stared back at the blank screen, his mind both jumping and reeling at the prospect.

"Well, I'll have to see what I can do. I mean right now I'm still in the middle of a rather crucial investigation and a lot's happened since you've been gone."

The caller on the other end chuckled. "I expected no less. Tell you what, I'm sending you the number for my home unit. Just give me a buzz on either when you've got a spare moment."

"I'll try, and it's great to finally hear from you again."

"Goes double for me handsome."

The CALL TERMINATED sign flashed on the screen. Jase asked Pericles to store the numbers in his personal contact file and then stepped out of the booth, his brain now in the grips of a torrential storm of emotions at what had just happened and the number of possible impacts it might have on his new life.

*Incredible how things can just make such a drastic U-turn in such a short space of time.*

The vulpine nodded before deciding to head back up to the cafeteria. Best not to keep Kryssa waiting with his food and risk being thrown out of her good books mere moments after getting into them.

4:41 p.m.-

Valerie harrumphed in aggravation as she continued to explore through the body of the Border collie that lay before her. The quiet hum of tiny mono-wings permeated the interior of the C.S.F. laboratory as a swarm of tester bees flew around the corpses' cleaned out interiors, carrying out various tests on the blood, bones, skin tissue, etc. and sending their findings to the work station on the side of the table where Valerie was monitoring their progress.

Another aggravated groan came from the felapin's lips as she looked over the results for what seemed like the hundreth time that day before leaning back and shutting her eyes against the intense light of the two glow-tubes that floated above the autopsy table, illuminating the proceedings going on below.

"So how we fairing so far?" Callista asked as she entered the lab, a small exotic plant of some sort tucked under her arm.

"Same as I've doing for the last four hours. Namely coming up with diddly squat!" Val licked over her lips and rubbed her temples. "Amazing how cases that seem so assuredly open and shut when you first start on them suddenly become a winding labryinth of nothing but dead ends once you get down to the specifics."

The small canary bird looked over the corpse under examination and then at the four others lined up nearby. "Still haven't found anything then?"

The hybrid brought up the test results she'd gathered over the course of the day on the holographic screen. "I've examined each of these bodies as thoroughly as possible and so far it's the same exact story in every case: the morph got shot up with some lethal and extremely complex cocktail of serums which was then cycled through their blood about 30 or 40 times. During this period, their immune system was reprogrammed to start treating certain vital organs and body parts as intruders and eject them from the body which ultimately culminating in the morph in question just dropping dead like 'shlump'."

She mimicked a body falling over with her arms.

"The annoying part is I can't figure out how they got them to do this. There's no bruising or ligature marks on the arms, legs or chest so these guys definitely weren't restrained in any way during the procedure. And the brains don't exhibit any signs of supression or tranquillisers so they weren't drugged either. The only possible conclusion I can draw from this is that they just willingly let themselves be killed off."

"Did the Network ID profiles offer up any clues?"

"None apart from the fact that these guys all came from different social backgrounds, different family types, some even different countries." Val stood and smoothed out her lopped, cheetah spotted ears. "The only two things they all seem to have in common is that they were all loners and none of them were known to be suicidal."

Callista sighed and reached up to pat the cheetah bunny on the shoulder with a winged arm. "Well I always did think pathology was a particularly difficult field."

"Difficult yes, but usually not impossible." Valerie pulled the terminal's connection spokes out of the link points on her spine before stepping away from the table to do some stretches. "I think I need a break."

"Well why not try taking your mind off things by having a look at this new addition to New York City's flora range?" Callista brushed the tuft of feathers that hung over her left eye aside so she could adjust her glasses and then held up the plant she was carrying for Valerie to get a better look at. At first glance its structure was somewhat similar to a Winter Wonderland orchid, only each stem appeared to have three dark purple flowers sprouting out of it instead of just a single white one, and each flower had the petals arranged in an odd fan like display so none touched the petals of the flower next to it.

"Looks kinda pretty." Val commented as she took it off the canary to get a better look.

"That isn't all, lay it on the table and switch the glow-tubes to sunlight mode."

Valerie looked down at the bird with a rather puzzled expression but never the less she lay the plant down and sent a mental command for the glow-tubes to adjust their light settings as instructed.

For several moments nothing happened. The plant lay there under the simulated sunlight with its flowers lazily resting on the metal surface of the table and the leaves splayed out as if trying to get a tan.

"Callista, I'm sorry but I just don't see what your point is." Val at last piped up.

"Look closer." The bird replied enigmatically.

Valerie still was as confused as ever but nonetheless she leaned down for a closer look and it was then she noticed a gradual change was taking place in the plant's colours, the dark purple petals and the even darker coloured stalk and leaves were gradually lightening and washing out to a shade of metallic grey to blend in with the colour of the table. As the now amazed cheetah bunny continued to observe, it changed until the whole thing was lying perfectly camouflaged on top of the stainless steel.

"A group of gardeners discovered a patch of these growing in Central Park round about an hour and a half ago. Apparently the chlorophyll in them has developed a new chameleonic ability thus allowing it to mimic the colour of its surroundings as a defensive measure once it gets a sufficient dose of sunlight." Callista explained.

Val picked the plant off the table and turned it around in her paws, nodding in impressiveness as she studied the plant's new metallic finish. "Another spontaneous evolution then?"

"That's what Pericles is currently theorising. Probably not a big one as there haven't been any more discoveries as of yet but worth a more in depth look nonetheless." The avian sighed. "Really it must be such a hassle for the computers, trying to maintain an up to date list of planetary vegetation when they're having to continually catalogue newly evolved series every couple of weeks."

Callista took the plant off Val and placed it on a nearby cart.

"Then again mind you, I really can't imagine there actually ever was a time when plants stayed the way they were and weren't constantly exhibiting new features and abilities due to growing in genison saturated soil."

Val shrugged and smiled. "I don't know, I rather like some of the new rose series we've been seeing lately. And they're a lot easier to care for then normal ones since they can flourish under a wider variety of conditions."

Val reached into the corpse on the table and picked out one of the tester bees. "Personally I've always been much more interested in studying what the Network archives have to say about us."

She contemplated the tiny insectoid mekanik between her fingers.

"Did I ever tell you the day Kryssa and I shut down that chemical plant I suffered a slight concussion and had a flashback of my childhood?"

"Oh really?" Callista said as she smoothed out her lab coat and sat down at the terminal where Val had been working.

"Yep, I was in the garden of my parents' house, a place I always used to go to when I needed some time to myself. Strange thing is, in the flashback there were bees swarming around the flowers. Live organic bees all roughly the same size as this one here."

Callista tried to imagine the scenario and chuckled. "Well there's a sight you'd certainly never see today."

Val turned her gloved paw over and let the bee drone crawl onto the back of it.

"I thought it was odd too. I mean in my entire life I've never actually seen a live insect, let alone one small enough to fit in my paw."

Callista shrugged. "Well what do you expect? They all left in a mass exodus and went to live on Arthros after the Network computers used genison to terraform it into a habitable planet. And unlike the spiders on Araknis Prime they don't really have any business ventures or exports to bring to Neo-Terra so they just go on living in peace by themselves until they're needed here."

Valerie nodded as she placed the bee back on the table and left it to quickly scurry over to join the others still studying the corpse.

"Anyways, after that incident I did some more research and found that amazingly for eons that was actually a fairly normal size for most series of arthropods. Flies, spiders, woodlouses, worms, none of them got much bigger than your average plasma cell. Most were actually regarded as pests by the Elders due to this fact believe it or not."

Callista 'hmmed' in response. "Well that certainly isn't the case any more. Probably a good thing too, I doubt the Network would have been able to complete both Neo-Terra's planetary habitat ring and the defence/docking ring ahead of schedule if all those ant colonies hadn't been so willing to work 24/7 to help build them." she chirped.

Val turned back to the corpse and leaned on the table. "Yeah well, too bad I don't have the same capabilities to find an answer to our current problem."

She lowered her head closer to the body, her eyes peering into the gaping chest cavity as if trying to derive some answer from the torn blood vessels and broken ribs.

"I know it's here somewhere, I'm just not exploring the right avenue to find it."

Callista stood up and draped a wing over the hybrid's back as she leaned over to stare at the body with her.

"Well it doesn't look like they left many visual clues." She reached in past the ribs and traced a feathered finger along the spine. "Aside from the obvious damaged areas and the missing organs everything here seems to be in normal condition."

She drew in some air to let out a sigh of her own.

And then stopped as she sensed a distinctly out of place fragrance wafting into her beak.

"That's odd."

"What is?"

"Well, I know this is going to sound a trifle bizarre but for an instant just then I thought I smelt something."

Callista leaned down even lower towards the cavity where the stomach used to be and took another sniff.

"Yes it's quite faint but right here at the beginning of the intestinal tract it smells rather like cinnamon."

Val instantly perked up when she heard that.

*Cinnamon??? Wait a minute...is it possible?*

Grabbing the corpse with both paws, the felapin practically stuck her whole head into it and took a big sniff with her more sensitive augmented nose, finding that past the expected putrid smells of rot and decay there was indeed a very slight, almost undetectable spicy scent that could not possibly be produced by a decomposing body.

"Well, am I right?" The canary asked as Valerie extracted her head, her eyes gradually widening as a new thought began to materialise.

*Cinnamon in the digestive tract??? By Deus that's it!!!*

"Callista, you're a genius!" The felapin exclaimed as she threw her arms around the avian and hugged her.

"Well of course! That's what I've been trying to tell everyone here for the past four years." Callista smirked as she pushed her glasses back up.

Val quickly dashed over to the table's work station and began to hastily reattach the connection spokes to her spine.

[Pericles, I think I've finally happened onto a breakthrough. I need a standard measure of genison sent to Lab 2 immediately.]

>On its way, Agent Piersen.< The computer calmly sent back.

Several seconds later a service mek shaped like a two foot long millipede ascended through a maintenance grav-shaft at the rear of the lab and scuttled out onto the floor. On the first segment of its back was a small carrying case marked with the bio-hazard sign.

"Now then let's see if my suddent burst of intuition was correct." Val stated as she picked the case up and snapped it open. Inside was a glass capsule containing a strange neon yellow gas. Genison in its purest form.

"Alright Callista, for this I'm also going to need a Directional EMP generator."

"Sure thing, just hang on a tic while I get the new one of its box."

Val looked back in puzzlement. "What was wrong with your old one?"

"It was starting to lag a bit in recharge time due to normal wear and tear. Instead of the usual 0.00026 second lag it was taking 0.00028 seconds so I decided it was time to replace it."

The bird headed off to another section of the lab while Valerie groaned and rolled her eyes.

*Typical Callista, if it doesn't give an ultra-perfect performance every time then it might as well be tossed away.*

She removed the capsule and turned it around in her paws, staring in fascination as the gas inside sparkled and swirled around.

*To think how much this stuff has changed our world after the meteorite fallout. Causing us to hyper-evolve into anthropomorphic beings, helping the planet to purge itself of all the centuries of pollution and leaving it teeming with new life and resources,*

A reminiscent smile found its way onto Valerie's lips as she held the capsule closer to her bosom.

*Enabling my parent's DNA to fuse harmoniously together so I could be born as the healthy little hybrid I am. It's just so incredible!*

"Easy there dear girl, I wouldn't get too attached to that thing." Callista said as she walked back in with a tube shaped device under her arm.

"Huh? Oh yeah." Val put the capsule back down. "Sorry but seeing this stuff and thinking about how I probably wouldn't be around without it always makes me sentimental."

"Well that's understandable; we all owe some degree of thanks to genison as well as the alien technology and other goodies recovered from the meteorites for the changes they've made to this planet." The avian lowered her specs so she could peer over them. "Just as long as you keep in mind though that not all of those changes turned out to be beneficial. For all the good it's done, that stuff has given us a fair share of problems too. You only need to venture out into the oceans for proof." She said.

Val's smile faded. "Well, yeah I guess I can't argue with you there."

She walked over to the work station and activated a bio-supression field around the autopsy table.

"Okay, I need you to direct a close focus pulse of around 6.2 kW into the abdominal cavity while I administer the genison." Val said as she entered a command for the tester bees to leave the corpse so they wouldn't be fried in the process.

"Whatever you wish Val." Callista mounted the EMP generator on the side of the table and angled the metal barrel down to aim at the gaping hole in the border collie's chest while the swarm of tiny robotic insects left what they were studying and flew off to a safe distance.

The hybrid took a deep breath then insterted the capsule into a slot on the work station and watched as the glowing yellow genison gas was siphoned out and dispersed over the corpse.

*If this reveals what I think it's going to reveal then we may finally be one step closer to finishing this debacle.*

5:53 p.m.-

Sharon, Jason and Kryssa were back in Cyan's office, all exhibiting a growing sense of impatience as they waited for whatever it was that Valerie had needed them all to be reassembled for.

Presently the cheetah bunny burst in with a flourish, her paw holding up a data tablet in triumph.

"Good news everyone, I've finally found some new leads." She said enthusiastically as Callista followed with several tester bees on a small tray.

"Good to hear, that's more than we've been able to come up with so far." Cyan groaned as she brushed aside the half dozen reports covering her desk and folded her paws. "So what've you uncovered?"

"The answer to how exactly our mystery arms dealers managed to consensually aquire such a huge number of dead morphs with organs just ripe for the picking."

Callista picked up one of the bees and placed it on a circular panel located next to the room's main computer monitor. As if on cue the insect mek lowered its head and extended an organic proboscis into the panel to upload its latest findings into the computer.

"This is one of the corpses Kryssa and I found in the morgue in Brooklyn." The felapin started to explain as an image of the Border collie materialised on the screen. "It's missing virtually all of the main organs from its digestion and circulatory systems as well as both fibulas and all of its fingers of course."

Images of the cavities where the aforementioned body parts should've been appeared on the screen.

"From what my initial studies revealed I can estimate that our poor friend passed away roughly about three weeks ago,"

A murmur of understanding emanated from around the room.

"And blood tests confirmed my suspicions that the means by which the flawless preservation and easy removal of the organs was accomplished was indeed by having a wide variety of chemical agents circulated through the body that reprogrammed the immune system to treat the required parts as intruders and reject them."

A long list of the relative chemicals used flashed up.

"Now as you all can probably deduce this would entail that the victims had to have still been alive when this cocktail was administered. And according to his Network profile he was a normal, mentally stable and perfectly healthy canine specimen with no known suicidal tendencies so it's a fairly good bet he wouldn't just consent to being shot up with a lethal mixture of morph killing serums."

"Then how exactly was this massacre of sorts carried out?" Cyan asked.

"Well that's what we found to be the most baffling problem." Callista picked the bee drone off the console and replaced it with another one.

"An extensive study of the fur and epidermal layers of the wrists and arms revealed no signs of bruising or ligature marks indicative of being strapped down."

Close up shots of the relevant bodily areas materialised on the screen.

"And whatever these chemicals may do, none of them exhibited any sedative properties." Valerie leaned against the wall and shook her head. "To be honest for the last week I've been as confused as you are."

"So what was the answer you said you finally arrived at?"

Val smiled. "Well thanks to a momentary intervention on Callista's behalf." She gave the canary a nod. "I got to thinking that there may actually have been a way for all of those 40 or so morphs we discovered to consensually take these lethal chemicals into their systems and just let them go to work. A way that wouldn't show up on standard routine tests and most likely wouldn't be recorded on their profiles either."

This brought a look of puzzlement from the other occupants.

"And that is?" Cyan asked cocking an eyebrow.

Callista crossed her wings behind her back and smiled brightly, knowing that her moment in spotlight had now come. "I smelt cinnamon coming from inside the corpse."

"Cinnamon?"

"Yep, a cinnamon smell on the tissue of the small intestine. Something that can only occur from a vast consumption of this stuff."

Val plugged the data tablet she was carrying into the terminal and the complex atomic structure of an organic substance appeared on the screen. The other occupants of the room studied it for a moment before recognising what it was.

"Malorium?" Cyan and Jason asked almost simultaneously in confusion.

"Yes malorium, the latest breakthrough in all purpose designer narcotics. Also known as 'sunrise powder', 'sparkle', 'nip' or more commonly just 'spice'." Valerie sighed. "I believe it's become quite a favourite among teenage clubbers these days."

Sharon surveyed the reactions of everyone else and then turned back to the felapin. "So what exactly are you saying here Valerie? That every one of the morphs used in the manufacture the orga-guns was a drug addict?"

Val shrugged. "When you think about it, it's actually quite a sensible plan: mix the necessary chemicals in with malorium, a popular and relatively easy to get ahold of drug which has so many different chemical compounds in it anyway nobody would really notice if a few dozen more were added, distribute it to various dealers and wait for the desperate addicted morphs to come flocking for their latest fix. Then it simply becomes a matter of waiting for them to keel over and die once the chemicals have purged their organs from their bodies and then either covertly retrieving the corpses or paying the coroner to sell them to you."

"And if the profile histories for these poor souls are anything to go by, most of them were of the lower class sort who worked menial jobs and preferred a life of solitude." Callista added as she rubbed a wing under her beak. "In other words, the type of morphs who could just drop right out of existence and never be missed."

Cyan leaned back in her chair and contemplated the possible connotations.

"Pericles does this sound feasible to you?" She asked.

Very much so Commander. Many malorium addicts go to great lengths to ensure their habit isn't recorded on their Network profiles; therefore we usually have no knowledge of it until an autopsy is performed. - Pericles explained. - And if there was no autopsy done then essentially these addicts would become exactly what those responsible would want them to be: a nameless and faceless statistic which the computers would never think to examine more thoroughly. -

"Which fits in with why all the morphs look like they were just ripped open and smashed to bits. Most likely they were either scooped up right out of their homes or went straight from the med-centre to that abandoned morgue where our mysterious gun runner's less experienced henchmen worked on removing the necessary organs, bones and fingers." Val followed.

There was a collective nod of amazement.

"I'm still a bit confused though. What does that have to do with cinnamon scented intestines?" Sharon asked.

"Malorium has a genetically enhanced and genison evolved protean structure. The only difference is that it's designed so that the chemicals which produce the usual extreme burst of energy and general on top of the world feelings can also be absorbed into the body during various stages of digestion. This way you can eat the drug like any normal food, feel the expected results and on top of that it's also designed to fool most standard tests because most of the components are derived from the evolved forms of various household spices, hence its nick name."

She gestured for Callista to place another bee drone on the terminal.

"However what most morphs don't know is this: because of the aforementioned factor, as the drug is broken down it leaves behind a nearly undetectable residue on the walls of the various organs it passes through. As this residue decays over time it emanates a very faint smell of spice, sometimes cinnamon, sometimes thyme, sometimes oregano, generally nothing you'd expect to smell that far down in the digestive tract."

"I see." Cyan nodded.

"It's quite easy to miss mind you, the smell doesn't show up until about two to three weeks after the morph in question has died and by then any scant traces of the drug which may remain have degraded too badly to be tested."

"How were you able to determine that it was in fact malorium then?"

The felapin averted her gaze and squirmed a bit. "There is one procedure that can still reveal the presence of the drug at this late stage. It isn't used very often because it usually results in the body being mutated beyond recognition, which tends not to sit too well with any family members who may have been hoping to give it a proper burial."

On screen, the results of her and Callista's latest test appeared.

"If the body containing the malorium is exposed to a substantial enough amount of genison and then hit with an EMP, it triggers a variety of changes in any new cells the body produces due to forcibly accelerated evolution." A slight smile stretched across the felapin's lips. "And since one of the primary properties of genison is its ability to fuse DNA of any kind together, the body's cells will fuse with the malorium and start exhibiting the same properties as the drug, thereby confirming its presence."

This earned another round of impressed nods from the other agents.

"That's absolutely brilliant Bunny girl!" Sharon exclaimed.

Val dipped her head and blushed. "Hey, I was just doing what Cyan asked us to do: make use of my talents and give us something to work on."

"You've done far more than that Valerie; this info could very well prove to be the key we need to crack this whole enigma wide open." Cyan picked up one of the reports and studied it as Val just blushed deeper.

"Alright, if whoever we're dealing with is using the corpses of drug addicts to make the orga-guns then our best bet to start targeting their contacts and see where they can lead us. Pericles," She said looking over at the computer. "Inform High Command and the Network of our findings. We're going to need to start monitoring all major med-centres across the U.S. as well as any known areas where malorium suppliers may operate."

Understood, I shall get on it at once Commander.-

Cyan leaned back and steepled her fingers.

"Now the question is where the hell do we start looking? There's just as many malorium importers working in this city as there are peddlers and we don't have the resources to just start picking them off the streets one at a time in hopes of getting lucky."

"I believe I may have an answer to that Cyan." Kryssa said as she stood to face the squirrel. "If you remember, about three weeks ago I apprehended a pitbull named Tyrone Russell in Queens on suspicion of malorium dealing. He managed to beat the charge but I was able to find out that soon after, he took up a job at the Arakno Corp.'s branch in Brooklyn, less than twenty minutes away from where the morgue was located." Her normally stern expression darkened somewhat. "I'd say it's a pretty good bet he hasn't decided to turn over a new leaf just yet."

Cyan nodded. "Then perhaps we need to pay him another visit. Alright Valerie, accompany Kryssa over there and confront him with your findings, let's see if he knows anything about this affair."

Upon hearing this a brief hint of worry crept into Kryssa's expression as she looked over at the felapin.

Actually I think it would be best if she didn't, Commander. Mr. Russell is currently rated as a gamma level 4 threat and while Agent Piersen has shown a remarkable improvement in performance over the last few months I still think it would be best to not have her take on an individual with a recorded history of brutally attacking morphs and taking hostages just yet. - Pericles cut in, much to the bat's relief.

"Fair enough, I'll go with Kryssa then." Sharon said as she stood and cracked her knuckles. "As you all know, I've had considerably more 'experience' in getting bad dogs to stay down." She grimaced as her paws ghosted over the scarred part of her thighs.

"Of that I'm only too well aware. Fine, Sharon, Kryssa, you two head for Arakno Corp. Meantime Jason, I want you to go with Valerie to this address."

She slid a tablet over to the fox.

"It's the med-centre where the majority of those morphs you found in the morgue were reported to have last checked into. I want you to do a thorough check of the records for any other patients that were either declared D.O.A. due to over dosing on narcotics or were admitted for over dosing and then died. I know it's a bit of a long shot but let's just see if anyone else from there suddenly just disappeared without a trace."

"We'll see what we can find Cyan." Jason bowed.

"Let's get to work." Sharon said as she turned to head out.

"Just a minute Sharon, I believe I have something you and Kryssa may find useful." Callista turned to the interface screen and entered some data. "Pericles would you please be so kind as to fetch this from the lab?"

At once, Dr. Wren.-

Moments later another service drone entered the office with a large silver briefcase on its back.

"Right, now if you two could please roll up your coat sleeves for me." The canary bird politely asked as she opened the case and brought out two large chrome plated cuffs with menacing looking pincer claws mounted on them.

"These are a new type of restraining device I'm hoping to get approved for standard issue. Strap them on your wrists."

Sharon and Kryssa duly did so.

"They're controlled by a combination of nerve impulses and movement from your fingers and your wrist muscles."

"You mean like this?" Sharon aimed at the far wall and flicked her wrist downwards slightly, causing the claw to snap open and then shoot out several feet on a long flexible energy beam to smash into the stone work.

"Oh, uh, whoops." Sharon grinned a little in embarrassment. "Sensitive isn't it?"

"Curl your index and middle fingers towards your palm." Callista said.

Sharon did so and the beam retracted the claw back onto her wrist.

"I call them 'las-leashes', they're designed to grab onto any part of a fleeing suspect and ensure he or she doesn't go too far out of reach." Callista explained as she took hold of Kryssa's wrist and lifted it up. "The beam can extend up to a maximum of 40 feet and the claw is fitted together with a super-elasticated membrane thus allowing it to expand around thicker body parts such as waists and necks as well as ensuring it can't simply be pulled off." The avian shrugged. "I figure if this pitbull friend of yours suddenly decides he needs to be elsewhere in a hurry it's better than the usual options of either immobilising him or dealing a disabling shot to the leg."

"Very impressive Callista." Cyan stood up and walked around the desk to better examine the gadgets. "Though I'm rather surprised you'd managed to finish this project so quickly. Your fellow team members estimated that you'd need at least another two or three weeks."

The canary smirked. "Yes well, unlike them I actually know how to use a screwdriver."

"Well thanks anyway, I'm sure these will come in very handy." Sharon smiled before leaning in to quickly peck Callista on the tip of her beak. "Right then, the day is growing old and we've still got a lot of work to do so I think we'd best hit the streets and get on with our relative tasks."

Then I advise that you all take an umbrella with you. - Pericles intoned. - According to the latest weather reports it's going to rain quite heavily tonight. -

6:41 p.m.-

"Uh, Dr. Brekken?" Laura's voice sounded out over the lab's inter-com.

"Are you still here Laura? I told you to leave early so you could pack and make it to the port on time." The rabbit replied, his eyes remaining fixed on the microscope's display screen in front of him.

"Well I wanted to make sure all of your non-essential files were organized and stored before I left, just so neither you nor the replacement drone would have to deal with any trivial matters while I was gone."

Brekken nodded. *Considerate little girl, even if for the wrong reasons.*

"Anyway a net-com call for you has just come in. I know you're probably busy but it's on a channel only you have access to."

The grey hare's ears perked up.

"I see, put it through."

He peeled off his lab gloves and went over to the communication enclave to redirect the call down to the lab.

"I trust I'm not interrupting you." The eagle on the console stated as Brekken brought up the channel.

"Considering the nature of what I've hired you for, I think I can find the time to hear you out." The hare adjusted his glasses and sat down. "What's your latest report?"

"Roughly about ten minutes ago two crafts left from the C.S.F. HQ. After tracking them to their relevant destinations I've confirmed that they were manned by the last four specified targets."

Brekken cocked an eyebrow. *So they've at last emerged from the safety of their fortress. That can only mean...*

"Where did they head to?" He demanded.

"The ones known as Jason Dermont and Valerie Piersen are now at the Thomas Newhart Memorial med-centre in Brooklyn, the other two; Sharon Lysan and Kryssa Valhorren have gone to Arakno Corp."

Brekken closed his eyes and let a long aggravated groan waft out through his teeth.

*Tyrone! I should've known that dog wouldn't have the common sense to slink back into the shadows and stay quiet after I had him acquitted!*

"How do you wish for me to proceed doctor?"

The lapin leaned back in the chair and removed his glasses for a moment as he debated.

"The two at Arakno Corp. are now your top priority. There is a high chance that they may have gone to speak to an...'associate' of mine there. I'm sending you the file now." Brekken transmitted the relevant data. "It is absolutely vital that they never get the chance to interrogate him. Do whatever you must to ensure this!" He sneered.

"And as for the other two?"

For the second time that day the grey furred lapin smiled. "I've had the med-centre's mainframe computer fitted with a special little program of my own design. The instant they try to poke around in there, as they always do, their souls will be wiped clear out of existence along with any last traces of incriminating evidence." He put his glasses back on and stood up. "You just make sure the blue vixen and the bat don't survive, understand?"

7:03 p.m.-

"What fitting weather this is, considering the nature of our business here." Kryssa said as she stepped inside the lobby of the Arakno Corp. building and flapped her wings slightly to shake some of the water off of them as she closed her dripping umbrella. "If I didn't know better I'd swear somebody was trying to send us a message."

"I don't know, I kind of enjoy a warm spring rain. It refreshes me and rejuvenates my drive to see that we finish this investigation as soon as possible." Sharon said while running her paws over her damp fur and then through the glistening wet mane of long pink hair. "Just kinda wished WCHM wouldn't use keep using these downpours as an excuse to play those old Cascades or Weather Sisters songs. They sound so mocking."

The two tranversed the length of the elegantly laid out lobby and stopped as a huge tarantula scuttled out in front of them.

"Greetings agents." It said in a high pitched whistle like voice, marred somewhat by the quiet 'whooshing' of the respirator filter attached to the underside of its abdomen that pumped air into its trachea. "Welcome to Arakno Corp. My name is Tela, how may I help you?"

"Hi, I'm Sharon Lysan and this is Kryssa Valhorren." The vixen said holding up a holo-image of her ID. "We're here to speak with one of your employees, a mister Tyrone Russell. Is he still here by any chance?"

The spider raised one of her trimmed short haired legs and tinkered with the optical visor that covered her four upper eyes.

"Let's see, Russell, Russell, ah here we are. Yes he's not due to clock out for another twenty minutes or so."

Tela glanced over the agents, paying extra attention to their weapons and folded her two front legs together. "Erm, I trust he's not in any trouble is he?"

"Not as of right now. We simply need to ask him a few questions." Kryssa answered.

The spider spread her legs out and bowed politely. "Of course, this way please." She swivelled around and scuttled down the hallway, the manipulator claws on her metal leg caps clicking lightly off the marble floor.

{Don't let your guard down.} Kryssa sent privately to Sharon as the two followed the spider to the grav-shafts.

#Trust me, I don't intend to.# The vixen nodded, her paw reaching behind to lightly trace across the sheath of her SF katana blade as Tela selected a floor number and the grav-lift began to descend.

"Well this is a rather refreshing touch. Most other corporate buildings that I've been to usually just leave their administration computer to greet and guide visitors around the premises." Sharon commented trying to make conversation.

"Of course, as one of Neo-Terra's top importers, manufacturers and distributors of spider silk products, we at Arakno Corp. feel its better if visitors have a morph escort them around and provide information rather than a mekanik. While the computers may be able to do the job more quickly and efficiently we think it's still important to maintain the organic element."

Sharon nodded.

"We also firmly believe in maintaining an honest and considerate work force so if there's anything my superiors might need to know about Tyrone I'd appreciate it if you could notify us as soon as possible."

"As soon as we're aware of more so will you be. Till then I advise that you not worry about the matter." Kryssa stated in a tone that suggested it'd be best if Tela stopped pressing them for information.

"Of course, please accept my apologies." The spider replied as the lift arrived at the designated floor and all three stepped out into a massive storage area.

"We took on Tyrone as part of our maintenance personnel about two and half weeks ago. For the most part I'm pleased to report that he's adapted quite nicely to the normal hustle and bustle of things around here." Tela explained as the morphs walked along a variety of machines that were sorting and wrapping up large bundles of spider silk for storage.

"Tell me Tela, in the time he's been here has anyone noticed anything strange about him?" Kryssa asked.

"Not really. There have been several reports of him taking longer breaks than is allowed but that's a common fault among most new recruits."

Kryssa and Sharon both looked at each other with suspicion as Tela scuttled up to a lynx studying a data tablet. "Excuse me Michael, these agents from the C.S.F. need to see Tyrone, do you know where he is by any chance?" Tela asked.

The lynx looked up. "Uh sure, I asked him to carry out some checks on the electrical grid before he went home. He's right down there." He pointed to a pitbull that was on the lower level scanning an electrical panel.

"Thank you sir, this shouldn't take long." Sharon replied

"He's uh not in any trouble is he?" The lynx repeated Tela's question.

Kryssa just shot him an icy look as she and Sharon walked passed.

#Okay Krys, I know you're a little raw at having not been able to nail this guy the first time around but right now we're going to stand a better chance of catching him out if you don't do anything he might conceive as threatening.# Sharon advised as they approached the pitbull.

Kryssa's face remained dark but her eyes expressed that she understood.

{Very well then, would you care to take the lead?}

Sharon nodded and took the data tablet that the bat was carrying before authoritively stepping in front of the pitbull.

"Tyrone Russell?"

The canine stopped what he was doing. "Yes that does happen to be my name. What's it matter to you?" He sounded rather annoyed as he turned his head to regard the vixen.

"Agent Sharon Lysan, C.S.F. I need to ask you a few questions." She stated firmly.

"Yeah, what're you gonna try to pin me for this time? Forgetting to signal right as I was heading for work? Overdue library book? Or are you just bored and looking for a punch up?" He asked snidely as he subconsciously licked at a long curling scar that ran all the way from his left eye down to his upper lip.

Sharon ignored the comment as she studied the tablet in her paws. "Actually it's more to do with your previous conviction of malorium dealing. We feel it may have some relevance to a current investigation of ours so I need to clarify a few more details." She looked back up at the pitbull, making sure to maintain a calm but dubious expression so as to let him know he wasn't intimidating her at all.

In response, Tyrone huffed and leaned against the machine. "Oh geez, you guys just can't find it in yourselves to admit defeat can you?" He leaned in and sneered. "Girl I did my stint in the Justice Courts and they came up empty. You guys got to rough me up good, I got defaced by the media and then the Deus decided enough was enough and let me have my life back. Fair square, done deal. Law says you can't haul me back in for a second try so why can't you just leave me alone?"

Sharon nodded. "True but as I said we have sufficient reason to believe that your case may have relevance to a current investigation of ours."

Tyrone cleared his throat but kept on sneering. "How? You got another poor soul to drag through the mud and need some practice?" He stared at her as though trying to tell her to fuck off using only his eyes.

"Let's just say it might have paid for you to have taken a closer look at your wares before selling them." Kryssa stated coldly as she stepped forward to stand next to Sharon.

Tyrone's sneer dissolved to a mixed look of aggravation and underlying anger.

"Well, well if it isn't Kryssa Valhorren. Come to add to your handy work?" He growled, gesturing to the scar.

Kryssa's face darkened considerably but nonetheless she didn't move. "No. I merely thought you'd like to see the after effects of yours."

Sharon accessed the file containing the crime scene stills the bat had taken at the morgue, as well as Valerie's forensic report on the tablet before handing it to the pitbull.

Tyrone snatched it off her and flicked through it, the anger on his face gradually faltering and then fading to a subtle look of shock as he read further.

"I trust you see my point." The bat said.

He slowly raised his eyes to glare at the bat, his brief moment of uncertainty now sliding back down beneath a defensive wall of anger.

"Just what the hell do you think you're trying to pull on me now?" He curled his paws into fists.

Kryssa took another step forward and craned her neck so her eyes were on level with the canines.

#Krys, what are you doing?# Sharon sent.

{Just trust me.}

"You and I both know that you were guilty of the malorium dealing charge and I've no doubt that if I tore this place apart right now I'd find evidence that you're doing much of the same here."

The canine's eyes twitched but he stood his ground. "So what are you going to do about it?"

"I'm offering you a choice Mr. Russell. Cooperate with us and give us the names of who supplied you and I promise I'll refrain from doing everything in my power to try and implicate you in this again." She said in a voice somewhere just above absolute zero.

For a tense moment the two morphs did nothing but stare daggers at one another.

"You really believe you can link me with this shit?"

"We've already determined that it was malorium that killed those morphs. How long are you willing to guess it'll take us to link one or more of them back to you?" She said calmly. "And while you may have what it takes to get off a drug charge I'm willing to bet you don't have the resources to beat several simultaneous counts of second degree murder."

The tense silence resumed for another moment or so before Tyrone bared his teeth and gave a defeated sigh.

"Alright, alright, I'll play along with your damn charade if it'll keep me from heading back to the stalls again." He looked around the storage area. "But this is a little too public for my liking, mind if I suggest a change of venue?"

"That depends, where did you have in mind?"

Tyrone gestured upwards. "How about the roof? Just wait for about five minutes then come up."

Kryssa contemplated the matter and stepped away. "Just remember what happened the last time you tried to run from me."

The pitbull growled again as he headed to the grav-shaft.

#You sure this is a wise idea Kryssa?# Sharon sent.

{I know this dog Sharon. His desire to keep his own fur free and intact far exceeds all other priorities in his life.} Kryssa sent back. {Besides as Pericles said, he's still considered a gamma level 4 threat. Right now the very last thing he's going to want to do is give us a reason to terminate him.}

Sharon thought about the matter and decided she had to agree. #Yeah I guess you're right.# She followed the bat back towards the shaft. #By the way, thanks for handling that so calmly.#

{It seemed like the best course of action. It's what you asked of me and it got him away from you.} Kryssa seethed quietly, much to Sharon's amazement. {Regardless of how often we may come around to see him he still should've treated you with more respect!}

7:12 p.m.-

The first thing that Sharon noticed when she stepped onto the roof five minutes later was the way it had been planted and designed to look like a large ornate garden, complete with benches, two fountains and a paved walkway all around the perimeter. The second was that that the skies were now raining a lot more heavily than when they'd gone in.

And the third was that despite the bat's earlier words, the roof of the Arakno Corp. building looked for the most part to be totally deserted.

"Tyrone?" She called out, getting nothing but the repetitive pitter-patter of water droplets hitting the roof in response. At a loss she turned to Kryssa who was still calmly staring out at the increasing darkness in front of them.

"Tyrone?" The bat called out as her ultra-sensitive augmented ears twitched this way and that, still not sensing anything.

"You're sure about what you said before right?" Sharon asked hesitantly.

"He's not dumb or desperate enough to try running." Kryssa drew her U.A.P. and set it to plasma on a low charge. "You search the left side, I'll search the right. He's probably just making a last ditched ploy to delay the inevitable."

Sharon nodded and pulled out her U.A.P. before stepping onto the grassy part of the roof, glancing down in contemplation as she heard a wet 'schlrup' and felt her boots sink slightly into the rain soaked ground.

*Well at least I know Jason is safe and dry. Not that I'm complaining about my own environment.*

The vixen felt a smile pass her lips as she activated the IR function in her retinas and began searching among the foliage. Truth be told while the pitbull had indeed turned out to be every bit the jerk Kryssa had portrayed him as, she couldn't help but feel a small twinge of thanks that he'd chosen the roof as his place to confess. Now at least she could briefly get back under the skies and enjoy the much loved feeling of water coursing through her fur and down over her body, washing away some of the grime from the streets and letting her feel 'cleansed'.

Sighing happily to herself, Sharon quickly checked that Kryssa was occupied with her search before opening her muzzle and letting it fill to the brim. She swished and gargled before spitting it out onto the ground and enjoying the cleaner taste it left in her mouth.

Satisfied, the vixen took another survey of her surroundings and noticed what appeared to be an individual crouching behind the fountain in her area. Raising her gun, the vixen carefully made her way over and inched around the fountain, finding the form to indeed be that of Tyrone trying to huddle in the shadows.

*Exactly as I expected, fifty percent pride, fifty percent ego, zero percent ingenuity.*

"Alright, nice try Tyrone but all you've done is buy yourself another few seconds. Get your paws up and start spilling as you promised!"

Tryone didn't respond.

"Tyrone, come on, we've been more than patient with you. Insulting an agent of the C.S.F. is a bad enough mis-demenour but lying and then outright refusing to obey can easily land you where you just said you don't want to go." Sharon stated in aggravation.

Still the canine didn't respond.

"Fine then, if I have to sacrifice finesse in favour of ferocity then so be it." She reached down to grab his shoulder and haul him erect.

"On your feet now!"

And then the vixen immediately saw that Tyrone was no longer in any condition to give names or details, and most likely never would be again, on account of the gaping vaporised hole in his chest where his heart once was.

*Oh sweet Deus!!* Sharon thought as she glanced around.

#Kryssa, I found our dog. Get over here now!#

In an instant the bat was at her side, hissing quietly in contempt when she saw Tyrone's body.

"Well so much for that avenue." Sharon quickly flipped her U.A.P. back up to standard charge setting and stood to scan the nearby roof tops. "Better notify Pericles and the mek drones for this sector. Bastard can't have gotten far."

Kryssa however continued to stare at the now deceased doggy and slowly closed her eyes as realisation dawned.

"I don't think he got away at all." She stated forlornly. "He's playing off your instincts, planting Tyrone in plain sight so you'd do the naturally expected thing and call me over." She looked to follow the vixen's gaze. "We've let ourselves be exposed; this is right where he wants us!!" Kryssa quickly unslung her MRG launcher and primed it with a long range impact mortar.

And then immediately stopped dead as she felt a small nip to the back of her neck, exactly like a mosquito had bitten her.

"Uh, Kryssa? You okay?" Sharon asked, noting that the bat was wearing an almost unseen look of shock on her face.

Krys closed her eyes and hissed loudly as she reached up to her neck and felt something tiny sticking into her spine. Pinching it between her thumb and index claws, the bat yanked the object out and brought her hand forward for the two morphs to get a better look at it, prompting Sharon to go wide eyed when she saw the dripping needle tip of the tiny winged dart that now rested in the bat's palm.

*A harbinger!* Sharon looked up at Kryssa with extreme worry. "Krys you've been injected with something!" She exclaimed.

{So it appears.} Krys calmly slipped the dart into the pocket of her coat and carried out a self diagnostic on her wrist comp. {But whatever it is, it hasn't tripped off any of the toxin sensors on my body yet and it doesn't appear to be fast acting either.}

Sharon gulped and responded in kind. #Then that can only entail it's something that's designed to immobilise you, slow you down so that whomever fired it can move in and finish the job.#

Her eyes grew to the size of dinner plates at the realisation of what she'd just said.

Quickly she strained her cyber enhanced ears to listen in at her surroundings, barely managing to catch what sounded like a faint click of something metal touching down on top of a rain swept surface directly behind her.

Almost like lightening Sharon's paw shot up to pull her SF katana out of its sheath so that it was now over the exposed part of her neck. Barely a nano-second later a lound 'ping!' rang out as something zinged into the exposed sword at mach velocities and ricocheted off.

Pulling her sword out the rest of the way, Sharon whirled around to see a black hulking shilouette on a nearby roof spread out a great pair of wings and take flight into the darkened skies.

*Oh no you're not!* Sharon thought as she held out the arm with the las-leash on it and flicked her wrist.

The claw shot out towards the fleeing shape with the glowing beam trailing behind it like the tail of a flaming comet. The shape shuddered and then stopped its ascent as the claw managed to grab onto a part of it and the beam went taught.

*Gotchya!*

Sharon let a smile cross her face.

Which then quickly melted into a look of surprise when the shape changed direction and began flying over the length of the roof, whisking the vixen straight off her feet and dragging her along behind it.

*Oh schmed!! Always one thing you fail to take into account isn't there girl!!*

Sharon gave herself a quick rebuke and then grunted as her body was slammed against one of the fountains.

Thinking quickly the vixen hooked her free arm over the lip of the pool part and held on for dear life as the flying morph tethered to her changed course again and tried to wrench her off the structure.

Sharon yipped and grit her teeth as she was yanked around the full circumfrence of the fountain's pool and then all the way back, the barrels of her U.A.P. clacking off the inside tiles as she valiantly maintained her grip.

Unfortunately the morph in the skies cottoned on soon enough and alternated its course to where it was now directly over the fountain before flapping its wings and shooting straight up into the night sky.

Not expecting this at all, Sharon gasped in shock when she felt herself being violently jerked upward to where she couldn't hold onto the fountain and her weapons at the same time. Still too shocked to make a decision, the vixen was forced to let go and began ascending after her captive.

#Krys, if you can, try to catch my leg!#

Sharon looked down at the rapidly shrinking bat, seeing that while she was now kneeling on the grass part of the roof her violet eyes betrayed that she was still more or less in control of her body.

With the same inhumanely fast speed as the vixen, Kryssa shot her own las-leash and snagged Sharon on her calf. Inhaling slowly, the bat yanked her arm back and curled her fingers inwards, dragging both the vixen and her winged assailant back down onto the roof.

"Whew! Thanks Krys, I owe you for that." Sharon said as she got up. "You feeling alright?"

The bat uncoupled the claw and exhaled. "My legs are starting to feel a bit numb but it's nothing that'll hinder me yet." Her eyes narrowed. "Our friend apparently didn't account for the fact that I'm a lot stronger than those other agents."

Sharon looked over to where the avian (an American bald eagle as she now saw) had landed about 30 feet away from them. Slowly he folded his massive brown wings over his body and brought himself up to a crouching position before lifting his head to stare first at them through the black visors of his helmet and then down at the metal claw still fastened securely around the ankle of his metallic talon shaped boots.

"If you're thinking of trying to wrench that off then don't. It's fitted with an elasticated membrane so all you're going to accomplish is stretching it." Sharon stated authoritively as she stood up and raised her U.A.P. "Now lie back down on your stomach and spread your arms."

The eagle continued to stare silently at her for another second or so.

Then without any hesitancy he swept one of his wings aside and sent a volley of short range plasma beams towards the two agents from his arm mounted rifle.

"Sharon get down!!" Kryssa screamed as she threw herself onto the roof.

The vixen didn't need any telling, the instant her eyes registered the purple glow of energy rushing towards her, she twisted her body around and knocked herself off balance so she too fell to the ground. As the beams seared through the air mere inches from her torso, Sharon switched the sonar sheath on her katana sword on maximum and skilfully spun the blade out in front of Kryssa to deflect any shots heading in her direction.

#He must be the one who killed off the other agents! Schmed, how does a non-military personnel get hold of plasma weapons!?#

{I don't know, but if we don't try to stop him we'll never be able to find out!} Kryssa sent back as she set her U.A.P. to armour piercing rounds and returned fire.

The eagle ceased shooting momentarily as he registered the sound of gunfire coming from his opponents and then quickly curled his other wing around to shield his body as he stood back up. The sounds of metal hitting metal rang out through the raining skies as most of Kryssa's bullets blew through the hard coated feathers on the exterior of the wings, their inertia being slowed down enough so that they merely bounced uselessly off the avian's power armour.

Seeing that her friend's assault was not having the desired results, Sharon piled on with her own plasma barrage but that proved even more fruitless as the beams merely impacted and dispersed on the wings.

{That's not going to work Sharon, we need to try something else.} Kryssa sent as she tried to stand up and cringed when she sensed the feeling was gradually leaving her legs.

Seeing this, the avian again layed in with another barrage of plasma fire but Sharon was ready this time and grabbed ahold of the bat to throw both of them out of harm's way behind the temporary cover of one of the fountains.

"Agreed but try not to move too much okay Krys? You're only going to end up pumping that stuff around your body faster." Sharon glanced around the fountain to see the eagle changing the plasma cell in his Hyper-blaster rifle for a 7.32 hollow point round magazine and again spreading his wings in preparation for flight. "Looks like he's going to make another pass. Damn this guy must know a really good weapons salesman."

Kryssa groaned. "So what course of action do you suggest we take then?"

Sharon thought fast. "I'll see what I can do to keep him stationary. Just make sure that MRG launcher of yours is loaded and ready when I give you the go ahead." She looked down at the bat and smiled knowingly. "Standard ammo may not make much of a hole in this guy but let's see how resilient he is against a ballistic missile."

The faintest hint of a smile passed over the bat's lips as she nodded.

Sharon sheathed her sword and rolled out from behind the fountain just as the eagle soared over head and rained down fire on the two agents. Leaping quickly to her feet, the vixen darted around the structure, wrapping the las-leash beam around it until it was again taught and stopping the avian dead in his tracks.

#Alright Krys, take your shot!# She sent while pulling with all her might against the struggling bird in the sky.

Krys sucked in a breath and steadied her MRG, trying to line up her sights while ignoring the blurriness seeping into her vision.

*Dammit, come on fight girl! You can't let this get to you now!*

She blinked and activated her retinal enhancer, sighing in relief as her sight briefly cleared again, allowing her to draw a bead and slam the eagle with a reduced payload rocket, just enough to disable but not kill him.

There was a momentary shuddering as the bird was enveloped in the full force of the explosion and then Sharon's beam went slack as he crashed onto the wet grass.

*Knew that'd do the trick.* Sharon smiled to herself as she walked over to the twitching winged morph. "Okay buster, now do you feel like cooperating with...huh?"

Sharon's line of thought was broken off by a low whirring sound coming from the eagle's legs.

Two seconds later her stomach felt like it was doing the same as the bird nailed her with a full on kick that was like someone trying to impale her with the flat tipped trunk of a Redwood.

"Ooogh." Was all Sharon could muster as she went flying several feet across the the roof and into a bench.

{Sharon are you alright?}

The vixen grabbed onto the bench and hauled herself back up with difficulty.

#About as alright as anyone else hit with a sonic generator on full blast would feel.# She turned around to see the assassin was now back on his feet, the rocket's blast having charred his armour somewhat but surprisingly failed to crack it.

*Schmed! This guy's better protected than a tank!*

Sharon immediately went for her U.A.P. again but by the time she'd gotten it out of its holster the eagle had his rifle raised and a targeting beam centered on her heart.

For a moment the world just seemed to stop dead for the vulpine. Her paw frozen around the grip of her gun, eyes staring straight at her distorted reflection in the assassin's black rain drenched visors as his talon tightened on the trigger, inch by precious inch.

It seemed only like sheer dumb luck that at that moment, Sharon's fingers twitched inwardly towards her palm, and caused the las-leash to start retracting the claw still currently attached to the eagle's ankle.

The sudden tug on his leg only threw the assassin off balance momentarily but it proved to be just enough time for Kryssa to leap from where she was sitting and tackle him back to the ground.

Surprised that the bat was still putting up such a fight even with his immobilising serum flowing through her veins, the bird gave little intial resistance. A factor Kryssa was all too happy to exploit as she immediately grabbed onto his Hyper-blaster rifle and wrenched it off his arm.

Tossing the weapon aside, Kryssa began laying in with scratches and punches, pummelling and pounding him everywhere she could see, trying to find some weakness in his apparently immpenetrable shell.

#Krys what are you doing?? That's only going to make your condition worse!#

{I can't...let him...hurt you!!} Kryssa snarled back as she continued to struggle with the avian.

All Sharon could do was watch helplessly as the two combatants kept laying into each other, each seeming to be equally matched.

Up until the bat's trench coat suddenly tented outwards as something tore through her abdomen underneath.

"KRYSSA!!!" Sharon cried as the eagle pulled out whatever it was he'd used to impale the winged rodent and knocked her off him with another well aimed kick. Krys went tumbling several feet across the roof and lay still, leaving the vixen to just stand there staring at her body in shock silence until she coughed violently and spat out blood.

"Kryssa?" Sharon rushed over as the bat weakly hauled herself up onto her elbows and gave the vixen a reassuring wink.

"It's okay Sharon, he didn't puncture anything vital,"

With an amazing display of strength, Krys brought herself up to a sitting position and assessed the bleeding gash in her abdomen. "And while my body may be failing me my immunity to pain certainly isn't."

Sharon let herself a quick exhale of relief. "You got any Re-gen or bandages on you?"

The bat reached into her thigh pads and fished out the necessary medical supplies. "Valerie's been quite insistent on making sure that I always carry them around with me."

"May the Deus bless her." Sharon smiled as she looked to see the eagle getting back to his feet, blood and rain dripping off the two foot long underhanded blade extending out of his gauntlet. With a way wards glance in her direction, he dug it into the claw on his ankle and sent a massive electric charge into the device, frying every circuit in it to a crunchy crisp and finally allowing him to tear it off.

*Great, impenetrable and fitted out like a Swiss army knife.*

Sharon groaned as she unstrapped the now useless las-leash from her wrist and stepped back trying to decide what the hell she was going to do now.

*If I call for back up he'll just fly away and escape and anyway I probably won't be able to hold him off till they get here. If I alert Jason it'll just place him and Valerie in further danger. Pericles will probably take a while to find anything useful on this guy. This just keeps getting better and better.*

The vixen huffed as she crossed off her options one by one, trying not to think about what she was going to do about Kryssa who was no doubt getting worse by the minute, despite the strong face she was putting on.

Despaired, Sharon again turned to face the assassin and it was then she noticed that while the eagle had blood dripping off his arm, not all of it was coming off the blade. There was also a small trickle, presumably from his scuffle with Kryssa, coming from further up. Around where his armour broke to accommodate his elbow.

*Of course! His joints aren't as heavily protected so as to not to hinder flexibility!*

Smiling inwardly to herself, Sharon drew her SF katana and cranked the sound sheath up to a suitably paralysing frequency.

{Sharon, what do you think you're doing?} Kryssa sent in bewilderment.

#You've inadvertently discovered our friend's weak point.# Sharon replied as a second blade extended out of the avian's other gauntlet and he stood ready for battle.

#Patch yourself up Krys, looks like I'm going to have to give this guy a firm talking to.# She sent as the two crossed swords.

Meanwhile -

"The med-centre's mainframe interface is just in here." The basset hound in hospital fatigues said as he led Jason and Valerie into a room full of consoles. "The patient records have their own allotted drive so you should be able to find whatever you need easily."

"Thank you doctor, we'll try to be quick." Valerie replied.

"Though I must admit, I do find it rather disconcerting being asked to let you see these. I mean they are confidential info." The hound remarked.

"If you wish to take it up with our administrator then please feel free to do so." Jason said in a slightly more firm tone.

"Okay, okay, just letting you know." The dog held his paws up in a defensive gesture and backed out of the room.

"Alright Jason, if you could please lock the door then we'll see what we can find here." Valerie said as she sat down at one of the consoles.

The fox looked at the hybrid in confusion. "Well alright, but do you mind if I ask why?"

Val unzipped her collar and folded it down. "It'll take too long for us to look through all the records the conventional way. Better to just take the up close and personal approach." She looked back over her shoulder at the door. "Besides, on a courtesy note, the less time we have to spend bothering the staff here the better."

Jase appeared uneasy.

"Actually if it's alright with you I think I'll opt out." He said while reaching up to rub the back of his neck. "I'm kind of a little squeamish about cyber-worming."

The felapin cocked her head but then smiled. "I guess it's an acquired taste. Okay once I'm in you can check over the files and copy them for when we return to HQ."

Jason nodded his thanks and turned around as Val leaned back on the chair and allowed herself to become linked with the computer. While he was aware that it was a relatively safe procedure, and that in reality it was really only a small step above the normal procedure of going on-net, just thinking about how the essential essence that gave each morph life was being sucked out of their bodies and converted into a computer format made Jase's stomach turn.

[-Alright Jase, I'm in. Log on to the console next to me and I'll start sending you anything that looks suspicious.-]

~Got it. ~ He moved over and sat down.

[-Okay, let's start with last's month's records....hold on a minute, looks like I need to do a bit of sorting for drug related admissions first.....okay, now let's have a closer at the OD cases....hmmmm, quite a lot of them here, this may take a while.-]

~Don't worry; I'll deal with any impatient staff members who may drop by. ~ Jase assured.

[-Much appreciated Jase....right, here's one that missing a date of discharge...I'm sending it to you now....-]

Jason watched his screen and waited for the record file to appear. Several seconds passed which then turned into minutes but nothing came up. Confused, Jase ran a search for it but that didn't find anything either.

~Uh, Valerie? Sorry to butt in but I'm not receiving anything on my end, could you try it again? ~

There was no initial response, causing the fox to look over at the lifeless cheetah bunny next to him. ~Val? ~

[-Hold on Jase something's wrong here, the file just disappeared on my end too. I'm trying to look for it.-]

~Valerie I think you'd better get out of there. ~

[-Wait, two more files just vanished. Now another three just went...now five more, what the hell is going on here?-] The line went dead.

~Valerie? ~

For two angst ridden minutes the fox got nothing in response, a fact that was only made worse by the trembling voice that then came through his mind.

[-J-Jase? I...I think there's something else in here with me. It's wiping the mainframe clean, I-I can't stop it!]

Another brief but tense silence.

[-And I can't seem to get out of here either! -] Valerie sent in panic [-Jason, help!-]

The fox groaned and then began madly hammering in commands on his console.

~Pericles, this is Jason. Something's infected the Thomas Newhart med-centre's mainframe and Valerie's currently stuck inside with it. I need you to help me isolate her and initiate a retrieval program now! ~

>Understood, I'm establishing a link with the mainframe...link established, now searching for Agent Piersen's neural ID signature...<

The seconds seem tick by at an agonisingly slow pace for the fox as he tried to bring up every type of attack and anti-viral barrier he could find on the drive, none of which seemed to do much to slow what ever it was that was progressively destroying all the data on the mainframe.

~Hang on Valerie, Pericles and I are working on getting you out now. ~

[- Please hurry Jase, this thing's already erased half the archives, pretty soon there won't be anything left to delete except me! -]

*Not if I have anything to say about it!* Jase thought to himself as he accessed the contents of each of the med-centre staff's personal trash cans and began uploading them to the records drive, showering the unseen menace with more and more data which it would have to chew through before it could get to the frightened cheetah-bunny.

*Deus please, don't let this be a replay of my parents' last night together!*

>Agent Piersen located, Agent Dermont. Initiating retrieval now.< Pericles' voice calmly resonated out.

Jase felt his heart skip a beat as he looked over at the felapin's body. For one horrific second, nothing happened.

Then Valerie's eyes snapped open and she sucked in a huge breath of air.

"You okay girl?" He asked as she grabbed onto her chair's link spokes and practically tore them out of her neck.

"Yeah, yeah I'm alright, just a little shaken up."

Val accessed the medical scanner on her wrist comp and carried out a diagnosis on herself. Nothing out of the ordinary was detected.

"Phew! Thanks Jase, I thought I was done for." She smiled and patted his paw.

"Hey just count yourself lucky this place seems to be mainly staffed by the sort of morphs who just can't bring themselves to actually throw anything away. There must have been at least four months worth of old mail in some of those trash cans." He chuckled as Val nodded.

{Pericles, can you get verification on what it was that attacked the system just now?}

>I've just finished quarantining it Agent Piersen. It's a custom designed sleeper virus programmed to search and destroy mass amounts of data in a very short space of time.< Pericles piped up. >From my initial analysis, it appears that it had disguised itself as one of the patient records and was activated by your worming into the mainframe.<

Both fox and hybrid looked down at the consoles.

~ Can you hazard a guess as to where it came from? ~ Jase sent.

>Unlikely, just as Dennis Nedry thought to do when he shut down Jurassic Park; whoever created this has taken painstaking care to cover their tracks. The design is of a type that does not match any in my data banks and it bears no sign of having originated from anywhere on the Hyper-Realm. <

Another pause followed as Pericles checked over the virus.

>At the moment I can only theorise that it was deliberately uploaded by somebody here as a means of erasing any incriminating evidence that may have been on the mainframe as well as anchoring your souls on the Hyper-Realm and then erasing them while they were still in digital format.<

Jase cringed at the thought. "And to think that if I'd gone in there with you they'd have succeeded in spades."

Val turned her head around to look at Jason with fearful realisation in her eyes.

"But if someone set that thing up to get rid of us, that can only mean..."

"They know we're onto them." Jason finished as his eyes went wide and he jerked his head back to the door. "Sharon!"

"Kryssa!!" The felapin cried in alarm as she looked up at the fox.

"Would you care to drive or should I?" He asked wearily as the two burst out of the interface room and tore down the hallway to the entrance.

7:45 p.m.-

*I have really got to get the number of this guy's sword fighting instructor.* Sharon groaned as she narrowly ducked underneath another of the bald eagle's sideways slashes and parried his following uppercut with her sword, the bird's arm seeming to shake like a vibrating massager in overdrive from coming into contact with her katana's sonar sheath.

*Clearly I haven't been getting my credit's worth just following the military's elite kenjutsu training programme.*

Sharon spun her blade down to block a thrust aimed at her stomach and force it aside before twirling her body around to nail her avian assailant in the gut and knock him back down onto the rain soaked grass to give her some room to breathe. Their fight so far had seemed to be a fairly even match. Both sides had given it their all and both were getting considerably battered.

Another groan escaped the vixen's lips as she felt over the side of her abdomen where a large bruise was no doubt forming after she'd endured another vicious kick from the bird.

Sighing she wiped some blood from her nose and spat more out of her mouth as her opponent got back to his feet and slowly tightened his clawed hands into fists, a steady stream of blood dripping off them from more wounds which Sharon had managed to inflict through the weaker parts of his armour.

*At least he's given Kryssa a wide berth so far.*

Sharon let herself smile briefly as the two began to circle around each other, her eyes casting a brief wayward glance at the bat who was calmly applying the last of her bandages even though her hands were now shaking terribly.

#How much longer you think you can hold on Krys?#

The bat curled her trembling hands into fists and closed her eyes.

{I don't know, my toxin inhibitor aug and filtration system are both running at maximum, any other type of poison would've been wiped clean out of my body by now yet this stuff is somehow still managing to affect me.}

Sharon was briefly distracted when the avian made a flying leap into the air and then attempted a dive bomb onto her with his outstretched blades. Feeling her speed enhancer kick in on its own accord, the vixen leapt to one side as the eagle came crashing down, his blades sinking about 6 inches into the soil.

#Just try to hang in there! This creep is finally showing some signs of cracking. As soon as I can get him to stay down for long enough I'll get us both out of here.#

Out of the corner of her eye, Sharon could make out the bat shooting her a knowing stare.

{Perhaps then I may know of a way to help speed things up.} She got down on all fours and started to drag herself across the roof.

#Krys now what are you doing?# The vixen sent back in disbelief as the avian wrenched his blades out of the ground and sent them to again meet with her katana.

{Just hold him off till I can reach my launcher!} Kryssa answered, giving her a stern nod.

Sharon sighed and grit her teeth. She seriously didn't want the bat to try anything else that might futher incapacitate her but seeing as she was currently locked in a death hold with the eagle and quickly running out of ideas to boot, the vixen decided she couldn't really protest.

Gritting harder, Sharon instead focused on trying to force her opponent's blades back down away from her face. She couldn't believe the bird wasn't being rattled senseless from the prolonged contact with her sword but she supposed his armour was probably designed to dissipate enough of the sonic charge so it wouldn't paralyse him like it would an unprotected morph.

Grunting and feeling the strain of taxing her strength enhancer aug so heavily, Sharon continued to push down on the blades, staring defiantly into the bald eagle's helmet visors until they suddenly broke out from underneath her sword and curved upwards to meet at her neck. With nary a second to think about it, the vixen slammed her paws down on the bird's chest and pushed her torso forward slightly, just enough so the blades ended up hitting her shoulders where the combined protection of both her Ralvek ladened coat and suit would ensure they never succeeded in actually cutting through to her fur.

Feeling a brief surge of relief shoot through her, Sharon rolled backwards and got back to her feet as the avian quickly got back to his feet and let fly with a flurry of darts from a hidden needle shooter attached to the inside of his wrist.

Taking advantage of the reduced surface friction caused by the rain water, Sharon let her feet slip out from under her, causing her body to sink into a splits position while the darts zinged past over head.

*Nice try but it's not nearly as effective when you don't have the element of surprise.* She thought as she got back up and let fly with a downwards slash to his head which the bald eagle blocked with the metal coated exterior of his wing before following up with his own attack as thunder roared out through the raining skies above.

Meanwhile, Kryssa had managed to reach her MRG without any further undue hindrance save for that caused by her rapidly failing body. Breathing heavily and with extreme difficulty the bat brought herself up to a sitting position and grabbed onto the weapon, her arms feeling like a hundred pounds of dead weight each.

Taking a deep breath and baring her fangs, the bat summoned what scant reserves of strength she had left and lifted it off the ground into her lap while trying to ignore a strange itching sensation that was becoming more prominent in the space between her eyes. The bat couldn't quite place it but it felt oddly like liquid was running down the length of her skull under her fur.

*Remember girl, Sharon is now depending on you as much as Valerie did beforehand. You are NOT going to let this get the better of you!*

Emboldened somewhat by the pep talk, Kryssa shelved the new feeling to be dealt with later and pumped her optical enhancer up to maximum, allowing her now extremely blurry vision to clear just enough that she could distinguish the eagle's hulking winged form from the vixen's thinner, more streamlined one.

{Sharon, when I give you the word, get the hell out of dodge!}

Taking another breath, Kryssa set her launcher to electro burst grenade and forced her almost completely paralysed arms to shakily aim it at the two combatants.

{Now!}

With nary a questioning glance, Sharon leapt up and iniated a kangaroo kick to the eagle's chest, forcing him to stumble backwards several feet while Kryssa depressed the trigger.

The grenade shot out and nailed the avian in the back right between his wings, bringing an unmistakable squawk of pain from somewhere deep within the confines of his armour as a massive electric charge surged through his body.

Convulsing severly, the avian collapsed to his knees and then fell on his hands, his body twitching violently as the electric charge dissipated.

Cautiously, Sharon drew her U.A.P. and approached the smoking bird, looking for any signs that he may still have enough left in him to continue the scuffle and, from the outset, finding none.

"Quite a fight you put up there, worthy of recognition in any hall of fame. Especially considering the 14 other agents you wiped out beforehand."

She leaned down and took hold of his helmet.

"But you knew it had to end at some point, and right now if you value your life I think it'd be best if you start divulging some info, starting with the obvious one of who the hell are you?"

From across the roof, Kryssa blinked to try and clear her vision, and saw to her horror what looked like an extremely blurry vixen trying to tug the helmet off her winged prisoner.

{Sharon, don't he might still be dan-}

The bat never got a chance to finish her statement as her ears, the only two sensory organs on her body still in reasonable working order, picked up the crackling sound of electricity surging out of one body and into another one.

Sharon suddenly felt like her organs were being rapidly consumed by a raging five alarm fire but she never screamed.

Indeed it is highly unlikely she would've even had sufficient brainpower to remember to do so as the pain of having several million volts sent through her was immediately coupled and then blotted out by the feeling of her augmentation meks shorting out and then being forced to shut down as a last ditched effort to protect her.

As her paws slipped from the bald eagle's helmet, Sharon barely managed an exhale of breath before the world went black and she collapsed into a lifeless heap on the roof.

"SHARON!" Kryssa screeched as she tried valiantly to get back to her feet and then hissed bitterly when her limbs refused to follow through.

Instead all the bat could do was collapse back onto the grass as her own body finally threw in the towel and listen as the avian got up and walked over to first pick up his rifle then moved several feet over to retrieve something else from the ground.

"Of course, you must have had your armour set to absorb and store the charge from that grenade. In preparation for when she touched you, as you knew she was bound to do."

A bitter hiss escaped her lips as her metallic ear picked up on the increasing volume of his steps, signifying he was approaching her.

In one last daring act she attempted to get up but the eagle saw to that by grabbing her MRG out of her hands and then slamming his talon down on her chest.

For a moment he did nothing but regard her in silence, the only sound being the dripping of water off the metal vocoder encasing his beak as he watched her try to get her paralysed body to move on sheer will power.

"Well? What are you waiting for? You managed to put her down, aren't you going to finish the job?" She said bitterly.

The response she got was the gentle swish of metal blades being raised upward, as if in preparation to strike.

Which, to her amazement, was then followed by the sound of them being retracted back into his gauntlets.

"No." He said.

Kryssa moved her head slightly over, the simple motion seeming almost nigh on impossible in her current state.

"Why not?"

The eagle leaned down and held his arm over her face. Flexing slowly he allowed several drops of blood to trickle out of his wounds and drip onto her nose and into her mouth.

"Sharon said I am worthy of recognition to you, well the same is true of you to me. No one has ever held out that long against my toxins and never in my life have I encountered any morphs with as much cast iron strength and a will to give themselves up to save the lives of others as you."

The avian kneeled to grab onto Kryssa's arm and pulled her coat sleeve down to decouple her suit from the glove. From a hidden compartment on his leg he drew out a vial and injected its contents into her arm.

"I may seem to be nothing more than another common killer to you but I am not without some semblance of honour. Hence I will not take either of your lives as you are but will instead face you on equal terms next time."

Kryssa was about to ask what he meant by that but stopped when her ears registered the sound of sirens and patrol craft approaching. With great effort she turned to face the eagle again as he stood up.

"That doesn't excuse your previous actions. As an agent of the C.S.F. I will still aid in all attempts to hunt you down and bring both you and your employers to justice." She swore.

The assassin lifted his talon off her and bowed his head.

"I'd have expected no less of you. But know this: my presence is but a small demonstration of the power the C.S.F. is trying to oppose. Continue in your attempts to bring it down and things will only steadily become worse for you as time goes on."

He stepped back.

"However, as a token of respect, I will provide you with the answer to your friend's question,"

He turned around and began to walk away. "Tell her that around most parts I am known as Siddik Al Faddil."

Kryssa made out the sound of wings being spread as the bird shot off like an arrow into the stormy night sky.

Seconds later the grav-shaft slid open and Jason and Valerie, along with several other agents and security drones burst onto the roof.

"Sharon!" Jason said, running over to the twitching and barely breathing vixen.

"Kryssa!" Valerie followed as she dropped her Shock-core rifle and made a bee line for the bat. "By Deus are you alright? What happened? Are you injured?" The hybrid asked in rapid and increasingly panicked succession as she helped prop the bat up.

Kryssa merely tried to flex her fingers and, finding that feeling was returning to her limbs, she slowly felt around until she located Val and gripped her shoulder.

"It's alright Bunny girl, I was in trouble but I'll be okay now." She blinked and looked in the direction of Jason who was frantically checking over Sharon. "Go help her."

Valerie nodded and darted over.

"How is she?"

"She's received a massive electric shock. Her body's gone into almost total shut down."

He decoupled his gloves and pulled them off as Val looked over the vulpine.

"Why is she twitching like that?"

"The nano-meks in her are trying to restart her systems but they're too badly damaged to do it and don't have enough power left to repair themselves." He depressurised and unzipped Sharon's suit. "Not unless they can get a boost from another source." He looked down and began frantically flexing his paws.

*Come on, come on dammit! Don't hold back when I need you the most!!*

A tingling feeling began to reverberate through the fox's arms, prompting him to sigh in thanks as dozens of thin bio-mechanical tentacles snaked out of his fur and opened their half metal, half flesh mouths to latch onto Sharon's augmented veins and neck.

"Jase, what are you doing?"

"Providing the boost." He replied before beginning to transfer bio-electricity along the tentacles from his own reserves into the vixen in front of him, watching in angst as she slowly stopped twitching and, after seven panic filled minutes, finally began to breathe normally.

"Huh? Wh-What happened?" She asked as she sat up.

"Shh, it's okay Sharon you're safe now." He assured as he stroked her shoulder.

"Jase?" She looked down at what he was doing. "Oh geez, shoulda guessed that damn bird would still have one last surprise in store!"

Cheetah bunny and fox both cocked their heads. "Bird?"

"We'll explain once we get back to HQ." Kryssa said as the meks helped her up. "I'm afraid the situation has now become a lot more complex."

9:41 p.m.-

"And that's about the whole of it." Jase concluded as he, Valerie and Cyan walked down the corridor to HQ's med-centre.

Cyan nodded as she looked over the fox's report in her paws. "And Sharon firmly believes that this Siddik Al Faddil is the one responsible for the other killings too?"

"So it appears. Personally I initially had difficulty believing it too, that one single morph could wreck so much havoc in such a short space of time."

The three stepped into the observation area where Pericles was monitoring events.

"But after seeing the number he did on Kryssa and her, I'd pretty much call myself convinced." He said as he looked through the window at the bat who was being patched up and checked over and then at the blue vixen who was lying in a maintenance capsule.

"What's the latest doctor?" Cyan said as a Siberian tiger stepped through to the observation area followed by an octopus like medi-mek.

"Sharon's sustained multiple percussive injuries as well as quite a few ruptured blood vessels but we've got her on the fast road to recovery now. Her augs just need an hour or two more to repair and recharge and then she'll be good to go home." He turned to Jason and winked. "That was a good call on giving her the extra juice. Her suit absorbed most of the shock but her brain had almost totally shut down and her heart rate was slowed to a virtual stand still, ditto for her respiratory rate and circulation. If you hadn't provided the nano-meks with the boost they needed to kick start her back into consciousness when you did she'd have been in real trouble."

"And Kryssa?"

The striped feline leaned against the window as he stared back at the bat. "She's a whole different story. From what I can tell she got hit with some kind of self replicating neuro-toxin, one designed to be able to resist against every kind of filtering and inhibitor system we've got."

The medi-mek floated over to Valerie and handed her the harbinger dart Kryssa had pocketed.

"Seems this stuff not only has the capability to paralyse muscles and inhibit sensory organs but apparently it can also cause small amounts of duramantium metal to revert back to the liquid state we have it in when we use it to coat your bones. We can't fathom how but Kryssa's missing a silver dollar sized patch from the front of her skull. Just flowed right off like water from an egg shell." He shrugged in amazement.

"Well I guess that finally explains how the other agents were taken out with head shots." Jason commented.

"Indeed. Unfortunately it appears her assailant shot her up with the antidote before he high tailed it off the premises so her body has pretty much destroyed most of the toxin by now. Looks like that's going to be the only means you guys have to find out more than what we already know." The tiger gestured to the dart as Val turned it over in her paws.

"How is she doing?" The felapin asked in trepidation.

"Wounds are pretty much standard fare. Probably would've been fatal if they'd been inflicted on any other morph but she should be right as rain in a few hours. As for the after effects of the toxin, well her vision is back to normal but she'll need a bit more time before she regains complete control of her limbs." He stroked the fur on his chin in contemplation. "In fact I may actually have to make history here and keep her over night." He smiled as the fear dissipated from Valerie's face. "You can see her now if you want."

Val nodded and headed into the infirmary, a sense of warmth and contentment flowing over her as Kryssa turned to look at her from the bed.

"Valerie?"

"Hi Krys." She said as she sat down on the bed. "Feeling better now?"

The bat lifted an arm and flexed it again. "The sensation hasn't quite yet come back but it will soon." Her stern gaze drifted as the felapin stroked over her shoulder.

"That was an incredible display of bravery and strength you put on back there. Sharon said she's never seen a more determined or valiant soul."

The bat's eyes fell back onto her claws as she curled them into fists and hissed quietly.

"Even so, I still could've done better. I should've anticipated that damn eagle would've been able to make use of an electric charge and turn it against us. I should have hit him with something stronger and put him down for good!"

She turned to look up at the hybrid.

"And I should have come with you to the med-centre. I swore to protect you and you were nearly wiped out because of my negligence. I should have been there for you Valerie, should have tried harder to..."

The bat broke off when Val grabbed her head with both paws.

"Krys,"

"Yes?"

"Shut up." The cheetah bunny said before leaning in and giving her the most passion filled kiss she could muster, letting the bat know that whatever harsh criticisms of herself she may have, the only thing the felapin cared about was that she was home and safe.

Val felt tears begin to course down the black stripe under her eyes as the bat relaxed a bit and kissed her back, both morphs wrapping each other up in their arms, tongues gently moving into each others mouths, wanting for nothing but the feel of the other.

Something which the other occupants of the room were also sensing as they watched the extreme display of affection in amused silence.

"Awwww, doesn't that just warm your heart?" Sharon smiled as she continued to view the proceedings.

"Believe me; I know just how they feel." Jase said as he leaned down to kiss her on the cheek. "To be honest Sharon, the whole time I was trying to awaken you on that roof the only thing I could think about was how I'd most likely never find another vixen more suitable for me than you."

"Then I guess I truly do have the perfect combination: the most trusting and selfless fox around at my side and a million tiny nano-meks inside me working night and day to keep me alive and in fighting shape." Sharon smirked as she kissed him back. "I don't see think things could possibly get any better right now."

Jase stopped and pulled away when he heard that. "Perhaps I might know of a way." He smiled knowingly as inspiration struck. "When the docs are finished with you head over to my apartment, I think I might have a little surprise in store for you."

Sharon looked up at her partner and grinned. "Alright then gorgeous, it's a date."

Jase nodded and turned to leave but was stopped along the way when Kryssa grabbed his arm.

"Jason, wait."

He looked down to see the bat staring up at him with her usual stern expression but a look of what appeared to be gratitude in her violet coloured eyes as she held the felapin closer to her.

"I just want to thank you before you leave. For rescuing Valerie in the med-centre and keeping her safe." She said as a very brief hint what could almost be construed as embarrasment crossed her features. "And, on a lesser note, for providing me with a break from the usual lack of lunch time company in Bunny girl's absence."

The fox simply gripped her arm and smiled warmly back at her. "As I said before, I'm just doing what I can to maintain friendly relationships here."

-Exactly as Commander Cyan anticipated you would.- Pericles floated in followed by the ground squirrel in question. -I must admit that while I did have my misgivings about her violating C.S.F. directives by combining you together, I believe now that perhaps she did indeed have the right idea.-

"Coming from you, that's a pretty serious compliment." Cyan admitted as she smoothed out the front of her red military uniform before consulting the data tablet in her paws. "However it seems our adversaries are growing in both intelligence and number and unfortunately with Tyrone's death we're essentially still at square one in terms of discovering who's behind this."

"Believe me, he won't be missed." Kryssa scowled.

Cyan cast a questioning stare at the bat before continuing. "Henceforth, in light of recent events, I've decided to take things a step further and add one more to your number: a transfer from the Seattle branch who's had extensive experience in investigating narcotics and drug trafficking. He should be here sometime the day after tomorrow."

The squirrel placed the tablet back under her arm and ran a paw through her raven coloured hair.

"In the mean time Pericles see what you can find on that virus that attacked Valerie, and I'd also like to see what you four can dig up in regards to this mysterious eagle assassin of ours, particularly where he came by the means to take out some of the best agents on the force." She said with a hint of venom.

"Trust us Cyan, we're as anxious to find out as you." Sharon assured.

"And we do have one fact to help narrow the search down." Kryssa ran her tongue over her lips. "He's Type O."

Val nodded her agreement and then stopped as she remembered something.

"By the way Cyan." She got off the bed. "I apologise for not doing this sooner but I know how much you respect our opinions on your decisions so I'd like to just thank you for pairing me up with Kryssa last week." She blushed and squirmed somewhat in embarrassment. "As you just saw, it's kind of had the same effect as with Jason and Sharon, and if I had to be honest the last few days have without a doubt been some of the best of my life."

Cyan looked down at the cheetah-bunny and smiled as she patted her on the shoulder. "While I'm glad to hear that Valerie, I'm afraid I can't take credit for that particular decision."

The felapin was surprised. "Well if you didn't then who...?"

Cyan's smile went from cheerful to knowing as she cast a nod in the direction of the remote probe hovering next to her.

"Pericles??"

-It's really not that surprising when you think about it Agent Piersen. After all one of my secondary objectives as administrator of this branch of the Central Security Force is to do what I can to make each agent as able bodied and well rounded as possible. Agent Valhorren presented the optimal means of bringing out the self-confidence you need to become a better agent and the affection you feel for her provided the best method by which she could become more socially acceptable.- The probe rotated its single blue eye down. -By pairing you up I henceforth ensured the greatest probability that you both would improve overall. Pure simple mekanik logic.-

Val stood in shock silence as Sharon just threw her head back and laughed.

"Is it any wonder I'm so supportive of machinery?" She said.

10:13 p.m.-

Jase stepped out into the lobby and went into one of the net-com booths.

*Don't know if this is really the right idea.* He thought as he brought up his personal contact file and selected the number.

*But I'm not going to keep any secrets from Sharon and to be honest she did say this is something she'd like to see.*

"Hello, Optimum Bodybuilders Health and Fitness, manager's office." The male voice resonated.

"Glad I got you before you closed up." Jase said to the blank screen.

There was a brief pause.

"Foxy?" The voice asked.

Though he knew he couldn't see it, Jase still nodded. "You free to meet up in about 20 minutes or so?"

11:27 p.m.-

After a prolonged journey through the streets of Manhattan to enjoy a little bit more of the night time weather, Sharon at last stepped into Jason's apartment.

"Jase?" She called out while taking a moment to shake out her soaked hair and admire the décor of the place.

~ Glad you could make it my sweet vixen. We're in the bedroom. ~ The reply came over the cerebral link.

*We?* Slightly confused but excited by the prospect, Sharon hung up her trench coat and walked into the living room, noticing an upright piano that was now set up in one corner.

*Interesting, I never knew he had a talent for music.*

Sharon wandered past the bathroom and stepped into the bedroom.

"Jase? You here hands-"

Sharon felt her voice stop dead in her throat as she gazed upon her partner, now stripped to his boxers sitting and being loving fondled by what she could only describe as the most drop dead gorgeous male velociraptor she'd ever seen.

"Hey there, have a seat." He said indicating a plush comfortable looking chair that had been next to the bed.

Sharon registered the gesture but for the moment her body seemed hesistant to do anything that might divert her eyes away from the cuddling couple in front of her.

"J-J-Jase, wh-what are you doing?" She asked half in shock, half in excitement.

"You've been saying about how much you'd like to see me get it on with another guy." He smiled and then murred softly as the raptor licked over his cheek, tracing a long curvy line with the tip of his saurian tongue before lightly kissing the area.

"And today, much to my surprise, I discovered an old flame of mine has apparently also taken residence here so I thought I'd take advantage of the opportunity." He reached behind to stroke over his companion's head. "This is Klesk Vadrigar."

The raptor turned to offer her a playful grin. "Pleasure to make your acquaintance." He nodded in approval as he looked her over. "I'm glad to see Jase still has such excellent taste in companions."

Upon hearing the sensual tones radiating out from the dinosaur, Sharon felt herself relax as her mouth twisted into an amused smile.

"Well, this certainly is a pleasant surprise to come home to." She said as she set her U.A.P. down next to Jason's on the nightstand and walked around the bed to get a better look at Klesk. His physique was even more perfectly balanced than Jase's in terms of having a near flawlessly developed musculature while still retaining the sleek, agile build his series was renowned for. Wrapping up his body was a cascade of black scales stripped with red on the back, snout, knees and tail and fading to a light grey over his chest and stomach. It was all the vixen could to stop her tongue from rolling out as she ran a paw over his arm, feeling how rigid the bicep was as Klesk continued to stare at her with his gentle green eyes.

"Wow, that practically rewrites the definition of 'packed.'" Sharon said in amazement.

Klesk took his hand off from where he'd been stroking Jase's own well muscled stomach and flexed for her.

"Yeah it's impressive, but that was just thanks to having this adorable fluff ball around to provide incentive for me maintain it." He winked at her.

Sharon's grin grew wider as she caught the inferred meaning. "Ooh so I get two hunks and a story to boot." She loosened her collar and sat down on the chair. "Okay then Jase, let's hear it."

The fox looked back at the raptor who nodded in agreement before kissing him on the nose.

"Well, Klesk and I met up about four years ago when I was just getting started in Cincada."

He murred again as the dino's hands went back to massaging his front.

~I'd just gotten out of the U.T.M.C. and was still feeling a little tee'd off at how I'd dedicated three years of utmost devotion to their cause and was being left as nothing more than wasted resource slowly going bad as a result.~

He switched over the cerebral link as his murr became a low moan when one of Klesk's paws slinked down over his abs to glide over and tenderly caress the rising bulge in his boxers.

~As a result I decided to try to work out some of my anger by joining up with a local gym near HQ. Some place that stayed open late so I could give myself a sound and brutal purging of all the pent up negativity in me.~

He looked back at Klesk, finding himself gradually slipping into and getting lost in the raptor's sea green eyes like he'd done on so many occasions long ago. Feeling his body slowly sliding into submissive mode, Jase closed his eyes and let himself be guided forward, his head automatically tilting to oneside so his muzzle could slide together with his lover's scaley snout.

Sharon swallowed and squirmed as she watched the two males kiss, a feeling of heat emanating out from somewhere deep in her loins as Jase wrapped his arms around Klesk and reached up to stroke the feathers of his multicoloured head crest while the dino allowed one of his paws to move slowly down the fox's body, his claws making little rivets in the white chest fur before turning 180 degrees and closing together to slip effortlessly into his boxers.

~One night I guess I went a bit too far. I'd just gotten my strength enhancer fitted that day see so when it came time to start pumping the iron I pretty much figured 'what the fuck? Let's pump this sucker up to the maximum and really give ourselves a work out.' ~

Jase punctuated his statement with a much louder moan as the bulge in his boxers grew and straightened out into a full size tent under Klesk's slow and sensual ministrations. Feeling his body go limp in the dino's arms, Jason leaned against his lover and sighed happily as he was pulled further onto the bed and laid down, Klesk propping his head up with one arm while the other gripped his paw and guided it down into his own boxers.

#So what happened then?# Sharon asked, her eyes slipping closed as her paw glided over her cloth covered breasts before migrating further south to feel over her now burning sex.

~Same thing that happens to any agent that goes too far before their body has had sufficient time to adapt to new augmentations: cyber-burn out. ~

The fox looked back up at the raptor and smiled lovingly, his paw stroking over the smooth rapidly hardening flesh of the saurian cock.

~Fortunately Klesk here happened to be on duty that night and was kind enough...ooogh...to grab the weights out of my paws before I ended up crushing my trachea. ~

Klesk let out a small pleasured filled moan of his own before leaning in to again kiss the fox on the lips, this time making sure to use his tongue as well.

Jase murred softly at the feeling of a wet saurian tongue slipping in to explore his mouth, his own rising up to give it a formal greeting before sliding along the underside to survey the surroundings where it came from.

The two morphs kept this up for a while, their mouth muscles slowly writhing alongside, playing over each other's sharp predatory teeth, swabbing the roof of their maws, tickling each others tonsils, generally just go where they wished and do what they want as their hands continued to caress each other's boxer clad genitals.

From the sidelines Sharon felt like she was going to start hyperventilating with lust at the scene playing out in front of her. Her nipples were becoming almost painfully hard and her nether regions were now attempting to prevent a blaze from breaking out by initiating a flow of fluids to the hottest areas. Murring in delight at what she was seeing, Sharon reached up to depreassurise her suit and unzip it so she could have freer access to her breasts.

Meanwhile on the bed, as sensual and arousing as the males were finding their kiss, the need for oxygen was gradually taking more priority now and they were forced to break it off.

"Wow, you've been practicing since we last met." Klesk stated.

"Didn't have a choice, she demands even more of me than you did." Jase said nodding at Sharon. "Not that I'm complaining in the slightest."

Klesk looked over at the vixen and smiled even more playfully when he saw what she was doing.

"Like what you've seen so far?" He said before leaning down to kiss the fox on his neck. "I think I know just how to proceed then."

Gradually he moved his head down Jason's stomach, his snout leaning in to plant a kiss on both pecs and then each of his abs, all of which left the fox gasping as a feeling of being in utter heaven settled in his body.

"Mmm, you look better every time we do this." He lifted his head up as a look of what could possibly be deemed as regret passed over his features. "I can't believe I was actually dumb enough to leave it behind." He mused under his breath before his smile came back. "Best make up for lost time then."

Slowly he got back down and rubbed a paw over the front of Jason's grey silk boxers, a warm glow of satisfaction taking root as he felt how hard the fox had become coupled with the loud moan that signified he was enjoying every minute so far.

Tenderly the raptor extracted his other hand and took a firm grip on the waistband of the clothing.

Getting the idea, Jase lifted his rump slightly so the dinosaur could pull them off, revealing his red, fully erect shaft for all to see.

Exhaling slowly, Klesk lay back down and cupped the fox's balls as he traced over the hot flesh with a claw.

"Tell me that isn't one of the most beautiful things you've ever seen." He said to Sharon who was gazing in equal enrapturement.

"It's certainly one of the few things in the world I've grown to absolutely love the sight of every time it's presented to me." The vixen admitted as she caressed over a breast.

"I can think of another." Jase grinned as he reached over to grab onto Klesk's boxers and pull down.

Chuckling lightly, Klesk lay back on the bed and propped a foot on the fox's shoulder while his undergarments were also removed.

Jason couldn't help but coo softly as he tossed the raptor's boxers away and reached up to fondle the foot while his eyes just drank in the ambrosial sight of the muscular dinosaur lying prostrate in front of him, cock throbbing at its full 10-inch length, eyes beckoning him to tend to it, black and red stripped tail gently snaking underneath to wrap around his own bushy white tipped one.

"Damn it, I promised I'd try to stop drooling like a deranged teen every time I saw you like this." He said as he wiped his mouth.

Klesk just reached up and stroked his cheek. "The fact that you still have that reaction after what I did to you more than makes up for it."

Jase sighed and just shook his head. "You had an opportunity to climb out of the slums and you took it. Perfectly understandable." He said before pushing him back down and climbing on top.

#If you don't mind my asking Jase, what is he talking about?# Sharon sent.

Jason delayed his response for a moment so he could lean in and take the raptor in another passionate kiss.

~Well just as you have your goals in life and I have mine, Klesk's dream desire has been to start his own chain of fitness centres around the U.S.~

A combined moan reverberated from both vulpine and dinosaur as Jase shifted position slightly so their cocks rubbed against each other.

~ Sadly...oogh...things didn't quite work out as easily as that.~ He looked down into Klesk's eyes. ~ His upbringing was a difficult struggle to say the least, and unfortunately nobody ever taught him about who are the right morphs and who are the wrong morphs to mix with.~

Sharon looked at the raptor and nodded as she caught the meaning. #Got involved with the underground?#

~Through no fault of his own but yes. It was a lifestyle he found easy to stick with and it helped him pay for the courses he needed to get degrees in finance and the like. ~

He moaned again and broke the kiss, the wrestling of their tongues leaving him yearning to please the raptor more.

~Thankfully his common sense and his determination to succeed on his own got the better of him before he sunk in too deep. ~

Slowly Jase began to repeat Klesk's kissing treatment on the raptor's own muscled torso, giving every patch of scales a loving touch from his wet lips as he made his way down to his groin.

~ He cleaned up and took on a job as a personal trainer at the place where I met up with him. Course by the time I did, he'd managed to work his way up to assisstant manager. ~

Sharon sighed contentedly, her eyes quietly urging her partner on as he reached his intended destination and gave the tip of Klesk's cock a soft and delicious kiss while his paw moved down to wrap around the rest of the shaft. Hearing a very encouraging amount of low growling coming from further up, the fox ran his tongue down the length of the raptor hood and then withdrew to let his paw give it a few strokes before licking it again.

#So go on, what happened after that?#

~We fell into conversation while I was recovering then briefly went our separate ways, only to run into each other again later that night.~

Jase opened his mouth to let the first inch or so of Klesk's saurian penis slip in past his lips before gently pursing them to create a tight ring around the scales and then gradually pulling off while his paw continued with its rhythmic stroking of the rest, murring in contentment as he felt pre begin to dribble out onto his tongue.

"Ooh Deus, you always did enjoy this part didn't you Foxy?" Klesk said as he reached down to fondle Jason's vulpine ears.

#Foxy?# Sharon giggled.

~Yeah I know, not really that imaginative of a pet name but the way he makes it sound so affectionate always gets me.~ Jase smiled back at the vixen. ~Guess it's kind of like how you always call Valerie 'Bunny girl.'~

Sharon nodded and then murred deeply as her paws continued in its relentless squeezing and caressing of her breasts, loving how large and wonderfully soft they felt.

As Jason opened his mouth to let the rest of his dino lover's shaft slide inside the warm confines of his muzzle, Sharon unzipped her suit the rest of the way so she could slip a paw into her panties and stroke over the burning folds of her pussy, a feeling of warm satisfaction radiating through her body as her eyes remained glued to the goings on in front of her.

#So anyway what was he referring to earlier? About leaving you and the like?# She sent.

Jason continued to suck on the smooth sweet tasting cock, his paws roaming along the raptor's toned legs before slipping down to cup and fondle his balls.

~Well after about two years of us going steady, Klesk heard of another fitness centre offering a management position further east in Connecticut. ~ He looked back at the vixen. ~ It was pretty much the dream opportunity for him since by this point he'd had just about all he could take of Cincada and with the new job he actually stood a fighting chance of garnering enough resources to open up his own establishment. ~

For a moment the fox stopped what he was doing.

~ But I wasn't ready to move on at that point; still needed more time to get my head straight and the like. It was a heartbreaking decision but I had to stay behind. ~

Sharon looked down at her partner and nodded in understanding.

#So he took the risk regardless and broke up with you.#

Jason took his mouth off Klesk's shaft to give his balls a kiss.

~The worst part was my own life got so mixed up after that I soon forgot about him with worrying ease. ~

Vulpine eyes lifted to stare into saurian eyes.

~Then after another two years I finally managed to sort myself out and realised I too needed to just get the hell out of that city but by then I'd pretty much lost all contact with this guy.~

A small but sincere smile formed on both male's face before Jase again enveloped the raptor's cock in his muzzle and began to suck greedily while Klesk reached down to stroke through his red hair.

~Then today he called me out of the blue. Seems he not only succeeded in landing the management job but they even let him switch over to spearhead their new branch here in New York.~

Sharon stopped her feverent stroking as she looked up at the raptor, trying not gawk at just how handsome he looked at that moment stroking through the fox's hair.

"Wow, it must have been tough giving up your passion for your ambitions."

Klesk looked back at the vixen and smiled as another moan escaped his lips.

"You...oooh...have no...ahh...no idea. But at least...oh Deus!...at least tonight I finally have the chance to make amends."

Sharon looked back down at Jase, noticing a solitary tear running down the length of his muzzle as he continued to pleasure the dino and it was at that point she finally deduced why she was getting so unusually turned on by these two males even though she'd seen this type of thing many times before.

Unlike all the X-vids she'd watched time and time again, Jase and Klesk weren't doing what they were doing for her entertainment nor were they doing it for the sake of the pleasure like some of the orgies she'd been involved in. They were doing it because after what must surely have been a hard break up for both and then living apart for so long, the two had at last found each other again and discovered that neither felt a shred of anger or bitterness towards the other, only the undying passion between them that had never once faltered over the years.

And as Klesk gently cupped Jason's head in his hands to lift him off his shaft so the two could embrace each other and kiss before the fox turned around and lifted his tail to present his rear to the raptor, Sharon knew the quiet burn of affection between them was at last being fanned back into a roaring flame.

With a howl which she tried her best to repress, Sharon seized up as her first orgasm of the night hit with full force, her juices flowing freely out of her fiery sex while her paw almost crushed her breast with all the pleasure flowing through her body.

From the bed, Jason just smiled sweetly as he watched the beautiful vixen yip and thrash around on the chair, something he himself soon felt like doing when he felt a scaled hand take hold of his butt cheek, followed by a thick wet tongue against his tail hole.

Digging his claws into the bed sheets, Jase closed his eyes and moaned loudly as Klesk licked and prodded at the tight puckered ring of muscle, his muscles tensing at the long forgotten but no less enjoyable feeling.

"Mmm, you've been keeping in shape back here too I see." The raptor mused as he inserted a finger to feel around.

"Yeah...oooogh...there were one or two other males....ngah...after you left." The fox admitted. "I thought...errghhh...thought that since my female relationships...ooogh...weren't working out I'd be able to....Oh Deus....find a suitable replacement there." The fox lowered his head as another digit intruded into his anus. "What a dumbass I was to think that anyone could replace my first."

Upon hearing that, Klesk removed his fingers and reached up to rub over the vulpine's back. "Foxy, you just did what anyone else in your situation would be expected to do." He moved up to kiss him on the back of his neck. "I'm just thankful you finally managed to find someone like her and feel happy again." He gestured to Sharon who while flushed was still staring back at them with a look in her eyes that pleaded for them to continue.

"So, you ready for the final resolution and climax." He asked.

Jase just looked up at the dinosaur, taking a moment to again get lost in those gentle green eyes before reaching up to ruffle his multi-coloured feathered crest.

"Klesk, just shut up and fuck me."

Nodding, the raptor lifted himself up and placed the tip of his pole against Jase's slavered pucker. With a quick intake of breath Klesk began to push himself in, hissing softly through his teeth at the tight hold that gripped each inch as it passed in.

Burying himself to the hilt, Klesk paused momentarily to take hold of Jason's head and turn so the two were facing each other again.

Taking the hint the fox closed the distance between them so they were kissing again as the raptor gradually began to pull out and then pushed in again.

From the sidelines, Sharon just watched in amazement at this tender display of emotion.

*Deus, those two really do still have the hots for each other!!*

The blue vixen moaned as she felt her sex was still on fire, and thanks to the recharge she'd gotten earlier, Sharon expected she had enough left over for another round.

Finally deciding she'd had enough of just watching, Sharon stood up and pushed her stealth suit down onto the floor before practically tearing her soaking wet panties off and tossing them aside.

"Sharon?" Jase asked as she pushed her long pink mane out of her face before getting onto the bed.

"Sorry but you two are just so damn hot together I couldn't stand it any longer."

Smiling she reached down to stroke over his rock hard fox hood which had now also developed a fully engorged knot.

"And any way I think you deserve an extra special reward for the show you put on." She said as she manoeuvred underneath the vulpine and spread her legs.

"My kind of girl." Klesk smiled as he kissed Jase on the cheek. "Go on Foxy, she's right, you earned this."

Shooting his raptor lover a quick smile, Jason slid his arms under the vixen and held her close to him as he positioned his cock at her entrance. "May I assume that tonight we're only going with one hole? Or are you going to torture me by making me choose again?"

Sharon just smiled seductively. "I'll let you off the hook for tonight."

Nodding, Jase pushed himself in, a low moan of pleasure reverberating from both their throats at the union.

"Okay Klesk, I believe you were in the middle of fucking him raw." She said.

Grinning, Klesk recommenced with his thrusting, pushing into his lover's ass who then followed by pushing deeply into the vixen's passage.

Jase grit his teeth and held Sharon closer to him as he tried to ignore the slight sting that came as a result of having not been mounted in so long. It soon faded thought as the gratifying feeling of being inside the vixen of his affections while simultaneously being mated by his first ever male love drove him almost into a frenzy.

Switching on his endurance augmentation Jase began to hammer into Sharon, watching in utter contentment as her pretty face twisted into the same visage of pure euphoria it did on the many other occasions they'd mated.

"Errgh...oh Deus you feel incredible Sharon." He said as she wrapped her arms around his neck.

"You...uhhh damn...just are incredible Jase." She got out as she shut her eyes as tight as she could.

"Ukh...I'd describe him...erf...no differently." Klesk shot back as he pushed into the vulpine's tight anal passageway. "Damn, how I've missed this!"

"Same here." Jason grunted as he felt the raptor cross his arms over his chest and hold onto his shoulders for dear life while continuing to pump away. An action which the fox was trying to match both in rhythm and enthusiasm as he continued to piston into the vixen. Sensing that she had quite a firm grip on his neck, Jase let go of her and reached in between to fondle her breasts, massaging and rubbing through the cerulean fur while tweaking and playing with the stiff nipples, all of which just caused the vixen to ascend higher and higher on the plateaus of pleasure.

"Deus yes! Oh you just....aaahhhhggg....just make every part of my body feel good!" Sharon cried out and then grabbed his paws as she felt something distinctly familiar pushing from underneath the fur.

"Woah...uuhh...hold on Jase....ngh...I can feel....."

"I know." Jase groaned as he used one paw to hold onto to Sharon's shoulder while his other reached behind to grab the raptor's.

"Klesk...oh my...st-stop for just a second."

"What...what is it Fo-" Klesk broke off in shock as the fox's tentacles again slid from the confines of his fur and extended out to wrap around the three morphs.

"Whoah, this is new." The raptor said as a few latched onto his neck and spine while others snaked downwards to attach themselves to his groinal area, which the raptor had to admit did feel kinda nice.

"They're intended for emergency transfer of bio-electricity or to help me ascertain the health and mental state of a crucially incapacitated morph." Jason explained. "Kinda screwed up slightly when they were installing them which is why they tend to just lash out when I start exerting myself."

Sharon smiled gently as she reached up to rub his chest fur. "Trust me Jase, they're always welcome."

The fox just smiled back and kissed her as Klesk ran a clawed hand over his own chest.

"So I take it this pleasurable feeling of having a cock in my ass which I'm sensing right now is coming from you?"

Jase looked back and nodded. "Yep, and I can feel the exact opposite reverberating through me."

As a response the raptor leaned in to kiss him again before nuzzling against his cheek. "You know I've always had my doubts about the meks until I met you. You're the most perfect blend of fur and machine that I've ever laid eyes on."

The fox closed his eyes and bowed his head as another tear trickled down his muzzle which Klesk gently licked off.

"Damn, you look cute even when you cry." He said before again moving down to grab onto his hips. "Come on, let's make this an occasion we'll never forget."

Jase nodded as the raptor again started to thrust in and out while he turned to kiss Sharon before burying himself further into her depths until his knot finally popped in and tied them together.

Sharon just mewled and then moaned loudly as the tentacles fed her a generous sensation of what her vulpine lover's cock was experiencing as it moved inside of her tight slick passageway to mingle in with the expected pleasure she was already sensing from his doing so.

The room soon became one continuous cacophony of moans, yips, growls and hisses as the three occupants continued with their lewd chain. Klesk was by now just letting his head become totally clouded in the blissful pleasure of mating with the fox he'd been forced to unceremoniously leave so long ago, Jase was enjoying the double onslaught of being rammed in from behind, which felt absolutely heavenly, while being tied to the most gorgeous vixen he'd known, which felt even better, and Sharon was just letting herself be lost in a sea of utter euphoria from getting to participate with the other two.

#Jase, oh Deus, Jase keep...nnn...keep going! Keep fucking me till I explode!# She practically screamed over the cerebral link.

~Have every intention of doing so...ergh yeah...just trying not to...gah...go off myself first! ~

As he felt the raptors balls slap against his own, Jase grit his teeth and did his best to try and dampen down the tingling feeling that heralded the approach of his climax. Desperately wanting to help both of his partners reach their own respective peaks before that happened, Jase racked his brains, trying to come up with something through the thick haze of pure ecstasy that currently enveloping his mind.

As good at blotting out all other semblances of rational thought it may have been, there seemed to be at least one small recess that was still functioning for Jase suddenly remembered something from many years ago when he and Klesk had first been together.

Releasing one of his paws from Sharon, Jason reached over and grabbed Klesk's tail, quickly unwinding it from his own.

Trying his hardest to hold back, the fox brought it around and placed the last inch in between his teeth. Without another second's hesitation he then clamped his jaws shut and bit down on it as hard as he could.

A cry of shock echoed out from behind him which was then followed by a much deeper roar of orgasmic bliss. Feeling the raptor's hands tighten around his hips, Jase could only sigh in contentment as he felt the wonderful rush of spooged flowing up into the confines of his anal passage.

Grabbing onto Sharon again he pushed in as hard as he could and just let his head fall back as his own climax hit him with all the speed and intensity of a hurricane.

"AAAAGGHHH" He cried out in a whirlpool of euphoria as his fluids shot out to coat the depths of the vixen's treasure.

"DAAAAYYYYYUSSSSJAAAAASSSE!!!" Sharon soon followed as she clawed and pulled at the bed sheets in her pinnacle of pleasure while being accentuated by a clap of thunder from outside.

Satisfied at last, the three morphs let themselves collapse into a bundle of sheets, tentacles, fur and scales as they cuddled with each other.

"Well, (pant) that was...(pant)...unexpected." Sharon said as she took hold of Jase's paw and squeezed it tightly. "What brought...(pant)...that on?"

"A little... (pant)...kink of Klesk's (pant). He always... (pant)...loves having his tail bitten or... (pant)...chewed on while having sex." Jase smiled tiredly at the dino before picking up the appendage in question and kissing it.

"What can I... (pant)...say? I happen to...(pant)...have a bit of a masochistic streak...(pant)...in me." He rolled over on top of the fox and slid his arms under his back so he could hold him lovingly. "I'm just glad I got to do it with you one last time. To make up for what I did."

Jase twisted his torso around (his lower half was still tied to the vixen) to stare into the dinosaur's eyes before reaching up to stroke over his muscular arms as the tentacles wound themselves more tightly around them. "All I ask Klesk is that you don't punish yourself. It's over and done with. I just wanted to show you tonight that I've never once hated you over it." He soothed before raising his head to kiss the raptor again.

Sharon propped herself up as she watched them, watched their arms intertwining and feeling over each other as their mouths did the same. The sight looked so beautiful to the vixen that she just had to intervene.

"Hold on there Klesk, who says you two can't stay together after tonight?" She asked.

Both morphs stopped what they were doing and turned to regard her.

"What do you mean?" The fox enquired.

Sharon smiled lovingly as she moved over to stroke his hair. "Jase do you remember what we agreed on on our first night together? About how we were going to keep our relationship open so others could be included?"

Jase thought for a second and nodded. "Yes."

"Then what's to prevent you from getting back together again with him? I mean it's pretty obvious you two are still head over heels in love with each other."

The fox looked to the raptor and then back at the vixen with a somewhat worried expression on his face. "But Sharon, what about you? Yes I guess my feelings for Klesk are strong now as they were back when we were a couple,"

He shifted position to rest a paw on her shoulder. "But my feelings for you are as equally strong. I don't want to risk losing you." He was starting to sound panicked.

Sharon just shook her head and leaned in to lap gently at his face. "Jase you're not going to lose me, you're just as much in my heart as I am in yours. The only difference, as I now see, is that yours is big enough to accommodate the affections of two morphs."

Jase opened his mouth to protest but the vixen was quick to silence him with a kiss.

"Trust me Jase, one of the worst things you can do in this life is to squander the love you feel for another. Especially if he loves you just as much back"

Jason stared back at the vixen, seeing nothing but sincerity on her face before turning to look up at the dino on top of him.

"Klesk?"

"Jase I've said it before and I'll say it again, leaving you the first time around was definitely one of the biggest mistakes of my life."

The fox sat up. "You were given the chance to get a step closer to your dream, and what's more you've succeeded phenomenally because of it."

"That doesn't excuse the fact that it was still wrong. I left you to fend by yourself in one of the biggest cess pools in the U.S. No job, however beneficial it may have been, was worth abandoning you like that."

Klesk leaned down to lightly kiss Jase on the forehead.

"And if the price I have to pay for my crime is that I have to share you with someone else from now on then so be it. I can't bear to hurt you in any way again."

Jason blinked in disbelief, his mind seemingly unable to grasp the concept of him now having two lovers.

But after looking into both the gentle green eyes of the raptor and then the vixen's sparkling emerald ones he at last caught on to the reality of the situation and hugged Klesk tightly as tears again ran down his face.

"Damn it, this is why I could never hate you." He said.

A very grateful smile spread over Klesk's black and red striped snout as he wrapped an arm around the vulpine before beckoning for Sharon to come join in the hug.

The three stayed in the loving embrace for perhaps at the most five minutes but for them it wouldn't have mattered if it was an eternity. During the period in which they could feel each other's bodies and smell each other's scent, whatever may have been going on in the rest of the world didn't matter one bit for the vixen, the raptor and the fox.

Eventually Jase's knot went down so he could pull free from Sharon and allow the morphs to stretch out on the bed while still holding on to each other.

"So how much longer till these guys decide to let go?" Klesk asked as he tugged gently on one of the tentacles still latched on to his neck.

"Should've done so by now. Just a minute."

Jason closed his eyes and flexed his arms as he concentrated hard. Seconds later he felt the satisfying sensation of metal gently pulling itself back into his fur as the tentacles detached and retracted back.

"Still don't quite have control over them but I'm gradually getting there."

"As I always say practice makes perfect." Klesk stated with a hint of his regular playfulness creeping back into his voice. "And as soon as you've had some time to rest, I'd be more than happy to go for another round to help you practice a bit more."

Sharon looked at the raptor for a moment before laughing heartily.

"Klesk, I can see you and I are going to get on just fine!"

Jase nodded his agreement before leaning up to give each of his lovers a thank you kiss and then settling back down on the pillows.

Tired but eternally grateful, the fox closed his eyes and let himself drift off to the gentle pitter-patter of the falling rain outside.

1:21 a.m.-

"As you can see doctor, these last four agents may present more of a problem to us than previously anticipated." Siddik said to the grey rabbit on the screen of his wrist-comp.

Brekken merely nodded in response as he worked on cleaning the pair of Jorgen AP-50 Avengers while watching the video feeds of the bird's fight with Sharon and Kryssa.

"So then, it appears Agent Valhorren is as unstoppable as my dearly departed associate described her as. Interesting." The lapin mused as he put the guns on his desk and sat back in his chair. "You made absolute sure they never got any information out of Tyrone?"

Siddik bowed his head. "Yes doctor whatever knowledge he may have carried, it died with him."

Brekken nodded again. "Then they're still essentially searching blind. This gives us the advantage."

"Perhaps so, but that bat is now onto you and will not stop until she's hunted both of us to the ground. I recommend you pull out of this business while nobody can trace your involvement."

At that Brekken snarled and banged his fists on the desk.

"Absolutely not!! Not while my buyers are still waiting for their supplies!" He got up and walked around the desk to stare out the window. "Today may not have gone according to plan but it is only a minor hindrance. I shall simply have to provide you with something more powerful to deal with those last four targets." A sinister smile crossed his lips. "And fortunately I currently have something in development which may prove to be just the thing."

He turned back to the monitor. "For the moment I want you to lay low while I set something else in motion." His eyes narrowed as he pushed up his glasses. "And yes that does mean I still have need of you Siddik, despite your misgivings of having 'failed' me so to speak."

On the screen, the bird stared back through his emotionless black visors. "Then I will need to make use of your facilities to come up with a more potent and resilient form of my toxins." He glanced down at the damaged las-leash he'd taken from the roof. "As well as working on designing a new gadget for myself."

Brekken leaned in as he looked over the eagle on the screen. "Those wounds need to be tended to as well. I'll have the necessary medical supplies made available."

Siddik nodded and the projection faded out.

Brekken walked around the desk and picked up his Avengers. An almost mysonginistc sense of pleasure radiating through his body as he attached a magazine and cocked them.

*They may have gotten lucky this time, but I still have plenty more resources to make use of.*

Satisfied, the lapin walked over and bought up another channel.

On screen a frill necked lizard materialised, dressed in a black Rouge State military uniform with a mirrored faceplate that concealed all but his eyes.

"Commander Logan, I trust my latest project is going as planned."

"Yes sir." The lizard hissed. "Ten battalions are now ready with another twenty in the final stages of development."

"Excellent, organise them and have them ready to be sent over to these designated coordinates."

The rabbit transmitted the relevant data.

*Let's see how well they fair against my new army.*

TO BE CONTINUED...

It's here, can you feel it?

A chance to change your world if you want it

You can give up a lot, but don't give in

Be ready for the break when it comes your way

Today, I say, be prepared

A break in the clouds-You will be heard

Raise your voice, stake your claim

After the storm, after the rain

Let me ask a question

Where do we go from here?

Playing games to past the time-but that's OK

'Cos time in on our side

There's nothing like a rain

Falling down again

To come and wash away the pain

Falling down again

To clear the air so we see again

And we won't give up

No we won't give in

When there's so much we can do

And we won't give up

No we won't give in

When there is so much left to do

2 Unlimited - Nothing Like A Rain.

------------------ FINIS -----------------