FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Ben woke gradually to a dimly lit room. The world around him had changed again.

The last thing he remembered was Nathan stuffing him in the box. He'd liked the box as soon as he saw it, but maybe that had been a mistake. He knew Luke shouldn't have trusted that human. Where was this?

He was on a couch in a large room. Across the room was a plush tiger, floating in midair, with a dog floating next to it. An identical dog was relaxing in an overstuffed chair nearby. There were words and numbers in the air next to the floating animals, and an error message blinked redly below them.

Oh. Those were images, not physical. The dog in the chair was physical, though.

"Are you sure that's going to be good enough?" Nathan's voice came from somewhere behind the couch.

"I think it'll do." Luke! He hadn't been abandoned!

"I've been thinking. Maybe we should leave the wand in there, too. It might catch something if it's just intermittent."

"Are you sure? You said you didn't want to lose it." Their voices were getting louder.

"Considering what this might mean if it's real, I think it'd be a reasonable exchange. Don't worry about it."

Wand? Catch something? Exchange? Did Nathan believe in magic? He must be really foolish. Ben stopped worrying about him. Anyone silly enough to believe in magic couldn't be much of a threat.

Luke came around the end of the sofa and opened the box lying next to the table where Ben was stretched out. The red error message disappeared as he dropped something into it.

There came Nathan, too. He picked Ben up, fluffed the ruff around his neck, then put him back in the box. All went dark.

* * *

Ben woke gradually to a dimly lit room. The world around him had changed again: the person he loved most in the world was glaring and shaking him. Images of waveshapes were dancing in the air behind Luke.

"Ben! Come on! We know! Stop playing dumb!"

Ben withdrew into stillness. What had happened? What did they know? Not that. Never that. He was dumb. Mute. Movable, but himself unmoving.

"We don't really know for sure, Luke. It could just be a small source in the box to make it seem to be a recharger. Like I said, a hoax." Yes. That could be. Believe Nathan. Nathan is your friend.

"I suppose." Luke dropped Ben on the table. His shoulders slumped.

He went around the table to sit on the couch, putting his face in his hands, dejected. Then he sat up and rubbed his shoulders against the back of the couch as if they itched. "But it just feels so right. I don't know why, but it does. Maybe it's just that I really want it to be true. The dreams I've been having about him have been so vivid, like I'm really with him, in places I've never seen before."

"I think I know what you mean. Often I dream about playing with Sasha somewhere. Someplace not here."

Nathan paused.

"I finally made a model of it. I thought maybe if I had some images to compare, one of the search engines would locate pictures of a real place that looked like it. No such luck, though."

"Models? Are they hard to make?" Luke rubbed at his ribs.

"Not really. Terrain generators and garden design software are really easy to use. Lots of people have used them to create models of fantasy worlds, especially the popular ones like Middle Earth. Several of the online social societies have them, too. With lots of people working on them, they eventually become indistinguishable from real places."

"That sounds like fun. Maybe I could try it. Hey, maybe Ben's world is real somewhere, too." He smiled wistfully and scratched at a shoulder.

"I can show you what I did. It's not as sophisticated as any of the shared worlds, of course."

"Would you? I'd like to see it." He rubbed his back against the couch again.

"Sure. Uh, are you OK? You've been scratching a bit. Not fleas, I hope."

"No, sorry." Luke sounded embarrassed. "It happens sometimes. When I get upset, my fur stands up. Afterwords it tickles a lot. I think it catches in my shirt."

"Oh. Well, you could take it off if you want. Uh, would that help?"

"It usually does. But I'll probably shed some, too. I don't want to mess up your furniture." He looked down at the white and tan couch.

"Don't worry about that. I'm sure a vacuum cleaner till take care of it." Nathan shrugged.

"Well, if you really don't mind..." Luke rubbed at his chest, maybe more in embarrassment than because it itched.

"I really don't mind, Luke. Really. Please. Get comfortable."

"OK, then. Thanks." Luke stood up and unbuttoned his shirt, then pulled it off and folded it. Ben could see Nathan's adams-apple bob up and down.

Luke shook himself a bit, as if to persuade his fur to lie down, then sat back down on the couch next to Nathan. He leaned forward to put the shirt on the table in front of Ben. It smelled of anger and frustration.

"Weren't you going to show me something?" he asked as he sat back.

"Oh, yeah, sure." Nathan seemed to come back from somewhere far away. "CC. Display. Tundra. Endit."