FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

By the time Wolf made it inside the ship, the hangar was suspiciously calm aside a handful of discarded guards and smoking defense turrets. As the wolfen was levitated and then rotated around to settle into one of the docks, he found himself suddenly face to face with the arwing. Looking much less worn out by the battle than his fighter did. He frowned at the shin kick to the ego while he climbed out and hit the deck.

Taking stock of the hangar's layout, attention was drawn toward the center. A terraced pyramid with a flat top, the layers once packed densely with those ankh fighters before he and Fox had something to say about it. Slanted elevators accessed the heights, crawling up the slotted ramps with huge gear wheels shielding the otherwise uncovered platforms.

On the ride up, vase-shaped turrets extented directly over the path but each of them were dispatched with the laser magnum. He kicked warm debris off the platform as he reloaded. The top of the pyramid offered a little more cover, with a scattered maze of supply crates and maintenance equipment.

Hung overhead was a series of obelisks extending down from the ceiling. Intricate lines of circuitry traced up them with crackling surges of energy.

As Wolf watched a spark snap between the sharp tips of the structures, it left a figure visible in its wake. High up on a catwalk was a slight feline figure with a long, elegant rifle propped on the railing. A circular ring that must have been a high capacity magazine was looped over her shoulder as she aimed the cane shaped device downward. He caught the glint of light on a square scope.

At the same time though, there was the subtle shinking sound of metal sliding on metal as a turret behind him extended from one of the structural beams gating the entrance. A shot passed above his head and the turret crumpled inward in an explosion of sparks and smoke. Looking up, a phantom of air manifested, blinking on and off a few times before Fox came into view crouched on top of a crate.

Wolf leapt into motion. The next thing Fox knew, his hips were clenched by claws and he was yanked to the ground in a rough landing that ended with him sprawled out over Wolf's lap as he crouched against their cover. A high intensity laser passed through the space Fox had occupied an instant ago.

"Nice shooting," Wolf smirked.

His grip loosened on Fox's thigh, moved up to help cradle his magnum. Lightfoot interrupted with the analysis of the situation she had been working on in the background.

<The structure above us appears to be a highly modified FTL engine, currently active. Rather than moving the ship, it is tuned to blink a designated target. I expect it to rely on a marker or beacon worn on the target's person.>

"Got it," Fox said, "Doesn't make her any easier to catch though..."

The point was demonstrated as another electric snap echoed throughout the hangar. The feline appeared on top of a crane above them now. Fox and Wolf had to scramble around to the other side as the vacated space was peppered with lasers.

Wolf exchanged gunfire with her for a moment, sparks raining off the crates each time he peeked out to shoot back. One of his shots blasted away a lock mechanism that secured the crane to the support beam and it shrieked as it fell out from under her. She teleported away before gravity could even touch her, leaving the crane to crash to the ground and crumple a crate with a lash of its chain.

"Can't pin this one down," Wolf grumbled, "Shit,"

<Fox, I believe I can make use of that device for you as well. The blink beacon is relatively simple, the suit's local nanites can replicate it. Though I will have to reboot for the change in configuration. Give me a moment.>

Fox considered this as he peeked around the crate, "Really don't think I can spare a moment,"

"Leave it to me. I'll keep the bitch off your case,"

Wolf dashed out into the open, running low behind the barrel of his weapon. Greetings came in the form of a flash from the heights and a laser winging off his shoulder. He fired back as he dashed between cover to the center of the space.

<Applying armor modifications now. Stand by.>

Where he knelt, Fox could feel liquid moving through his fur as material was shuttled elsewhere and nanites got to work with a nudge of static playing up and down his body. The suit grew thin over his shoulders and thighs, shrinking into webs of trickling liquid. The armored gauntlets shrunk and receeded, winding around his wrists to reform as bracers each sporting a network of glowing lines. At the center of his chest plate the armor sunk into a shallow receiver dish.

<Reconfiguration complete> Lightfoot announced. Though the suit was now reduced to more of a leotard and didn't feel complete in the slightest.

-

"Destroy my fleet and think you're walking away?"

Natia fired, scoring a grazing hit on the big wolf's side. She bared her fangs in delight as he stumbled, breaking his fall by rolling over a shoulder and behind a stack of pipes.

So all her vengeance wasn't going to be invested in Polar it seemed.

Her joy was disrupted as the blink engine fired. Her attention was take off the lupine target and toward the one that had just appeared standing beside her.

Her face squeezed into a snarl as she swung the sniper rifle around, which Fox ducked under. A laser landed dead center of the weapon, punching a molten hole into it. Stumbling back she dropped the ruined rifle. Staring daggers at him wasn't enough and so she extended the claws on her gauntlets.

"You're done. Give up," Fox recited behind the barrel of his blaster.

In response, she teleported behind him.

Claws were poised and ready to rip his spine out, only to whoosh through thin air. The barrel of his weapon nudged her in the back, until she again disappeared. The pair flashed in a tense game of leapfrog. Space was folded over and over again, the cadence of the blink engine rising until it sounded like an old car starting up.

Before long they had run out of space on the catwalk. One of the railings was warped and crushed out of the way as Natia took its place, but not balanced quite so well. Fox siezed the space piratess by one of her flailing arms. She was yanked forward and around, tripped over a leg and slammed on the floor. Fox took her by the arms and crouched over her to pin her in place.

With a feral yowl she wrenched her head aside, glaring even through the streak of blood running down and through one of her eyes.

"I'll never surrender," She said hoarse and vicious.

Her tail lashed up. A ring decorated the tip of her tail, housing what appeared to be a black gemstone. She bit down on it and it depressed with a click. In the distance, there was an explosion directly over the main vacuum barrier.

All Natia had to do was push off the floor, spin on a single claw tip and then she was airborne. Along with everything in the hangar not bolted down. It was plunged into blaring alarms and crashing debris on its way out into space. Before he knew it Fox was scooped head over heels along for the ride.

Acting quickly, Lightfoot blinked them over to a catwalk which he slammed into sidelong but he took the cue well enough, latching on to it before he could be wrung through the railing. Now holding on for dear life and horizontal to the floor. The entire catwalk bowed upward as a crate slammed into it from above. Metal groaned as it buckled further from the pull on the structure.

Sparks were lashed as more whirling debris pelted the catwalk's underside. Something else came swinging down- or up, from below. Wolf, clinging on to a thick chain. After bobbing to a stop, he swung himself over and dropped down to stand with much effort on the side of the catwalk, pinned against it by the force of the rushing air whipping them mercilessly.

Fox snarled with pain as a massive hand locked his wrist in an iron grip. He was pulled up hand over hand, and then arms were clamped around his waist as Wolf lifted him up. Hunched from the force bearing down on them, Wolf fought for each step that he took away from the treacherous path of the damaged section. Up a dented incline to more stable and structurally sound ground.

Natia meanwhile passed the empty barrier, just as the emergency doors slid down to slam into place. She grew smaller against the Slag Storm as if submerging in magma then blinked out of sight with an electric crackle.

She expected to teleport into her escape pod. But found out too late that somebody had hacked and rewritten the blink engine on the fly- a feat that only a skilled AI could pull off. Natia instead found herself locked inside a cryo tube in the bowels of the ship. She angrily pounded on the glass until it frosted over.

-

Fox had a bird's eye view of the rearranged hangar where he hung upside down, folded over Wolf's arms. The lupine had his legs hooked around a post and railing of the catwalk.

Lightfoot blinked Fox up onto stable ground. Unburdened, Wolf took the old fashioned route, curling up to grab onto the railing and haul himself over it.

Wolf shook out his hands then moved his neck one way and the other, stretching out. Then looked to Fox.

"All that's left is the bridge. Shouldn't be too much trouble but stay frosty anyway,"

Fox had to lean on the railing as he watched who he believed to be his arch enemy...simply walking away.

<Reverting to original configuration. Stand by, please.>

Good timing. That would give him a moment to linger behind while he tried and failed to process the confusing cocktail of emotions Wolf stirred up.