FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

"Taking Chances"

"Okay, Chance, okay I get it. You don't like me coming up with these inventions." Jake moaned as he dragged a paw down his face, briefly reacting to the smell of grease left behind. "But if we're going to combat crime in Megakat City, it would be awesome to be able to be at the crimes in the blink of an eye right?"

Chance growled as he rolled out from under the jet, wearing his typical coveralls and sporting a greasy rag on his forehead. "Well, yeah. But come on, teleportation? It's the work of science fiction isn't it?"

"I've been reading Doctor Anton Kibler's book Going Places and I really think he's onto something. It's not like it's a major thing--"

"You're turning the jet into your science experiment, Jake. It kind of is a major thing!"

Jake Clawson frowned and rolled his eyes. "You're probably more pissed about the fact I asked you to test it, aren't you?"

"Since when am I your guinea pig anyway?" Chance confirmed it before rolling out from under the jet completely and getting up. The larger cat stood at about a head over Jake and was probably twice his body size, and still looked less intimidating than the scrawny, darker furred genius now leaning against the plane's fuselage without a care in the world. "You're the inventor, shouldn't you be the one testing this stuff out? What if that thing turns me inside out?"

"It won't, I've added the failsafes in place that the cockpit would be immune to any molecular changes of the surrounding atmosphere. You'll be perfectly safe! Besides, I've got to hang back here and monitor your progress from my station in case something does come up--"

"You see? You see!? It's things like that, that when you say 'em I get chills that go down my spine and make my tail go all bristly."

Jake glanced down and indeed there was a frizz at the end of Chance's tail. Without moving his head much, he glanced back at Chance. "Come on, don't you hate those nights where we've got an emergency at two in the morning? Usually flying there, taking care of business and getting back, we're not getting any sleep because the sun's coming up. Just imagine what it'd be like if we could be there in the blink of an eye? I mean if that's the case, we could fight crime anywhere in the world! No way we'd have Feral on our tails all the time. Unless you'd rather I go and you man the station?"

Jake gestured to the nearly full circle of computer monitors. Chance took one look at it and swallowed; the soft beeping noises coming from the computers, the electric buzz, the blips and blinking of lights he had no way of interpreting made him grow wide-eyed and his mouth hung open for a minute. Turning toward Jake, who had the smuggest of smug grins wiped across his face, his arms crossed and a know-it-all stare in his eyes. After a minute, Chance huffed out exasperated. "I'll go get suited up." He said.

Chance slipped into his jumpsuit and donned the mask, adopting his alter-ego of T-Bone and walked out toward the jet after about twenty minutes. He was still adjusting his mask as he spotted Jake dressed as his alter-ego Razor standing by his computers, moving deftly between one screen to another and typing in various codes and commands that the bigger of the duo couldn't keep up with. Looking dubiously at his jet, he laid his hand flat on the hull and sighed. "You sure this thing is gonna work?"

"I don't know." Razor said without looking up from his computer. "But the science seems pretty sound. I'll be monitoring you the whole time, you don't have anything to worry about."

"Yeah, if you're that confident you'd be going with me..." Chance said under his breath.

"What?"

T-Bone smiled and waved his hand dismissively. "Nothing, nothing. Alright I'm off."

The large cat climbed the ladder and drew back the cockpit hood, he slipped into his pilot's seat and hunkered down before strapping his harness on. As he affixed his helmet and put on his mask, he gave a thumb's up to his partner, who then entered the radio through his headset. "Okay, big guy. You ready to go?"

"As if I had a choice?" Chance teased.

"Alright, the new red switch on your console will activate the teleporter, you'll need to be going above five-hundred miles per hour to align the new manifolds for the jump. I'd actually recommend being a little closer to a thousand, just to avoid re-entry burn."

"Re-entry burn? You mean like falling from space?"

"Sorta. If it takes too much, the engines could overheat. But in the event that happens the cockpit is lined with heat-resistant shielding that should keep it from getting above a hundred and twenty degrees."

"Why do I feel like you're wanting to fry me like an egg, Razor?"

"Alright, engines on, turbines active."

Grumbling, Chance began to activate the engine and soon the jet roared to life. As he activated the turbines and thrusters, there was a sudden jerking motion and T-Bone found himself flinging through their short hangar at top speed. The doors hidden at the back barely had time to open before the jet blasted through them and into the sky. "Holy crap! What sort of juice did you put into my baby? She's going insanely fast!"

"Probably some of the new mechanics we put in, just adjust accordingly."

Chance glanced at his speed meter and was reading a fast incline to eight hundred miles per hour, which quickly moved to eleven hundred. He began to adjust his pedal to slow down, but instead an alarm began to blair in his ears. "Accelerator's stuck! I can't slow down!"

"Aw man, the system must be overriding the jet's controls. It's not going to respond until a jump is made. You're going close to twelve-hundred, you need to activate now!"

"What if I blow up!?" Chance shouted into his headset. Instead of a response though, he got an ear-load of static blasting in his ears. He stared grimly down at his console; his speed was now exceeding thirteen-hundred, almost at the top speed that it could handle now. "Oh hell!" He heard himself mutter as he swung his hand forward and flicked the red switch in the center.

There was a pulse that flooded the cockpit, vibrating for a brief second as blue and white lights surrounded him. Chance inhaled as the lights looped up over the window and he noticed the entire jet was aglow with the same color. Sparks shooting off the wingtips filled the sky around him as he watched a strange, white bubble form around him and with a loud screech that filled his ears, Chance suddenly fell into darkness.

Alarms screaming roused Chance from unconsciousness, and the first sight he spotted alarmed him into full-awake mode. A mountain, completely covered in trees was rushing at him as the jet spun like a top toward it. The cat immediately snapped to his controls and found that the engines themselves had gone out as well. "Come on... come on!" He muttered to himself as he forcibly grabbed the control stick and forced all his strength into stabilizing his attitude. He wasn't tumbling forward, meaning that he was still on course, but the loss of one engine caused the spin. The other may have gone out immediately after, but the spin had to be controlled first. As he pushed the stick hard against the spin, he began to feel a slight resistance as the plane began to glide against the grain of the spiral. He immediately felt sick to his stomach, but puking would need to wait until later.

After a few moments, the spin had stabilized, but he was staring straight at a mountain coming directly toward him now. "Razor? Jake! Come in!" He shouted. "Where the hell am I?!" But only static responded on his comms. "Shit..." He then took the auxiliary wheel and tried to force a bit of a turn to avoid the mountain. The proximity alarms began to sound off as the turbulence increased, seemingly beginning to shake the plane apart. Chance realized that his efforts were growing more fruitless by the second, his claw tapped on the switch to the ejector seat and he lovingly patted the console. "I'm sorry about this old girl..." He lamented before leaning back in his seat and clicking the button. He felt the hatch snap open and his seat explode from its position, launching him into the air. Looking down as he watched his plane vanish from under him, Chance realized that wherever he was now; it wasn't Megakat City... or any place he'd ever seen before. He looked back at the jet just as it clipped a crop of trees, then spiraled unrelenting into the forest, vanishing from sight until a distant explosion and rising cloud of smoke rose from the spot. "Great. Just great." He sighed to himself as he tried his headset again. "Okay, Jake. Joke's over, you better have a good excuse for sending me into the howling wilderness and crashing the plane... hello? Ja-AAAAAAAKE!"

Two massive arms wrapped around the chair, grabbing Chance and pinning him to the freefalling object. He looked up to see an orange face with a thick beak for a mouth. Blue tufts dragging down from his cheeks only grabbed the cat's attention for a moment before he noticed a pair of large wings wrapped partly around them. Chance very quickly hit the second button on his seat and his chute deployed suddenly. The explosion of the box popping out for his parachute caused the beast to grunt in pain and be thrown from the chair as the air caught the sail and suddenly stunted Chance's fall.

Watching the beast fall into the trees only worried Chance more that he was gliding in almost on top of him. "Wh-what the hell is that?!" He shouted aloud. "Where the hell am I?!"

As he fell into the jungle, a sudden stop jerked his attention upward, where his parachute had gotten caught on the upper branches of the trees. Not thinking, Chance simply extended his claws and sliced through the ribbons holding him aloft and he plummeted a few feet before catching himself on the trunk of the tree, tumbling almost until he hit the ground. "Aw Jeez, that was stupid." He admitted.

Suddenly, a movement out of the corner of his eye caught Chance on guard. He turned and quickly threw his weight toward the beast that had attacked him moments ago. His hands met the large claws as his shoulder came into contact with the beast's massive shoulder. It was still a bit of an outmatch, but Chance managed to slow the tackle and turned the beast around, slamming him into the ground. Quickly wrapping the thick arm around and jamming his legs in between the beast's, Chance forced the creature into a pin, slamming his crotch down on top of his opponent's. "There! How do you like it, ass?" He shouted angrily.

Chance managed to get a good look at him now; he was a beast in size, almost twice his width and almost a foot taller. He was barely clothed, only a white layer of cloth was wrapped around his waist, leaving a thick musculature to be barely covered by anything. His eyes were red, he was breathing so heavily that his chest was heaving heavily. He growled and struggled to free himself from Chance's grasp. "Hey now, come on don't try to escape." He struggled, his arms beginning to slip despite his determination to keep him steady. Suddenly, the creature's arm slipped free and managed to knock T-Bone's mask off him. The beast let out a roar as Chance tried to calm him down. "Hey, look I'm just an ordinary guy... there's no need to--UNH!" He grunted as the beast's large claws slipped free and kicked Chance up to his feet. A pair of slashes as Chance ducked away resulted in his top being ripped. "Hey, now! This was a lot of work!"

The beast dropped low, placing a claw onto the ground that ripped through the dirt. His wings spreading wide as Chance took a step back. "Oh forget it, I'm outta here!" He shouted as he turned and started to run. He made it ten steps when a massive slam hit him from behind. Chance cried out as he flew through the air and the creature wrapped his arms around the cat's body before driving him into the ground. Chance tried to move, but found his left arm had been twisted backward behind his back, his right arm pinned to the ground and the creature's full weight pressing down into one point on Chance's back. Chance pulled his arms back, trying to break this hold but only met pain no matter which way he tried. He then felt something he didn't expect; a long, slow sniff at the back of his neck. "Oh hell no, you didn't just--" He grunted as he slipped his left wrist free, wrapped it around the back of the creature's neck and with all his strength, managed to pull him downward. He shoved the creature's head into the ground and with a quick twist, he sommersaulted himself on top of the beast's bear chest. "Now LISTEN! I don't know who you are, but I don't screw around on the first date." He said, using his arms to try and hold this beast still and failing miserably as he was quickly yanked down against him.