FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Part 4 – Marching Orders

Everyone jumped in surprised as the shout echoed off the far walls of the nearly empty hanger bay. Everyone looked to the smallest member of the group to see that her eyes were full of tears as she looked at everyone. "Please... S-stop... F-fight-ting... B-bickering among ourselves isn't g-g-going to get us anywhere..." Dusine came over and wrapped the Mauluse in an embrace as she started to lightly sob.

"Shhh... it's okay..." Dusine offered up lightly as she comforted Minuet.

"Min's right..." Jordan sighed and looked up at Rulve, feeling a bit guilty for getting agitated with the female Almedhas. "Bickering isn't going to get us anywhere. Neither is arguing or fighting over something trivial that technically has nothing to do with our situation." He looked over at Kasey, who had backed away from Celia and looked away with a little bit of shame. "The way I see it, right now there are two objectives on the table. One: Find out what has happened here on this station. Two: Attempt to either repair the runabout so we can fly out of here, or find another way off the station. Otherwise, we are stuck here until another rescue ship makes its way here, which probably won't be for a better part of a week or more." Jordan stood there and let what he said sink in with everyone.

Rulve looked down from her spot on the runabout and took a deep breath. "So, what are you proposing?"

"With two objectives needing taken care of as quickly as possible," The human crossed his arms and frowned. "That we split into two groups."

"But..." Kasey started to object, but one stern look from Jordan stopped her.

"As of right now, I am assuming full command." Jordan said to some surprise from the group.

"Hey" Rulve exclaimed as she stood up. "I should still be in charge as I'm the pilot of the Stardust Traveler. And even though it's down, that should still count for Something!"

"It does." Jordan said, making the rabbit blink. He turned to face her. "We are now in an unknown, possibly a combat situation. Which means that the sencor combat officer should take charge. And unless you have combat experience that I'm unaware of, I'm afraid that is me." He looked up at Rulve who just hung her head in submission. "One voice needs to be the one giving the orders and that is why I'm taking command." He said as he glanced back at the others. "However, I will admit my limitations as a Space Marine and one of those is when it comes to the inner workings of a spacecraft. Rulve, you are our pilot and you're needed here to oversee the repair of our ride. Same with Nasyn."

The rabbit, as well as everyone else was silent for a moment as what Jordan said sunk in. "Alright." Rulve sighed, relenting to the human. She jumped down off the hull of the runabout and walked up to Jordan. "First thing is though, 'Sir,' is that we should arm you with something. Won't do us any good if you can't defend yourselves."

Within a few minutes, Rulve had gone to the small arms safe inside of the Runabout's cockpit and retrieved the four sidearms that were inside. Jordan then had her give the pistols to himself and the three Lykains, much to Kasey's ire. Even some of the others started to voice their concerns about how the weapons were distributed. Namely that the group going should have the bulk of the weapons.

"We still don't know what has happened here." Jordan simply and flatly stated. "Its best to divide our firepower evenly so we at least know that we have someplace we can fall back to if needed. Besides, this station might be a scientific research facility, but it's bound to have Some kind of armory that we can access." It made sense to them and Jordan cleared his throat to get everyone's attention. "Alright people here's how it's going down. Nasyn, Theaz, Celia, and Minuet you four will stay here with Rulve and do what you can to repair the runabout so if we need to we can take our leave. Kleo, Dusine and Kasey, you three are with me." He said, pointing to the three as he turned towards the airlock to the hanger. "We're going to make our way to Operations and hopefully get some answers as to what has transpired here."

"W-w-wait!..." Everyone stopped in their tracks to look at the Mauluse. Jordan looked quizzically as Min shuffled her feet. "I-I... Um..." There was an uncomfortable silence that fell over the five as Minuet tried to put her thoughts into words. Dusine walked over to Jordan and leaned in close and whispered something into the human's ears.

He looked at the Caushae and muttered to her. "You sure?" Dusine just nodded and turned to look at Min and gave the girl a wink. She then practically shoved Jordan towards the mouse, causing the human to step awkwardly to Minuet. "So... Min..." He said, trying his best to use the right words. "Do you want to come with us?"

Min nodded her head. "Y-yes... I... I think that I c-could be of more use t-to you than if I stayed here... I w-wouldn't know what to do, I'd just be in the way. I d-d-don't know very much ab-bout fixing things."

"You know," Jordan said, placing a hand on her shoulder. "It could be more dangerous going with us. We might not make it back, then again, we might just find an empty station."

"I..." Min took a deep breath before she tried again. "I know. But I think that I'll be in the way. If I go... At least... M-maybe... I could be a decoy so you guys could esca... EEK!" Minuet let out a squeak as the human pulled her into an embrace.

"I would never willingly do that to you." He said as he held her close. "Just like I wouldn't ask anyone else to do anything that I'd be willing to do myself." He held her there before a cough interrupted them.

"It's a Kodak moment." Kasey said with a slight snicker.

Jordan cleared his throat as the two pulled away from each other. He looked back to the runabout looking for the rabbit pilot. "Hey Rulve!"

"Yeah?" She shouted back as she stood up, already back on the hull of the small ship.

"We're taking one of your helpers, Minuet, with us."

"Knock yourself out," She said dismissively. "I wasn't really sure what to do with her anyway."

Minuet looked down till Jordan gave her shoulder a light squeeze. Heading back with the mouse in tow he gave a quick glance at his group. "Alright." He said with an air of command in his voice. "We know our job and the sooner we do it, the sooner we can leave. Let's shag it people."

It was some time after the five left as Rulve and Celia grunted, working on the oversized piece of scrap metal that was lodged in the starboard side of the hull. The piece of what was once a bulkhead of the station looked like a knife that was stabbed into a roast. The sooner that they could remove the humanoid size shrapnel, the sooner they could truly assess the damage. With another firm pull, the two were finally able to dislodge the unsightly hunk of refuge free of the hull of the Runabout. Celia threw the scrap off onto the deck of the hanger before joining the gray Almedhas. The pilot just stood there as the wolf came back and seen what happened to the ship.

"Val-ruah" Celia gasp as she sees the damage.

The piece of bulkhead was very much like a knife that had stabbed the large shuttle. It had completely demolished the components that were hidden under that section of armor plating hull. Normally, the ship's hull would have repelled the metal like it was a piece of hail with nothing more than a racket inside the runabout as it bounced off the plating. Only instead, because of the deceleration from Slipspace, the ship was hit with multiple fragments with some of them not only piercing the outer hull, but also puncturing some areas of the inner hull that most Terran ships were built with. That piece of bulkhead had stabbed right through vital components that were situated in the space between the hulls.

"Fuck..." The rabbit cursed in Sol Common/English as she surveyed the damage. The Almedhas couldn't help but to think that if that piece, or any of them pieces would have hit another meter or two to the left... There would have been three more casualties at least, amusing that the whole ship wouldn't have decompressed from the cockpit being compromised. That bulkhead would have gutted the interior had it struck the canopy at that speed, and there was nothing that she could have done to stop it...

"So what's the word?" Theaz asked as she kicked one of the fragments with her boot that was thrown on the deck of the hanger.

Rulve sighed as she ran a hand through her hair and pushed her ears back. "The Runabout is salvageable, given enough time anyway. But the Communication Transceiver, Navigational Relay and the Subspace radio is nothing but scrap. Were going to have to replace everything."

"Is there any good news?" The wolfess asked a bit dejectedly.

"The good news is that thanks to you and Dusine, we got local Com-lines. But no way to communicate our status without any kind of local line of sight. But at least we could still take off without those." The rabbit sighed as her ears fell down.

Theaz hesitated as she crossed her arms. "But?"

"The bad news is without any kind of navigational sensor or equipment, we can't use the Fold Drive and this bucket is too small to have the backup Slingshot Drive. Which, even if we did, it would be a twenty-two year journey back the way we came with the drive. And that would be even IF we can replace the fuel that had leaked out when the lines were ruptured from the impact. We are currently here to stay at this point."

"Val-ruah..." Theaz muttered as she looked around the small, mostly empty hanger. "Like we got the parts just laying around here."

"I...I don't know what to do..." Rulve said as she crouched down into a ball as she gripped her head in her paws. "This was my first assignment on my own and it was only supposed to be a milk run. I was only supposed to fly you guys to Artemis Terminal and come right back. I know I shouldn't be like this, but I keep trying to figure some way out of this mess. But every time I do, there seems to be more problems that cropped up."

"Life happens." Theaz said as the rabbit felt the Lykain give her shoulder a light squeeze. "As Kasey had said, 'Life won't wait forever for us to feel ready.' Well, sometimes we got to roll with what we got." Theaz helped Rulve back to her feet before calling for Nasyn to come out. Theaz walked over to the feline. "Nasyn, why don't you take Celia and find the control room. We're going to need both the location of spare parts or location of other hangers close by."

Nasyn looked at the Lykain skeptically. "Isn't that more your area of expertise? And why isn't Rulve telling me this?"

Theaz put her arm around the cat and led him to the other side of the ship. "Listen" She said in a low voice. "This situation has put Rulve under a lot of stress, and right now she needs some time to gather herself back up. I would go on my own but I'm still running a few things with the main computer. That leaves you and Celia."

Nasyn gave a low growl under his breath, not liking what Theaz was saying. However in his mind she was making a lot of sense. Since Jordan left with the others, Rulve was doing nothing more than picking the scraps of metal out of the hull of the Runabout. Logic already told him that they would have to leave the confines of the hanger anyway to retrieve parts to fix the vessel. Though he had hoped that they could leave in a large group, as having grown up in Human controlled space, Nasyn knew exactly the kinds of horror movies Kasey was referring to.

But if Rulve was as bad as Theaz had said...

"Fine..." Nasyn relented. "Let me grab a pad and I'll see what I can do..."

"Thank you Nasyn. Be careful, okay?"

"As much as possible...."

Some thirty minutes later, the cat engineer and his wolf escort had made their way to the hanger's control room. Up two flights of stairs and more than a few times backtracking to find the right place. Nasyn wasn't too sure when the last time this particular hanger was ever used, if it even had been before now. As it was, the feline Caushae was waiting for the computers to boot up from a shut down state. He stretched with a groan as he waited in the comfy office like chair as his companion gave a wide yawn.

"How much longer?" Celia asked as she brushed her creamy colored hair out of her face.

Nasyn looked at the screen with a sigh. "Another minute or so." The wolf snorted. "If I could make it go faster, I would."

Celia closed her eyes and rubbed the bridge of her muzzle. "Sorry." She said. "I don't know what it is, but since we have left the confines of the hanger there's..." She waved her hand as she tried to put her thoughts into words. "There's a strange, lingering feeling. Almost like we're being watched or something." Her nose flared as she inhaled deeply. "But yet, the scent of everything hasn't changed. Nor have I heard anything out of the ordinary."

Nasyn nodded. He had that feeling too that he couldn't explain. A beep brought them out of their thoughts and he pulled himself closer to the terminal. "Okay, we're in business." He started to tap away at the keyboard to bring up the needed information, and plugged his data pad's cord into a connection slot.

As he tapped away Celia kept an eye on their surroundings. There was something here, but none of her scenes was picking up on anything. It was just a 'gut feeling' as humans would say, something that she, herself, never put much stock in despite her faith in the spirit worlds. Her huntress instincts were telling her that something was wrong. Something wasn't right... But what?

She shifted uncomfortably in her jumpsuit like uniform and let out a gasp that the feline didn't catch. That feeling between her legs... That building warmth that was starting to grow just below her belly... 'The Hell?...'

Nasyn slapped the enter key with a wide grin as he finished with his task. "Alright, it's going to take about ten minutes to download everything into my data pad." Stretching again he took a deep whiff of air. His nose flared as he caught a strange scent. "Hey Celia, do you smell that?" He asked as he started to turn his seat around to his companion. When he turned to the wolf his eyes nearly came out of their sockets as his jaw nearly dropped and shattered to the floor. "CELIA! WHAT THE HELL!!"

He had been so focused on his task that Nasyn had tuned out everything else around him. If he hadn't, he would have heard the sound of a zipper being undone, or the soft stifled pants and wines coming from the wolf. Nasyn was left dumbstruck by what he was seeing before him. His Lykain companion was leaning against the far wall with her uniform open wide, letting her downy chest exposed for all to see and one of her arms reached down into the space between her legs.

Celia was biting her lip, her eyes were screwed shut as her fingers worked her wet and sensitive spade. In the back of her mind, she was quite confused. It wasn't her time to go into heat, but here she was; hot and ready for some stud to take her. "Val-ruah..." She cursed, whimpering as she shuttered from her assaulting her nethers with her fingers. It was her turn to be so focused on what she was doing that she never heard Nasyn yelling at her. It wasn't until the feline came up to her and grabbed her that took her out of her heated mind and back into reality.

"CELIA! Snap out of it!" He shouted as he shook her. "What gotten into you?"

Celia stared at the gray tiger feline. "I... I..." She stammered. Something was most certainly in the air and it was clearly affecting her mind. "I... I don't know..." She hissed as her mind started to slip back into its heated state. "There's something in the air..." Her fingers made lewd slicks as they started to pump into her womanhood again, making her moan as she shut her eyes again. She gasped as her body shook in throws of an orgasm.

"Celia!" Nasyn snapped as he shook her again. "Stay with me. Just hold out for a few minutes and we can get the hell out of here."

He was soon caught off guard when the wolf clumsily kissed him. Whatever was affecting Celia, was starting to affect him too, he could feel the heat going through his body and to the tent that was forming in his pants. He could feel the heat that she was giving off as she pressed herself against him. He could feel his more feral, basic instincts kicking in, telling him to breed that willing female before him into next week. His body was starting to burn, needing for release. The thoughts of burying his barbed shaft in her folds made it twitch to the point of trying to burst through his pants.

However, his more rational mind was staying in control, helping him enough that he was able to keep his head and pushed her off of him. "Celia, Stop! You're not yourself. Please... Stay with me!"

"I... I can't... Control..." She huffed, gritting her teeth. In all her years, she never knew a heat cycle so strong. "I need... Help..." Celia looked up and locked her eyes with Nasyn's, her lips trembled as she whimpered. "Val-ruah... Please... Help me... I need... Need you... You're the only one... Th-that can..."

Nasyn looked at her with worry. She was giving him the puppy dog face as she pleaded to him. He wasn't sure what to do. While he had been around other Lykains, most females never gave him much of the time of day. Yet here was Celia... Begging for him to take her, and here he was having quite a bit of trouble trying to keep her at arms length as she fought with herself.

"If... IF I do this..." Nasyn said, starting to give in to the moment as Celia started to whimper. "You're not going to get mad later and come after me to castrate me are you?"

She shook her head no.

"You sure?"

The canine's head nodded yes.

"You promise, right?"

"Y-y-yes..."

The Caushae sighed as he closed his eyes and muttered, "Fuck me..."

"Gladly!"