HardClone: Chap IV
#3 of HardClone
All chars/story/ies are mine...
****************************************************************************
IV.
Gretchen Stalked into the mess hall and over to the serving line.
"Hey, Laverne, Wha'cher no good?"
The goldenblond furred afghan wolf hound smiled and nodded.
"Not much, Gretch. We're outta beef kidney just now this morn' gots some liver though."
"Hm, sure an' make it t'en eggs t'day. Yeah, w'ut the hell, scramble'em an' give me lotso' ket'chup."
"Ah," the wolf hound nodded.
Gretchen smirked.
"Yeah, its gettin' close t'th'at t'ime. Startin' t'get tw'itchy."
"Yah' an' now we got time off you gonna try for pups this time?" Laverne said as she dumped half a bottle of ketchup into the large mixing bowl.
Gretchen frowned.
"Naw, gonna stay with Jack, just have some fun."
"Hmn, I don'know, you could ask d'boss to fix that up." The wolf hound nodded as she poured the measure for ten eggs from the pre-scrambled pitcher into the bowl of ketchup.
Gretchen smirked.
"I don' th'ink so."
"O' think of it, red headed puppies! You want that liver warm?"
"No and yes."
"I don'know, could be the thing to draw him closer."
Gretchen scowled at the wolf hound. Laverne did not look up from the grill.
"You yap t'much old woman."
The wolf hound smiled as she put the plate on the shelf for Gretchen to take.
"Just friendly words from an old hound to a young pup."
Gretchen's lips curled up in spite of herself.
"Right."
Gretchen took the plate and stepped to the shelf and got a large mug with large twin handles and filled it with warm goat's milk. She walked over to the large round table. Gabriel half stood as she sat. She nodded at him. The other two anthromorphs, Ted and Sheppard, nodded to her and kept eating.
"Good morning, Gretchen. How are we fealing today?" Gabriel's deep voice seemed jovial.
"Good mornin', Gabriel." She smiled back, "We're doing jus' fine. And how are "we" doin' th'is fine day?"
Gabriel tilted his large grey head. From Gretchen's point of view, the stubby horn on his nose blocked one eye. She wondered if that was a wink or a reproachfull glance. The rhino anthromorph nodded and twisted his lips in what she knew he considered a smile.
"We are doing just fine and dandy." He replied most jovially. "And how did we sleep this last eve'ning?"
Gretchen inclined her head and gazed into the deep eight litre stainless steel bowl that sat in front of the large anthro. He blinked and looked down into the oat and sage grass filled bowl.
"What?" He asked.
"I was just tr'ying t'see how much sugar you have in th'ere. You seem a little hyper today." She let a soft smile come to her lips.
"Ah," He said, "You haven't heard the good news yet." He nodded.
She nodded.
She bobbed her hand and nodded again.
"Well?" She snapped.
"Well what?" The rhino asked back, eyes as innocent as angels's.
Ted 'hrumphed' and Sheppard snorted out a quick laugh. Gabriel smiled at the daggers in Gretchen's eyes.
Her voice was deep and low.
"You know how t'boss is always on t'look out for any signs th'at we may be slipping back into at'avism? T'first sign is t'craving for raw meat."
She slitted her eyes and laid back her ears. Her lips curled up exposing her viscious canines. Gabriel chuckled.
"I'm sorry, my dear. We get the next three months off and we've finally received some new personnel. A lovely lady rhino is one of them as a matter of fact."
Gretchen's voice was still low.
"You mean t'tell me you t'ormented me for o' so long an' all you have t'tell me is th'at you're gettin' lucky?"
Sheppard choked on his laugh. Ted 'hrmphed'. Gretchen's slitted eyes slid sidelong to glare at her fellow team members. Ted's drooping bulldog features were a mask of calm. Sheppard steadfastly avoided her gaze. Even Gabriel had suddenly become overly studious of his bowl.
"And?" She said.
"Clyde an' Annie have a new friend." Sheppard smiled into his plate as he chewed on a last bit of nearly raw beef kidney. Ted 'hrmphed' again and began licking his plate. Gabriel stayed bent over his bowl chewing. Gretchen glared at each of them in turn.
"If you don't quit beating around t'bush and t'ell me what's up, I'm gonna get Laverne to whip me up th'ree dishes of scrambled cojonies."
Sheppard smiled up at her, then suddenly waved over toward the counter.
"Hey, buddy, come on over."
Gretchen looked up at the new comer. He was a grey rabbit anthromorph with long, thick standard legs. As he walked over slowly, She watched his eyes quickly flick from one to another of the group. He nodded to them and sat between Gabriel and Sheppard across from Ted.
"Good mornin'. I'm Cleet."
"Gretchen," She nodded to him, then to each of the others, "Gabe, T'ed, and Shepp."
"So you're the boss?" Cleet asked tilting his head toward her.
She frowned a bit.
"No. T'boss is t'Boss. I'm Chief, or 'T'op'. What's your gig?"
He nodded, his chin tight. She saw the fur under his right eye grew at an odd angle and a scar showed through. His right ear had a bit of a notch out of it and was scruffy at the tip.
"Recon." He said simply. As he took a sip from his mug, Gretchen saw that he had human standard five fingered hands and that the little finger of his right hand was gone. He had some nasty looking scars running up his arm from his hand where his pinky should have been. She folded her own stubby, four fingered hands in her lap.
She tilted her head as she looked at him.
"You're not'an uplift are you?"
Cleet set down his mug and looked back at her calmly. A soft moment of silence passed as the other three all looked at him.
His gaze didn't falter. Neither did hers.
"No. I'm from the vats."
Gretchen nodded slowly.
"Welcome t'th'team."
He let a small smile show and nodded once.
"Good to be here."
"Where'ya from, Cleet?" Sheppard asked, ignoring Gretchen's steely sidelong glare.
"I was with Retrograde for a while. I took a few hits in one raid an' spent a year gettin' put back t'gether. I tried home steadin' on New Garden. Too boring. Never was one for the farm life."
"You were with the Fold Space Pirates?" Sheppard asked his brows rising a bit.
"Mn-huhn." Cleet mumbled into his mug as he drank.
"So, uh, you're free?" Sheppard stared at him. The rest at the table looked on quietly. Cleet put down his mug and looked at each in turn, then he looked down into his bowl and began to eat his porridge.
"Yes."
The others looked at each other quietly for a moment.
Gretchen and Gabriel caught the quick motion of Cleet's eyes as he glanced up toward the counter. She and Gabe looked over to see another standard legged anthromorph coming over toward them.
"Hi, is there a spot here?" The young rottweiller anthro asked.
Gretchen blinked as Gabriel stood up and offered her his own chair and mumbled to the others asking if they could scoot around the table to make room. Cleet watched the sly smile sprout on Sheppard's face. Everyone moved closer and the new anthro sat between Gabriel and Gretchen.
"My name's Bethany", she said holding out her hand to Gretchen.
Gretchen looked at Bethany for a second before taking the normal looking five fingered hand. She got a suprizingly firm grip back from the young anthro.
"Gretchen." She said back absently. Then she smelled her. Bethany had that distinctive warm musky odor. Out of the corner of her eye she saw that Sheppard had caught the scent too as he leaned closer over the table.
"So, Beth-" He began.
"Oh, please call me Bethany. I like it better than just plain Beth." She nodded.
"'K." Sheppard said. "Where'ya From?"
Cleet looked back and forth between all the anthros. He watched Sheppard breath deep. Cleet took a deep wiff. He saw that Ted had stopped licking his plate and sat looking at Bethany. Gabriel had gone back to munching from his bowl but he obviously had his eye on Gretchen. Cleet saw that Gretchen had lowered her ears and was leaning her head face on towards Bethany. He took another deep wiff and caught it this time. It was a pungent, moist odor. A soft frown crossed his lips.
"I just came from the Immaculate Evolution Advanced Training Center. I-" Bethany said.
"I.E.?" Sheppard yelped out. "You mean you're fresh from the Vats?"
"Vats?" She asked. "Oh! No. I was born six years ago."
Ted sat up strait and his heavy bulldog eyelids sprang upward.
"You're only six? Do you have any combat experience?" He asked her quietly.
Bethany tilted her head at an odd angle.
"Yes. I was in the Dehr-Kahd assault." Gretchen saw Cleet flinch a bit when Bethany said that. "We spent nineteen months on planet before reinforcements arrived to get us off planet. It was a hell of a time. All that hiding and fighting with primitive wepons and hand to hand combat; yes I think I have some combat experience." She said with tight lips.
Ted heaved a sigh that fluttered his jowls as he let out the breath. He crossed his short arms and leaned back tilting his head down with a frown on his droopy face.
"So, do you have any real combat experience?" He asked with another sigh.
Bethany's face screwed up into a snarl.
"And just what do you mean by that!" She snapped at Ted.
"It's O.K." Gabriel said gently putting his large hand on her arm. "He doesn't mean any harm. It's just that the Dehr-Kiresh conflict was thirteen years ago."
"What! Are you mad? I was there. I was-"
"I can explain." Cleet said quietly and she looked at him. "I'm from IE too. Remember when you were born and after a while they put you into the virtual reality training system?"
"Yes, but that's not-" She said back with some heat.
"I know, I know. But later on they put you into a VR machine that had a gradiated resistance suit in it."
"Uh, yes? It helped build my muscles and increased my combat speed." She said with a shrug.
"Some of that time was real training and some of it, well some of the time you spent in those machines was under the trance of a touch machine. The machine read some one else's memories and experiences and emotions and burned them into your brain."
She scowled at him.
"No. I was really there." She said seriously.
Cleet nodded. "I know it feals that way, but you weren't really there. Your mind thinks it was there but your body knows different. You-"
Bethany's eyes tightened and her voice became very hard.
"No. Even my body knows I was there." She held up her right hand. "A Dehr bit my little finger off. It took a year to grow back. I still feal the pain when it gets cold."
Gretchen noticed that Cleet was sitting with his hands under the table. Cleet allowed a bit of a smile to touch his lips.
"I believe you. And for what its worth, your experience, even though touch induced, is quite extensive and valid." Cleet nodded to her and then to Gretchen. Gretchen blinked back at Cleet.
Bethany shook her head. "Right. Whatever you say. I was there; and I have enough experience for any military unit." She looked into each of their eyes. They just looked back at her, their eyes calm and unwavering. Her eyes hard, she didn't even blink.
Cleet nodded. "If you'll all excuse me. I better go finish movin' in."
He picked up his tray and took it to the pass through window. Ted got up and took his plate up and followed Cleet out. Bethany shrugged and went back to eating.
"So," she said between chews, "Who're you guys?"
She nodded to the others.
"My apologies," Gabriel said, smiling, "I am Gabriel and this charming, slobbering puppy is Sheppard." He said waving a huge hand towards the other young anthro.
"Oh come on!" she laughed out. "I've heard some silly ones but that one's kinda dumb."
Sheppard frowned. "What do you mean?"
"Your base form is that of a German Shepherd. Tell me you didn't think that up yourself." She smiled at him.
Sheppard did not smile.
"My Mother named me after one of her favorite writers. Who did your mother name you after?"
Bethany blinked.
"I didn't have a mother." She said quietly. "I named myself."
Sheppard's mouth wrinkled up and he looked down, then up at her.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean anything by that." He tried to smile
"It's O.K., I'm sorry I, I mean I-" Bethany frowned down at her plate.
A quiet pale fell over the table.