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FOX Academy:

Book I - The New Breed

Book II - The Werewolf of Odessa

By Dikran_O

Chapter 1 - To Russia, With Love

Marcel had just come off the half-pipe and was really catching some air when his Academy pager went off. Hidden in a hollow near his tail and covered by a patch of fake fur it was set to vibrate, not an unpleasant sensation, but nonetheless a distracting one when you were 50 feet off the ground and in the middle of one of your more radical tricks. It made him pause for an instant at the top of the arc before grabbing the board to set himself up for the landing and the subsequent trick; almost an instant too long. He barely made it back on the board as the wheels touched the wall of the half-pipe and had to lean way out to bring it in line for the climb up the other side. The audience loved it and their screams of approval penetrated the envelope of solitude he cloaked himself in while performing. If the crowd was on your side the judges would be too, so he incorporated the extended pause into the next few tricks.

Waiting in the designated area at the end of the half-pipe for his score and placement, Marcel accepted the props of the next competitor, and dutifully lifted his board to salute the crowd when a very respectable score appeared; he had just taken first place away from the favourite. He climbed down as the next dude up prepared to shred.

Avoiding the congratulations of the other participants, and the skater-groupies crowding the barriers, he headed for the port-a-potties designated for competitors only. Once inside he pulled the pager out of its hiding place and switched on the screen. It was displaying a financial news group service, one that sent advisories out to the big investors so they could contact their brokers before the great unwashed got wind of the latest trend. The message it displayed wouldn't have gone out to any investors, but a casual observer would not find it unusual.

"Universal exports are up; recommend immediate purchase of domestic stocks." It said. This simple message meant "Return to FOX Academy Headquarters immediately."

Now Marcel was in a quandary. There was one more ride for each competitor before the final tally. If he dropped out now, with no obvious injury to explain it, he would get a reputation as a 'pusher', a fraud, someone who collapsed under the pressure of competition. In addition he would, by default, come in last and lose his standing on the skating circuit. He needed to participate in a certain number of these competitions and collect a minimum amount of points in order to keep up his cover as a professional skateboarder. On the other hand, 'immediately' didn't leave a lot of wiggle room in its interpretation.

Silver, his mentor until his recent loss, had told him that reacting was never good enough, that he had to analyse a situation, consider all the angles and outcomes, and decide on a course of action; then stick with it unless the conditions it was based on changed drastically. Silver had also told him, "It's better to ask for forgiveness than for permission." so Marcel cleared the screen, took a nervous pee, and returned to the competitor's waiting area.

* * * * * * * *

Vikki was in the Academy Hospital's physiotherapy department when her pager signalled her. She had received her bionic paw a week before and she could already make a fist and rotate the wrist 180 degrees. She was now attempting to articulate individual digits, but without much success. It was a skill that she needed to master if she wanted to take the robotic paw to the field with her.

Her mechanical replacement lay on the table beside her. It looked like an art-deco creation, all angles and function. In order to shoot with it she had to place the gun in its grip and extent it toward the target; the wire that ran from it up to her shoulder harness would pull the trigger when her arm was almost fully extended. While it was fine for instinctive shooting, taking careful aim was impossible, and too many things could go wrong if the wire failed. Once she mastered the new paw she would be able to pick up a pistol or even draw one from a holster and fire it in whatever manner was most suitable for the situation.

She briefly considered using the new paw to pluck the pager from her belt, then she abandoned the idea; she had yet to learn to control the strength of its grip and she already owed the Academy several hundred dollars worth of phones, door knobs and toilet flush handles that she had inadvertently crushed.

Six weeks had passed since she had last seen Silver, the senior agent whose love and advice had brought her back from the brink of despair after losing her paw on her first mission. It had been five weeks since he was reported killed in a raid on the same compound where it had happened. On first hearing the news she almost slipped back into despondency, but she hardened herself, and vowed to drive herself to succeed as an agent of the Foreign Operations eXecutive in memory of him.

She was determined to get back into the field as soon as possible, and her resolve drove her to work on overcoming her handicap almost to the point of injury. Every morning she worked on exercising the muscles of the damaged arm until it trembled; then she ran until she dropped. Every afternoon she practised moving the robotic paw; then she spent hours on the shooting range. Every evening she studied theory, codes, techniques, languages and cultures; then she fell asleep searching the Academy's databases for clues as to who was behind the events that had almost ruined her and killed Silver.

Her physiotherapist and the prosthetics technicians agreed that she was making amazing progress, but they were equally afraid that she was going to hurt herself, mentally if not physically. Have I been trying too hard she thought? Lately she was feeling nauseous every morning, throwing up if she didn't get to her stock of lemonade first. The therapist thought that it was due to low blood sugar brought on by excessive exercise.

Vikki pulled the pager with her right paw and keyed in her password. Since she was already at FOX HQ, her message was slightly different than Marcel's.

"Aurum up 14 on news of Galena on the Don."

Aurum up 14, a meeting in Gold's office at 1400 hours, 2:00 pm, was simple enough, but Vikki was puzzled by the rest of the message. She walked over to the Academy library turning the phrase over and around in her head. The Academy maintained a number of Internet accounts under false names with several of the large carriers in order to conduct open-source research without identifying themselves and Vikki signed into one of these. Calling up several search engines she set them to work simultaneously, checking the results of one while entering new terms in another.

Galena, a city in Illinois, a sea-side resort in Maryland, a crystal, a mineral containing lead. The Don, Godfather, Marlon Brando, Mario Puzo, the Don River, Cossacks, Rostovslavaya Oblast. She pulled up biographies and maps, the atomic table and metallurgy texts. Where was the link? She looked again at a map of Azov on the Don river in Russia, when she zoomed out she recognized the border region just north of it as the area of her ill-fated mission. Scrolling back several pages she found the fact sheet for the crystal form of Galena, and its associated metals. One entry caught her eye.

News of Galena on the Don? Could it be? She stood up so suddenly that she knocked the chair over. She punched the computer's off button with her left paw as she turned to run from the library, not noticing the fist-sized hole she left in her haste.

* * * * * * * *

Marcel left the podium carrying his second place trophy as soon as the stipulations in the competition's contract allowed, shunning the fans and the media alike. If they interpreted it as him being a sore prick, well he wouldn't be the first Pro boarder with such a reputation. He had to deliberately miss a landing on his last run to avoid coming in first and being forced to play the excited winner for a series of obligatory interviews with the pseudo-sports networks, but that was okay; this wasn't his real life, just his cover.

He took the exit from the restricted area that led to the street, where he could catch a bus going to the Central Experimental Farm, which served as cover for the Academy. There was a long black limousine parked across the street, the chauffeur leaning on the fender. When the chauffeur looked up and spit a wad of red onto the sidewalk Marcel recognized the Academy's Combat instructor, the Doberman Rusty, and his heart sank.

"Am I in shit?" he asked as he approached the limo.

"I dunno," Rusty replied jovially. "Does 'Bring that little prick's tail back on a spike' sound like you're in shit?" They rode silently back to the farm.

At the Chief of Staff's office Marcel found Vikki, Bill 'the Professor' Hanlan from Plans already there. Vikki looked impatient and Gold was drumming his fingers loudly on his desk. The monitor of his workstation was turned sideways so that everyone could see the image of Delores 'Baby Doll' Johnson, who was inspecting her painted claws for flaws.

"Alright, let's get started." The Chief of Staff said as Marcel settled into a chair. Delores straightened up, Vikki leaned forward eagerly and Bill didn't move.

"As some of you may have guessed, we've located Silver and we believe that he is alive."

"Yes!" Vikki clenched her fists. Marcel was stunned.

"Silver was reported down by friendly special forces when their team was ambushed in the mine that Vikki found." Gold continued. "They couldn't get to his body to confirm that, but when they blew up the satellite interceptor and collapsed the shaft it was assumed that everybody left inside was killed, if they weren't dead already. Now it appears that they had another exit, along a river bank some 1500 metres away. You continue Hanlan."

Bill did. "Although they were outside of the intensive surveillance envelope we did have some systems with wide enough coverage to include the river. Analysis of all collection shows a number of small boats appearing on the river without having come down it. Subsequent collection revealed a cave entrance under the trees that line the river, just high enough for a small outboard-motor boat to pass through. That river leads south to join the Don River in the Rostovslavaya Oblast administrative district of Russia. A review of the signals intelligence for the region in the days following the raid showed an increase between the Moscow network we identified earlier and an entity in the town of Azov." Delores' face disappeared for a moment and a map of the area took its place. The seaside town of Azov, the Don River and the border between Russia and the Ukraine were all marked.

When Delores' image returned she took up the narrative.

"The Prof passed the info on to us here in Moscow and I went to work on my contacts." She smiled and wiggled her ample bosom to emphasize the type of work she was best at. "Eventually I was able to hook up with a Colonel from the part of their Inspector General's office that oversees the missile forces expenditures. There is a project that is very close hold being run out of a castle near Azov in the Rostov region, near where the missiles were intercepted. They had a success, we're assuming that meant the intercept, and then a setback several weeks ago; probably referring to Silver's raid. The General Staff here is demanding someone's head, someone in Azov. That someone, and I haven't been able to find out exactly who, is claiming that he has a valuable source of information to trade for the time to get the project back on line; a western agent. My contact is going down there in a week to verify this."

"Obviously," Gold continued, "we think that that agent is Silver. None of the unaccounted for special forces soldiers on Silver's squad would be considered so valuable." An aerial photograph of a city on a lake or seashore filled the screen. "This is the town of Azov, an ancient fortress city on the silk highway which sits on the shore of the Sea of Azov. The Cossacks captured the fortress off the Turks several hundred years ago but were in turn driven away. They destroyed the fortress before they left."

A close up of ruins with a single intact battlement and a ticket booth appeared. After a short pause the scene changed to show another aerial photo, this time of a medieval castle. Shadows revealed that it had sheer walls and pointed turrets at regular intervals. The central Keep was likewise turreted. The only obvious entrances were the massive front gates; the windows were merely slits for firing arrows through.

"The Cossacks left this castle intact, and that is where the operation is based, and where we believe that Silver is being held. Our new planning officer, Bill Hanlan has been studying the site and has come up with some interesting ideas. Bill."

"The Russian government has kept this operation at arm's length; for the sake of deniability should it go wrong. If we hit them before the Army takes control I think that we can get out without them raising a general alert. This castle has some unique features that I think we can exploit. I'll need Delores, Marcel and yourself, Gold, to pull this off. We may have to call in Randy from the Sudan also."

Vikki interrupted. "I want in."

"Aside from your emotional attachment, which disqualifies you from going, there's the matter of learning to control your prosthetic." Gold was receiving routine reports on her progress, as well as the bills for all the damage.

"I can pass the basic fitness tests with my mechanical paw, and I'm willing to let Dr Gordon decide whether I'm mentally capable of handling this mission." She retorted.

"That won't be necessary." The Chief of Staff replied. He knew how import it was for an agent who had suffered in the field to get back out again as soon as possible. "We'll still go through the process, but unless notified otherwise consider yourself part of the team." He turned back to Bill Hanlan. "Walk us through it."

"I'd like to move this to the Ops centre where I have a scale model and other material set up." Bill stood and the rest prepared to follow.

"You two go ahead." Gold said to Bill and Vikki. "Marcel, close the door."

Vikki gave Marcel a look of pity as the door closed between them. When they were alone Gold turned to Marcel and gave him a cold stare.

"The message you received said that you were to return here immediately, yet you stayed at your 'X' games for several more hours. Explain."

Marcel looked right at Gold and repeated the lecture that Silver had given whenever Marcel did something that might blow his cover.

"The Academy has spent a good deal of time, effort and money establishing a cover for me as a professional competitor on the international skateboarding circuit. That cover allows me to travel freely and gives me access to places that other forms of cover don't allow. It also provides a measure of safety as security officers are always suspicious and the boarder image will make them look for signs of drugs and deviant sexual habits rather than espionage." Marcel left the script. "Placing high in this competition was the only way of keeping my standing on the international circuit, and avoiding first place was the best I could do to speed things up for ya. While this job might not need that cover intact others might, and if you really needed me right away you would have had Rusty give the officials a note like my mother'd died or something."

"How long did it take you to decide whether to stay or drop out?"

"About 30 seconds."

"Good, you've learned to think fast." Gold smiled and opened the door. "What we really need is new set of codes to allow agents more flexibility when possible. Let's go see how Hanlan plans to rescue Silver, shall we?"

* * * * * * * *

The subject of their deliberations sat uncomfortably in a seat-less wooden armchair. Silver's wrists were shackled to the arms of the chair, his ankles to its legs and a wide leather belt held him against the back, prevented him from slipping down through the hole where the seat should be. The chair was bolted to the concrete floor of a windowless room with stone walls and a heavy wooden door. Silver thought it might be some sort of castle. The floor around the chair was stained black by the blood and sweat of a thousand previous occupants.

This was Silver's first visit to this particular room. He had awoken three weeks ago in a brightly lit room, strapped to a hospital bed and connected to various drip-bags and monitors. As he healed and his strength returned they had moved him to successively more secure and austere quarters, the latest of which was a cold, damp stone cell only eight feet by six feet. It had no bed and only a hole in the corner for sanitation.

Silver looked up as the door opened. Two bears in Russian army uniform entered with assault rifles at the ready. They checked the room and double checked Silver's shackles. Satisfied, they stood on either side of the door at attention and waited.

A moment later Silver heard someone else coming down the hall, a heavy tread on the stone floor. An instant later the doorway was filled with one of the largest wolves that Silver had ever seem.

The wolf was tall and extremely muscular. His fur was the grey, black and brown of the European Timber wolf. His age was difficult to discern, extra grey around the ears and muzzle suggested that he was old, but how old was difficult to tell. His dark-brown eyes were bright, his teeth were white, his fur was thick and vibrant.

"Allow me to introduce myself, "the wolf spoke with a slight accent. "My name is Vasyl, Vasyl Igorovich Timoshenko; but my friends call me the Werewolf. Actually, so do my enemies, but not for long." The infamous Odessa Werewolf, thought Silver, so he's the one behind all this. Silver knew his profile very well from Marcel's first mission in Nicosia, but he played dumb.

"Sorry, I didn't catch all that. My mind was elsewhere. Vaseline Timbits was it?"

"You can have your little jokes Mr Silver, but it will do you no good. I need to know how much you know about my little hobby before I trade you back to the Russians. They will surely get the information out of you eventually, and I must know so I can anticipate their reaction, just in case, eh? Tell me now and you will go to Moscow intact. Refuse and risk losing the use of one or two minor appendages."

"You're bluffing Vasy. Moscow doesn't like damaged goods. I was just along on that raid as a guest. I know nothing about your operation, that's the analysts' job."

"Oh I think that you do. FOX has been a pain in my backside for months, ever since that Mr. White came nosing around. Then you kill my granddaughter, steal my secrets, make me look like a fool. Finally you interfere with the single greatest development in missile technology today. I would kill you now but the program can continue without the installation you so wantonly destroyed and I must buy some time to re-establish operations closer to the source, so it's off to Moscow you go; but not before we have a little chat."

The Werewolf dug a claw into Silver's chest and traced one of the scars that criss-crossed it, drawing blood as it went.

"But these scars and the look in your eyes tell me that physical or mental torture will not work, you will die or go insane before telling me. The Russians will probably use the latest drugs, but they are better equipped than I and have time to spare. No. What we need is something that you know will destroy your ability to function if it does not stop, yet will leave you intact for Moscow. Fortunately, since the collapse of the communist regime, this country has plenty of exactly what we need."

He snapped his fingers and one of the bears leaned out into the hall to wave someone in. Visions of white-coated hunchbacked assistants lugging car batteries attached to testicle clamps flew through Silver's head. He was genuinely surprised when the Sable stepped into the room.

She was smooth and sleek and her ebony fur had that silvery glow that only Sables native to northern Siberia have. She leaned one arm against the door and put the fist of the other on her hip as she studied Silver, looking down along her snout with a slight grin. Shy she was not, for she stood naked save for copper hoops that dangled from her ears.

The guards could not keep their eyes off her, and Silver could feel her having an effect on him as well. The werewolf was all business however. He leaned over Silver.

"You are about to experience a little-known form of torture invented in northern Africa and used extensively against agents of the French government by the Algerian rebels. This young lady is going to perform fellatio on you until the blood vessels in your penis burst and the tubes in your testicles snap, if you can hold out that long. It's like having a vasectomy done with a blunt, rusty spoon. I am assured that it is not just the excruciating pain that induces people to talk, but the knowledge that if it goes on too long the pain will never go away and one will never enjoy any type of sexual gratification ever again. Moscow will still have you as intact as they need you to be. What do you say Silver, want to talk now and save yourself all the misery?"

"And miss my turn with her? You're dumber than I thought Werewolf, if you wanted to scare me you should have got your ugly old mother to blow me ... again."

The Werewolf's arm came back and the subsequent blow may well have broken Silver's neck, but he froze, his lips tight and his eyes blazing.

"For that, Silver, I won't let her stop until I see blood, even if you do want to talk." He stepped back and motioned the Sable forward.

She was undeniably desirable. She was petite, only about 5 feet tall, but she was shaped like an hourglass, full hips tapering to tiny feet in one direction and to a firm waist in the other. Her full breasts stood proudly on their own, completing the figure. She brushed the fur back from her sky-blue eyes and smiled as she approached. The motion of her hips and the swaying of her breasts was enough to transfix the guards. When she lifted her tail and leaned down to look Silver in the face one of them dropped his rifle, but only the Werewolf seemed to notice.

The Sable settled between Silver's knees, keeping eye contact with him. Resting her breasts on his thighs, she rubbed the outsides of his legs. She lowered her head and let her bangs brush gently across his still tranquil member. One paw reached between his legs to find his sack and she traced its contours with the tip of one claw

Silver debated trying to resist, but he knew that in the long run it would be useless. Already he could feel the blood swelling his prick. He closed his eyes and let himself go.

As his member swelled to full size she rubbed her head up and down it length, now cupping his balls and squeezing them gently. She moistened her lips and ran them along each side as well, her tongue darting out now and again to flick at the pulsing veins. She took his cock with her free paw near the base and rubbed the underside below the slit, where it was most sensitive, with her thumb. Soon it had grown too long for her tiny paw to reach and she began stroking up and down, letting the pad of her thumb brush there with each repetition.

When he could get no harder she worked her mouth a moment to produce saliva and, bending over his prick, let it drip down onto it. She spread it with pursed lips until the upper half was glistening, and then she barred her teeth and traced her way back up to the tip with them. The sensation, combined with the sense of danger, made Silver strain at his shackles.

She did not need to prolong this; she would save her best work for later, when it was needed.

She lowered her head and engulfed his swollen cock. Bobbing her head up and down, letting her tongue rasp along it as she drew back. Soon she could feel his balls tense in anticipation. She pressed down on the channel with her thumb, not hard enough to block it, she just wanted a split second's warning. She felt it bulge as he came and she pulled her head back and to one side, aiming his cock towards him; she wasn't being paid to fulfill his fantasies by swallowing. A good deal of his cum flew over his left shoulder to splatter on the floor; the rest flowed down his shaft and over her paw.

The Werewolf threw her a towel and she wiped her paw then Silver's dwindling penis. She looked inquiringly over at the Wolf and he nodded. Getting up she disappeared into the hall and came back with a leather shoulder bag. From inside she pulled a package and a lighter then she retreated to a corner of the room and lit up a cigarette, Turkish tobacco from the smell, Silver thought. The guard who hadn't dropped his rifle grouped for a pack of cheap Russian cigarettes but the Werewolf snapped a phase in Russian and he put it away hastily. Obviously he hadn't earned one yet.

When she was done smoking the Sable brushed at her fur, rotated her neck to loosen it up and approached Silver again.

The short break had allowed Silver to recover his breath, but little Silver hadn't had enough time to bounce back right away. The sable stoked it, caressing his balls gently again. She rubbed herself against the insides of his thighs, raised a breast to her mouth and let him watch as she sucked her nipple erect. She ran the tip of the nipple along his cock and they both felt it twitch. Smiling again, she drew him into her mouth and sucked the air out from around it. It grew as the blood rushed into the low-pressure area and she encouraged it by twisting her head back and forth as she pulled back to the tip. She repeated the action until his cock stood on its own again, vibrating in anticipation.

Now she licked it all over to lubricate it, enclosing the tip as she passed each time. Dealing it long tender stokes with a soft paw. Taking inside her warm mouth she slid her lips down to the base, letting the tip bump along the top of her mouth and enter her throat. Working her neck and larynx she squeezed the last inch of him where it lay deep inside her while her lips massaged the base. After a minute she came up for air, pulling back slowly, then drawing him in deep again.

After a few more minutes Silver was ready to come again, and this time he felt his balls pull in as they drained; not so much juice this time.

The sable took another cigarette and went back to work. She visited her bag and pulled out a white plastic bottle. Squirting the contents on her paws she rubbed them together to work the lotion in then returned to Silver.

The lotion must have been made with menthol because it made his cock feel cool where she rubbed it on. Placing the still flaccid member in her mouth he felt a unique sensation of heat and coolness simultaneously. It was enough to start the process again. As her paw went down her head followed, and when she pulled her head back her paw went up, so there was a continuous rippling hot and cold effect on him.

When he came the third time it was almost pure white, his balls were producing new carrier fluid but there was no more sperm to carry. There was a slight ache there, indicating that they had had enough for one night; but the Sable wasn't done yet.

Despite the lotion it took her much longer to excite him again. She had to pull each testicle into her mouth and caress them with tongue and lips to sooth and relax them before he could get erect again. After the fourth time the ache was constant.

Each time she returned from her ritual cigarette it took longer to get him back up and to bring him to orgasm. She danced naked for him. She rubbed herself all over him. She sucked on his fingers, bit his thighs and tongued his ears. The Werewolf watched it all impassively. Silver noticed that he changed the guards at one point, although he wasn't sure if it was because their shift was over or they were being driven mad by the exhibition.

There were twelve cigarette butts in the corner and the Sable was working on number thirteen when the Werewolf finally approached Silver and pulled his head back.

"Ready to talk Mr Silver?" He glanced down at Silver's shrivelled, red member. "He looks like he will survive ... so we'll wait a bit before we chat, heh?" He motioned the Sable back.

Her fur was matted and damp from her efforts now. She worked her jaw and rubbed her neck. She shot the Werewolf an angry look but wisely said nothing. Returning to Silver she began to work.

After ten minutes it was obvious that little Silver had given up. The Sable waved the limp sausage at the Wolf and shrugged. The Werewolf said something in Russian and she went to rummage in her bag again. She brought out a small glass vial and filled a syringe from it. She moved behind Silver and found the artery at the base of his neck with her fingertips. Quickly and professionally, she injected the drug.

Placing the syringe back in its case she turned and stood in front of Silver. With legs slightly spread she brushed the fur back from her eyes and stared at him. The intensity of her gaze drew his eyes up to hers. Slowly, she lifted one leg then the other over the arms of the chair he was bound to. Pressing her breasts against his chest and wrapping her arms around the back of the chair she ground her sweaty pelvis into his.

Silver began to lick and kiss her neck. He nuzzled her shoulder and moaned softly. He buried his snout in the luxuriant fur on her head, nipping at her ear, and then he gasped. Lifting herself off and back she stood to reveal and erection as long and as hard as the first.

"Yuri, you know my girl Sachina?" one of the guards whispered to the other.

"The one that is so fat and ugly you have to drink half your pay to go to bed with her? Sure, I know her."

"What do you think it costs, a vial of that drug?"

A glare from the Werewolf silenced them, then he nodded to the Sable and she began again.

There were eighteen cigarette butts on the floor when the first trace of red showed in his cum. Silver's breath was coming in short, shallow rasps. His limbs were limp and he could no longer lift his head. The Sable was tiring also. She could no longer move her neck and she had difficulty straightening up. She stumbled on the way to her corner smoking area and it took her three tries to light her trembling cigarette. She had had to use the drug again the last time, and was now considering taking some herself.

The Werewolf looked her over before squatting in from of Silver and looking up into his face. He slapped Silvers snout from side to side and gauged the reaction ... nothing.

"By now the pain should be incredible, but I think that you are too numb to sense what is happing to you down there. If this continues you will suffer permanent damage, but if you can't feel it, how will you know when to talk, heh? I think a few hours to let my assistant recuperate," He nodded at the Sable, "and for you to recover enough to really experience the pain; then we'll see if you'd rather talk," he grinned evilly, "or play until your very balls liquefy and squirt out on the floor."

The Werewolf stood and barked an order at the guards, who helped the Sable to pack her bag and checked to make sure everything she had taken out of it was returned. They checked the locks on Silver's shackles again and inspected the floor around his chair, flicking away bits of dirt and dust least he figure out a way to manufacture a weapon with them. Satisfied, the Werewolf waved them out into the hall and addressed Silver once more before following them.

"When we see each other again, Silver, only one of us will walk away whole." He slammed the door shut and Silver heard the lock turn and the sound of multiple footsteps fading away.

Silver forced his heart to slow, just as he had forced it to speed up when the Werewolf was inspecting him. He formed a ball of awareness inside his chest and sent it exploring around his body, checking the status of each muscle, tendon and joint in isolation. It was a technique he had learned many years ago; control the breathing, control the body, control the mind. He thanked god that he had kept the practise up all these years, and he thanked W for funding those three months spent in a Bangkok brothel, learning other techniques that had finally paid off tonight.

Nonetheless, he avoided letting the ball of sensitivity anywhere close to his groin, better to keep that area isolated until he could get some painkillers, or at least a block of ice.

After he was sure that there were no listeners at the door Silver started to retch and heave. He almost vomited but he closed his mouth, worked his throat, and eventually the copper hoop and hook earring he had snatched earlier was between his teeth. Closing his eyes, he bent to the keyhole of one shackle and started to work it by feel.

* * * * * * * *

Marcel had a revelation: boats were bad; especially little black rubber boats that bounced from wave to wave in a rainstorm on a cold September night in the Sea of Azov. He was willing to bet that any three of those five conditions would still equal bad. They had been on the water for over an hour now and his arms ached from holding on to the rope that ran around the front of the Zodiac. Nothing about his life on the city streets had prepared him for this.

Vikki and Gold, on the other hand, seemed to be doing just fine. Marcel supposed that Gold had done this sort of thing countless times before, and Vikki's sedate state he attributed to her holding on with her artificial paw.

The Zodiac and its pilot were on loan from the British Special Boat Service, the Royal Navy's SBS. It would wait offshore until they signalled or until it was time to return, then it would leave, even if they had not arrived. The boat slowed. Marcel's night vision was now at its peak and he could just make out a lighter line ahead that marked the shore. The pilot cut the engine as they slid up onto the small beach.

The three agents left the boat quickly. Pausing at the top of the slope Gold noted that the dim silhouette of the castle was where he expected it to be; they were on the right beach. He consulted a GPS and led them toward it.

The castle sat atop a hill set a kilometre back from the beach. An ancient stone roadway once connected it to docks there, but a long section had collapsed some time ago. A paved road now traversed the collapsed section. Closer in, the walls rose straight up, smooth with age and now slippery with the rain. Perhaps a professional climber could scale them, but Marcel knew that they could not, but this was where he came in.

Gold checked the GPS again and moved parallel to the stone roadway. Forcing his way through some bushes at the base of the rocky hill he exposed an iron grill. Its bars formed squares about four inches a side, preventing wild animals from entering a sewage pipe barely 18 inches across. He took a tube out of his pack and squeezed an inch of the paste inside onto each of the thick bars. Meanwhile, Marcel began to strip off his gear, storing it in a canvass bag. When he was down to a tight Speedo bathing suit he stood shivering.

"Okay," He said miserably, "Where's the grease?" Gold handed him a can with a metal lid. Marcel pried it open and sniffed at the contents. "What is this stuff?"

"Pig fat," Gold replied. "Non-sentient of course. It's a local product so we can dump the container when we're done."

"Do I have to, you know, smear it all over me?" Marcel asked.

"You know the dimensions. What's the problem?"

"It's just ...well...Pig fat."

"Do you have some sort of religious restrictions that you haven't told us about?"

"No. It's just that it reminds me of someone I once knew." Marcel shuddered with the memory of that night in Nicosia. "Hand it over; I'll consider it penance for past sins."

Marcel dipped a paw into the can and began to smear the goo on his fur. This was probably the 'in thing' when Silver was a kit he thought to himself, wondering how he would look in a leather jacket and engineer boots. Maybe he'd try it out when they get back.

The grill made several 'pings' and fell on the grass at their feet as its weight broke the last of the acid-eroded connections.

"Got your bags?" Gold asked. He saw that Marcel did. "Then off you go." Marcel looped the rope attached to the bags over his shoulder and slid into the tunnel. Vikki and Gold guided the bags in behind him. When they could no longer hear him or the bags bumping along the tunnel they moved off toward the castle.

* * * * * * * *

Delores "Baby Doll" Johnson, a Swift Fox ex- of the Calgary police, was the FOX junior agent in Moscow. Her job description included persuading high-ranking Russian males to talk to her. Given the abundance of physical assets that nature had seen fit to bestow upon her this was rather easy; the hard part was scheduling. Her orders from FOX HQ had been very specific, and required confirmation. Confident that she could meet the timings she had replied in the affirmative, now she was regretting it.

Getting the Colonel to take her along on the trip to Azov had been simple. Persuading him to leave the official driver behind so they could 'be more intimate' had been easy. Slowing him down so that they would arrive at the time stipulated in Bill Hanlan's plan was proving to be a pain. Every hour or so she called a pee break and checked her GPS, comparing it with the optimal time from the schedule. Several times she had had to suggest that they stop for a little R&R (more like a B&B she complained to Vikki later, Blowjob and Backache) so that they wouldn't arrive too early.

As they neared the castle she saw the stone roadway silhouetted against the cloudy sky. She could just make out the 40-foot gap where the road crossed its path. Poking the Colonel in the ribs she said "Sergi, pull over."

"What? Now? It is pissing down rain and we are almost there."

"NOW. I mean, Sergipoo," She twirled the fur of where his shirt was open. "Don't the lighting and the driving rain make you tingle all over?"

"Tingle? No. It makes me want to drive cautiously. These roads have not been inspected for..."

She put one tender paw between his legs. "It makes ME tingle, but not for long. Know what I mean?

The Colonel evidently did, because he brought the ancient Russian sedan to a halt immediately.

"Not here dear." She said. "Another 20 meters further."

"Why?"

"I want to be able to see the lovely ancient architecture as you ravish me like the Cossacks of old" Oh Christ, where do I get these lines? She thought, but the Colonel was a romantic, as all Russians are, and obliged.

"A little further ... further ... back up a touch ... There! Good." She checked the sedan's alignment with the roadway. "Now I can see everything." She turned to him and tipped his peak cap back on his head. "So, what is my big, brave Cossack inspector going to inspect tonight?" The things I do for my country, she thought.

* * * * * * * *

Marcel crawled easily through the first series of tunnels. He could move swiftly on paws and knees. He wasn't using a GPS to navigate, since they did not know how reliable it would be in the depths; he had memorized all the turns and the distances between them in a life-sized mock-up. Coming to a sharp turn in the tunnel, he checked for the grill that should be there and found it. Placing the larger of his two bags on the shelf there he produced a tube of the same material Gold had used earlier and applied it to the bars. Attaching a bungee cord to it so that it wouldn't fall after the bars were eaten away, Marcel continued on.

He turned into a narrower tunnel that led toward the castle. After marking off the proper distance he stuck out his right paw and was rewarded with empty space; the side-tunnel was there. It grew narrower as he went along, and he started to appreciate the grease. Counting five openings on his left he squeezed himself into the sixth, pushing his small bag before him. It was a tight fit; he doubted that he would have made it without the bacon grease. The Speedo was saving parts of him that he thought highly of from being sanded away by the rough stone.

When he had forced himself two meters down the hole he found the last obstacle, a steel plate with numerous holes drilled in it, screwed into the stone from the other side. Peaking through one of the holes he saw a large room with a heavy wooden chair in its centre, its back to him, and a solid wooden door opposite. There was a dark figure slumped in the chair.

Marcel groped in his bag and produced a small dental mirror, a syringe full of yellow fluid and two elastic cables. He hooked the ends of the cables through a couple of the holes and anchored them in cracks in the stone. He used the mirror to locate the bolts holding the barrier in place. Marcel squirted the fluid from the syringe in the areas where the bolts should be and held his breath as noxious fumes rose from those spots. In less than a minute the barrier shifted as the weight was transferred to the cables.

Marcel would have to back-up into the last tunnel and turn around if he wanted to enter the cell feet-first. That could take several minutes in these tight confines. The figure in the chair had not moved; was that a good thing or a bad thing? Suspecting that Silver may need some of the drugs he had brought in the bag, Marcel decided to continue in face-first for the sake of speed.

He pulled the steel barrier inside and slid it under him. Gripping the handle of the bag in his teeth he eased it out of the hole to dangle against the wall. Inching forward he started to emerge, a slimy newborn birthed by a castle. When his arms were out he could press on the wall and pull himself out, but the slippery grease and the weight of the bag threatened to pull him face-first into the concrete. He gripped the stone inside the hole with his toes and held on for a moment as he set himself for the next move.

Letting go and pushing hard at the same time he popped straight out of the hole. Jerking the bag up in an arc pulled his torso around and up and he spread his arms for balance as his feet touched the floor behind the chair. Using the momentum, he sprung a back flip over the chair, tossing the bag up at it apex, landing three feet in front of the chair and facing it. He deftly caught the bag as it dropped in front of him.

"Ta dah!" No applause, no appreciative comments, no grunt of grudging respect came from the chair-bound audience. Marcel stepped forward and checked him out. A mid-sized Black Bear, naked save for tattered shorts, was shackled in the chair, its neck broken.

Now where the hell was Silver?

* * * * * * * *

At that moment Silver was pressed up against a wall, hoping that the two Bears coming up the corridor would not turn his way. The guard at the bottom of the stairs leading up from the dungeon had been the same one who had dropped his rifle earlier, and after breaking his neck Silver discovered that the accident had damaged the action, rendering it useless as a firearm. He had put on the Bear's baggy uniform more for warmth than for disguise, and even though his tail tucked inside helped to flush it out a bit he was sure that he would be spotted as a fake even in this dimly-lit corridor.

Thankfully the two Bears turned down another hallway. Silver waited until their footsteps receded and stepped out into the corridor. Suspecting that the exit was to the left based on the slope of the floor he turned that way, and almost walked right into a large Brown Bear standing silently in the middle of the corridor.

The Bear had managed to get the finger of one paw up to the second knuckle inside his nose, but he was holding his assault rifle by the pistol grip in the other, his finger on the trigger. He slowly raised the rifle up level with Silver's stomach. A glance told Silver that the safety was off. It was, in fact, set on 'automatic'; one squeeze and you could use Silver for a cheese grater. The Bear still had his finger in his nose, making his Russian difficult to translate, but Silver understood the gist of it; he was fucked. He put the useless rifle down on the floor and held his paws up.

Finally finished his proboscis prospecting, the bear made a wide circle around behind Silver, keeping well out of his reach. Just my luck to run into one that knows what he's doing, Silver rued. Once behind him the Bear grunted and motioned him forward. Off to see the Werewolf, he suspected. Silver was contemplating his chances of a successful back flip and thigh grip to the Bear's head when he heard a bubbly gurgle behind him. Stopping, he listened. The gurgling stopped and there was a scrape and a thump. Turning cautiously around he saw that the Bear was now on his knees. Marcel's left paw was stuck in the trigger guard of his rifle, preventing him from pulling the trigger. Marcel's right paw was holding the hilt of the knife he had just stuck through the Bear's throat, preventing him from breathing. Marcel rode the Bear down as it slumped to the floor.

Without as much as a glance at Silver he pushed the rifle out of reach then checked for a pulse. Satisfied, he cleaned his knife on the Bear's jacket before turning to face his mentor.

"Vacation's over Boss. Time to go home."

"Let's hide this one so we can get a head-start before they find me gone." Silver advised. "Say, you wouldn't happen to have any anti-inflammatory drugs in that bag would you?"

Marcel handed him a large brown pill. "One every four hours and no operating heavy equipment, and Gold sent this for you." He handed Silver his silenced Glock-17.

Silver checked that it was loaded, verified that the magazine was full and seated properly. He accepted the two extra magazines and a clip that held them on his right forearm, from where they could be loaded quickly. He clipped a holster to the belt holding the uniform jacket closed but kept the gun in his right paw, at the ready.

"Let's go then." Silver headed up the corridor.

"Nope, this way." Marcel indicated the downhill slope. "Things are about to get busy in that direction."

Silver reminded himself that this was now Marcel's operation and turned to follow.

* * * * * * * *

Gold and Vikki had been busy outside the castle. They had visited the ramp leading to the ancient docks and had now circled around to the main entrance on the opposite side, facing the town of Azov. Lacking the protection of the steep hill there was an outer wall on this side. It was topped with broken glass and its only entrance had a pair of Bears guarding it. The analysts believed that the ground between it and the Castle was monitored and mined also. This was the end of the road for them.

"Let's get it set up." Gold ordered. He dropped the heavy pack that he had carried up the steep slope with a sigh of gratitude. Vikki dropped her lighter one as well. Flexing his shoulders to loosen them up the large golden-furred fox began pulling metal tubes and plates out of his pack. Quickly assembling them in the dark, just as he had practised for days before the mission, he constructed a Russian 82mm mortar while Vikki laid out the ten mortar bombs that she had carried.

Normally a mortar this large was carried by two soldiers, but Gold was an unusually large and fit fox; still the climb reminded him that he was well into the second half of life now. He promised himself a weekend at his chalet with one of his male friends, a masseuse, when this was over. He checked the GPS, judged the winds to be mild, and set to adjusting the aim of the mortar.

Vikki kept watch on the time. When their mark approached she gave Gold a two-minute warning. As the second hand swung around again she opened her mouth to give the one-minute warning, but the sirens from the castle drowned her out.

"Oh-oh. Fox is out of the bag." Gold muttered, then to Vikki, "Weapon Ready!"

"Rounds Ready!" she relied.

"Prepare to fire."

"Prepare to fire," she repeated.

"Fire!"

"Fire!" and she dropped the first round down the tube.

As they had rehearsed she dropped three rounds and paused. Gold quickly changed the aim to a pre-set point and ordered her to continue. The first rounds were just striking the ground by the guard post as she started dropping another three rounds. There was another adjustment then three more and they stopped. She had one round left.

The second set of three bombs had been aimed at the Castle's main gate, the third at the tower behind it. The two Bears at the guard post were prone, dead or wounded. The tower was a smoking hole, victim of a direct hit. The main gate was damaged, but still in place. Gold set the aim back and made a slight adjustment before ordering her to drop in the last bomb.

Bingo! The gate had started to open as she dropped the shell in the tube. A dozen Bears were crowding the entrance, looking to see if it was safe to rush out to their defensive positions, when the bomb whistled down. The Bears looked up. The shell came down. The Bears went up. The doors came down. The Bears came down ... all over the place.

The whole sequence had taken only two minutes. Setting a booby-trap on the mortar, Gold stepped back and motioned Vikki to follow.

* * * * * * * *

Marcel navigated by memory again; down one corridor, up a set of stairs, through an arched doorway. It was easier to move safely with two, they could come around blind corners with a silenced gun pointing in each direction. So far they had only had to kill one more Bear. Finally Marcel stopped in front of a door in the rear tower.

"We need to go in here, but the analysts weren't sure what this room was used for, so be prepared for a surprise." He told Silver. He tried the knob, and it turned freely. Positioning themselves they dove into the room when Marcel pushed the door open, one low, one high, covering both sides.

The only thing in the room was a narrow bed. A nude Sable was curled up on it, snoring softly. Marcel admired her for a moment.

"Think she needs rescuing?" he asked hopefully.

"No." Silver replied. "She was my torture."

"Dang. Sign me up for the next session. Looks like she's dead to the world."

"Probably exhausted. What do we need in here?"

Marcel pointed to a ventilator grill on the floor by the wall opposite the bed and tried to imitate W. "The egress, old chap."

Lifting the grill carefully, Silver looked down. The hole would be a tight fit for his shoulders but it widened out into a horizontal tunnel immediately, so it could be done. He looked back at Marcel and raised his brow.

"Age before beauty. We're going to the left."

Silver wedged himself in one shoulder at a time. The three weeks of coma and the torture had slimmed him down a bit; he'd have to get Rusty to design a regime to build the muscle back up. Once inside and moving it was easier, and he heard Marcel drop in behind him. Marcel pulled the grate back into place with a slight scrape and they were off.

In the room they had just left the Sable continued to snore for a minute, until the sounds of them crawling down the tunnel disappeared, then her eyes snapped open. She didn't hold any particular loyalty to the Werewolf, and the fact that the Silver Fox could even move after what she had done to him had earned her respect for him, but the Werewolf paid those who assisted him handsomely, and punished those who didn't mercilessly. She jumped up and ran from the room.

A minute later the alarm sounded.

* * * * * * * *

Delores had had some troubles of her own; Sergi wasn't performing as required. Exhausted and drained from too many 'rest stops' over the last two days he sat sobbing softly in the driver's seat.

Delores, her blouse open, her bra around her neck, thought hard. She needed the Colonel distracted in exactly 145 seconds or he might hear the explosions above the sounds of the storm. She changed her approach, switching off the seductress she set her personality to 'Mother'.

"Oh, my poor baby." She crooned in Sergi's ear. "Don't you fret. You've just been working yourself too hard and you've been making mama so happy these last two days; mama's been asking too much of you. Come here, mama's going to make it all better." She pulled his head between her breasts and let him cry against her. She stroked his ears, keeping one eye on her watch. Seconds before the mark she pushed his head lower and, taking a large breast in each paw, squeezed his head between them.

Sergi was taken by surprise and struggled at first, but then he sighed and settled into their warmth. Delores could hear the faint booms of the triple explosions, once, twice, three times. A few seconds of silence passed and then the final distant explosion. She relaxed her arms to release the Colonel but he remained in place, no longer crying. He raised a paw and began to stroke one fuzzy breast.

"Delores, milaya moya, you have cured me."

Great, Delores thought, on to phase two.

* * * * * * * *

The alarm penetrated the tunnels where they were just approaching the shelf where Marcel had left the large bag.

"Damn, they must have found one of the Bears. What's the plan Marcel?"

Marcel pulled a long wooden board out of the bag. It was shaped like a torpedo and had four straps, in two sets of two. Four large grey wheels completed the picture.

"Gold says this was a transhipment point for the spice trade when the Turks ruled here. There's a ramp leading to docks on the sea outside that grill." He indicated the iron grill, now held up only by the bungee cord he had put there earlier; the acid paste had done its work.

"Oh hell no." Silver went pale with sudden realization.

"You wanna wait for them to gas the tunnels maybe? Come on, it's like riding backseat on a motorbike." Marcel challenged.

"Who thought this scheme up anyway?"

"Bill 'the Professor' Hanlan. Gold's new resident genius."

"Remind me to kill him for this if we live."

Marcel handed out clothes from the bag, neoprene body suits and spandex swimming slippers. He strapped some gear on himself and checked that all of his knives were tied down. Silver had only his gun and spare magazines to contend with.

"You just cover my back Silver 'cause I'm gonna be busy." Marcel explained.

"Touché." Silver conceded, amazed at how their roles had reversed since their last time in the field together.

The stone beneath their feet trembled and three faint booms could be heard. Pausing in their preparations they heard and felt the next salvo hit closer, and the third closer still.

"Distraction?" Silver enquired.

"Feint on the front gate." Marcel answered as a single last explosion shook them.

Marcel held the board on the edge of the ancient stone portico while Silver set his feet in the straps.

"Hang on." Marcel let the board drop.

They sped down the steep ramp, Marcel balancing for them and weaving to avoid obvious obstacles. He wore a headlamp that only illuminated a short distance ahead, but intensive image analysis had resulted in a 1:1 model built overnight by army engineers; the hours of practice he spent on it were paying off now. He kept the speed up as they rocketed down the slope; they were going to need it for the next manoeuvre.

"Marcel, what's that dark patch up ahead? We aren't near the docks yet are we?"

"Just hold tight Silver."

"Wait a second. Is the roadway gone? FOR CHRIST's SAKE THERE'S A CAR PARKED IN THE MIDDLE OF THE GAP." Committed to the plan, however, Silver tightened his grip as the board left the earth and they flew ...

* * * * * * * *

Delores lay back on the bench seat of the Colonel's sedan with one leg hooked over the seat and the other on the steering wheel as he slumped in and out of her. She moaned in what she thought would be appropriate places; she wanted to keep him going but not to too fast. She had insisted that he roll down the driver's window a bit "to let the fresh air in", and she listened for her cue. From outside she heard the rumble of wheels, saw a dim light descending. Show time boys and girls.

She began to buck her hips like she was having a fit. "Oh God Sergi, Oh my Cossack champion. Yes, Yes, YES..." As anticipated, Sergi lost all control and began to jerk in orgasm. At the height of his pleasure, and her performance, the sedan shook like it had been bombed. The Colonel's head came up, but Delores pulled him back to her breast and looked him in the eyes.

"Oh Sergipoo, you made the earth move!"

* * * * * * * *

"I can't believe that you just did that." Silver said, looking back at the dent they had left in the roof of the Russian sedan. The touchdown and ricochet had given them just enough lift to clear the other end of the gap and land back on the ancient roadway again. Now moving much slower than before, Marcel began to push with one foot to regain speed.

"What's the rush Marcel? Another gap?" Silver asked apprehensively.

Marcel didn't answer. He had been counting to himself since they landed on this side and he needed to concentrate. He pulled a black box from his gear and slid its lid to one side, revealing a glowing white button. Silver recognized the device immediately.

"Why do you have a remote detonator Marcel?"

Silver saw the answer up ahead, iron gates separating the docks from the roadway. They were approaching fast. Marcel reached his count and pressed the button. Ahead of them the gates flew apart in a ball of fire that dissipated just before they raced though the opening. Behind them another explosion collapsed the stone gateposts, preventing anyone on foot or wheels from following. Silver had to admire the thoroughness of the planning.

He anticipated that they would slow down and stop now that they were on the dock itself. When Marcel continued to race toward the water unabated he wondered if he planned to skid to a stop to impress him. Then he saw the small stone ramp that would have served for loading taller ships and the blinking light out on the water.

"I hate you, all of you." was all he had time to say before impact with the cold Sea of Azov filled his mouth with water.