FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Chapter 1

The quarters in the ship was illuminated only by a single computer screen and the myriad twinkling stars of space that could be seen through the room's wide window. Aside from the constant hum of the ship's engine that permeated the entire craft, a rhythmic drumming sound filled the chamber, fingers being tapped on the arm rest of a chair over and over. The human who stared at the screen had her dark skinned face bathed in the soft glow of the screen. Her brow was furrowed and a slight scowl crossed her mouth. Something about the task set before her bothered her. She did not like going into an unknown place. She did not like to unnecessarily risk the lives of the people she worked with or who were under her command. This order for her and her crew was all of the above. Kendra slid a finger up to her cheek and ran it over the scar on her left side. It was a habit, more a subconscious act than anything else, but for those who knew her well enough it meant she was at least annoyed. She read the message again for the tenth time, sent to her by central command.

Dateline: 22.3.1421 UTO standard

CommTo: Lt Kendra Forrest, acting commander of rescue and retrieval vessel the Capher

Priority: Alpha; divert course and cease all prior activity and mission

Subject: Distress signal received from planet RT-4522, surveyed once seven standard years prior to current date. Planet is currently uninhabited with limited data on ecosystem available. Data packet from distress signal confirms ship the Lothia, first logged as missing 1.2 light years from planet's location. High probability Lothia made emergency landing on planet. Distress signal ceased transmission shortly after planet location was ascertained; assumed malfunction. Proceed immediately to coordinates of RT-4522 and locate crew. Determine if ship can be salvaged, retrieve crew. Data package included contains navigation coordinates to RT-4522 and profiles on full crew of the Lothia.

Transmission end.

The strumming of her fingers continued to fill Kendra's room. Her eyes danced over the Lothia's crew data. They were experienced; much more so than her current crew. Ten bodies served aboard that ship, with a collected two standard centuries of working knowledge in planetary survey and exploration. The Lothia and her crew had been stalking the fringes of explored UTO space for the past eleven years without a single incident; then this. Her finger continued to rub along her scar and her frown only furrowed more as she read it over again. She and her crew were not explorers. They were an emergency rescue vessel, commonly dispatched to help with space station disasters or ships left stranded in space after debris impacts or other similar misfortunes. Going to unsettled fringe worlds was normally left to other exploratory vessels. However, UTO stellar laws said they had to go. They were the closest ship to the transmission thanks to their last job helping on a mining collapse in a deep outer falashi colony.

"Damn it," she muttered to herself, breaking the relative silence of the room. She didn't know why, but she could not shake an odd sense of dread that had crept into her.

The speakers in her room blared to life, the chime letting her know that she was being called on. No rest for the weary.

"Yes," she said softly.

"Kendra, we're only two hours out from planet fall. Meal is ready. Stop brooding in your room and join us. You know it's bad luck to not have something to eat before a job. You have to have something," said a male voice. It was Adam, the other human crewmember on board with her.

Kendra sighed. "Fine, fine, I'll be right there."

"Thanks 'mom'. See you in a bit."

"Call me mom again and you can spend the next year cleaning all the giant alien toilets instead of them cleaning their own. Out." Kendra closed the communication as she heard Adam start to laugh. Mom. She was the oldest member of the crew, forty-four terran years and counting. She actually was old enough to be Adam's mother and that thought often annoyed her. He was only kidding, she knew he respected her deeply, as did all her crew, but sometimes it wasn't comforting to be reminded of how she was getting old. Time moved too fast, even out in space where it all seemed so timeless.

The woman pulled herself out of her seat, shrugged into her jacket, and walked over to the door to her chamber. It slid open with a soft hiss for her when she waved her hand over the panel to the side of it. Kendra strode out and to the platform right before her quarters. Her mech was berthed there, facing the room at chest height. The entire front chest plate was open, the ramp extended and awaiting her entrance. She felt a moment of pride looking at her mech. It was a technological marvel of science. Even if mankind was not its inventor, it was still wondrous to Kendra. Sometimes it amazed her that she would be in a situation like this. Twenty years ago she was a veterinarian in a small town in upstate New Hampshire on earth. Now, she was a certified mech pilot, had advanced training in full medical science and xeno-medicine, and was captain of a ship and crew. Not bad for a poor girl who just wanted to make sick animals better.

Kendra climbed into her mech, strapped herself in, and powered it up. The mech came to life, its engine whirring up to power. The hatch closed as the gyroscopic balancers activated. Screens flickered into view all around her letting her see as if through her own eyes. Though she was enclosed in a massive box of metal and plastics and other materials, she could see everything. Her feet slid into the housings for them and she inserted her hands into the reflex gauntlets. One by one she checked the systems, exactly as she was taught, until the mech was fully online and ready to move. The first lurching step of the machine was always the best to Kendra. Even now, after over seven years of piloting them, she loved that first step. Her mech used an older reflex control system, not as advanced as the military grade neural interface. It made piloting the mech feel more like one was wearing a massive powered armor, rather than it seeming to be a full extension of her own body. Thus she felt every jostling, quaking step her mech took. Kendra would not have it any other way.

Her mech moved along, the metallic feet of the machine clanging down on the deck with each step. She walked through the corridors of the Capher, corridors designed to hold alien life that stoop upwards of twenty-five meters tall. Her mech was fifteen and a quarter meters tall, giving her plenty of room to navigate. The gears and actuators made plenty of noise as she walked, though most of it was baffled inside her cockpit. She glanced over at the display that told her how the myomar muscles were working, a series of electroactive polymer cables all throughout the mech that acted similar to organic musculature. It was all in the green and that satisfied her. She had a mech that suffered catastrophic myomar failure once and it was most unpleasant.

After a few more turns in the corridors Kendra's mech strode into the central recreation room of the ship. She and her crew tended to call it the lounge. There she saw the others settled at the big round table near the kitchen. Adam's mech stood at one side, the chest ramp open and latched onto the specific spot for it on the table. The human sat at a human size table atop the gigantic table the aliens ate at. Kendra would be joining him there shortly. He, like all the rest of the crew, wore a grey and blue jumpsuit with patches on the shoulder identifying his membership of the Capher's crew. To Adam's left was Hakurr Itan. He was a ralai, a pretty big one at that, standing just over twenty meters tall. Hakurr looked like a massive humanoid tiger with musculature that matched some professional body builders that Kendra had seen pictures of back on earth. He was the ship's engineer, with a background in the military, and two years' experience in rescue procedures. Next to Hakurr was Neji Nihova, a viliti, though to Kendra she was a giant white rabbit with black eyes. She had a very feminine figure which often distracted Hakurr, even Adam, and stood a little over sixteen meters tall when standing. She served as the ship's pilot and navigator and performed her tasks well. The final crew member was Imacha Tachai, a nine and three-quarters meter tall tordenchi, which meant he was a mouse as far as Kendra was concerned. Also a certified rescue worker, the mouse frequently coordinated their efforts in such matters. She knew he was brilliant, with abiding interests in planetology and xenology among other subjects. She also knew he was fussy and often amusingly difficult to get along with, but she put up with his eccentricities as he was too good to replace.

All at the table greeted her and Kendra's mech raised its hand in a wave to them. Her mech moved to the side of Adam's mech. She chuckled to herself and shook her head slowly as she saw the Chinese symbol for 'man' painted on the shoulder plates of the mech. That was new, yet more decorations added to his already 'festive' mech. Kendra shifted the mech into the needed position, then opened her cockpit and lowered the chest ramp. It clamped down on the table berth point and locked into place. Kendra shut down her mech, walked down the ramp, and over to Adam. Adam Sheng was Chinese, dark hair and eyes, and quite proud of his Asian heritage. She took a seat at the human size table and looked over the food. Kendra glanced up at Neji and nodded.

"Not bad. You're getting better at it. This actually looks like a pancake now, not a rock-shaped lump like last time," she said. Adam almost spit his food out as he laughed.

Neji basked in the praise, ignoring Adam, and said, "Thanks! I've been trying to get used to more human foods. I like quite a lot of them." She leaned her head a little closer and said in an almost conspiratorial tone, "Even if Hakurr don't like them, I think pancakes are the bong."

Now the food came out of Adam's mouth as he laughed even more. "Oh God! Don't Neji, just stop. You're mauling the English language more and more with every passing day! Ha ha!"

Kendra shoved Adam and favored the huge rabbit with a slight smile. "You meant the bomb, not the bong, trust me. Honestly Neji, you don't have to try to use terran slang around us to make us feel more comfortable. It's okay. Adam and I are completely adjusted to being around all of you. We've been working together for almost two years. If we aren't settled in by now, we'll never be."

The huge viliti grinned, her long ears perking up. "Thanks Kendra." She stuck her tongue out at Adam once then went back to eating. Between mouthfuls she mumbled, "I just want to get better at your English. If Adam can learn to speak Ralai, I can learn English like a native too."

Hakurr glanced to the side and shrugged. "I don't mind pancakes, but they aren't meat. Just don't taste as good." His voice was a deep rumble that almost made the small table Kendra sat at vibrate.

The tordenchi just rolled his eyes at all the banter. He lowered his head and did his best to ignore everyone, placing his full attention upon reading the yutri he had before him. He looked over any and all data available on the planet they were about to reach and committed it to memory as best he could. Though he knew most of his crewmates were intelligent, some of them very much so, he was by far the smartest on board and commonly felt it was his responsibility to make sure no foolish errors were made.

"So Kendra," said Adam, "Did Center send us any more information about this last second save we have to pull off? We've never had to pull folks off a wreck on a cherry planet before. Is it dangerous down there?"

Kendra's finger slid up to her cheek and rubbed the scar for a moment. From the corner of her eye she saw Imacha closely staring at her. The human lowered her hand before speaking and said, "No. Nothing. We have all we're going to get. I want this to go as fast and smooth as possible. Scan the planet, locate the crashed ship, swoop down, pick the crew up, and get off. No wasting time or sight-seeing."

Adam nodded, along with Hakurr and Neji. Both of them had no problem doing exactly what was asked of them, though the viliti's ears drooped a little. She did so enjoy seeing new worlds and had never been on an uncolonized planet before.

"Something disturbs you Lieutenant." The tordenchi spoke in his higher pitched voice, the words tumbling out of his mouth very fast. It took Kendra a while to get used to how fast the alien spoke when she first met him and another few months to get over her surprise at how good he was at reading her feelings. He was also the only member who refused to call everyone on a first name, more casual basis. To him, everything was business.

Kendra looked up at Imacha, the tordenchi's attention apparently half divided between her and his yutri. "No, not really. I just..." she began before he cut her off.

"Lie."

The other three halted in the middle of whatever they were doing to look between Imacha and Kendra. Adam let out a low whistle. Kendra frowned at the tordenchi.

"That was out of order Imacha. I'm not really bothered by..."

"Lie again."

Kendra felt anger rise up in her and was about to raise her voice, but she got control of her emotions before she said something she might regret. She wasn't used to any of them speaking to her in that manner, but if anyone was to do it, it would have to have been Imacha. The woman put down her fork and knife, rubbed her palms together, and was about to speak when Imacha cut her off once more.

"If you do not want to speak openly with us about your feelings on the matter, that is your prerogative. However, I feel I have merited enough respect over the time we have shared for you to not send a blatant falsehood in my direction. You have never done so before; please do not make this the beginning of a new habit." Imacha never looked up from his pad as he spoke.

Kendra sighed and nodded. "I apologize Imacha. Sorry."

The momentary tension in the room faded and the other three started breathing again. All of them knew that Kendra, though she was usually a very calm and collected woman, could explode into a fiery temper when poked just the wrong way.

Kendra continued, "You're right. Something is bothering me. This whole thing. Going to an unexplored planet. Looking for a needle in a haystack. The sudden termination of the distress signal. It just has me on edge. I can't shake the feeling that I'm bringing you all into something dangerous."

Hakurr spoke up. "Hey, don't worry. We have weapons. We can take care of ourselves. Adam, you, and I all have prior military training. You two have mechs. We're gonna be perfectly safe. Even if there is dangerous animal life o­­n the planet, we can deal with it."

Adam nodded. "Yeah, come on cap. I've read dozens of files on some of the wild alien fauna out there and all of them can be dealt with by a good old slug thrower or flamer. We're going to be fine."

The tordenchi looked up from his yutri and stared at the human. "Your statement, Mister Sheng, is based off a hopeful supposition that has no actual facts backing it. The following are examples of facts. Fact; the planet is unexplored. Fact; there is no extant data on any native flora or fauna. Fact; the pilot of the Lothia was rated at a 9.2, superior to Pilot Nihova. Unless the ship suffered utterly catastrophic damage, it is highly unlikely the forced landing would have resulted in the death of the crew or extreme damage to it. Fact; even if the ship did break apart and all the crew died, there is no mechanical explanation how the distress signal could be activated for two days then suddenly cut off on its own. They have their own internal power supply separate from the rest of the ship with a duration of three months continuous signaling. They are constructed to withstand almost all forms of damage, designed to survive even the destruction of the vessel itself. The likelihood of something being amiss on the planet is, in my personal assessment, high."

"You do know this is crazy talk, right?" said Neji. "I mean, come on. They crashed and we have to go get them. The worst we might find planet side is, umm, maybe some Rynar. An expeditionary team at best. If that is the case, we flee and report their presence back to Center who handles the matter from then on. This ship is fast enough to outrun most anything the Rynar can throw at us. Stop worrying Kendra and stop trying to get all the rest of us worked into a bad fur day Imacha."

Adam chuckled. "All right, that one was better Neji. Bad fur day. Thumbs up." He gave her a thumbs up and the viliti returned it to Adam, a big grin on her face.

Imacha stood up and shut off his yutri. He looked over at Hakurr, then Adam, and last at Neji. "I hope for all our sakes that you are correct. Lieutenant, I will be making final preparations for planet fall. If I may be excused, my appetite seems to have left me."

Kendra nodded and the tordenchi walked out of the room, his toe claws clicking on the floor as he moved. When he was gone, the other three broke out into good natured banter once more, all of them laughing a little about their crew mate's grim demeanor. Kendra's hand slipped up to her cheek once more and she slid her finger across the scar slowly. She stared down at her plate of food and tried her best to push aside her feelings of worry and doubt.

She failed.