FSE

Furry search engine

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I took a seat across from a shadowy figure as the rest of the guards followed, keeping a close eye on me. I leaned back against the chair and attempted to look relaxed.

"Who are you?" The rich voice asked politely.

I strangled down a thousand wise-ass remarks and settled on ambiguous instead.

"I'm Alath, and I just wanted to ask for a favor of you."

"What sort of favor?" The voice sounded tight.

"I happen to be in need of quantities of food for certain...religious obligations."

"Religious obligations?"

"Yes," I leaned forwards and steepled my fingers under my chin. "You see, a short time ago I came into possession of a rather old chapel and I'm rather in need of supplies."

The chair across from me creaked as its occupant leaned back in their chair.

"And how exactly did you ‘come into possession' of this chapel."

"The previous owners fell on hard times, when I received it from them they were absolutely skeletal." I fought to maintain a straight face.

Suddenly a fist slammed down on the table between us, causing it to jump slightly, judging by the hand that had just come into view, the person I was speaking to was a man, and an angry one at that.

"What does Lightbringer want with us?" The formerly rich voice had gone cold and flat. "Doesn't he already take enough?"

I could see I was going to have a bit of trouble with the fact that there had only been one god in town for who knows how long.

"I never said anything about Lightbringer." I dropped the temperature of my own voice to below freezing. "As I said before, this chapel happens to be very old, and it doesn't have jack all to do with Lightbringer. I need food to help some people out, something you can provide, if you help me you'll be remembered, if you don't...you'll be remembered then too."

"Are you trying to threaten me?" The voice sounded incredulous and the guards ringing me shifted their hands on their swords, bristling.

"Not really," I ignored everyone but the man across from me. "I'm telling you that what you do now is going to affect how I'll deal with you in the future. Trust me; a favor from me is going to be worth quite a bit very soon. I intend to make a few changes round here."

"You intrigue me Alath, a man who claims to be a part of a religion without Lightbringer, who comes into this warehouse, which is supposed to be secret, to ask me a favor while surrounded by armed men. You've got balls if nothing else."

"I just have a tendency to wander into things and try to make the best of them; I have enough food at the moment to last me about a week so by the end of that I hope I'll have an answer from you. If you don't believe I'm not one of Lightbringer's then perhaps you'll come down to the slums for a sermon some time." I rose from my seat and walked past the guards towards the door I had come in through. I heard the sound of the person in the seat behind me rise from their own seat.

"The slums!?" The voice sounded incredulous, "Surely you don't mean that-"

I cut him off with a hand gesture and turned my head over my shoulder,

"That the church I received is the same one that no one comes out alive from," I cocked an eyebrow, "Yes it's that one, I told you I plan to change things." Then I turned back and stepped out the door. My dramatic exit was slightly marred by the fact that the corner of my robe got caught in the closing door; I gave off a string of epithets that would have burned the ears of anyone within hearing distance and yanked the corner free hoping that no one inside had seen that, or heard it for that matter.

"Well that was an impressive bout of swearing," Kazath's voice nearly made me jump out of my skin. "Do you really think he'll help though?"

"I held one hand up and waved it back and forth to show my indecision.

"It's pretty much a fifty-fifty shot at this point, hopefully I can get what I need from him and from there I can work out on a larger network; I really need someone in this town who's higher up. I'm just too new to this town, I don't know who's in charge or what the balance of power is and I have no idea how to go about finding things out quickly and efficiently while at the same time avoiding suspicion, its driving me nuts." I gnawed my bottom lip in frustration.

I was puzzling over my problem while I walked back towards my base of operations, and that was when the thugs stepped out into my path. I wasn't so deep in thought that I didn't notice them so I was able to quickly appraise them. They were a couple of ugly, brutish humans, armed with nasty looking blades that were also none too clean, a lot like their owners actually. I knew by the looks on their faces that I wasn't likely going to able to talk my way out of this one as I had my first time entering the slums.

"Well, well, well boys," The largest of the thugs sneered. "Lookee what we got."

I sighed as I watched the three thugs close off the alleyway to the front and I heard another two cut off my escape route from the back. "I'm not particularly looking for a fight right now so can I just pay you something to go away."

The Thug leader sneered again, maybe that was just the way his face was.

"I don't think you're in any position to offer us anything, fur lover." He spat in the dust.

"And what," I asked, icy calm, "makes you say I'm a fur lover."

"We seen you in the slums, talkin with them animals." He spat again.

"You seen like a very unimaginative fellow so I guess it must be true, although if your putrid stench is anything to go by were probably so drunk out of your mind you could have mistaken your own ass for the moon." All attempts at diplomacy had been set aside at this point, five to one in a deserted ally I wasn't going to convince these goons to back down so I decided to bait the lead goon one last time. "And I'd watch who I call animal if I were you, at least until your annual bath. I mistook you for a pig when I first saw you."

The thug leader roared his inarticulate raged and reached forwards with both hands dropping his sword, he obviously intended to throttle me with his bare hands for my insolence.

Back in the old world people used to say I was vicious in a fight, not that I got into a great deal of them. I don't think of it as viciousness though, after all viciousness is all about the intent really and all I intended when I fought was to win. If my opponent was a particularly nasty person, or if I was in a nasty mood, the viciousness came after the fight. I suppose the thug leader might have disputed that, at least once he stopped writhing around on the ground vomiting and clutching at his balls. I looked at the other two thugs in front of me; their faces had gone very pale under the dirt coating their faces.

"Still want to fight?" I heard the two thugs behind me rush forwards and shrugged. "Guess so."

I pivoted on one leg as the thugs behind me came into range driving back with one elbow, I felt the thugs sword slide across my back as my elbow collided with his face, the impact picked him up and launched him into the second charging man who, tripped up by the human missile fell on his own sword, killing him instantly. The final two thugs finally thought to charge and I felt myself slip into the state where everything seemed to slow down. I charge at the space between the two thugs and dove through as I felt their swords run lightly across my cheeks. I turned quickly, before the thugs could recover from their clumsy thrusts and ran up alongside the one on the left; seizing him by his dark greasy hair I gave him a yank forwards and smashed his face into a barrel along the wall, the barrel disintegrated as the mans face struck it and I felt the blow lift my own feet of the ground, reacting quickly at this unexpected reaction I snapped my foot back at the last thug who was just getting his sword back up. My foot caught him full on in the face and I felt something crunch under my heel, once again I felt myself flying forwards and I crashed forwards onto the thug leader.

I got up unsteadily to my feet and looked at the would be thugs with dismay, I could tell at a glance that I had inadvertently killed three of them. The first one I had struck had broken his neck, either from my hit or in the fall with the second thug who had fallen on his sword, and the man I had kicked in the face's nose had broken and driven back into his brain. I looked at the two who had simply been knocked unconscious; the man I had kneed in the balls was out cold from me flying forwards and inadvertently head butted him into oblivion, probably a mercy really. I rubbed my throbbing forehead and flipped over the thug I had smashed into the barrel, he had some nasty face lacerations but he'd live.

"Just once in this hellhole, Kazath," I gestured at the mess in the alley. "I'd like to go a day without killing somebody."