FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

The day after Sam and Max had arrived and explained their situation, they stood ready and waiting outside the T.E.A.R base with the general, Kevin and Andrea, the balmy sands sending whispers of itself across the sea with a carefree wind and the sun up high. Oddclaw soon joined them as he hopped off from the Petrie, the shimmering shining ship making its landing at the new hangar base to be shielded from the outside world with Jeremy waving at him. The two made a little slap-tap-handshake-and-hug as they went to join the detectives.

"Yer brother alrigh' Odd?" asked Holt.

"Yes," he replied, "I told him I had to help rescue someone and I will be back in three days, he un-derstand. Stonevoice is with him."

"Who?"

"The row-bot with the sword."

"OHHHH righ', huh izzat whut you call 'im?"

"Barkclaw called him that when they met. I like it."

"Better than whut yer sister calls me. Ahm not the only guy on this base with a hairy nose."

"No but you are the one she likes."

"Awwwww, you butterin' me up now." He gave the raptor a noogie as the dog and rabbit turned towards them.

"Hail friend," said Sam with a charming wave, "took you long enough."

"Yeah where ya been?" nattered Max. "You fall through a wardrobe into Narnia?"

"Wha-I...OH, you have read that book?!" cried Oddclaw.

"Naaah I don't read, I gots a problem with words."

"Oh. It is a very good book, I love Narnia."

"I too love thinly-veiled Christian allegories, but only when presented in the form of Chick tracts. It's like a funnier but more racist Family Circle."

"I only bought those cuz we ran out of toilet paper," said the dog, "though I appreciate it helps you keep still in the bathroom."

"SO," said Holt with hands clapped, "we off to rescue this guy?"

"Yep!" The canine slapped his large hands together with anticipation. "We're just waiting for our car to get here."

"Oh right, the 'caaaaar' that is arriving," said Kevin with loud airquotest and a nudge to Brightman, "sure, sure like a car is coming around here."

"Are you questioning our vehicular veracity along with our verisimilitude?"

"Yes, that is exactly what I am questioning."

"Well, just wait."

With finger lifted Sam turned towards the longshore beach, looking up into the sky as if waiting for something. His eyes darted occasionally whilst Max's head followed his movements. Nothing. For five minutes there was a sense of tumbleweeds if they had existed in this time before Kevin smirked and crossed his arms.

"Welp, my feet are rusting out here so let me just get back to thinking how right I was back in my la-"

[b][i]CRRNNNK![/i][/b]

The second he turned, something fell with a heady crunch onto the sand with gasps of shock from the raptor and humans. Sitting out with a cruddy suspension in smooth black and white was a fierce-looking retro convertible with police symbols on its doors and raised headlights reminiscent of a 50s drive-in theatre.

"WHAT," barked Kevin.

"What is THAT?!" gasped Oddclaw almost raising his gun towards the new steel beast.

"That's our ride!" cried Max. "What you never seen a car before?!"

"HAH!" snorted Thomas. "Looks like you owe me a coffee Kev."

"OH COME ON," Kevin threw his hands up blustering, "you didn't know that was going to happen!"

"I still bet against you so you better cough up, don't ever bet against a Roswell kid."

"Okay seriously?!" stressed Andrea turning towards both men with arms wide and an aghast sneer. "Is ANYONE not going to talk about the 1960 DeSoto Adventurer that just fuckin' landed at our base?!"

"What surprises you more?" asked Thomas. "The fact it's just a regular car, the fact that you actually recognise the model of that car, or the fact it fell out of the sky with impeccable comic timing?"

"Why are YOU so calm about this?"

"Major, general," he replied tapping his medal-clad chest, "what part of that don't you get, miss NASA?"

"A caaarr?" Oddclaw scratched his head vaguely recognising the shape of the machine. "OH, yes, humen go inside them!"

"RIGHT!" shouted Max with finger raised high. "Also other bipedal creatures with or without licenses and or criminal records!"

"How thuh fuck's this gonna get us anywhere!?" Jeremy walked up to the car and kicked gently at one of the tires. "Never seen any car that'd go across sand like a jeep!"

"Oh ye of little faith," said Sam swinging himself over the door into the roofless driver seat, "just sit up in the back and watch her go."

"You sure you're up fer this Odd?"

"Yes," replied the raptor, "we have to help, and I have to be their guide."

"Alrigh', thas fine by me, HUP!"

The veteran lumbered himself into the backseat as Oddclaw followed after him, climbing onto the car's trunk and slipping into the plush red velvet upholster as Max bounced into the driver's seat. Sam grabbed his ears and smacked him down into the passenger seat, grabbing the wheel for himself as he started up the engine. The loud humming throb burned out a puff of smoke from the tailpipe behind them as Oddie jolted nervously. Holt grabbed his wrist gently to soothe him whilst Sam turned his head to the T.E.A.R. group.

"Don't worry about us!" he said with fingergun cool and a wink. "We'll be back before you can say Gabriel Garcia Marquez."

"Was that before or after he became Fray Tormenta?" asked Max inquiring.

"Marquez was Colombian pendejo!" shouted back Kevin.

The DeSoto went screeching off across the beach spraying sand behind it in a hot wave of cream dust, burning rubber as the police car swerved round the curving coast and into the rainforest. Sam sped his way through the bristling ferns and wild squawking troodons amidst shrieking primordial wings and buzzing giant bugs that occasionally splatted or crunched against the windshield. The raptor in the back felt dizzy from the constant undulating bumps and shudders as the car dinged against palm trees or chuggered through a muddy patch, but always its speed kept at a surprising constant.

Jeremy was astonished to see such a sturdy vehicle survive every environment they faced. Revving up a fallen tree the dog caught a huge leap as the wind skimmed across their heads, crushing down hard onto the volcanic hardened slopes of the Death Nest mountain. Instead of cutting through the middle like Oddclaw had done, they simply veered onto its steep hill and went at a violent angle that tilted the car at 80 degrees. The passengers in the back clung on to each other tightly with Jeremy's hair on edge whilst the DeSoto roared around the entire mountain twice, before racing back down to the other side and into the desert.

"H-HOW ARE WE MOVING SO FAST!?" cried the raptor.

"NEVER MIND THAT WE JUST DROVE UP A FUCKIN' CLIFF!" shouted Holt before turning to Sam with a double-take. "WHA-H-HEY, EYES ON THE ROAD YOU FUCKIN' TWAT!"

The dog was busy reading Catch-22 whilst steering with one hand idly, ignorant to what lied ahead whilst Max was taking pot shots at scorpions they drove past. Their tough ancient armour managed to deflect some of the piercing bullets, but they weren't in much trouble owing to the rabbit's horrible aim as he planted one foot on the the top of the door with a hand wrapped against the windshield's top, firing off at anything that caught his eye.

The desert was a long endless sea of scorching hot dunes as Sam veered his wheel left and right, serpentine movements across the sands like a sidewinder of steel with the constant hot wind that was at risk of burning their cheeks. Desert dwellers such as hot-footed oviraptors and flat-frilled protoceratops watched the skimming vehicle with curiosity amidst their hunts.

"Jeremyyyy," whined Odd, "I think I should have stayed home!"

"You an' me both dab," said Jeremy cuddling him close, "whutever happens, ah just want you to know that I love you more than I ever loved any man in my life."

"I love you too!"

"Sam, they're doing that thing again!" said Max.

"What thing?" asked Sam.

"That thing where people start crying, shouting 'I love you', 'I wish I never came with you guys' and 'you can't put me in the freakin' boot'-WAIT STOP!"

The car came to a shrieking halt as Oddclaw suddenly lurched forwards to hit his chin on the car seat's head, throbbing dull through his jaw whilst Jeremy checked him over.

"Christ you alrigh'?!"

"A-a-aow...th-this car cannot stop moving!"

"Why'd you stop?!"

"Cuz the USB started beepin' real fast!"

Lifting up their small eggplant-shaped stick, the little data carrier glowed with alarming frequency. Sam put the car into its parked mode and pushed open the door to investigate their surroundings and adjust his tie.

"Alright boys it's time to look good, we got signal here so look for anything that's unusual or stands out of place."

"Right," said Holt, "Oddie, anything round here that don't belong 'ere?"

"Um, them," said the raptor pointing at the cops, "the car, you, and...that."

His claw turned towards a rather bizarre-looking building of Asian design that stood out like a burning red thumb in the midst of the desert wastes. A pagoda coloured in red and gold lacquer that shined in the sun, with flags billowing in the grit-speckled wind.

"How the fuck we missed that?" added Holt scratching his head.

"Maybe the sun's in yer eyes," said Max helpfully with a shrug, "I hate deserts, always getting sand up yer butt."

"So uh you two like, whut, together or friends?"

"We're partners! In everything, whether it's crime, fighting or marriage-"

"Wait yer married?!" blurted Holt.

"Nooo!" said Sam looking up at the sky squinting. "Wait...yes? No! no? Yes?! Maybe only once and I'm not sure that's even canon."

"Well ah weren't expectin' that."

"What is mah-reed?" asked Oddclaw tilting his head.

"It's uh, when two people decide to be together for the rest of their life."

"OH, we have that, that is when a male and female have children together."

"Uhhh right, yeah that's sorta like it. So uh, are we going to that tower or wot?"

"First we need to plan our attack," said the dog hunched over to pull off a branch from a dead bush, "from what we had to deal with yesterday, these thugs'll be more hot-headed than a Jerry Lewis telethon."

"The only time when people gave more money AFTER the main star left!" said Max grabbing one stick for himself to gnaw on.

"Seriously?!" The soldier hoisted himself out of the car with a hefty thud. "You lot not even gonna talk about thuh giant fuckoff pagoda in thuh middle of thuh bloody desert?"

"Did your tribe make that?" asked Oddclaw staring at the alien construct.

"Fuck naw, we never built anywhere outside of them Brokenclaw Sands you know that! Besides we 'ave enough sand where we are now without all THIS crap."

"But, who made it?"

"Our kidnapper," said Sam scribbling in the sand, "musta set this up to keep an eye on us in case we came."

"How?!" squawked Jeremy with hands agasp. "How could he possibly know, this wuzn't even here thuh past week!"

"Did you bother to LOOK last week?" said Max challenging with a snubbish look.

"Well...no, we don't check the desert that much."

"Then for all you know it COULD have been here last week!"

"But that sorta thing takes weeks to build, we woulda noticed!"

"The flyers would have told me," added Oddclaw, "if they saw something that did not belong, they always tell me. And that was not there before."

"Clearly our enemy is capable of rapid-transitional development," explained the dog detective still sketching out a plan, "someone capable of not only dimensional travel but also able to build limited constructs within a short amount of time."

"Yeah like zap 'em in!" said Max. "Maybe he just beeps it from a remote!"

"Alright here's what we're gonna do. Max, you still have those tablecloths we stole from the royal wedding?"

"Still fresh with Prince George's baby spit! I'll always cherish the parting gift."

"Not as much as the felony that awaits us back on English shores, now here's what we're gonna do."

The pagoda was a rose to a height of eight stories above the dunes, a strange threatening sight to all that lived amongst the desert as an anomaly to further confuse their lives. Prowling the parapets and balconies were archers dressed as ninjas in full red wrappings, with samurai soldiers on the ground floor in black lacquered armour wielding their ruthless katanas beneath the bannered flags. The lookout suddenly called out a warning at something on the horizon, as the soldiers braced themselves for an attack with eyes piercing on the horizon.

Walking towards them was a ghost in a shimmering white that caught the sun's reflection, blinding the soldiers until the being came closer to reveal that there were actually three of them approaching. A raptor who stood naked like a man, a human in military clothes and lastly a rabbit that stood towering above both with the most beautiful white embroidered dress. The samurai guards approached with swordtips raised as they barked in a surprisingly blunt American accent where their mouths did not match any of the words they spoke.

"HALT! Identify yourself!"

[b]"Iiiii am the moon goddess Usagi Yojimbo,"[/b] said the rabbit-headed one with two voices at once. [b]"Your master has prayed to me to serve you victory against your future enemies."[/b]

"Hhhwhat?! You are the moon goddess?!"

[b]"Didn't your mother tell you not to repeat your elder's words?"[/b] she said flicking one man's nose. [b]"I shall not tarry long if you so choose to insult me."[/b]

"But, we have not heard of any such invocation!"

[b]"Your purpose is to hold a sword, not peer into your master's mind now stand aside!"[/b]

"Well...who are these two?!" stammered the guard waving his sword around.

[b]"These are my retainers. Donatello, and Leatherhead. They will not be interfered with during our passage, or I shall make certain you will wither with each passing night, is that clear?"[/b]

"Y-yes, yes madame Yoji-"

[b]"SPEAK NOT!"[/b] She slapped her melon-shaped face across his rugged lips. [b]"Only the emperor is worthy of speaking my name and you are not HIM!"[/b]

"Yes y-yes, please, accept my apology madame I sincerely deeply and humbly apologise. LET THEM THROUGH!"

The gates opened up revealing their passage into the pagoda, a gorgeously-patterned interior with strange motifs that clashed between various dynasties. Blue swirled Ming vases propped upon cushions long halls; flowing rivers of koi carp with red wooden bridges and platforms above the water; flower symbols that adorned samurai swords and Chinese blades that crossed each other upon the walls amidst guards with spears and katanas proudly stiff.

"Good thing we memorised that fanfiction," muttered Max out of earshot from the guards.

"I wish you never had to say that," said Sam muffled inside the robe of tablecloths.

"What is a fanfick-shun?" asked Oddclaw keeping in step.

"Think it's like a Tijuana bible," replied Holt opposite, "but with more words an' less pictures."

"I...do not un-derstand."

"Ehhh, we'll ask Jane when we get back."

As they approached the grandest most important doors of the place, the air changed with severity as the guards gave them a scowling look of indignancy before opening the way forwards to their leader's room. A sanctum of straw-matted floor and folding screens showing various images of birds and trees with brushing strokes amongst thick plush cushions where seven women laid sprawled out in kimonos. Amidst them all was an Asian man in pale blue robes and tied-back grey hair with the largest Fu Manchu moustache they had ever seen, stretching out across the room and somehow managing to hold itself up without the slightest droop.

Jeremy was shocked at such an absurd facial arrangement of hair, but also partly jealous with a silent fume as he stroked his own normal-sized stache with enviable look. The leader of the building spoke with words but his mouth seemed to be repeating the phrase "I demand your parsnips NOW good sir or else suffer the death of a thousand ferrets!".

"Who are you?!" he actually said.

[b]"Ahhh my future emperor,"[/b] replied the newcomer, [b]"I am the moon goddess that so came from the stars to praise your victory."[/b]

"Hmm?! A moon goddess, here?! Why have you come to me in this time of peaceful unsteadiness, when all is aquiver with the warring threat on the horizon?!"

[b]"Because I have seen your prophecy, and it is good for all of the kingdom. I have heard your whispers in your sleep, and I know that you shall rule all that you see."[/b]

"HMPH, so is that true?! How do I know you are not just an illusionary apparice, shared by my concubines and men of my castle, a thousand deaths of the mind cast across these infernal ancient wastes?!"

[b]"Would you consider us anything less? Offer me a test, and I shall PROVE it that I am the Moon Goddess!"[/b]

"Hmmmm...very well." The warlord shifted his robes to sit up more properly in the lotus fashion, cross-legged as his moustache remained immune to gravity. "I am Sum Dum Goy, master of this realm, and so I offer you a challenge of a most natural pertinence. As I was going to St. Ives, I met a man with seven wives. Each wife had seven sacks, each sack had seven cats, each cat had seven kits. Kits, cats, sacks, and wives, how many were there going to St. Ives?"

Jeremy and Oddclaw looked at each other with pure perplexment, struggling to figure out the math in their head until the "moon goddess" blurted out:

[b]"One."[/b]

"...that is correct!" gasped Dum Goy. "Truly you are wise enough to be of the moon!"

[b]"Have I proven ourselves-I MEAN-myself now?"[/b]

"Hmmmm...I see no arbitrary reasons of any whathappenstance to disprove of your veritations."

[b]"Then in turn I shall ask you one thing. And one thing only."[/b]

"You may ask, that is fair."

[b]"Who is your master?"[/b]

"I BEG your pardon?!" blustered the warlord almost staggering to his feet.

[b]"I know you are not the one who brought your army here. I insist that I meet with your master, and do not THINK of betraying me!"[/b]

"I...I-i-i have no master upon my station!"

[b]"LIAR! Now tell me THEIR name!"[/b]

"HE HAS NO NAME!"

"Uhhh, we never mentioned a 'he'," said Holt smiling.

"BU-...waaaait a minute."

Goy snatched the tablecloth hard with a wrenching tear to reveal the canine underneath, that the rabbit stood upon the shoulders of as his face twisted in horror. Before anyone could speak, Oddclaw lunged at him with a flying punch to crack his face with the butt of his shotgun, causing the women to scream fleeing from the room.

"[i]HELP, HEEEELP, ASSASSIIIIIN![/i]"

"[i]SAVE US PLEASE, WE'RE JUST THREE LITTLE MAIDS FROM SCHOOL![/i]"

"Time to let 'er rip little buddy!" shouted Sam.

"HOHO YEAH FINALLY!" The rabbit bounced off to twirl his luger in a frantic grip. "IT'S CLOBBERIN' TIME BOYS!"

"GET THE INTRUDERS, KILL 'EM NOW!"

The guards began pouring in as both Sam and Max started firing off on all fronts, backed by Oddclaw and Jeremy who came ready with shotguns aplenty. The raptor was assaulted by a sword-swinging samurai as he ducked beneath the vicious blade, whirring above his head before he fired straight upwards into the warrior's skull, shattering his face into an explosion of glassy static shards that oozed black and white. His body fell limp and staggered backwards as Oddie gripped him by the waist to hurl him into his comrades.

Jeremy stood against another samurai, his sword coming down hard against the Welshman's gun in a hard block as he angled his weapon just right to blast the swordsman's arm straight off, gushing hot monotone ichor with a Wilhelm scream from his lips until Holt grabbed his head. He drove the man's face straight into his knee to stun him further before grabbing his remaining arm and swinging him around like a squaredance partner. The soldier released him into another small horde of armoured troops, sending them crashing through the wooden wall with a brazen [i]KRAKK[/i] as they all ended up falling into the koi carp pool.

Sam was beset upon by two samurai at once, their wild screams ululating with fierce frenzy as he ducked beneath their crossed swords and fired at one of their helmets. The pinging bullet caused one samurai's helm to start spinning round his head, blocking his view in panic whilst swinging his sword wildly with reckless abandon, as the dog pulled out a second gun from his coat. Or rather, a gun-shaped salad shooter that smelt strongly of onions.

"Don't cry samurai!"

"WHA-AAAAGH!"

The second samurai received a faceful of onion slices, dousing his cheeks with a stench that watered his eyes and forced him to start sobbing on the spot with howling tears running down his nose. It only turned even more tragic once his helmet-blinded friend swung too hard to the right and accidentally decapitated his crying skull with one chop, the former swordsman's body simply crumpling forwards to disappear in a hissing shriek of static.

Max never stopped moving, rabidly running back and forth with excitable aim that never hit anything, but always came off close. His luger pinged and sparked its bullets everywhere causing bullet holes to just randomly appear next to people who ducked with fright. Archers came from the rafters above, with arrows aimed from twelve longbows ready to pincushion the lot of them. The rabbit fired at one, but instead accidentally hit an unturned screw that was the very foundation for one of the rafter structures. One beam came loose causing one archer to fall screaming, his arrow flying off to hit another of his friends in the knee, then that friend fired off his arrow which shot his friend in his knee and so this continued for another nine men who lost their nine knees. The rafter beams however fell onto the second wave of samurai warriors who became buried under the rubble, of which Max stood on top of proudly before blowing the smoking tip of his gun.

"INFIDELS!"

The warlord Dum Goy staggered onto his feet from the back of the room nursing his wounded jaw.

"YOU SHALL NOT LEAVE THIS SANCTUM OF SUPERIOR SOLITARY ALIVE, FOR I HAVE A SQUADRON OF ANTI-ASSASSIN ARMADA THAT SHALL DEAL WITH YOU FORTHWITH!"

With a click of his fingers he summoned a horde of eight ninjas in resplendent black suits, with kunai and shurikens out in full force as they stood in front of their master.

"Awwwww fuck this," whined Holt, "I fuckin' hate ninjas."

"You and me both," said Sam, "their unwavering adherence to historical inaccuracy just boils my blood!"

"LET'S FEED 'EM TO THE ELEPHANTS AT THE ZOO!" shouted Max.

"Max you were banned from every sanctuary, petting zoo and animal reserve."

"Except Seaworld!"

"Well they've done worse than you."

"KILL THESE INTERLOPERS!"

The master's bark sent the team of ninjas down upon them, a hopping shrieking mass of callous dagger-wielding fiends that leapt from wall to wall ready to slice and dice that Sam and Jeremy had problems keeping up with. They found themselves teaming up back to back with their slower builds, aiming to blast their pesky foes right out of the sky with cautious steady hands. Sam was surprisingly accurate, managing to pop down two of the ninjas with throat or headshots as they spittled out their black-white seep upon the mat whilst Jeremy pump-blasted one in the stomach with a leading shot of his modern metal firearm.

"Whut's with their blood?!" shouted Holt.

"Must be German!" said Sam. "Gotta keep things family-friendly!"

"You wot?! SHIT LOOK OUT!"

He pushed Sam's head out of a shuriken's path, barely scraping past his skull but taking the dog's hat completely off and pinning it against the wall. He gasped with a sudden panic feeling his furry scalp, as he fumbled around in his pockets for something useful whilst Jeremy kept him covered with booming shots, scattering daggers and stars out from the sky whilst ninja number four remained exceptionally fast to hit. Eventually the dog shouted:

"GET DOWN!"

Holt didn't even think as he ducked beneath a large cartoonishly red magnet that Sam wielded above him. The kunai and shurikens suddenly ripped off from the ninja's belt, almost tearing through his clothes as he was pulled forwards by a yelping squeak right into the canine's fist with a cracking blow.

The other four ninjas however focused on Max and Oddie, the faster wily pair whose supreme agility and reflexes made for a constant effort in trying to pin them. The rabbit bounced and hopped with absurd aerial leaps, twisting like a ballerina whilst firing the most inaccurate shots this side of a barn wall as zipping dagger blades and shimmering stars kept shrieking past his fur. The raptor remained grounded, dodging and siderolling from every moment of the ninja's hands where a trace of light could be seen glinting off of a piece of metal. Neither of them were ever hit, much to the assassins' growing frustrations as Oddclaw fired back managing to wound one in the leg by blasting half of his foot off, causing him to fall screaming to the floor and clutch himself in pain.

"MY TURN!"

Max vaulted over to his wounded foe and vomited a pair of pliers out from his throat, before starting to pull out the ninja's teeth one by one with a senseless violent abandon. The raptor was admittedly startled by such ferocity from a small beast, amidst the crying shrieking anguish of the black-clothed aggressor.

"NO MORE SNICKERS FER YOU!"

"[i]A-AAAAAAAAIIIIIH![/i]"

"This little white piggy went to market!"

"[i]A-AAAAAGGGHHH![/i]"

"THIS little white piggy went to court to sue the Nestle company!"

"[i]EEEEEEEEAAAAAARRRRGH![/i]"

"And this little white piggy went WEE WEE WEEE!"

"[i]GU-GUUHHHHH![/i]"

"ALLLLL THE WAY TO WITNESS PROTECTION!"

"[i]N-NOOOO-HO-HOHHHHH, AAAAAAAAAGH![/i]"

Whilst the lagomorph was busy exhibiting dental torture, Oddie saw the other three ninjas trying to aim for them with lethal little stars for the rabbit's head. He swung straight into their path with a piece of broken wood from the fallen rafters, shielding Max from the baker's dozen of piercing shots that thunked into the wood.

"THANK YOU NURSE!" said the rabbit. "Now bring me THE CLAW!"

"The...claw?!"

"Yeah, one of yours'll do!"

"WHA-HEY!"

The rabbit grabbed Oddclaw's other arm and started twisting the weaker teeth out of joint, taking the raptor's fingers and angling them like tools of death. The sound of creaking enamel forced painfully slow from their gummy hold was only deafened by more shurikens and kunai thudding against the wooden shield that Oddclaw propped, moving around in all directions to protect him and Max. Throughout all this came the sounds of twisting sucking noises and the constant screams muffled from the ninja's lips.

"AGH jeez this wisdom tooth is REAL deep!"

"[i]N-NNNNNNNNNNGH![/i]"

"Well whaddaya want from me, it's not MY teeth that are giving me problems, you know what you need?!"

"[i]NMMMMMMPH![/i]"

"Yer right, I don't know what you need, I never had to look after ninjas before, is that like feeding a turtle?! Do you guys eat the same diet?!"

"[i]M-MMMPH, MM-MM-MMMHHH![/i]"

"Well the last turtle I had ran away, I tell ya, you play two hours of SimCity and next thing yanno you turn round and it's GONE!"

"[i]Mmmnn-hnn-hnnn-hnnnnnnnh![/i]"

"How was I to know turtles don't like pizza, TV lied to me! I expect television to educate me properly I mean, what's next?!"

"[i]NNNNNRRRRRRHHHH![/i]"

"Of COURSE wrestling is real! Are you insinuating that Booker T DIDN'T win a wrestling match, so he could reclaim his legal copyright of the letter T, from his brother's evil lawyer?!"

"[i]NNNNH?!?[/i]"

"Well how ELSE do people settle legal disputes, what with DEBATING?! This is why nobody's ever a ninja-lawyer, if you can't put a suplex on a subpoena then you gon' git the CHAIR before we PUT YOU in the chair!"

"[i]NNNNNNNNNN[b]GHAAAAAA-" SHPLUP![/b][/i]

With one last tug the rabbit bowled over backwards grasping the ninja's wisdom tooth, the gum-riddled opponent having passed out from exceptional agony and lack of anaesthetic with Oddie still holding a hunk of wood festooned in sharp pointy bits. One of the ninjas had enough, and came down to the floor with a sharp knife rushing towards the raptor who stood waiting to attack. The short sword carved through the wood surprisingly fast, chopping in three bits with a crackling splint as Oddclaw threw the battered shield onto the fiend just before it broke, pulling out his gun waiting behind the wooden block to fire through the shards and blow the assassin's head clean off in a spurt of monochrome ooze.

"F-FUCK, OFF!"

"WOAH-HO THERE!" shouted Max. "Let's keep this PG alrighty?"

"Wh-what?!"

"Yer only allowed ONE use of that word and that's all ya get!"

"Just help me kill these things!"

"What's the magic wooooord?"

"Um, PLEASE?!" panicked Odd with spasming fingers.

"I would ALSO have accepted 'thaumaturgy' but that's fine too!"

Standing side by side, the reptile and the rabbit stood aiming their weapons towards the last two ninjas. During this Sam and Holt turned towards the master of the place, the lord Goy whose moustache bristled like black lightning as he stood up with rageful grimace and unsynchronised mouth.

"SO, you think you can defeat me with every postulation of your aggressive exacerbatory needs, WELL! I shall demand you to have at thee, for I have FURY!"

"Settle down Milli Vanilli," warned Sam, "I'll only ask you this once. Surrender now and tell us who you work for, or else I'll have to get serious."

"HAH! You cannot defeat me, I am the lord of this kingdominion, and all that it has surveyed within expansive tracts of the wasteland primordial, what can you possibly hope to form achievement with-"

"OHHHH SHUT THUH FUCK UP!" barked Jeremy. "GAWD yer fuckin' borin' me to death I've had enough of you!"

The soldier marched towards Sum Dum Goy and whalloped him on the head with his shotgun like a club, sending the master down as the two last ninjas were blasted down by Oddie's shots. The dog stepped towards Goy who grabbed for Sam's hat still hanging from the wall nearby and started fiddling with it before he snatched it back, placing it on his head rightfully and then grabbing the lord by his Fu Manchu.

"Now look...you tell us who you work for, and I won't sic Max on you."

"I always wanted a warlord's teeth!" cried the rabbit still clutching a wisdom tooth dripping from his pliers. "Go on, say no DO IT, make my day!"

"A-ALRIGHT! ALRIGHT I GIVE," cried Dum Goy, "I SURRENDER TO YOUR INFALLIBLE NEED! M-my master...I do not know his name b-but he summoned me from my faraway homeland."

"What's he look like?" inquired Sam.

"I...I only heard his voice, h-he was one of ours, a man of the great Asian lands, an accent I could not place upon the tip of my furthermost tongue."

"Where is he now?"

"Last...last I observed of him from our communications, he was beyond the mountains, to the west, the far-rising ones that scrape beneath the clouds."

"The Skylands!" said Oddie. "That was where our ray-dar said he was!"

"Well, westwards sumwhat," corrected Holt, "whut about this hostage yer master has, is he thuh same place?"

"Our hostage," continued Goy, "he is...preparing for his greatest of ascension, he shall become as a god, one who shall conquer all of our worlds, the worlds within the fabric of our realities from behind the looking glass."

"Looking glass?! Wot like Alice?!"

"No, another glass, the glass of dreams and magic, the glass that millions of people have watched and shared the memories of and so I...I...g-g-guh..."

"Hey, hey keep talking, come on don't choke on me now!"

"GH-GHHHHKH!"

The warlord gasped a stuttering breath and sighed his last as he fell upon the mat with a pallid look. His tongue had swollen up and his face became white as a ghost with all the signs of a disturbing fate that Sam knew from his prognosis.

"Poisoned. Guy musta taken something when he knew he lost."

"Awwwww!" whined Max. "I HATE when they do that, they suck all the fun out of you getting to kill them!"

"So yer target's off up in thuh Skylands?" added Jeremy.

"The flyers can help us," said the raptor, "if someone is hiding there, they will find them."

"Flyers?" asked Sam turning round to stand up from the body.

"They live in the Skylands, I am friends with them."

"Well that's convenient! Alright let's head on out of here."

"Can I take some of the fish?!" asked Max gleefully. "I wanna know if teeth are in their diet!"

"Maybe later Max, why dontcha save those up for some of the bigger fish they got in the ocean?"

"OOOH YEAH THAT'S A GREAT IDEA!"

With a pouchful of teeth the rabbit walked off in front as they left the strange pagoda and went back to their car sitting out in the desert. A few beasts were curiously sniffing the vehicle or climbing into it before Max shot off a few bullets ringing into the sky, frightening them off whilst something occured to Jeremy.

"Reminds me, how thuh fuck did you answer that riddle so fast?!"

"What you never watched Die Hard 3?!" said Max. "I mean I wouldn't blame ya but it's got Jeremy Irons in it so that's ALWAYS worth it!"

"Ah think we got those movies actually, never watched 'em though, you'd recommend it to us?"

"Absolutely," replied Sam straightening his hat, "and start from the first one! It's the feelgood holiday film of 1988 that codified the modern action movie as a masterpiece of dry wit, balanced dialogue-to-action ratio and character development all wrapped up in a festive package."

"Aw nice, alrigh' then we'll check it when we get back, whut you say Odd, movie night?"

"Oh yes!" replied Odd. "I love watching moo-vees!"

"Really?" asked the dog. "What kinds ya like?"

"Um, real ones. I do not like sigh-figh, or fan-tissy, or anim-mayted."

"Oooh right, more of a realist huh?"

"I thought all moo-vees were real! But the humen tell me it's not, and that confused me."

"I know watcha mean!" said Max patting the raptor's arm. "That's why I stopped playing videogames!"

"You kept throwing hats at people trying to possess them!" retorted Sam.

"BUT THEY MIGHT HELP ME JUMP HIGHER SAM, I NEED MORE STAR MOONS!"

"Mr. Wallace was sixty years old with sciatica, the only thing that's gonna jump higher with him is his hospital bills!"

They all hopped into the car and drove off across the desert, heading towards the Birthlands with Oddie's directions to keep them focused. The now-abandoned pagoda bereft of life soon faded over the horizon behind them as the sun started to set, a brimming blood-orange orb that sunk into the sea straight ahead.

"Should we worry about that building stayin' there?" asked Holt.

"When we find our criminal mastermind," replied Sam, "we'll find a way to get rid of it from this place."

"Ah good, don' wanna clutter this place up...so, why were all them people just disappearin' when they died, ah mean bodies don't normally just fizz up into black an' white."

"We're trying to figure that out ourselves, and the signal they emit is similar to that of the one we're tracking. We suspect that they're not actually living beings but creatures replicated by some form of cathode-ray technology, reinventing a televisual feast of static into a resonant three-dimensional being that would make John Logie Baird's eyes pop out of his skull!"

"So...are you sayin' that someone is makin' people...out of TV static like?"

"If what we think is true, then they undoubtedly have the master signal by which they can reverse the process and dispel any of the remnants they leave, such as that faux-Asian pagoda."

"OOOH!" clamoured Max. "What if we could get the guy to shrink it down and put it in a snowglobe?!"

"I don't think that's a good idea," spoke Sam wisely with a finger raised pointedly. "Snowglobes are mystical in their effervescent nature to drain one's power and spirit, it's a little known fact that the real reason Citizen Kane dies at the start of the movie is because he broke the snowglobe, which contained his true power. But they realised that the common public wasn't aware of this and so they just wrote up some other plot about rosebud or some junk."

"Gift shop owners are the most POWERFUL secret lobby!" proclaimed Max waving his gun higher to the sky. "Freemasons got nothing on those guys!"

"All the blacksmiths and bakers in the world cannot compare to the profits of selling cheap diversionary knick-knacks purposefully built for the sole purpose of bragging to people back home of the places that they're too poor or encumbered with duties to ever visit."

"That's just nonsense!" challenged Holt. "That sorta tat's not even been around that long!"

"Oh really?" The mutt turned his head still driving with one arm leaning on his seat "Explain the trinkets brought back from the Crusades in the twelfth and fourteenth centuries. The feet of saints, a well-preserved heart of supposedly one of the infants slain by King Herod, shrouds of Turin? Anyone else would call them sacred artifacts, but we all know that's just knick-knacks wrapped in ancient reliquary."

"Sixty years from now," said Max, "those silver coins we hawked from Rudolph Giuliani's gonna be a priceless artifact from a sad confusing time!"

Sam scratched the back of his hat briefly taking his hand off the wheel as they slightly veered, before reaching into the swelling grassy plains of the Birthlands. The sounds and smells of life continuing was always something that warmed Oddie's heart, sighing as he leaned out the side of the car to savour the moist scents. Jeremy watched him with a passive smile, stroking the back of his scaled head as Oddclaw turned back to look at him. They said nothing for the next hour except Oddie giving directions towards the Lake of the Longnecks, where the Skylands towered high above on the opposite side along with said longnecks far away.

"Hold onto yer hats!" said Sam doing so, "it's time fer a swim!"

"Wait what?!" cried Holt.

"Well how else we gonna get through?!"

"B-BUT, NO, W-WAIT HOW CAN WE BREATHE UNDERWATER!?!"

The question forced Sam to a screeching halt, tires screaming against the earth as chunks of dirt and grass flew past them into the water, hitting a few creatures and disturbing one of the crocodiles that slid back into the murk. Almost everyone hit their head, except for Max who went falling out straight into the loch bubbling under the surface. Oddclaw ran to the lakeside frantically reaching for the rabbit's foot, but he hopped back out followed by a ruthless croc snapping its jaws towards him as Max shook himself clean like a dog.

"Whaddaya mean you can't breathe underwater?!" said the other dog.

"Ah mean we're not drivin' through that, 'specially not with all them beasts muckin' around inside it."

"And we didn't pack any spare oxygen bags. Dang, how are we gonna get across?"

"The longnecks will help us over the water," said the raptor, "but we have to wait. They come back here when it is day."

"AUGH!" snarled the rabbit. "If only we didn't stop over at that pagoda!"

"But you had fun fighting our enemies, and we found where your target is."

"Yyyyeaaaaah...yeaaah I did have fun, and I got some new teeth!"

"Well I guess we're stuck here then." Sam slumped up into his seat. "Good thing I got this deck of cards to pass the time."

"Aw nice whut game you play?" asked Holt.

"Poker mostly."

"I'll play sum with ya! Hey Oddie howsabout we teach ya?"

"Teach me what?" asked Odd.

"Poker, it's a human game come on siddown."

Moving out of the car they all sat on the grass as Sam shuffled out cards to all four of them whilst Holt explained the rules to his friend, the soldier politely instructing him how not to show your cards to your opponents, what types of cards were preferable to have and most importantly, how to bluff. Oddclaw found this last part rather suspicious until Holt explained that poker was not necessarily a game of skill but rather deception, that even the most worthless cards could win the game if you could intimidate your opponents into folding.

They played into the night using rocks for currency, gauging each other as the sounds of whooping cries and snuffling roars echoed throughout the lands giving a strange sense of atmosphere. Max was random as always, constantly flicking between being either exceptionally obvious that even Oddclaw could read him by his face alone, or being deviously intelligent to an almost psychic degree that frightened Holt; the soldier himself was daring, a risk-taker who went in hard and tried to terrify his opponents with sheer bravado; the raptor was as expected, rather clumsy in his bluffs, playing on false assumptions and the only way he wasn't losing worse than Max was the fact that he could smell the excitement of his opponents in allowing him to fold, or advance on the stakes; lastly, Sam was the most methodical of them all in almost always folding first, baiting his cards and never going all-in unless he wanted to throw his opponents off. Soon it was the last match of the night, a fire glowing on their faces as they sat huddled around the burning sticks with Sam locked in a dead match with Oddclaw.

"Raise." The dog leaned himself back.

"...hmmm...I will raise." Oddclaw did the same.

"...hmmmm...call."

"AGH, come on already!" yammered Max.

"Patience my little padawan-"

"DON'T, you EVER quote that filth to me again Sam! You KNOW what those people did!"

"I wasn't quoting, if I did I woulda said young not little, padawan is a perfectly cromulent word that's existed in sanskrit!"

"No it's not, not the way you use it you traitor!"

"Alright let's settle this. Jeremy, right?"

"Aye?" said Holt leaning back against the car door.

"When we get back to the base, remind us to look up a dictionary alright?"

"Alrighty."

Time passed for the longest minute as the dog and dinosaur gauged each other carefully. It was time to show off their cards as Oddclaw produced a surprising hand.

"Woah, dab you got a straight!"

"I did?!"

"Yeah thas good, thassa good hand! Alright dog boy whut you got?"

"Awww dang," said the mutt all defeated, "looks like I have to go home with nothing...but a flush."

"OH! You won!"

"Yep...heheh, not bad for your first round Oddboy, though I admit it was only the last round I started figuring out your tell."

"My...tail?" he asked looking behind himself at the sturdy length swishing the dirt.

"No, tell," explained Sam, "the tic in your body language that tells me when you're winning, so I can alter my tactics to keep you from that."

"Oh. What is it?"

"You tap your toeclaw fast when you get excited." The dog pointed at Oddie's foot where his largest claw was clacking the dirt.

"...I did not know that."

"WELP, YOU LOST!" cried Max. "Now you can EAT IT!"

"Don't talk like that Max," said Sam putting the cards back in their deck. "Besides I got more chips than you than the last time we played poker."

"That's cuz you ain't never counting the ones I got in my STOMACH!"

"Nobody counts gut money Max, unless we're playing German poker in Aachen."

"Wenn sie das spiel nicht vertragen konnen, verlassen sie das Bierhaus!"

"Oder trinke besser als dein gegner," replied Holt in scratchy Deutsch, "dann konnen sie dich NICHT gehen lassen!"

"HAH!" The lagomorph grinned with a smile of respect. "Wow where did you pick that up big guy?!"

"Couple years in thuh war weren't it, you pick up a lotta shite from drunken krauts on the other side of a barb wire fence."

"OOOOH were you in a pit fight or sumthin'?!"

"Hah, ah wish, woulda been much more fun than where ah wuz." Jeremy stretched out his arms and sighed with a heave. "Think ah best turn in fer the night."

"I am tired too," said Oddclaw with a wincing flex of his claws, "the longnecks will be here when it is day, I think they will take your car with us on their backs."

"Great!" replied Sam. "The car's a little too packed for all of us to sleep, so you take these tablecloths for yourselves."

"Thank you Sam!"

Handing over the flouncy white sheets, Oddclaw wrapped himself in one whilst Jeremy took the other, the dog and rabbit sitting up into their car to lie across the seats with Sam sprawled out in the back and Max placing his head diagonal of the steering wheel. The raptor and soldier slept next to the fire being careful not to let their cloths get too close for fear of burning. Eventually they decided to just wrap both blankets round each other and curl up in a snug tight coccoon grinding on each other.

"God them stars are beautiful," muttered Holt.

"Yes." Oddclaw sighed and cuddled his naked body against the human's clothed form.

"Summat wrong dab?"

"I...the stars make me think of Eyeclaw."

"Awww...I'm sorry."

"It is fine. He was very happy when he died."

"Well...that's nice but...are YOU happy?" Holt turned himself over to face the raptor with their crotches grinding each other. "Yanno when someone close to you passes away, the first thing you gotta worry about are you and your family."

"My family were not close to him. But I was, and his family too."

"How do they feel?"

"I...I do not know," he said pressing his head on Holt's chest, "I did not want to ask."

"Why not?"

"I...I worry they think it is my fault that he died."

"Awww come now Odd, I'm sure they don't think that, yer all fighters, you know whut yer gettin' into every day you go out in thuh world."

"What about your family?" Oddclaw looked up at Jeremy's eyes. "Did they know too?"

"Oh aye they knew," said the war veteran, "remember me dad put me in the army to fight an' toughen up, they knew whut ah wuz getting into."

"Do you miss your family Jeremy?"

"Mmmm...me mum ah miss. Not me dad so much, but yeah ah do miss them both."

"What were they like?"

"Hmmmm..." Jeremy propped himself up by the shoulder slightly shifting as Oddie did the same. "Mum wuz a Protestant, kept to herself, summat of a housewife with no imagination, always about boys should be boys an' girls should be girls, that sorta thing. Me father were a proper cymro though, he always spoke with great pride about Cymru, he always made certain ah learnt thuh language of mah people. The English forced us to learn their language at school, an' if they heard you speakin' Cymraeg they'd beat you within an inch of yer fuckin' life with this big-arse stick, or hang a wooden noose round yer neck they called the Welsh Not if they heard you speak it. My father hated that when he wuz a child, he despised it."

"They forced you to speak a different language?" asked Oddclaw.

"They did...so me father taught me at home with my original language, an' thuh school taught me their language...turned out decent though, wuz able to get in the army well, make sum friends, sum of which I buggered, we 'ad a laugh."

"You like your father then?"

"Oh he wuz great! Just a bit harsh, he knew ah were reckless for a reason, always causin' trouble which did hell on mum's nerves so...but ah loved me dad, he were harsh but fair, he never hurt me more than ah deserved, he always told me to never stop fightin', not against Nazis nor the English."

"Nat-zee?"

"The people ah fought in the war," explained Holt. "But to me father the English were just as bad, forcing their culture on us the past hundred years, beating us as children, taking our homes an' erasing our culture bit by bit. Everybody always mentions Scotland up north with their problems, but nobody ever think about us in Cymru. Silencing our voices. Problem wuz I tried to explain to dad that how he felt towards the English wuz how I felt bein' a queer. He weren't as harsh, but he did put me in the army thinkin' all I needed was summat to vent my rawness to, expel that masculine fury from me...certainly expelled it all over that Jewish lad ah gave a righ' bugger up the arse behind the fields, Silverstein ah think his name wuz...god, his arse felt like magic."

"I am sorry you are not home with your family," said the raptor pulling an arm around Holt's waist, "but I am happy you are here, and that we met."

"Really?"

"Yes. I love you Jeremy." He gave the human a kiss which slightly shocked him. "You are my best friend."

"I...O-oddie I...awwww, cummere mochyn bach. Ah love you too."

The two warmly embraced for the rest of the night, holding each other close as they fell asleep in a peaceful heat from their bodies. The raptor felt the beating heart of his human friend against his own whilst the Freelance Police slept oblivious in their car despite Sam scratching the back of his neck in a constant burning irritation. Biting nagging itching.