System of the Damned

  Chapter 14 - Roderick

  Life changes and nuclear Christmas trees.

  In the roughly two local months since I’d helped Xavier and Lola inform the Allied leadership that they wouldn’t personally be in the fighting, life had been interesting. It was hard to sip coffee out of a cup with a muzzle, but it was less messy than lapping it up. Paperwork sucked no matter how large or small your hands were, and even if you could breathe fire and turn it to ash, you still had to look it over. Sadly Xavier, Evans, and the others had learned to send me files to a tablet, since I didn’t break them as much as I was burning paperwork to ash.

  I may have also set other things on fire, thrown a tantrum, flipped a truck, been a royal pain in the ass, but then I got married. That sort of thing happens when you accidentally get a woman pregnant that is the daughter of two powerful leaders. Not that she didn’t bring me from the broken ass mess I was, back to being a person again, that felt things other than pain. Not that she’d woken me up one evening chittering and squeaking like an otter on crack, informed me that I was going to be a father, and then hit me with a hammer when I hadn’t immediately jumped for joy. Honestly the panicked yelp I’d let out was very reasonable, just like the argument we’d had about her getting my last name.

  We had pictures taken during the ceremony, and then a week later as well, because I’d gotten angry with her refusing my name and buzzed her furless. Which is how I know that Lo’Kar may not have mammaries or nipples, but Ca’zeze do, and so do hybrids. She’d done the same to me in my sleep, christ we both acted like we had fleas the first few days. Luckily it only took about six days for us to get our fur back, making up is the best part of arguments, also she’d taken my last name. It was then that Albert had descended like a squeaky mad scientist, which he was, and is still, but it didn’t make him suddenly appearing and squeaking orders any less odd.

  Dna tests, blood tests, my giant fuzzy ass stuffed into various scanners, and Thunder went into a few as well. Hell even Grek and Stormwind got dragged in...literally...by Lola, and put through several tests. Oddly, Captain Rowland and many others “found” things to do and other places to be. Xavier though was a mess of unintelligible squeaks, chitters, and face hugs, and that was before Albert’s horde was birthed from the iron wombs. I have to admit that I’ve taken to smoking cigars rather frequently, and it has nothing to do with an already hormonal female having mood swings like a bipolar schizophrenic. She still kept a close eye on me like I was a glass vase that might break, but the nightmares were starting to come further apart. And thanks to hormones, she was now nearly as feared as Lola, choking out a raging monster has that effect on people around you. And yes the monster was me, and she used my own damned belt to choke me unconscious. Publicly.

  I honestly wasn’t fully one hundred percent back to how I’d been, and never would, but I was surviving. The fact that Thunder was actually a very snuggly female helped that a good bit, not to mention getting face hugged by various bunnies. I wasn’t too keen on “Uncle Fluffy” as a permanent nickname, but one versus six is a losing battle. And never trust a bunny when he says he’ll keep something small, they’re lying, because I was now “Uncle Fluffy” to about two hundred or so bunnies. I’d raised kids, one was still alive, I knew some of the fun and terror, but try escaping reading a bedtime story to a horde. I do mean a literal horde, but try saying no to a group of toddlers that can vaporize a valley or bench press armored vehicles. Cause oh let's keep things smart and make only the little bunnies able to go fast, I can agree with that, but I still daily send a memo to El Capitan about a two or three foot tall long eared nightmare that accidently ripped something apart. Because, hey let's make the big ones have near the same strength to weight ratio that Lola has, that oughta be just fine. Cigars are lovely and great and keep the big fire breathing Major somewhat sane.

  This isn’t taking into account the four out of five other berserkers that flitted between human thought and crow in a chrome shop levels of adhd. Add in bunnies that can outthink you, can vaporize things, or even in a one point three gravity atmosphere...leap over a hundred fucking meters into the god damned air. Captain Rowland still hasn’t come to visit the skull, which is where I, Thunder, the berserkers, and the hordes of unholy cute terror all live. The mimics help though, and are learning some very bad habits from us all. I'm going to blame the bunnies, not that Xavier is completely my fault in the first place.

  So yes my trauma treatment has gone very well and my wife is absolutely in love with the horde, because she gets all the snuggles and love. I on the other hand get some snuggles, but mostly “Hey, Uncle Fluffy!” and then hit with a flying pack of fuzzy bricks. Many of them are still learning to control their strength, and I guess I am the best target for impact practice.

  Honestly I can’t bitch that much, I love the horde, the tiny ones, normal size, and the giants that look like you fed them steroids. They seriously look like they’ve been fed steroids, bodybuilder bunnies, and that’s not just in the big ones, no that ranges through all of them. They’re all choosing their own names and I thought humans could be bad with hair color, Albert willingly alters their fur colors for them. There are bunnies of every fucking color around, and I seriously have a duo that go by Master and Blaster, which is a reason never to let kids watch Mad Max movies. Granted Master is a hell of a chemist, and Blaster loves to blow shit up and tote Master around on her head when she isn’t blowing something up. Did I happen to mention that the bones could be dried, ground, and turned into a somewhat stable form of RDX? Said bones being literally all around the growing camp and being slowly mined by hyper intelligent bunnies that think flashbangs are fun.

  The kids also do absolutely nothing slowly, some of them are overly intelligent and others are more varied, but all in human levels for the most part. They just learn very quickly and I think a certain little mad scientist might of tweaked all of their brains to process faster, and there aren’t enough translators to go around to all of them. Luckily for me, Dorothy altered my translator to much more rapidly translate things spoken around me, and give them different voice tones. I know Xavier’s mental voice is properly deep and male for himself, but still odd when some of the bunnies sound as deep as my growling when they’re translated.

  Oh! Captain Rowland got adopted by one of Zeus and Hera’s kids, and he named her Elizabeth because he’s so crumpet munchingly British. I might of also forgotten to mention that I have my own shiny moments, especially when my new wife found out that I get distracted by squeaky toys. Fucking Xavier told her, but I can’t really be mad at him, I bribed Albert to make him pink for a week. All it cost me was getting Evans to sneak some bio samples from dead alien crews to the tiny mad scientist. Said mad scientist was doing comparisons of current and previous genetic make ups, and had told me that the only reason my wife existed was Caltunium’s weird ability to mutate and bind things, the rest of it went right over my damned head. Basically it was turning us all into something relatively compatible to the other things surviving on the world, or murdering us outright. Anything pure...died, modified with the little scars as he put it, and the Caltunium slipped in and went to work twisting and mutating. He tried to be patient with me and had learned very quickly when I spaced out.

  The others that had survived on the planet had come to the same sort of idea, but they had all been given a mind numbing and migraine inducingly detailed report of just how it was mutating all of us. Hell the bugs didn’t even have dna naturally, and the crabs, those damned things should have been as toxic as radioactive waste...but they weren’t now, and tasted really good. Mmm gumbo, I was going to have to ask Lola for her recipe. She’d become the defacto den mother of the entire horde, and used the cuteness of her kin to stabilize my wife’s crazier swings in moods that she seemingly had at random.

  On to the fun though, because my main duty was training, and most of the training...was the other berserkers. Though I have to admit that having my ass handed to me by a giant lizard woman was odd, and finding out she’d been an assassin for the Tong was disturbing. Lady Jira was rather polite oddly enough and was helping me learn a few hand to hand tricks that I hadn’t known. By using them on me and giving lectures as she did it. She used the name Lady Jira since her registered name had been false, like Miss Li’s, Yinyang’s, Spot’s, and some others that Miss Li said were doing a good job of hiding from her. Sadly getting a Tong agent to give up said information was about as fun as snorting habanero juice, but as far as training, order, and combat needs went, they looked to me. Joy!

  The four horsemen, Albert, Dorothy, Marie, and Isaac, worked rather hard to help us all out and visited the Skull often. They had also given the names to my fellow berserkers, though the cute terrifying little shits were the only ones allowed to call me “Uncle Fluffy” and I made sure of that. Isaac was also giving Spot regular therapy sessions and helping him get over the issue of laser pointers, which meant that it was only an occasional problem having five hundred pounds of cat man rampaging after a dot. Dorothy was also helping Lady Jira with her manners and violence issues. Xavier and kids had been practicing and teaching some of the other terrifying blurs how to control themselves and I guess measure their time and speed. This left me time to get myself into my usual trouble.

  Miss Li had proven that she was a qualified sniper and had taken my lever action rifle, refitting a new scope and other bobbles to it to match her liking. The suppressor was the size of an old diving air canister, but the tiny waifu could handle it. Granted if she reads that I wrote her as Waifu, she’ll most likely shoot me, somewhere non vital since she gets along with my wife. I’m fucking married! That is going to take ages to get used to, and gonna have another kid...which was still easier to deal with than trying to talk a mimic out of something. Like the sword and shield that a certain mimic had stolen along with a bunch of alien ammunition and weaponry. They aren’t at all stupid creatures, simple, but not stupid, and harder to talk out of something that they like than a cranky toddler out of a snack.

  I eventually gave up and let the cargo container sized mimic keep my stuff as its war booty, much better than getting a face full of the spines it kept with itself. We were going to have to figure out a way to name or catalog our jiggling friends, and I was letting the bunnies name themselves or each other. Other than the mute Maestro, cause that rex was absolutely badass with instruments, had an odd knack for almost any musical device. I’d also been happily sending him for lessons at the Yangtze, cause no one wants to get beaten by a bunny with a steel guitar. Literally steel by the way, and not joking that he beats people with it, cause you don’t touch Maestro's shit without permission. And I’d named him myself after he’d pulled up an ancient Jimmy Hendrix song...and made his fucking guitar talk.

  *************************

  My truck was parked by one of the half buried buildings we’d fashioned around the Skull, though this building had a Ma Deuce quad mount turret sitting atop it. Thanks to the Rodu’s engineering abilities and the raw amount of steel they were salvaging in space, the camp had a munitions factory running. The two giants that stood on either side of the door were only about three feet tall, the five point seven by twenty eight millimeter, belt fed machine guns they carried were a variant of the ma deuce. Granted some of the tanks could fire a fifty caliber, but it was easier for them to use a smaller caliber all around. I shook my head as the duo saluted me the same fucking way Xaiver did, bend one ear and cross it against the other, leaving their hand’s free. Both had harnesses on and backpacks that held ammunition, grenades, and com units, and the sight still made me shake my head. “You know the term gun bunny is an old human term for mortar and artillery grunts. Or human women that like guns.”

  They looked at each other and then at me and shrugged in unison, which made me look at them more closely and realize they were twins. Oddly mirror images of each other with forest green fur and a black patch around one eye. “Well when we meet more of your humans, then they will be unpleasantly surprised.” Left spot chittered.

  “Very unpleasantly surprised indeed, imagine when we get the fabricator and learn its secrets.” Right spot chittered.

  “Oh yes...the first mother has proclaimed that once we have the fabricator and the four horsemen have learned its secrets, then we shall take our place ruling as protectors over all of you with our mecha.” There was a little fervor to Left spot’s chittering.

  “We shall ride into glory and battle and…” I must have been showing some of the trace of terror that had suddenly started to flit into my brain like a hummingbird on cocaine, because Right spot paused. “Oh you humans are so gullible, honestly you should know better than to fall for that. The First has no wants to be ruler over everyone.”

  “So true, he turns into a mess when some of the others use their cuteness. Honestly falls apart in a mess of chittering and snuggling. He’s caused your wife to be buried in bunnies several times you know.” Left spot chittered and waved an ear for the massive door, which had a smaller door built into it. “Go on in, Honey is mostly furless and the Lord of Sudden Violence is doing repairs on a Rodu hauler.”

  I let out a rather canine whine and slumped as I stood there, rubbing a clawed hand over my muzzle and face for a moment. “And you two think that the names Left spot and Right spot are good?” I got in unison nods and huffed as I moved for the door. “Just don’t cause too much panic please, one of these days I’d like to relax enough not to have a fucking fur coat.”

  I yanked open the larger door and stepped into the long hall that went into the reinforced bunker where Honey did all his metal and machining work now. Arabic heavy metal sounds like wailing tortured cats to me, but I’m not going to argue about music choices with a man that turns into a giant honey badger. Not to mention the actual honey badger that had recently started to snarl along with the music when he was working in the shop with Honey. I’m just fucking glad that I don’t have to hand Stanley sockets or tools like some of the techs do.

  The place should have been horridly hot since it was underground and it smelled of burnt carbon, burnt hair, man funk, and oils, but it was as cool as someone with thick fur might want. That was with the forge flaring and the auto hammer clanging on the bit of metal that Honey was getting shaped. I didn’t say anything, and didn’t need to, his sense of smell was probably better than mine. I also wasn’t going to risk startling a man who two weeks ago had slowly murdered one of his countrymen in public. The murdered man had raped, then slit the throat of one of the chinese refugees, and then been caught.

  Prophet had learned of it and asked Honey to make an object lesson of the man in the old and brutal customs. Honey had one upped Prophet and started in human form, then changed and skinned the man alive. There are drugs and other things to keep you awake through the worst things and cause you to not bleed. It’s amazing what meth and red hot iron do in place of proper things. I’ll be honest, I vomited when I watched the recording, and there were only a few unemptied stomachs from the ones who’d watched in person. Honestly I think the worst part was that Stanley had quietly and happily helped his human murder someone slowly. I think it was actually calming for the little demonic creature of hatred.

  The best part about it was that Adam, the AI, happily and rapidly transmitted the video to anyone that asked about it or seemed inclined to...how did Albert put it….oh. Force someone into a struggle cuddle...fucking bunnies. Little shit was a bad influence on Adam, but Captain Rowland didn’t seem to mind. It was a simple form to be filled out for the murdered crewman instead of dealing with judiciary hell. It was a much simpler bit of paperwork for myself as well, and we didn’t really have more than the mp’s anyway, who had happily let Honey drag the screaming man from the brig and through the ship to a nice public setting.

  All Prophet or Honey had said about it to anyone not of their religion was simply. “We cannot be as we once were. We are few and are faithful, Allah will understand. Or we are damned.” And then they casually shrugged and walked away, but I couldn’t be upset at their hope to salvage a bit of their faith. The Chicoms had turned a good chunk of the middle east into a nuclear wasteland, hell they’d even nuked the shit out of Israel.

  I was still daydreaming and thinking when the steel shard brushed my fur and sank into the wall behind my head. It snapped me back to reality and my eyes locked onto the grinning face of Honey, who had three more steel shards in a raised hand. “Would you please stop doing that, you may be able to shift and dance a jig and sing a tune as calm as can be, but some of us have issues.” I huffed and pulled the shard from the wall. “Besides…it makes me nearly piss myself when I’m good and distracted.”

  That got him laughing, a rough booming laugh that sounded much more crazed now than it had before. Not that he’d ever been sane, or a stable normal person. His rank was a given and uncared for thing like Xavier’s rank, but his job as our weapon’s officer was due to his skill. The fact that the man could make a blade or zip gun out of about anything helped, but his skill at using them helped teach others. “One of these days, Major, I may even pierce your ear to teach you not to daydream in my shop. I also live with and am friends with the most angry and hateful being on this planet. If I can keep from losing parts to Stanley, I can keep out of your reach.”

  A snort ripped out of my nose and I shook my head as I moved around benches and machine tables. “I know. I have to bribe the violent little bastard to do things for me, hell everyone bribes him when they want to simply ask him something.” I handed over the shard as I got closer to him and watched as he laid the oddly sharp metal strips into a cup beside the press. “How have you been faring?” I asked him first, because I had more questions, but that was most important.

  He let out a hiss of a sigh and shook his head, a slight slumping of his shoulders. “I have been doing as best I can, Major, aside from my religion, dealing with the aliens, having religious conversations with a creature of pure hate, and the manic curiosity of the bunnies.” He shook his head. “I’m just fine, I have slipped in my progress to be a better person, but I am truly trying my best. The rage has actually calmed since Miss Li visited me in my old forge.” He got a slightly sour look on his face as he turned and looked me in the eye. “And electrocuted me as if Allah pronounced I should be smote.”

  If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  I couldn’t help but smile a little at him. “The recording of you punting her out of your shop is still one of the top rated videos according to Adam.” His eyes narrowed for a second and I shrugged. “The most watched ones are still of Isaac and Spots…” He snorted loudly at that and shook his head. “Have you been praying?”

  He sighed and nodded. “Yes I have, though we are not supposed to have the saliva of animals on us when we pray. My spit is the spit of an animal now, does this make me unclean and my prayers unheard?” He shrugged. “Prophet has his hands full with the others and they’re terrified of me now.”

  “I wonder why…” I mumbled.

  “Kiss my lovely brown ass you fluffy infidel.” He said with a hint of a smile as he checked over parts, which I had no idea what they went to. “I was doing what was needed, and I may be damned for murder in the eyes of Allah, but he needed to die.”

  I snorted and shook my head. “Yes, I know you also lost your temper in doing it. I’m just glad that you and Prophet took care of it before one of the ladies did it. My wife being one of the ones who wanted to...how did she put it...oh yes.” I cleared my throat and picked up a nearby hammer. “I’m going to nail his organ to a tree and break every bone in his body.” I couldn’t manage the proper squeakiness she got when angry. She was so cute when she was enraged.

  He raised a finger. “And that is another point, most of these people, the aliens...they’re just people. There are so many things to wonder about, would Allah be their god? Is their Goddess kin to Allah? Do we adopt their faith now that we are away from home? Do we preach to them of ours?” He sighed and set down the parts on another table. “Not to mention…” He waved a hand around. “How in the name of Muhammed do we figure out where Mecca is!” The last came out as a slight bit of a snarl. “We don’t even fucking know what direction Earth is from here!” That came out a full snarl...which cut off when I shoved a cigar into his mouth and spat flame on my thumb, holding it for him to light his smoke.

  “With our current conditions and regeneration rate, smoking is of no harm to any of the berserkers unless smoking near explosives.” I said in a rote tone. “I asked, and this blend helps with the nerves and stress, also not much addiction risk for us...so smoke, or I’ll have to change your handle to Salty.” He didn’t really smoke, none of the muslim contingent did. One of those old banned things. Thankfully he leaned his head and puffed to light the cigar, taking in a deep inhale and starting to choke.

  “Easy...small puffs and inhale some air too. It’s rather strong until you get used to it.” I said in a soft growl and popped a cigar into the corner of my maw and puffing it alight. I took a puff and a deep inhale, holding it before blowing it out my nose up at the ceiling. I took one more deep draw, dash of breath, and then held the smoke in my lungs until they burned. Barely a puff escaped when I exhaled. “I stopped praying or caring about god when I lost most of my family.” I admitted and felt the claws grab hold of my heart as I closed my eyes. “God, Allah, Buddha, doesn’t matter where the fuck Mecca is or that there are aliens here with their own religions. What matters is what you and your people do.” Another deep drag and I opened my eyes, locking onto his nearly black ones. “You, Omar, are a high functioning madman. You care about your people, and you have your faith.” I growled out, smoke rolling up from my maw as I talked. “We both know that you don’t give two shits about most people here, I want you to not be what your old man was and take care of yourself and your people.”

  He puffed on the cigar and held it awkwardly as he spent a moment thinking, taking his time and trying to properly place things. He finally nodded and moved over to a small box, pulling something out and walking over to me. “I will do my best, Major, but only if you take this. I know how you Christians love your symboles. If you are willing to pray again, I will pray for guidance.” He gave me a manic grin. “Allah knows I need it…”

  I stared at the cross, looking at the flecks of Caltunium worked into the gold alloy, the careful work of the loop, the strong yet simple chain it hung from. It was my turn to take a moment before I nodded and gingerly took it, slipping it over my oddly canine head and letting it settle on my neck. “I can do that, and you’re not the only one that needs guidance. I have an alien wife and a child on the way…”

  Honey choked on smoke and thumped his chest with a fist as he sat his cigar on a metal plate, finally taking a deep breath. “I know, leave it to you to end up playing Captain Kirk and getting an alien princess pregnant!” He barked a laugh and sauntered over to a table covered with a dust tarp, the parts he’d been working on still in his hand. “I have something for you, oh prince of alien heathens.” He bowed lightly and jerked the tarp free.

  I was looking down at the table next to me and wondering if I should hurl a hammer at him or one of the blanks of alloy that the mad machinist had piled up, but stopped dead. Sitting on the table was a nine barreled, six foot long, gatling gun, though all of the barrels looked like the interiors were small. There was a helmet beside it that looked oddly proper for me, and I could see a trio of ultraviolet lasers mounted just above and to either side of the barrels. It also had a damned stock attached to it and was set up to be fired as a rifle. “It’s…it’s beautiful, what does it fire?” I asked as I looked at the receiver breach, which looked like I could stick a finger in safely.

  He leaned over the gun and picked up a shell, tossing it to me. “Something that Isaac came up with to punch through the crab’s shells.” The casing was like a regular fifty caliber, but the actual bullet was one of the five point sevens. “Casings will be pulled back into the feed sleeve and dumped into the base of the ammo pack as it is emptied. Since marines can break anything, I have four settings worked in, safe, single, burst, and bullet hose.” He grinned and was starting to attach the last finishing bits to the gun. “You have to hold it with both hands to fire it, a pressure button on the foregrip spins the barrels, and there is a secondary safety in the firing grip. Let go of either and it will stop firing, no unfriendly friendly fire if the user is shot in combat.” He made a face, because he’d seen it happen and I nodded.

  I couldn’t help but ask, because saving shell casings was a need, but having it built into the gun was odd. “Why is it built into the weapon to feed the spent casing back into the pack?” I asked as he went over the gun checking it over.

  “Oh because the casings are the same alloy as the gun, the propellant isn’t powder, it’s composition four.” His hand shot out to catch the round as I jerked away from it, my ears snapped up and apparently looked hilarious to him. “Don’t worry so much Major, we’ve tested these rounds and Boom is very careful about making sure each round has the proper amount of explosives…”

  Boom? A bunny? I couldn’t stop myself. “Who the hell is Boom?”

  His manic grin broadened and he set down the shell as he moved to a door I figured was just a closet. Instead it led into a tunnel, a lit tunnel that was carved out of rock and had reinforcements bracing the walls and ceiling. The most shocking part was that I felt comfortable in a tunnel, I could fit the warg down this thing and have a little room. My head was on a swivel and my ears were twitching as I could faintly hear machinery noises. “Our small friends have been very busy. They connected this tunnel to my shop about three days ago, and the one called Arnold has been leading this project.” He waved a hand casually at the wall.

  “Arnold...isn’t that one of the dwarf tanks like Lola, just a little guy?” I half asked and then nearly missed a step. “This is why your shop was cool, it’s being fed air by these tunnels…” I looked like a nearly dumbstruck puppy as I looked around, and had walked over a hundred meters on a gentle slope downward. Arnold had also been one of the ones interested in a form of industry, mainly machinery, and had been to the Eda ship.

  “Yes, the little fluffy ball of muscle, he and the four horsemen, and of course a few others...figured out something very interesting.” He turned and gave me a grin as we came to a hatchway built into the rock that had about three dozen different hazard signs. I’d forgotten about my cigar until he casually plucked it from my maw and set it in a tray, nodding to one of the many “no smoking” signs. “This is where Boom does its work.”

  It’s work? Maybe a mant….he opened the door and my brain stopped working for a very long moment. Behind the door was a room that could hold every vehicle in the colony, if you were willing to stack them. There were tracks running in from a tunnel that had a blast door ready to slam shut, and what looked like wooden carts on the rails literally filled with shell casings, bullets, and a single one of C-four. I knew it was C-four because I could smell it at a distance and had worked with the marine’s playdough before. All of that my brain could handle, it was the fucking massive tree in the middle of the chamber that was pulling in the carts on one side and pushing away carts of ammunition on the other. There was the mild red tint to the room that made me look up and notice the orb of no doubt radioactive material hanging over the tree.

  Honey looked around casually and then back to me, calm as could be with a giant tree mimic producing ammunition for us. Not to mention the nuclear christmas tree star, or the four foot tall mantis on the wall beside me. It was casually talking to a male Lo’Kar that had a bunny on either shoulder. Aaand then a composite and alloy bug leg tapped me atop the head. “Excuse me Major, but you might want to close the door. We do try to keep this room sealed from the rest of the tunnels.” The bug buzzed from above and behind me, and of course there were blast vents and all sorts of safety plans in place. I hoped there were at least.

  I reached back and pulled the hatch closed, then blinked a few times as I looked around the room more. “The...they can make things?” I asked stupidly, because brain no work now, please try again during normal business hours.

  “Has the Major become broken?” Buzzed from behind me and I looked up the mantis that was standing on the wall looking at me curiously. Its coloring was odd, and hard to properly pick out with my messed up ability with colors. The prosthetic bit of leg told me that this was the emissary from the bugs that dealt with the alliance heads. It had an odd sort of pack on its back and it really did look like a giant damned mantis, which was keeping out of my reach thanks to a few bad reactions humans had to its people. The pitch a human adult could rise to when it had a four foot tall bug scuttle past them on the ceiling was amazing.

  “I think a little bit, I didn’t warn him about this...I just said that Boom makes the ammunition for us, and he asked about Boom...so I brought him here.” Honey said from beside me, and then he grabbed my fluffy tail and made me stiffen. “Did the brain reset work?”

  I growled softly and huffed out a breath, my clawed hand swatting his away from my tail. “Yes, but you know I hate it when people grab my tail…” A hand was gently starting to pet my arm from the other side and I looked down into three sets of eyes, which thankfully belonged to three people and not a mimic petting the giant puppy. That had happened already and was creepy as hell.

  The oddly lithe male looked up at me and kept petting my arm as the dwarf bunny on either side of his head watched me curiously. I knew both bunnies had to be an oddly bright yellow or orange, which was just a guess. Colors yes, I could see colors, picking out shades..um, nope, not happening. The male had on the simple pants, shoes, and vest that his people wore, but I noticed that he had fur lining it. “”Greetings, are you feeling stable my lord?”

  I stiffened at his words and slumped as Honey snorted behind me, because he’d heard this before. He’d been around when a few of the Lo’Kar had come to visit. “Do not call me Lord, my rank is Major. Call me either Major O’Connell, Roderick, or Hound please.”

  His head cocked to the side, but it was the mantis that spoke first, well buzzed first. “Major is an annotation or description of size, not rank. The small furry ones call you Uncle Fluffy, would that not be better?”

  I actually whined at that, because there were dueling bunny giggles. “No, only the small fluffy ones are allowed to call me that.”

  “Why, you are rather fluffy compared to a Ca’zeze. Much thicker fur, and it is also longer.” This from the small hairless Lo’Kar and Honey was NOT helping me at all with his sniggering.

  “No. Only the bunnies.” That was definitely a whine.

  “I have anteni much like their ears, may I use the name that they use for you?” The bug buzzed and I wanted to run from the room. Aliens were as bad as toddlers!

  I looked around and then pointed at the giant tree. “Why tree make ammo?” I growled out in pure barbarian and Honey had to put a hand over his own mouth to quiet the laughing he didn’t want echoing around the cave. It took me a moment to notice the coins being tossed past me to the bunnies, Lo’kar, and bug, which is why I turned and glared at Honey.

  Being glared at by his superior officer, and a giant werewolf didn’t bother Honey a bit, but he lived with the small fuzzy lord of hate and violence. “I’ve been waiting for days…” He sniggered and coughed, keeping out of my reach now. “You didn’t expect me not to have people mess with you after I’ve heard every tiny fuzzy one calling you that...and heard it chorused when they see you? Honestly Major, I’m disappointed you think so little of my ability to mess with people.”

  I glared at him and shook my head. “Honestly, if I could get you drunk, I’d tattoo The Star of David on your ass, literally your ass, maybe I can talk Stanley into doing…”

  “Don’t you fucking dare!” Honey yelped and glared at me. “Don’t you fucking dare give that little infidel any ideas!” His voice was near pleading and I grinned, snapping my ears straight and wiggling them. It was then that he realized that I was messing with him and he slumped. He’d bribed four others into helping and no doubt planned this for a day or so, and I won with a casual threat involving his former pet and now evil partner in crime. And then he grinned up at me wickedly and I heard a squeak, my ears twitching as another sounded. “It’s a draw then…” He said and held up the little squeaky chew toy he pulled from his pocket. It had tooth marks all along it from very sharp teeth. “Honestly it helps with stress, doesn’t it?”

  I huffed and looked over at the tree. “Yep. So the mimics aren’t just some native and weird as hell alien animal?” Back on topic, ignore the tempting chew toy. That’s a good Major…focus.

  “This is still restricted information.” Buzzed from the mantis and I turned to look up at it, because it’d moved spots on the wall. “The polymorphic creatures are an accidental creation of sentient life, not all of them are able to function at the level that their origins were able to. I am unsure as to what it originally was meant to become other than a polymorphic crystalline based fabrication system. They were able to do molecular changes and fabricate things without the heat needed to melt and bend metals or other materials.” It watched me and twitched an anteni.

  “So you’re saying that the creatures that are all over this planet acting like rocks, trees, and tires are an industrial accident of life?” I asked, a brow raised and my arm was being pet again by the little male, make that males because the bunnies were petting me too. I’m not made of glass! I could take in information without breaking, but the petting did feel good. Especially when a neon bunny started using claws. I might of let out a murr and had to fight my traitorous tail from wagging.

  It chirped, what did a chirp mean? Cricket much? It started buzzing out words again and my translator went to work. “Yes, originally they were made to turn radioactive elements into what the Eda call Nobu crystal, what you humans call Caltunium. It wasn’t the mutative energy holding material we now have, that is the accident. This system was sealed to contain the accident...and what the other Eda believed was the last of the issues that had started a war.”

  I was leaning into the scratching claws, but that last sentence made me snap straight and stare at the mantis, who twitched at my sudden movement. “War, and what issues?” I got out before having to bat away Honey’s hand from my ear. “And I’m still stable, stop that!” I barked, kinda literally, and then whined. I wanted to be able to relax and be human, not have a tail, not have a fur coat, little claws felt good scratching into my...fur...damned bunnies.

  The mantis made that cricket noise again and cocked its head to the side as it watched me, then it tapped itself in the chest with one of those weird bug arms. “Us, four other races that no longer exist, and those egg stealing crabs.” That last came out in a weird and very angry sounding buzzing noise. “It is a very long story and a very depressing one. I may tell it to you later. The important part is that the accident happened, some of the Eda were desperate and tried to create a better, more effective crystal...your ship finally laid one of them to rest.” Odd bug arm pointing up at the ceiling of the room and my jaw dropped open.

  “The massive monster that took anti-ship missiles to kill….was one of the Eda...that caused the accident to happen.” I really had to focus to get the words out like a proper person and not sound like drunken scooby doo. The whole brain lock thing was trying to happen and I found myself rubbing my temples. “And not just that the giant monster that I now use its skull for a home was a being near my size once. They messed up and turned a crystal used for power and a goo into a mutative mineral of power and a sentient species?” Tiny little claws were working up my arm, my shoulder, and around my neck. “And I can’t go telling anyone about this?”

  “Correct, my people decided to slowly inform different people within each race. The small fuzzy ones of course refused to listen and all of them know to a point what is going on.” A slight tilt of the mantis’s head and I think it was glaring at the bunnies. “They have been digging several chambers and keeping them secret.”

  The male Lo’Kar made an odd clicking noise and looked between the bunnies and the bug. I was going to have to ask his name again, and find out the bug’s name. The bunnies were another guessing game of names, but judging by fur color, they’d chosen a dangerous profession. “There are also those of us from the Lo’Kar scientific and engineering fields that are in on this project. Though the most disturbing issue is the polymorphs that have taken a liking to combat, it is worrisome for us that they seem to be enjoying it.”

  I just sighed and brought my hands up to rub my temples and I’ll be damned if the little male hadn’t been right, I had much thicker fur than the Ca’zeze. Mine also wasn’t some weird metallic coloring like most of them. “I’m guessing a few Ca’zeze and Rodu are also in on this?” I asked as an oddly rhythmic sound was starting to make my ear twitch.

  One of the bunnies, I think he was neon yellow, chittered. “I am Tik and this is Tok.” It was a female apparently and I oddly hadn’t scented that out, but distractions. “There are at least a few from each group of people in this project. Sadly Major, you’re the last of your special group to learn of this.” And then she in less than a second was over by the hatch and chittering into a com unit. Apparently she was a blur, and as my eyes shifted to Tok, I could see that the male while adorable and fluffy as hell, could probably toss me across the room.

  Tok didn’t move as rapidly, but there was a definite weight and force to his movements, like the kick from my shoulder, the thud against the wall, and the flip and thud to land beside Tik. “It seems that those taking the accelerated training have come to gather you.” He chittered loudly enough for my translator to pick up. I still couldn’t understand raw chitter, and yes they called their odd language of squeaks, clicks, and funny noises...chitter.

  “What? Who?” I asked and found Honey shoving me for the door, and being honest, our compacted human forms were just a fraction shy of the strength of our turned forms. It was very hard to not get shoved for the hatch since Omar “Honey” Ayad was sadly stronger than me, fucking honey badgers.

  The hatch jerked open from the outside and I was shoved through, though I heard the bug scuttle out onto this wall. My eyes were on what was ahead of me though, nearly one hundred people stood in various forms of combat gear. Every one of our races were there, even the avians...which to me looked more like you took a tall Howard the Duck and crossed him with a really cranky eagle or falcon, only they had feathers meant to blend into a forest. They also got very angry when you made duck noises at them.

  Some natural looking humans I knew were from the squads and a few that had heavily mutated and some with only a minor oddity or two. It was easy as hell to tell the tanks from the others, because the human tanks had all taken to carrying a Ma Deuce like it was a carbine. I did notice Sergeant Johnson in full battle rattle at the head of a mixed squad, which looked like it was full of snipers. I got a small nod from her and a few others as I met their eyes.

  Lo’Kar combat troops apparently seemed to wear some sort of heavy plated armor that could be gotten out of rapidly by the one wearing it. The oddest thing about them was that the helmets had a definite air channel on their forehead that ran over the top. The helmets sported special face plates that could snap up and back down for their Pulsars. Each of them had the same sort of five point seven rifle I’d seen the bunnies using. I knew if something had to be done in a body of water, they’d ditch their armor and dive into it.

  Ca’Zeze troops had what looked like a mix of hard plate armor and shrapnel resistant cloth, and I say resistant because proof is such an evil word. Each of them had a small pack on their back that pumped fresh cool air into their combat suits to cool them, and make them hard as hell to notice with thermal sensors. Each of them carried a heavy laser rifle, cloned by Isaac from my wife’s rifle, or a heavy slug shooter...and a shield. Not a force screen or some sci-fi fancy toy, they each had a tower shield with a slot in it to rest their weapon on.

  Rodu combat engineers were terrifying to look at from a soldier’s point of view, and also a wondrous sight. They wore combat gear that was covered in many armored pockets, pouches, a backpack you could stuff a small Thai family in, and two grenade launchers. Because if you have two sets of arms, why not have two heavy weapons. I also knew from a talk with my wife that they no doubt got along great with Hiroshima, I’m fairly sure each had enough high explosive to level our FOB on the edge of crab territory.

  Avians had a very lovely sounding name if I could ever get my translator to not shit a chip when it tried to convert it to english. It worked out ok into something in Mandarin, which sounded like nonsense when it was translated to English. The birdmen and women all had wings as well as arms, and much like my little bunny buddy...could fly. Lighter armor covered them and each had an odd helmet that was flanged in the back to allow them to snap their heads up just over ninety degrees. They each had one of the five point seven rifles, only they had longer barrels than the other ones I’d seen.

  I heard a chirp from above me and looked up, jaw dropping at the two squads of heavy laser toting bugs. Instead of armor, they had a power pack on their back, and an odd sort of color shifting ghillie suit that was making it hard to focus on them. A trilling sound made me look down and I saw my wife talking with one of the Pulsars. My eyes slid past her to the most odd and disturbing part of the whole lot of them all.

  Bunnies with exoskeletons they’d refit like mecha, a few of them with “heads” that were mounted weapons. Bunnies in an odd sort of combat armor like the Ca’zeze wore, some holding overly large weapons for their size. A pair of the giants actually had a dwarf riding them and holding to what had to be a quiver of spears...for a bunny. But getting shanked with a metal bolt hurled by a tiny bunny that can flip a car would ruin anyone’s day. All of them had fur colors that would blend well with the forests.

  Thunder came over to me as I was looking over the silent troops, a smile on her face as she looked up to me. “Husband...I hope you like your present.” She beamed up at me and I stared down stupidly at her, before she made that cute little otter squeak. “Well our present...Xavier.” She made a few more cute noises that made me start smiling down at her. She was so cute when she was nervous. “He and Lola talked them into assigning people to work with you and the other ones.”

  Squeak Squeeee Squeak! “Ah-Tennn-SHUN!” How in the ever loving hell had Xavier gotten that shit programmed into all of the trans...I was suddenly saluted by every single one of the soldiers before me. Every damned one of them was looking toward me and I snapped gunny straight and gave them a parade ground perfect salute. It was also about that second that I realized those LOUD as hell squeaks had come from between my ears...and there was a tiny weight on my head.

  My eyes rolled up as I dropped the salute and I huffed. “Xavier, we are going to talk about this.” I said firmly...before I was brutally face hugged by a twenty pound bunny and cracked my head against the wall. The last thing I saw before darkness enveloped me, was Lola’s smiling face.