{"submission_id":"3341901","keywords":[{"keyword_id":"303","keyword_name":"canine","contributed":"f","submissions_count":"177130"},{"keyword_id":"946","keyword_name":"cervine","contributed":"f","submissions_count":"5827"},{"keyword_id":"9737","keyword_name":"felid","contributed":"f","submissions_count":"4903"},{"keyword_id":"123","keyword_name":"female","contributed":"f","submissions_count":"1017687"},{"keyword_id":"3149","keyword_name":"guns","contributed":"f","submissions_count":"1718"},{"keyword_id":"165","keyword_name":"male","contributed":"f","submissions_count":"1128255"},{"keyword_id":"4219","keyword_name":"puma","contributed":"f","submissions_count":"3595"},{"keyword_id":"4488","keyword_name":"ruins","contributed":"f","submissions_count":"656"},{"keyword_id":"397","keyword_name":"war","contributed":"f","submissions_count":"1755"},{"keyword_id":"38108","keyword_name":"white tail deer","contributed":"f","submissions_count":"51"},{"keyword_id":"5862","keyword_name":"winter","contributed":"f","submissions_count":"6006"},{"keyword_id":"164","keyword_name":"wolf","contributed":"f","submissions_count":"184248"}],"hidden":"f","scraps":"f","favorite":"f","favorites_count":"1","create_datetime":"2024-06-06 08:21:03.454165+00","create_datetime_usertime":"06 Jun 2024 10:21 CEST","last_file_update_datetime":"2024-06-06 07:36:20.14756+00","last_file_update_datetime_usertime":"06 Jun 2024 09:36 CEST","username":"AbiOrionsson","user_id":"366161","user_icon_file_name":"281649_AbiOrionsson_autogrammkarte_konzept.jpg","user_icon_url_large":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/usericons/large/281/281649_AbiOrionsson_autogrammkarte_konzept.jpg","user_icon_url_medium":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/usericons/medium/281/281649_AbiOrionsson_autogrammkarte_konzept.jpg","user_icon_url_small":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/usericons/small/281/281649_AbiOrionsson_autogrammkarte_konzept.jpg","file_name":"5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.doc","file_url_full":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/files/full/5066/5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.doc","file_url_screen":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/files/screen/5066/5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.doc","file_url_preview":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/files/preview/5066/5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.doc","thumbnail_url_huge":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/huge/5066/5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.jpg","thumbnail_url_large":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/large/5066/5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.jpg","thumbnail_url_medium":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/medium/5066/5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.jpg","thumb_huge_x":"300","thumb_huge_y":"299","thumb_large_x":"200","thumb_large_y":"200","thumb_medium_x":"120","thumb_medium_y":"120","files":[{"file_id":"5066874","file_name":"5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.doc","file_url_full":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/files/full/5066/5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.doc","file_url_screen":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/files/screen/5066/5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.doc","file_url_preview":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/files/preview/5066/5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.doc","mimetype":"application/msword","submission_id":"3341901","user_id":"366161","submission_file_order":"0","full_size_x":null,"full_size_y":null,"screen_size_x":null,"screen_size_y":null,"preview_size_x":null,"preview_size_y":null,"initial_file_md5":"3b4b0da6204b161be2318465a970fa5a","full_file_md5":"3b4b0da6204b161be2318465a970fa5a","large_file_md5":"","small_file_md5":"","thumbnail_md5":"d27fefbbeafea68c821ec7587c96a939","deleted":"f","create_datetime":"2024-06-06 07:36:20.14756+00","create_datetime_usertime":"06 Jun 2024 09:36 CEST","thumbnail_url_huge":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/huge/5066/5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.jpg","thumbnail_url_large":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/large/5066/5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.jpg","thumbnail_url_medium":"https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/medium/5066/5066874_AbiOrionsson_when_it_begun.jpg","thumb_huge_x":"300","thumb_huge_y":"299","thumb_large_x":"200","thumb_large_y":"200","thumb_medium_x":"120","thumb_medium_y":"120"}],"pools":[],"description":"To the people reading this Story: \nAs this is the first story, I upload here on inkbunny.net, and I’d like to read your thoughts about this, to see where I could better myself. But before that I want to give the following information:\n\nEnglish is not my native language. The reasons I write that here are: \n\nA. That I’m aware that my English-skills are a mix of the British and American English. I just don’t know what word is from the American and which is from the British.\n\nB. The use of punctuation, especially the use of quotation marks when switching back and forth between the narrator and the spoken word, is probably a bit unusual for native speakers, as I unfortunately only really know it in my native language and am not sure about the rules in English.\n\nAdditionally: This is an entry for the writing contest by Backlash91[url=inkbunny.net/s/3317537][/url]. So, parts of this story are given by its specifications. One of these is: The protagonists are soldiers. However, I do not have any military background whatsoever. So, I opted that not using military speech is better than to try and accidentally offend people actually knowing how to use military speech.\n\nAnd last: I’d like to apologize if it feels rushed, but it took me 22 days of the month given to have a general idea for the story, so I had to cut some parts of that Idea and (roundabout 90% of) my normal writing method. \n\nThat said, please tell me where I did mistakes be it about the mentioned stuff or things I’m not aware of. \n\n\nAbout the Titles “NSFW(?)”:\nI really do not know. I just thought it’s better to be safe than sorry and decided to label it NSFW.\n\n\nFor the copyrights:\nThe only person that might be needed to be mentioned here is Backlash91 since it’s a submission to his writing contest with the Names (and deer’s gender) given by him. (don’t know how to link his profile and showing his name)","description_bbcode_parsed":"To the people reading this Story:
As this is the first story, I upload here on inkbunny.net, and I’d like to read your thoughts about this, to see where I could better myself. But before that I want to give the following information:
English is not my native language. The reasons I write that here are:
A. That I’m aware that my English-skills are a mix of the British and American English. I just don’t know what word is from the American and which is from the British.
B. The use of punctuation, especially the use of quotation marks when switching back and forth between the narrator and the spoken word, is probably a bit unusual for native speakers, as I unfortunately only really know it in my native language and am not sure about the rules in English.
Additionally: This is an entry for the writing contest by Backlash91. So, parts of this story are given by its specifications. One of these is: The protagonists are soldiers. However, I do not have any military background whatsoever. So, I opted that not using military speech is better than to try and accidentally offend people actually knowing how to use military speech.
And last: I’d like to apologize if it feels rushed, but it took me 22 days of the month given to have a general idea for the story, so I had to cut some parts of that Idea and (roundabout 90% of) my normal writing method.
That said, please tell me where I did mistakes be it about the mentioned stuff or things I’m not aware of.
About the Titles “NSFW(?)”:
I really do not know. I just thought it’s better to be safe than sorry and decided to label it NSFW.
For the copyrights:
The only person that might be needed to be mentioned here is Backlash91 since it’s a submission to his writing contest with the Names (and deer’s gender) given by him. (don’t know how to link his profile and showing his name)","writing":"[center][t]WHERE IT BEGUN[/t][/center]\n\n\n„…UP. TO. OUR. NECKS.“, the anthropomorph wolf had kept is voice low. He didn’t need to yell. Looking into Private Mica Morez’ light reflecting eyes with a growl in each word already made her crawl backwards, deeper into their dark hideout and away from him. She didn’t like the thought, that Koslov might be right, wanting for him to be wrong. But him being a veteran with multiple successful missions on record – including one only he survived – gave his opinion a credibility she had nothing to hold against, especially since she had no experience beyond the training. She only knew that she would do anything to survive her first mission.\n\n‘He’s still a Private like me‘, the puma thought to herself. ‘All we need to do is finding a way out.’\n\nLooking around for an idea, only darkness, the way to the outside and the wolf’s grumpy face – barley illuminated from the snow’s reflection – awaited her searching eyes. It made it harder for her, not believing his words. They hid from a murder of titan crows, had both no backpack and stuck inside the ruins of an ancient, war-torn town. Like he said, their chances were close to zero, but they had weapons, so at least they could die trying.\n\nShould one come inside, wouldn’t be the hard part to kill that 1.2-meter-large beast, with luck the second would die too, after that they would have a problem. She only had a standard rifle that required precise shooting and luck against to drive away a titan or even kill it. Her only, questionable advantage was, that she kept four extra mags inside her pockets, which meant, that – despite losing their backpacks – she had a total of 150 rounds of standard ammunition. \n\nThe advantage over the first rave came from Private Koslov Keetriv. The HQ gave him a DMW-12-LR, an officially still experimental weapon with the ability to shoot through a heavy tank from 800 meters and near infinite ammunition in exchange for an extremely low fire rate. Technically part of the first gen of portable energy weapons, instead of using bullets, the DMW-12-LR recharged its three capacitors through its DM-generator, but also empty all three for one shot. \n\nThe good side, Koslov would kill with each hit. The bad side, the DMG-12 models would charge for 40 seconds per emptied capacitor, leaving Mica fighting alone for two minutes minimum. \n“Hey, Keetriv? Do you think, we can…”, Mica shifted her weight forward, suddenly feeling how something foundered beneath her.\n\n\n\n“MOREZ!” His shocked yell was the last she heard before hitting something with her head. \nThe wolf leaned over the hole, which had appeared under the anthropomorph puma, seeing her lying two floors below in dim light. Despite his shock he recognised the old missile next to her head and after 5 long seconds, he heard her groaning, proving clearly that Mica’s survived the fall.\nThe wolf quickly found a way down to his comrade by using the remains of the floor between as a hold. Landing on the floor he first checked her body for any possible bleeding. “Don’t you dare losing conscious or have a serious wound. 4611 took our first aid kits with him, when that damned buck decided to run, so we’re down to the bandage in my pockets.”\n\n“Hey, am not dying and don’t bleed.” Mica groaned, still groggy from the fall. “I’m lucky enough to only get some bruises and a headache, but falling two stories still hurts. So please give me a minute while we’re warm ‘n’ save.”\n\nKoslov stared at her for a moment. Traces of snow still covered their boots, the titan crows could attack at every moment, they had only the equipment on their bodies and… she didn’t hallucinate, despite the cold air coming from the hole in the ceiling, warm air filled most of the room. Looking around, he recognized several other strange things. The well-maintained rocket, placed in a rack on the – for a ruin from the last war – practically clean ground. With the missing ceiling here should be more than two decades’ worth of dust and debris from the floor above, but all around them came from Mica’s fall plus maybe a week since the last dusting. The most suspect thing however, he could actually see because a lamps light shown through the doorway.\n\n“Morez, on your paws and weapon ready.” He whispered the command, to which she reacted. With her weapon pointed to the ceiling and no raven in sight, she clearly didn’t realise the strange state of the room. So, covering her forehead with a hand, the puma lowered the rifle. \n\n“Darn it Keetriv. My head hurts and we found a warm and clean room in the middle of these snow-covered town ruins. Can’t I ha-.“ She scanned the room with her eyes. “Isn’t the town uninhabited since the last war? For my whole life this city is considered deserted, so who the hell lives between wild titans, just to keep this place clean, illuminated and heated till now? And why did they leave a missile here. Especially a one that looks well maintained?”\n\n“Glad you didn’t hurt your head too much”, joked Koslov nervously before he added in a more serious tone: “You’re right, it’s 25 years now. I was nine when they gave up on it. Still, just because there’s no reaction from any inhabitants so far, it doesn’t mean there aren’t any. How about I keep watch and you look what exactly we’ve found. Maybe it tells us something about the owner.” \n\nIgnoring the sarcastic tone during his proposal, Mica just gave him a thumb up and turned to the rocket. The dim light proved no challenge to her feline eyes, but the visible side offered no identifier or hint that could tell her, who built the weapon or what type of missile they’ve found. With one firm grip and a strained moan, she managed to turn the missile around, presenting its other side having some prominent letters on it. \n\n“Ehm, Keetriv? Why is here a weapon from before the Ignition? Or do they build those again?”\n\n“What do you mean, build these again?” His voice turned serious with concern. “Is that one of those illegal WMD?”\n\n“No, I think not. It says AGM-88.” After a few seconds of thinking she continued: “According to the books it should be designed to destroy radars. Only why would anyone need that? Before the Ignition those might had a use, but nowadays larger birds can be seen on a radar. No to mention, those birds of prey that hunt anything flying below Mach1.”\n\nThe Wolf sighted in relief bevor scratching his ear thinking about an answer. “Stonebiter’s base might have a use for that and should be close by. They’ve been looking for a way to get through the Graypelt fort’s air defences.”\n\n“Stonebiter’s base? There is no such base in the…” Mica stopped mid-sentence when the Wolf suddenly laughed.\n\n“Stonebiter is a nickname. The base’s supply officer, a Bull named López, apparently earned that nickname when within his first few days of training. The base is better known under the name…” \n\nA clattering sound from the ceiling had them both aiming at the hole, but seconds later they could see and hear how their former hiding space partially collapsed when some more rubble fell into the room.\n\n“Well, we should look for a way out and for Titan 4611. Besides the fact, that we will need our rations and water, which he should carry, he’s strong enough to carry the AGM.”\n\n“And how do we find our runaway? It’s not like we could use his tracker. The sarge carries the receiver, and…”\nBoth shuddered as they remembered what happened just hours ago. \n\n“We probably shouldn’t have cursed about that deer. Although accidentally, he probably saved our lives.”\n\n\n[center]…\n\n\n3.5 hours earlier:[/center]\n\nThe squad had a simple job. Protecting a small group of traders traveling through a mostly pacified region from one city to another. The worst things in the lands should have been the megafauna hiding in the town’s ruins or the woods they had to pass, but the squad included two titans themself. The white tail deer 4611 as an additional transport unit and the armoured wolf 4444 that could substitute for another small squad with heavy weaponry. Since they travelled by foot or sat in a coach, only snow and temperature prevented it from feeling like a two-week camping trip, or so they thought. \n\nAs they were packing up their camp on the fifth day, something detonated near the small caravan, Private Mica Morez and Private Koslov Keetriv hat the luck to be on the opposite side of a carriage. Titan 4611, who stood a metre behind them, however, got hit to the side. It wasn’t enough to penetrate a titan’s skin, yet enough to cause minor bruises making the stag to stumble, fell and panic. Both privates jumped to him, trying to appease the 3.5-meter-tall and nearly-6-meter-long titan, but the moment 4611 got up his harness’ hooks caught onto the two privates backpacks and jackets. The titan easily lifted both from the ground, non the less, they caused a sudden increase in weight and fuelled the stag’s panic, to which he reacted by sprinting away, carrying one surprised solder on each side. \n\nWhile the deer quickly fled into the close by ruins and around buildings. It still needed enough time for Koslov to see, how two RPGs killed the titan wolf. Already behind buildings, the recognized a short exchange of fire by sound, yet unable to help.\n\nBy the time they freed themselves, the privates neither heard shots to orient themselves nor did they know the way the deer had carried them with its 60km/h run. They tried to look to 4611, only to find out, that he had run even further, beyond the area they could overlook. When they realized that they the radio pack still hung on 4611 harness – together with most of their equipment – and that Koslov couldn’t reach anyone with his walkie-talkie, the puma fell into a screaming fit, cursing the titan, his speed, their bad luck and the world in general. \n\n“We must find that deer”, she finally said after calming down. “When se tell HQ what happen, they will find the attackers and…” \n\nKoslov interrupted her: “Were in the middle of winter in a snow-covered ruin, we shouldn’t lose 4611’s tracks unless it snows again. But there we’ll have to see if we can contact anyone.”\n\nMica gave little protest about his words, since he agreed on searching the titan and they ended up silently walking through the snow, accompanied by the silence of a dead city, only disturbed by the crunching of snow under their soles. On several occasion they had to carefully walk around craters in the snow – visible because the titan just walked through the 2 metres deep snow-filled holes – or find ways around debris the stag just jumped during his flight. After one hour, they felt frustrated, after the second, they wondered, if they still followed 4611 and when they closed in on the second and half hour, they felt watched. \n\nAnother fifteen minutes later, they trail led up a four-story-high hill of debris between two mostly collapsed tower-blocks. \n\nWhile exchanging irritated looks, wondering, why the titan chose that way, they felt like they came to far to stop. So, they choose to climb to the top, using it as an overlook to see where the trail would lead. It was there, that a crow’s caw let them spot the murder and their clear interest into something at that building. Not seeing any other possible target, Mica raised her gun to defend themselves, but her comrade just shoved her through a window into a narrow tunnel within the debris behind it and followed short after.\n\n\n[center]…[/center]\n\n\n“The receiver might be gone, but I’ve been told that the signal creates problem during radio communication on the highest frequence we use.” Mica thought out loud. “The walkie-talkie should be able to receive that. Sadly, the signal’s barely spreading there, so it would be hard to hear between the normal static… unless were close by and…”\n\nKoslov’s ears had perked up. “Wait, we can actually use the tracker with our current equipment?” The wolfs tail even begun to wag slowly, since that gave them a way better chance to reach a base. \n\n“Aaand…”, the puma repeated: “we won’t hear anything unless were within 100 metres or less, since we can’t tune your walkie-talkie up to the main frequence.” She walked over to the doorframe next to him, thought for 5 second and added: “Well, it might be more like 50 metres, don’t know what these walls made of.”\n\nKozlov’s mood dropped visibly. It would help, if the stag would hide, but they searched a deer, meaning that even with a hundred metres, they’d most likely see him before hearing the signal. “We may be better off looking for the inhabitants instead.” He thought out loud. “No matter if they’re here or left some days ago, we should be able to find intel and something we could use.”\n\n“Wait, you want to rob someone you don’t know?” Her voice and body language both made clear, that she hated the thought.\n\n“Rob? You’ve hit your head on a well maintained looking military missile’s rack… in a place where no person should be. This is either a secret base that violates the peace treaty from 238 with its existence or we’re inside a bandit hideout. In Both cases, we’re doing nothing bad.”\n\nAfter that, the wolf – ready to go – pulled his weapon up, hit the wall and cursed: “Fuck, why didn’t I kept the BMG strapped to the side of my backpack?”\n\nWith a sigh, the puma tapped against his knife, mentioning: “That might be better in this area.”\n\n“It doesn’t work well under fire.” The wolf growled, more to his weapon than to her. He still gave it a thought before actually securing his weapon. When he grabbed for his knife, Mica held her rifle out to him.\n\n“You’re the combat specialist and my head still hurt a bit.” She looked him in the eyes, to reinforce her words. “But our militaries purpose is to protect citizens, so please make sure you’re not mistaken.”\n\nHe took the rifle and turned through the door into the hallway. “Don’t worry, I don’t want to shoot at civilians either.”\n\nThey quickly learned that someone sealed of most parts of at least two floors and partly reinforced rooms. In the upper floor, where they had entered, six rooms could be entered, all seemed to be used as improvised storage units. They took the time to look through each of them, but only marks on the floor showed, where crates or the like once were placed. They only found out, that in each room, someone removed the ceiling to the floor above. \n\nOne floor below awaited them with ten closed doors. Slowly, carefully advancing, they found the first eight doors to lead into bedrooms with a total of 21 simple spring beds plus one better with an actual mattress on it. The nineth room they assumed to be a canteen, large, with enough tables and seatings to accommodate 30 people. Opening the last door, the two soldiers stepped into a second stairway, that only let them decent further to a third floor, leading in a different direction, away from the street the original came from.\n\nBut bevor they reached the last step, a dark, metallic thunder let Koslov and Mica stop in shock. Down the hallway something heavy just hit a massive metal plate. In the following silence, they listened carefully for any possible sound, until they felt sure, that other sound reached them. As they made the last steps down the Staircase, the wolf gave the rifle back to Mica.\n\n“Why?”, she whispered into his ear. “The DMG is for long range. You cursed yourself because you’re left with the Rifle not suited for the area.”\n\n“I’m probably better off using a weapon with more impact”, he whispered back. “Because in my experience, you need either a battering ram or a titan to create a sound like that. But I can’t be sure, and it’s better to be safe than sorry.”\n\nMica didn’t argue when she heard titan, readied her weapon, and took the vanguard. In front of her, only three doors led out of the hallway, one to the left, leading deeper inside the building, one placed on the opposite site from the two soldiers and the last at the one to the right, to a room that should face a street. \n\nThe Puma quietly moved to the nearest door, which happened to be one on the left side. Afraid that a feral titan could be on the other side, she slowly and silent opened the door, ignoring everything she had learned. Looking in into the room, they only found empty tables, bearing clear signs that the former inhabitants used this place as a kitchen. \n“For the next room, kick the door in. No matter if a person or titan is on the other side, we must NOT give them a chance to see us coming.” Despite the emphasized ‘NOT’ Koslov didn’t sounded angry, and more like he just gave a simple reminder. Mica still let her ears hanging feeling ashamed, that she needed the reminder. The wolf didn’t paid attention to her reaction while taking position at the next door. She shook her head trying to get her thoughts straight, but instead of focusing, a thought irritated her.\n\n“Is it just me or shouldn’t at least one room we found have a second door?”, the puma murmured before getting ready for the next room.\n\n“I think this wasn’t a building to live in. Many small rooms and only a few larger.” He pointed at the door and quipped. “After kicking that door in, a former storeroom might show.”\n\nMica took a good look at the door and saw no hinges. She pushed down the handle with her rifle and simultaneously pushed through the door with her shoulder. This way she stormed the room just to nearly fall onto a counter. Like Koslov joked, she just entered a former salesroom but only the counter and racks along the walls showed proof of its original use. Where shelfs should be, a large, four-legged table surrounded by blackboards stood prominent in the middle, creating the impression of a command room. On the rooms opposite side, the whole dormer front now only presented wooden barricades with no light coming through despites visible holes. Despite no visible thread or hiding place inside the room, the puma slowly checked the room. When she reached the barricaded windows, she looked through a hole. Outside the snow glowed in a violet light causing Mica to shudder.\n\n“Well, it’s night already.” She growled to herself. “How I hate this unnatural, violet glow from the moon fires’ shine.” \n\nShe walked back to the hallway, where Koslov stood ready to shoot at the last closed door. She cast a quick glance the wooden door, saw that she needed to pull it open and grabbed its handle. She gave it a quick pull before quickly aiming with her rifle through the doorway. Through her rifles tactical visor, she saw a vacated repair shop with high ceiling and filled with a generator’s humming. For the first time since the missile, they actual found useful equipment, but there were also many possible spots to hide. After a carefully search, that included a functioning restroom connected to the repair shop, only a thick metallic gate left to be searched. In big letters it had the word ‘LOCK GATE’ written over it.\n\n“Look at that”, Koslov said in an almost happy tone. “Now we Know where that sound came from.” \n\n“And over here is also the local power source.” Mica answered, pointing to a semi-portable DM-Reactor mounted to the wall over the gate’s controls.\n\n“What? Why should someone install that here?” Koslov couldn’t think of any reason for a DM-Reactor in a seemingly cleared out Basem or any outpost this small.\n\nMeanwhile Mica looked over their finding. “Strange… Each of those costs more than ten state of the art radio pack sets… Yet not even a stamp to prove a simple product inspection.” \n\nWhen she leaned forwards to take a closer look, her rifle’s stock striated a switch on the controls. Without a second of delay, a bright red LED turned on. Both privates stared down to the light, afraid of what they might have caused. After five seconds it switched to a bright green followed by the metallic gate slowly being lifted with an unwilling moan-like metallic sound. Mica and Koslov sprinted behind the first cover they found, aiming for the gate. Each second felt like minutes in which the gate barely moved. The puma licked her lips and tightened the grip around her weapon while the wolf instinctively tucked his tails between his legs. Neither inside nor around the lock gate a light had been installed, so the moment they could see under the Gate, they stared into darkness. When it opened its first 60 centimetres, a crow fell into sight with a wet smacking sound. The beast had its torso crushed and from the head remained little mor than bloody pulp, while a small amount of blood dropped from the gate onto the body. \n\nMica (who had aimed for its head) swallowed hard, she knew that whatever killed the crow would be able to hunt a tank. Killing her and Koslov wouldn’t mean any challenge to that monstrous beast.\n\nThen the Plate reached the first metre. Finally enough light found its way to the other side to allow to see a bit further inside. “You gotta be kidding me.” The wolf exclaimed, as light reached three more fresh crow cadavers. His grip hardened around his gun, while he looked for whatever caused that. \n\nWhen the gate reached 1.5 metres, they saw cloven hooves. As the light reached higher, brown legs shown and the belt of s backpack hanging on the beast’s visible side.\n\n“4611?”, breathed the wolf, while slowly more of the deer became visible. Blood run in thin line down its sides, while his breath created a thin mist in the air. Despite knowing the deer, the blood-stained pelt and visible breath from the dark let fear sink its cold claws inside their hearts. Every recruit knew stories about titans turning into wild, bloodthirsty beasts without any warning. Stories creating images fitting to what little they saw of 4611. \n\nBoth Privates saw their weapons tremble in their hands. For Koslov the situation turned worse the moment they recognized him while Mica never had killed before. Despite being a tamed animal, the titan was part of their squat and trusted companion. They tightened their grips, as the titan’s wounds became visible. Over his pelt cuts and wholes showed a clear picture drew a clear picture of what had happened inside the lock gate.\n\nThe 15 seconds since they took cover, felt like hours passed by, when his head became visible. The titan mustered the solders with his other eye while they did the same with him. From the distance they couldn’t see any serious wounds, but many minor ones including a bleeding cut above his left eye forced him to keep it shut. 4611 lowered his head pointing his blood-stained antlers to them, with feathers still sticking on them. He made one slow step towards them, then a second and a third. Mica couldn’t even aim clearly, unable to convince herself guilt filled conscious that the stag posed a thread. Meanwhile Koslov took aim through teary eyes, but the stag reached the gate before the wolf managed to aim for the head. \n\n “I’m sorry. Hoped it never happens again, but we need to survive. I’ll make it quick so please don’t resent me.”\n4611 fell. No shot was fired, yet the stag lied on the ground, not moving. \n\n“C-ca-can we g-get close?”, the puma asked shaken. The wolf didn’t know how to answer, didn’t know what they just witnessed, didn't know if their companion ever posed a threat to them. They closed the distance towards the titan step by step, staying on high alert.\n\nThe deer’s flank slowly rose and fall in the steady tact of a sleeping being. Nothing changed about that when they finally reached him. He slept while they removed all the equipment, didn’t moved when they checked and cleaned its wounds. He not even reacted to wolf and puma turning him on his other side to tread the wounds there. If not for the deer’s breathing, they’d assumed 4611 to be dead.\n\n“Those damned sadistic crows”, Mica growled while they applied first aid on the stag other side, speaking the first words since they began. “He had run for who knows how long, and here they stressed him to the point, that he collapsed as soon as he was safe.”\n\n“These crows won’t do that anymore.” The wolf answered. “Attacking him in that small room gave them what they had coming.” After a short silence he spoke again. “Hey… Morez, I know you’re supposed to contact HQ as fast as possible, but can you please leave the talking to me? You’d still need to make the connection… just leave the room after that and let me do the report. I feel like this is no burden you must shoulder yet.”\n\nThe puma turned her ears backwards and looked at his face, but seeing his expression made her forget her anger. He had that look only veterans could give, showing a pain one had to experience to understand. \n\nHer voice changed to a neutral tone. “Let’s first finish here. Then I’ll think about it.” \n\nOnce the deer’s treatment got finished, they stepped back. Mica took off her winter uniform, grabbed the radio pack and walked over to a workbench. Not further thinking for the reason, why this room had more than furniture left behind, she looked over the old, well-maintained tools until she found all she was looking for. Koslov stood behind her looking in awe, while she checked the six-pound heavy three-piece radio. Thoroughly working, she even dismantled parts of it, knowing where less resistant pieces were to be found. After ten minutes the puma gave a satisfied purr and turned to the wolf. \n\n“Despite my apprehension, that Abel’s fight could have damaged the Radio, it is fully functional.” \nThe wolf looked a few seconds dump folded, before a smile found its way to his face. The deer finally got a nickname, nothing special with a story behind, but given by a squat-member. A point that remembered him of the more pressing matter. Koslov gave Mica a thankful blink, before asking her by gesture to continue. The moment she turned back to the radio, he felt his mood drop again, knowing the report he would give in just seconds.\n\nBoth, wolf and puma jumped, when the radio sprung to live. With no warning whatsoever, the sound of thundering drums and screaming guitars filled the room. \n\nQuicker adjusting to the strange situation, Mica reacted by turning down the volume.\n\n“What is that noise?” Koslov asked her with the shock still in his eyes.\n\n“Thrash Metal”, answered the puma, closing her eyes to listen. “More precisely it’s Corpse Burning Carnage with their song Gorehunt Under A Violent Moon. I actually did try to learn that guitar solo when I was thirteen, turned out to be a duet.”\n\n“What?”\n\n“I tried to…”\n\n“You like that?”, the wolf specified his question.\n\n“It helped me to vent when my hormones went haywire… and after dad’s squamates brought us his dog tag.” She answered while trying to find a free channel. “Nowadays its just a strange nostalgia.”\n\nIt took them the better half of an hour to give up on finding a free channel. Someone played different jammed them all by simply playing differently themed playlist over all the frequencies they could use.\n\nMica turned the Radio off and slammed her flat hand on the table. “Damn it.” With a sigh she turned to the wolf. “Well, we must stay for the night either way. So… Do you try to get a heat stroke? Because that bullet-proofed padding only stores heat without protecting against Abel’ antlers.” \n\nThe wolf had to admit, that the uniform felt too hot, still he disliked the thought of walking nearly bare furred in front of a woman. “You know, you cats might be androgynous, but we…”\n\n“No buts.” She interrupted him. “I didn’t tell you to fully strip down to your fur. At least take off that coat.”\nHer tone remembered him off his mother and he didn’t even realize, when his padded coat fell to the ground. He just stood there, suddenly topless in front of that puma casually wearing only her loincloth.\n\n“See, its better.” She said amused, while she looked around until her eyes found a workbench with a mount for missiles that someone had crudely welded together. “Ha, as I thought, they tinkered with missiles down here.” \nTurning back to the wolf, she fell silent seeing his upper body, before she could say what she wanted. The grey pelt couldn’t cover several scars, most originated clearly from bullets or small cuts, but one long scar from his left shoulder to his right hip seemingly divided his torso into two. With him being a veteran, she expected to see scars in his pelt, just not one that looks this life threatening. \n\n“How did you…”\n\n“Survive? I shouldn’t have… but please let us not talk about this story.” His expression showed that unexplainable pain again, and the puma forced herself to look away.\n\n“We should bring that AGM-88 down here, so we can preserve our strength tomorrow morning.” \n\nThey walked over to the gate, where the saw a modified heavy-duty carrier. \n\n“They even left that fancy thing here. Whatever caused them to leaf, they suddenly had to leave mid packing.”\n\nIt took them a few minutes to figure out the controls, not only had each wheel its own break and hight adjustment, but the controls also needed one person in frond and a second behind the carrier. Once they felt confident with it, they tried on the stairs. It took them 15 minutes to reach the missile, with leaving it as the only other choice. Even with no fuel, carrying an AGM-88 safely down a stairway required at least more persons or a machine like the carrier they had. Five minute later they had the weapon secured on the carrier, ready to return to the workshop. The way back turned out to be even harder. After the first four steps, the carrier nearly crushed Koslov, who had decided to walk in front. 10 minutes later, they finally reached the last of 12 steps to the middle floor, both heavily panting from the stress they’ve felt with every step down.\n\n“Next stair… we have… to go…. faster. This slow… and the… the stress… kills me.” Mica said between her breaths. The simple thought of the second staircase exhausted her, but the prospect of doing it the next day felt even worse. \n\nThat she got no answer caused her a slight anxiety, that Koslov’s might have a heart attack. She looked to the wolf, to be surprised by his – despite the heavy panting – resolute face. He clearly thought about something, clearly to stubborn to give up. He first spoke after they regained their breath: “Then let’s go. The next stair has 20 steps, but I’m sure we’re faster than before. I’ve figured out, what I did wrong.”\n\nHe didn’t explain what mistake he meant, however his statement turned out to be true, they reached the workshop after just 8 more minutes. There they sat on the ground, using tables as back rests, and looked at or rather trough each other. Mica dozed off into sleep, while Koslov thought over their overall situation, unable to sleep.\n\n\n \nA few hours later the Puma woke up and looked at the wolf. At some point he had decided to only wear his Loincloth like herself.\n\n“He he, next time we should bring lighter clothing.” She breathed, stood up and stretched.\n\n“Sure, that’s a good resolution.” Answered the wolf to her surprise. He ignored her surprise and pointed at a clock behind her. “I double checked if the clock is correct, we nearly missed that today’s special.”\n\nThe clock had a digital display showing 23:59:56 31.12. Both looked at each other, counting the last seconds.\n\n“Happy New Year”, they simultaneously said unenthusiastic, not being in the mood to celebrate. Yet both smiled, finding absurdity in their situation. Koslov came over to her, handing over a hip flask. \n\n“It’s just water but sharing a drink is my packs new year’s tradition to ward of bad luck.” \n\nShe took one sip, expecting a cold liquid, not the warm water she got. Apparently, it showed in her face, because the wolf laughed. \n\n“Sorry for laughing. I used that pump just minutes ago, so the water inside still needs time to cool down.” \nInstead of a reaction to his laugh, she pulled his head down and gave him three quick licks between the ears. \n\n“That’s how my people ward of bad luck at new year.” She purred and pushed the hip flask against his chest.\n\nIt took her by surprise that the slightly larger wolf returned the licks before taking his hip flask. Afterwards, they made some jokes while filling every flask they had, not knowing when they’d get another chance for clean water.\n\n“It feels strange…”, the wolf begun out of the blue. “Only 264 years passed since the humans ‘ignited’ the moon but to us the moon was always like this.”\n\n“You really believe that?” Mica asked him surprised. “I mean, despite the videos telling otherwise, no one can get out the atmosphere.”\n\n“It was possible before the Ignition, the atmosphere got denser after that day.”\n\n“Yea right, and they had a moon base on the dark side…” \n\n“At least there are records of the international laws, which prohibit buildings on the visible site for aesthetics, and they had the technology in their early 22’nd century. And what else should have caused the Ignition?”\nThe puma had no answer to that, so she simply replied: “Ok, what do you think happened?”\n\n“Ok, but I only repeat what I heard, so I can’t answer question.” He cleared his throat, sat down and gestured for her to do the same. She followed that suggestion, just not the way he expected, as she placed herself close to him, barley not touching.\n\n“The Humans somehow calculated that there was something that the universe needed to have but they couldn’t perceive that something. This something they called Dark Matter. For several decades thy only ‘knew’ about that. Some guy, who’s name they later erased from history, developed the theory that allowed its use outside our atmosphere. Testing that Idea required a lot of space, space they had acquired on the moon only weeks before. The first success came a year later and created the original DM-Reactor, but all dark matter they created was instable and created the radiation we all live with today. Back then they only thought of it as an advanced power source. Another year later they found a way to create the restabilized dark matter, the stuff we know as dark matter and a needed material. The scientists got high on their achievements and created a total of 30 tons in dark matter, trying to make things out of it. This went on for another 2 years, before their government closed facility due to its high costs. Their greatest achievement wasn’t worth enough and turned into their greatest catastrophe when they turned off the machines.” \n\nHe stopped for a quick sip of water. \n\n“Dark matter needs its radiation to remain in the restabilized state, they found out the hard way. The 30 tons immediately went into the chain reaction we call the moon fire. It’s apparently not a flame, but a decomposition with so much energy, that it not only creates light but also pulls in the surrounding, natural existing dark matter and forces it into the reaction. Thanks to its size and endless supply of fuel, we now have the ultimate reactor orbiting our planet… It’s almost fascinating destabilized dark matter attracts dark matter in its natural state, but restabilized dark matter repels other dark matter, making the weapons it so got damn efficient.”\n\nThe wolf looked at the puma’s eyes, seemingly happy with his explanation. \n\n“Ok, I still have two questions”, she said with a thoughtful Face. “What has that to do with the denser atmosphere, our creation and humanity’s extinction? And more interesting, who told you that?”\n\nA short laughing emerged from the wolf. “I told you that I only heard it myself, so the first question I can’t give you a satisfying answer. All I know is, that the dark matter radiation caused many mutations, of which only us anthropomorphized and the titans were able to reproduce, although that might be a lie to hide a darker truth. And I know that titans are this resistant because they have dark matter embedded in their bones skins and whatever is on that skin. About the second question…”\n\nA grim silence filled the room. She glanced at his face. A face so full of frustration it sent shivers down her spine. More by instinct than conscious, she took his hand. \n\n“My cubs’ mother is the one who told me. But I, I had to fuck it up when…”. His voice broke, and he rested his free hand over his large scar. Pressing her hand, he continued with a voice so weak, she barley heard his words. “Just know that no revenge is justified, when it means to burn down bridges. Costs you everything you held dear. Hurt those you love.”\n\nThe mood had changed so quick from a mirthful easiness to a grim silence. She couldn’t look at him, feeling guilty for accidentally bringing it up, but she still felt him tremble. Not thinking about it, she snuggled against him and begun to purr, hoping to somehow help her distressed companion the way her mother did with her.\n\nShe didn’t know when, but at some point, his breathing slowed and became a soft snore. Short after she fell asleep too, sitting there, while hugging the wolf.\n\n\n\n\nWaking up hours later, still in the position they fall asleep in, both felt stiff with their backs hurting from the unfavourable position. Slowly they let go of each other, getting up after that did hurt with every little movement.\n\n“Damn it, I’m getting old” the wolf growled during stretching. \n\n“That’s not your age, only… ngh ahh.” The puma groaned in pain and relief at the same time, because she felt like a vertebra just jumped back into place. “That helped a bit. Where was I, oh yea, we shouldn’t have spent the night leaning on a workbench or a sitting position at all.”\n\nThe wolf turned his back far enough to look behind him, giving a groan himself. “That would have helped.” He turned back to her. “Hey Mica, thank you. If others ask, I will deny that this ever happened, but thank you. It felt good, not being left alone.” \n\nThe puma, in the middle of stretching her legs, nearly fall over Koslov’s statement. A few hastened steps later she regained her balance. “Next time, you can just come find me, I’ll be happy to help.” She answered with a kind voice before flicking her tail against his side. “And don’t worry, in front of others last night never happened to me. I already hear Simons’ jokes about cats and dogs”\n\nGlad that she stumbled to a place behind him, as the wolf needed all his self-control to keep his voice betraying his doubt: “Yeah, Larson would probably join him.” To himself he wondered, if they would meet their squats-members again, at least in this life.\n\nMica, not seeing his face, nearly monologed while stretching, telling Koslov her amused thoughts about the other members opinions, how her family would tease her, and other things. He laughed at some of her ideas, refused others with short answers, still he let her talk, thankful for the distraction. \n\n\n\nHalf an hour later, all three had eaten and were geared up. Despite being patched up like a he’d belong into a hospital, 4611 roamed the room on his four legs, unbothered by his wounds or the AGM’s weight on his side. \n\n“We still don’t know who’s used this base.” Koslov sighed. “But that’s not our priority.” With that sentence, he pressed a switch inside the lock gate. Less than a minute later, the streets awaited them, filled with 30 centimetres of fresh snow from the night. Five metres away, a short look back showed them a decaying building with a simple garage. \n\n“No one would have ever looked inside”, Mica whispered, feeling like she’d miss that place. “If not for that ceiling breaking under me, time would have just destroyed what little they left without anyone noticing.”\n\nThe wolf grumbled: “That DM-Reactor is worth too much, they planned on coming back, probably still do.” That said, he looked up to find an orientation, but between tower-blocks, even their ruins, it became hard to find the early morning sun. He still managed to orient himself to the east, where the closest base should be. Despite the higher snow, getting through the city’s ruins turned out to be easier than the day before, since now, they only need to keep the general direction and not following a trail from a being larger than themself. Finding a way however, got harder than before since the titan deer could no longer jump or climb safely with the AGM on his side. Leaving them only some streets they could use, they had to find passages through rubble or between buildings for most of the way, sometimes being forced to clear a way for the stag. \n\nBy the time the sun became visible over the city’s high ruins, they heard the first guns being fired, followed by the thunder of tank cannons. After they took a few seconds to listen, they realized that whoever fought there, stayed far south from their current location. They considered going towards battle, allies or not, they had a vehicle that would allow them to easier traverse the city. On the other side, an enemy with a tank posed an unbearable threat. They opted out to not go near the battle, instead they choose to take a detour leading them further away from the expectable danger. \n\nAt noon, with the sun at its highest, they had to take shelter in another ruin, exhauster from walking through the snow and clearing multiple piles of rubble for 4611. They sat down on larger pieces of rubble, stretching out their legs.\n\n“What do you think? How far did we go?” Mica asked out of curiosity, after the second alley entrance they had to clear, she lost track while regularly checking, if the unknown source still flooded the radio communication with music.\n\n“Actually walked, I’d say…” the wolf looked to the ceiling. “… about ten or eleven kilometres. Relative to our starting point, maybe seven, probably just six.”\n\nKoslov laughed embarrassed while pointing towards the deer. “Look at him, Abel still looks fit despite his load, and we’re already need a rest.”\n\nMica glanced over to the stag pawing the ground with his hoof. With a short giggle she turned her head towards a broken Window. Snow covert the ground in front of it, reaching nearly all the way to the rooms centre. When they entered, the building looked like the one they spent the night in, just another ruin in a city destroyed by urban warfare. The inside, however, was the polar opposite. Cold, dirty, just enough space to sit, somewhat sheltered from the snow, in other words the kind of place one would suspect in this city.\n\nOnce, they had rested for half an hour, Koslov stood up. “We should head out again. To reach the base with our provisions not fully depleted, we must get at least another 6 kilometres between us and that hideout.”\n\nTen minutes later, they reached the next pile of rubble. More out of procrastination than hoping for another outcome than before, they checked the radio for the 8th time the day. Like before, music greeted them. “Damn it, that fight south from us is already going for hours and they don’t need to communicate?” she cursed. \n\nThe distant noise of guns accompanied them since they had first heard them in the morning, raising the question who fought there. The wolf already reasoned that at least one state took part in the fight, simply stating that, following the convention from 21ATI, no private group could get that much ammunition. Naturally he didn’t believed in his own argument, but it helped, that states commonly attacked nests of dangerous titans. Depending on the nests, those missions were known to take anything from under an hour up to several days.\n\n“Ehm, Keetriv?” Mica asked, after they passed the rubble. “Isn’t the battle coming closer?” \n\nThe wolf’s ears perked up while he turned towards the south. He had no reason to answer verbally, his reaction made clear. Unwilling to learn the truth about the fight, they picked up the pace, breaking through obstacles by either using the AGM or letting 4611 shoving things away. \n\nTwo hours after nightfall temperature and the high snow had worn them off. Unable to go further they entered the remains of what turned out being a former cinema. They stumbled into the first auditorium – only those had double doors, wide enough for the titan – and barricaded the doors by shoving a trenching tool behind the handles. Moments after, privates and titan had unwillingly fallen asleep, warming each other in the cold hall.\n\n\n\n“We have more luck than we should.” Koslov grumbled at the next morning, walking to the door. He pulled the trenching tool from the door, breaking of both handles by accident. “Those old doors can’t stop anyone willing to enter.”\n\n“Not like we’ve done that on purpose.” Mica answered while stretching. “Besides you can hear that the battle is still far away.” \n\nBoth silently looked into each other’s face, slowly realizing, that the cinemas four walls dampened sounds with a high efficiency, exactly the way they’re supposed to. They never felt more thankful about that the standard rations being packets of nutrient mash, quick to eat, lasted for half a day, although with the trade-off that it tasted as bad as it looked. Thus, all three were ready to go after just five minutes.\n\nAfter the previous day, they had no realistic option to these five minutes, they still regret the time taken. Carefully opening the door, the puma saw armed figures running through violet glowing snow past the cinema, with short stops behind every cover they found, shooting back at an unseen enemy, covering their brothers-in-arms.\n\nSince she didn’t spot anything to tell the fighters affiliations, she stayed hiding. Another problem came from the sounds, with the door open, the privates could hear tank tracks running over the debris. Short after the first group got out of her sight, a second, smaller group of 20 people appeared hunting the first. A searchlight moved over them before turning further ahead. The few moments the light shown on the pursuers gave Mica enough time to recognize their affiliation.\n\n“It’s the URC. The hunt some other…” A loud explosion interrupted her explanation followed by a yell.\n\n“FOR THE FFC” With these words a third group attacked the URC-soldiers, putting them into a pincer situation with the first group, who joined in with the third’s battle cry. 4 soldiers fell within the first minute, before they found cover. A fifth fall in the second minute, then the tide turned a second time, as a second URC-tank came out of a ruin opposite to the cinema.\n\n“Fuck”, Koslov growled. “Open that door, we survived the start of another fucking war with the URC and didn’t even knew.”\n\nMica followed the order, pushed the door open and took aim herself. Her first volley took the enemies by surprise, killing one and wounding another. Her second volley ended the wounded, before she sprinted to a counter for a better position. Besides getting the remaining 14 enemies to hide in their coverings, her actions also led to the tank turning his cannon towards her. Glimpsing over the counter, she felt like looking death itself in front of her, as she saw the tank’s barrel aiming directly for her. But instead of the cannon’s flash, a violet beam went through the tank, causing a chain-reaction detonating first the fuel, then the ammunition inside.\n\nQuietly thanking the gods, the puma saw how Koslov dove into cover behind another counter with the DM-12-LR in one hand and his own standard rifle in the other. From there he took aim, waiting for a hostile target to show. She turned around her cover and did the same, praying, that the URC-Soldiers would surrender, but they didn’t. For two minutes nothing happened, 14 URCs surrounded and outnumbered by the Soldiers of the FFC. In the third minute they jumped out, guns blazing with crazy looks in their eyes. Seconds later, all 14 were dead. \n\nA minute after the last shots echo faded, Mica still kneeled, shaking with the rifle aimed were their enemies stood, realizing that she killed for the first time. Koslov came to her, took her rifle and then hugged the puma, saying nothing he only stayed with her, silently greeting the other FFC-soldiers coming inside the cinema.\n\n\n\n\n\n[center]Two years later:[/center]\n\n“That was a banger”, Mica cheered into the microphone on the desk front of her, sitting there with an e-guitar on her lab. “But I have to say goodbye, next on are my lovely colleagues from the Black Nights Show. But before that we here at FC-Rock…” She paused and played a 3-second riff on the guitar. “…like to give smaller artists a chance. Especially when they treat your ears like Rosebleed and the title song of her latest Album. So, here’s Rosebleed and Meet You After.” \n\nOne press on a button and the microphone turned off. From behind the glass the Bat gave her a thumb up. With a melancholic smile the Puma pushed her wheelchair back from the table, turning to the side. With a lot of struggles, she stretched her legs upwards and moved her paws. After a few short seconds, her legs fell down again, leaving her sitting exhausted but purring. Grabbing the dog tag at her guitar’s headstock, she looked up to the ceiling. \n\n“Did you see, I even moved my toes. Soon I will walk again, and then I can finally come and stand before you, proudly showing you who I’ve become.” \n\nShe forced herself to purr the words, while tears were in her eyes. The day he died was burned into her memory, his last words still in her ears. “You know, wherever they are, I’ll find them, even got help, and then I tell your kids, that your last words were directed at them. Tell them that you never forgot them, that you wished to tell them how sorry you were.”\n\nA nocking let her turn her head. A second knocking came from the door, somebody wished to enter the recording studio. She let go off the dog tag. After briefly wiping her face, she rolled to the door and opened. On the other side three wolf teens greeted her, standing there with their mother. \n\n“Hi, we got a letter from a staff sergeant, saying you’re searching us?” The woman said. \n\nMica looked at the four, taken by surprise. “Erm, erm…” Shaking her head she finally found the words. Looking at the mother she asked: “Are you Emilia Ševčuk?” \n\nThe young wolves all looked to their mother, curious what would happen. Emilia only nodded.\n\n“Then please, let us go to the break area, this might take a while.”\n\nOnly a few rooms down the floor all five sat around a table, and Mica told them about their father’s death and the 16 month she served at his side. The story of the one who saved her life, the war hero Koslov Keetrev, Sergeant postmortem.","writing_bbcode_parsed":"WHERE IT BEGUN
„…UP. TO. OUR. NECKS.“, the anthropomorph wolf had kept is voice low. He didn’t need to yell. Looking into Private Mica Morez’ light reflecting eyes with a growl in each word already made her crawl backwards, deeper into their dark hideout and away from him. She didn’t like the thought, that Koslov might be right, wanting for him to be wrong. But him being a veteran with multiple successful missions on record – including one only he survived – gave his opinion a credibility she had nothing to hold against, especially since she had no experience beyond the training. She only knew that she would do anything to survive her first mission.
‘He’s still a Private like me‘, the puma thought to herself. ‘All we need to do is finding a way out.’
Looking around for an idea, only darkness, the way to the outside and the wolf’s grumpy face – barley illuminated from the snow’s reflection – awaited her searching eyes. It made it harder for her, not believing his words. They hid from a murder of titan crows, had both no backpack and stuck inside the ruins of an ancient, war-torn town. Like he said, their chances were close to zero, but they had weapons, so at least they could die trying.
Should one come inside, wouldn’t be the hard part to kill that 1.2-meter-large beast, with luck the second would die too, after that they would have a problem. She only had a standard rifle that required precise shooting and luck against to drive away a titan or even kill it. Her only, questionable advantage was, that she kept four extra mags inside her pockets, which meant, that – despite losing their backpacks – she had a total of 150 rounds of standard ammunition.
The advantage over the first rave came from Private Koslov Keetriv. The HQ gave him a DMW-12-LR, an officially still experimental weapon with the ability to shoot through a heavy tank from 800 meters and near infinite ammunition in exchange for an extremely low fire rate. Technically part of the first gen of portable energy weapons, instead of using bullets, the DMW-12-LR recharged its three capacitors through its DM-generator, but also empty all three for one shot.
The good side, Koslov would kill with each hit. The bad side, the DMG-12 models would charge for 40 seconds per emptied capacitor, leaving Mica fighting alone for two minutes minimum.
“Hey, Keetriv? Do you think, we can…”, Mica shifted her weight forward, suddenly feeling how something foundered beneath her.
“MOREZ!” His shocked yell was the last she heard before hitting something with her head.
The wolf leaned over the hole, which had appeared under the anthropomorph puma, seeing her lying two floors below in dim light. Despite his shock he recognised the old missile next to her head and after 5 long seconds, he heard her groaning, proving clearly that Mica’s survived the fall.
The wolf quickly found a way down to his comrade by using the remains of the floor between as a hold. Landing on the floor he first checked her body for any possible bleeding. “Don’t you dare losing conscious or have a serious wound. 4611 took our first aid kits with him, when that damned buck decided to run, so we’re down to the bandage in my pockets.”
“Hey, am not dying and don’t bleed.” Mica groaned, still groggy from the fall. “I’m lucky enough to only get some bruises and a headache, but falling two stories still hurts. So please give me a minute while we’re warm ‘n’ save.”
Koslov stared at her for a moment. Traces of snow still covered their boots, the titan crows could attack at every moment, they had only the equipment on their bodies and… she didn’t hallucinate, despite the cold air coming from the hole in the ceiling, warm air filled most of the room. Looking around, he recognized several other strange things. The well-maintained rocket, placed in a rack on the – for a ruin from the last war – practically clean ground. With the missing ceiling here should be more than two decades’ worth of dust and debris from the floor above, but all around them came from Mica’s fall plus maybe a week since the last dusting. The most suspect thing however, he could actually see because a lamps light shown through the doorway.
“Morez, on your paws and weapon ready.” He whispered the command, to which she reacted. With her weapon pointed to the ceiling and no raven in sight, she clearly didn’t realise the strange state of the room. So, covering her forehead with a hand, the puma lowered the rifle.
“Darn it Keetriv. My head hurts and we found a warm and clean room in the middle of these snow-covered town ruins. Can’t I ha-.“ She scanned the room with her eyes. “Isn’t the town uninhabited since the last war? For my whole life this city is considered deserted, so who the hell lives between wild titans, just to keep this place clean, illuminated and heated till now? And why did they leave a missile here. Especially a one that looks well maintained?”
“Glad you didn’t hurt your head too much”, joked Koslov nervously before he added in a more serious tone: “You’re right, it’s 25 years now. I was nine when they gave up on it. Still, just because there’s no reaction from any inhabitants so far, it doesn’t mean there aren’t any. How about I keep watch and you look what exactly we’ve found. Maybe it tells us something about the owner.”
Ignoring the sarcastic tone during his proposal, Mica just gave him a thumb up and turned to the rocket. The dim light proved no challenge to her feline eyes, but the visible side offered no identifier or hint that could tell her, who built the weapon or what type of missile they’ve found. With one firm grip and a strained moan, she managed to turn the missile around, presenting its other side having some prominent letters on it.
“Ehm, Keetriv? Why is here a weapon from before the Ignition? Or do they build those again?”
“What do you mean, build these again?” His voice turned serious with concern. “Is that one of those illegal WMD?”
“No, I think not. It says AGM-88.” After a few seconds of thinking she continued: “According to the books it should be designed to destroy radars. Only why would anyone need that? Before the Ignition those might had a use, but nowadays larger birds can be seen on a radar. No to mention, those birds of prey that hunt anything flying below Mach1.”
The Wolf sighted in relief bevor scratching his ear thinking about an answer. “Stonebiter’s base might have a use for that and should be close by. They’ve been looking for a way to get through the Graypelt fort’s air defences.”
“Stonebiter’s base? There is no such base in the…” Mica stopped mid-sentence when the Wolf suddenly laughed.
“Stonebiter is a nickname. The base’s supply officer, a Bull named López, apparently earned that nickname when within his first few days of training. The base is better known under the name…”
A clattering sound from the ceiling had them both aiming at the hole, but seconds later they could see and hear how their former hiding space partially collapsed when some more rubble fell into the room.
“Well, we should look for a way out and for Titan 4611. Besides the fact, that we will need our rations and water, which he should carry, he’s strong enough to carry the AGM.”
“And how do we find our runaway? It’s not like we could use his tracker. The sarge carries the receiver, and…”
Both shuddered as they remembered what happened just hours ago.
“We probably shouldn’t have cursed about that deer. Although accidentally, he probably saved our lives.”
…
3.5 hours earlier:
The squad had a simple job. Protecting a small group of traders traveling through a mostly pacified region from one city to another. The worst things in the lands should have been the megafauna hiding in the town’s ruins or the woods they had to pass, but the squad included two titans themself. The white tail deer 4611 as an additional transport unit and the armoured wolf 4444 that could substitute for another small squad with heavy weaponry. Since they travelled by foot or sat in a coach, only snow and temperature prevented it from feeling like a two-week camping trip, or so they thought.
As they were packing up their camp on the fifth day, something detonated near the small caravan, Private Mica Morez and Private Koslov Keetriv hat the luck to be on the opposite side of a carriage. Titan 4611, who stood a metre behind them, however, got hit to the side. It wasn’t enough to penetrate a titan’s skin, yet enough to cause minor bruises making the stag to stumble, fell and panic. Both privates jumped to him, trying to appease the 3.5-meter-tall and nearly-6-meter-long titan, but the moment 4611 got up his harness’ hooks caught onto the two privates backpacks and jackets. The titan easily lifted both from the ground, non the less, they caused a sudden increase in weight and fuelled the stag’s panic, to which he reacted by sprinting away, carrying one surprised solder on each side.
While the deer quickly fled into the close by ruins and around buildings. It still needed enough time for Koslov to see, how two RPGs killed the titan wolf. Already behind buildings, the recognized a short exchange of fire by sound, yet unable to help.
By the time they freed themselves, the privates neither heard shots to orient themselves nor did they know the way the deer had carried them with its 60km/h run. They tried to look to 4611, only to find out, that he had run even further, beyond the area they could overlook. When they realized that they the radio pack still hung on 4611 harness – together with most of their equipment – and that Koslov couldn’t reach anyone with his walkie-talkie, the puma fell into a screaming fit, cursing the titan, his speed, their bad luck and the world in general.
“We must find that deer”, she finally said after calming down. “When se tell HQ what happen, they will find the attackers and…”
Koslov interrupted her: “Were in the middle of winter in a snow-covered ruin, we shouldn’t lose 4611’s tracks unless it snows again. But there we’ll have to see if we can contact anyone.”
Mica gave little protest about his words, since he agreed on searching the titan and they ended up silently walking through the snow, accompanied by the silence of a dead city, only disturbed by the crunching of snow under their soles. On several occasion they had to carefully walk around craters in the snow – visible because the titan just walked through the 2 metres deep snow-filled holes – or find ways around debris the stag just jumped during his flight. After one hour, they felt frustrated, after the second, they wondered, if they still followed 4611 and when they closed in on the second and half hour, they felt watched.
Another fifteen minutes later, they trail led up a four-story-high hill of debris between two mostly collapsed tower-blocks.
While exchanging irritated looks, wondering, why the titan chose that way, they felt like they came to far to stop. So, they choose to climb to the top, using it as an overlook to see where the trail would lead. It was there, that a crow’s caw let them spot the murder and their clear interest into something at that building. Not seeing any other possible target, Mica raised her gun to defend themselves, but her comrade just shoved her through a window into a narrow tunnel within the debris behind it and followed short after.
…
“The receiver might be gone, but I’ve been told that the signal creates problem during radio communication on the highest frequence we use.” Mica thought out loud. “The walkie-talkie should be able to receive that. Sadly, the signal’s barely spreading there, so it would be hard to hear between the normal static… unless were close by and…”
Koslov’s ears had perked up. “Wait, we can actually use the tracker with our current equipment?” The wolfs tail even begun to wag slowly, since that gave them a way better chance to reach a base.
“Aaand…”, the puma repeated: “we won’t hear anything unless were within 100 metres or less, since we can’t tune your walkie-talkie up to the main frequence.” She walked over to the doorframe next to him, thought for 5 second and added: “Well, it might be more like 50 metres, don’t know what these walls made of.”
Kozlov’s mood dropped visibly. It would help, if the stag would hide, but they searched a deer, meaning that even with a hundred metres, they’d most likely see him before hearing the signal. “We may be better off looking for the inhabitants instead.” He thought out loud. “No matter if they’re here or left some days ago, we should be able to find intel and something we could use.”
“Wait, you want to rob someone you don’t know?” Her voice and body language both made clear, that she hated the thought.
“Rob? You’ve hit your head on a well maintained looking military missile’s rack… in a place where no person should be. This is either a secret base that violates the peace treaty from 238 with its existence or we’re inside a bandit hideout. In Both cases, we’re doing nothing bad.”
After that, the wolf – ready to go – pulled his weapon up, hit the wall and cursed: “Fuck, why didn’t I kept the BMG strapped to the side of my backpack?”
With a sigh, the puma tapped against his knife, mentioning: “That might be better in this area.”
“It doesn’t work well under fire.” The wolf growled, more to his weapon than to her. He still gave it a thought before actually securing his weapon. When he grabbed for his knife, Mica held her rifle out to him.
“You’re the combat specialist and my head still hurt a bit.” She looked him in the eyes, to reinforce her words. “But our militaries purpose is to protect citizens, so please make sure you’re not mistaken.”
He took the rifle and turned through the door into the hallway. “Don’t worry, I don’t want to shoot at civilians either.”
They quickly learned that someone sealed of most parts of at least two floors and partly reinforced rooms. In the upper floor, where they had entered, six rooms could be entered, all seemed to be used as improvised storage units. They took the time to look through each of them, but only marks on the floor showed, where crates or the like once were placed. They only found out, that in each room, someone removed the ceiling to the floor above.
One floor below awaited them with ten closed doors. Slowly, carefully advancing, they found the first eight doors to lead into bedrooms with a total of 21 simple spring beds plus one better with an actual mattress on it. The nineth room they assumed to be a canteen, large, with enough tables and seatings to accommodate 30 people. Opening the last door, the two soldiers stepped into a second stairway, that only let them decent further to a third floor, leading in a different direction, away from the street the original came from.
But bevor they reached the last step, a dark, metallic thunder let Koslov and Mica stop in shock. Down the hallway something heavy just hit a massive metal plate. In the following silence, they listened carefully for any possible sound, until they felt sure, that other sound reached them. As they made the last steps down the Staircase, the wolf gave the rifle back to Mica.
“Why?”, she whispered into his ear. “The DMG is for long range. You cursed yourself because you’re left with the Rifle not suited for the area.”
“I’m probably better off using a weapon with more impact”, he whispered back. “Because in my experience, you need either a battering ram or a titan to create a sound like that. But I can’t be sure, and it’s better to be safe than sorry.”
Mica didn’t argue when she heard titan, readied her weapon, and took the vanguard. In front of her, only three doors led out of the hallway, one to the left, leading deeper inside the building, one placed on the opposite site from the two soldiers and the last at the one to the right, to a room that should face a street.
The Puma quietly moved to the nearest door, which happened to be one on the left side. Afraid that a feral titan could be on the other side, she slowly and silent opened the door, ignoring everything she had learned. Looking in into the room, they only found empty tables, bearing clear signs that the former inhabitants used this place as a kitchen.
“For the next room, kick the door in. No matter if a person or titan is on the other side, we must NOT give them a chance to see us coming.” Despite the emphasized ‘NOT’ Koslov didn’t sounded angry, and more like he just gave a simple reminder. Mica still let her ears hanging feeling ashamed, that she needed the reminder. The wolf didn’t paid attention to her reaction while taking position at the next door. She shook her head trying to get her thoughts straight, but instead of focusing, a thought irritated her.
“Is it just me or shouldn’t at least one room we found have a second door?”, the puma murmured before getting ready for the next room.
“I think this wasn’t a building to live in. Many small rooms and only a few larger.” He pointed at the door and quipped. “After kicking that door in, a former storeroom might show.”
Mica took a good look at the door and saw no hinges. She pushed down the handle with her rifle and simultaneously pushed through the door with her shoulder. This way she stormed the room just to nearly fall onto a counter. Like Koslov joked, she just entered a former salesroom but only the counter and racks along the walls showed proof of its original use. Where shelfs should be, a large, four-legged table surrounded by blackboards stood prominent in the middle, creating the impression of a command room. On the rooms opposite side, the whole dormer front now only presented wooden barricades with no light coming through despites visible holes. Despite no visible thread or hiding place inside the room, the puma slowly checked the room. When she reached the barricaded windows, she looked through a hole. Outside the snow glowed in a violet light causing Mica to shudder.
“Well, it’s night already.” She growled to herself. “How I hate this unnatural, violet glow from the moon fires’ shine.”
She walked back to the hallway, where Koslov stood ready to shoot at the last closed door. She cast a quick glance the wooden door, saw that she needed to pull it open and grabbed its handle. She gave it a quick pull before quickly aiming with her rifle through the doorway. Through her rifles tactical visor, she saw a vacated repair shop with high ceiling and filled with a generator’s humming. For the first time since the missile, they actual found useful equipment, but there were also many possible spots to hide. After a carefully search, that included a functioning restroom connected to the repair shop, only a thick metallic gate left to be searched. In big letters it had the word ‘LOCK GATE’ written over it.
“Look at that”, Koslov said in an almost happy tone. “Now we Know where that sound came from.”
“And over here is also the local power source.” Mica answered, pointing to a semi-portable DM-Reactor mounted to the wall over the gate’s controls.
“What? Why should someone install that here?” Koslov couldn’t think of any reason for a DM-Reactor in a seemingly cleared out Basem or any outpost this small.
Meanwhile Mica looked over their finding. “Strange… Each of those costs more than ten state of the art radio pack sets… Yet not even a stamp to prove a simple product inspection.”
When she leaned forwards to take a closer look, her rifle’s stock striated a switch on the controls. Without a second of delay, a bright red LED turned on. Both privates stared down to the light, afraid of what they might have caused. After five seconds it switched to a bright green followed by the metallic gate slowly being lifted with an unwilling moan-like metallic sound. Mica and Koslov sprinted behind the first cover they found, aiming for the gate. Each second felt like minutes in which the gate barely moved. The puma licked her lips and tightened the grip around her weapon while the wolf instinctively tucked his tails between his legs. Neither inside nor around the lock gate a light had been installed, so the moment they could see under the Gate, they stared into darkness. When it opened its first 60 centimetres, a crow fell into sight with a wet smacking sound. The beast had its torso crushed and from the head remained little mor than bloody pulp, while a small amount of blood dropped from the gate onto the body.
Mica (who had aimed for its head) swallowed hard, she knew that whatever killed the crow would be able to hunt a tank. Killing her and Koslov wouldn’t mean any challenge to that monstrous beast.
Then the Plate reached the first metre. Finally enough light found its way to the other side to allow to see a bit further inside. “You gotta be kidding me.” The wolf exclaimed, as light reached three more fresh crow cadavers. His grip hardened around his gun, while he looked for whatever caused that.
When the gate reached 1.5 metres, they saw cloven hooves. As the light reached higher, brown legs shown and the belt of s backpack hanging on the beast’s visible side.
“4611?”, breathed the wolf, while slowly more of the deer became visible. Blood run in thin line down its sides, while his breath created a thin mist in the air. Despite knowing the deer, the blood-stained pelt and visible breath from the dark let fear sink its cold claws inside their hearts. Every recruit knew stories about titans turning into wild, bloodthirsty beasts without any warning. Stories creating images fitting to what little they saw of 4611.
Both Privates saw their weapons tremble in their hands. For Koslov the situation turned worse the moment they recognized him while Mica never had killed before. Despite being a tamed animal, the titan was part of their squat and trusted companion. They tightened their grips, as the titan’s wounds became visible. Over his pelt cuts and wholes showed a clear picture drew a clear picture of what had happened inside the lock gate.
The 15 seconds since they took cover, felt like hours passed by, when his head became visible. The titan mustered the solders with his other eye while they did the same with him. From the distance they couldn’t see any serious wounds, but many minor ones including a bleeding cut above his left eye forced him to keep it shut. 4611 lowered his head pointing his blood-stained antlers to them, with feathers still sticking on them. He made one slow step towards them, then a second and a third. Mica couldn’t even aim clearly, unable to convince herself guilt filled conscious that the stag posed a thread. Meanwhile Koslov took aim through teary eyes, but the stag reached the gate before the wolf managed to aim for the head.
“I’m sorry. Hoped it never happens again, but we need to survive. I’ll make it quick so please don’t resent me.”
4611 fell. No shot was fired, yet the stag lied on the ground, not moving.
“C-ca-can we g-get close?”, the puma asked shaken. The wolf didn’t know how to answer, didn’t know what they just witnessed, didn't know if their companion ever posed a threat to them. They closed the distance towards the titan step by step, staying on high alert.
The deer’s flank slowly rose and fall in the steady tact of a sleeping being. Nothing changed about that when they finally reached him. He slept while they removed all the equipment, didn’t moved when they checked and cleaned its wounds. He not even reacted to wolf and puma turning him on his other side to tread the wounds there. If not for the deer’s breathing, they’d assumed 4611 to be dead.
“Those damned sadistic crows”, Mica growled while they applied first aid on the stag other side, speaking the first words since they began. “He had run for who knows how long, and here they stressed him to the point, that he collapsed as soon as he was safe.”
“These crows won’t do that anymore.” The wolf answered. “Attacking him in that small room gave them what they had coming.” After a short silence he spoke again. “Hey… Morez, I know you’re supposed to contact HQ as fast as possible, but can you please leave the talking to me? You’d still need to make the connection… just leave the room after that and let me do the report. I feel like this is no burden you must shoulder yet.”
The puma turned her ears backwards and looked at his face, but seeing his expression made her forget her anger. He had that look only veterans could give, showing a pain one had to experience to understand.
Her voice changed to a neutral tone. “Let’s first finish here. Then I’ll think about it.”
Once the deer’s treatment got finished, they stepped back. Mica took off her winter uniform, grabbed the radio pack and walked over to a workbench. Not further thinking for the reason, why this room had more than furniture left behind, she looked over the old, well-maintained tools until she found all she was looking for. Koslov stood behind her looking in awe, while she checked the six-pound heavy three-piece radio. Thoroughly working, she even dismantled parts of it, knowing where less resistant pieces were to be found. After ten minutes the puma gave a satisfied purr and turned to the wolf.
“Despite my apprehension, that Abel’s fight could have damaged the Radio, it is fully functional.”
The wolf looked a few seconds dump folded, before a smile found its way to his face. The deer finally got a nickname, nothing special with a story behind, but given by a squat-member. A point that remembered him of the more pressing matter. Koslov gave Mica a thankful blink, before asking her by gesture to continue. The moment she turned back to the radio, he felt his mood drop again, knowing the report he would give in just seconds.
Both, wolf and puma jumped, when the radio sprung to live. With no warning whatsoever, the sound of thundering drums and screaming guitars filled the room.
Quicker adjusting to the strange situation, Mica reacted by turning down the volume.
“What is that noise?” Koslov asked her with the shock still in his eyes.
“Thrash Metal”, answered the puma, closing her eyes to listen. “More precisely it’s Corpse Burning Carnage with their song Gorehunt Under A Violent Moon. I actually did try to learn that guitar solo when I was thirteen, turned out to be a duet.”
“What?”
“I tried to…”
“You like that?”, the wolf specified his question.
“It helped me to vent when my hormones went haywire… and after dad’s squamates brought us his dog tag.” She answered while trying to find a free channel. “Nowadays its just a strange nostalgia.”
It took them the better half of an hour to give up on finding a free channel. Someone played different jammed them all by simply playing differently themed playlist over all the frequencies they could use.
Mica turned the Radio off and slammed her flat hand on the table. “Damn it.” With a sigh she turned to the wolf. “Well, we must stay for the night either way. So… Do you try to get a heat stroke? Because that bullet-proofed padding only stores heat without protecting against Abel’ antlers.”
The wolf had to admit, that the uniform felt too hot, still he disliked the thought of walking nearly bare furred in front of a woman. “You know, you cats might be androgynous, but we…”
“No buts.” She interrupted him. “I didn’t tell you to fully strip down to your fur. At least take off that coat.”
Her tone remembered him off his mother and he didn’t even realize, when his padded coat fell to the ground. He just stood there, suddenly topless in front of that puma casually wearing only her loincloth.
“See, its better.” She said amused, while she looked around until her eyes found a workbench with a mount for missiles that someone had crudely welded together. “Ha, as I thought, they tinkered with missiles down here.”
Turning back to the wolf, she fell silent seeing his upper body, before she could say what she wanted. The grey pelt couldn’t cover several scars, most originated clearly from bullets or small cuts, but one long scar from his left shoulder to his right hip seemingly divided his torso into two. With him being a veteran, she expected to see scars in his pelt, just not one that looks this life threatening.
“How did you…”
“Survive? I shouldn’t have… but please let us not talk about this story.” His expression showed that unexplainable pain again, and the puma forced herself to look away.
“We should bring that AGM-88 down here, so we can preserve our strength tomorrow morning.”
They walked over to the gate, where the saw a modified heavy-duty carrier.
“They even left that fancy thing here. Whatever caused them to leaf, they suddenly had to leave mid packing.”
It took them a few minutes to figure out the controls, not only had each wheel its own break and hight adjustment, but the controls also needed one person in frond and a second behind the carrier. Once they felt confident with it, they tried on the stairs. It took them 15 minutes to reach the missile, with leaving it as the only other choice. Even with no fuel, carrying an AGM-88 safely down a stairway required at least more persons or a machine like the carrier they had. Five minute later they had the weapon secured on the carrier, ready to return to the workshop. The way back turned out to be even harder. After the first four steps, the carrier nearly crushed Koslov, who had decided to walk in front. 10 minutes later, they finally reached the last of 12 steps to the middle floor, both heavily panting from the stress they’ve felt with every step down.
“Next stair… we have… to go…. faster. This slow… and the… the stress… kills me.” Mica said between her breaths. The simple thought of the second staircase exhausted her, but the prospect of doing it the next day felt even worse.
That she got no answer caused her a slight anxiety, that Koslov’s might have a heart attack. She looked to the wolf, to be surprised by his – despite the heavy panting – resolute face. He clearly thought about something, clearly to stubborn to give up. He first spoke after they regained their breath: “Then let’s go. The next stair has 20 steps, but I’m sure we’re faster than before. I’ve figured out, what I did wrong.”
He didn’t explain what mistake he meant, however his statement turned out to be true, they reached the workshop after just 8 more minutes. There they sat on the ground, using tables as back rests, and looked at or rather trough each other. Mica dozed off into sleep, while Koslov thought over their overall situation, unable to sleep.
A few hours later the Puma woke up and looked at the wolf. At some point he had decided to only wear his Loincloth like herself.
“He he, next time we should bring lighter clothing.” She breathed, stood up and stretched.
“Sure, that’s a good resolution.” Answered the wolf to her surprise. He ignored her surprise and pointed at a clock behind her. “I double checked if the clock is correct, we nearly missed that today’s special.”
The clock had a digital display showing 23:59:56 31.12. Both looked at each other, counting the last seconds.
“Happy New Year”, they simultaneously said unenthusiastic, not being in the mood to celebrate. Yet both smiled, finding absurdity in their situation. Koslov came over to her, handing over a hip flask.
“It’s just water but sharing a drink is my packs new year’s tradition to ward of bad luck.”
She took one sip, expecting a cold liquid, not the warm water she got. Apparently, it showed in her face, because the wolf laughed.
“Sorry for laughing. I used that pump just minutes ago, so the water inside still needs time to cool down.”
Instead of a reaction to his laugh, she pulled his head down and gave him three quick licks between the ears.
“That’s how my people ward of bad luck at new year.” She purred and pushed the hip flask against his chest.
It took her by surprise that the slightly larger wolf returned the licks before taking his hip flask. Afterwards, they made some jokes while filling every flask they had, not knowing when they’d get another chance for clean water.
“It feels strange…”, the wolf begun out of the blue. “Only 264 years passed since the humans ‘ignited’ the moon but to us the moon was always like this.”
“You really believe that?” Mica asked him surprised. “I mean, despite the videos telling otherwise, no one can get out the atmosphere.”
“It was possible before the Ignition, the atmosphere got denser after that day.”
“Yea right, and they had a moon base on the dark side…”
“At least there are records of the international laws, which prohibit buildings on the visible site for aesthetics, and they had the technology in their early 22’nd century. And what else should have caused the Ignition?”
The puma had no answer to that, so she simply replied: “Ok, what do you think happened?”
“Ok, but I only repeat what I heard, so I can’t answer question.” He cleared his throat, sat down and gestured for her to do the same. She followed that suggestion, just not the way he expected, as she placed herself close to him, barley not touching.
“The Humans somehow calculated that there was something that the universe needed to have but they couldn’t perceive that something. This something they called Dark Matter. For several decades thy only ‘knew’ about that. Some guy, who’s name they later erased from history, developed the theory that allowed its use outside our atmosphere. Testing that Idea required a lot of space, space they had acquired on the moon only weeks before. The first success came a year later and created the original DM-Reactor, but all dark matter they created was instable and created the radiation we all live with today. Back then they only thought of it as an advanced power source. Another year later they found a way to create the restabilized dark matter, the stuff we know as dark matter and a needed material. The scientists got high on their achievements and created a total of 30 tons in dark matter, trying to make things out of it. This went on for another 2 years, before their government closed facility due to its high costs. Their greatest achievement wasn’t worth enough and turned into their greatest catastrophe when they turned off the machines.”
He stopped for a quick sip of water.
“Dark matter needs its radiation to remain in the restabilized state, they found out the hard way. The 30 tons immediately went into the chain reaction we call the moon fire. It’s apparently not a flame, but a decomposition with so much energy, that it not only creates light but also pulls in the surrounding, natural existing dark matter and forces it into the reaction. Thanks to its size and endless supply of fuel, we now have the ultimate reactor orbiting our planet… It’s almost fascinating destabilized dark matter attracts dark matter in its natural state, but restabilized dark matter repels other dark matter, making the weapons it so got damn efficient.”
The wolf looked at the puma’s eyes, seemingly happy with his explanation.
“Ok, I still have two questions”, she said with a thoughtful Face. “What has that to do with the denser atmosphere, our creation and humanity’s extinction? And more interesting, who told you that?”
A short laughing emerged from the wolf. “I told you that I only heard it myself, so the first question I can’t give you a satisfying answer. All I know is, that the dark matter radiation caused many mutations, of which only us anthropomorphized and the titans were able to reproduce, although that might be a lie to hide a darker truth. And I know that titans are this resistant because they have dark matter embedded in their bones skins and whatever is on that skin. About the second question…”
A grim silence filled the room. She glanced at his face. A face so full of frustration it sent shivers down her spine. More by instinct than conscious, she took his hand.
“My cubs’ mother is the one who told me. But I, I had to fuck it up when…”. His voice broke, and he rested his free hand over his large scar. Pressing her hand, he continued with a voice so weak, she barley heard his words. “Just know that no revenge is justified, when it means to burn down bridges. Costs you everything you held dear. Hurt those you love.”
The mood had changed so quick from a mirthful easiness to a grim silence. She couldn’t look at him, feeling guilty for accidentally bringing it up, but she still felt him tremble. Not thinking about it, she snuggled against him and begun to purr, hoping to somehow help her distressed companion the way her mother did with her.
She didn’t know when, but at some point, his breathing slowed and became a soft snore. Short after she fell asleep too, sitting there, while hugging the wolf.
Waking up hours later, still in the position they fall asleep in, both felt stiff with their backs hurting from the unfavourable position. Slowly they let go of each other, getting up after that did hurt with every little movement.
“Damn it, I’m getting old” the wolf growled during stretching.
“That’s not your age, only… ngh ahh.” The puma groaned in pain and relief at the same time, because she felt like a vertebra just jumped back into place. “That helped a bit. Where was I, oh yea, we shouldn’t have spent the night leaning on a workbench or a sitting position at all.”
The wolf turned his back far enough to look behind him, giving a groan himself. “That would have helped.” He turned back to her. “Hey Mica, thank you. If others ask, I will deny that this ever happened, but thank you. It felt good, not being left alone.”
The puma, in the middle of stretching her legs, nearly fall over Koslov’s statement. A few hastened steps later she regained her balance. “Next time, you can just come find me, I’ll be happy to help.” She answered with a kind voice before flicking her tail against his side. “And don’t worry, in front of others last night never happened to me. I already hear Simons’ jokes about cats and dogs”
Glad that she stumbled to a place behind him, as the wolf needed all his self-control to keep his voice betraying his doubt: “Yeah, Larson would probably join him.” To himself he wondered, if they would meet their squats-members again, at least in this life.
Mica, not seeing his face, nearly monologed while stretching, telling Koslov her amused thoughts about the other members opinions, how her family would tease her, and other things. He laughed at some of her ideas, refused others with short answers, still he let her talk, thankful for the distraction.
Half an hour later, all three had eaten and were geared up. Despite being patched up like a he’d belong into a hospital, 4611 roamed the room on his four legs, unbothered by his wounds or the AGM’s weight on his side.
“We still don’t know who’s used this base.” Koslov sighed. “But that’s not our priority.” With that sentence, he pressed a switch inside the lock gate. Less than a minute later, the streets awaited them, filled with 30 centimetres of fresh snow from the night. Five metres away, a short look back showed them a decaying building with a simple garage.
“No one would have ever looked inside”, Mica whispered, feeling like she’d miss that place. “If not for that ceiling breaking under me, time would have just destroyed what little they left without anyone noticing.”
The wolf grumbled: “That DM-Reactor is worth too much, they planned on coming back, probably still do.” That said, he looked up to find an orientation, but between tower-blocks, even their ruins, it became hard to find the early morning sun. He still managed to orient himself to the east, where the closest base should be. Despite the higher snow, getting through the city’s ruins turned out to be easier than the day before, since now, they only need to keep the general direction and not following a trail from a being larger than themself. Finding a way however, got harder than before since the titan deer could no longer jump or climb safely with the AGM on his side. Leaving them only some streets they could use, they had to find passages through rubble or between buildings for most of the way, sometimes being forced to clear a way for the stag.
By the time the sun became visible over the city’s high ruins, they heard the first guns being fired, followed by the thunder of tank cannons. After they took a few seconds to listen, they realized that whoever fought there, stayed far south from their current location. They considered going towards battle, allies or not, they had a vehicle that would allow them to easier traverse the city. On the other side, an enemy with a tank posed an unbearable threat. They opted out to not go near the battle, instead they choose to take a detour leading them further away from the expectable danger.
At noon, with the sun at its highest, they had to take shelter in another ruin, exhauster from walking through the snow and clearing multiple piles of rubble for 4611. They sat down on larger pieces of rubble, stretching out their legs.
“What do you think? How far did we go?” Mica asked out of curiosity, after the second alley entrance they had to clear, she lost track while regularly checking, if the unknown source still flooded the radio communication with music.
“Actually walked, I’d say…” the wolf looked to the ceiling. “… about ten or eleven kilometres. Relative to our starting point, maybe seven, probably just six.”
Koslov laughed embarrassed while pointing towards the deer. “Look at him, Abel still looks fit despite his load, and we’re already need a rest.”
Mica glanced over to the stag pawing the ground with his hoof. With a short giggle she turned her head towards a broken Window. Snow covert the ground in front of it, reaching nearly all the way to the rooms centre. When they entered, the building looked like the one they spent the night in, just another ruin in a city destroyed by urban warfare. The inside, however, was the polar opposite. Cold, dirty, just enough space to sit, somewhat sheltered from the snow, in other words the kind of place one would suspect in this city.
Once, they had rested for half an hour, Koslov stood up. “We should head out again. To reach the base with our provisions not fully depleted, we must get at least another 6 kilometres between us and that hideout.”
Ten minutes later, they reached the next pile of rubble. More out of procrastination than hoping for another outcome than before, they checked the radio for the 8th time the day. Like before, music greeted them. “Damn it, that fight south from us is already going for hours and they don’t need to communicate?” she cursed.
The distant noise of guns accompanied them since they had first heard them in the morning, raising the question who fought there. The wolf already reasoned that at least one state took part in the fight, simply stating that, following the convention from 21ATI, no private group could get that much ammunition. Naturally he didn’t believed in his own argument, but it helped, that states commonly attacked nests of dangerous titans. Depending on the nests, those missions were known to take anything from under an hour up to several days.
“Ehm, Keetriv?” Mica asked, after they passed the rubble. “Isn’t the battle coming closer?”
The wolf’s ears perked up while he turned towards the south. He had no reason to answer verbally, his reaction made clear. Unwilling to learn the truth about the fight, they picked up the pace, breaking through obstacles by either using the AGM or letting 4611 shoving things away.
Two hours after nightfall temperature and the high snow had worn them off. Unable to go further they entered the remains of what turned out being a former cinema. They stumbled into the first auditorium – only those had double doors, wide enough for the titan – and barricaded the doors by shoving a trenching tool behind the handles. Moments after, privates and titan had unwillingly fallen asleep, warming each other in the cold hall.
“We have more luck than we should.” Koslov grumbled at the next morning, walking to the door. He pulled the trenching tool from the door, breaking of both handles by accident. “Those old doors can’t stop anyone willing to enter.”
“Not like we’ve done that on purpose.” Mica answered while stretching. “Besides you can hear that the battle is still far away.”
Both silently looked into each other’s face, slowly realizing, that the cinemas four walls dampened sounds with a high efficiency, exactly the way they’re supposed to. They never felt more thankful about that the standard rations being packets of nutrient mash, quick to eat, lasted for half a day, although with the trade-off that it tasted as bad as it looked. Thus, all three were ready to go after just five minutes.
After the previous day, they had no realistic option to these five minutes, they still regret the time taken. Carefully opening the door, the puma saw armed figures running through violet glowing snow past the cinema, with short stops behind every cover they found, shooting back at an unseen enemy, covering their brothers-in-arms.
Since she didn’t spot anything to tell the fighters affiliations, she stayed hiding. Another problem came from the sounds, with the door open, the privates could hear tank tracks running over the debris. Short after the first group got out of her sight, a second, smaller group of 20 people appeared hunting the first. A searchlight moved over them before turning further ahead. The few moments the light shown on the pursuers gave Mica enough time to recognize their affiliation.
“It’s the URC. The hunt some other…” A loud explosion interrupted her explanation followed by a yell.
“FOR THE FFC” With these words a third group attacked the URC-soldiers, putting them into a pincer situation with the first group, who joined in with the third’s battle cry. 4 soldiers fell within the first minute, before they found cover. A fifth fall in the second minute, then the tide turned a second time, as a second URC-tank came out of a ruin opposite to the cinema.
“Fuck”, Koslov growled. “Open that door, we survived the start of another fucking war with the URC and didn’t even knew.”
Mica followed the order, pushed the door open and took aim herself. Her first volley took the enemies by surprise, killing one and wounding another. Her second volley ended the wounded, before she sprinted to a counter for a better position. Besides getting the remaining 14 enemies to hide in their coverings, her actions also led to the tank turning his cannon towards her. Glimpsing over the counter, she felt like looking death itself in front of her, as she saw the tank’s barrel aiming directly for her. But instead of the cannon’s flash, a violet beam went through the tank, causing a chain-reaction detonating first the fuel, then the ammunition inside.
Quietly thanking the gods, the puma saw how Koslov dove into cover behind another counter with the DM-12-LR in one hand and his own standard rifle in the other. From there he took aim, waiting for a hostile target to show. She turned around her cover and did the same, praying, that the URC-Soldiers would surrender, but they didn’t. For two minutes nothing happened, 14 URCs surrounded and outnumbered by the Soldiers of the FFC. In the third minute they jumped out, guns blazing with crazy looks in their eyes. Seconds later, all 14 were dead.
A minute after the last shots echo faded, Mica still kneeled, shaking with the rifle aimed were their enemies stood, realizing that she killed for the first time. Koslov came to her, took her rifle and then hugged the puma, saying nothing he only stayed with her, silently greeting the other FFC-soldiers coming inside the cinema.
Two years later:
“That was a banger”, Mica cheered into the microphone on the desk front of her, sitting there with an e-guitar on her lab. “But I have to say goodbye, next on are my lovely colleagues from the Black Nights Show. But before that we here at FC-Rock…” She paused and played a 3-second riff on the guitar. “…like to give smaller artists a chance. Especially when they treat your ears like Rosebleed and the title song of her latest Album. So, here’s Rosebleed and Meet You After.”
One press on a button and the microphone turned off. From behind the glass the Bat gave her a thumb up. With a melancholic smile the Puma pushed her wheelchair back from the table, turning to the side. With a lot of struggles, she stretched her legs upwards and moved her paws. After a few short seconds, her legs fell down again, leaving her sitting exhausted but purring. Grabbing the dog tag at her guitar’s headstock, she looked up to the ceiling.
“Did you see, I even moved my toes. Soon I will walk again, and then I can finally come and stand before you, proudly showing you who I’ve become.”
She forced herself to purr the words, while tears were in her eyes. The day he died was burned into her memory, his last words still in her ears. “You know, wherever they are, I’ll find them, even got help, and then I tell your kids, that your last words were directed at them. Tell them that you never forgot them, that you wished to tell them how sorry you were.”
A nocking let her turn her head. A second knocking came from the door, somebody wished to enter the recording studio. She let go off the dog tag. After briefly wiping her face, she rolled to the door and opened. On the other side three wolf teens greeted her, standing there with their mother.
“Hi, we got a letter from a staff sergeant, saying you’re searching us?” The woman said.
Mica looked at the four, taken by surprise. “Erm, erm…” Shaking her head she finally found the words. Looking at the mother she asked: “Are you Emilia Ševčuk?”
The young wolves all looked to their mother, curious what would happen. Emilia only nodded.
“Then please, let us go to the break area, this might take a while.”
Only a few rooms down the floor all five sat around a table, and Mica told them about their father’s death and the 16 month she served at his side. The story of the one who saved her life, the war hero Koslov Keetrev, Sergeant postmortem.","pools_count":0,"title":"WHEN IT BEGUN - NSFW(?)","deleted":"f","public":"t","mimetype":"application/msword","pagecount":"1","rating_id":"2","rating_name":"Adult","ratings":[{"content_tag_id":"5","name":"Strong Violence","description":"Strong violence, blood, serious injury or death","rating_id":"2"}],"submission_type_id":"12","type_name":"Writing - Document","guest_block":"f","friends_only":"f","comments_count":"0","views":"48"}