Posted using PostyBirb",
"writing": "Time was strange.\nWith no way to keep track of it in the complete darkness, the sense of it stretched until it lost meaning.\nNiel knew it couldn’t be more than a day since Wieland had been taken away. He knew how two days without sex felt, and this hunger, he’d initially confused with wanting food, was only starting to be noticeable. So he hadn’t been sitting in the dark for anything resembling two days.\nAnd yet.\nWith Dario and Fedor refusing to talk. With being alone with his thoughts, and the beating of his heart, he’d be willing to put money down that he’d been in this cell for at least a week. A week of occasional naps and snapping awake at the faintest sound, real or imagined. A week of considering what he could have done differently so he wouldn’t be in this place, in this situation. A week that couldn’t be more than one day.\nOlavo. That was where this had started. If he hadn’t been friends with him, they wouldn’t have had sex, and Niel wouldn’t have been initiated. Only there was also Fedor, and the dalmatian, who’d arranged for them to be at the same party. Even without Olavo, they’d meet, they’d fuck, and Niel ended up here again.\nSo the frat was what he’d needed out of his life. Only, getting involved with Sigma Theta Gamma hadn’t been his decision. He’d been pulled into that by the bat, and the so-many memories he’d given Niel, leaving him feeling like the frat house was a comfortable second home, even though he hadn’t set foot on the university campus by that point.\nAnd the bat had grabbed Niel because of Thomas. The bat needed Thomas’s brother, and as his best friend, Niel had to be there so Roland and others couldn’t grow suspicious.\nSo, there it was, the answer. If he’d never been friends with Roland, he wouldn’t be here now.\nIf he’d been willing to sacrifice the best friendship he had, and that was before the bat inadvertently deepened it, he’d be on the field right now, training for playing football for the school. Or he’d be studying history, with a goal of becoming a teacher. And he would be enjoying the largest sandwich he could buy.\nThat was it, all it would have taken for him to have a normal life.\nA day that felt like a week, and he was contemplating pulling a Jarod. Sacrificing everything just for a sense of normality.\nBut that wasn’t what he wanted, was it? That depressing chain of thought wasn’t about him having a normal life. It was about being out of this place.\nSomething he could make happen if he could get out of the cell. He’d tackle whatever guards were there, making sure Fedor didn’t get hurt. Dario might help, or he might not. Indestructible or not, the glimpse he’d caught of the capybara when they were captured again didn’t leave Niel with hope. They’d sneak around the dogs, find the leader, beat the crap out of him, take the staff and make a beeline for outside.\nThere had to be trucks for all the equipment Niel had seen. They’d steal one, and then they’d be free. It’d take the staff to Grant and then, he could get on with his life, normal or not.\nWhat did the staff even do?\nHe tried to remember if Grant had said anything about how they were made, what they were for. All he remembered was that the Practitioners had them, the Chamber wanted them. How they came to be might as well be magic, for all that Niel knew.\nMagic.\nIf he’d known more of it, he could have prevented this from happening. If the bat had given him memories where he learned phrases, if Olavo had taught him more than just one. If he’d known magic, he could have kept from being captured, freed Fedor and Dario. He’d have known Isamu was a traitor if any of them had bothered keeping a record of their history, and he’d have had phrases to counter his amazing reflexes so they could win the fight and not get recaptured.\nIf. \nIf this. If that. If wishes were horses, and all that crap.\nMaybe…\nMaybe being in here wasn’t the worse place he could be. After all, in here, he was shielded from whatever the Nazis planned on doing out there with a staff of unknown power. It had to be powerful. Why else hide it all the way in here, behind not Practitioner magic, but a set of locks only Survivors could unlock?\nActually.\nThere was Practitioner magic here. Could a bunch of academic with only sex magic build all the locks Niel and the others had to figure out so they could make their way to the staff?\nAnd basically hand it over to the Nazis.\nFuck. He had to get out of here before he drove himself insane.\nOr was it already too late for that?\nMaybe he wasn’t here at all, but on a hospital bed, dying of sex starvation. This was all a dream because Steward didn’t actually know anything about his condition, so couldn’t insist Niel be released so he could have sex and regain his strength. It would explain how, out of all the people they could have kidnapped, it had been Fedor and Dario, the only two other Survivors he knew. Olavo didn’t count. He was Society, as far as Niel was concerned.\nWasn’t there a trope about an adventure turning out to just be a dream? Which of the two was better for him? A dream while he died in the hospital, or becoming a sex doll for Nazis?\nHe chuckled bitterly. Why couldn’t life hand him easy choices?\nThe ground shook, and he was on his feet. Did Switzerland get earthquakes? Had he imagined—\nFedor cursed in Russian.\n“What that?” Dario asked, sounding sleepy.\nThe ground shook again, and this time, he made out distant explosions. So, not an earthquake. At least he didn’t have to worry about the cavern falling on their heads.\n“Screams,” Fedor whispered. “Fear, pain.”\n“Nazis are attacked?” Dario asked, hopefully.\n“We can hope so,” Niel said, trying to make out what Fedor heard and trying to manage his expectations. The way his life was going, it would turn out the attackers were USR revivalists, here to get the staff so they could bring Stalin back to life. And of course, in that scenario, it would turn out Fedor had betrayed them too.\nHe rested his head against the bars. He so needed to get out of here.\nHe stared at the light playing on the floor, and the form he was seeing there.\nThat’s it. He’s lost his marbles. How else was he watching a naked, two-inch tall rat approaching his cell? Any minute now, an orderly was about to give him an injection and he’d discover he was babbling in a padded cell.\n“Niel!” the imaginary rat called, and Fedor let out a startled curse.\n“Roland?” Niel asked.\n“Who is Roland?” Dario asked.\nRight, he wasn’t actually—\n“Small naked rat,” Fedor said.\n“You see him?”\nNiel moved away from the bars as Roland slipped through. Then, he made out the form of a full size rat in the intensifying light of the fires outside. Before he could ask if he was real, or how he was full size again, or how he’d found them. He was kissed.\nA faint voice in the back of his mind protested that now was not the time to have a naked rat kiss him, grind his crotch against his. It was not the time to get hard in response. He squashed the voice and squeezed the rat’s ass.\nFuck, he’d missed grabbing an ass, having a tongue exploring his muzzle. That it was Roland, that his best friend was in his arms, just made this better.\n“Fuck me,” Niel whispered the instant their lips moved apart. He didn’t wait for a response. He kissed Roland again, undoing his pants with his free hand.\n“Fuck now?” Dario asked in exasperation, and Roland pushed Niel away with a chuckle.\n“Later,” Roland replied.\nThe cold air in Niel’s pants was enough to clear his mind, and he hurried to put himself away. “What are you doing here?”\n“What’s it look like?”\n“You’re pulling off a rescue naked?”\n“I’m Society. What’s the point of wearing anything? And I can’t shrink clothing, so I’m going to end up naked, anyway. You never had a problem with me being naked.”\n“I’ve never had you naked while a prisoner of the Nazis.”\n“Neo-Nazis,” Roland corrected.\n“Whatever. Why you? I don’t know how to say this politely, but what exactly are your qualifications as a rescuer?” A distant explosion punctuated his question, then a second one, far too close, shook stone from the ceiling. “Unless you can shrink us, I’m not sure how much of a rescue this is going to be.”\nRoland dropped to all fours and reached between the bars. He looked over his shoulder, grinned, and raised his tail invitingly. He groaned as he reached on the other side and Niel stepped forward.\n“Fuck,” the rat whispered, and Niel started undoing his pants again. He was feeling peckish, and Roland had basically told him to—\nThe rat was gone, then a small form vanished on the side of the bars. By the time Niel was at the door, craning to look to the side. He made out scraping, then his two inch best friend dragging a key ring behind him.\n“Can you reach them?” the rat asked. “I’m getting fed up pulling them for what felt like a hundred miles.”\nNiel crouched and extended his arms, closing his fingers around the rat and keys. Roland let out a surprised exclamation as Niel stood. He grinned, the things he could get up with Roland at that size.\nFedor hissed. “Someone comes.”\n“Put me down,” Roland ordered, and Niel did so as a form appeared in the light from the fires, and then a doberman stood before his door.\nNo, The doberman. The dog grinned as he inserted a key. “I’m not leaving without my toy,” his kidnapper said. He pushed the door open, only for it to slam back into him with a rat’s muscular shoulder adding momentum. The doberman backpedaled into the opposing door, and Fedor wrapped his arm around the neck, cursing softly in Russian as the dog struggled.\n“What’s with the toy comment?” Roland asked, stepping out of the cell.\n“Seems that’s all us, non-canines, are good for. And—” Roland struck the doberman across the face hard enough he went limp. “—this is the guy who kidnapped me. Looks like he wanted me as his personal fuck slave.”\n“He’s fucking lucky I don’t have the time to make him pay for that.” The rat said, pulling him into the cell. “Get the others out.”\nNiel picked up the keys as Roland undid the dog’s pants. “If you’re planning on fucking him, he might enjoy it more than he claims.” The third key fit in Fedor’s lock. “He tried way too hard to be an aggressive top.”\nWhen he glance in the cell, Roland was pulling the pants up. His cock and balls being made prominent before vanishing.\n“Nice,” Fedor said.\n“You have no idea,” Niel replied, heading for Dario’s cell.\n“I find out?”\n“Once this is over,” Roland said, “we’ll find a place and a time.” He stepped next to the raccoon as he opened the door. “And how can you even think I’d want to fuck him?”\n“He’s a guy, Rol,” Niel replied.\n“He’s the guy who kidnapped you.” He leaned against the wall and put the boots on. “I don’t reward people for kidnapping my friend.”\n“Fedor, Dario, this is Roland. Why are you getting dressed? Aren’t they going to fall off the next time you shrink? I’m glad you aren’t stuck two-inch tall anymore. No matter how much fun you were having.”\n“Stuck?” Dario asked.\n“Me too. Took me a while to adjust to my power after my ceremony. And I can still have fun.”\n“You, Rol, are weird.”\nRoland snorted, putting on a jacket. “Says the guy with the fetish for the ancient Roman history section of his university library.”\n“It’s not a fetish. Everyone does it there.”\n“Very fun history,” Fedor said.\n“But are they all as much of a history nerd as he is?” Roland asked the Pallas cat.\n“The clothes, Rol?” Niel asked before Fedor could say anything. “What’s the point to them?”\n“No point in shrinking with the three of you there. Going forward, it’s all about using the chaos to be unnoticed and rejoin the others.” He zipped the jacket close. “And it’s not exactly warm out there.” Another explosion sounded. “And as for my qualifications to pull off this rescue. Who do you think is making things explode?”\nHe stepped into the cell and kicked the unconscious doberman in the stomach. He closed the cell’s door on exiting, locked it and broke the key in the lock.\n“Now you’re just being mean,” Niel said with a chuckle.\n“If he didn’t want me to be mean to him, he shouldn’t have been a Neo-Nazi. I mean come on. What does anyone siding with the losers expect?” He grabbed Niel’s hands. “Stick with me,” he told the others.\nThe outside lived up to the chaos Roland predicted. Anything that could burn was doing so. What couldn’t—an explosion send stone in the air—the explosions were destroying. Niel made out a form in the light of the most recent explosion, only for it to vanish just as he realized it had been another rat.\nAnother explosion, and in that light, he saw the rat again, and made out the bandoleer of balls over his chest. Then he was gone again. The next explosion was too far for Neil to make out details, but when the rat again vanished, things clicked.\nThomas was teleporting around the cavern, throwing grenades.\nEach explosion added light, letting Roland’s brother see more of it, and therefore have more places he could teleport to.\n“Here!” Roland called. The surprisingly strong wind, for being so deep within the cavern, buffeted Niel. As he steadied, he realized Dario wasn’t with them.\n“Rol, where is—”\nThe wind happened again, and Fedor disappeared.\n“What is going on?” He asked Roland.\nThe rat grinned as he let go of Niel’s hand. “Hold—”\nNiel was somewhere else, his stomach still where ever he’d been before. He put a hand against a stone wall and joined Dario and Fedor in dry heaving. Thank fuck his stomach was empty.\nThe wind happened again, and this time, the hyena stuck around after depositing Roland, who sat and put his head between his knees. Chima looked at them, gave Niel a nod of greeting, and vanished in another burst of speed induced wind.\n“Never going to get used to this.” Roland’s smile didn’t look comforting with his nose pad so dry it might be cracking and his ears with almost all color leached out of them.\n“Petunias by the sun, Hertz,” someone said. “Chike, the wind’s behind you. Summer, what the fuck are you doing?”\nA raccoon in a worn, dark brown leather jacket over a tan shirt and khakis watched the chaos with way too large binoculars. He pulled them away long enough to glance at Neil, then Jarod went back to speaking gibberish while looking over the battlefield.\nIt was code. Niel knew that, but he wouldn’t dignify the man with that term, not when he had to gall to rip off that look. But he had to speak with him, that he wanted to or not. He had information Jarod needed, and it could help keep Wieland safe.\n“The leader’s some wolf,” he said. When the older, young-looking raccoon didn’t react, Niel kept going. “He, or someone near him, has a Practitioner staff that looks like a leg bone. They have a German shepherd named Wieland Stubber as a prisoner.”\n“Where’s the Suzuki?” Jarod asked without looking at Niel.\n“Isamu’s with the nazi, so he can go fuck himself. Or better yet, not get fucked for the next few weeks.”\nJarod nodded, then spoke gibberish again. The only thing Niel made send from them were the last names he recognized. Not even a thank you for the information, or a well done, son. The least he could have done was fucking look at him when they talked.\nNiel stumped back to Roland, who’d regained colors, and his nose pad looked shiny again. As much as he wanted to give that man a piece of his mind, now was not the time.\n“You okay?” Roland asked.\n“He’s an asshole,” Niel groused as he dropped next to the rat. “We’re fucking blood, so he could at least act like he gives a damn about me; be relieved I wasn’t a prisoner anymore.” At least Stewart hadn’t let things sour. He’d tried to talk with Niel. Niel was the one who’d ignored him.\nJust like Jarod was doing to him now.\nHis biological father turned as he scanned the cavern, and Niel saw the holster with the ancient revolver. “Really?” Sure, Jarod was an archaeologist, and he probably had had adventures against the Nazis once he was young again, but did he really have to go so far in ripping the look of one of the best movie…\n“Oh, my fucking God.”\n“What?” Roland looked from him to Jarod and back.\n“He’s not ripping off the Indiana Jones look. They fucking based the character on him.”\nJaros lowered the binocular with an annoyed sigh. “I should never have gotten drunk with that Spielberg fellow.” He raised them back to his eyes, and Niel might as well no longer exist.\nRoland looked at Niel as if he had answers, but he too had no idea why Jarod had sounded like having a series of movies made based on him, along with horrible remakes, had been the worse thing to happen to him.\nChima appeared in a gust of wind, then dropped to his knees.\nRoland was beside him, checking for injuries.\n“Exhausted,” the hyena panted. “Just fuck me.” Then he laid down and Roland got out of his clothes.\nA minute later, Thomas appeared without disturbing the dust at his feet. He staggered to the wall and leaned against it. “Hey Niel, Glad you’re okay.” He lowered himself. “Thanks for the info.”\n“Did you find him?”\nThe rat shook his head. “They scattered as soon as the first grenade went off. Maybe a quarter of them made it out before I forced them back inside with explosions.”\nBears and badgers in tactical armor walked into the stony alcove from a crack in the rock Niel hadn’t noticed. Others followed, and Niel figured they were all from Society families. He looked at Roland, fucking the hyena. His amateur rescuer had been smart enough to bring along professionals.\n“No!” Jarod yelled. “That’s not the plan, Summer! I don’t fucking care. That thing can’t cause widespread damage. Get your tail back in here. I told you to—” He lowered the binocular and looked into the distance in disbelief. The cursing that followed went through a multitude of language.\nNiel was impressed. Jarod had to be fluent in all of them for the words to flow so effortlessly. He didn’t curse in German because he was still at the stage he had to think about what he wanted to say.\n“What happened?” Thomas asked, undressing a badger. They were all undressing. It had to mean the bulk of the operation was done.\n“That friend of yours.” Jarod said the word like it was a curse. “Just decided to go off on his own because he thinks he needs to get the staff back. I told him it doesn’t pose any immediate danger, but no. He knows more than I do about that thing, and he’s going to get himself killed trying to get it.” He looked at Thomas. “You have to teleport to him and get him back.”\nThe rat shook his head. “I’m wiped. Even if I could get a line of sight on where he is, I’d land there and drop unconscious. I told you how my power works,” he snapped as Jarod opened his mouth. “So stop acting like you know how it works better than I do.”\nJarod went back to cursing under his breath as he looked over the cavern.\nNiel felt better knowing the man was pissing off more than him.\nUnfortunately, if they were shutting things down, it meant they weren’t going after those who’d escaped, much less were in the process of escaping. Jarod was busy watching the remnants of the battlefield while Roland, Thomas, and the others were busy with sex.\nNo one was paying him any attention.\nHe moved cautiously until he was in the tunnel the badgers and bears had arrived by. Once out of sight, he ran for all he was worth. Maybe it was questionable if Wieland was a friend, but he was a victim of the same circumstances, and he wasn’t leaving him to the Nazis’ less than tender mercies.\nHe made it outside without being stopped and all that was left were abandoned cargo trucks on the side. Not one person in sight. He’d missed those who had made it out. Even if he got in one truck and drove off, he wouldn’t know where they—\nMotion out of the trees. A pair of dogs were sneaking toward a truck. Niel thanked Him for the good fortune and headed for the truck they were edging for. As soon as one opened the driver’s side door, Niel ran for it. He grabbed onto the back and pulled himself in, grinning in victory as he rolled to a crouch and found himself face to face with a kangaroo with a fist in the air, and a bundle of shiny things in his other hand.",
"writing_bbcode_parsed": "Time was strange. With no way to keep track of it in the complete darkness, the sense of it stretched until it lost meaning. Niel knew it couldn’t be more than a day since Wieland had been taken away. He knew how two days without sex felt, and this hunger, he’d initially confused with wanting food, was only starting to be noticeable. So he hadn’t been sitting in the dark for anything resembling two days. And yet. With Dario and Fedor refusing to talk. With being alone with his thoughts, and the beating of his heart, he’d be willing to put money down that he’d been in this cell for at least a week. A week of occasional naps and snapping awake at the faintest sound, real or imagined. A week of considering what he could have done differently so he wouldn’t be in this place, in this situation. A week that couldn’t be more than one day. Olavo. That was where this had started. If he hadn’t been friends with him, they wouldn’t have had sex, and Niel wouldn’t have been initiated. Only there was also Fedor, and the dalmatian, who’d arranged for them to be at the same party. Even without Olavo, they’d meet, they’d fuck, and Niel ended up here again. So the frat was what he’d needed out of his life. Only, getting involved with Sigma Theta Gamma hadn’t been his decision. He’d been pulled into that by the bat, and the so-many memories he’d given Niel, leaving him feeling like the frat house was a comfortable second home, even though he hadn’t set foot on the university campus by that point. And the bat had grabbed Niel because of Thomas. The bat needed Thomas’s brother, and as his best friend, Niel had to be there so Roland and others couldn’t grow suspicious. So, there it was, the answer. If he’d never been friends with Roland, he wouldn’t be here now. If he’d been willing to sacrifice the best friendship he had, and that was before the bat inadvertently deepened it, he’d be on the field right now, training for playing football for the school. Or he’d be studying history, with a goal of becoming a teacher. And he would be enjoying the largest sandwich he could buy. That was it, all it would have taken for him to have a normal life. A day that felt like a week, and he was contemplating pulling a Jarod. Sacrificing everything just for a sense of normality. But that wasn’t what he wanted, was it? That depressing chain of thought wasn’t about him having a normal life. It was about being out of this place. Something he could make happen if he could get out of the cell. He’d tackle whatever guards were there, making sure Fedor didn’t get hurt. Dario might help, or he might not. Indestructible or not, the glimpse he’d caught of the capybara when they were captured again didn’t leave Niel with hope. They’d sneak around the dogs, find the leader, beat the crap out of him, take the staff and make a beeline for outside. There had to be trucks for all the equipment Niel had seen. They’d steal one, and then they’d be free. It’d take the staff to Grant and then, he could get on with his life, normal or not. What did the staff even do? He tried to remember if Grant had said anything about how they were made, what they were for. All he remembered was that the Practitioners had them, the Chamber wanted them. How they came to be might as well be magic, for all that Niel knew. Magic. If he’d known more of it, he could have prevented this from happening. If the bat had given him memories where he learned phrases, if Olavo had taught him more than just one. If he’d known magic, he could have kept from being captured, freed Fedor and Dario. He’d have known Isamu was a traitor if any of them had bothered keeping a record of their history, and he’d have had phrases to counter his amazing reflexes so they could win the fight and not get recaptured. If. If this. If that. If wishes were horses, and all that crap. Maybe… Maybe being in here wasn’t the worse place he could be. After all, in here, he was shielded from whatever the Nazis planned on doing out there with a staff of unknown power. It had to be powerful. Why else hide it all the way in here, behind not Practitioner magic, but a set of locks only Survivors could unlock? Actually. There was Practitioner magic here. Could a bunch of academic with only sex magic build all the locks Niel and the others had to figure out so they could make their way to the staff? And basically hand it over to the Nazis. Fuck. He had to get out of here before he drove himself insane. Or was it already too late for that? Maybe he wasn’t here at all, but on a hospital bed, dying of sex starvation. This was all a dream because Steward didn’t actually know anything about his condition, so couldn’t insist Niel be released so he could have sex and regain his strength. It would explain how, out of all the people they could have kidnapped, it had been Fedor and Dario, the only two other Survivors he knew. Olavo didn’t count. He was Society, as far as Niel was concerned. Wasn’t there a trope about an adventure turning out to just be a dream? Which of the two was better for him? A dream while he died in the hospital, or becoming a sex doll for Nazis? He chuckled bitterly. Why couldn’t life hand him easy choices? The ground shook, and he was on his feet. Did Switzerland get earthquakes? Had he imagined— Fedor cursed in Russian. “What that?” Dario asked, sounding sleepy. The ground shook again, and this time, he made out distant explosions. So, not an earthquake. At least he didn’t have to worry about the cavern falling on their heads. “Screams,” Fedor whispered. “Fear, pain.” “Nazis are attacked?” Dario asked, hopefully. “We can hope so,” Niel said, trying to make out what Fedor heard and trying to manage his expectations. The way his life was going, it would turn out the attackers were USR revivalists, here to get the staff so they could bring Stalin back to life. And of course, in that scenario, it would turn out Fedor had betrayed them too. He rested his head against the bars. He so needed to get out of here. He stared at the light playing on the floor, and the form he was seeing there. That’s it. He’s lost his marbles. How else was he watching a naked, two-inch tall rat approaching his cell? Any minute now, an orderly was about to give him an injection and he’d discover he was babbling in a padded cell. “Niel!” the imaginary rat called, and Fedor let out a startled curse. “Roland?” Niel asked. “Who is Roland?” Dario asked. Right, he wasn’t actually— “Small naked rat,” Fedor said. “You see him?” Niel moved away from the bars as Roland slipped through. Then, he made out the form of a full size rat in the intensifying light of the fires outside. Before he could ask if he was real, or how he was full size again, or how he’d found them. He was kissed. A faint voice in the back of his mind protested that now was not the time to have a naked rat kiss him, grind his crotch against his. It was not the time to get hard in response. He squashed the voice and squeezed the rat’s ass. Fuck, he’d missed grabbing an ass, having a tongue exploring his muzzle. That it was Roland, that his best friend was in his arms, just made this better. “Fuck me,” Niel whispered the instant their lips moved apart. He didn’t wait for a response. He kissed Roland again, undoing his pants with his free hand. “Fuck now?” Dario asked in exasperation, and Roland pushed Niel away with a chuckle. “Later,” Roland replied. The cold air in Niel’s pants was enough to clear his mind, and he hurried to put himself away. “What are you doing here?” “What’s it look like?” “You’re pulling off a rescue naked?” “I’m Society. What’s the point of wearing anything? And I can’t shrink clothing, so I’m going to end up naked, anyway. You never had a problem with me being naked.” “I’ve never had you naked while a prisoner of the Nazis.” “Neo-Nazis,” Roland corrected. “Whatever. Why you? I don’t know how to say this politely, but what exactly are your qualifications as a rescuer?” A distant explosion punctuated his question, then a second one, far too close, shook stone from the ceiling. “Unless you can shrink us, I’m not sure how much of a rescue this is going to be.” Roland dropped to all fours and reached between the bars. He looked over his shoulder, grinned, and raised his tail invitingly. He groaned as he reached on the other side and Niel stepped forward. “Fuck,” the rat whispered, and Niel started undoing his pants again. He was feeling peckish, and Roland had basically told him to— The rat was gone, then a small form vanished on the side of the bars. By the time Niel was at the door, craning to look to the side. He made out scraping, then his two inch best friend dragging a key ring behind him. “Can you reach them?” the rat asked. “I’m getting fed up pulling them for what felt like a hundred miles.” Niel crouched and extended his arms, closing his fingers around the rat and keys. Roland let out a surprised exclamation as Niel stood. He grinned, the things he could get up with Roland at that size. Fedor hissed. “Someone comes.” “Put me down,” Roland ordered, and Niel did so as a form appeared in the light from the fires, and then a doberman stood before his door. No, The doberman. The dog grinned as he inserted a key. “I’m not leaving without my toy,” his kidnapper said. He pushed the door open, only for it to slam back into him with a rat’s muscular shoulder adding momentum. The doberman backpedaled into the opposing door, and Fedor wrapped his arm around the neck, cursing softly in Russian as the dog struggled. “What’s with the toy comment?” Roland asked, stepping out of the cell. “Seems that’s all us, non-canines, are good for. And—” Roland struck the doberman across the face hard enough he went limp. “—this is the guy who kidnapped me. Looks like he wanted me as his personal fuck slave.” “He’s fucking lucky I don’t have the time to make him pay for that.” The rat said, pulling him into the cell. “Get the others out.” Niel picked up the keys as Roland undid the dog’s pants. “If you’re planning on fucking him, he might enjoy it more than he claims.” The third key fit in Fedor’s lock. “He tried way too hard to be an aggressive top.” When he glance in the cell, Roland was pulling the pants up. His cock and balls being made prominent before vanishing. “Nice,” Fedor said. “You have no idea,” Niel replied, heading for Dario’s cell. “I find out?” “Once this is over,” Roland said, “we’ll find a place and a time.” He stepped next to the raccoon as he opened the door. “And how can you even think I’d want to fuck him?” “He’s a guy, Rol,” Niel replied. “He’s the guy who kidnapped you.” He leaned against the wall and put the boots on. “I don’t reward people for kidnapping my friend.” “Fedor, Dario, this is Roland. Why are you getting dressed? Aren’t they going to fall off the next time you shrink? I’m glad you aren’t stuck two-inch tall anymore. No matter how much fun you were having.” “Stuck?” Dario asked. “Me too. Took me a while to adjust to my power after my ceremony. And I can still have fun.” “You, Rol, are weird.” Roland snorted, putting on a jacket. “Says the guy with the fetish for the ancient Roman history section of his university library.” “It’s not a fetish. Everyone does it there.” “Very fun history,” Fedor said. “But are they all as much of a history nerd as he is?” Roland asked the Pallas cat. “The clothes, Rol?” Niel asked before Fedor could say anything. “What’s the point to them?” “No point in shrinking with the three of you there. Going forward, it’s all about using the chaos to be unnoticed and rejoin the others.” He zipped the jacket close. “And it’s not exactly warm out there.” Another explosion sounded. “And as for my qualifications to pull off this rescue. Who do you think is making things explode?” He stepped into the cell and kicked the unconscious doberman in the stomach. He closed the cell’s door on exiting, locked it and broke the key in the lock. “Now you’re just being mean,” Niel said with a chuckle. “If he didn’t want me to be mean to him, he shouldn’t have been a Neo-Nazi. I mean come on. What does anyone siding with the losers expect?” He grabbed Niel’s hands. “Stick with me,” he told the others. The outside lived up to the chaos Roland predicted. Anything that could burn was doing so. What couldn’t—an explosion send stone in the air—the explosions were destroying. Niel made out a form in the light of the most recent explosion, only for it to vanish just as he realized it had been another rat. Another explosion, and in that light, he saw the rat again, and made out the bandoleer of balls over his chest. Then he was gone again. The next explosion was too far for Neil to make out details, but when the rat again vanished, things clicked. Thomas was teleporting around the cavern, throwing grenades. Each explosion added light, letting Roland’s brother see more of it, and therefore have more places he could teleport to. “Here!” Roland called. The surprisingly strong wind, for being so deep within the cavern, buffeted Niel. As he steadied, he realized Dario wasn’t with them. “Rol, where is—” The wind happened again, and Fedor disappeared. “What is going on?” He asked Roland. The rat grinned as he let go of Niel’s hand. “Hold—” Niel was somewhere else, his stomach still where ever he’d been before. He put a hand against a stone wall and joined Dario and Fedor in dry heaving. Thank fuck his stomach was empty. The wind happened again, and this time, the hyena stuck around after depositing Roland, who sat and put his head between his knees. Chima looked at them, gave Niel a nod of greeting, and vanished in another burst of speed induced wind. “Never going to get used to this.” Roland’s smile didn’t look comforting with his nose pad so dry it might be cracking and his ears with almost all color leached out of them. “Petunias by the sun, Hertz,” someone said. “Chike, the wind’s behind you. Summer, what the fuck are you doing?” A raccoon in a worn, dark brown leather jacket over a tan shirt and khakis watched the chaos with way too large binoculars. He pulled them away long enough to glance at Neil, then Jarod went back to speaking gibberish while looking over the battlefield. It was code. Niel knew that, but he wouldn’t dignify the man with that term, not when he had to gall to rip off that look. But he had to speak with him, that he wanted to or not. He had information Jarod needed, and it could help keep Wieland safe. “The leader’s some wolf,” he said. When the older, young-looking raccoon didn’t react, Niel kept going. “He, or someone near him, has a Practitioner staff that looks like a leg bone. They have a German shepherd named Wieland Stubber as a prisoner.” “Where’s the Suzuki?” Jarod asked without looking at Niel. “Isamu’s with the nazi, so he can go fuck himself. Or better yet, not get fucked for the next few weeks.” Jarod nodded, then spoke gibberish again. The only thing Niel made send from them were the last names he recognized. Not even a thank you for the information, or a well done, son. The least he could have done was fucking look at him when they talked. Niel stumped back to Roland, who’d regained colors, and his nose pad looked shiny again. As much as he wanted to give that man a piece of his mind, now was not the time. “You okay?” Roland asked. “He’s an asshole,” Niel groused as he dropped next to the rat. “We’re fucking blood, so he could at least act like he gives a damn about me; be relieved I wasn’t a prisoner anymore.” At least Stewart hadn’t let things sour. He’d tried to talk with Niel. Niel was the one who’d ignored him. Just like Jarod was doing to him now. His biological father turned as he scanned the cavern, and Niel saw the holster with the ancient revolver. “Really?” Sure, Jarod was an archaeologist, and he probably had had adventures against the Nazis once he was young again, but did he really have to go so far in ripping the look of one of the best movie… “Oh, my fucking God.” “What?” Roland looked from him to Jarod and back. “He’s not ripping off the Indiana Jones look. They fucking based the character on him.” Jaros lowered the binocular with an annoyed sigh. “I should never have gotten drunk with that Spielberg fellow.” He raised them back to his eyes, and Niel might as well no longer exist. Roland looked at Niel as if he had answers, but he too had no idea why Jarod had sounded like having a series of movies made based on him, along with horrible remakes, had been the worse thing to happen to him. Chima appeared in a gust of wind, then dropped to his knees. Roland was beside him, checking for injuries. “Exhausted,” the hyena panted. “Just fuck me.” Then he laid down and Roland got out of his clothes. A minute later, Thomas appeared without disturbing the dust at his feet. He staggered to the wall and leaned against it. “Hey Niel, Glad you’re okay.” He lowered himself. “Thanks for the info.” “Did you find him?” The rat shook his head. “They scattered as soon as the first grenade went off. Maybe a quarter of them made it out before I forced them back inside with explosions.” Bears and badgers in tactical armor walked into the stony alcove from a crack in the rock Niel hadn’t noticed. Others followed, and Niel figured they were all from Society families. He looked at Roland, fucking the hyena. His amateur rescuer had been smart enough to bring along professionals. “No!” Jarod yelled. “That’s not the plan, Summer! I don’t fucking care. That thing can’t cause widespread damage. Get your tail back in here. I told you to—” He lowered the binocular and looked into the distance in disbelief. The cursing that followed went through a multitude of language. Niel was impressed. Jarod had to be fluent in all of them for the words to flow so effortlessly. He didn’t curse in German because he was still at the stage he had to think about what he wanted to say. “What happened?” Thomas asked, undressing a badger. They were all undressing. It had to mean the bulk of the operation was done. “That friend of yours.” Jarod said the word like it was a curse. “Just decided to go off on his own because he thinks he needs to get the staff back. I told him it doesn’t pose any immediate danger, but no. He knows more than I do about that thing, and he’s going to get himself killed trying to get it.” He looked at Thomas. “You have to teleport to him and get him back.” The rat shook his head. “I’m wiped. Even if I could get a line of sight on where he is, I’d land there and drop unconscious. I told you how my power works,” he snapped as Jarod opened his mouth. “So stop acting like you know how it works better than I do.” Jarod went back to cursing under his breath as he looked over the cavern. Niel felt better knowing the man was pissing off more than him. Unfortunately, if they were shutting things down, it meant they weren’t going after those who’d escaped, much less were in the process of escaping. Jarod was busy watching the remnants of the battlefield while Roland, Thomas, and the others were busy with sex. No one was paying him any attention. He moved cautiously until he was in the tunnel the badgers and bears had arrived by. Once out of sight, he ran for all he was worth. Maybe it was questionable if Wieland was a friend, but he was a victim of the same circumstances, and he wasn’t leaving him to the Nazis’ less than tender mercies. He made it outside without being stopped and all that was left were abandoned cargo trucks on the side. Not one person in sight. He’d missed those who had made it out. Even if he got in one truck and drove off, he wouldn’t know where they— Motion out of the trees. A pair of dogs were sneaking toward a truck. Niel thanked Him for the good fortune and headed for the truck they were edging for. As soon as one opened the driver’s side door, Niel ran for it. He grabbed onto the back and pulled himself in, grinning in victory as he rolled to a crouch and found himself face to face with a kangaroo with a fist in the air, and a bundle of shiny things in his other hand.",
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