FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

You know that old phrase, a mirror holds a thousand secrets? No? It's something my mother always said, I guess I just figured everyone had the same mother or something... Regardless, I think she meant that a mirror only shows you a fraction of what is really reflected. Take me for example. Most people would call me boring, if not completely forgettable.

As I look in the mirror now, I can't help but feel a sigh crawl out from within my throat.

"If this holds a thousand secrets, then I'm already a thousand shorter than everyone else..." I groaned.

I'm oddly small for my age, and pencil thin which isn't too unusual for my species as far as felines go but stay with me, it gets worse. My fur is completely black, and my only redeemable feature is my eyes. I have the lightest blue eyes -I at least- have ever heard of. Seriously, their borderline white! Even so, I'm usually forgettable in a small group, and my friends all say I completely disappear in a crowd. At least, that's what I get when I find them. Not that they really ever looked.

My style is pretty nonexistent. I never really understood fashion. I think my sister tried to help once or twice by buying me some clothes that are somewhere tucked away deep in my closet, but other than that, I generally just go for blue jeans and whatever t-shirt doesn't reek. Regardless, everything just looks baggy on me, so there's no real features to show off. I guess I really am just as boring as everyone thinks I am.

Other than my simple appearance, and basic fashion sense, I actually do have a quality that seems to stand out from most. I have a pretty good family life. My mother loves the crap outta me, and even seems to take an interest in my ridiculous love of collectables, especially the occult stuff I have all over my room. Heck, she even gave most of them too me!

Other than that, our family kinda has a dark spot... My dad passed away last year, and I suppose that's pretty sad, but it was a pretty quick thing. He was driving home from work and was t-boned by a van. The police said he died on impact, and somehow, that made it a lot easier for me to process. There was a few months where I was pretty distant, I suppose. Even so, it the fact that we never really seemed to connect, and the fact that he was gone without pain made everything so much easier to accept. After all, people die right? I mean, we all die eventually... In my mind, it's better to go out fast that be strung out, full of pain. Besides, there's nothing I can do about him being gone. I'm no necromancer.

On a more positive note! Another oddity, I have an older sister who is actually my best friend. I know, weird right? We've always been pretty close growing up. I suppose because her and dad fought so much, is probably one of the reason's why it was so easy to get over dad's accident. I always sided with her. Mom used to say that we should have been born twins, with the connection we have. I think mom kinda lost her mind a little after the accident though... Regardless, my sister's doing one of those online college things, so she's home when she's not off working at Starbucks. Physically she seemed to get all the good looks in the family, at least she's pretty popular with men for a complete nerd.

Serena, my sister has the same black fur as me and mom, but beautiful glowing green eyes and no matter what she eats, she somehow stays thin just like I do. She never really developed large breasts that would make her one of those bombshell types, but that never seemed to stop all the attention she received. Even so, I don't think I've ever seen her with a boyfriend. She typically dresses in a kind of tom-boyish style. You know the look, tank tops during the summer, and those t-shirts with the collars cut off showing off her bra straps in the winter, not that you would ever see them underneath all the blankets or hoodies she constantly piled on. I guess stylistically she would be considered kinda goth-esque. She didn't wear black all the time, black always kinda disappears on us anyways. No, she wore colors, but white and purple were her favorite, and almost everything she had displayed some kind of occult reference be it a pentagram or summoning circle. Like I said, me and her are oddly connected, she's the one who got me into demonology and the occult, but that's for another time. Anyways, she's not what I would say is a complete babe -because that would be gross- but she seems to be pretty popular, often going out to the city with friends and the like, or staying with her friend Anna in the city.

Anna was probably the nicest girl I had ever met. It's safe to say I used to have the biggest crush on her before she moved away for college. She had always had this big dream about being some big time journalist, which this pathetically boring town would have crushed in one hot minute. She was too good for here anyways... So she moved away to Sharron, the big city just thirty minutes south down the highway from here. When she last came over for her going away party, I recall actually crying. Despite my desperate attempts to hide my deep-seated love for Anna. My sister simply held me to her chest and gave me the whole there's more that one rabbit in Chesterton speech, which totally made me stop bawling my eyes out. Was it that obvious?...

Other than that, life as a teenager isn't as bad as most people make it out to be. Of course, there's all that hormone crap, and random urges here and there. But when it all boils down to it, it's all a matter of perspective. For example, sure I may be incredibly miserable -ninety percent of the time- but at least I have access to a car, a decent amount of freedom, and a loving supportive family.

Being a boy -I'm sure- also makes my pubescent experience much easier, at least in my personal situation. I don't have a girlfriend, and I'm not exactly the most popular boy in class. As my mother would say, "your a good boy Tomás, but it would do you some good to get into some trouble every now and then." Whatever that means. Nevertheless, I assume she's calling me a good kid. With that in mind, I am allowed significant freedom with my sister's car as she so rarely leaves the house recently save to check up on Anna, who seems to not be doing so well lately... I am also allowed a reasonable allowance on the family credit card for gas and a few ice cream treats every now and then.

Recently, I have really gotten into table-top gaming on account of my sister. She's one of those nerdy types you would never guess fell down the rabbit hole so far, and knowing probably still wouldn't change how you felt about her. She has been dying to find some more people to play with, especially as most her usual friends seem to be moving on with their lives elsewhere, and she's still working hard on her degree program.

She bought me a Space Marine starter set for my birthday last month, and ever since I've been hooked. I mean, I know it's probably the nerdiest thing ever, and surely wouldn't grow my reputation any, but whatever. I enjoy building the models, painting them, and the sweet serenity within the whole lonely experience. Then there's the game portion of the hobby. My sister kicks my ass horrifically every time, but I still enjoy playing. Besides, since we started, she's been oddly more chatty with me. She even offers up the car a bit more often than usual. It's kinda weird, but nevertheless, I'm enjoying myself regardless.

Therefore, I have been using some of my savings for most of the cost of expanding my dominion over my ever growing blood angel crusaders, supplemented by the family credit card. However, this had gotten me into a spot of trouble recently, so I have to be much more careful with how I have the items shipped.

Luckily, at my local grocery store, there is Chirpy. Chirpy is a Amazon locker. An Amazon locker is basically a set location where Amazon exclusively delivers to. Basically, you get messaged a code, drive to the location, walk up to this little computer screen, type in the code, and a random locker door pops open with your item inside. You take your package and that's all there is to it. It's really handy for christmas gifts if you don't want someone to see it being delivered to your house. It is also great if you ever ordered something expensive with your parent's credit card, and you didn't want them to know.

Regardless, Chirpy has been a little more annoying than usual. Lately, I have been getting two notifications a day telling me I have a package ready. In fact, my phone is ringing right now.

"Hi! My name is Chirpy, and I have a package for you! Enter code: 3XY56 to receive package." I sighed, flipping my long black tail once again.

The crazy thing about this is that, I didn't order anything. I tried to log into Amazon, but I have no pending orders...

I figured it must be some kind of glitch or mistake or something. So I just shrugged it off. Then my phone vibrated once more.

"Hi! My name is Chirpy, and I have a package for you! Please retrieve package as it has been available for two days. Maximum allowed pickup time is three. For each day after the third, $3.99 will be charged. For more information, here is a link to Amazon locker location terms of service. Please enter the following code to receive package: 3XY56. Sheesh..." I groaned.

The last thing I wanted was for my parents to receive another charge just because of a mistake. Then I thought, what's the worst that could happen? I received somebody's bulk underwear order? My pubescent mind wandered to all sorts of places on that one.

I sucked it up, pulled on my warmest hoodie, slid my black ears through the top of my hood, snagged the keys off my sisters desk while she was deep into some kind of nerdy MMORPG campaign, and drove the fifteen minutes to the grocery store. I walked past the registers to the front counter where cigarettes and lock-case booze could be bought when the vibrant -if not iconic- orangish-yellow Amazon locker came into view.

It was pretty simple, and looked an awful lot like the lockers at school, only without any handles. The screen was dim, so I approached it, and woke it up with a tap of my claw. On the screen read Hi! My name is Chirpy! Please enter the code below. I looked up at the black decal letters Hi, My name is Chirpy also above the screen.

"You think they want everyone to know your name is Chirpy, huh?" I said, rolling my eyes. The old hound behind the counter glared at me. I recall back a few summers when I tried to buy cigarettes to look cool and build up some cred, but was harshly lectured by her when my incredibly obvious fake ID story failed. I don't know what the hell I was thinking, but ever since she always seemed to glare at me as though I were still trying to scam cigarettes or something.

I retrieved my phone from my pocket, and typed in the numbers on the screen. I hit the enter button, and a locker door popped open suddenly, making me jump slightly. It was all the way at the end, and I was a little frustrated at being startled by a thing named Chirpy, so I stomped my way over, side-glancing around the store nervously.

Inside was a simple square box, roughly the size of a soccer ball. I grabbed it, and frowned at it's weight. It was much heavier than I pictured, maybe 20-25 pounds? I don't know... Regardless, I put it under my arm, shut the locker door, and left to go back to the car.

As I walked, I read the shipping label, and frowned at my name written in sloppy child-like letters.

"The hell?"

I sat in my car, and searched around for the leatherman dad had gotten me when he was pretty sure I was losing in the whole masculinity department. I slid the knife through the thick tape wrapping, cussing under my breath.

"The hell! How much friggan tape can they pile on thi-" The top popped open, throwing my left paw dangerously close to the knife blade. I took a moment to thank the stars I didn't cut myself.

"Mental note, be more careful." I exhaled, wrapping my tail around my leg. A weird habit I had whenever I was nervous.

I picked out some of the wrapping paper cushion wadded up inside.

It looked like every holiday had been represented in one parcel. There were painted eggs, candy canes, birthday cakes, and even menorahs! I tore through all of them, a whole years worth of holidays just to see who the hell sent me a sloppily hand wrapped package from Amazon.

"Ack!" I screamed tossing the thing into the passenger seat.

Eyes stared back at me, with it's bent snout pressed against the seat.

Sitting there was a canine woman's head, at least I thought it was once a woman. It's face had been seemingly bashed with some blunt object, crushing it's snout into oblivion. I could feel my heart drop into my stomach.

My phone buzzed, and it was my mother.

Hey honey, could you pick up a package for me from Chirpy? I ordered some christmas cards. Thanks!

I frowned, because right after I finished reading her text message, I received a second message, a screen grab of her amazon locker package retrieval number. But... it was from an 800 number, and read:

Hi! My name is Chirpy, and I have a package for you! Enter code: 48Y72 to receive package.

The number I was receiving notifications for the head, wasn't an 800 phone number... it was the local area code.