Day 7
#9 of Days
Ok, that journal entry about taking some time to read up Stickmaker's latest, well, my muse had differant ideas.
Now eight pages of single spaced text later and I am almost dead on my feet at two am again.
We managed to fill the twelve hours quite well in the end, keeping the experiments rotating in and out of the incubators, some sleep and some good ol' aerobic exercise. Time had, well, flown.
Almost ten minutes past the deadline I had set Harry he announced over the speakers that we were approaching Sydney international airport and that there were people active in the tower, so we raced to the cockpit.
"I repeat this is WHO, that is, World Health Organisation aircraft, designation Whiskey Hotel Oscar three eight one, I am on final approach, can you advise as to what runway you want me on?" The pilot was saying calmly into the mic. "Ok, I got that, making for runway zero six west."
He turned to us, "You two had best strap in, they reported a slight cross-wind at ground level."
We secured into the first pair of seats we could, being careful to not sit on our tails, we hadn't had the chance to carve a chunk of foam out of these chairs, like we had some others, yet.
After a slightly jarring landing we began taxiing toward the main terminal, "Ok, looks like we have a few on the tarmac waiting for us this time, they have stairs and... holy shit, get up here and look at this!"
Unbuckling we returned to the plane and our gasps on seeing the people were simultaneous. About a dozen mutated humans were waiting for us, there was a few rats, a scattering of canines of varying breeds a pair of cats and a lone... "Shit, is that a kangaroo?" Karen asked in astonishment.
"Fuck, no more mini-fridge in the cockpit." The pilot said solemnly.
We had been very careful not to interact with the pilot too closely so far, poor bastard deserved the chance to choose what he would have looking back at him in the mirror each day, for the rest of his life, but I sensed he had come to a decision, "Well, damn it all, since I don't seem to be able to shake this damn disease I guess I had better chose a species".
"Yeah, you name it and I will see what I can do. I had my choice kind of made for me, not that I don't love being foxy." Karen added for my benefit, she knew I still felt bad about that first kiss and what it had done to her, "You have been such a help, you deserve to have the pick of whatever you want." She finished.
"Well, as a matter of fact...", He said, and leaned closer, but not too close, and whispered something.
"A wolf? How the! No, no, I will get it, you stay here and we will handle the people on site. Get your bike ready though, in case I call you on the radio."
"Just shout it to the world why don't you. Yeah, a wolf, why not? They are pretty awesome so far as critters go." He defended his choice.
"Ok, will see what I can do, there was a few zoos here before this shit hit the fan, might be able to wring something." I backed his choice personally, I definitely had no regrets about being a fox, but wolves were pretty much the king of the canines.
We left him to his book and music and set about getting ready to meet the 'reception crew', finally with a knife for me and a pistol for Karen we opened the door, the little WHO badges swinging around our necks.
I could hear muttering from them, "... do we even know they are who they say they are?" "We don't, but I heard from one of the ground crew about this pilot, he is the real deal." "And what if they don't know about the fur, they might freak out and...", I decided that they had enough time to speculate and relieved them of that last worry.
"Gentlemen." I said as I stepped out of the door of the plane, "Glad to see some people have been following the instructions we sent." I had heard the broadcasts the WHO researchers had been broadcasting, full of particulars in regards to dosage and drugs to use.
"You the Doc the pilot talked about?" One man asked.
"Nah, I am just her lackey, doctor Ellis is right behind me." I said and stepped forward bringing her with me. I guess just hearing the accents I was so used to had put me on 'sure footing', so I had naturally taken the lead, forgetting of course that Karen would have to be the 'big dog' so far as our little team went.
She stepped past me, moving down the steps, "Hello doctor, we were a little worried that there might be further problems, we had a cargo plane drop off a huge supply of the drugs a day ago, we hadn't expected any further arrivals."
"Well, rest assured that everything that can be done is being done, my associates have me here running a little errand for them, if we could speak about it inside where its more comfortable." She replied to the speaker, one of the cat mutants, some kind of tabby I think.
A pair of the split off the returning group to help me secure the plane, "Names Mike, this is Jev." The cat facing me supplied, gesturing to the german shepherd beside him. "You need this refuelled any time soon?", He asked.
"Yeah, we might be needing to hare off again on another job, its Dave by the way.", We shook hands and I helped them push the stairs clear.
"You better go catch up with your girl, those bastards will be drooling all over the place once the high of outside news wears off." Jev said with a wink, tongue lolling to the side.
"Oh, our pilot's still in there, he hasn't been mutated yet, we are trying to set him up with his choice, a wolf if you can believe it, the old bastard has been no end of help to getting all this under what little control we have."
"Hey, I heard one of the guys who survived, a wolf-hound, Sam I think was his name, was a vet, has been helping a few others get the zoo animals safe, you might want to swing by there and ask if he can help you." Mike supplied.
"Thanks mate, will do." I called, running to the terminal.
I was wandering through the terminal building, walking in the direction I just 'knew' Karen was, when it struck me, I was following her scent. Concentrating on hers alone I found I could almost pick up whispers of conversation, well, not really, but I could sense what emotions she had been feeling, it was amazing. I was so proud of my new trick I nearly walked right into the group of mutants as they escorted her to the locker area.
"Oh and here he is! David, join us, we are almost to the lockers." She called.
"He is patient zero?" I almost froze in terror, she had told them everything, "I want to shake your hand son, if you hadn't come forward and let the med-heads do all their tests, well, we would likely all be dead. Damned if I wouldn't have just crawled into a hole and died in that situation." The rottweiler held out his hand, which I took numbly.
"Not only that, but since his recovery he has been assisting my team with experiments, with all the medical trained staff needed doing the nitty gritty work, we were in short supply of lab technicians." She added, grinning to me, eyes shinning.
"Hell, kid is practically a hero then." The kangaroo stated, "Whats your poison mate?" He asked, my aussie accent tipping him off that I would know what the question meant.
Grinning I replied, "V B if you have some, but any larger would go down well. Damn beer they have on the plane is,", and I winked at Karen, " like making love in a boat."
The rottweiler replied with a practised air, "Fucking close to water?". We all shared a chuckle at that.
We had reached the lockers and Karen pulled out the key, "L twenty is the locker we are looking for."
There were still some bodies around here, evidently they had been clearing as much as they could, but this was one of the last areas, or so it seemed.
And in very little time we had found it.
'The Thinker,
Well, we know of your lost resolve, if you found this note, it was likely in the hope that the drug might be useful to your new masters. My Brothers have sworn that they will kill you on sight, but I have almost grown fond of you, I have watched you as you made the first few legs of your trip, and, truth be told, was surprised you made it as far as you did, I felt you would have been stopped in London for sure.'
There was some spittle marks on the paper, a few flecked with blood.
'Yours, approaching his final rest, the Lamb of God.
PS. The container is at pier four, it was unloaded from the container ship Faringo, which will ply the waves no more. Farewell my son, know that I will pray for your soul.'
Karen was tossing the key up and down in her hand, "Well, we got a container to go find."
"We will have a truck brought around to the front of the terminal if you will-" One of the men was saying, but fury had filled me, I recognised one of the last of the bodies left to clear.
"YOU FUCKING BASTARD!" I yelled, and started kicking and ripping at the corpse, "YOU RUINED MY LIFE, YOU ROUINED BILLIONS OF LIVES, FOR YOUR FUCKING SICK GOD." I had most of it out of me now, I was panting heavily. "You... you..."
The one thing that would bring me right out of that angry state, Karen, leaned in to my back and whispered to my ear, "Its not all bad love, he brought us together."
"Shit, this the one you were telling us about ma'am? One of the fanatics?" A man asked, I didn't notice who.
I growled, but again Karen supplied the silver bullet to my tension, "Live to spite him, if he is in the afterlife, looking at us, lets show him that his death was meaningless. Love and live."
Finally I could think strait again, "I am good, I just, I kinda lost it I know, but I think I might need that beer now, if you have one?"
A green can was handed to me, and with relish I cracked it open, raised it and said...
-
"To living!" He toasted.
"Living!" The rest of us said, and I took a gulp of my beer, screwing my face up at the bitter taste of the horrible stuff.
David hooked me around the waist, "You get used to it." he commented, nuzzling my neck.
We walked to the front of the airport terminal, to find the truck was not the only thing waiting for us, the bright aussie sun blasting down on me, I belatedly took another pull from the can, "Uh, your right." I said, it was still pretty bad, but hot sun on a fur coat with clothes on top would make any beverage potable.
Climbing into the truck with David, I barely had the door closed before we started rolling forward.
"Names Bob." The driver said, reaching out a furred paw to us between gear shifts, "You have to forgive the state of my cab, don't normally have anyone else up here, and definitely none as pretty as you ma'am." I grinned at the comment, the window beside me was down, the sound from the truck drowning out most of the conversation going on, and with David between us I only had limited contact with Bob.
I was in a half daze, my hair was all over the place thanks to the wind from the window, before I knew it the can in my hand was retreating from my muzzle again, you really did get used to the damn stuff, it sure left an interesting after-taste, one that reminded you in no uncertain terms, that you were consuming a beer.
We arrived shortly at the gates to the pier, it was fenced off and locked up tight but the driver jumped out with a pair of bolt-cutters and dealt with that problem. A bit of driving later saw us eyeing a shipping container warily, there was always the chance it was a trap.
"Bob, jump out and head over there behind that stack of containers" David said, "Take Karen with you please.", He added.
"No, no no no. I have come this far with you, there's not a hope in hell I am not going to be with you when you open that.", I had already thought of this, and had made my mind up as to how I wanted it to go.
"Just... ok, I can't beat you can I babe?" He gave in, kissing me lustily. "Well, lets get it over with."
He put the key in the lock and twisted, the lock sprang apart. We cracked the seal on the container when we wrenched the locking mechanism open. David threw a door wide and we looked in, sure enough, the thing was packed tight with shipping pallets of azathioprine, enough for thousands of doses. "Makes you wonder how long they have been planning this, you can't just buy this quantity without someone taking notice." I put in as we re-locked the door.
"Its safe Bob, we got the mother lode here!" David called happily back to the driver.
It took a bit of work, but Bob had worked with forklifts before he had said, and what he was driving was a really big fork-lift.
"Ok, that's all tied down, now where to kids?" The guy asked.
"You need to take this to the airport, tell them to call WHO and tell them what we got, there will probably be planes coming for it before the day is out."
"Your not coming with?" He asked.
"Nah, we gotta go see a man about a wolf." And David winked with his statement.
"Ah, the zoo? But you two are already changed..."
"Our pilot, who has been a huge help, has made up his mind he wants to be a bit wolfish." I answered, "And we are hoping we can get him a hookup."
"Well, you talk to Sam, he is the vet working down there at the moment, and you tell him Robert Grey sent you down, that'll grease his wheel a little, if you understand me french." The trucky winked.
"Thanks mate," David said to him, as he got back into his truck, "catch ya round."
"See ya." Bob finished the ritual farewell.
Took us two streets of checking each car before we gave up looking for an unlocked one. "Its only seven more blocks, lets just run it!" David exclaimed.
I replied by taking off at a quick sprint, settling back to fast jog. I had to keep my mouth open or I started feeling too hot, it was at that time my mind woke up to the fact that I wouldn't be able to sweat now, so duh, of course I had to pant like a dog.
We called it a tie as we rounded on the front gates to the zoo, which were open.
As we walked into the office just inside the gate we were accosted by what looked like a hyena mutant. "Ah, good, more hands, here take these." And we each had a large kitten thrust at us with bottles which they were gamely trying to gnaw on.
-
Holding the young cats, whose race I still couldn't identify, I was overwhelmed by the overload of cute. Then the big kitten in my arms promptly shat on me.
Karen, however, had full stock of the situation, or so she thought, "Excuse me, I am Doctor Ellis, this is my assistant, we are here to ask if-" was as far as she got.
"I don't care if you are the Queen of England, I have their mother, a lynx, in there halfway bleeding... Did you say doctor? As in medical doctor?" The man charged ahead with the conversation, ignoring all pleas to relent.
"Uh, biology but..."
"Close enough!" And with that he grabbed the kitten from Karen and dumped it in my arms and pulled her through to the next room.
I looked at the kittens, now snuggling together, done with their first meals. "Well, that's not the worst introduction I have had this month. Welcome to the world little ones." And I promptly lay down on the carpeted floor, and cuddled up the young. "Poor defenceless little bastards, I hope this day ends up better for you than last week was for me."
Stifling a yawn, I was still on jet-lag-time, I curled around the babies and fell asleep.
-
When we were done the poor mother barely had a pulse, she had lost a lot of blood, but the Vet I had assisted, obviously the 'Sam' Bob had talked about, had worked tirelessly to bring her through it, his happiness in seeing me was apparently because he needed someone competent to assist him.
"Thanks for that, I doubt I would have gotten her through that without you. Names Sam by the way, Sam Knight." He held out a blood soaked paw, I returned the gesture.
"Well, you know my name, Karen Ellis, my assistant is David-", And my brain screamed, I had slept with the guy and didn't even know his last name, mom would be proud...
"Well, lets go see how he did with this girls babies." Sam said.
We scrubbed in the sink and I the vet opened the door for me, "Damn, and I thought the sight of those kittens was the cutest damn thing I have seen all month..." I managed to say, at the sight of Mr Mysterious himself curled up with the two little kittens asleep, only their heads poking out. At some point he had ripped his shirt off.
"Well, I know they're not dogs, but how about we let them have a nap while they are quiet." Sam commented, ushering me into the next room and closing the door quietly behind us.
-
I woke up feeling warm, warmer than I should, I remember taking my shirt off roughly, the kittens seemed to calm more when they had fur to snuggle to, but now I could swear I felt something at my back, and the fur on it was thicker than Karen's.
Turning my head slightly I was looking into the eyes of a very drowsy lynx and new mother, she started purring at the sight of me awake. "Damn, how do I get into these situations." Sighing I felt her curl a bit tighter against me and I fell asleep again.
When next I woke, I remembered her and slowly turned, bringing the now, very wide awake kittens, who had woken me, against her. She started purring loudly again when she felt the little bundles start to nurse. I couldn't help but reach out to tenderly pet her.
"Well, about time you woke, sleepy head, its getting late." Karen and the man from earlier were sitting on an old couch having a quiet beer, it seems she got the taste for the stuff quick.
"You know she has never let a person so much as within a meter of her, even worse when she was pregnant." The man said, "Names Sam, your missus here has told me a bit about you, for what its worth, thanks. For manning up enough to see the Doc and for taking care of that girl and her kittens."
I blushed, a bit, thankfully I now had quite a thick coat of fur leaving me rather well defended against others seeing it. "Thanks, she must have come out of the anaesthetic quick."
"I couldn't risk using much, mainly just dosed her on painkillers. Despite that, she has taken quite a shine to you." He returned, almost sounding relieved.
"I was just talking to the doc here about a friend of yours, wants to have a bit of a getting-to-know-you with a wolf. We were just about to call him." The he added.
"Yeah, Harry, you know the zoo just east of the airport... yeah there is one there, well apparently there is a pair of wolves in residence, if you wanted to come and say hi to them the guy running the place won't mind... you there Harry? Harry?", Karen said, talking into the headset of the field radio, she rejoined the conversation, "He is on his way, had his bike out and been ready, asked if I could send up a flare to show him where it is?"
"Fine by me, you may want to call the airport and let em know what's happening though." Sam replied.
As Karen went outside with an emergency flare-gun in hand, Sam turned to me, "Your a lucky bastard David, make sure she wants for nothing, you got me?"
"Yeah mate, well covered there. Her command is my will." I replied, grinning like a fool.
Harry arrived in very short order, I was about to head outside to greet him when the lynx in the corner started making to move to follow me, I got Karen's attention, nodding to her to go out and returned to the distraught creature.
-
Sam escorted Harry through the zoo steering clear of every mammal, finally closing in on the wolf enclosure.
Harry suddenly looked worried, "How they going to take to me?"
"That won't be a problem mate, these puppies are tame, raised by a local when he found them as strays, they had gotten free of some whack-jobs private little zoo, and he raised them for three years before he twigged to what they were." Sam assured him.
Sam walked around to the side and opened the first of a double gate, "Only one gate can open at a time, I will back away and you can go in there, if they do start to get a bit rough there's a tazer in the plastic bucket there." He told the now almost shaking pilot.
Harry picked up the tazer and walked into the cage, then cycling the gates, advanced into the main enclosure.
He needn't have taken the precaution, the wolves ran up to him and presented themselves for pats and scratches, laughing he complied.
He played with them for a bit, making sure to get up close with the big canines. The poor things seemed starved for attention.
All too soon the sky started to darken and we left the gambolling creatures to their fun.
"So that's it?" Harry said as we returned to the front gate.
"Yeah, that's it." I replied, "You will still want to avoid other species until you start to show signs that you have absorbed the wolf DNA, but apart from that, welcome to family Canidae!" I added.
"You wait here, I will go help David with the lynx." Sam said.
He was gone a while. Harry was asking me all manner of questions, what it was like with a tail, did you go cross-eyed much with the muzzle, what the fur feels like when its attached to you. I tried to answer and was halfway through trying to explain tail wagging to him when David appeared, carrying a baby kitten. Trailing behind him was a much more alert mother with the other kitten swinging from her mouth, held by the scruff of its neck.
"She, uh, she won't let me leave..." He stated lamely.
"So, 'it followed me home, can I keep it'?" I replied, but could see in the big cats eyes that this wasn't something that was going to be able to be reasoned. "Harry, head back and warm up the plane."
"Sure boss." He said, beating a hasty retreat.
I knelt down real close in front of the cat, never breaking eye contact. I reached up and cradled the kitten carefully, taking its weight as she let go, I passed it up to David.
"He is MINE!" I don't know where it came from, why it was directed at the beast, but she held my eyes for a second acknowledging me and then slunk around me, walking low to the ground, head turned from looking at me.
The behaviour seemed to feel right, she had given in, it was ok all of a sudden to have her nearby. I reached out to pet her, and she allowed me, purring lightly as I did so. "Ok, its fine by me, you have to look after her though."
He just looked happy that we hadn't torn each other apart, in a way I was too, because I knew without a doubt, I would have attacked her with everything I had if it had come to that. She may be small for a 'big cat', but a bobcat is still big enough to cause some serious damage if provoked.
"Well, now it seems she will let two people near her, although I am baffled about why she didn't attack you, she seems quite attached to David..." Sam mentioned.
"I dunno mate, I guess its a g-" was all David got out before he sensed both mine and the cats head turn toward him and glare.
"Care to finish that?" I said, archly.
"Uh, guess its a great time to make tracks..." He saved, lamely.
"Yes." I replied, then turning to Sam, "Thanks for helping our friend with the wolf."
"Thanks for helping me save three lives, take care of them, all of them, no matter how stupid they may be." He replied, and I got the implied reference.
We found a car on the third try this time, and bundled the new mother into the back, David took the wheel and we headed back.
"We all good." The pilot told us when we entered the plane, the cat had at first been a bit out of sorts with going into the door of the plane, but when David walked in carrying her kittens she trotted in meekly.
"Lets head back to Cairo and meet up with the team again." I told him.
"No can do, the team re-located to LAX yesterday, if we lay on the speed we can make it there before morning." Harry replied.
"Lets get moving then!" I called back with a laugh.
I turned and saw David and the two kittens playing, the mother just watching them. I walked over and laid down behind the cat, she purred more as I started to pet her. Yeah, I think we understood each other now. I was just about to say something to David when take-off pushed us back against the wall.
"Shit, forgot about this." He said, being sure to cradle the kittens.
"Same." I returned, offering much the same to the adult bobcat.
It took about ten more minutes before I passed out from mental and physical exhaustion.
-
The kittens were asleep again, Karen and the big cat were curled up, improbably, together. But due to my nap in the afternoon I was still awake.
Turning sideways I reached out to Karen and started lightly stroking the fur at her shoulder, she murred and snuggled closer to the cat. After a while I managed to join them in sleep.
The bobcat, well, she started as a plot device but made it known to me, that under no uncertain circumstances, was she going to let me leave her as such. Never work with animals or children folks (and her kittens count as the worst of both).