FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Harry's path took them almost immediately out of the woods. Though their encounter occurred around noon, they were out by sunset. Instead, they ventured back to the desert. He didn't explain how he knew where he was going; only that he knew which way to go.

After a few hours, most were unsure he actually had any idea; after a few days, they were absolutely certain. It was a relatively straight line at first. Lack of terrain and landmarks made it hard to tell but it felt fairly straight. However, at the end of the 10thday, (Michael had put himself in charge of keeping track) they reached the end of the desert which confused Harry.

It turns out, Harry's sense of direction relied solely on the fact they were heading to some location in a desert. The concept of their destination being in another desert seemed to evade him. He insisted it had to be in this one, declaring all they had to do was turn around and walk back. After Rogue asked for where it was he was heading too, he declared that he knew where he was going and began walking. The others reluctantly followed.

This trend continued, with Harry keeping the others lost in the desert. He supported only by Michael's desperation to get home and find his sister. Rogue and Trevor followed along solely for the strength in numbers. For a time, their survival hinged solely on the fact that Rogue actually carried a sufficient amount of food for their journey. That time ran out after about a month.

"I'm telling you, we can afford to stay in the desert any longer," Rogue declared as she pulled out the last piece of jerky she had. She broke it in half and tossed a piece to each human. Trevor wasn't very interested and offered it to Michael as well, earning an evil eye from his "partner". He rolled his eyes and began to consume it.

"Look, we'll reach there any day and he's based in a hospitality zone so we won't have to worry about it anymore."

"What's a hospitality zone?" Michael asked.

Harry seemed confused by the answer till he remembered this wasn't their realm. "There are places in our world where there's an unexplainable mass of energy. The energy doesn't disperse and never runs out but needs a way to manifest. This forms a "hospitality zone" which provides the basic needs of survival for whoever inhabits it. It's also rumored that..."

"Those are just rumors," Rogue interrupted. "There's no need to scare them."

"What?!?" Michael exclaimed, giving Harry a good chuckle.

"That's probably scarier than the rumor itself," Harry declared. "Now you've got them thinking the world will spontaneously combust!" Michael breathed a sigh of relief, confirming the statement.

"I am more curious as to what this rumor is, though," Trevor stated.

"Tell you what," Harry answered. "When we get there, I'll tell you. Now, can we please get moving?"

"Back into that desert?" Rogue said aghast. "We'll starve in day if we don't reach your sanctuary. We can try again later but we need to go elsewhere and get resources. Somewhere we know how to get to!" The last statement was added to cut Harry off before he could argue his case further.

He forced himself to admit that the desert wasn't exactly a great option. "Alright then, mother, where do you suggest we go? A city? I'm sure they'll just love to see a pair of humans wandering around."

"Why what's wrong with humans?" Michael asked.

"Some believe you don't belong here," Harry started. "It doesn't help that there's a number of prophesies around your kind and not a lot of them are great."

Rogue continued for him. "Those that don't mind your presence and don't care for prophesy will probably want to bind to you for your energy. There's nothing to prevent a being from having multiple bonds, most won't want to share because it gets complicated and possibly life threatening to the one in the middle."

"It won't be hard to realize you're bound to us so they'll try to kill us and convince you that binding to them is for your own good."

Trevor chuckled a bit. "And we don't know anyone who's done that."

"It's different," Harry declared. "I actually am doing this for you two. This place isn't nice to you guys so the sooner you're gone, the better."

There was a moment of silence following the last statement. Harry turned and looked at each set of eyes staring at him. He felt judged by them, though he hadn't done anything wrong.

"I didn't say they had to go into the city," Rogue stated. "Or even that we had to go to one. I just said we need more supplies. I can acquire them and we don't have to go far from the desert. I just can't fetch food in a desert."

Harry gave Rogue a confused look, almost like the words she spoke were signs of madness. Rogue didn't react in the slightest. Eventually Harry found himself wanting to see this. "Alright, let's go. You gather some food for us." Rogue glared at him but turned and walked on as she had planned to do regardless of his actions. Harry eagerly followed behind with Trevor and Michael following up afterwards.

There didn't appear to be an exact direction in her search. Rogue led them into the wood, constantly looking around, as if searching for something. She would occasionally halt and run her fingers along a tree, as if trying to feel something deeper within; none seemed to satisfy her. Harry voiced his impatience but she ignored him. He even tried to head back to the desert but returned when he found she ignored that as well.

After about an hour of travel, she finally halted. Resting her hand against a tree, she seemed about to pass it up as well. Instead, her eyes began to glow and she let loose a howl. It was very canine in nature; the kind of howl you'd hear in the dark night of western movies. And then she froze, moving only to look around. As Harry questioned her motives again, Trevor decided to explore the area with his own senses.

In an instant, Trevor felt something very wrong. He could detect trees shaking in the wind but said trees were couldn't be seen and no wind could be felt. He saw leaves dancing around in front of him where only stillness could be observed.

"Real funny," Rogue commented as she witnessed Trevor's near panic.

Trevor was flustered by the misinterpretation of his actions. "No, there's tree's there, that aren't there! And leaves, flying in a wind that doesn't actually exist! And what are these?" Trevor asked as he began to take awkward steps around the area.

"Foxes! Those are foxes! Little, invisible...no, incorporeal foxes!" Trevor began to wave his hand around close to the ground, as if afraid he'd make contact with it. Rogue appeared to be surprised by his response though Michael and his partner seemed to think Trevor was crazy. "And there they go! Along with the trees that don't exist."

Trevor held a confused look on his face as he searched for the phenomena he had felt. Finally, he directed his attention at Rogue, as if requesting an explanation.

Rogue sighed. With the other's watching, she would have had to explain eventually anyways. "It's rare but there are digimon that can open a hole between dimensions. I can do so but it's very well limited and consumes more energy than I care to expend; especially if I have to feed 4 instead of just myself."

"Well, you could just open a hole and let us through," Michael stated.

Rogue shook her head. "My openings aren't very large and you don't want to know what happens if I lose focus halfway through." To illustrate her point, she held up a hand, showing the 3 digits on in it with a central one obviously missing, drawing a cringe from Michael.

After a short moment, she flipped up the "missing" finger nonchalantly. "If you ever meet a one-handed impmon, that was my fault." Michael was a little aggravated by the deception but his desire to use her ability to head home was thwarted.

"Besides," Harry added. "We should look for your sister first. If you go back without her, you may find out she is here and I don't think there's anyone who can help you come back in your world."

Michael nodded in agreement. "Why do you have to connect with our world for food? Are "hospitality zones" the only other way to get food?"

For the first time since he'd arrived in this world, Michael didn't get an answer. Harry had answered every question before it but was suddenly paralyzed and Rogue was in similar condition. Trevor hadn't been paying much attention but the sudden silence drew some from him. He and Michael exchanged a look, wondering what was going on with them.

Suddenly, both renamon began to walking. They didn't say what they were doing or where they were going. They didn't even seem to notice that Michael and Trevor were still there. Michael and Trevor both watched in confusion before silently agreeing to give chase.

"Where are we going?" Michael asked as he ran up beside Harry. Still no answer came. He tried waving his hand in front of his face and poking him but nothing seemed to draw any kind of response.

With Michaels attempts to provoke them failing, Trevor decide to just put himself in their path. "If you don't tell us where..." he started till Rogue placed a hand on his shoulder and began to push him out of the way.

Trevor seemed to snap after letting himself be pushed just a bit. He reached out and took a firm hold of Rogue's shoulder. Taking ahold of its wrist, Trevor swung it around and slammed it into the nearest tree, pressing Rogue against the tree before pinning Rogue's arm behind it's back and moving his hand from the shoulder to the neck.

"I said...!" Trevor began to repeat but halted as he noticed a new oddity. Rogue didn't seem to be bothered in the least. It wasn't angry about the manner it was being handled and didn't even flinch from being smashed face first into a tree.

"Let her go." It was one thing to hear it from Harry in a strange, monotonous voice. For whatever reason, though, Rogue said it with little distinction between their voices. It even referred to itself in 3rd person. Trevor could only look back and forth between them, confused about what had happened and what to do next.

"Tell us where you're going!" Michael demanded. He appeared equally confused but figured someone had to push the encounter on.

"To die: you'd best go on your ways or you'll become my meal, too."

Possession; there was no doubt about it now. They didn't know how it worked either so the means to free them was unclear at best.

'Maybe freeing them isn't the only answer,' Trevor thought to himself. After a few seconds, Trevor began trying to remember the feeling from earlier, remember how the bonding process worked. Sure, a specific emotion was probably all he needed to render her helpless but he didn't even know what that emotion was. Perhaps, he didn't need to use the bond.

Trevor's time was up; Rogue began to squirm beneath him, attempting to break his grip. As he held it in place, refusing to release it from his grasp. He attempted to recreate the feeling from before, this time being the actor in drawing energy from Rogue. He wasn't very successful at first, feeling wisps flow into his body. He didn't get much time to perfect the technique as "Harry" decided to assist the restrained renamon.

Harry rushed at Trevor, attempting to tackle him and force the release of Rogue. Seeing Harry coming, Trevor kicked Rogue's legs out from under it causing them to fall to the ground. He then rolled away, just as Harry struck at the ground where they had been. Trevor ended the roll, sitting upright on top of Rogue and quickly drew both arms together and again pinned them to her back.

While keeping an eye out for Harry, Trevor returned to his attempt to steal what remained of Rogue's energy. He almost instantly felt the wisps of energy again but they quickly turned into a steady flow. It was week, like a shallow brook with the water being waylaid by the rocky bed of its shallow water. Just as he began to strengthen the pull, He saw his vision disappear.

Trevor felt he had too much to focus on as he kicked his sixth sense into gear, locking it on Harry and retaining awareness of his every move. He resisted flinching as the hot fire energy began to pour into him, initially feeling like pocket warmer but quickly growing to the temperature of an oven. It didn't hurt, but his body desperately believed it did.

It wasn't long before Harry made his second attempt to free Rogue. This time, he stepped quietly up beside Trevor and attempted to give him a strong punch to the face. The fist made a solid impact, but not with the intended face. As it collide with a palm now hidden in his own black mist, the fingers closed around and held tightly.

Rogue had stopped squirming moments ago but Trevor wanted to make sure it wouldn't just get up and wander off to its death. He found it weird that suddenly, he couldn't maintain the strong flow of energy that he had before. He developed a suspicion as to why and confirmed it as he attempted to do the same to Harry.

The familiar wisp could be felt but Trevor couldn't get any more. He tried as hard as he good to get the steady stream from before only to barely maintain the little bit of drain he could get. Harry was resisting. Somehow, Rogue figured out what he was doing and gave him its energy.

Harry glanced at the Rogue, who was more or less twitching on the ground at this point. He didn't get to look for very long before Trevor tried the same attack Harry had. Harry tried to block the attack as well but Trevor changed opened his fist, locking both of Harry's hands in his grip.

"What did you do to her?" Harry asked as Trevor pushed against him, preventing him from being able to fight back. Trevor didn't answer, focusing solely on stopping Harry's ability to attack and draining his energy. It was much slower this time; so slow he feared he'd never steal enough to disable Harry. Due to the overdose of energy he had taken from Rogue, He wasn't feeling any fatigue from the wrestling he had gotten himself into.

"Harry", on the other hand, was panting heavily already. He was just losing all his energy; between Trevor taking a small amount of it over time and expending it in vain to fight him. It didn't help that, at some point, Harry gave in, allowing a stronger flow of energy to flow into Trevor. The moment he trembled with weakness, Trevor kneed Harry in the gut. As Harry doubled over and fell to the ground, Trevor stepped back and stared dead at him.

Harry looked up and returned the stare. Fighting was useless, his possessor realized, it was just going to lose both of its playthings if this kept up. Maybe some sort of threat would work.

"You think you beat me? I heard about your dilemma: you have no food. How long will you last without them? A day? Maybe 2? Sure, you may have all their energy but it still doesn't last forever. And if you wake them back up, I'll just possess them again in an instant. Think you can fight them when you're as tired and weary as they are now?"

"You want their energy for yourself, right?" Trevor asked.

Harry gave him a confused look; like he was getting a desired result that he wasn't supposed to. "Yes, and if I can't have it, no one can!"

"Well, I have it now. You don't need them anymore. Release them and take me in their place."

"What?!" Michael exclaimed. Surprise and shock filled all but Trevor's face as he commanded the attention in the area.

"I'm guess that, for whatever reason, you can't control humans, or you'd have taken control of us as well. However, I'll come to you willingly if you just promise to let them move on. I'll provide the other human with just enough energy to revive them when I'm gone and then head to your location."

"No don't!" Rogue yelled.

Trevor wasn't sure whether Rogue had just been released or if it had managed to fight of whatever spell took hold of them. With either case, he refused to listen to her. "I have all their energy; they'll be next to worthless after you get me. All I'm looking to do is give them that chance to survive. If I must sacrifice myself to do so, then so be it. Do we have a deal?"

Silence filled the air for a few moments as the absent being thought its choices over. Michael wanted to stop him but he was the key to saving Rogue and Harry. He didn't want Trevor to sacrifice himself, but if this was their only hope and it was his choice.

"Alright," Harry finally declared. "I'll let your furry friends live." He extended an arm and held it as straight as he could, pointing in the direction they had been headed. "Go that way and don't stop. You'll know when you've found me!"

With his final order given, Trevor placed a hand on Harry's forehead. After a few seconds, Harry collapsed to the ground. "But if you try this trick on me, I will kill you!"

Trevor limply nodded in acknowledgement as he walked over to Michael. He grasped Michael's hand and gave it a bit of a shake as he transferred some energy to him. "They'll know what to do," Trevor declared as he was about to offer resistance. He nodded and looked away, unable to watch as Trevor marched to his death.