FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

The security lockdown continued from all around them. The red blaring lights deafened both ears and sight partially rendering the whole of the laboratory, the server room and the military computer in red and black. James stood before the one dubbed "Project Zero" as Ashwin and Derek Anseed stood behind him at the doorway to the data transferring room, the lone surgeon's table sleekly illuminated next to him.

"Are you...a-a-are you [i]f-f-fucking...wh-whhh-h-h-h...[/i]"

He struggled to make his lips even move as he bowed his head clutching his hands against himself, feeling the deepest shock to his heart wincing with a slight painful sound that whined from his throat. He couldn't even bring himself to look at the strange metallic raptor on the floor, sputtering with eyes flickering like the lens of videocameras, its brain synthetic and exposed beneath impenetrable glass fibers. The voice flickered occasionally from its skull as if words were being copy-pasted into an incomplete sentence.

"[i]D-e-r-e-k...let...please let me s-l-e-e-p.[/i]"

"Th-th-that...that...is...m-my mum?"

"No," said Derek Anseed, "not truly. But it is an image of her, and one that does not do any justice for her."

"......no...no, no, n-n-no this...this is not happening. This...NOTHING f-f-fucking even-h-how is this......why? Why is she here?"

"She...th-there is so much to explain, but she made that copy herself, it...it was supposed to be a beta subject, she wanted to create a synthetic brain in order to experiment with, when she died and the project fell through I-"

"Ashwin."

James stopped shivering as he raised his head, his eyes turned cold and blank.

"Let me punch him. Just...l-l-let me punch him once in his fucking face."

"No."

The elephant stood between him and the human.

"James. Oi know this shit's fucked but-"

"[b][i]SHUT UP![/i][/b]"

His scream elicited piercing green eyes frothing with fury.

"[i]THIS IS BEYOND FUCKED, THIS IS SOMETHING [b]WORSE![/b][/i]"

"We came 'ere to do a mission. You 'ave a roigh' to feel loik this, bu' oi cannot let you hurt 'im."

"[i]I DON'T CARE! THIS [b]FUCKBITCH[/b] IS CARRYING AROUND MY [b]MOTHER[/b] LIKE SOME FUCKING PET![/i]"

"Oh it's definitely fucked up, you got no idea 'ow pissed off oi am rest assured this ain't gonna go away. But you need to stop thinkin' abou' wantin' to put a piece in 'im."

"[i]OR WHAT!? YOU'LL SHOOT ME!?![/i]"

"No. Oi just won't let you. You come at 'im you 'ave to get past me."

"[b]DON'T.[/b] Even. Try to [b][i]FUCKING STOP MEEEEEE![/i][/b]"

With unrelenting rage blistering from the maddening confusion in his mind he pounded his steps towards Ashwin who stood firmly like a rock, letting James slam into him without budging a single inch. The raptor punched and striked with all his strength, screaming and trying to move around the elephant blocking the doorway to where Anseed was fearfully cowering with a deep look of shame. Ashwin never moved, never lifted a single finger, crossing his arms firmly as he watched James continuously hammer his fists violently into the body of his friend.

Beating his fists until they hurt and beyond the point of feeling them throb and tremble with greatening agony, James screeched and sobbed clawing at Ashwin's armoured front trying to slam into the thick grey skin. Ashwin did not move until he saw James finally give up out of pure exhaustion, his arms swinging more ached and tired as tears trickled down his face reddening with beastly rage and sorrow. Once he was done fighting, James pressed his head against Ashwin's chest and weeped with heaving shoulders as he felt his gnarled thick hand press upon the back of his head.

"Cummere. S'gonna be okay. Shhhhhh..."

He said nothing, hugging his friend close as Ashwin bent his head down and wrapped his trunk closely around FG's neck in a tighter embrace, calming him down as he heard James' sounds of mourning muffled in his chest. He rocked him gently, motioning his body back and forth almost subconsciously, until the raptor managed to gain a grip on his mental state.

"Thassit...shhhh, thassit mate. Now...lissen."

The elephant placed his hands upon FG's chin to raise his head.

"Oi promise you...that wotever 'appens, we make these fuckers pay fer everything, that clear? Now...we just need to figure out wot to do next. General is upstairs, we 'ave to move to stop him."

"I agree," said Anseed, "but he cannot escape yet. He has an escape plan, a backup for this but until the security lockdown is over he has no means of escape. Every door and window in this place has been well-sealed by your activating the procedure so I-"

"YOU shut the fuck up," said FG, "you don't get a fucking right to talk for all the shit you did."

"A-a-alright. Fine. You have no means of finding him until the lockdown is over so...may I...explain to you what all this is about?"

"I-i-i don't...wanna hear you right now. You...you're sick. You fucking...this."

He swept his hand towards the robotic creature.

"I'm hearing her words...words I never got to even hear before, I had to STRUGGLE to remember and this...this fucking abomination pretending to be my mum and you're telling me that THIS is responsible for the entire experiment you fucking made me part of?! DID YOU PLAN THIS?! [i]DID YOU HAVE SOME [b]SHIT[/b] AGAINST HER SO YOU MADE ME SUFFER TO TEACH HER A LESSON!?[/i]"

"[i]NO![/i]" cried Anseed. "[i]N-NO, YOU'RE WRONG I NEVER WANTED THAT![/i] I NEVER WANTED TO EXPERIMENT ON YOU, I PLEADED WITH GUSTON TO NOT USE YOU, I USED EVERY TRICK TO DISSUADE HIM BU-"

"[i]THEN WHY ME?![/i] WHY!? This all is just TOO fucking coincidental-"

"[i]YOU WERE THE FIRST SUBJECT THAT IT WORKED ON! YOU PERFECTLY ADJUSTED TO THE EXPERIMENT, NO ONE ELSE DID![/i]"

"...what?!"

"I...please. Let me explain everything, I-i-i need to. I want to absolve, I want to...pay for my mistakes, I KNOW what I did was wrong, but I was held hostage by this loathsome place, I couldn't DO anything!"

"Got a point," said Ashwin calmly, "the only reason oi'm 'ere is cuz he sent fer help, took a few years to even get through discreet, but there it is."

"We cannot do anything until the lockdown has subsided so please...let me tell you about this, let me explain. I will not try to vindicate myself, I will not put myself in a good light, but I want to tell you the truth, James. I have...I-i-i have to make it up to your mother. Hearing her in that...thing breaks my heart."

"Then why is this?" stated James snarling. "Why is she in this? This...copy or whatever, I don't GET what this is."

"It is a synthetic brain that she and I sculpted many years ago. We scanned her data into it as a test subject, it does not remember anything beyond the year 3491. It can only respond in memory, we just need a base level of data to contend with."

"What do you mean you sculpted years ago? You mean when you first started with me?"

"No. I mean when you first came into this world thirty-six years ago."

James felt the world fade away from him briefly, the walls pulling back in a sense of confused disbelief. He said nothing and crossed his arms hearing Dr. Anseed talk his story.

"Forty-one years ago, Mary Campbell came to the company that I once worked for, Binding Life Industries in London. She had moved from Dundee, Scotland, where she was a very promising neurosurgeon from the Ninewells Hospital. Having studied for eleven years in her subject, she was formulating a concept for those with Locked-In Syndrome to restore the processes that allow us to move our bodies with our minds, but recreated artificially."

"Wh-...wait...neurosurgeon? Mum was a doctor?"

"Yes. She entered her application to Binding Life with a thesis on a mental processing unit that replicated the means by which we move our bodies."

"Wouldn't you jus' give 'em bionic limbs?" asked Ashwin.

"No, since the problem lies entirely within the brain since the usual reason for such conditions derive from a stroke or brain damage, it is entirely neurological trauma. She started to develop on this as a first step, but of course we needed a brain that responded to our experiments. Project Zero."

He pointed disconsolate at the metalic beast.

"Mary discovered in another department of our industry that we were working on nanomolecular manipulation to act similar to chemical neurotransmitters, the very same process that allows you to move your hands, to speak, to do everything. That was where my department was, and so we became friends joining together to create the Campbell-Anseed Processor. That large square chip in the brain that you see. That was around two years after she had joined us."

The raptor noted there was indeed a large blocky-looking shape crowned on the very centre of the false brain, sitting on the very line that separated left and right sides of the cranium. He was thankful that it stopped speaking when in resting state, struggling to heal itself from the battle as he tried to wrap his head around this.

"You...this...entire project that...I was part of...started even before I was born?"

"Yes," stated Anseed, "it was originally called Project Awakening and designed to overcome quadriplegia and neural stroke effects, but it then turned into something so much greater. Once we started to create the processing unit, we molded the synthetic brain from Mary herself at her request, sculpting it. We opened her head, carefully placed a mold of her neural patterning like an actual cap and let it settle, then removed it once the electrical signals had caused enough work on giving us an impression."

"Wh-why...her? Why not somebody else?"

"She offered, she was a very...spirited scientist, always wanting to leave her mark, she trusted her people and trusted me explicitly. I...I was her friend for five years, we became very close, partners in science. We placed the C.A.P onto the synthetic brain once we had its partial copy, then put the brain into a mannequin, not that one, but a much simpler cast body with a very remedial network of musculature, then made the wiring throughout the entire body like what you have to give your nanos the passage to travel through anyplace."

"Coulda just used a real guy," mumbled Ashwin. "Or build a computer, why the bother of makin' sum sort of rubber brain?"

"We needed the 'flesh' of the brain so we could make certain that the C.A.P would place itself correctly. We did not want to take chances, we had to be certain that it worked harmlessly when upon an actual brain, not a computer. The synthetic brain does have its own computer inside the molding to solve smaller problems with, to give it all the processing power it needed. Once that was done, we began to give it instructions that it understood from us after training it with its aural receiving unit. Mary, lift your left arm."

Without even thinking, the machine in the corner lifted its left arm effortlessly.

"Mary, point to me."

It pointed with the left arm towards Derek.

"See? That was all it was, originally, and we saw that the C.A.P was working perfectly. The nanos replicated electrical signals to make musculature move like any other body."

"It..." James rubbed his head feeling tired suddenly. "It really...thinks that it's her. This...I-i-i-i don't know what to think."

"But then something happened when one day I asked within its vicinity...Mary, can I have some water?"

The robotic raptor looked up slowly and raised its right arm pulsing something blue from inside its clawed steel fingers. Rippling with a familiar light, water itself began pouring sleekly from out of its palm to trickle onto the floor.

"We didn't realise that the nanos were more advanced than first suspected, for we had only been using them as a replacement for electrical signals. But the nanos I supplied from my projects were capable of creating the most basic elements of chemistry, which to it would be pure child's play."

"It just...KNOWS what water is?"

"Water exists in your body, it already knows the chemical composition from scanning its own surroundings, in the same way that your brain understands how to prevent your stomach from eating itself, even though YOU do not know, don't you?"

"I-i-i don't," confessed FG, "so it's...sort of subconscious but also not?"

"Semi-conscious. That was why I chose these nanos in particular, a very specific design that would fit well against Mary's own ingenious ideas. So we now had a fully working processor, and so began our full venture into Project Awakening. All we needed now was a more living subject but unfortunately there was a delay due to a...well, you."

"Me?"

"You had been exhibiting a very bad fever at this time, your father was sick with worry and after it wasn't...going down any we brought you in and tested you. Normally we would not do this being we were not a hospital but...you had an acute case of linear scleroderma."

"A what?"

"Hardening of the skin, a systemic autoimmune disease where your...immune system was attacking its own healthy parts of the body, it was...I do not recall what caused it, but regardless you came in, covered in deep purpling scars all over you, like the ones you still keep."

The raptor rubbed at his snout feeling the texture across them. They were somewhat bumpy, and he felt them slightly raised more than the rest of his skin but not enough to have been significant as Anseed further explained.

"You were about ten months old, your immune system was hitting overdrive and we had to find a means to stifle it. So we began trying to find various chemicals to use on you hoping to try and reduce the damage. The other problem is that, you would have to receive that medication constantly which of course, would be expensive. It was then that Mary hit upon an idea, realising we had something indispensable. The nanos able to develop any chemical composition."

"So...w-w-wait...this...these aren't a...birthmark?"

"No, they are scars from when your autoimmune system was attacking you. We understood that since the nanos themselves comprehended the chemical composition of water, if they were aware of OTHER compositions, they would create it. So we fed into the processor the data for methotrexate to start with assisting you in your healing. And our synthetic model was able to give that to us, without ANY cost! We had in our hands something that could give us essentially unlimited medicine of most variants. Imagine this."

His eyes lit up with wondrous gasp and a genuine excitement rebirthing in him.

"What you have...in your body, was originally conceived as an infinite medicinal dispenser. Foscarnet, aciclovir, darunavir, all of these we could MAKE with the nanos that are in you. If we understood the actual medicine's formula, and put the data into the C.A.P, it can create that medicine forever...essentially, I have not tested which chemicals it can or cannot produce as we never had time but...suffice to say, we managed to stop your scleroderma from spreading and eventually we managed to gather enough treatments to correct your autoimmune system and revert it back."

"With just one drug?"

"No no no no no, it took many varieties and...frankly, I cannot even remember all the details after this long, it was a very long and arduous process that involved having to trigger your genes partially to revert the autoimmune system back from whatever first caused it. S-sorry I...rambled but the point is, because you were sick, we discovered the possibility of the C.A.P and its nanos far quicker than we would have, even though it took you a great many months to heal. We were ready to patent ourselves out the door, with your father's help since he was a patents lawyer...until the...unfortunate happened."

"I...s-s-sorry I'm...I need to sit down."

James did such as he sat onto the table with a sudden exhaustion as the urge to simply lay down and drop to sleep became an ever-increasing temptation upon him. But his mind was too frayed, too frantic with comprehension struggling to take it all in. Eventually Ashwin walked over to place a hand on his back. They almost had not realised the security lockdown was still continuing, despite the elephant wondering how long it took for it to be over as he let the sounds and flashing lights fade from his notice before curiosity got the better of him, asking Dr. Anseed:

"Alroigh', lemme ask you sumthin'. 'ow did the A.R.M.E get their 'ands on this project?"

"The military hired me," said Derek honestly, "When Mary was killed, the entire project fell through without her assistance and I was...in shock, bereaved and the project was put away. Her husband was also the one who was going to help officiate the patent so it...fell into rather open territory and I just quietly boxed it away."

"No one wanted this infinite medical dispenser? Cuz oi foind that 'ard to believe."

"Without Mary's assistance I...I didn't know what to do, eventually I was hired by the British Army. They saw my credentials and frankly I...wanted to leave after she had left us. I took my research with me, hoping perhaps I could put it to better use."

"Loik wot?"

"Well...considering I would be working with a militaristic company, I was hoping I would be able to create an accelerant for healing rate of the body by my usage of nanos. Years passed, I rose up in the ranks as a simple researcher in a new company and I managed to form several new ideas, but...they never asked about Project Awakening, I never presented it. Until nineteen years ago."

"Go on."

A voice came from beside Dr. Anseed out in the corridor. Thomas stood with a heaving gasp against the doorway, his arm still broken as he struggled to keep standing which gave the scientist alarm.

"I'm interested in all this and how it came to be upon my fair city."

"A-are you...are you alright?"

"I'll live."

"No, no you shouldn't, let me make a sling for you at least. Please."

"...alright."

"Is that alright with you?" Derek asked Ashwin.

"Foine by me, but yer not leavin' my soight."

"I have some supplies in the lab."

It only took a minute with escorting from the elephant before Derek found the first aid kit on the wall of the laboratory as he returned with triangular bandage and safety pins to support Thomas' arm slightly raised against his chest. The bear had to lower himself to kneel and allow Derek to even reach his shoulder but he managed to make a full sling to rest his arm into it.

"Thank you."

"It's...the least I could do considering it was my project that broke it."

"I appreciate it. But you were saying about how this project came to be."

"Yes I uh...I uh, the A.R.M.E were looking for new patents to demonstrate to the world. I met Guston when he was at a trade show between military organisations and he was very impressed by my work. But then amongst my things he discovered Project Awakening and found it more fascinating. He asked me what it was and I said it was the essential construct of an infinite medicinal dispenser, able to create medicine from pure nanoenergy. He asked me if it could form ANY chemical, including steel or metal and I said yes theroetically. He hired me on the spot and...I did not realise what his true intentions were."

"Unlimited weaponry?" said Ashwin mockingly.

"Y-yes. Yes it...was that exactly but then came a problem concerning the C.A.P. Because it was built to Mary's own neural scan, it only works on reptilians. I forgot about this, after so long and so...hhhhhhhh...so many people this place has taken. The first people that came in were poor and willing subjects, get paid to be a lab rat...of course after the intense work upon them in wiring a whole new diagram of circulatory, the processing unit never worked. Every time I experimented on a human, or canine or what have you, it never worked. Never took. Always rejected. Too many people were starting to 'disappear' and Guston became desperate. So he resorted to more illicit means."

"Kidnapping."

James stood up once again after managing to digest enough.

"So you kidnap me...did you know? Did...did you want to make this some sort of fucking irony?"

"It...it's not irony if-"

"Don't."

Ashwin pressed a finger towards Anseed's face who kept schtum continuing.

"No, I had no intention of that. You were picked up because you were the first reptilian the company was able to find whilst out on orders. We tried with every single species and knew it had to be something, but I did not want to say what. I knew from the markings on your face that you were Mary's son. I tried every excuse to make him release you but he was adamant. I had to do it. He forced me, I opened you up and made you the first working project of the newly-rewritten Project Spectrum. But there was-"

"One problem?" said James mockingly. "Of course. What?"

"I...I mixed up the data that was supposed to be in you. It was supposed to be military data to download into your C.A.P, but I was exhausted and emotional and overcome with...w-w-with, I needed...I mixed up the wires between the main computer we had at the time, smaller than that one...and...my personal computer. S-s-something I had been working on to keep myself occupied inbetween projects. But you reacted violently. You escaped. And I admit I could not have been happier that you did but then you disappeared."

"So I escaped after a freakout because you got the data wrong?"

Derek nodded glumly as James wanted to say something in counterance. Something to villify and degrade the doctor but nothing came to him. For once he was silent as he simply sighed with every effort in his brain focused on absorbing all of this. There was nothing further said between any of them as they waited for James to speak, as the security lockdown soon ended finally. The lights now faded, the noises stopped as both windows and doors began to reopen exposing the laboratory to the outside world one again minutely from the angling of the glass panelling on the laboratory's view of the city.

It was in that moment they heard somebody rushing up the stairs from below as Sarah came into view looking around at the four people in the lab, her rifle out and ready.

"Wha-...what is this, a beatnik club, what's going on?"

"Just a lot of shit," said FG, "I'll fill you in on it later."

"Good cuz I don't have time, sorry. We gotta stop Guston, he's making his way out on his own escape route."

"I thought you were handling security," said Thomas firmly.

"Security's dead, EMP fucked all of 'em straight down to hell but I saw somethin' on the cameras before they went out. That's why I came up here, he's got a chopper waiting up top."

"Wait...what?"

"It's shielded, there's a hangar inside floors sixty-eight to seventy, that's why I saw nothing but industrial-looking shit. He's got a means of escape if any shit went down which I can tell it clearly did."

"He does," said Derek Anseed. "We had it installed around four years ago, once we expanded ourselves fully."

"And you are?"

"Derek Anseed, I...I'm responsible for-"

"Everything," said FG striding forwards, "every fucking thing that's happened to me since I escaped fourteen years ago, all HIM. But you're right, we don't have time, Guston's gonna get away if we don't just go."

"You alroigh'?" asked Ashwin.

"No. I'm not. But when I'm through with this, doctor Anseed is gonna give me every fucking answer that I want about my parents or so help me god I'm gonna-"

"Oi got it. Yer not goin' anywhere without our permission, that clear?"

"Perfectly," said Anseed clearly. "I will follow your orders without delay but I must tell you something. Guston will have himself prepared with full body armour and a most deadly weapon."

"Which is?"

"An electromagnetic rifle, based upon a miniaturised railgun. It was one of his pet projects, another deadly weapon for dealing with armoured and robotic opponents. I fear that um...James will not do very well against it if it manages to hit him. It has a charge on it rather than relying on any conventional weaponry such as bullets, but because of its force and kinetic recoil within the charger, it has a rather sluggish reload of around thirty-eight seconds."

Sarah and Ashwin shared a look of disbelief at this before the dolphin stated:

"That is quite frankly the shittiest fucking weapon you would ever wanna bring into a gunfight."

"Well it WAS an experiment, but one that was very close to Guston's heart. I'm certain he will have his backup handgun too so please do not let your guard down."

"You better git goin' then," said Ashwin, "before you miss yer floight."

"Yer not goin' it alone," added King, "I'm ready when you are kid."

"You sure?" asked FG.

"I can still fight, I got three guns on me which is more than plenty to take out Guston and this chopper of his."

"Ashwin?"

"Oi'd love to," said the elephant, "bu' someone's gotta stay 'ere an' keep the exit route all clear cuz one, oi gotta make sure that our good doctor 'ere don' try to do nuthin' funny, two, oi gotta download all the data from this mainframe 'ere an' thirdly, Thomas 'ere's lookin' a bit grim with that arm of 'is fucked in."

"Alright. Sarah...I guess it's you and me finally."

"Heheh, hell yeah."

She braced her rifle ready for combat, gripping it like it was the last thing she would ever have in this world.

"Let's fuckin' do this."

"Before that...one thing."

James walked over towards Derek Anseed who would struggle to meet his gaze.

"There was one thing I never understood between me and Roy that bugged me for fucking ages even though we were the same. How come HE was able to get back home here, without any problems, just straight back teleporting...and I couldn't?"

"Wh-wh...what?" asked the human.

"I struggled, for YEARS, to get back home to this place, to this city, and I could never fucking do it yet Roy was able to. Why is that? You said you wanted to recreate things with him but HE managed to-"

"O-o-oh, of course, the...topographical data...I remember now it almost slipped my mind during our experiment on him but I put it in as an extra perjorative."

"The what?"

"Map data. Your brain does not know the correct coordinates of where your home was, but with Roy I input that data in so he would be able to zip straight back to us and keep a report on any clues to find you."

"Alright...so it's...just a piece of map data you forgot to put in me? Huh. I see, guess you fucked up a few things about me then what about-"

"James, we gotta go."

Sarah brought him back to the mission as he shook his head clear and sighed nodding grievously before they went to the roof of the building. The raptor felt everything inside him full of muddying emotions frantic as he struggled to comprehend the answers that he had long been given over what was the second-most confusing, or perhaps the third, of his entire life in terms of answers. He only hated Guston that bit more for delaying his search for truth complete, as both him and Sarah climbed up through the laboratory area to find an entire four stories of stairs without any access point into their respective floors. Nothing but a long trek to the very sky as they burst free from the door.

The top of the building was but a windstreaked platform with a helipad in the form of a giant H, marked clearly upon the central spot as James and Sarah felt the bristling gales howling from the very height of the city beneath their feet. All around they could see other skyscrapers but few of them were any bit taller than the A.R.M.E's lancing sword of architecture, with the exception of perhaps the long-standing Willis Tower to the southeast. Guston was nowhere to be found as Sarah stood alongside James feeling the cold shear of the Windy City creep into their bodies.

It wasn't before long that the H began to sink slightly, as the sounds of heavy machinery came to their ears scraping back to pull apart the helipad itself. Slowly but surely amidst the whining steel, there was the sound of something fluttering heavily, an old familiar sound that James knew from anywhere. Rising from beneath, the sight of rotorblades would be seen as nothing more than a dark blurring motion above the helicopter's pure black carriage with one of its side doors opened already. Guston's head appeared in view along with something resonating a deep subsonic sound.

"[i]GET DOWN![/i]"

James threw Sarah hard to the right as both managed to dodge the violent pulse of kinetic lightning only barely just. The rifle shot with a streaking blue stretching across the city sky and far beyond their vision, but it was close enough to James that he felt the most pure and intensely physiological agony shrieking through his veins.

"[i]A-A-A-A-A-AAAAAAAAAA[b]AAAARRRGH![/b][/i]"

"[i]JAMES![/i]"

He fell stumbling, nearly collapsing as the throbbing pulse of electromagnetic power shook his very nanos deep, rattling them as he vomited by a sickening reaction onto the blacktop as Sarah ran to his aid struggling to pull him back up. His hands were shaking, his entire body was warm not like body heat, but the kind of unnatural warmth Sarah felt from the barrel of a recently-fired gun.

The chopper continued to raise itself fully from the elevator beneath the helipad until fully showing to its hovering landing gear underneath in the form of an anti-grav propulsion cushioner, with the rotors acting as its main lift into the air. Stretching out to 58 feet long and at a height of 12 feet, it had missile launchers underneath its wings and a chaingun beneath the half-prism-shaped cockpit as the general smiled down upon them in a full pure-black armoured suit of impenetrable bulletproof fabric, blonde buzz-cut hair immaculate above his jowls giving him a toad-like face with a pig-nosed sneer.

He slowly placed a helmet onto himself whilst the two were distracted as he sat in a kneeling position for perfect sniping, his long silver steel rifle held carefully in thick armoured gauntlets with forked tip and blue lines trickling artificially down the wiring inside its casing. His voice came radio'd in from the intercom of the chopper.

"[i]Seems like my own project works on abominations like you.[/i]"

"WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT SHIT?!" roared Sarah above the chopper's noise.

"[i]This is just a particle accelerator rifle, working on electromagnetic fields to propel charged particles at high speeds, using superconductor magnetic technology. It's what moves trains from Osaka to Tokyo. It's what my special chopper is protected from, for me to observe the world without harm. And it also will be what eliminates...you.[/i]"

"WELL I GOT THREE GUNS HERE THAT SHOOT A LOT FASTER THAN YOURS, GUSTON!"

"[i]The only thing you're shooting for is going straight into a sardine factory when I'm done with you, wretched little thief. Do you have any idea what I was? I was born a soldier, raised a soldier and I will die a soldier whereas you will be nothing more than a statistic on the news.[/i]"

"No you ain't, no you aren't, and no you won't, you'll die as a failure!"

"[i]You call THIS a failure? MY city, my rules, my empire where I shall prove to the military my worth truly to them as an indispensable need. If I couldn't prove to them on the field then I shall become even greater off of it, when I supply the world with unlimited weaponry in the form of those like this pathetic shitscale who thinks he can stand up to me.[/i]"

"[b][i]DON'T YOU EVER CALL HIM THAT![/i][/b]"

She fired from her assault rifle towards the helicopter's cockpit, not taking chances with armour as the bullets pinged cracking across the thick glass harmlessly.

"YOU KNOW WHY I CAME HERE TO DESTROY YOU?! IT WASN'T BECAUSE YOU FUCKED WITH MY CITY, OR BECAUSE YOU FUCKED WITH ME, BUT [i]NOBODY! FUCKS! WITH MY [b]SON![/b][/i]"

"[i]Then enjoy the both of you dying together as you deserve to be! I want to make certain I leave no loose ends before I have to leave for a business meeting. TAKE THEM DOWN![/i]"

The gang leader grabbed James quickly up from the floor and shook him to his awakening as his eyes refocused, the chopper slowly turning towards them with its chaingun underneath the cockpit locking onto them. He reacted swiftly and staggered running with Sarah as they circled the length of the roof, hearing the chaingun spin to a high-pitched whine and rattling off with dozens of bullets, scorching hot sparks racing along behind them as they outmaneuvered the chopper's slow-turning radius upon them. The raptor was struggling to recover from the feeling of brutal electrocution, burning his insides as he felt his blood turn hot.

Soon a long enough time had passed for Guston's rifle to recharge as he signalled the pilot to turn once more allowing him to get a straight shot on FG. The two looked at each other, noticing the rifle had enough of a charge-up time to warn him of its shot as he waited to dodge with a gust of wind forcing himself out of the way whilst Sarah ran the other way, heading close beneath the chopper. Seeing the raptor evade his crackling spark of electromagnetic firing, the ex-army general noticed Sarah running closer towards him as he pulled out his handgun to fire on her head.

The dolphin wasted no time pulling out her revolver in mid-run and stopping swiftly with perfect aim, firing off towards Guston's hand as she shot back towards his desert eagle. The spasm of his armoured hand feeling the sharp ping of impact from the bullet threw his aiming off, missing Sarah's head by a few feet as she fired her second and third shots towards the rifle hoping to disable it somewhat. The armour casing was tough, enough to resist a few high-caliber bullets despite marking a dent as the general called out to his pilot for another maneuver.

The chopper turned and suddenly tried to land on Sarah in the hope of crushing her beneath its weight, feeling the force of the anti-gravity landing gear push down next to her as she ran fast as she could. It began to rush after her, hanging low enough to try and either ram her, or slice her apart with its vicious rotor blades as she dodgerolled to one side away from the cockpit's bowed front. During this, Guston suddenly saw a blinding blur of scaled brown crash into him from the side, pounding him against the interior of his escape vehicle.

His armour kept him safe from damage as he gripped his rifle close, but James already had his scissors out and ready during his rushing charge standing up swiftly before Guston with burning red steel. Blazing hot, he struck down viciously upon the general's head who rolled quickly to his left despite his greater age and sweeped his leg hard to knock down the raptor. James fell down fast, and soon the general was on top of him with a desert eagle in his left hand and the rifle in his other, viciously pistolwhipping FG furiously across the face before pulling back to fire point-blank.

The raptor sweeped his left hand up with blocking shield from his own gauntlet, multicoloured in seconds as the force of the bullet shattered imperfect against his guard before James slammed his fist against Guston's face. The strength of his shielded punch was enough to stagger the human from his dull forceful impact, giving James enough time to viciously roll him off with scissors in his right hand and thrust with blazing strength. The armour resisted his heat-piercing frenzy as Guston stumbled up to bootkick him off the helicopter, barrelling straight out the open door and falling back onto the helipad.

James had little distance to fall since the chopper had barely lifted itself since, Guston readying his electromagnetic rifle for a full and fatal blast upon FG until something violently struck from his right. A shotgun blast point-blank from the side of the chopper cracked viciously across his rifle's front forcing it completely off-balance, with Sarah's sawn-off firing both shells straight across its casing as Guston roared with frustration.

The raptor stumbled his way back up just in time to see the general swing his rifle like a club powerfully towards the dolphin who ducked before he pointed his desert eagle at her face. He never had a chance to fire when the raptor barged into him once again, slamming his scissors deeply against his chest to send him catapuling back into the copter's carriage. The two fought again inside as the chopper raised itself, but suddenly a powerful breeze restless in Chicago night buffeted against it, sending it slightly off-kilter as it forcefully corrected itself.

Two occupants rolled inside the open-door carriage, struggling to fight each other with only one hand free of weapons between them. The general cracked the chamber of his desert eagle across FG's face bruising his eye powerfully, whilst the raptor slammed his gauntlet-shielded fist into Guston's helmet sending a dull painful sensation rattling through his skull. He knew he was going to have better luck finding a way to fight him at long-range with his scissors struggling to cut into the steel-thick resistant armour as he leapt from the chopper's door, landing swiftly back on his feet with a brief gust to diffuse his fall safely.

"James!"

Sarah rushed up next to him as he heaved gasping with a throbbing head.

"I have an idea, when the chopper comes down, get behind it under the tail an' when I shout fer you, give it everything you got, straight upwards like a fuckin' hurricane."

"...got it."

He nodded and understood fully as he saw Guston stagger up towards the open door ready to fire down upon them. Sarah he was not interested in, but the raptor he knew now to be the greater threat as James dodged the moment the lights turned blue. He was starting to tire out, his energy was getting low and after no rest from using his nanos as well as being almost fully hit once by the horrid EM pulse, he was slowly stumbling his way around to behind the chopper before Sarah ran straight underneath, firing upwards with her assault rifle to empty an entire clip.

"[i]HEEEEEEEEEEEY YOUUUUUUUUUUU [b]FUCKERRRRRRRRR![/b][/i]"

The screaming pounding of assault rifle fire rattling the undercarriage was more infuriating than anything as Guston demanded the chopper head downwards ready to crush her once once and for all. Sarah waited to run ahead of the chopper whilst Guston this time decided not to shoot for her, but instead kept an eye out for FG in case he came charging into his face with a lower altitude once again. The helicopter began to dip cautiously towards her with expert skill, ready to mow her down into sushi as she shouted:

"[i]JAMES, [b]NOOOOW![/b][/i]"

"[b][i]FUCK YOU ALL![/i][/b]"

Suddenly from behind there came a violent bristling gale more strong than anything they had predicted as the raptor powered with both fists a tremendous shrieking maelstrom with more fury than predicted. It wasn't as demanding as his arm cannon would be and for this he was thankful, struggling to keep his eyes open as he went spinning upwards like a dandelion seed of death, with scissors out fully to crack hard against the rudder of the tail. His force was strong enough that the momentum slammed the rudder completely upwards tipping the helicopter forwards to crash down its rotors against the roof top.

Cracking steel pinged and sliced across the roof as the blades began snapping like bone whilst Sarah ran frantically towards the roof entrance for cover. The chopper crunched hard by its nose as the cockpit shattered fully, screams from the two pilots within as the entire weight of the carriage crumpled against them as the vehicle went scraping violently sharp across the entire building top and falling over the edge. Guston had no choice but to leap, falling into a clumsy roll upon the ground gasping harshly from a sudden limp as he sprained his leg.

The pilots would plunge to their death, as their screeching panic became fully consumed by the shrieking of twisted steel. Once the sound of chaos began to recede, Sarah peeked out from behind the door of the roof entrance to see the general still live with now the entire roof scarred with heavy black and burning flecks of steel. James was falling to his feet at the other side of the building, his body now exhausted from all his energy being spent as his eyes struggled to keep themselves awake. His legs refused to obey his will to stand as he gasped towards the night Chicago sky in all its polluted splendour.

Clouds darkening all the more as he heard thunder in the distance, but more important was the sound of footsteps heavy and clunking towards him before a sudden boot slammed into his ribs.

"You little SHIT!"

"[i]GUUUUH[/i]!

He rolled violently across towards the roof's edge, gasping with a shivering choke of his lungs from the brutal impact, wincing as he clutched himself into a foetal position with Guston kicking him harder. His boot swung viciously across James' body, sending him rolling once again before a stomp to his face with a heavier bruising.

"If you...had just OBEYED!"

"[i]AAAAARGH![/i]"

"ALL OF THIS...would have been prevented. You could have been something greater, but you REFUSE to leave the streets where your worthless people have so chosen to die in."

"[i]G-GAAARGH! FUCK YOU![/i]"

"Is that all you have to say?! REALLY!? What the hell have you accomplished?! WHAT HAVE YOU EVER DONE IN YOUR LIFE, [i]YOU HAVE ACHIEVED [b]NOTHING![/b] I BUILT THIS PLACE, I SERVED MY COUNTRY AND I WILL SERVE IT AGAIN WITH YOU AS MY WEAPON! WHAT HAVE YOU EVER DONE IN YOUR LIFE, TO DESERVE RESPECT YOU LITTLE [b]FUCKING SHITSCALE!?[/b][/i]"

"[i]HhhhHHHHHhhhh[/i]...I...h-h-have done...much more than you ever will. Hhheheheh...but you...you'll never know about any of it. I've been a pirate...an exorcist...a murderer, vigilante, swordsman, a fucking hero. What have you done that was so great? Maybe you were a soldier once, but now...you're just some sad sack-faced desk jockey who thinks he's still a general after he got forced to retire."

"I was not FORCED, you vermin!"

"If you were so good in the army...why aren't you with them still? I don't think you took this job...because you were smart enough to know how to put two wires together cuz otherwise...you wouldn't have let me become who I am. So yanno what? Thank you...thank you for being the most stupid son of a bitch I ever met so you could let me make the greatest mistake. Hhhahah...hhhahahahahaha...hhhhahahahahahahahahahaha, HAHAHAHAHAHAHA-[b][i]GA-AAAAARRH![/i][/b]"

His face met another brutal stomp with the general's boot, pounding him ferociously twice until blood spit from his cheeks, welting his face to a thickening purple darker than his own striped markings as the general stepped back a few feet. He braced himself with the rifle still in his grip, standing beside the roof's edge as he took aim and charged up the electromagnetic pulse ready to obliterate James completely. Locking sights with the raptor's head. Waiting for the violent mutually-assured destruction of the raptor's internal organs as James watched.

Neither of them saw Sarah until it was too late, the sudden slam of her grey body colliding with a shoulder tackle into general Guston with such force that he toppled fully towards the roof edge. The rifle fell from his grip, blasting a shocking spurt across the building without hitting a single thing as both human and dolphin fell over the edge. The whistling shriek of the wind almost deafened her to James' screams.

"[b][i]SARAAAAAAH![/i][/b]"

Crashing down upon the slanting section of the A.R.M.E building, both leaders scrabbled onto each other as they rolled desperately down the slope without stopping as the momentum pushed them ever onwards. Streaking past windows at an angle from the 70th floor and rapidly falling fast, their fists came out whenever the two stopped rolling to end up skidding across the hard sculpted architecture of glass and steel as Guston pounded King ruthlessly across the face whilst on top of her.

Guarded completely in armour, he feared no attack from her as he relentlessly beat into her, bashing her into thick horrid indigo bruises that swelled her thick bottlenosed head until she scrabbled to pull out her sawn-off shotgun. Pumping both shells into his skull, the force alone was enough to crack partially through his armoured helmet by a wounding dent as he roared from the sudden pain. It was enough of a distraction that allowed her to force him off by a sudden roll, pulling one of his arms against herself and sliding both of them across the slanted roof.

Sarah struggled to stop herself from rolling, her eye wounded and swollen with heavy welts across her melon as she swiftly reloaded her shotgun whilst in mid-slide. Guston came down towards her once again as he pulled out his handgun firing powerfully down upon her as she rolled to dodge. Soon they streaked past the 55th floor, knowing that once they hit the 40th there would be nothing but the streets way below to welcome them. She fired back with her revolver fully, keeping the shotgun close in her other hand until the human came towards her.

His clip was soon empty, but not before he had managed to crack two shots across Sarah's right leg and thigh causing her to shriek, blood streaking across the windows that she fell past as the wind continued rushing past her back. Freezing ruthless chill striking across her flesh, she watched Guston suddenly vault himself forwards in a flying leap pushing his entire body forwards in a monstrous attempt to crush Sarah completely between his steel armour and the solid structuring of his great empire to be.

She dodged with an instinctive certainty remembering which hand held her shotgun as Guston landed beside her, pounding his fists from above like a psychotic ape as she pumped both shells again into his face. The armour cracked finally enough to cause him to scream, feeling the scraping sharpness of his helmet crushed inwards to stab at his face as he desperately tore it off from his head. Blood gaped freshly upon his cheeks as he roared with piercing eyes suddenly lunging for Sarah's neck in a choking crush as she gasped forcing herself not to scream and lose air.

With all her bullets emptied out her guns she clocked Guston once across the face with her still-heated Lupara shotgun, stunning him briefly before she shoved the Colt Python straight into his throat almost suffocating him to vomit. She couldn't pump him full of lead but she could most certainly make him choke on the gun barrel as he coughed and stuttered fiercely scrunching his eyes up as she felt her lungs shrieking to breathe from his gauntlet-coated fingers strangling the life out of her. Choking snarls as she gritted her teeth, she forced back every breath she had and shoved forwards into his grip to violently punch his throat from inside with the barrel.

"[b][i]HRRRRRGHHK![/i][/b]"

He couldn't stop himself, his hands spasming from the urge to dry vomit as Sarah kept her revolver down inside his throat, feeling the sucking muscles desperately try to force it back out before she slammed the shotgun down on his skull like a hefty stone. Choking harder, he fought back in a sudden rush with frenzied rage and punched her straight between the eyes just in time for them to see the very edge of the sloped roof. There was no hope, no grappling point, nothing but a pristine side of the building where they would both fall straight out into the abyss. Chicago waited for their bodies to land upon its streets.

But they never came, not immediately at least. Sarah felt the cold shriek of the wind embrace her but something suddenly lurched in her stomach stopping her in mid-air. Then something dragged down her chest violently sharp as a stretching pain ripped through her shoulder as she screamed. Grappling from an open window was a huge white-furred hand of black claws pulling Sarah hard against the side of the building by the waist. Guston was hanging on to her desperately by the assault rifle she still had around her waist, the strap digging sharply into her left shoulder.

"[i]HOLD OOOON![/i]"

"[i]A-AAAAAAARGH! NNNNNGH![/i]"

"[i]JUST HOLD ON, I'VE GOT YOU![/i]"

"[i]THOMAAAAAAAS![/i]"

Birgisson gasped with his eyes turning bleary from the startling pain with his left arm already broken whilst the right fiercely clutched Sarah as hard as he could whilst Guston kicked his feet sharply underneath both of them. The weight of him combined with his armour was turning into a struggle of attrition, Sarah's body being pulled downwards with the shoulderstrap of her rifle cutting viciously into her skin. The human had no weapon left but his hands as he tried to climb up onto the dolphin and get closer to the ledge of the window for himself. Until he saw the knife glistening from beside the head of Thomas, Long and silver with 18 inches of military design.

The strap of the rifle was sliced in half from Sarah's back safely avoiding her shoulder. Guston did not realise he was falling until three seconds later, his eyes widening in a shock-filled look of stricken disbelief. Then fear. It was a look Sarah would cherish for the rest of her life smiling down at him as her confidence regrew in but a single ragged breath.

"Happy trails...Guston."

She had been waiting to say this ever since the operation began, seeing the lone human general falling below to where the streets of Chicago welcomed him with open arms of pure industrious gravel. Falling for a good 500 feet which to him lasted in but the span of eight seconds of mortal terror until darkness took him. Darkness within the space of a solid crunching crack of the road underneath, his armoured body causing a small fracture in the tarmac with his skeleton snapped in seventeen places. Blood pooled inside of him only to escape through his twisted skull.

Thomas pulled in the dolphin with some assistance from Ashwin lending a hand and trunk to make sure she was released back onto solid floor, heaving with desperate relief as she smiled up at the two. She was almost on her knees, her face swollen as she tried to keep her tongue working with eyes blinking harshly.

"I...hhhhhhad him on the ropes."

"I'm sure you did," said Birgisson, "screaming my name like your life depended on it. James called us on the radio soon as you fell over the edge."

"Oh...sh-shit is he okay?!"

"Why not ask him? James, you there?"

"[i]Y-yeah,[/i]" said FG over comms, "[i]is Sarah...is she-[/i]"

"I'm here kid," said the dolphin, "my shoulder hurts but...and I'm a li'l uglier than I used to be."

"[i]Fuck...really? That's...gotta be a world record or something.[/i]"

"You little shit!"

"[i]Hhhhahahahaaaaa...uuuungh...fuck, c-can you get someone to pick me up please? I can't walk myself down.[/i]"

"Oi'll get 'im," said Ashwin heading back up, "weighs nuthin' to me at this point, you just 'ang toight."

"[i]I'm not going anywhere...I'll just...sleep out on this roof.[/i]"

"There's more romantic places out there."

"[i]Not in Chicago there ain't.[/i]"

"He's right," added Sarah, "trust me, the most romantic thing in this city is when the water doesn't look like an oil spill."

As the elephant walked off to bring James back from the top floor, Sarah slumped into Birgisson's arm who staggered slightly feeling awkward at this moment, the two alone for the time being as they stared towards the night city. As the sounds of people came clamouring from down below at the sight of Guston's body, the police sirens resonated throughout the streets as the bartender criminal stood firmly beside the chief commissioner. They understood in that moment what Sarah would say next.

"It's finished. It's all...at least over fer this operation."

"Indeed," said Thomas firm, "we have all their forces decimated, everyone that is still living has surrendered according to intel downstairs."

"Where's that guy you were keeping captive on the top floor?"

"We had him tied up...just in case, there's a lot we should explain regarding him, I think it best to let James explain it all for you."

"Is...there a reason exactly?"

"Yes. We're going to have to clean this place."

"We'll help out," said Sarah, "might as well after getting this far, we got all the data?"

"Ashwin downloaded it off the mainframe whilst you were on the roof. We should probably get to hospital."

"Yeah that uh...that would be a good idea before my face falls off from all that shit did to me."

The two began to walk slowly towards the stairwell as they waited for Ashwin to come back down with FG being carried over his shoulder, alive but exhausted with Dr. Anseed cuffed by his hands as he walked forwards willingly with hanging head full of shame. The world-weary warriors marched down towards the first floor, knowing that they had fought all resistance within the former A.R.M.E headquarters as guards and members of staff were disarmed and dragged out from the building.

The city felt it could breathe again that day, as if a weight had been lifted across the entire stretch of Chicago itself. People watched in amazement as the small elite team walked out of the front building. Birgisson, Osho, Skliva, Campbell, King, Liebowitz and Venkatanarasimha. Firefighters came along with ambulances and film crews from the local news station. Jenny smiled, carefully escorting Sarah as she took her arm opposite of Thomas before they climbed into an ambulance. The days went by in almost a blur for FG as he passed out in another ambulance, which Jenny hopped into to make sure that he would be safe under her guardianship.

Ashwin took Dr. Anseed into his custody heading back to Sarah's bar by means of a van prepared for his squadron at a secured location three blocks away as the scientist went on without incident, remorseful but willing to his saviours despite the elephant's grim look upon him. He had his mission regardless and soon James was out of hospital no more than five days later to recover from his wounds, with Sarah and Thomas leaving around the same time as they all went together back to their main base of operations.

Thomas the polar bear went with the pachyderm to perform his official duty to the city as they headed to the mayor's office, after placing a call to inform them of such knowing that the news would be desperately hungry for any answers to the assault that swept across Madison Avenue. Anseed was kept under guard by Ashwin's squad in a hidden location nearby that none of them knew, a base he had made operational for his own purposes if needed. Sarah, James and Jenny were making their own calls across the district, Canaryville's finest placing in every call they could to report a stocklist of casualties.

Weapons were handed over to the police discreetly by a mutual agreement to be stripped and disposed of as evidence of the A.R.M.E. Security cameras were carefully taken down across the city with their assistance as their parts were made into scrap for future use in repairing the damage to the streets and infrastructure. The former A.R.M.E's headquarters were soon cleaned by the police, having a helping hand from any locals who would offer to dig in and remove all that had once been. The server farm was the most gruesome, having revealed the servers themselves to have been the containment units of some, but not all, of the missing reptilian populace.

The survivors of the A.R.M.E's staff and guard force were swiftly detained and imprisoned awaiting trial, as people began to clear the streets of all debris with James, Sarah and Jenny helping to do the same. Thomas and Ashwin along with the small S.A.S squadron also assisted once the two had returned from official duties to explain to the mayor all that had been happening, at least what they could explain of the utmost discretion to their criminal friends. It was only after two weeks that the news heralded something new to report to its people on Channel 4 as a female cougar presented the story at her desk:

[i]"Good evening. Tonight, the end of the cleanup operation concerning the assault on the Advanced Research Militaristic Enterprises building on Madison Avenue, resulting in a complete shutdown of the company to follow. On March the seventh, a joint collaboration between the Chicago PD and a vigilante group formed by Chicago citizens, seized the A.R.M.E building in an operation formed by the chief commissioner of the Canaryville district. Thomas Birgisson stated 'what had once been unproven theories surrounding the military developments group, became too insurmountable to ignore, and I invoked our right to protect the city from a mounting force that was nothing short of draconian'.

"The headquarters of the research development company were raided around 6:40pm, after which the battle began as the police infiltrated the building and exposed evidence of criminal activity. Teri Sanford joins us in the studio as representative of the mayor's office, good evening."

"Good evening,"[/i] said a brunette human female.

[i]"Mrs. Sanford...how did this even come to task? What happened to have caused such a chaotic frenzy authorised by an official member of police?"

"The commissioner explained to us, after the whole operation had been done that, he approached us and said that he had been forming a secret operational taskforce to mount evidence against the A.R.M.E's illicit operations, none of which were known by the mayoral office just to be clear."

"Of course."

"He combined a large group of experienced civilians and his own officers along with those representing the actual military for advice on how to proceed."

"But surely that constitutes as illegal, especially if military members were present amongst them? Plus, recruiting civilians to form a vigilante group is what some might call, downright excusing of criminal activity."

"Only if they had not been trained by actual military representatives and as a result had been given such authority for this sole purpose over the past few years. The military representative, who I cannot name for legal reasons, were the ones to approach Birgisson and explain that, certain parts of the A.R.M.E had been staffed by those with criminal records of a military statute and they were being currently pursued for activities. The military had extended this offer to the A.R.M.E, so I was told and when the company refused to extradite these criminals...well...it turned into an act of war."

"Was the mayor aware of any of this, not even in the slightest?"

"No, we had no authorisation of this and only learned of the full details back on the twelfth, a few days after the assault. We are at least immensely thankful for the low casualty rate of unarmed civilians, good people, who worked within the company offices completely unaware of what sordid dealings were behind such sealed doors whereas the civilians of the streets, they were well-trained by this military authority and given unquestionable assurance to operate only within strict parameters."

"And who was this group?"[/i] asked the news reporter.

[i]"We have no idea who,"[/i] replied Teri Sanford, [i]"they just...appeared suddenly, they haven't even got a....a-a-a-a leader amongst them said Chief Birgisson. But whoever they were, he has stressed that they were a collective of citizens from all walks of life who had been trained and profiled accordingly to be the best of potential for this...operation."

"And what evidence has been found concerning the A.R.M.E's operations in the past few weeks?"

"Experiments, inhumane practices, uhhh weapons development that exceeds lawful boundaries, misuse of funding, all of which that none of our office or any of their investors had been aware of at all and would never authorise. We have all the evidence handed to us after our uh, military representative along with Chief Birgisson provided it to us."

"What about the martial law that they imposed on this city, now how did the A.R.M.E get to wield such power of authority when the mayoral office actually allowed them to act as a policing force?"

"Naturally that has been discontinued, we were extremely ignorant of their work, knowing only what they allowed us to see concerning their task forces, the judicial squads, as well as the advanced cyber security which...frankly, if they were taken down by a task force made of our own police officers and citizens who had nowhere near the technological capacity of them, it was foolish of us to even place our trust in them. The martial law was stated originally as a means to quell potential riots in the strife-torn parts of the populace due to various complications concerning fiscal balance across the infrastructure, but with the assets that we seized from the A.R.M.E, now we can hopefully begin building up from that to rebuild what is left of it."

"And for those who worked in the A.R.M.E, soldiers and scientists alike?"

"They are being processed by our police force concerning involvement and remorse over their actions. Some of them appear to be truly ignorant o-or just low-level workers whilst others were clearly very involved and they shall be processed accordingly, within trials of our state."

"Mrs. Teri Sanford, thank you. Coming up next, the results of the Canadian export scandal involving two former governors an-"[/i]

Click. The TV went off as James laid back smiling with a soothed easeful look on his face before turning towards Sarah sitting next to him.

"I take it that worked out pretty well."

"It did," replied the dolphin, "I'm surprised how quickly the office took with it."

"Something tells me that Ashwin may have had a part in that, he can be pretty fucking scary."

"Was he always like this?"

"Oh fuck no, I only knew him like maybe four years or so."

"You got a real knack fer makin' friends I gotta tell you."

"Heh...I guess. So what now?"

"Now we wait."

Jenny spoke this as she walked up from behind them leaning over the sofa to smoosh their heads against her cheeks.

"Just got a call from Thomas who's coming over to uh talk to Sarah and then once we've got this all cleared officially, we say goodbye to yer buddy from London."

"He's leaving?" asked FG. "Today?"

"Apparently, but he wants to check with something first, said he wanted to talk to Thomas firstly."

"Alright then...I guess if all is said and done that means I can leave too."

"A-a-ah, not yet."

"Huh?"

"Ashwin told me to tell you to stay until after he leaves, apparently that doctor dude wants to talk to you."

"Fuck there's a lotta talking about to happen," said Sarah, "it's like that Dogma movie or somethin'."

"Ew don't remind me."

"Hmhmhaha...hhhhh...welp, I'm hungry, who wants pizza?"

"I DO!" cried FG. "Fuck I haven't had pizza in like three years or something!"

"Let's order some, JENNY!"

She snapped twice her fingers at the doberman.

"Dial it up, the usual!"

"Uhhh-"

The doberman snapped back with mocking look.

"Do you see a fucking leash an' collar on me?"

"No but I see your name every paycheque I give you so snap to it!"

"I went to college for this?"

"That's right you did," said FG, "now look at you roughing it with the locals, hashtag common people."

"Oh FUCK, youuuuuuuuuu!"

Flipping both middle fingers from each hand with mock shaking outrage, she eventually gave in with a mirthful look and headed back down into the telephone room to ring up for pizzas. Twenty minutes later they were all eating and enjoying each other's company whilst taking a seat each of the sofa with a pizza individually on their laps as they watched a TV show about couples arguing in front of a live studio audience.

"She's totally his sister," stated Jenny.

"Deeeefinitely his sis," added James.

"No doubt about," said Sarah.

"[i]Jonathan...we have the results.[/i]"

The people waited with baited breath. Pizza was held perhaps inches away from their snouts.

"[i]You...ARE the brother![/i]"

"[i]OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH![/i]"

"HOLY [i]SHIT![/i]" cried FG.

"THAT'SA bingoooo!" clamoured Jenny.

"YEP!" added Sarah. "Fuckin' yer sis, thank GOD you guys were into anal or you'd have some SERIOUS problems right now."

"Maaaaaan that sucks, they got separated at birth who the fuck woulda known?!"

"I mean," said James, "if anything at least it'll make the sex more fun."

Both girls turned towards him slowly with eyes widening.

"Wow," said Jenny flatly. "What. The fuck."

"Yeah James," said the dolphin, "I knew you had issues but hmhmhmdamn-"

"OH COME ON IT WAS A JOKE!" he shouted.

"Mmhmm, mmhmm, sure, tell yer psychiatrist that."

"Well I mean it's not like anything HAPPENED when those two were fucking, not like they both exploded or some shit, I mean at this point you might as well stick together you already broke the no-sister rule."

"NOT when you're publicly known in front of an entire audience."

"Well that's their fucking fault they should have had this tested privately fuck's sake!"

"Right?" replied Jenny. "Seriously, why do people gotta do this, we have soap operas to make up shit, I don't need real people too stupid to go check their DNA typing."

"Then why are we watching this?"

"Because all the soap operas don't come on until much later and there's only ONE I actually like which is in about forty-five minutes."

"Heh, Koopin watches them with his mum so I feel ya."

It was around this point that they heard the side door opening as Thomas Birgisson walked in with Ashwin and Dr. Anseed behind him, the scientist now freed from his lab clothes into a rather unassuming white polo shirt and slacks that made him look like a golfer. Thomas wore his police outfit, full in blue with badge and cap but still wearing a sling for his arm healing as Ashwin stood firm to attention in his all solid black armour courtesy of the British S.A.S.

"Evening," said Thomas politely. "Are you all well?"

"Good as good thank you," replied Sarah. "Jenny said you were needing something?"

"Yes. Could you please stand up?"

"...wha? You're...you're really...gonna do this here?"

"Afraid so."

"Wait what's going on?" asked FG.

"Sarah Ibenez Maria Francesco Clinton Booth King...would you please stand up for me?"

Sarah knew what was coming as she put down her pizza and sighed regretfully, standing fully before the great police chief with stern black eyes upon her as the older bartender put her hands out, wrists turned up towards him.

"I am arresting you for organised acts of criminal intent, including arson, grand larceny, kidnapping-"

"W-wait wait!" shouted FG.

"False imprisonment, extortion-"

"Are you fucking serious?!?"

"Murder, forgery, aiding and abetting, assault and battery and lastly, interfering with police investigations over the course of several years. You have the right to remain silent, anything you say or do can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney, but if-"

"You FUCKIN-"

"[b]Don't.[/b]"

Ashwin grabbed him by the shoulder with such force that he suddenly felt it was going to break underneath his crushing grip that made him sit still against the couch in panicking. Jenny was oddly composed and silent throughout all this which disturbed James even more as Thomas finished.

"You cannot afford an attorney, then one shall be appointed to you. Now do you understand?"

"I do," said Sarah politely, "I'm ready, officer."

"S-s-sarah!" cried James. "Wh-what are you doing?! The fuck are you-"

"Isn't it obvious? Did you really think I was gonna get through an entire deal with the police, and have them NOT know what I did? It's all over kid. The city's free, I got no reason to do this anymore. I'm turnin' myself in."

"This is such BULLSHIT, after everything she's done for you in setting this up, you can't just-"

"James. [b]Stop it.[/b]"

Her voice dropped into a pitch that made him turn silent as she stood waiting for the cuffs to come onto her. And yet they never came as Thomas simply stated:

"If your assistant is done with his ranting I believe it is time for us to proceed, miss King. Which is what I was planning to say, except for one thing."

"Wait a minute, what?"

"United prerogative of mercy."

The elephant said this as he walked forwards with both hands behind his back.

"Due to the people involved in this mission an' knowingly accepting they are of potential criminal stature, oi wuz given for this mission only the power representative of the Governor-General of Great Britain. Whilst oi woz 'ere on these shores, oi represent the British government and of its military structure entirely. Wotever oi say..."

He pulled out from his armoured pocket an official-looking document in an envelope which he passed onto Thomas Birgisson.

"Is executable immediately."

"Wh-...WHAT!?" cried Sarah.

"It means that...normally you would be incriminated fer your past transgressions an' be sent off to jail, but in this case...well, oi got this because of your work an' credit to society concernin' this great operation, you're redeemed."

"No. No wait...this is not...this isn't right."

"You wot?!"

"This is some shady shit right here."

She stepped away defiantly crossing her arms.

"No offence, captain, but I don't really like the idea of the military bailing me out with some kinda magic get-out-of-jail-free card."

"Sarah, what?!" stammered FG. "W-w-wait, wait, Ashwin, fuck, FIRSTLY...Ashwin how high up ARE you, did you just say you represent the British GOVERNMENT?!"

"Special ops perks," said Ashwin firmly, "exercisin' me roights as representative of British military whilst on these shores, actin' on behalf of the U.S Military as well cuz due to the mission at 'and...they decided oi needed a special leg-up fer things."

"You just HAVE this just so you can pardon Sarah for all her gangster shit?! How the fuck did you know?!"

"Oi never knew actually. It wuzn't brought for 'er...it wuz brought in to pardon...you."

The elephant turned towards Derek Anseed pointing with a smile upon his face, his broken tusk glistening in the light of the bar's living quarters.

"There are a lotta people that wanna take in our good doctor's research back in 'and an' oi thought...let's not beat around the bush, you done a lot of bad shit."

"I know," said Derek, "and I want...to pay for it, I-i-i can't just...I have nowhere left to go, at least perhaps I will be safe and paying my time in prison back in London."

"See...the original mission wuz to get doctor Anseed out, pardon 'im with the special bit o' paper, which may oi inform you that it is NOT copyable as there is a special code that cannot be scanned in the actual document so if you try to pardon anyone with a copy hohoho you're fuckin' nicked, get 'im back 'ome an' take 'is research with us for future discussions. That's 'ow it is."

"And I thought...that in the end I do not deserve to be pardoned for my crimes."

"I'm not doing this," said Sarah. "I'm not...look, this is just-I was ready dammit. I made this deal with Thomas that if he helped me out, I would give him every single thing about my activities incriminating me, the biggest payload he can ever have and throw me into prison because, well, I sure as shit am not gonna be able to continue when he knows about it?"

"I admire your remorse," said Birgisson, "but as mister Ashwin has stated, if he has pardoned you then I cannot do a single thing."

"DON'T give me that Lethal Weapon bullshit, I was ready to do my time, DO YOU KNOW WHAT I DID?!"

She stomped towards Ashwin with a violent sneer.

"I've poured blood into this city, most of it wasn't mine, this entire force, this group that I built out of violence and suppressing the strongest beneath me. I'm not an innocent person, I am an old bitch who has lied, cheated and killed her way to the top because this city was in FUCKING HELL and I had to do everything I could to make things work. I didn't WANT to be a criminal leader, but it happened, people looked up to me. I took vengeance on some thieves, things came out of hand, suddenly I'm the one leading them. So I built an empire, I made more people follow under me until we were one wholesome Fishnet. And it was good. I...I did everything I could."

"Why?"

"Because this place is fucking shit. This city is rotting inside a corpse of a nation, nobody's able to move from here so we just hide out here, I came here to start a cheap place back when things were kinda okay, but I came in right when everything went to shit, crime rates went up because YOUR predecessor Thomas, was a filthy fucking backstabber who loved to shoot kids!"

"I remember," said the bear sadly, "Michaels was an inexcusable chief."

"I made this place be self-sufficient, but the only way it was gonna live was to steal and cheat the system. Then after the old chief was gone, Thomas came in and things started turning out okay, not brilliant but okay. Everyone was sorta happy but I couldn't just give up the whole crime racket because I was the only thing that was able to keep it down, and because it stayed down, the police looked like brilliant people so Thomas benefited from it! He got his funding, he looked like a damn reformer, YOU GOT A MEDAL FOR IT!"

"I know. And to think I owe some of that to you is, quite frankly...startling."

"But it's over. I want to leave, and I know that the only way I can leave this place, this entire operation...is to give myself over to you."

"Can I say something?"

Derek Anseed stepped forwards solemnly, his hands still bound.

"I know of the work you did for this city. Guston was aware of a certain criminal group that had been interfering with his work but he was never able to find it truly. Never knew who was the real boss. But I know that whoever was leading it...was doing a far better job for this city than I ever did. You are a thief, a forgerer, a murderer yes...but you at least managed to save more people than I ever did. I never saved a single person. Everyone I experimented on was forced through training to become an indispensable weapon. Some more willing than others under stressful duress. Neither of us are good people. But you...you are better than me. Would you at least accept that?"

Sarah softly stroked her chin, pondering on this as they all watched with a potent decision, Birgisson holding the document still that would pardon only one of the two from spending the rest of their life in confinement. James had his eyes piercing a vicious stare through Derek who could hardly bring himself to look at him, until Sarah eventually sighed with relenting voice.

"Alright. You win. I...I suppose you won't be getting that bonus soon Thomas."

"I know."

"You...can you pardon me then?"

Birgisson brought out a pen as Ashwin oversaw the signing of Sarah's name onto the document. She was conflicted, a strange sense of relief versus an ineffable struggling to accept a fate she had planned for herself now being thrown out of her hands without any sense of planning on her part. The loss of control was brief but it tore into her thick with a shuddering sigh as the police chief pocketed it.

"You have been pardoned by the governments for your crimes Sarah King. Our business is done. I admit I am not...especially pleased by this but I will tell you now two things. One. You will disassemble this entire operation and never bring it back, is that clear?"

"Perfectly.

"Two. If you so much as commit a felony or misdemeanour, I will make certain you will serve the fullest extent of whatever penalty has been deemed appropriate to the crime."

"Understood. I'll be clearing this entire thing out...the only reason I did all this was because the city had gone to shit. If I had...someone like you back in all the beginning I never would have wanted to...would..."

She turned towards him.

"Would you help me...make this city whole again?"

"I would do nothing less, for this city. So long as you...promise to stay as the true neighbourhood watch rather than making it more of a euphemism."

"Deal."

They both shook hands gladly as a smile returned to her face. It was a slap on the wrist, but it stung well enough to make her feel a little deserved of it as Ashwin stretched his legs with a rising of his limbs with arms almost scratching the roof.

"RRRRRrrraaaaaaahhhh...roigh', that's that then. Now."

He moved towards Derek Anseed who softly approached FG as the raptor cautiously moved away from him, despite the cuffed restraints of his hands being held up in defence before his long brown hair and worn aged pallour.

"Don't worry," said the human, "I just wanted to give you something. Mister...Venkatanarasimha, could you hand it to me?"

The elephant pulled out from his pockets a small device resembling a touchscreen phone, which Derek utilised in his restrained hands due to Ashwin's much fatter digits almost crushing the whole thing in the bed of his palm. James did not know what to expect besides the small flashing light that blinked red three times before beeping green rapidly.

"Wh-what the, what was that?" asked FG.

"That was a data transmitter," said Anseed, "I sent you the coordinates of Chicago in the United States of America, topographical information for your processing unit. You spoke before how you were unable to teleport back home whereas young Roy MacGregor was. This is what I used for him, an app I created to transmit any data to our subjects, much easier than just feeding cables into the back of your brain further down the...line of the experiment."

"So...I can come back here now? Like anytime?"

"Precisely. There is also one last...gift I have for you, I know it will not make up for what I did but..."

Ashwin brought out the last gift in the form of a small fanny pack that he gave to James. Gingerly opening it, he saw something that made his heart almost clutch itself in a gasping shock. Three raptors were staring up at him from a small laminated photograph. One was an adult female with wild green eyes exactly like his wearing a white lab coat with an aged scar down the front of her neck. The other was an adult male with soft grey eyes and bulbous ridge on the top of his head whilst in a dull blue polo shirt and grey slacks.

The last was an infant, no more than but a year old with freshly swollen purple stripes and bleary green eyes wrapped in a swaddled cloth. James started to feel his body break softly, shuddering with tears breaking through from his eyes as he saw barely a small PDA also within the pack.

"Wh-wh-wha...what...is that...is that them?"

"Yes," said Anseed, "Mary Elizabeth Thomson nee Campbell, your mother. And Gerald Campbell, your father. There is a PDA that contains every single piece of data that I managed to find on them. You wanted me to answer every single question about them...here it is finally, where they lived, what lives they had, where they studied, I wrote it all out for you over the past two weeks. I wanted to...honour them in some way so as to not forget them so I made this small...data storage, it's very easy to access, fully charged and it will last at least four months before running through, I made it myself. Solar-powered too so you can leave it in the sun and it will just simply recharge if you ever want it such. It also contains videos, audio clips, just pieces that I managed to scrounge up from our days together. I...I know that seems perhaps a tiny bit obsessive-"

"It...why did you...why did you make this? Was this for me?"

"Yes. ...I felt terrible. I wanted to make...something to show you but...I was so taken by business I was not able to find you, or even know where you went in your life. By the time I did manage to find out where you had gone after your parents' death, you had already been adopted. So I thought...no. I should not interfere when you were living happily with another family...hopefully. I do not know how you came to be here but-"

"It doesn't...matter. My foster family turned out alright but things...just happened and I made a lot of stupid mistakes too."

"I won't ask for forgiveness."

"I know. But...still, thank you. Thank you for keeping my parents' memory alive. I...I'll look through this when I'm ready, if that's okay."

"They were my closest friends. I know they must look down on me with such shame for what I did with Mary's research and also her...synthetic brain-"

"What happened with that?"

"I disassembled it. We have all the data needed but I...gave 'her' a proper burial with all of the technology that was not going to be used. I did not want to leave even a shadow of her still suffering beyond its time."

"I appreciate that. Thank you."

"I only hope at the very least I can give some closure to you."

"I'm not...the one that needed it."

The raptor pocketed the photo and PDA into his satchel before asking:

"What about Roy? Wasn't there anything you were able to look up about him."

"I'm...I'm sorry. There was nothing I could find concerning him."

"It's okay...well, no, not really but it doesn't really matter anymore when he's not......hhhhhhhhh..."

James found himself conflicted with an overwhelming sense of relief combined with great sorrow. He sobbed softly into his hands sighing deep as he struggled to compose himself, none of the others in the room saying anything on the matter until he was able to speak.

"You alright?" asked Jenny.

"Y-yeah...I just...I guess we're all just leaving by this rate huh?"

"You...you heading off?"

"I have to. As long as Sarah's alright now...I've got no other reason to be here. I just...there's one person right now that I wanna be with...and just...I need him."

"What the people want, and what the people need, are always different."

Sarah said this firm and nodding sagely.

"I know what you wanna do James. It's okay. After all you've done for me...I would be asking too much to have you stay here with me a bit longer now that everything is...cleared safe."

"Are you...sure?"

"Of course."

She walked over towards him and without a word simply hugged him tight. He pulled her closely in turn gasping with a sigh of even greater relief shuddering with tears on her shoulder as she patted him gently.

"I want you to promise me something. Don't...don't forget about me, okay kid? I want you to come back, to visit at least, now that yer able to. Could you come back?"

"Of...of course I will...thank you."

"No. Thank you James. You're my hero again. You were always my hero...and you will always be...like a son to me."

"Heh...you always were a mum to me...when I needed it."

"I should have...done better but...we're here now."

The two parted their embrace as James readied himself for farewell. Jenny stood up and hugged him almost instantly with a sibling-like squeeze patting harder against his back.

"You better come back or I swear I'm gonna whup ya."

"Heheh, sure you will."

"I may not be second-in-command to nothing anymore but that ain't gonna stop me any. Take care okay?"

"You too Jenny. It was great to meet you."

Next he moved on towards Thomas Birgisson who he shook hands with by a firm grasp of his thick white-furred hand and leathery black palm, respecting each other dutifully as the bear began with:

"I remember when you used to be a reckless joyrider."

"Well I hope I did better than before."

"No, you're...still a reckless joyrider at least according to the plan we had. You just learnt not to break your arm this time."

"Hahahaha...well, be glad I'll be out of your hair for a good while."

"I will be. Good luck, and safe journeys mister Campbell."

"You too officer."

Derek was reluctantly next, despite having his hands still restrained but the raptor decided to play the better man and gave him a hug pulling closely against him. Knowing the scientist was harmless, he at least wanted to say:

"Thank you...for changing my life."

"Wh-what?"

"Heheh...just...saying thank you."

"B-but...Roy...he said the same thing to me."

"Hmmm...well maybe him and me were more alike than we think."

The raptor winked at him keeping his secret safe, but last of all was Ashwin who pulled him up into the tightest hug he could make without hurting FG. Lifting his feet off the floor, the elephant wrapped his trunk around James' back halfway as the raptor wrapped his arms around the large grey neck.

"You couldn't resist could you Asswind?"

"PFFFT, HAH! Not loik yer pushin' me away any ya cockgargling twat!"

"Stupid cunt...hhhhahahahaha......I love you man."

"...oi love you too."

He said this with a crackling in his voice as they looked at each other's eyes longingly with a deeper friendship than they ever could think. Their scars were seen close enough against their bodies as they hugged one last time before FG asked:

"Will I...will I ever see you again?"

"Maybe one day...hopefully...if not oi'll...jus' leave a message with Sarah, that alroigh' fer you?"

"Totally," said Sarah King, "yer always welcome here. Cuz any friend of James is a friend of ours after everything you've done for us."

"Noice...thas noice, alroigh' toime fer me to ship ou'. Come on doc."

"I'm going too," said FG, "I'll follow you for a bit."

Venkatanarasimha carefully put FG back down onto the floor as he took Derek Anseed's arm to cautiously lead him out of the old Two By Two bar, the raptor following along with everyone else out into the backlot of the tavern. Already the sky looked clearer perhaps because of them or maybe something had changed for good in the city. Whatever was the case, they all stood staring up at the clouds starting to clear just a bit before Ashwin brought out a radio he had hidden on his person, one Sarah had never seen.

"Circus, come in Circus, this is Dumbo."

"[i]Circus here, what's your performance?[/i]"

"We got the feather, repeat, we 'ave the feather an' Jim Crow's 'ere with us. Toime to pack up an' return 'ome."

"[i]Understood, what's the status of the parade?[/i]"

"Elephants are all clear, over. The parade's left an' everything's gone on swimmingly."

"[i]Roger that, fly on back to us Dumbo. Over and out.[/i]"

Ashwin shook his head with a chuckle as the group stared at him in disbelief.

"Yeah oi know, s'a fuckin' stupid codename bu' you'd never know wot we're on abou' wouldya?!"

"I guess it works," said Sarah, "in some way. Is that you leaving now?"

"Oi go me own way, jus' gotta wait fer the pickup to come roun'. James!"

The raptor stood at the other side of the lot.

"Buy us a bag o' croissants wouldya?! Fuckin' starvin' next toime we meet!"

"Hahaha sure!" replied FG. "Maybe two for you!"

"Roigh'! Later!"

They both parted ways to opposite ends of the tavern lot, the FinalGamer walking from them by a good distance as he braced himself. The old familiar tingling had been running through his veins for the past three minutes in preparation as his world came apart slowly from around him. All that his friends could see was a spiral void of infinite dimensional abyss, that slowly began to consume him by a howling gasp of existence that made all of them gasp with silent awe as they saw for the first time how he had left their world fourteen years ago.

"Wha-wha...where," stammered Jenny, "where is he going?"

"...home."

Sarah pulled Jenny close with an arm around her gently in rapture.

"He's going home."

And so it was that James Campbell disappeared from his home world for a second time, fading away from its existence by a darkened silhouette that burned into their brains knowing that one day he would return. With happiness slowly blooming throughout Chicago, it would become a good year...and the start of a good city to be reborn again.