FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Havik was running low on time. Very low. The feeling of the biting snow brushing against the outlines of the suit. It had to be -280 Celsius here, nothing standing above the ice capped mountains. The wind could still be felt biting as hm even with the suit doing all it could to help him survive. His walking stick helped him maintain some balance on this strange planet, the wind whispering in his ear to lay down, to sleep. He was tired. He had been walking for a very long time. Three days without sleep can wear down on anyone.

He kept walking though. The cold air was wearing down his suit and he couldn’t stop for even a moment. Every step he took gave him a shiver. His legs going numb, his mind tricking him. He would hear the voices of his mother calling for him, wishing him home.

Soon. Very soon…

These intrusive thoughts continued for a while before he felt like he was being watched. He felt a small tingle climb up his tail through his spine. Instincts like that are not to be ignored on a planet like this. He took his walking stick, really a spear, and gripped it tightly. Though his hearing was off, it was the only thing he could rely on as the snowfall had begun to increase, ruining his vision. He growled and his visor lit up, scanning the area immediately around him. It had some trouble finding exactly what was there but it still counted three creatures making its way to him. He gripped his walking stick and it flared to life, no longer a simple stick but instead transforming into a spear, glowing at the tip with a warm hue that burned every flake of snow that came near it.

He slowed his breathing and watched his surroundings, the snow slowly moving around him as if alive. And then all at once something leapt out from the white sheet of the snow, hissing loudly and lunging forward at him. Havik rolled out of the way and smacked the strange creature with the blunt end of his weapon. The creature yowled in pain and swiped at Havik’s feet, bringing him crashing onto his back.

He made sure to keep his grip on his staff and pointed the end at the snow creatures who cowered at first to it, shrinking away from him with a loud hiss before burying themselves under the snow again. Havik eyed the snow cautiously, slowly backing away towards the cave. Every few seconds had the snow mumble beneath him, the threat encircling him.

“zzzzzz-ik! Co-zzzzzzz-in!” His communicator spoke to him. He was about to respond just as one of the snow creatures jumped up from behind him. He swung his staff at it, smacking it in the face before stabbing his spear into its chest. The beast cried before solidifying into ice, falling apart immediately. Havik readied his weapon for the second attack from the other snow creature but it had disappeared, no trace of it anywhere.

Taking that as his cue to run, he quickly bolted for the cave in the distance, doing his best to ignore his numb and tired legs to reach for some viable sense of safety. He was almost there when the ground beneath him moved, making him trip and fall into the snow. He heard the rumbling of the ground as the snow creature vaulted towards him again. It gripped onto his back, biting at the metal plating and scratching at his armor, managing to tear a hole in it before it was shoved off, Havik whacking at the creature with his staff. It was stunned for a bit before he aimed the spearhead at the creature, firing a shot of energy from it. It just barely missed, but it scared the creature back into hiding, allowing Havik to flee to the cave.

He was out of breath and his armor was damaged, but he was alive. He used the staff to start a fire, the flame starting out blue in color and cold before warming to a nice orange and giving the heat he needed.

“Hestia base, are you there?” He spoke to the communicator. There was nothing but static. He groaned and tried to patch up his suit. It was keeping his body heat regulated in this horrendous cold. “Come on guys… Pick up!” He yelled. The comm spoke up with more static before…

“Havik?” He jumped up to attention.

“Yes?! Hello?!”

“Havik, are you there?”

“Yes!! Yes I’m here!” He shouted louder. The connection yielded more static before responding.

“We’re on our wa-zzzzzzzz-cover! Just a few-zzzzz!” They were coming. He was almost home! But he couldn’t get his hopes up. He needed to buy just a few more minutes but with how cold it was, he might be dead in that time! He patched up his suit as best he could and grabbed his things, staying tight in the cave until his saviors came for him. He had to. The minutes ticked by and soon his communicator called out for him again.

“We are hovering over your co-zzzzzz-light so we can see you!” He didn’t hear the whole of the message but knew what they needed him to do. He placed his cloak on and grabbed his staff, stepping out into the wide open snowy field, the ice beneath his feet beginning to crumble. Soon his steps led to the earth shaking, cracking beneath his feet. He felt the earth move, a heavy groan coming from underneath all the ice and snow but he spared no time in finding the origin of it. He took his staff and pressed one of the buttons on the side, a bright flashing light emanating from the gem at the top. He ran from the shattering ground as fast as he could, holding the staff high before calling for someone to answer his calls. There was only static.

In its place though he heard the ship flying towards him, coming down from the clouds like an angel, but in response, the planet groaned again, the dirt beneath his feet slowly lifting upwards. Havik stopped just at the edge at this new cliff, seeing that it wasn’t any mountain, it was a hand. A clawed hand that lifted Havik upwards. The hand was closing to crush him between its fingers.

Leeeeaaaavveeeeee!

The voice was deep and booming, the earth rattling with its tone. Havik, with no other options, leapt between its fingers, sliding down the hill side of it, almost snowboarding. He’d be having much more fun if his life wasn’t in peril. On the way down, ice spikes dug out of the sides of the mountain, making him dodge out of the way, another one ripping his suit. He saw the ship fly back down to where he was falling as Havik was coming up on a massive end that would send him falling into an icy ocean.

The ship reared around at the bottom of the mountain cliff and opened up for him, two people waiting for him, arms extended!

“Come on boss! You can make it!” One shouted. Havik steeled his nerves, took a deep breath and just before the end of the cliff, he jumped, almost gliding through the air as he landed in the small shuttle.

“We got him! Go!” Shouted one of the crewmates. Wasting no time, the ship closed its back opening and floored it away from the mountain. But the threat wasn’t over. Another hand had come to try and catch the ship mid air, the crew just barely missing it. The fog of the snow storm was clouding their vision but the pilot flew straight up, hoping to avoid any other threats. The last one came from a large, concentrated breath of what looked like fire coming from the ground.

“What the hell! They breathe fire now?!'' shouted the pilot. Havik looked out the window and saw in the ground a massive creature unlike any he had seen before staring right at them. It glared with murderous intent before reelasing one more fire breath, the blue flame too cold to be real fire. No. It was breathing ice. The side of the windows were freezing over, the vision clouding up again and one of the engines was failing. Giving everything they had into the thrusters, the ship was just barely able to make it out of the frozen planet's atmosphere, safe enough in the open expanse of space.

“Holy crap! You really love risking it, don’t ya Havik?” asked the pilot, laughing slightly.

“What can I say? Cutting it close is my thing. Really adds to the fun of the adventure.” Havik took a seat, breathing heavily as his body slowly warmed up. Or tried to. The planet was really cold after all.

The trip was luckily uneventful. The ship flew effortlessly through the open bit of space before coming up on a massive shipbase. The hull was massive, capable of taking multiple transporter ships into its housing and was headed by a massive crew to keep everything running. Havik was one of that crew and he needed to report his findings. The transporter ship flew into the base and after a few moments of communication between the pilot and the base, he was allowed off.

Etna Base was the name of the legendary hull, a large mining ship dedicated to the extraction of powerful relics and wealthy minerals from all manner of planets. It housed countless species from across the galaxy all working together for one purpose; Greater unity between the distant peoples. Havik took off his helmet and took a deep breath. He felt the wind brush against his face and hair. He was a handsome young man, no more than 30, dark skinned with a nice smile and shoulder length black hair. One of the many humans on this ship. Humanity had been in space for a few centuries now but were making an effort to have a bit of a say in the intergalactic affairs going on.

“Mining unit #98142 Havik please move to the sick bay for a check up procedure.” a voice called from the intercom. Havik groaned, looking up at the ceiling as if talking directly to the person.

“Awwww I’m fine! Really!”

“Commander's orders. Get in there ya big baby,” the voice said back, making him laugh. He quickly made his way to the medical wing of the ship, walking by several people who seemed really excited to see him return home. Countless people on the ship were happy to see him, cheering his return before he finally made it to the sickbay. There he found the lead doctor of the ship, a tall and slim Maned wolf with a black muzzle and paws, looking over something on their tablet before turning to see Havik waiting for him. The nametag had the name “Kol Mikmininink”.

“Hey doc. Been called here for the whole check up thing.”

“Of course. Get undressed for me and get on the table, we’ll do the usual procedure.” He did as asked, removing the suit he was wearing and tossing it into the sanitation box. Undressing to his underwear, Havik climbed onto the diagnosis table and it lit up for him, showing all of his vitals and even an x-ray that showed his nervous system, skeletal system and every other part of his body that needed to be checked.

“Told youuuuuu, I’m fine.”

“Mhmmmm, still gotta make sure. That planet was one of the coldest ones in our records and you have no fur to protect you. How you survived is beyond me.” The two of them shared a chuckle as they went over more of his vitals, making sure his breath was steady, his nerves were returning to normal, all signs going green. The suit, even when damaged, still worked amazingly well!

“I’m not hearing any bad newsssss,” Havik chimed before someone else came into the room. Two people, carrying themselves with great importance, stepped into the room and looked over the man on the body scanner bed. The taller man was human, dark skinned with gray hair and dressed in a black a decorated military uniform, dark blue in color with silver accents, the left breast holding some well decorated insignia denoting his rank. The official name for it was “Deity” for that’s effectively what he was.

Sovereign Deity Almaros Keverik, better known by his name “Hephaestus”. But one piece in the greater machine that was the Human empire's will to settle and expand out into the stars, he was the manager and orchestrator of all mining and extraction operations going on. In order to better protect themselves from the alien threats they had a run in with before, they developed the “Apotheosis” project which took only the best and brightest men and women of Earth and its colonies and put them through rigorous training and preparation for their next phase of life: Immortality. Hundreds of thousands of people were allowed to try and only a few passed, gaining their new name and becoming the head of an important division in their corner of the galaxy but all had one purpose.

Home and Hearth, Enrich the Earth

Next to him was the ship second in command Itz Isilii Im’ilik, often called “Silli” (pronounced See-lee) or “Sill” because his name was a little difficult for those not used to it. Being the first mate, he was in charge of everything else the Captain couldn’t get to. Taking the load off so to speak. A grey cat wearing a black, blue accented uniform and blue glasses, he was easily recognizable. In fact he was rarely seen without the Sovereign.

“How ya feelin’ Havik?” The Sovereign asked, standing next to the Maned wolf as he looked the human over.

“I’m fine! Seriously, you guys are so paranoid,” he said as he began to sit up, before being pushed back down by the doctor.

“This is protocol. We do this every time someone returns from a new planet. Gotta make sure you got all the digits and extremities working. Can’t send you on another mission and then suddenly you can’t walk,” Sill mentioned, charting down everything that the doc told him too.

“Well I think-” he said up again before being pushed down by Doc.

“We know what you think. She’s almost done. Just sit through it.” Hephaestus said, crossing his arms with a smile.

“Ah man. That means she’s gonna hit me with a - OWW!” He screamed as a needle was shot into his neck. He willed himself to stay put, not flinch at all since that just made it worse but after a brief heat wave overtook his body, he was… okay. His breathing was heavy and his body felt ready to sweat but it actually felt nice after the trip to the ice cube of the galaxy.

“And all done. Free to go whine somewhere else,” The Doc joked, letting him up off the table as Sill gave him a robe.

“I told you guys. You have no faith in me at all. That stuff you pumped me full of before the mission and the well made suit were all perfect. Nothing was gonna hurt me.”

“Precautions, Havik. Precautions,” the Heph laughed before having Sill and Havik follow him, thanking the Doc for her work. “We got a meeting later. Some of my colleagues are a little curious about what you found out there and what was happening.”

“Ah, standard stuff. No problem. Found a real pretty piece I gotta show them all. I’ll be there as soon as possible to debrief everyone,” Havik said as he stretched. “Gonna take a quick shower and then get properly dressed. I’ll be down there in about half an hour.” Sill and Heph nodded, continuing down the ship halls as Havik entered the shower rooms. He immediately felt the warm, wet air and could hear the showers turned on. He removed his robe and underwear and grabbed a towel, walking in before hearing cheers of congratulations towards him.

“Havik!”

“He made it back!’

“He’s not an ice cube! Yayyyy!”

“You owe me 100 bucks!”

“Nice job making it back big guy!” Praise after praise came his way as he hopped into the shower stall, blushing slightly at all the compliments. One cool thing about the ship was that hot water was not an issue to come by, thank goodness. He needed some more warmth in his life right now.

The shower stalls were fairly open, only a small slide between each shower to give some space and a modicum amount of privacy to the one using it. It didn’t help too much since the person was still very much exposed to any wandering eyes but hey, something is better than nothing. The censor divider only covered the torso down to the groin so you could look over to the person next to you and still talk but they wouldn’t see anything too personal. And of course there were more private showers around but most used these. They had seen each other naked so many times, it had almost lost its luster. Almost.

He turned on the shower, feeling the warmth rush down his body and soothe his aches. Being on an ice cold planet has a way of seriously messing with you. He may have told everyone he was fine but in truth, he just didn’t want to seem like he was whining.

“Got any new scars to share?” said someone next to him. He looked to see a tall, black and white wolf looking down at him. He was very tall, his emerald green eyes looking down at the shorter human with an overexcited grin.

“Haha! What’s with you and seeing my scars?” Havik laughed.

“Cause I don’t got none! Well… none that show up easily.” He moved some of his wet fur out of the way to show the pink skin underneath with some scarring and healed wounds coating his arm. When he removed his paw, the fur went back to its position, covering up the wounds. “Chicks dig scars.” He smiled.

“Well sorry big guy, nothing more than what I already got,” Havik said, washing his face. His body was pretty scarred up in all his years of work. Mining on harsh planets for rich minerals always had some dangers. The biggest one was the one on his back that stretched from just above his butt all the way to his neck. It looked more like when a glass window had a crack in it, the massive wound branching out into numerous smaller scratches that adorned his body.

The stall across Havik was a lithe feline woman, her pelt a mix of brown and black and her hair a dark purple, cut short and resting at her shoulders. She let the water run against her back as she leaned on the stall leaning closer to the human.

“Just once I wish you’d take me on one of those missions. I would be an amazing help,” she said as Havik splashed her with some water.

“Noooo, you would have left to do God knows what and get us nearly killed.”

“I am not so shallow!” She stood up for herself as she splashed Havik with some water. “What I do, I do for the good of the team! Besides, I know you can handle yourself just fine. I don’t need to watch over you all the time like some others…” she glared at the white furred rabbit a stall across from her. He was busy washing his tail but knew she was talking about him.

“Come onnnn, I try my best out there! You know I’m not all for the firefights,” he said, moving to wash his ears. She turned to face him, scoffing.

“Then you should find a new line of work! This whole thing is about shooting down tin cans!” She responded. The rabbit shrugged slightly embarrassed.

“Leave me to the tech stuff. I’ll keep y’all informed…. I used that word right, right Havik? ‘Y’all’?”

“Yes, Tie. You’re good,” the human chuckled. He continued with his shower before hearing the sound of wet feet slapping on the floor, quickly getting louder and louder as they approached him. “Oh no…”

“Haviiiiikkkk!” came the voice, grabbing him from behind and lifting him off his feet. “You’re alive! You made it!”

“H-hey! Tundra! Not while we’re naked!” He shouted but she was ignoring him, spinning in place. She laughed hard, far too excited to see him return in one piece, all of their teammates laughing as well. She would swing him in her arms, squeezing him tightly and licking his face which made him laugh. When she was finally done, she put him down but refused to let go, hugging him so tight he could scarcely breathe. But he didn’t have the heart to push her off.

She looked like the female version of Brutus, the wolf next to Havik in the shower. Black and white fur with bright blue eyes. She was a muscular woman, still having a feminine figure but definitely no damsel. She was also quite tall, taller than Havik at about 7 ft and 6 inches tall.

“I missed you too, Tundra. I was only gone for a moment. Less than a day,”

“That’s too long for her to be away from you,” said Brutus, making Tundra lean out and slap his butt.

“You shush!”

“Oww! It’s true! You’re obsessed with him!”

“I am not obsessed! He’s our leader. I am worried for his safety.”

“Suurreeee,” everyone said at once, making Tundra pout. Havik scratched under her chin and her tail wagged, making him let her go. He resumed his shower for a bit longer before calling it over, saying goodbye to his friends before getting dressed, walking through the ship to the Captains Quarters. Along the way though, he stopped at the main hallway, overlooking the open expanse of space, the infinite twinkling stars in the distance, passing by a large ringed planet nearby. There were some ships passing by, flying to and fro, carrying any number of important and not so important goods from all over.

“Hey, skinny,” called Silli, walking up to him. “Captain’s waiting.”

“I know I know. I was just taking in some of the sights.” Havik walked down the hallway with the cat, passing by some other fellow Miners and ship dwellers, passing by the cafeteria and looking at the menagerie of people laughing and joking and eating down below. Havik took another pause.

“Taking in another sight?” Silli asked.

“Y-yeah. Well it’s just…” He took a deep breath before trying to explain. “It’s just… don’t take this the wrong way-”

“Oh here we go…” Silli chuckled.

“Here me out! Hear me out. Like… Humanity spent thousands of years trying to perfect space travel, only getting into space for the first time in 1961. Then we finally find the means to explore the stars, colonize dozens of planets and finally make it out into the wider expanse of space…” He looked at the cafeteria, filled with humans and beasts of all colors and species. “And we find out it’s just occupied by a bunch of furries.”

“Hey!” Silli nudged him, making Havik laugh.

“Just sayin’! Quite the interesting discovery. I imagine a bunch of people back home were excited to know this.”

“People are always excited to know of life on other planets. It’s a great thing to find out.”

“No I mean… There are a group of people back home that love anthro animals like you. No disrespect!” He jumped up to try and seem not so offensive, the grey cat smirking at him.

“None taken… What’s Earth like?” Silli asked, bringing Havik back down the hallway.

“Oof. It’s recovering from some… heavy damage but it’s getting much better. Used to be a serious mess. I read the stories. Seas boiled, atmosphere full of smog, surface warmer than ever recorded. But we lucked out with an extraterrestrial visitor. Gave us a bunch of tech we used to fix things up. Now it’s almost like its old self again.” Havik slowed down for a bit, taking a deep breath before smiling.

“Sounds lovely. Maybe one day I can see it.” The two looked at each other before laughing. They had finally made it to the Captains door, Silli tapped a badge to the reader and it beeped green, opening up and allowing them to walk in. The room was large, divided into two floors, the top floor dedicated to the Captain and his main five crew members, Silli being one of them. The bottom floor was all high ranking communications officers, talking back and forth with the many ships coming and going from the massive hull.

“Never been in this branch of the ship before. Nice view.”

“Never gets old,” Silli said. “Get ready. The Gods are about to show up.”