A Fox in the Works Loose Edges By Fox Cutter 03/22/2000: Doctor Starker picked up the data PADD from his desk, using his thumb to scroll through the contents of it as he made notes on his notepad. I sat across from him, in the same chair I occupied every time I came to visit the bear. I was human this time, and with a significant improvement in my attitude towards the older man. Rhea sat at my side, her head held high as the web of electronics that wrapped around her skull flicked with light. "Well it's no surprise that you have done as well as I had expected you to do," the doctor said as he set the PADD down on his desk and picked up a folder, opening it to the center page. "In fact it's rather surprising where the variations between the two of you occur," he said. <> Rhea said, her tail tuft tapping gently on the floor next to the chair. "You are welcome," he said as he picked up the PADD again and looked between it and the open folder. "Mentally you are closely matched to Fox. The differences come in the places where instinct seems to rule, but your intelligence and understanding are the same as each other. She is just as much a sentient being as you are, Fox," he said. <> she said with a slight smile. I reached down to remove the electronics from her large head and said: "I'm glad you suggested this. It will help a lot in getting my sister recognized as something more than an animal." He nodded his head and started to take some further notes. "I hope that it does help you. I will prepare a statement of what I've found, and I will be more than willing to testify to it, if I must." "Thank you very much," I told him as I set the device on his desk. "I appreciate all of your help, you have no idea just how much it means to me," I said as I stood up. The bear nodded his head and made a few new notes as he watched me over the rim of his glasses. "I have a few thoughts on that matter," he said, and looked at his watch. "Are you going somewhere? We still have most of our time today," he told me with a stern voice. I shrugged, and then looked down at Rhea. "Well, there is some work that I need to get to at the shipyard." Starker shook his head and tapped his fingers on the table. "And I'm sure you remembered to schedule it around our appointments," he said. "I'm back to being a human, I'm not really sure there is much reason to continue with out sessions," I told him. He shook his head. "That was not the reason you came to me, and it's not a reason to stop seeing me." I shrugged again and reached down to pet Rhea's head. "I'm whole again, that is what matters," I told him as I reached for the door. Rhea moved forward, sliding between myself and the doorway, blocking the exit with her large body. <> she told me. I glanced down at her, then back at Doctor Starker. The bear nodded his head slightly and motioned for me to return to the chair. With a sigh I let my hand drop away from the handle and walked back to the chair. I dropped back into it with a huff, my arms crossed over my chest. The doctor rose from his chair and walked around the desk, coming to a stop in front of me. He rested himself against his desktop as he placed his paws in his lap. "You haven't told me, how do you feel now that you are back to being a human?" I shrugged as I relaxed my arms slightly. "I'm feeling better, it feels good to be myself again." "You said your full lioness form was your real self," he said. "Yes, it's what I really am, but not who I really am. Being human is part of that, and I feel the most myself when I am human," I told him as I reached down with one hand to touch the side of Rhea's neck. The bear nodded and made a few notes, a slight smile on his muzzle. "Now that is something quite different from what you have told me before." I shrugged. "Before, I didn't know if I could be a human again. The fact that I now know how to control my powers means that things are balancing again," I told him. Starker nodded again and scribbled a few notes. "How much control do you have of your powers?" "Enough, but it isn't as easy as it could be. It takes time to do the shift, time and energy, but I'm learning. Milgrove thinks I should be able to shift in moments once I have full control. It will take time, but we are doing some exercises every day. It's slow going, but I'm mastering it." The bear smiled at me and tapped his pen to the paper. "That is good to know. I would like to learn more about this at some point in time." I nodded, closing my eyes and taking a deep breath. I reached up to take off my glasses as I pushed into myself, touching gently at my powers. Once I had my hands on it I pushed gently, and changed forms. I felt my body slide around as fur grew, and my legs changed. My height fell away as much of my mass simply vanished and I was left an anthropomorphic fox. Opening my eyes, I looked up at the Doctor, a smile on my long muzzle. "It takes time," I told him as I adjusted myself, allowing my bushy tail free of my clothing. The bear nodded as he returned my smile. "So I see, that is very impressive. Have you spent much time in this form?" he asked me. I nodded, turning my wedding ring on my finger. It barely fit in that form, but the fur was almost enough to keep it from sliding free. "A few hours, here and there. It's something of a fun body, and one that I've used the least. It's also the hardest of them to hold, but the more I use it, the easier it will be." "Like any muscle," he replied. "How much time do you spend in your other forms?" I gave him a small shrug. "Most of the time I'm human. I've spent a few hours here and there as a full-lioness, which is nice. It feels natural, and it is the easiest of my forms to take." "And how much time in your female form?" he asked. "Enough," I replied, pulling my arms a bit closer to my body. <> Rhea said. Doctor Starker nodded his head, jotting down a few notes. "That does not surprise me at all. That was where your trauma occurred; it makes sense that you would be avoiding it." "I'm not avoiding it," I snapped a little to quickly. He gave me a strong look, and then shook his head. "I understand, Fox, but I believe that you are," he said. I started to protest, but he cut me off with a raised paw. "Yes, yes, you say that you are not, but I can tell from your body language that you truly are. It's also clear that I can not tell you otherwise for the time being, but that will pass with time." I started to protest again, but let the words die on my tongue as I shook my head, my ears folding slightly. Instead I licked my lips and looked away from him. The bear set his pad of paper down on the desk and rose to his feet. "I don't believe any more conversation on this subject will help for the time being." "Agreed," I told him as I stood, feeling my clothing sag around my body. I held my pants up with one paw as I shifted myself back to human. The change moved faster this time, everything sliding into place with ease as I placed my glasses back on my face. Starker looked at his watch and nodded his head. "I suppose we are finished then. We still have some time left, but I feel that we will not make further progress today." I nodded my head as I dug though my pocket. "Do you have anything scheduled after me?" I asked. "I have two free hours," he replied, giving me a curious look. "Good," I told him as I pulled the norm-shift stone out of my pocket and threw it towards the bear. He caught it with a deft paw and looked closely at it, his eyes widening slightly when he realized what it must have been. "Want to go for a ride?" I asked him with a smile. * * * Samantha sat on the grass, her legs crossed and her cloth tail warped around her hips. She had a data PADD in her lap and two more sitting at her side. Hunched over slightly she read through her notes, occasionally taking a bite of the sandwich held in her hand. With a soft snort she paused the PADD on her lap and shook her head. "This guy is too clean," she said then finished the last of her meal. She had spent the last month looking into Richard Stanz, but hadn't found anything about the man that reflected badly on him. Nothing reflected on him at all. The fact was she could barely find anything about him past his name. Wiping her hand clean on her pants she picked up a different PADD, looking over the scattered information on its screen. It was a collection of the human's employment records, jumping from one organization to another. Every job and position he had was leading up to him being a perfect candidate to work in the Office of Planetary Defense. No one he worked for had any anything bad to say about the man. Nor did they have anything particularly outstanding to say about him. He had made no real waves as he worked his way up the ladder to his current position. He just seemed to vanish when no one was looking at him. She suspected that was exactly what he wanted. With some luck, and a little careful walking around the law in a few places, she had even managed to pull up his security clearance. Even that didn't find anything about him, not even a bad break up in his past. It was just so damn pat. Samantha threw the PADD to the ground and stretched out her legs and tail, flicking the cloth in the grass. She was at a dead end, and didn't know what else she could do about her target. She leaned back on the grass, resting her hands against the blades as she watched the people move around the market. She wasn't the only one who had decided to take their lunch out on the grass. Most were couples who were enjoying their time with each other. That thought made her smile, thinking of the date she had planned with Mallory that night. This time she was taking him out to a small place she knew that was well off the beaten path. It wasn't even on Prid, or on a world that knew about the Consortium, but not so out of place that her boyfriend would stand out. Her tail flicked with a soft giggle as she thought about the fact that she had a boyfriend. It had been years since the last time she had gone steady with anyone... far too long. Even better was the night before when they finally had their first roll in the hay. It had been something quite different, but was still one hell of a good time. She was eager to do it again. She let that memory slide out of her mind as she started to collect the PADDs. She had hoped that a nice day out in the sunlight would help her think, but instead it had simply proven to her that she lacked enough information to do anything of value. Putting her things in her sack she climbed to her feet and stretched out her arms. She let out a soft gasp of surprise when she saw Stanz walking by the edge of the park. He was walking with a tall human male, and they were talking rapidly to each other. Samantha watched, her mouth hanging open slightly in surprise. From everything she had found the man didn't have any friends; so she had no idea who he was with, or what they were talking about. She stood for a few more seconds and watched them walk past before she started after them. Her tail was flicking in excitement as she kept herself about a hundred feet away from the pair of men, watching them talk to each other. Following was never her skill, but she did the best that she could do, making sure they didn't see her the few times they came to a stop. They moved quickly through the market, moving from shop to shop, but never actually going anywhere. They seemed to have finished their conversation, but didn't slow down. It was to her detriment that she didn't pay close attention to where she was going as they moved towards the edge of the market. Soon they were in among the new construction, with mostly empty shops. There were fewer people around and she had to drift further back to keep from being noticed. Finally she had to rush around a corner to keep them in sight, and ran smack into the arms of two burly looking men. She let out a yelp, trying to twist away, but they grabbed her tightly and pulled her into an empty storefront. Samantha tried to yell, but a large paw clamped over her face as they closed the door behind themselves, blocking out the light. She was thrown back against the far wall as both men pulled out their guns and pointed them at her. Stanz was standing by the door, with the taller human next to him. The taller man was shaking his head, his arms held across his chest. Stanz held a small device and was making notes on it. "You scream, and we will kill you," the tall man said. Samantha took a deep breath and let it out, counting to ten. "And what will you do if I don't? Let me go?" she asked, her tone heavily sarcastic. The man shook his head. "No, but we will at least keep it painless, otherwise we will just cut you till you bleed to death," he said. She looked towards the man, and then at the two others who were holding the guns. Both were felines, one a tiger, the other a lynx, or something like it. They were also amateurs, one was holding his gun parallel to the floor, and the other had it in a lose grip that would cause it to fly free when he pulled the trigger. "I see, painless can be good," she said, letting her tail drop as she pulled her power away from it. The two cats would be easy to deal with, it would be the humans that would cause her problems. Gently she reached out with her telekinetics, slowly building a mental wall inside their guns. It wasn't easy to keep in place, but it would be more than enough to deal with them. The tall human walked forward, moving between the two felines as he looked down at her. "Now, you've been poking your nose around where it shouldn't belong, and I'm not that pleased by it. My business is my business, and you have no reason to be involved in it." She shrugged, shifting herself slightly to be more comfortable, making sure to keep her hands away from where her gun was. It did surprise her that they hadn't disarmed her, but that just reassured her assessment of their skill level. "I'm just doing my job, it's nothing personal," she said. The human shrugged his shoulders and clenched his hands together. "I can understand that, but you have crossed a line, and I simply can not let that stand. Now who are you working for?" "You know what, I forget her name," she said with a smirk. The tall man tisked and shook his head. "That isn't what I was hoping to hear. I guess we will just have to encourage you to tell me the truth," he said, and then turned to look at the lynx. "Shoot her someplace painful," he told the man with a smile. "Delighted," the feline said, looking down the side of his badly held gun. He took careful aim at her lower leg as and pulled the trigger. The explosion came as a surprise to everyone in the room as the gun blossomed outwards. The force of the explosion sent shrapnel flying back, slicing open the lynx's face and sending him to the ground. Samantha was on her feet in a moment, using her power to pull her gun into her hand. Before the second feline could easily react she had put a bullet in the back of his skull. She pushed past him as his body fell, jumping onto the tall man. They landed hard on the floor, her legs on his shoulder. She grabbed his balls with her powers and gave them a very forceful squeeze. Next she fired an additional shot into the wall next to Stanz and motioned for him to take a seat on the cement floor. The man looked startled, but did as he was told. "Now," Samantha said, turning her attention to the man under her. "Who are you, and what business did I get involved in?" she asked with a polite smile, then pressed the barrel of her gun under his chin, the hot metal hissing softly. He looked at her with surprise in his eyes as she gave his balls another squeeze. He grunted in pain and shook his head. "Sorry hon, I don't kiss and tell," he said. She looked down at him, shaking her head in disappointment. "I'm not going to kill you, I have friends who are _much_ better at that then I am. I'll take you to one of them, and they can carve your flesh off a strip at a time. So you can talk to me, or you can talk to them, but I'm not much for playing with you." He said nothing, he just smiled and turned his head to the side. His arm suddenly twisted under her, and she saw a flash of something move over his fingers. She threw herself to the side, firing two shots into his chest as something long and metal fell from his fingers. "Shit... that should have gone better," she said as she lowered her gun, panting softly. She glanced to the wall where Stanz was setting, looking pale. "At least I still have you," she told him. "You have no idea what you have," he said. She shrugged. "Maybe not, but I know where to start," she said as she dug through the dead human's pockets, and laughed when she found his wallet. "You guys really have no idea how to do this, do you?" she asked as she pulled it out. Her surprise grew when she found the man's ID card inside of it along with his credit chit. "So, Richard Stanz, what did you and Aikl Lakeleaf here have planed?" she asked as she kicked the dead man. "Nothing important," he said. A moment later he ducked down as the door was kicked open and three men rushed in. Samantha jumped up, her gun held at ready before realizing that it was the police. All three of them had their weapons trained on her, all ready to pull the trigger. She dropped her gun to the floor and lifted her hands. "I see we are going to need to talk about this," she said with a wan smile. * * * I sat in the back seat of the taxi with Samantha at my side, looking angry and annoyed. Santhera was in the front seat, watching us both with wary eyes, one arm draped over the back of the seat. I wished Fox had been there to take care of this, but he was off playing around somewhere and I couldn't get hold of him. It was too bad. He would have had an easier time dealing with the police. "Aren't you even going to ask what happened?" Samantha said, trying to break the silence. My ears rocked back slightly as I turned to look at her. "It couldn't have been that bad, they did let you go," I said. She snorted and pulled at the tracking bracelet that was locked around her left wrist. "It was self defense, even the cops agreed with that," she said. "For the moment, but things can change," I said with a frown. "You're lucky Fox has some pull even when he's not here, otherwise you would be in prison right now," I told her. Samantha frowned and pressed herself back into her seat. "Fox wasn't the one who came to get me, you did. Thank you for doing that, you didn't have to." I tilted my head to the side as I looked at her. "You are a friend, and not just Fox's friend. When you called, I had to do something," I told her, rocking slightly as the car pulled up to the house. We slipped out of the taxi, and I paid the driver, the hyena who always seemed to be giving us rides. After that the three of us walked back into the house and out of the midday sun. "So, what exactly happened, in detail," I said as soon as the door closed. The young woman gave me a simile and dropped down onto the couch. "Thanks for waiting until we got home. I killed two men," she told me. "And maimed a third," I said as I sat down across from her and crossed my legs under my long skirt. "Why were you there in the first place?" "It was a job," she said. I raised my paw at this, "Are you getting into the assassination business?" She shook her head. "I'm not competing with you, Oriana, I was investigating one of the men, the one who survived. I saw him at the market with one of the men I killed and I followed them. I got grabbed, things went bad, and I defended myself." "Why were you looking into the man?" She chuckled, "Mallory found something irregular with him; they both work at the OPD. Mallory wasn't getting anywhere with internal security, so he came to me." A slight frown played over my face. "Did you tell the police this?" "Yes I did, and I gave the cops all the information that I was able too, not all of it, but enough. Hopefully Mallory's concerns will be addressed now," she said. I nodded and relaxed a bit into my chair. "What about the information you didn't give to them?" I asked her. "It's stuff I shouldn't actually have which I kept at home. I'm going to destroy it as soon as I can," she said. "No," I said, my ears laying back. "If the police found out it would look bad for you no matter what the information may be," I told her, then paused for a few seconds as I thought about it. "Give it to me, I'll take it to the Guild, they'll know how to destroy it without anyone knowing." "Elena could do the same," Santhera said from her place by the door, "with fewer questions than the Guild would have." I gave my bodyguard a short nod, "Sie would, sie would also copy all of the data first. The Guild will just destroy it." The tigeress paused for a moment's thought, and then nodded her head in agreement. I turned my attention back to Samantha. "So, is this how you met Mallory?" I asked. She nodded, a smiled spread over her face and a small sparkle appeared in her eyes. "Yes it was," she said, and then frowned. "Crap! I can't go off world! So much for my plans for tonight," she said, slumping down against the couch. I stood up from the chair and walked over to the couch, sitting back down next to her. I placed one paw on her back and held there for a few moments. "We can work something out, and the house is large enough that you can stay here if you like." Samantha looked up, and gave me a small smile. "Thank you," she said. "So, Fox tells me he is an interesting man. What's he like?" I asked her. She laughed and smiled so widely I worried that she might hurt herself. "Large, doubled up and prehensile," she said. I let out a laugh and shook my head. "That's _very_ important!" I said, returning her smile. "You don't know the half of it," she said with a smirk. * * * Richard Stanz paced in his apartment, furious with himself and with what Aikl had done. It wasn't supposed to have happened like that, no one was meant to have been killed. Not even that woman. Now Aikl was dead and the cops were looking into all of them! He tugged at the bracelet on his wrist, wanting to rip it off and throw it across the room. But if he did that the police would be on him in minutes. At least they believed his story about being taken off the street, the same as Samantha had been. A soft knocking came from the door, distracting him for a moment. The human rushed over and looked through the peephole, relived to see that in was Alexandria. He flung the door open and let the tigeress inside. She was dressed in a business suit that hid much of her muscular body, a briefcase held in one paw. She gave Stanz a dark look as he closed the door, tisking softly. She was a lawyer, and carried herself like one. She was also employed by Prid's Interim Government. This was Ms. Orange. "What happened?" she asked as she set her case on the small kitchen table. "No one gave you any authorization to take this sort of action." "It was Aikl's idea," he said as he sat down at the table. She nodded, "And now he is dead, so we have no need to take any action against him. You, on the other hand, will need to be dealt with." The human shifted uncomfortable in his seat, but said nothing. Alexandria sat down and looked back at him. "The police have already started to inquire about you, and soon the Office of Planetary Defense will begin their own investigation. Will they find anything?" He shook his head. "No, everything is in place, and I've covered my tracks in compliance with the protocols. There is nothing for them to find." "Good, then there will be no loss," she said, snapping open her briefcase. "What would the two men that were with you know--anything that could be dangerous?" "Aikl told them enough that it would blow my story out of the water," he said. She nodded again. "Well, the one survivor is in a coma, but if he regains consciousness it could harm us. He will have to be eliminated," she said with some distaste. Stanz's nodded and pulled his hands into his lap, looking intently at the woman. "What about me?" "We can't leave you where you are now, so we will have to take you to ground," she said, and removed a small device from her briefcase. "Let me remove that bracelet," she said. He lifted up his hand, offering it to her. She took it in her paw, pulling him closer to her as she pressed the device to the bracelet around his wrist. With a soft hum the clasp opened and it fell free. Stanz pulled his hand back and rubbed his wrist as she put the device away. "So what now?" "Now we leave," she said and snapped her case shut. ----- This story (AFiW #505) is copyright 2005 by Fox Cutter. Hardcopy reprints limited to one per person, all other rights reserved. This story may not be distributed for a fee except by permission of the author, and this copyright notice may not be removed.