Anthro- Chapter Two

Chapter Two of my book, Anthro

The neon lights were still moving around the gymnasium. It seemed as though time had stopped. One of Rayne’s back paws was pressed onto the unconscious red fox’s back, the other balancing her out as she stood, glaring at Burdock. Skarii was holding his small blade, pointing it at the red fox in case the fox regained consciousness, and Fox was aiming his gun at Burdock. Burdock stood motionless, his chest slowly rising in falling as he breathed softly in the silence.

“I told you to explain yourself,” snarled Rayne.

Burdock slowly lowered his paws, reaching down towards his pockets. Fox tapped the side of his gun, creating a small clicking noise, and Burdock’s paws froze halfway between his shoulders and waist. The grey wolf curled his tail around his right ankle, remaining still otherwise, and began to speak, “What I know I cannot tell you. It is against the Order. All I can tell you now is that your interference may cause the end of your life.”

“I don’t care!” shouted Rayne. “Tell me why you’re ruining our SENIOR prom!”

The room suddenly became dark. There were hundreds of tall, hulking shadows at the windows and doors, surrounding the building in their mysterious circle. Ten masked, black pawed creatures strode in, marching into a tight circle around the small group in the gym. Each of the masked figures was armed with heavy weaponry-- weaponry which the three teenagers could not match.

A voice came on the loudspeaker, booming throughout the gym, “Teenagers! Drop your weapons and leave the gym! Do not speak of these experiences to anybody! We have cleared the minds of all of your peers. We will be watching you!”

With a loud clatter, Fox’s pistol hit the floor. An even quieter clatter sounded off when Skarii had dropped his blade. Rayne stepped off of the red fox, backing towards Skarii as fast as she could and grabbing his arm for reassurance. The masked figures stepped in closer, two of them strapping their weapons to their back to lift the red fox off of the floor. Others checked on Burdock and nodded to them before walking back into their more loose, circular formation. Two of them stepped aside, making way for the teenagers to leave the building.

The teenagers did so without hesitation. Fox led the way, grunting to himself about unfair numbers. Rayne dialed a number into her cell-phone. Within an hour, a white cab drove up and a wolf identical to Rayne stepped out to open the back doors. Rayne smiled at the wolf, who remained silent as the three teenage furs got into the cab. The doors closed behind Fox and the white driver-wolf climbed in. Without a single word passing between the four occupants of the cab, the teenagers were driven home.

WHITEWOLF MANSION

Fox kept his voice low, his paws resting on the sides of a gaming controller and his icy blue eyes focused on the huge screen before him, “Those cheating people and their so called ‘Order’. They outnumbered us like a bunch of wimps! I could’ve taken them if there weren’t so many, but they--”

“Fox, shut up! We aren’t supposed to talk about it! Besides, it doesn’t matter now. Whatever happened in that building, it won’t bother us again. We’re out of there and we probably won’t experience that ever again. Don’t worry about it,” said Rayne.

Skarii was tapping away on his own controller, his tail curled softly around Rayne’s waist. He remained silent, as though he was concentrating strictly on the videogame. Fox grunted softly as he went into silence, reluctant to keep his mouth shut. Rayne had a controller of her own with her name scrawled on the back of it. She turned her controller on and waited for the round to end so that she could join the game. Soon she was tapping away with the boys.

There was a tapping on the door and Rayne jumped up to answer it. The wolf that had driven the teenagers home was standing at the door. “Hey Rayne, m-may I play?”

Fox and Skarii’s heads instantly whipped around to face the door. “It’s a girl?” they asked simultaneously.

The white wolf’s cheeks began to gain the soft pink color of a rose. She nodded. Her voice was barely a whisper as she said, “My name is Enya Ray Whitewolf.”

Rayne giggled softly and explained, “Enya Ray, whose name is my name backwards with the ‘r’ in Pig-Latin, is my sister. I told her I would pay her to drive us home if she acted like a driver and remained silent. She agreed, not for the money, but because it would be a fun joke to play on you two.”

Rayne stepped aside and Enya Ray entered the room, dressed in a less formal outfit than she had been in when she picked the other teenagers up. She realized that the boys were also dressed informally, so she turned to Rayne. Rayne had the same idea and was wearing a simple tee-shirt and basketball shorts, just like the boys. Rayne smiled at Enya Ray and said, “Don’t be embarrassed. You fit right in with your pajamas on!”

Enya Ray smiled, sitting down next to her sister, who sat next to Skarii. The four picked up their controllers and began tapping away, unsuspecting of the miniature camera that flew into the door behind Enya Ray.

SOMEWHERE OUTSIDE OF TOWN

Burdock slid into a tall-backed office chair and glanced at the papers in front of him. Folding his paws together, he leaned forward with his elbows against the surface of his desk, closing his eyes tightly and sighing. He had told three teenagers that their lives were endangered, and he had mentioned “The Order”. Spying on the three teenagers seemed the only way that he would be able to keep up the secrecy.

He watched as the three teenagers played videogames with a fourth, unfamiliar teenager. The only talking they did was not even talking at all. Victorious chants and disappointed “boos” played through the small microphone that Burdock had personally fit to his SpyCam 2.0.

The black and white vulpine seemed to maneuver the game as though it were his heart and soul. Burdock’s eyes followed the way that the fox’s digits slid across the buttons, rapidly tapping whenever it seemed appropriate. The black and gold Draconian boy didn’t seem far behind the fox, but the two, white, lupine females were struggling to catch up. At one point, the one he recognized even stumbled over the keys.

“That fox has surprising hand-eye coordination,” mumbled Burdock. “Perhaps he could be useful. He even has a good gut feeling. Pulled a pistol right out of one of his pockets.”

Burdock continued to observe the four teenagers, thinking strongly about recruiting the fox into The Order. His paws played over the keys of his small desktop keyboard as he typed everything that he thought into the small “message box” and sent it.

“I hope I don’t regret this…”

Burdock continued to watch the camera until a small “beep” played on his computer. He turned to find the message box icon flashing and clicked on it to open the reply: “Are you sure you can trust someone so young with such a responsibility? Tell me more about this fox boy.”

Burdock described the fox and waited. The other reply opened automatically when he received it: “Black and white with a red fence of fur separating the two colors? That sounds familiar… And he has a strong sense of his own gut feeling? Owns a pistol at his age. Sounds like one of Carcer’s boys.”

Burdock mumbled, “So that’s it, huh… Carcer. You were a good one. Whatever happened to you?”

Author's Note

Please review to the best of your ability.