Becker – Micah, Doberman pinscher
Stephen – Thalia, African wild dog
Connor – Akela, grey wolf
Cutter – Katya, snow leopard
Jenny – Varro, silver fox
Abby – Leofas, pine marten
The first day that Captain H. James Becker and his dæmon Micah began working in the ARC, he was introduced to the team not with a fizzle, but with a bang.
Literally.
He was walking down the corridor with Micah loping along just behind and to the right of his feet as all military dæmons were trained to do when another bloke nearly ran into him coming 'round the corner, his attention focused entirely on the folder he was attempting to read. "Steady on, mate," said the other bloke, tall and well-fit with a mess of dark hair and sharp blue eyes. At his side was the most peculiar looking dæmon Becker had seen yet. She had the sleek elegance of a greyhound with her long, slender legs and slim build, but she had a ridiculously fluffy tail and enormous round Mickey Mouse ears, not to mention her fur was mottled in tan, white, black, and dark brown like a tortoiseshell without the style. "Hey, you're the new soldier boy, aren't you?" asked the man.
Becker raised an eyebrow. "Captain Becker," he said coolly, then rested a hand atop his dæmon's head. "Micah."
"Mm. I'm Stephen Hart, this here's Thalia," the other bloke replied, ruffling the odd dog dæmon's ears. She wagged her fluffy white tail and grinned broadly at Micah, showing lots of sharp white teeth. "Has Lester given you the five-pence tour already?"
"Yes, we've been shown the facility."
Before Hart could answer, however, there was a bang! as loud as a gunshot from one of the labs, and Becker's hand automatically went to his sidearm as Micah stood up straight, ears cocked forward. Hart only glanced down the corridor as if someone had shut a door particularly loud, and Thalia's tail thumped eagerly on the floor. "Connor's home!" she exclaimed.
They made their way towards the sound, Hart walking calmly, Becker still with a ready hand on his sidearm. One of the labs had the door propped open, smoke filtering out into the corridor. On the table was some sort of machinery, a mess of tubes, wires, gears, and such, the source of the smoke pouring out into the room, and sitting on the floor was a young man wearing what looked like a set of aviator's goggles and the most eye-catching clash of colours that Becker had ever seen. He waved a hand in front of him to clear the smoke away and coughed out, "Wow! That was great!"
As Becker stared down at the sitting man with disbelief, Hart calmly stepped around him and crouched on his heels, using the edge of his sleeve to wipe away the soot that blackened the goggles. "Good to have you back, geek-boy," Hart remarked with a wry twist of the lips even as Thalia's tail wagged so hard her hindquarters slipped back and forth with the scratch of nails on tile. "At least you wore goggles this time."
The young man beamed, pushing the goggles back on his head. "Akela wouldn't let me otherwise."
It was then that Micah noticed a pair of luminous golden eyes watching them from beneath the table. The dæmon had been indistinguishable from the shadows around her at first glance because her fur was entirely black, no other trace of colour anywhere in her. At first, Becker thought she was perhaps some sort of dog, but as she rose and slid out into full light, Micah bristled defencively and pressed back against his leg at the sight of the largest wolf that he'd ever seen, dæmon or not. This must be Akela, then, she thought towards Becker, and he sent a mental nod of agreement.
"Well, one of us must has to look out for you, and you certainly don't do it," Akela said in a velvety voice that sounded like wet silk dragged over stone. Thalia bounded over eagerly to playfully nip at one of the wolf's ears, still wagging her tail and grinning; it seemed that all of Hart's levity had been put into his dæmon. Akela responded with a lick of the muzzle.
"At least now I don't have to look after him every second," Hart remarked dryly.
"Oh, whatever," the still-unnamed young man chortled, giving Hart a good-natured elbow to the ribs, then reached out and stroked Thalia's back. He simply reached out and touched the other man's dæmon as casually as Becker might scratch Micah's ears.
"The fuck?" Micah hissed quietly, taking another step back towards him.
Hart didn't even blink twice, and even smiled a little as Thalia leant into the touch, tail thumping. He placed a sure hand on Akela's head, rubbing behind her ears.
As Becker was mentally reeling from this oh-so-very casual breach of the most deeply ingrained taboos, two new voices spoke from the doorway.
"Well, lad, you're not even home a day, and you've blown something up. I just won sixty quid," laughed a man's voice with a thick Scottish brogue.
"And I've got forms to fill out now," sighed a cultured feminine tone.
Standing there was a man in his late thirties or so, with unkempt blond hair and intelligent blue eyes, arm in arm with a gorgeous dark-haired woman, her makeup and hair impeccable, dressed sharp as a blade whilst the man was in well-worn cargo trousers and faded t-shirt. To the man's opposite side was a sleek snow leopard and a silver fox dæmon. The fox stood just between the snow leopard's front legs so the tips of its ears just tickled the underside of the cat's jaw. Neither seemed at all perturbed by Hart and the young man's casual touch of each other's dæmons.
Then a third voice piped in, "I heard something blow up, is Connor back?" A head of white-blond hair cropped boyishly short popped around the corner just before a young woman in punk-rockette style clothing came to stand beside the man and woman. Curled around her nape was a handsome pine marten with intelligent dark eyes.
"Hiya, Abby!" Connor enthused, waving at her with his free hand as Hart grasped his other arm and hauled him up to his feet. "I'm surprised the smoke alarm hasn't gone off yet."
"Well, it's dissipated down the corridor now, or it probably would've," Abby remarked as she came over to hug him tightly, then turned to look at Becker and Micah. The entire time, they'd both been standing off to the side like a pair of stumps, taking in the unfolding scene with disbelieving eyes. "Oi, take a look, it's our new soldier boy!"
Connor let out a burbling laugh. "Look at his face! Think we've done stumped Action Man."
Before he or Micah could think of a thing to say, an alarm began blaring loudly in another part of the ARC. "And we're on," Hart said. "C'mon, Cutter, let's get to the Hilux." He hastened out of the room, Thalia bounding at his heels.
"Go, I've got it," said the dark-haired woman, already holding a mobile to one ear. She kissed the man, Cutter, on the cheek then expertly used one thumb to swipe away the smudge of lipstick on his cheek.
"You're an angel, Jenny, never doubt it," Cutter remarked as the snow leopard departed a feline kiss to the fox's head with her raspy tongue before hurrying away after Hart. "You, with them," she told Becker sharply in a voice that said she didn't expect nor would she tolerate any backtalk.
Abby clapped Becker on the shoulder with more force than such a petite figure should wield. "Let's see what you've got, Action Man," she challenged before loping out the door.
"If you think you can keep up, of course," Connor added as a parting shot on his way out the door at Abby's heels, the black shadow of Akela loping easily at his heels.
Becker glanced down at Micah, just to be sure that she'd seen and heard the same thing he had. She gave him a helpless shrug. Hitching up the Mossberg on his shoulder, he took off in the direction the others had gone.
This was certainly going to be interesting.