I Refuse to Die!
Chapter 1
The Heavy Divers boots carried the unfortunate Beastman to the bottom of the water recycling system, otherwise know as the sewers of Teplin. The owner of said boots, or rather the forced wearer is none other than Dirge. As humanoid type beastmen he looked mostly human, but like most 3rd generation beastmen he had a few animal like characteristics. the most prominent of which would be the wolf ears atop his head, his sharpened canines, and his unnaturally large hands, tipped with razor-like claws. He also had a large bushy tail, But he usually hid that under his jacket. Currently he was wearing an underwater diving suit, which barely kept the disgusting water at bay. He shined his flashlight around, looking for whatever had been clogging the main flood pipes. What he found lodged in it seemed to be a mass of garbage clotting the pipe.
"Hey Domm, I found the blockage." He radioed in to the supervisor Dominjo, a flamingo type beastman.
"Pfft you might want to get that looked at." Domm busted up, laughing at his own crude joke.
"By God Domm, Cant you be serious for like five fucking Seconds." The wolf growled into his headset.
"Geez lighten up will ya?" Dirge could hear the flamingo lean back in his chair.
"Fuck off, your not the one swimming in filth right now."
Without waiting for a retort, Dirge used his Underwater drill to grind away at the edges of the clog. A few seconds in there was a short Crack! Followed by the rotten garbage flooding into the tank pushing Dirge over with a yelp. Mission accomplished Dirge dug himself out of the mess, and started walking/hopping to the ladder that would get him out of the fetid waters. Upon climbing out of it, one of the idiot workers, some random beastman, tossed his empty plastic cup into the tank. It bounced off the helmet of the diving suit with a hollow clang. Without hesitation, Dirge walked back to the showers, fighting off thoughts of murdering his co-workers. Flipping on one of the showers he let some of the muck rinse off the suit before giving the helmet a sharp twist, which let off a hiss off air as he lifted it off his head. He spent the next several minuets removing the rest off the suit before stripping out of the wet suit underneath and showering himself. His shaggy mane-like hair bogged down with water, as did his tail. He sighed the icy cold water helping numb his sore muscles.
'That damned suit is heavy.' He groaned as the cold water shut off, the automatic timer having run out.
Grabbing a towel, which he wrapped around his waist, He shook out his hair, not unlike a dog would. A flick off his tail flung most off the water from it as well. He opened his locker, a simple metal door that was dented and scraped beyond reason, and grabbed his own clothes. Before he shut the door he caught a glimpse of himself.
Icy blue eyes stared back, a small scar on his cheek just under his eyes drew his attention. He had gotten it when a beastman came to work drunk. He had spared him no mercy when he started a fight. For some reason he found combat of any kind extremely invigorating. One of his ears flicked, he could hear someone coming. As if on cue a Beastman bearing a Ganmen badge came around the corner.
He immediately noticed Dirge. "You, your names Dirge correct?"
He nodded.
"You are hereby summoned to a meeting with the Spiral King Lordgenome." The beastman quickly turned and left.
Dirge was left stunned, and confused. He was a lowly worker, Created to be nothing more. Why would he be summoned to the King? Deep in thought, Dirge never saw the small gout of green flame the whisped off his hand as he shut his locker.
Lordgenome was a cautious man, He took every chance available to him to see to it that his empire would never fall.
So why had he let that one insignificant Beast live?
The thought continued to plague him, even as one of his maidens caressed his bulging frame. A warrior must be fit, even as a king. It was a simple mistake with an even simpler answer.
Kill the Spiral Beast.
He had created them to cheat the Anti-Spirals trap, but it had failed. Once the Spiral Beasts started releasing small spiral energy they would continue to do so until the spiral power their body created eventually destroyed them, and everything around them in a massive explosion.
So why had he let him live?
With a shake of his bald head, he sent his maiden away. A knock on the massive doors of his throne room ended his musings.
"Enter." His voice boomed over the room.
A humanoid beastman entered, the same one he had personally created 17 years ago. The lupine slowly approached the throne before kneeling before it.
"My lord?" He did not seem afraid, merely wary. A warriors trait no doubt.
"Ah, you are dirge correct." It was not a question. "It would seem I have need of someone a sort of, messenger. to one of my generals, his name is Thmilph. By the end of the day you shall be aboard his Dai-Gunzan, where you shall give him the message that my servant will give to you before you depart." The spiral king leaned forward in his throne and stared down the wolf. "Afterwords you shall do exactly as he commands, Am I understood?"
The beastman nodded. "Yes sir."
"Then Begone."
When the beastman left, Lordgenome relaxed back into his throne. Content with his resolution to the problem he let the matter slip from his mind completly. By the days end he was troubled no more.
Dirge on the other hand, was far more troubled than the Spiral king had ever been. Sitting in the special, flying transport ganmen small packet clutched to his chest while they traveled east. The beastman across from him was boasting about some raid on one of the human settlements that had surfaced, something about the humans fighting back.
"They say in a week or so they are gonna send a commander out their to deal with the stupid humans." Dirge ignored the Boasting Beastman in favor of the gossiper instead.
"What settlement was that?" Dirge's interest was peaked.
The boar man turned to him. "They say it's called Littner or something, they keep blowing up ganmen and taking the scraps, so Thymilph decided to sent a commander after them.
Dirge filed the information away for later, a human rebellion was very unheard of. A violent shudder ran through the ganmen when it started to descend tword the Dai-Gunzan. It finally touched down on the deck, Staying just long enough to unload its passengers before leaving again. Left standing on the deck he quickly followed the others into the hangar-ish structure below Dai-Gunzan's control tower. Lined up along the walls of the hangar were ganmen. One of which caught his eye, It was a variant of the Gunzar models. It was blue and green instead of the classic red and yellow most Gunzars wore. it was a Ganbow, designed identically to the Gunzar save for its dual pistols as opposed to the usual swords. Dirge only admired the ganmen for a moment before walking away to find the general.
He found him ordering his men around inside the command tower.
"Commander Thymilph sir?" the ape turned around to face Dirge.
"What?" He grumbled. "Well! speak up pipsqueak!"
Dirge quelled the growl rising in his throat.
"A message from the Spiral King sir." The ape was suddenly very interested.
"Well give it here then!" Dirge handed him the packett.
Dirge turned to leave the room, but before the door could shut he heard something very startling.
"So he sent the mutt to deliver his own death warrant eh? that's pretty cruel. Hahahah-"
The slamming door quickly cut off the sound of the Generals laugh.
Dirge only stood there mouth open and eyes wide.
Several hours later Dirge's shock had transformed into a cold hate, and determination. He wouldn't let them kill him, no he'd already found out about the plan by eavesdropping on Thymilph some more. Now he hid behind a crate in the hangar. Trying to decide which ganmen he would take, the Ganbow kept drawing his attention once again. Unfortunately the Ganbow, and Gunzar, where both notorious for having hard heads and flimsy bodies. They could break their own arms with a hard enough punch. To bad it was the only ganmen he was familiar with. His decision made he climbed up the catwalks and snuck over behind the Ganbow. He disconnected the cables holding the Ganbow in place, afterwords he carefully climbed over the chassis of the ganmen until he was inside it mouth. He placed a hand on the shielding of the cockpit. It beeped before sliding open, Dirge wasted no time climbing in and shutting the shield again. The multiple displays flashed red for a moment before a solid smack the the console between his legs turned the warnings green. An image of a face with dog ears and a jackle's grin flashed on them before they all switched to a view of what the ganmen could see.
"Lets get this show on the road!" Dirge pushed the controls forward, the ganmen responded with a lurch foreword, a few second later the behemoth finally woke up and started to respond correctly. Beastmen scattered under the Ganbow's feet. Dirge turned the ganmen to the door way. he started to run, charging at the rapidly closing blast door. Thymilph's face appeared on one of the screens.
"What the hell do you think your doing!" He was livid.
Dirge just smiled and flipped him the bird, then he deactivated the communications. Looking back at the door, he noticed it was two thirds of the way closed. Pushing the ganmen harder he slid under the gate and rolled onto his feet. to his left he noticed a ganmen preparing to be catapulted by one of the giant arms of Dia-Gunzan, an insane plan began to form. Grabbing the other ganmen by the shoulders he flung it out of the way just in time to be picked up by the arm and draw back.
Thymilph saw what he was doing ad attempted to stop it.
"You idiots, stop that launch!" Unfortunately he was too late. He tried to shoot the Ganbow before it left the Dai-Gunzan's range but failed. the smaller ganmen sailed off into the horizon.
Dirge was ecstatic, He was free! the entire world was his to roam! A thought crossed his mind. Why not stick it to the empire, He could go to that little village to the east, Littner! Help them rebel!
Dirge's stomach growled. He hadn't packed any food.
"Well mabe I can get some supplies as well."
So when the Ganbow landed in the dirt and sand it already had a place to go,and started heading east. The wolf inside couldn't remember the last time he had smiled so much.
