V: Push

"Bro?"

Modo turned to find Vinnie leaning against the door to the comm room, arms folded across his chest.

"What that tosser want?" Vinnie's slender white tail flicked distastefully.

Charley stepped around from behind Vinnie, avoiding the lashing tail as she entered the room. "Who was that?" she wanted to know.

"Quickshift," Vinnie replied with a dark scowl, "Throttle's big brother. He has his head shoved so far up his ass he should be inside out."

Of course it took women's intuition to notice anything. "Modo...what's wrong?"

Modo shook himself. He spoke slowly, as if trying to convince himself of something. Or perhaps testing out the words to measure the truth of them. "Plutarkians. Got. Rimfire."

"What?!" Vinnie snapped into an upright position. "Who...how...?"

"Quickshift told me. Botched mission. God dammit!" Modo clenched both fists hard. His bionic one protested by running a visible blue current of electricity from fist to shoulder. If he felt it he didn't show it.

"Ohh what else could go wrong!" Vinnie punched one fist into the palm of his other hand, ears flattening back against his skull. He looked more angry than upset. He looked like he wanted to get out and vent his anger on a bunch of unlucky Limburger-owned goons. "I wonder if ol' fishlips knows about this one."

"Why would he?" Modo said glumly, "Rimfire was in the SAS. And our fat friend never seems to know anything useful."

"Better than sittin' on our tails doin' nothin'." This time Vinnie punched the wall close to his head. The resulting thud echoed in a very hollow fashion throughout the entire scoreboard.

"So what we're jus' gonna bust in there and then?" Modo folded his muscular arms - or one muscular arm and one rather blocky bionic one if one wanted to be pedantic about it - across his large barrel chest.

"It's worked before." There had never been a sweeter sound than that low, smokey voice that got girls swooning at the mere sound of it.

"Throttle!" Charley exclaimed happily. She was shocked and how gaunt and haggard he looked. His tan mane, out of its usual ponytail, was somewhat mussed up and tangled. If he'd been human he would have had some serious stubble happening. As it was his fur just looked a little on the 'need to be brushed' side.

"Bro..." Modo's posture loosened up. He didn't say anymore, just gazed at Throttle with the helpless look of a very lost puppy.

"I heard." Throttle's face darkened briefly. "He needs a lesson in tact." Running his fingers through his tangled brown mane, getting caught up in numerous knots, he said, "let's go see what Limburger knows." Turning abruptly, his long tail gliding gracefully out behind him in a very banner like fashion, he stalked off towards the exit to the scoreboard.

"No way I'm sittin' outta this one," Charley cut in before Vinnie could say a word. "I wanna keep an eye on Throttle." To her surprise, Vinnie merely nodded and allowed her to follow them to the undercover area where they kept their bikes.

*******

There was a look of mixed horror and amazement replacing the constant smugness on Mace's face. The cold, withered corpse of the rat lay at his feet, deathly pale in its inifnite sleep. No apparent cause of death. Not unless one counted the scratch marks on the shoulders, and a strange bluish tinge on a furless patch on the side of the neck. He looked at Harley and the strange feline girl.

Harley was looking just as shocked as he was. The girl was crouched in attack position in front of Harley, fangs bared. He vaguely noticed the two top canines were very prominent, the two lower ones slightly longer than the rest of the teeth. Her blue, lidless gem-like eyes were flashing, though from the lighting or her current mood or a combination of both he wasn't entirely certain.

"You do this?" Mace demanded, nodding towards the corpse.

A snarl that sounded a combination of a hiss and a growl emitted from the throat of the girl. It was a nasty, serrated sound filled with the promise of pain.

Mace was not about to let either of them see that he was rattled. His hand closed around the hilt of his blaster as he yelled "Did she do this?" at Harley. The beautiful chestnut mouse nodded mutely. Then the blaster was out. The girl sprang forward. Her speed startled Mace. He pulled the trigger almost reflexively and would have missed if she hadn't been almost on top of him by the time he fired.

The girl's silent growl turned into a very audible shriek as the force of the blast knocked her back.

Little bitch. Most of Mace's captives learned very quickly not to mess with him. He'd get the occasional spirited one, like this girl, like Harley had been. They broke relatively soon. He briefly wondered if he'd have the pleasure or if the girl's next owner would be able to handle her. He aimed a kick at her stomach, not to damage but to knock the wind out of her.

The girl flicked her tail, glancing off Mace's calf and knocking it enough so he missed her. Mace grimaced as pain lanced up and down his leg. Inadvertently he dropped to one knee, surprised to find the back of his pants on that leg had been sliced clean through. The material was rapidly being soaked with blood from the gash he'd received.

The girl gathered all four paws beneath her, glaring evilly at him from a crouch. She looked like she might spring again. Behind her, her elongated tail lashed menacingly.

"Heh," Mace smirked, struggling to his feet. His leg burned, but he was by no means crippled. Keeping his blaster trained on the girl, he said, "I know exactly what to do with you." Limping slightly, he stalked back out of the room.

*******

"Stoke." Scabbard touched his cap in a near-salute of greeting.

"Scabbard," Stoker returned with a nod. His mechanical tail thrashed once before waving indeterminedly through the air behind him.

"Never picked you for the father type," the seargent smirked, nodding towards the little girl trotting at Stoker's side, clinging to his hand.

Stoker sighed and glanced down at Windsong. "Long story. How's the General doin'?"

Scabbard's features clouded over slightly. "Not so good. Physically the medics say she's fine, but she don't seem to wanna come back from wherever she is."

Probably in happier times. "Out of intensive care?"

"Yeah. S'pose you wanna see her."

Stoker answered with a look and that was enough. "Still no cause?" he inquired as they walked down the back corridors towards the infirmary.

"Not that they've found. Whoever it was didn't rough her up much, not nearly enough to cause what's happened anyway. The only clue they have to go on is that bruise. Though how they got the fur off..."

As usual a thousand possibilites flitted briefly through Stoker's mind. As usual each one got dismissed for not being able to add up adequately to the result. "Think this is the year of not making sense," he muttered.

"Things haven't made sense since the government sold us out," Scabbard's voice held a hint of bitterness as he held open the door to the infirmary, admitting the two guests in before him.

"Mm." Stoker glanced around the infirmary. It wasn't busy, which was always a good sign. His eyes picked out the fully curtained off cubicle just as Scabbard pointed it out. Nodding slightly in thanks, he headed in that direction.

Minus the drip that snaked into her arm, Carbine looked like she was sleeping. Sleeping and about to wake up and yell at him for walking in on her. Which of course didn't happen. Stoker would have been a lot happier if she had. A smirk twitched on the corner of his mouth when he remembered when he had found out her and Throttle were together.

"Fraternising with the enemy, kid?"

Throttle, obviously not realising Stoker had been watching, had had the full complement of caught-in-the-act reaction. - freezing up with a beautiful stunned mullet expression. What Stoker would have given for a camera at that point in time. The memory turned his smirk into the hint of a smile.

The girl Throttle had been sucking face with - wearing army stripes - had turned quite casually and glared at Stoker, looking like she owned the place. "Problem?"

"No problem."

It had been in one of the momentary lapses of peace so he didn't mind. It mildly amused him at the time and he had even briefly wondered how long they would last.

They had lasted a while. Until recently anyway. No one was quite certain what had happened. She'd broken up with Throttle shortly before being attacked. Theories and the random gossip that people loved to indulge in were flying around as to why but no one knew anything, not really. Stoker walked over to the bedside, Windsong following closely.

"Carbine?" It was worth a try. Nothing happened. He wasn't expecting it to. With a sigh, he gently brushed her jet black mane off her neck. The blue welt jumped into his vision with all the subtlety of a noisy missile. He had been told it looked like a bruise. If bruises were one solid colour, an unnaturally bright, vibrant blue and delivered by something that was slightly elongated and narrow on one end, then yes it looked like a bruise. And then there was the problem of all the fur on top of said 'bruise' looking like it had been shaved off, while the fur surrounding wasn't so much as ruffled.

Stoker did have some comment in mind but it was lost on Windsong's reaction.

The child's silver eyes dilated, looking a lot bigger in their solidity than normal eyes would have under the same circumstances. Scrambling up the bed past Stoker, she'd rested a small hand on the bruise. Then, twisting around, her entire body screaming terror, she whispered, "He's here!"

This opportunity was not missed by Scabbard. "You know them?" Seizing on the opportunity involved instinctively grabbing at the child.

Reflexively Stoker stepped between them, catching Scabbard's arm and fixing him in a suspicious glare. "Mind tellin' me what the fuck is goin' on?"

Right on cue, Carbine suddenly jerked upright, almost knocking Windsong off the bed. Her eyes were wide open but unseeing. "Throttle!" she cried.