A Fox's War

by Brandon Varnell

  “Hawa…”

  Lilian took after her mother in more ways than one, it seemed.

  If there was one thing that everyone could get behind, it was relaxing to a nice anime after dinner. Even Christine enjoyed some anime, though you couldn’t pay her to watch any of Lilian’s recommendations, or so she said. The only one among them who didn’t like at least one anime was Iris.

  “Why can’t we watch a good porno?”

  Iris would rather watch porn. Apparently.

  Christine wrinkled her nose. “Why the hell would we want to watch porn?”

  “For research purposes?”

  “Don’t answer my question with another question!”

  “Come on, you two,” Kevin interrupted them. “Keep it down. We’re trying to watch this.”

  The anime they were watching was called Inuyasha and, aside from Fruits Basket and Inu x Boku SS, it was the only anime that Christine would willingly—or at least publicly admit to—watch. That did not mean that he and Lilian weren’t interested in it. Inuyasha was an older anime that had been popular in the late 1990s, and neither of them had seen it. That said, Lilian did have all fifty-six volumes of the manga.

  “Excuse me, Lord Kevin?”

  Kevin turned his attention to Kirihime, who stood several feet away, hands clasped in front of her. “Hm? What’s up, Kirihime?”

  “Nothing. It’s just… I was going through your laundry, and I discovered this strange device in your back pocket.” She held out what Kevin immediately recognized as a USB drive—the same USB drive that had been in Justin’s butt hole for gods knew how many days.

  “Don’t touch that!”

  “Kya!”

  Kirihime dropped the device onto the ground. Kevin leapt to his feet.

  “Quick! Get some sanitizer and clean your hands!”

  “B-but I’m wearing gloves!”

  “Then throw those in the wash and clean your hands!”

  “B-but I—”

  “Do you want to be contaminated, woman?! That thing’s been up someone’s bunghole for several days!”

  Kirihime turned green. She then rushed out of the hallway. Kevin could hear the thump-thump of her hurried footsteps as she opened the door, raced out, and slammed the door shut.

  “What’s going on, Stud?”

  Kevin ignored Iris’s question and rushed into the kitchen. He stopped hearing the TV play and assumed that Lilian had paused it. Kneeling down, he opened the cupboard and pulled out a set of latex gloves, which he put on as he dashed back into the living room.

  “Oi! Stud, don’t ignore me!”

  “Sorry, Iris, but this is important.” Kevin picked up the USB drive and stood up again. “You guys keep watching the anime. I’m going to see what’s on this USB drive.”

  “You can’t expect us to keep watching when you’re acting like this, can you?” Christine asked.

  “I want to see what’s on the device,” Lilian added.

  Not up for a battle of words, Kevin shrugged. “You’re welcome to follow me, then.”

  I can’t believe I forgot about this.

  He’d meant to give this to Kotohime so she could give it to Monstrang, but she was out on patrol now. Since there was no one he could give it to right now, he decided to check the contents himself.

  Ignoring the others, Kevin entered his bedroom and sat down in front of his computer, turning it on and inserting the USB drive after his computer had booted up.

  “What do you think is on this?” Lilian asked.

  “Maybe it’s the stud’s stash of porn,” Iris suggested.

  “Only you would think up something so lewd,” Christine admonished.

  “It’s from Justin,” Kevin told them. “He said there was something important on here.”

  “Justin’s stash of porn?”

  “Enough with the porn already!” Kevin and Christine shouted at the same time.

  Kevin opened a folder and accessed the files inside of the USB drive. There were a lot of them. Counting down, Kevin saw that there were over 1,600 files, and all of them were dated. He opened one. A word document appeared on the monitor, which described things such as logistics, battle plans, after action reports, and casualty reports.

  “These… these are missions that the Sons and Daughters of Humanity have undertaken,” Kevin murmured. Everyone else was silent. They knew how big of a find this was.

  “We need to inform someone,” Lilian said at last.

  “But who should we tell?” asked Christine. “Kotohime told us that the Four Saints have left Neo Seiryuu.”

  “We’ll tell Kiara.” Kevin unplugged the USB and turned off the computer. “She’s not on patrol right now, I don’t think.”

  Lilian’s nose scrunched cutely. “How do you know?”

  “Because they’d never have two of their most powerful forces working the same shift,” Kevin explained. “It’d mean they wouldn’t have anyone for the next shift. Now, let’s go.”

  Kiara was fast asleep when incessant knocking struck her hearing.

  Groaning, she sat up in bed, blinking several times as she rubbed her eyes. The knocking became louder.

  “Ugh, hold your damn horses,” Kiara muttered as she pushed herself off the bed. Though the air was not cold, the stump leftover from where she’d ripped off her own left arm gained goosebumps. She blamed it on the heating blanket.

  “Kiara!” Kevin’s voice was shouting from the other side. “Kiara! I need to talk with you! It’s urgent!”

  What could be so urgent that you’d wake me up in the middle of the freaking night?

  Growling like an irritated beast, Kiara exited her room, went over to the front door, and ripped it open. Kevin was on the other side, along with Lilian, Christine, and Iris. She glared at all four of them with a look that all but screamed, “Explain yourselves before I murder you.”

  “What the hell do you want, boya?” she asked. When he said nothing, she scowled. “Well?”

  “Uh… it’s… well…”

  As Kevin stumbled over his words, Kiara wondered what the hell his problem was. It wasn’t until she remembered something that she’d forgotten in her irritation—namely, that she slept naked—that she realized what sort of malfunction he was suffering. She glanced at herself. Then she looked up at him.

  “Are you really so unused to the female figure that you’d be disoriented from seeing me naked?” Kiara asked, amused. “Seriously, boya. I thought you’d be better than that.”

  Kevin still didn’t answer. She surmised that he hadn’t been expecting to see her naked when she opened the door. Seeing this, Lilian stepped forward.

  “We have information that we think will be vital to defeating the Sons and Daughters of Humanity.”

  Whatever Kiara had been expecting, it hadn’t been that. She looked from the young redhead, then to her mate. Kevin had finally stopped gawking at her. When he saw that she was staring at him, he nodded.

  “Justin had a USB drive, which has reports on, if not every action taken by the Sons and Daughters of Humanity, then most of them. I meant to give it to Monstrang after getting it, but it slipped my mind.”

  “It slipped your mind?” She raised an eyebrow. “How does something like that slip your mind?”

  Kevin’s cheeks turned so red they were nearly luminescent. “L-look, it just does, okay?”

  “Whatever.” Kiara decided that she didn’t want to know. “Give me a second to get dressed. Then we’ll go and find someone who can sort through all of this information, okay?”

  Kevin and the others nodded. Kiara shut the door, then entered her room and dug through her dresser. Sighing to herself, she realized that the chances of her getting anymore sleep tonight were slim.

  She was beginning to regret answering the door.

  The night was too quiet for Kotohime’s taste. She knew that she was being pessimistic, but when she considered how she was neck deep in combat most nights—especially recently—the lack of violence t
onight made her edgy.

  Her squad that she was in charge of was one of the regulars that she worked with. They were a mixed group of humans and yokai, whose names she knew by stint of having worked with them for so long. Each one had a unique talent. Josh was a skilled sniper, Ursula could use enchantments that even some kitsune would be envious of, and Bertrand was skilled at trap setting and recon; he also made a damn fine cup of tea.

  “Are you feeling unwell, Kotohime?” came the respectful but quiet voice of Josh. He was a very soft-spoken young man. In some ways, he reminded her a more mature, less tsukkomi-like version of Kevin.

  He also lacks Kevin’s adorableness.

  “I am fine,” she said.

  “‘Tis strange how quiet it is this night,” Bertrand said, sniffing the air. “For the past week, we have been beset upon by the Yamata Alliance, yet now there is no one to greet us in combat. This silence is disquieting.”

  “I’m rather fond of the silence,” Ursula countered. “I think it’s much better than having to constantly exert myself.”

  “Be that as it may, I feel like this quiet bodes ill for us.”

  Kotohime agreed with Bertrand. Something told her that it wasn’t quiet because the Yamata Alliance had pulled back. Was it because they were waiting for something? Reinforcements, perhaps? She wished they had more information.

  Shifting alerted her to Bertrand, who was staring off into the distance. He looked startled.

  “Something wrong?” she asked.

  “The barrier around Neo Seiryuu just went down,” he informed her.

  Everyone stiffened. The barrier was one of the key reasons Neo Seiryuu had not yet been discovered by enemy forces. It acted as a gate that separated the underground community from this dimension, working as a sort of dimensional barrier, or bubble, which kept Neo Seiryuu out of phase with the real world. If the barrier was gone, then it meant that whoever had broken it would be able to find Neo Seiryuu.

  “Split up,” Kotohime ordered. “We each need to investigate the seals and see whether they were destroyed or just damaged and how it was done. Josh, you take the north. Ursula, the south. Bertrand will take the east, and I’ll take the west.”

  “Roger!” the three said at the same time.

  As they split off to their own destinations, Kotohime reinforced her muscles to the max.

  There was trouble afoot, and she needed to discover the reason why.

  She only prayed that this wasn’t an unfixable situation.

  After Kiara donned a gray business suit, she, Kevin, and the others left for the tower. On the way there, Kiara called up Mack and demanded that he “get his ass out of bed and meet them, or she would break her foot off his ass.” Those had been her words, not Kevin’s.

  They met with Mack inside of Monstrang’s office. Mack looked like he’d just rolled out of bed. His pinkish-red hair was in disarray, his eyes were droopy and irritated, and he periodically yawned, raising a hand to his mouth and smacking his lips.

  “There had better be a damn good reason for you calling me this late at night,” he said.

  “I wouldn’t be up if there wasn’t,” Kiara replied, holding out the USB drive that Kevin had given her. “Here. Take a look at this and tell me what you think.”

  Mack stared at the USB drive, then sighed, grabbed it, and set it on the desk. After booting up the computer and typing in the password, he inserted the drive.

  Standing in the background, Kevin watched and waited as Mack accessed the files in the drive. It didn’t take long. Barely a second into clicking on the mouse, the pink-haired usagi sucked in a sharp breath.

  “This is…”

  “Reports on the Sons and Daughters of Humanity’s activities for the past several years, I’d wager,” Kiara said when Mack trailed off.

  “Where did you get this?” he asked.

  “I got it from Justin,” Kevin said, stepping forward. “He apparently had that… hidden on his person. It was found by the doctor, who gave it to me. I’d… well, I had forgotten about it until Kirihime found it in my pants pocket.”

  The incredulous look on Mack’s face accurately summed up his thoughts. “How could you forget about something like this?”

  Kevin’s cheeks reddened. How many times would someone ask him this? “There were extenuating circumstances, okay? Besides, I didn’t know what was on it.”

  Mack rubbed his face. He looked even more tired now. “Well,” he blew out a deep breath, “at least this means we don’t have to wait until he’s healthy enough to be interrogated. This is more than enough information to appease even the hardliners who were against the rescue operation.”

  “There were hardliners?” Lilian asked.

  “There’s always hardliners,” Mack said. “It’s the nature of politics.”

  “I thought this place was a dictatorship,” Iris commented.

  “Even dictatorships have politics, and no, this isn’t a dictatorship.”

  “We’re getting off track,” Kiara said. “We need to decide what we’re going to do with all this information.”

  “That would depend on what sort of information we have.” Mack leaned back. “I’ll get a team together and have them sort through everything on this USB. Even if there is something in here that we can use, it will take a long time to sort through.” Mack sent Kevin a dry expression. “You seem to love giving people more work.”

  “Sorry.” Kevin shrugged unapologetically.

  Just then, several loud sirens flared to life, the ear-splitting noise forcing everyone to cover their ears. Lilian and Iris screamed as their sensitive eardrums were assailed. Kiara grimaced, blood leaking between her fingers.

  “What the hell is with this obnoxious racket?!” Christine demanded.

  “It’s the alarm letting us know that the seals have been broken!” Mack shouted, standing up and moving over to a place with a command console attached to a wall. He pressed a button and the alarm in the room died off. However, the alarms going on outside remained.

  He turned to everyone, his expression grave.

  “Someone has destroyed the seals that separate Neo Seiryuu from the rest of the world.”

  “Which means?” asked Iris.

  “It means that our location has been compromised,” Kiara said.

  Mack nodded. “Someone has discovered where we live, and that someone is likely going to attack soon. Damn it. This really couldn’t have come at a worse time.”

  “What should we do?” asked Kevin.

  “You are going to do nothing,” Mack said. “Our forces should be in the process of evacuating the civilians to our emergency bunkers, which is where you’ll also be going.”

  Kevin narrowed his eyes. “Excuse me? Look here, just because I’m young doesn’t mean I—”

  “Do not misunderstand me,” Mack interrupted. “This isn’t about your age or even your capabilities. You might do some missions for the boss, but you’re not a member of our defense force. You’re a civilian. There are protocols that we need to follow here.”

  Kevin clenched his hands into fists, which shook fiercely. Mack ignored him.

  “Kiara, gather Phoebe and her group. Tell them to head to the main gate, then get over there yourself. Also, if you can, get in contact with Kotohime and whoever’s with her. We need to know what their status is. I’m going to contact the others that are on standby and organize them into a defense force.”

  “Will do,” Kiara said as she turned around. “Come on, kids. It’s time to head back.”

  “What?” Kevin looked back and forth between them. “But surely I can help out? You can’t expect me to just not do anything.”

  Kevin didn’t want to fight. However, he wasn’t going to hide away when his friends were in danger either. Maybe it was contradictory, but he wanted to at least do what he could to protect his friends.

  “That’s exactly what we expect you to do,” Mack said. “You’re strong, don’t get me wrong, but you’re not a professional
. In a situation such as this, all you’d do is get in the way.”

  Kevin gritted his teeth, feeling more frustrated by the moment. There weren’t many things that he disliked, but being told that he would be a hindrance was one of those things.

  A hand touched his. It was warm and gentle, and the contact made him turn to look at the person who it belonged to. His eyes met bright green.

  “Lilian…”

  “I know you’re upset, but I think Mack brings up a good point. This isn’t like when we were sent out to find Kuroneko.”

  Kevin could have done many things. He could have discarded her words and continued to argue. He could have told her that she didn’t know what she was talking about. He could have done a lot of things.

  He did none of that.

  “You’re right. I know you’re right. I just don’t like doing nothing.”

  Lilian’s understanding smile put his mind at ease. “I know.”

  Kevin sighed and turned to Mack and Kiara. “All right. We’ll head to the shelters.”

  “Heh, glad to know you can follow instructions. I was afraid that all of your accomplishments would go to your head,” Kiara said with a grin.

  “Whatever.”

  A plan of action had been made, and Kevin left the tower with the others. The outside was in a state of chaos. The area around the tower was a riot of activity as people working on standby flooded outside to begin the evacuation.

  Kevin and his friends began moving toward the nearest shelter. The shelters were basically a series of underground bunkers, which could only be accessed via a series of elevators that could only be opened by retina scans. As they started to walk, Kevin remembered something and changed directions.

  “Beloved, where are you going?”

  Kevin gave Lilian a reassuring smile. “I’m going to get Justin, just in case this attack is being done by the Sons and Daughters of Humanity. Don’t worry. I’ll head right to a shelter after that.”

  Lilian sighed. “If you’re going, then I’m going with you.”