-???, Oleander-
“I swear this is the most fun I’ve had in a while.” I was in a fight with two guys named Virgil and Dante, but I had a partner in this too.
“Yes, it is quite a lovely battle now isn’t it?” Said the umbra witch with guns strapped to her feet, she kicked up a leg and fired a shot to make Dante dodge into the path of my attack. “Here I thought unicorns were supposed to be pure, yet I find I like you more than the traditional ones.”
“Nobody said we had to be purely good.” Stating this as I watched Dante dodge me with his trickster style, I quickly performed a strike raid that had my key blade smacking him in the face several times. “I’m not purely evil either.”
“YOU GET THEM OLLIE, SHOW THEM THAT THEY ARE REALLY BAD POSERS!” Fred shouted as he deflected Virgil’s attempt to stab me.
These two guys were a bit more powerful than Fred alone which was why this would take a while. At least Bayonetta was making this a bit more even with her witch powers.
It was all in good fun really, despite us trying to outright kill each other.
Things would get a little heated when both angels and demons started bothering us, they really shouldn’t have.
-Earth, Western Kazakhstan, Shanty-
I did not be expecting what we would see upon entering the region known as Kazakhstan, but it was being a nice stop.
“Oh, come on! Italian Hippo, seriously Murray?!” Mopsy stated as we pulled in to stop at another hippo themed restaurant. “How can you not see a running theme between all these restaurants?!”
“Hey it’s not taco or burgers, it’s actually quite classy for once Mops!” Murray stated with his general cheer, Mopsy not be having any of it as she got into an argument.
“So are you…” Sly asked as he looked to Bentley.
“Now looking into this particular line of restaurants, yes.” Bentley stated as he had several things up on his computer screen about Hamburger Hippo, Coo-Coo Cola, Hippo Taco and now Italian Hippo. “I still don’t know what Coo-Coo cola has to do with all of this, but there’s a conspiracy here, I swear it Sly!”
I be having a lot of fun on this thing called a road trip.
- New York, the morning after Professor Nimnul’s attack, RAS hospital, Pom-
“So, we can agree that Dolly somehow redirected it in back in a single concentrated destructive blast at the machine…” We were still trying to figure out how Dolly did her Bark Blast, aside from me feeding her my strength through our bond. “Otherwise she’d be completely paralyzed.”
“That and possibly other unknown factors… keep in mind that I wasn’t made for understanding the occult, sorcery or anything else related to magic.” In other words Dormach was made for technology and not magic, yet my magic seems to have affected him greatly. “Hold on, receiving a call from Camden Town one oh one Dalmatian Street.”
“Oh, hey there Pom, I hope I didn’t wake you up. I got into contact with the group that Smolder and Ocellus are with. They gave me the place where you should be able to meet up with them.” Dylan was looking peppy. “You can find them in Calisota Duckberg on Killmotor Hill, they are going to wait there for you and are quite sad that they missed you in New York. Now tell me how Dolly is doing… I’ve got a lot of concerned pups over here and I’m just as concerned about her health.”
“Well her tail and nose had to have some surgery to fix the damage done to her. Otherwise she’s a walking bruise, her throat is a bit raw, but she’ll be fine and as soon as she wakes up we’ll be heading straight for Calisota as soon as we can. After shaking any mercenaries that might be following us, at least Dolly knows what it feels like to be me now.” That’s how I felt in general, Dolly wouldn’t need medication for the next few months or so for heart problems. “If anything Dolly is still healthier than I am, considering I’ve flat lined twice in this hospital.”
“Actually seven times, but I don’t think you actually remember the other ones that happened. Here, I’ll show you and timestamp them for your convenience.” Okay, that was rather disconcerting Dormarch, given you were now showing me the other times my heart stopped. “If the power went out you probably wouldn’t be here, so you owe Dolly your life. Also I’ll make sure to inform you when you need to take your arrhythmia medication. Speaking of, you will not be on anxiety medication.”
“Well that’s a relief, but why?” Here both Dylan and I looked at Dormarch.
“That anxiety medication you took yesterday was highly ineffective. What should have lasted you at least a minimal four hours… only lasted about twenty minutes.” Dormarch showed me a scan of myself and pointed out the time with which it was working for me. “You either have so much anxiety that you burned out the medicine or you have a high resistance to drugs that help with anxiety.”
“It’s the first. I have anxiety about wanting to get back home, needing to get my kids back together to keep them out of danger and again bring 'them' home. I have to figure out a way to get back home which is going to be an arduous task in and of itself. Having to protect both you and Dolly on top of all this is just making things that much harder for me as I will always do my best to keep you both safe, as such staying alive has become a mind melting chore and I have been in so much stress and danger over the last few weeks that I couldn’t fight when I was sorely needed. This made Dolly go in my place to solve a situation and now look at her, at least they cleaned up her fur from the bloody mess it was when she came in. I’m worrying about my health, her health and even Dormarch’s mental health, I have little idea what trouble Shanty is getting into and if Dodo can protect her from it. The only thing that isn’t making me worry at the moment is that Smolder and Ocellus are currently together, but that’s because they can mostly handle themselves and are fairly mature for their ages.” My tone made Dormarch and Dylan consider each other warily as I motioned over to Dolly sleeping on a bed next to mine, having to breathe through her mouth since her nose was blocked by bandages. My heart rate was getting pretty fast, but I slowed my ragged breathing and eventually the heart monitor returned to a normal beating rate. “I’m only handling it all this well because I need to or else my whole world is going to fall apart at a moment’s notice and where would that leave Shanty, Smolder and Ocellus if they have to find a way home without me to tell my wife and family that I had died on some other world due to a heart attack! So its little wonder that I’m an anxious, nervous wreck of a lambkin about what incredible existential crisis is going to fall onto my fluffy little backside next! Most of my people require lots of anxiety medication because we stress out easily… I try to be above that... not going well… Dolly also needs new gear.”
There was a lot of silence following my rant.
“Do you think you can wake Dolly for me?” Understanding why Dylan asked this, I nodded tiredly while rubbing at my face with my left hoof. I put Dormarch down and reached over to wobble Dolly slightly and she yawned, she tried to stretch out and looked like she was about to panic. "Also, we will have your money problems handled quite soon."
“It’s okay Dolly, it’s alright, your safe.” I stated calmly, more calmly than I actually felt at any rate. She looked up at me and looked at the fact that she was next me. “How are you feeling?”
“How soon are we leaving? I’m going to be honest here Pom, we probably should have left as soon as I was done being patched up.” Dolly seemed as wary as I did and she must know how I was feeling at the moment, because she lifted her head and licked my nose lightly. “Heh, so how many mercenaries do you think are between us and wherever we’re going now partner?”
“Yeah, about that Dolly… we know where you are heading next, but you really shouldn’t avoid the question.” After picking up the device, Dylan was moved over to Dolly to interact with her. “Seriously, how are you feeling personally sis?”
“How do you think I feel? I feel like I got ran over by a truck… wait my tail… how is it?!” Dolly grunted as she tried to stand up and fell back onto the mattress, she turned her head to look at her wrapped tail.
“It’ll make a full recover Dolly, you need to rest. Talk to your brother some more.” I started petting Dolly a bit as I sat the PET next to her. She actually eased down and looked to her brother, there was a slight smile on her face as my hoof ran over her fur.
“So uh… how did the family take me losing the fight?” Dolly tried weakly.
“Well Dolly, they…” Dylan stopped when he heard a puppy state one word loudly.
“Dolly?” One puppy said and then it started to echo throughout the house and before we knew it, we saw Dylan getting swarmed by puppies trying to look at the screen with wagging excited tails.
Each one of them was saying ‘Dolly’ excitedly.
“Heh… my name is a trigger word for the family now.” Giggled Dolly as she watched all her little brothers and sisters crowd around Dylan and each one of them was trying to get her attention. “Hey guys, so I guess you saw all that on the news huh?”
“You were awesome Dolly!” Delgado the speedy wheelchair pup stated.
“Are you going to be alright Dolly?” Dee Dee asked poking her head out of the crowd.
“Did you really do a super bark?” Dizzy asked from next to her twin sister.
“Oneesan, you’re alright!” That was her little brother Daisuke I think.
“Everyone, the paw means pause!” All the pups whined, but backed off of Dylan and he moved the device and sat it down. “There now she can see all of us, so you don’t have to crawl all over me to be seen.”
There was quite a loving smile on Dolly’s face, despite the pain she had to be in… she wasn’t exactly on any painkillers currently.
I got up and decided to go see two other hospital goers that were as large as we were while Dolly communed with her family.
Making my way into the next room over, the mice of this world were fairly resourceful at getting supplies and paying for them to use for their own ends. I entered the room the Flight Brothers were currently interned in.
“Hello.” I stated softly making the two currently bickering albatrosses stop and look to me. “I just wanted to say thank you for saving Dolly.”
One just waved his wing in a bashful manner, the other stood up more proudly and saluted with a wing. After doing that Orville and Wilbur went back to bickering.
Orville dropped out of retirement to lend aid and was a good person. Wilbur proved himself to be as agile as a pegasus despite his fairly large wingspan. The animals of this world were just as amazing as the animalistic and bipeds.
I turned and left and eventually saw the two mice that Dolly had befriended as I headed back to the room Dolly and I shared. They looked surprised to see me out of bed, fairly understandable if I almost died seven times and that friendly nurse squirrel kept reviving me.
“Hey there, uh… Benard and Bianca?” They nodded as I crouched down to meet them eye to eye. “It was nice to meet you and thank you for watching out for Dolly for me. Even if I can only speak canid, meaning like foxes or dogs, I know that you can at least understand me right?”
Bernard nodded and Bianca walked up to pat me on the leg gently.
“I’m sorry, but Dolly and I will have to start running soon or else we’ll bring trouble to New York in the form of the mercenaries that shot me. I know we haven’t recovered, but we can’t risk people’s lives if they are willing to gun me down in the streets.” They both looked concerned when I said this. “So we’ll be heading out within an hour regardless of our states, right now I’m just giving Dolly some time to talk to her family. She has a lot of brothers and sisters you know. I’ll be doing most of the legwork since I doubt Dolly will be in much of a fighting condition, not that I am either, but I’ll manage somehow.”
The two started squeaking at me looking particularly worried.
“Remember that I don’t understand you and you can’t talk me out of this. I have medication and a legally obtained prescription… well as legal as the doctor animals here can make them really.” I wasn’t going to worry about the legality of my prescription medication concerning animals weren’t on the same level of civilization as animalistic and bipeds. They still followed me into our room where I saw Dolly looking sadly at her family.
“Hey, don’t worry bro, sure Dormarch said we’ll need a few weeks of rest to fully recover, but we don’t exactly have that kind of time as even I don’t think Pom is that lucky. Everyone knows I’m Leap Lamb’s sidekick and mercenaries are soon going to be all over New York soon hunting us down.” Dolly was with me. I was hoping she would abandon me, our bond and finally go home. Nope, I just had to get a dog with an undying sense of loyalty. “The sooner we leave the safer we’ll be bro, I’ll try to keep in contact. Love you fam!”
“We love you Dolly!” Hearing at least ninety eight voices of her brothers and sister made Dolly start tearing up.
“Try to be a bit safer out there honey.” Doug her father stated with tears in his eyes and he snuggled a large number of pups, that Dalmatian was affectionate as I remember him being. “We believe you’ll be a great hero someday. Even if you aren’t you, can still follow whatever dreams you want.”
“Please don’t push yourself Dolly, I’ve seen what happens to those who overstrain themselves with injuries like yours and it isn’t pretty.” Delilah stated as she and the rest of the family said their goodbyes and the call ended.
“Hey Pom… let’s go partner!” Dolly stated to me immediately, her voice sounding a bit off due to her bandaged nose.
“Right.” I nodded.
-An hour later, New York rooftop, ????-
“This is Tobias Rieper, I’m in the area.” I stood on the roof scanning on of the streets of New York. Nobody knew where Caper Canine or Leap Lamb were, but they were both here. “I need information on the targets.”
“Forty Seven, one of the targets you should be on the lookout for is Sabu Taj. She’s after Leap Lamb for a device she has on hoof and she seriously wants to kill her for a failed mission in Wakanda, Zootopia. She’s not in the states yet and she’s under a lot of scrutiny, she’s a target of opportunity and has made a lot of enemies recently. Kill her if you see her.” Nodding to my handler I waited on the more important information. “Your other targets are Leap Lamb, the device from Kahn Industries she holds and Caper Canine. Leap Lamb has a preternatural ability to dodge bullets, can climb walls, runs faster than an Olympian, of course her namesake also has meaning as she can leap more than fifty feet and some have even stated that she might have the ability to fly short distances. From what little we could pull from the incident in Zootopia, she has dodged at least having four assault rifles being trained on her all at once, with some crossfire, and came out of it with only one bullet in her. That was the only direct shot that hit her, grazing shots were stated to miraculously deflect off her wool. The mercenaries on her were top notch and well paid, resourceful enough to sneak in three helicopters in. Said helicopters were swiftly disabled by Leap Lamb one after the other in an impressive displays of strength and speed, the last helicopter was blown apart at range through unknown means. So Leap Lamb might be holding back on her full capabilities and is to be considered exceedingly dangerous to approach close up.”
“I’m going to need a little more detail on Caper Canine. Is my objective to kill them?” Even for me, I’ve had harder to kill targets with less information.
Leap Lamb was stated to be a hero and highly capable one from the news that she’s befriended Africa’s Tail Team. The Tail Team were good judges of character and they liked Leap Lamb.
“I don’t want you to eliminate them, you are to disable both Leap Lamb and Caper Canine for capture. People seriously want that device in their possession intact. If Sabu Taj or any other high profile mercenaries show up hunting them, then you are to eliminate them.” My handler was asking for a bit much, I’ve heard of Sabu Taj’s preparedness in the field. The Leopard was better at sabotaging things than I was, a rare thing to find in our field. “Caper Canine is a little odder, she possibly has the ability to control other animals, is known for expertly wielding a skateboard in combat and is quite agile even without it. Despite this, Caper Canine is nowhere near as tough or as fast as Leap Lamb is as shown by the incident with one Professor Norton Nimnul. She still held up to being tortured by electricity and managed to walk it off. She has a very unusual ability to perform what people are calling the Bolt Super Bark on the internet, but due to the magnetic interference it is possible Caper Canine might have absorbed the electricity and turned it into raw explosive force. From what we’ve seen it has nothing to do with the mechanics of how Bolt’s Super Bark works, it might have been what took out Sabu Taj’s personally helicopter in the Zootopia incident. Both Caper Canine and Leap Lamb can go bipedal at a moment’s notice and move as well as they do on all fours.”
“Sounds like a challenge.” I pulled up my scope and aimed the tranquilizer dart loaded into my weapon. It was a completely silent option and if she reacted to this, then I knew this was going to require a lot more thought.
I squeezed the trigger and the dart flew forward, then my target tripped over a leash on a dog, which also had a cat tied to the other end.
The strange sight gave me pause for a few seconds.
The dart struck the wall where my target’s neck should have been, then the target immediately looked at the dart and then directly at me through the scope with a hint of fright. It was if she could see me even at this distance, she then quickly scooped up the dog and cat then started running on her hind legs.
Caper Canine had been cowering on Leap Lamb’s back and seemed to be barking something while looking around, for anyone on approach. So the dog was just as intelligent as the owner, hmm…
I quickly lost sight of all four of them as Leap Lamb immediately went to ground, as she didn’t appear in the crowds.
“Very interesting, this one might actually take some time.” I grumbled softly, that reaction time and the fact that she could even possibly see the glint of my rifle and know how to stay out of even my sight.
Leap Lamb was quite resourceful and reacted quickly to threats, I’ll keep that in mind.
I loaded up another shot, spun around and fired a dart as someone busted through the door behind me.
The mercenary went down.
It seems I’ve been compromised, I’ll try to find Leap Lamb later.
Something tickled my mind… I looked back through the scope at where I took my shot.
She took the poison dart.
-On a truck leaving New York, Pom-
I currently didn’t have any resources and I really needed to buy quite a few things for Dolly. Also food was going to be an issue, given that we somehow picked up another dog and a cat.
“Are you working for the green eyed man?!” I looked down at the struggling dog with the black lightning bolt symbol painted onto his side. The black cat with green eyes was looking panicked and was notably tied to the dog by the leash.
“We don’t know anything about a green eyed man, but we all just certainly just got shot at.” Dolly stated warily while holding her skateboard protectively like a shield and looking around. “So it’s probably a good thing we decided to bug out of New York when we did.”
“Excuse me, but do you have an owner doggy?” I said as I crouched in front of him and started petting him, he seemed angry up until I started showing him some love.
“Hey, stop that!” The dog barked at me angrily and I did so, I really didn’t want to go back into New York having just gotten out of the city. “Do you know where the Green Eyed man and Penny are?”
The cat made a few randomly sounding mewling noises.
“Wait his name is Bolt, as in that Bolt? I’m Dolly, this is Pom, now can you tell us what is going on with him?” Right Dolly could talk to the cat, she listened and nodded a few times before turning to me. “Uh, Pom, I think we have a situation. By the way this is Mittens and that’s Bolt.”
Bolt was looking at the cat with a curious distrust, but he seemed much safer with Dolly’s presence. He was unsure about me.
“What’s going on and how much trouble is this going to cause us, we’re not exactly in any fighting condition right now.” The cat, Mittens, made a curious sounding noise and Dolly gave me a wince.
“A lot, apparently Mittens here has a better idea of the situation than Bolt does… Bolt wasn’t exactly let in on the reality of his situation as an actor.” Dolly ran her paws down her ears. “So he might think he’s an actual super dog.”
“Hey, I am a super dog, it’s just that those diabolical packing peanuts must have sapped me of my super strength.” Bolt me made giggle a bit, who would have a weakness to packing peanuts? I heard Bolt wine and heard his stomach gurgle. “So weak, what did that Green Eyed Man do to me?”
The cat rolled her eyes and meowed something sarcastic sounding, she then seemed to start talking to Bolt gently and poked his stomach. Dolly looked to me and tilted her head to my satchel.
I took out the Dolly's dog food and offered some to Bolt.