Wickaninnish – A Traveller’s Beginning

This chapter is rated NC-17 for sexual situations and violence. If you have not read the disclaimers in the first chapter please do so before proceeding.

The Death of Childhood

It was much later that night after the party thrown by his family and friends when Kit and Black Mitten walked arm in arm to the door of the temporary room he had been assigned in the bachelor’s quarters.
“So did the Elders tell you where you going yet?” Mitten asked.
It was traditional that new adults were moved to another town to help emphasize their independence.
“Potlatch,” Kit said tail wagging.
“The Capitol! Oh wow!” Mitten said hugging him close. “I can’t wait until I get my adult name next year, then we can mark each other and move in together.”

They stopped in Kit’s doorway. Mitten leaned up and licked a Kit’s muzzle.
“Can I come in? I would like to give you a special present.”
Kit growled and nuzzled her neck fur while he palmed open the door behind them and pulled her inside.

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Five years ago the Council of Elders had voted not to invest in an outer system sensor network. The fact that their Vargr neighbors had not attacked in over 30 years and the financial demands of on going social programs led them to feel it was not necessary. Thus the ship that had entered the system days ago had gone undetected as it approached the Istaqa home world.

Gunthar bared his fangs as he looked on the world below. For too long it had been the home of those misbegotten stains on the Vargr known as the Istaqa. Before the humans came, his people regularly raided this world for its natural resources and to bring divine justice to the freaks. The Istaqa put up little organized resistance, fighting as individuals. Then the humans came and organized the Istaqa militias and brought enough meaningful trade to build planetary defenses. For the longest time his people gave up raiding the Istaqa, the cowards that ran his government even signing a treaty with their new human masters.

But no more, Gunthar was about to show the inferior mongrels their human masters could not protect them. He had spent much time and effort, gathering a following of warriors, spying out a blind spot in Istaqa’s planetary defenses and obtaining a raider ship. Now it was all going to come to fruition.
“It’s time,” he said to his gunner. “Power up the systems.”

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Ahiga watched as Akando rolled the dice. The human had brought the game with him to the lunar station that served as base for the system’s fleet of system defense boats (all 3 of them). The game was one of the rare items transported from Earth by his ancestors and none of the Istaqa on the station had seen it before. They rapidly picked up playing it though.

Ahiga picked up the dice cup and rolled his turn. Akando and the others Istaqa growled.
“Yatzee!” Ahiga yelled, writing up the score.
His glee was short lived as klaxons started sounding throughout the base.
“Unauthorized vessel detected! Unauthorized vessel detected!” The base AI screamed.

Ahiga and the others leapt up, scattering the game pieces as they rushed to the console.
“Target coordinates…” Akando said checking the readouts. “Yiff! They’re inside the lunar orbits! How did they get so close without being detected?”
“They must have killed most of their velocity out system and are coming in for a gravity insert. Scramble the boats! Alert Potlatch!”
Ahiga knew it was already too late.
“Missile Warning! Missile Warning!” The AI said, calmly announcing its impending destruction as the point defense lasers made a desperate attempt prevent it.
The first boat was just powering up when it, and the base, disappeared in a nuclear maelstrom.

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Kit let out a yip as Mitten’s hands clawed and clutched at the fur on his back. He rewarded her efforts by quickening the pace of his driving thrusts. He felt her grip around his shaft growing tighter as he swelled inside her, his release drawing near. She cried out his name as her climax came. Her muscles clamped down on him triggering his own release.

They collapsed into each others arms, panting. Mitten was the first to notice the sound from outside.
“What’s that?” She asked.
Kit listened to the sirens wailing outside.
“The militia alarm! The Vargr are…YIP!”
Pains shot through his groin as he tried to leap up. They were still tied! Awkwardly, he picked Mitten up in his arms and carried her, still joined to him, towards the bathroom.
“What’s going on?” Mitten said panicked.
“The Vargr are attacking!” Kit said as he pulled her with him into the shower and turned the water on full cold.

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Gunthar looked at the map as the ship descended into the planet’s atmosphere and grinned. The first part of the operation was a complete success. He was already looking ahead to his successful return from this raid. His success would cause thousands to rally to him. He would return with a hundred ships.

At last he would show these inferior mongrels that they were not safe from the divine will of Kfaeghr. And he would do it the way members of his sect had always done. Looking at the map he marked a town far from the heavily defended capitol. He pointed it out to his lieutenants.
“That one,” he said. “Tell the warriors they can take all they want, but no one is to be left alive.”
His raiders had been cooped up in the cramped ship far too long; they were ready for the task at hand.

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Kit and Mitten came out of the building, their fur still wet and soaking into their clothes. Explosions lit up the night. Kit saw in the distance a large space ship hovering low over the town. Figures leapt from the hatches, floating down on grav belts to the ground, shooting as they came.

“I’ve got to get to the armory!” Kit said.
“Don’t leave me Kit! I’m afraid!” Mitten said clinging to his arm.
“Alright but stay close,” Kit answered, hugged her briefly and then they set out towards the town hall where the militia armory was located.

They maneuvered their way through the dark streets, one of the first blasts from the ship’s guns had taken out the power plant and communications center. Kit’s anger grew as they worked their way through the carnage. They had come upon Shaman Hania dead, gunned down in the street. Everywhere they went were bodies of Istaqa and a few humans. Adult, child, male, and female it made no difference, all were slaughtered ruthlessly. None of the bodies they encountered were armed. This slaughter made no sense!

They came around a corner and halted. Two Vargr were moving toward them carrying sub-machine guns.
“They have us cut off,” Kit said looking around. “Hide in that building and I’ll draw them off and circle back to get you.”
Mitten looked afraid but obeyed. Kit moved off down the street wanting to put some distance from Mitten’s location before exposing himself.

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Gunthar was walking down the burning street with his First when his comm sounded.
“Report!”
“There are two air rafts approaching from the capital city. They are just outside our maximum range.” The ship’s gunner reported.
“Air rafts? They are probably only carrying hand held missiles, open fire as soon as they are in range. You should be able to destroy them well before they get close enough to fire back.”

Kit watched as the Vargr put his comm back on his belt and the two started to move again. Just then a pup that couldn’t have been more than 6 came crying out a nearby building.
“Mommy?” the pup called over and over again. One of the Vargr pulled a knife from his belt and started toward the pup. The child’s cries turned to shrieks of terror at the Vargr’s approach.

“NO!” Kit yelled leaping from his concealment but the Vargr didn’t hear his yell as their ship’s guns began firing on the distant air rafts. He started running towards the Vargr but he was too far away.
The Vargr stood over the shrieking child and raised his knife when Black Mitten came yelling out of the nearby doorway. She held a metal pipe in her hands and smashed it over the Vargr’s head, caving in his skull.

Gunthar stood in shock as this puny bitch killed his First, grabbed the child up and began to run. With a growl he raised his SMG and gunned her down. Two late he heard the yell behind him.
“Mitten!”

Kit had almost reached the Vargr commander when he saw Black Mitten fall and not move. He screamed out her name. The Vargr turned and as Kit saw his face an unstoppable rage filled him. With no weapons but his hands and fangs, he leapt at the Vargr. Gunthar, his gun out of alignment, just managed to grab his knife as the coyote hit him.

Kit was distantly aware of the knife entering his side but the rage that consumed him overwhelmed any feelings of pain. He grabbed the Vargr by the neck as Gunthar fell onto his back; rational thoughts gone; Kit fell back on the basic instincts of his distant coyote ancestors and sank his fangs into the Vargr’s neck crushing his windpipe.

Gunthar was last thoughts were surprise and shock, uncertain what was more wrong, the feel of this inferior mongrels teeth at his throat or the sight in the sky above him.

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The Vargr gunner watched with satisfaction as his missiles streaked towards the distant air rafts. Even with the AI guidance, at this range they might miss but there was plenty of time for more volleys. Suddenly alarms sounded from his console as a dozen hand held missile launchers from air rafts that had snuck in under his sensors while he was busy tracking the more obvious distant targets opened fire at near point blank range. The gunner had no time to react, the gunnery AI could however, but it had a dilemma, it had more targets than it could track at once. It hesitated to evaluate and assign target priorities. The hesitation was too much. By time it decided the incoming missiles were the bigger threat and transferred it priorities from directing its own outgoing missiles to defending against the incoming ones, the first missiles struck. The raider ship disappeared in a ball of flame.

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Kit rose up on his hands and knees as the figure below him stilled. The taste of blood in his mouth was strange and he reeled as the pain and blood loss from the knife wound in his side struck him all at once. He looked over at Mitten’s still form and started crawling in her direction.
“Mitten!” He cried but she didn’t respond. The only sound coming from the crying child sheltered beneath her blood stained body. He just made it to her side before he collapsed into darkness.