by Tom Jones
Arcades looked at the panel that was next to the cell’s door. The panel resembled the ones that were found in the hotel, and the light was currently red. The fox wondered if he would be able to get a keycard, but he dismissed the idea quickly. He did not want to have to get close to the guards. He knew that he would not be able to take the guards on with just a G17 with two additional magazines. Arcades knew that there wasn’t anything he could do to rescue the wolf as of now, but he also knew that he would not be able to rescue the other anthros that were locked in the cells that lined the walls. The fox took a deep breath and decided that he should just move on.
Arcades took a look behind him, and he looked to see if there were any guards around. Luckily for the fox, most of the guards were on the other side of the prison area. The fox was not sure how many anthros Omega had taken captive, but he was not sure if there were any other anthros beyond this area that he was in. Arcades continued recording, and he was wondering if the evidence that he had just obtained was enough. However, he decided to press on and see what else he could find. Arcades wanted to make sure that the evidence that he gathered would be able to convince anybody.
Continuing down the cellblock, Arcades continued looking to the right as he recorded all of the anthros that were in the cells. Most of them were being kept in the same way as the wolf; However, some of them were lacking the cords that connected to the crotch area. Other anthros had cords that were connected to their nipples instead, and some anthros had cords connected to both the crotch and nipples. Arcades had passed by around thirty anthros now, and he was not sure how much more evidence he would need. Arcades felt that all of the anthros looked similar in a way. They all shared the same collar, muzzle, and blindfold.
The more cells that Arcades passed, the more anthros he saw detained. However, none of them could see the horrified expression that was displayed on the fox’s face. Arcades passed a few anthros that were in straight jackets, but they were trying to press their butts against the wall. Arcades was not sure what they were trying to do. When he passed another cell, the fox stopped. He saw an anthro cheetah that removed himself from the wall to reveal a dildo that was sticking out of the wall. Arcades could not frown more than he already was, but the camera was not facing the fox. The fox remembered that his camera was still rolling. He would not be the only one to see this, but he did not know if that was a good thing or a bad thing. Arcades forced himself to continue moving, though he was not sure if he would make it out of this facility in one piece.
Reaching the end of the cellblock, Arcades looked at a door that seemed to be unlocked. He wondered if the door led to a higher floor, or something much worse. Arcades went through the unlocked doorway, but he heard walking coming from the area that he just left. The fox stopped, and he turned to the source of the sound. Since the place was pretty quiet, Arcades was able to hear footsteps coming from behind the door now. Small windows in the door allowed Arcades to record what was going on behind the door. The fox saw a guard come into view. The guard looked at a few of the cells before stopping at one of them. The guard scanned what looked to be a keycard on the panel, and it turned from red to green. The guard opened the door, and he went inside.
Still recording, Arcades was waiting for the guard to emerge. After an extended moment of waiting, the guard emerged, and he was holding a restrained anthro by the arm. The anthro was a coyote that was blindfolded and muzzled much like the other anthros. His hands were cuffed behind his back, and his legs were shackled too. Arcades was wondering where the guard was taking the coyote, but he knew that he would not be able to follow them. He would risk being caught. Arcades was hoping that he was not picked up by any security cameras, but he did not notice any in the areas that he went to.
The fox turned around, and he viewed a dimly lit stairwell. Arcades carefully ascended the stairwell, and he was looking upwards the entire time. Since the fox was barefoot, he was able to take quieter steps, but he was mainly listening to any personnel that would be descending on his location. Arcades felt that he was wasting battery and storage at this point, so he disabled his camera before continuing to ascend. After traveling up the stairs for some more time, Arcades was not seeing any people coming up or going down the stairs, so Arcades figured that he was either going to a place that was less populated or a place that less anthros would be traveling out of. Arcades felt that it was more likely the former, as he had not passed through any locked security doors in order to reach the stairwell. Arcades thought about how the place could be used by an escapee, but he remembered that all of the anthros he saw were all chained and blindfolded. They would not be able to navigate the complex, and the sound of their shackles would definitely give away their location.
As the fox reached the top of the staircase, he peeked through the door that was in front of him to make sure that no guards were in view of the door. After confirming that the coast was clear, Arcades traveled past the door. The fox looked at the surroundings, but he could not see too much. The room was dimly lit with blue. A large Omega Foundation logo was on the wall. Arcades recognized the logo, and he flipped on his camera again in order to gather evidence. Arcades looked at the logo, and then he looked to his right to see another door. However, this door was a set of double doors, and the Omega Foundation logo was painted on them. Arcades moved closer to the doors, and he peeked through the window. He looked at the sign that was above the doors, and it read ‘CONFERENCE ROOM’. Arcades decided he would go inside to see if there was anything important.
The fox peeked through the tinted windows, but he could not see any figures that looked as if they were standing up. Arcades then noticed that this set of doors included one of the panel locks. Arcades did not have a keycard, so he was unable to open the doors by himself. The fox looked at the panel, but he did not have anything with him that would be able to open it. The fox then remembered what he did back in Hong Kong to attempt to open a door that was electronically locked. He had opened the electronic control box, and he attempted to trip the door in order to make it open. He decided that he would attempt this again.
The fox disabled his camera again, as he figured that he would need it later in order to gather more evidence. He removed his multi tool from his pants, and he switched to something that would be thin enough to get up underneath the seams of the panel in order to pry it open. Arcades tried a couple of tools that turned out to be too large to fit, but he finally found one that was able to get underneath the seam. The fox used the tool like a lever, and he was able to generate enough torque to prop the panel off. He looked at the wiring that was connected to a small integrated circuit. Above the circuit was the screen itself that the panel consisted of. The fox took a look at the circuit board, and he was trying to figure out what he could do to open the door.
Arcades decided he should see what actually opened the doors. The fox pocketed the multi tool before grabbing the board with his gloved hands. Arcades pulled towards himself, but he could feel that the board was being held by something. The fox stopped, and he looked at the structure that held the board in. He noticed four screws that held the assembly together. Arcades pulled out his multi tool again, and he switched to the screwdriver. Luckily, the screwdriver was able to fit easily enough to remove the screw. The fox twisted left until he was able to take the screw off. Once he had it complete, Arcades removed the screw and placed it on the ground next to him. He did the same to the other three screws holding the board in place.
After he finished, Arcades put away the multi tool again, and he attempted to lift the panel off from the assembly. This time, he was successful, and the panel was able to be lifted from where it was being held in place. Arcades looked at the wires that were attached to the board, and he unplugged them himself. The fox attempted to open the door, but he found that it still would not budge. The fox then attempted to scratch his head, but he remembered that he was wearing a helmet. The fox scratched his neck fur instead. Arcades blindly reached into the housing tha
t held the panel, and he was touching everything he could. He was hoping that one of the components behind the panel would open the door.
After moving his hand in the housing, he felt something that almost felt like a small switch. Arcades flipped the switch, and he heard a beep coming from the door. The fox looked up at the door, and he tried to manually open it again. The door began to slide open. The fox stuck his foot inside of the doorframe, and he knew that he should probably stick the panel back in the door’s housing. After reconnecting the panel, Arcades placed the panel back in the housing, and he began to screw it back in place from his sitting position. Arcades was still able to keep one foot in the door frame to keep it open as he was working on making it look like nobody had infiltrated the conference room. Arcades just hoped that he would not need to do this again in order to get back out of the conference room. After placing the cover back on the panel, the fox was now ready to enter the dark room.
When Arcades entered the room, he was relieved that it looked empty. Arcades noticed something was odd, however. He could see furniture that looked rather odd. All of the chairs in the room seemed to be oddly shaped. The fox approached one of the chairs, and he felt it. Arcades realized that the chair he was feeling was a living anthro. Arcades jumped backwards in surprise, shock, and horror, and he looked at all of the other anthros that made up the furniture in the room. The anthros were restrained in a way that prevented them from leaving the furniture positions that they had assumed. The fox looked around the room some more, and he could only see a few things that were not made from anthros. There was a bookshelf on one end of the room that was filled up with some books, and there was a wide conference table in the center of the room. All of the chairs were anthros, though. The fox flipped on his camera to record the room. Though the lighting was pretty poor, the fox was hoping that his camera would be able to pick up what he was looking at. Arcades directed his attention to the books that stacked the shelves. He noticed that most of them were encyclopedias, so he turned back around to view the rest of the conference room.
Just when Arcades was about to disable his camera, he heard footsteps approaching the room. The fox quickly hid behind the bookshelves, and he lowered his stance to increase the chances of remaining hidden. He stared at the door, and he could hear that somebody was making his way inside. The fox heard the door open after it beeped once, and a human wearing blue and black walked in. The human did not see the fox due to the lighting conditions, but he was holding a laptop in his hands. The human approached the large table, and he sat the laptop down on it. He then sat down on one of the anthros. A noticeable grunt that was produced by the anthro was heard. When the human had heard the anthro grunt, he delivered a slap to the anthro’s butt, which made the anthro grunt louder. The human opened the laptop, and he began to login. The fox was not sure what the human was looking at, but now he knew that he wouldn’t be able to leave the room until the human did. Arcades was hoping he would not have to stay for too much longer, for the fox decided that he had plenty of evidence to show CDI.
The fox could hear more footsteps that were approaching the door that he came in. Arcades watched as another human entered the room. This human was wearing UCP much like the guards were; However, he was not wearing combat gear, nor did he have an XMP-1. He was wearing a field shirt as well rather than a combat shirt, but it was completely unmarked. Instead, he had a holstered handgun that Arcades could not determine the model of thanks to the viewing angle and the poor lighting. The man wearing UCP sat down on an anthro on the other side of the first man, and they settled in before they began speaking. Arcades quickly reset his camera in order to give himself the most recording time in a single clip. He did not want to segment what the men were about to say.
“So, how many did you guys get in Germany?” The man with the laptop was the first to speak. The man wearing UCP replied, “Hundreds of them. Germany is one of those countries where you can just find more anthros.” The first man nodded, “Yes. I take it you shipped them off to Facility Three?” The man wearing UCP responded, “That’s right. We had a train operating out of Berlin that we used to bring them close enough. We then brought them in unmarked semi trucks.” Arcades was surprised to hear what he was listening to. The men continued, “How are they coming training wise? It’s been about a week or so since the first ones should have arrived. How long do you think they’ll be until they’re ready to be sold? We have a few buyers contacting us already.” Arcades was still not sure who these two people were supposed to be. He knew they were in Omega, but he didn’t know what they exactly did. “They’re rejecting it of course. A few of them are accepting it, though. For the ones that are accepting the training, we are considering sending them to Facility Eleven to see if that’ll train them faster.”
The man with the laptop looked up at the camouflaged man, “You know, there has been a break-in at Facility Eleven about a couple days ago.” The camouflaged human looked surprised, “What? Someone from the outside got in?” The human with the laptop nodded, “Yes… Our informant described him as a male fox. He’s roughly six feet tall, and his fur is black and white. He beat up our informant pretty bad. Once he’s healed up, he’s not going to be there at Facility Eleven anymore. That incompetent anthro apparently forgot to disarm the intruder, since he said that he was beaten with a handgun. He was of course too concerned with sex rather than keeping Facility Eleven a secret.”
Arcades’ heart sank when he heard the humans describe him. He now knew that they knew him. The fox continued to listen. “Do we know who this guy is? By the way, is he a purebred red fox? He might make a good slave one day.” The man typed on the computer, and a projector appeared from the ceiling cover. A curtain came down over the large dark window, and it turned on. Arcades saw himself on the screen. The man with the laptop spoke, “Now, we believe that is a picture of him. This was taken last year, 2027 in Las Vegas. He is seen here rescuing one of the foxes we were about to transfer out.” The camouflaged man nodded, “Yeah. Is that a still image from LiveLeak? That picture is pretty damn blurry.” The human’s question was answered, “Yes. A civilian took this cell phone video and uploaded it to LiveLeak. Alpha and Omega team found this image on the net earlier this year when they went to Hong Kong.”
Arcades knew that it was only a matter of time before they knew who he was and what he did. The fox was hoping they didn’t look to their immediate right and behind the bookshelf. The men continued after Arcades saw another picture of himself displayed on the screen, “And now this picture was taken during the night of our raid in Hong Kong. We believe that this fox took the jade cane before we were able to get it. However, that mission was not a total waste for you guys. Alpha and Omega team was able to retrieve the prototype for what ended up becoming the XMP-1.” The camouflaged man nodded again, “Uh-huh. So, how do you think he got into Facility Eleven?” The man with the laptop brought up a picture of the vent that Arcades used to gain entry to the hotel. He began speaking, “This chute right here. It was originally designed as a chute to dump trash with, but we didn’t really need that. We put grates in front of it to block it off, but it looks like he was able to remove the grates and get inside. He was able to get up to the third or fourth floor before our informant caught him.”
Arcades had believed his entryway into the hotel was a ventilation shaft, and he had just been proved wrong. The camouflaged man spoke next, “How did he figure out the location of Facility Eleven?” The laptop man replied, “He most likely found it thanks to the internet. We’ve been trying to remove all of the information we can about us, but new leaks appear daily. They keep coming faster than we can take them down. Luckily, we have the clear web under control for the most part.” Arcades could not believe the sheer amount of evidence he was gathering. The camouflaged man began speaking again, “So, hasn’t the most recent cargo from Facility Eleven been taken by him?” The laptop man nodded, “We think so. A few of our Internal Security Group ground units report seeing
him. They escaped in a Sikorsky S-70. Looked to be modified to be close to spec as the USAF HH-60 Pave Hawk. We don’t have any images of that fox escaping, though.”
Arcades was glad to hear the last bit of information. However, he had a feeling that Omega was already very close to tying him together with Fox Security. The fox knew that he would have to tell CDI as soon as possible after he escaped, for Arcades was in a race against time. The laptop man then spoke again, “We also have reason to believe that he was the one who freed the last train car in Berlin before we ordered the NSS to retreat. He seemed to have been prepared to open cuffs that used non-standard keys. That was the entire reason why we used those South Korean cuffs on those foxes. When a few of our undercover agents in the Bundeswehr came on that train, they confirmed that none of the restraints had been forced open or broken. Apparently, he brought keys with him to escape the informant at Facility Eleven as well.”
The camouflaged man shook his head, “Damn. How would he know to do that, though? We picked those because the keyholes look exactly like the standard keyholes from the outside. Most people would give up after trying a regular key. He wouldn’t know to use the non-standard keys unless he owns them himself.” Arcades knew that last bit was true. He did own a pair of the same model thumbcuffs that the men were speaking of. The laptop man spoke, “Anyways. The NSS did their job, and we don’t need them anymore. Thankfully, most of them were killed in Germany. The ones that didn't die there, we sent to Syria. The good news is that all of them died in Syria. We planted plenty of NSS bodies in Syria so that it would cause even more tension between the human Arabs and the white nationalists. Unfortunately, one of our guys was killed in Germany. We believe that one of the NSS guys might have taken his Omega badge to Syria. Hopefully, nobody found that.”