Under the orange sky, long shadows are cast as Velvet rushes forward, its six legs thick as logs rumble and shake the ground.
Birds scatter from trees and small animals scurry from their way to hide from this force of nature tearing through the forest.
Frank holds on for dear life to its thick tufts of coarse fur, Pineapple runs behind them, struggling to keep pace.
They break out of the forest and into the facility’s clearing.
“Velvet over there!” Frank shouts and points at the gate entrance to direct the foxbear.
The far away guards seem to have already noticed them.
However, Velvet keeps its course and crashes through the fence right in front of them instead.
Like match sticks, the iron fence bends and breaks, not exactly flimsy, but no match when on Velvet's way.
The gate guards no doubt having alerted the compound, run towards them as the first response group.
Oh great, I wished I could have talked to them first...
“Velvet, that’s enough”
The wall of the facility approaches, Velvet shows no sign of stopping.
“Stooooop!”
The beast keeps on running, straight at the facility’s concrete wall.
Frank leaps from the foxbear's back and rolls to soften his fall.
However, the backpack and gun on his back stop his roll and his legs strike the ground hard instead of completing the roll.
Ahhh, that... stings.
The foxbear strikes the wall with its shoulder, but the wall’s surface only cracks slightly.
Frank sits up from the ground and holds his shoulder that got yanked by the backpack’s straps.
With an aching back he struggles to stand, the guards are fast approaching, though the guards seem more concerned about the beast than him.
Playing it cool, he casually strolls towards them along the side of the building.
The gaping maw of Velvet opens up as it backs off from the wall slightly, it lifts up its tongue and globs a big ball of acid from the glands underneath.
It hits the wall that starts sizzling and melting, a green-gray concrete ooze mess slowly dripping down.
Pineapple runs to Frank’s side and proceeds to take some cover behind him.
“Let’s take the main entrance” Frank says quietly to the cat.
The guards run towards them, heading straight for the foxbear, Frank avoids looking at them as they pass.
“Frank! What the hell is this about!?” The other guard grabs his shoulder as his partner continues to the foxbear.
Frank turns to look at the guard.
“Pablo! Oh sorry about the mess”
“This is no time for joking around, give me one good reason why I shouldn’t arrest you right now”
“Because this is really important” Frank looks at him serious with determined eyes.
“I’ll tell you all about it if we ever meet again”
He breaks Pablo's gentle grip on his shoulder and breaks into a run with Pineapple.
“You better!” Pablo shouts after them and mutters under his breath:
“Better be the best god damn story..."
At the main entrance, Frank pushes aside the door, too damaged to be locked.
They hear more commotion arriving from the residential area, entering into the facility as quickly as the heavy door allows.
The lights are out, most worker's day already being over, with little to no business to the facility's premises at this hour.
“Pineapple, can you please give me some light, just this once”
The cat’s cone swirls with light, row after row lighting up into a large sphere of light.
“You’re the best! Follow me”
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Pineapple purrs happily which echoes in the massive hall, as they navigate through the maze of cages.
Animals wake up as the light falls on them, some snarling at them disgruntled from the rude awakening while others ignore them entirely.
The foxbear has entered the building through is own hole, as the crashing and gunfire approaches.
Animals shriek as their cages are damaged and broken somewhere in the distance.
They proceed forward in Pineapple’s light.
BOKOOCK!
Frank’s heart jumps to his throat as a Chickstrich on the loose enters the cone of light.
MEAOOW!
Pineapple dashes after it and the white and gray ostrich like bird runs away.
“Pineapple!” Frank calls out, but before he can even finish, he is left behind in the darkness.
The cone of light flickers around the hall as the cat chases the bird all around.
It takes a little bit for Frank's eyes to adjust to the dark and he starts seeing the cage’s white tinted forcefields.
They barely produced any light, only being able to see the faint outlines of the few nearest cages.
Occasional electricity crackling on their surface produced a little more light, but not enough to tell him the correct path for sure.
Some loose red lasers swish over Frank's head, high enough that they likely weren't meant for him.
Followed by a loud clanging of metal, echoing from nearby, somewhere in the surrounding dark.
Frank gazes around wary, but does not see its cause.
As the clang fades a very quiet sizzling takes its place.
The lasers just probably hit some metal…
They should really watch their fire...
Y-yeah...
He continues towards the back wall, or where he thinks it will be at, the cages at least keeping him from going around in circles.
From the animals he saw or heard, he could establish his location for he remembered the layout somewhat.
He dared not to check his communicator for the map to see where he was, what better way to get caught than have the device transmit his location to the people he's trying to avoid.
New cage outlines stop coming into his view, he holds out his hand and carefully creeps forwards.
After a bit of fumbling, he touches a stone cold wall.
Somewhere here is the entrance to the spaceship hangar…
He starts shuffling along the wall to the right, feeling the wall's rough surface for any protrusions.
Light footsteps sound from behind and a light beam shines on him.
He turns around and shields his face, Pineapple has returned with some gray and brown feathers in his mouth and some white downs sticking to its face.
“You actually caught it?”
Pineapple swirls its twin tails pleased.
Did he eat it?
No way, that’s just a mouth full of feathers from one bite…?
Right?
Frank gazes back on the wall, now lit up, and sees that he has just passed a large plastic blue button.
He presses it and the massive door, a meter to his right, starts rolling up.
Light floods into the dark space through the ever widening gap as the spaceship hangar's lamps flash on in rows.
Dozens of spaceships are parked in the hall in neat rows with plenty of space between each of them.
The hangar is massive, almost as large as the main cage area.
Frank eyes the two kinds of ships available, the automatic ships resemble these metal boxes with wings, unpainted and lacking in any flair or pizzazz.
While the manually flown ships are much sleeker and have two sets of wings for actual maneuverability within atmospheres.
He picks the closest manual ship, in front of the main door and little to the left, its cargodoor facing them.
The only way into these ships, meant only for transportation of goods, was through such a back door, no other options existed.
His chosen ship is otherwise completely metally gray, just two dark green strips run along its hull vertically, setting it apart from others of the same model.
The duo arrives at the ship’s back, Frank digs his employee ID and flicks it over a dark black sensor, it beeps with a green light and the cargo door begins to descend.
They board the ship and he presses a button on the other side, the door starts to close back up.
A semi-large metallic cargo space opens before them, the floor full of cinches to ensure sufficient grip and the wall's having rings attached to them to tie the cargo from.
A large but still narrower corridor leads they way into the cockpit
It’s only a three seater, the pilot’s seat, and one seat on each side of the corridor, facing forwards. One the sides some table space embedded in the wall, maintenance hatches and grates. Straight ahead a large windshield, in the middle, right ahead of the pilot chair a display, with various buttons, gauges, levers, switches and dials.
Frank sits on the pilot’s chair and checks some of the gauges as he turns on the power from a large reddish button.
Fuel... check. Battery... check.
Alright… should be all good to go soon, just got to open the hangar door and warm up the engines...
Soon we are out of here Amethyst.
Just hold on a little longer...
He remembers the bone and quickly slides the backpack off his back, opening its flap.
Phew.
He breaths out, glad his fall didn’t break the bone in two.
Strange glistening shines on its surface however, he picks up the bone out of the way to look deeper into his bag.
The banaorange he grabbed as snack is squashed and leaking liquids everywhere, on his spare clothes too...
Damn it, why did I pack it with me, this always happens!
He dunks the banaorange into the bin, located next to the pilot's seat, afterwards drying his hands and the bone with a paper towel.
Alright, it's all fine now...
Though it definitely still smells like fruit...
Frank packs the bone back up and gazes at the dashboard, the energy levels have risen high enough.
Now to warm up the engines…
As he is about to start the proceedings for launch, he glances at the monitor that shows the ship from the outside from different angles via cameras.
Some sort of triangular slab of metal has appeared on the ground behind their ship, some distance away.