Hundreds of creatures sat in the central area. There were dozens of large beasts like they had encountered upon entering the den, with hulking frames, twisting horns and fearsome claws. The smaller creatures only on their first or second dose, still had faint contenances from their old lives, but the irreversible dosing process had begun warping faces into snarling animal visages. Their hands had sprouted claws and their eyes glinted with a wild crazed light. This pack operated off a strict size-based hierarchy, with the larger and more beastly creatures being waited on the smaller ones, who received equal dispensations of grief and derision by way of gratitude from the brutes.

One freshly dosed small male whelp with two budding horns, twisted misshapen limbs and a body covered with brown curly fur, for all the world resembled a goat. He struggled to carry two large buckets of festering drink, that he was pouring into a trough that was set before a large female ape-creature who had long white fur, thick blue hide and its chest was armored with heavy scales. Just as he was about to pour, he slipped on the greasy wet floor and sloshed some of the fluid on the Ape hybrid.

It roared with anger as the fluid sloshed over its fur and scales, and she immediately backhanded the smaller hybrid hard, sending it flying with a bleating wail of surprise across the floor. The Ape creature lifted her trough and emptied it with several large dribbling swigs, belching long and loud, pounding her chest with satisfaction.

“Stephen Stupid!” She declared, pointing out the goat-man that was still struggling to rise.

The den chittered with cruel laughter, at the unfortunate state of the goat hybrid.

The Den Master held up his clawed hand and addressed the assembled creatures before him, in a cawing timbre.

“My beasts, beasties, brutes and whelps, blood of my pack; let me introduce a new ally, Silhouette! I have been working with them for some time and they have come to share a great power of their own design with us.”

A shrouded figure moved forward to stand beside the Den Master. It wore an obscura field bracer that refracted the light around them, making their physical form appear like both a flickering shadow and the flame of a candle. It stepped forward and addressed the pack.

“Creatures of the Den, I am here to make you powerful; I am here to make you feared from level eighty-one to surface city! I come with a dose of unparalleled strength; it will transform not only you, but also this den into something to be feared and respected. No longer will you have to settle for the shadowy recesses of this quarter; but with my dose you shall rise and possess this whole level; and make it a haven for hybrids on all levels, and all of you will be as kings! These citizens who fear and loathe you, do not understand or deserve you!”

A bipedal hippo with a thick leathery hide held up a huge fist and shook it at Silhouette.

“You make big promises, but you hide your face. Anyone who says they want to selflessly help strangers, only truly serves themselves! This is truth! How do we know this isn’t a Republic trick to destroy us?”

The sharp metal caps on his large wide teeth clicked with each word he spoke.

“Well Silhouette, can you answer Grux’s question?” The Den master said, before flitting up to a huge nest that was suspended above the pack. He fluffed up his feathers and lounged against the metal side of his nest. One of the female bird hybrids with pink and light blue tipped feathers, ran her hands through his downy breast feathers. He trilled a dirty sounding note to her; and she tittered delightedly and continued to stroke his plumage.

“You are smart to distrust someone new.” Silhouette said. “But there are few that hate the Legions and the unblemished citizens of the Republic more than I do. I hate their persecution of anyone who is different than they are. You know you are different in your souls, so much so that you were brave enough to bare your arms to the unknown and receive the dose. You did this to improve your lives, to become strong, and to make your own destiny, no matter what the Republic has to say about it. Now that the Republic has outlawed hybridization, it only shows they fear you and your power, and they want to take that away.”

Silhouette’s eyes grew wilder as her rant grew long. “They only care about conformity and making everyone toe the line. These citizen’s husks that lay before us; were drained and sacrificed so that our brothers and sisters might transform. The unblemished are but a resource to be used by the strong, and I promise that they will be the first of many sacrifices the Republic will make on our behalf. If we must rip it apart to make it more equitable then so be it! Grux is right! Promises without substantiation ought to be assumed as lies! But here I stand, offering you this tool; this ultimate amalgam of my own design to make every one of my words true!”

Silhouette held aloft a large canister of pink gelatinous fluid, that seemed to pulse as it reflected the light of the central den through it.

“This is enough dose to transform twenty times your number!”

The assembled creatures roared, clucked, and yipped their collective approval of the newcomers' words.

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Moloch had almost heard enough but he felt an inner prompting to watch this spectacle unfold a little bit longer. He could see Krasus lifting his wrist intelor up to give the command for the Legionnaires to open fire, on the den.

“Wait a moment Brother, I want to see what this seditious creature is up too.”

“I hope it gets to the point; I can hardly bear to suffer to hear it speak another word.”

Moloch looked at the being. It seemed to flicker in and out as the light bent around it. It was using a voice modulator which made it impossible to determine the gender or any details about the identity of the newcomer. Obscura bracers were a very expensive tool. He had no idea that associates of a low-level den like this had access to that kind of tech and the ducats to buy it.

“Then give us reason to trust you!” The hippo said.

Silhouette moved out its hand, indicating the pulsating incubation globs.

“Before you within these globs; are five welps; and they have all chosen to take my amalgam dose. Their transformation is almost complete; and when they emerge from incubating you will only have to believe your own eyes!”

“Are they powerful in battle?” The Hippo creature asked. “Could one of them possibly defeat me?” He stood up to his full height that he might flex a physique that was bulging with muscle and howled, his challenge up to the domed ceiling of the central den. The other members of the den made hisses and squeals of approval. It was obvious that this hippo hybrid was considered by most of the pack to be their most capable warrior.

Moloch adjusted the grip on his emitter pistol, there was no way he would want to face that hybrid without it.

“Not only are they immune to the mental attacks of the Awakened; but they can heal from almost any wound, and their lifespan has been increased many times that of a normal hybrid!”

Grux narrowed his eyes with suspicion. “All of that from dosing only a single time? Lies! I have gone through the trials of the glob fourteen times and each time, and through the agony that burned away my body, while I evolved, I kept my senses! Only through the trials does a hybrid grow strong!”

He clenched his huge fists and shook them in the air, while howling with all his might.

“Den Master, this trickster seeks to replace me as your second with an offering of its freshly birthed whelps! It knows you aren’t particularly skilled at crafting doses, and it seeks to win your favor with its dosing routines! It never bothered me, for with each of your doses, despite the pain, I reemerged better than before!”

The Den master shifted uneasily. Knowing in his heart that Grux’s statement about his skills was true.

“I am skilled at designing doses! I made this den, and look at you, you are all terrifying!” He squawked indignantly, defending his wounded pride.

The pack made grunts and squeals of unenthusiastic acknowledgement at the statement, as all of them knew firsthand the agony that came with the trial of the glob and had suffered because of the Den Master’s ineptitude.

“It is not like many of you died from my doses!” The Den master said, the confidence in his voice receding with every word.

“Define many, my master, for we could probably agree to say a lot have died.” The goat-hybrid welp bleated, who had gotten up from the Ape-man’s blow, and re-shouldered his serving buckets.

“My dose was only supposed to give me the horns of a goat. Not turn me into one! Now I am stuck like this because there is too much goat stuff in my gene-code! It would kill me to dose again!” He cried.

The other members of the pack made chitters of agreement amongst themselves, each one now thinking about how each of their doses could have gone better, if the Den Master was more talented at genesmithing.

“Well, eherm, uh…” The Den Master stuttered, trying to think of some appropriately appeasing platitude that would serve to distract the den from the unpleasant truth that the hippo had so inconveniently brought their attention to.

Grux’s obtuse mind finally realized the difficult position he had put the den master in by calling out his lack of skill before the pack and knew if he did not act to salvage the situation, the reprisal for such public embarrassment would be swift and severe.

He picked up a large tankard from one of the long tables and cocked back his arm, closing one eye to line up his throw.

It flew true and cranked the goat-man upside his head, with a resounding smack.

It wailed with pain and fell to the ground and slid across the greasy floor a tangle of limbs and buckets. Grux pointed and laughed with the rest of the pack who joined in mocking the goat-man, who was still trying to get up but kept slipping and falling, as his irregular hooves struggled to find purchase on the wet floor.

“You are stuck as a sniveling serving goat because you were weak!”

He snorted derisively and ham handedly tried to revert the course of the discussion back to his original topic.

“Do not fall for its lies!” He said pointing his scarred stubby hand at Silhouette.

The Hippo hybrid growled.

“I have fought dozens of battles for this den; I have shed blood for this den! I stand next in line as the packmaster, not you!”

Even his crude brutish features could not conceal the obvious covetous desire that was burning away in the core of his soul.

This gave the Den Master reason to smile.

“Be at ease; Grux.” The Den master said, gliding down from his nest, and landing beside Silhouette. Somehow managing a devious expression, despite his long-hooked beak, and bony feathery face.

“I have a simple solution that will resolve all our doubts about this newcomer's claims.”

“What would that be?” Silhouette said, its voice parsing in and out, as the light bent and flickered around its form.

“Call forth your champion, and let Grux challenge him before the pack, then we can see the veracity of your claims for ourselves!”

This suggestion pleased Grux immensely and he began hyping himself up for the fight, bobbing his head and throwing shadow punches.

“Fight me if you dare, for Grux will tear your champion's head from his shoulders!” Grux howled, shaking the muscled flab of his torso with a vigorous intensity.

Silhouette stood very still. It seemed to carefully consider the proposition.

“Very well, we accept your challenge.” Silhouette said. “Kotuk, step forward! Behold! See what caused the whelps to desire my dose above all else.”