He stood in the doorway, in that awkward stance of interrupting something unexpected.

"Ras," Challis said, delighted. "Come try this. That is," she looked at Jakko and sheepishly started to remove the cord, "If you don't mind. Sorry, I should ask you first."

Jakko shrugged and swept an arm toward Rasalas.

"You need to try this," Challis said again. She held the cord out, and felt the flux overflow starting to fade. Her breath came slow and dull, the brimming energies – Jakko had called them effluxes – gone as if brushed away like dust.

Rasalas didn't even glance at her. He was glaring his one eye at Jakko in disbelief.

"What is she doing with that?" he hissed, stalking in with half-formed fists and bent on bloodshed. "You keep that crickin' wire away from her, you hear me?"

"Wait!" Challis stepped between them. "I'm fine, just stop." She knew more than anyone about Rasalas' anger, quick as a fox, and the deep exhaustion and frustration that brewed it. Violence had become such a gray area for him. But there was always a reason, if rarely a good excuse.

"Why do you have this?" He snatched the wire out of her hands. "Are you out of your mind?"

Then he froze, his eye locked on hers. Challis stared back and, with a shock that made her step away, saw the iris flare a pale yellow, blazing out from between the bandage strips. At her reaction, Rasalas turned away in a hurry. But his patch was acting up too: fire-bright flecks shimmered over the pattern of geometrical vitasnaps. He inhaled in bursts, trying to swallow, while sweat beaded up on his hairline.

Jakko shifted behind Challis. Rasalas mechanically held out the wire without looking at him, but Jakko had to tug it free from his fingers.

"Thank you," Jakko said stiffly. "You know there's thrike crap in your hair, right?"

"If I may." Drunnel's voice interrupted. Challis had almost forgotten he was there. He approached, holding out an amiable hand as if nothing had happened. "Gannagen."

"Haske." Rasalas took it, and the handshake held for a moment too long before it broke apart with a jerk.

"Thank you for joining us," Drunnel went on smoothly. He gestured at Rasalas' face. "That doesn't look fun. My condolences. But please, let's do a bit of a restart. For your sister's sake." He headed back to the safety of his desk, then pulled the chairs out and placed them both in the center of the room. "Sit and let me explain. There's something I have to offer you both, if you're willing to listen."

Challis noted distantly that Jakko had used similar words with her in the courtyard. She and Rasalas must give off the impression that they weren't natural listeners.

"How'd you find me?" she murmured to Rasalas as an excuse to keep watching him. He was rubbing his knuckles, distracted, looking everywhere but at her.

"Oh, the – the guard tried to report me to Rib-eye's office but I told him about Tofflar's, um, helmet. Had to actually show it to him before he believed me. Still trespassing. He sent me to check in up here. Guess he thought these gents would tell me off."

Drunnel leaned back on the desk with all the nonchalance of someone who was definitely listening. He raised the eyebrows in feigned surprise when the Gannagens gave him wary looks instead of moving toward the chairs. "Sit. Unless, of course," he went on in his casual tone, "you'd rather not. Jakko would be happy to escort you to the stablemaster's quarters instead. Trespassing? You'd get, let's see, twenty-four bells in holding and a triple-wage fine? But then, back to your productive lives as normal."

He smiled at them.

They sat.

"Excellent," Drunnel said, clapping his palms to the desk. "Jak, stop looming. Now, let me clarify whatever skewed impressions you may have of us. Jak and I are agents from the Franken Histology Foundation, or FHF, in Arrkagongol district down south. With the Cormellican Institute. I hear you're familiar with that area?"

"Cormellican, yes," Challis said, a little too darkly. Beside her, Rasalas' boot twitched like it wanted to kick her.

"Of course." Drunnel was smooth, smooth as it comes. Oledrocca to the core. "The FHF assigned us to the Exhibition you put on here in Polescos. Normally, FHF agents attend these events to discuss logistics and advances in pterosaur cultivation, and to upkeep a healthy affiliation with all circles of floxogelenical value in Oedolos. Your father, in fact," he gestured, "was a well-known name to us until your, ah, change of fortune some years ago."

Neither Gannagen moved. Drunnel tapped his fingers, the first sign of nervousness, and pushed on.

"The FHF is looking to hire some operatives for an excursion in two cycles, specifically those above the age of twenty-one and with some experience handling animals. Big animals."

Challis tugged down her hammering heart and asked, "What kind of experience?"

"Just basic knowledge of how to manage, handle, and simply behave around high-flux creatures bigger than you. Of course, for the more technical processes you will be provided all necessary instruction and training."

Challis and Rasalas glanced at each other and then away. She nodded. "Ah."

Drunnel leaned forward suddenly, rubbing his hands together.

"Have you ever heard of maccotons?"

Rasalas let out a short laugh. "Real ones?"

This time Challis' boot twitched. But Drunnel was grinning, a glint in his eye.

"Real, and wild."

The room went quiet. Slow shock seemed to rise up from the floorboards, stiffening the Gannagens' limbs before finally reaching their brains. Then it faded, uncomfortably, leaving behind only a cold sticky feeling.

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

Drunnel's voice had a slight tremble as if speaking past a laugh. "The FHF got news of a herd sighting just last cycle up on the Kelvidic coast. Maccoton herds only emerge from the swamplands every hundred years or so, if population explosions drive them apart. With the news of a dozen baby calves spotted with this herd, that seems to be the case."

He did chuckle then. "You should see your faces."

Rasalas, to regain some footing, spoke up again. "What's the excursion for?"

"We hope to acquire some maccotons alive for preliminary research, and they would be invaluable during the present floxogelene crisis. At this rate, even with cuffs and circunets, flux will soon become scarce enough to drop average lifespan, slow down resource production, and tax the health of everyone in the city. The pterosaurs are more aggressive than ever, death toll is up and there are signs of it getting worse. But," Drunnel thumped the table with a fist, "with maccotons, there's hope – more than hope. From up here in Polescos, the largest river in the rainforest is hardly two miles away. There sits only a wall of cliffs between it and us."

He looked back and forth between them, still enjoying their reactions. One's eyebrows had shot up, while the other's had frowned down.

"And?" Rasalas asked.

Drunnel's eyes flicked to Challis when she sucked in a breath. "The cliff," she said. "Maccotons. Water is the best flux conductor. We can bring that river to us."

"A reservoir," Drunnel said, giving her an approving nod.

Challis smiled. Drunnel's speech, his offer of something new, was rubbing sparks into a desire that had sat cold in a corner for years.

"They're huge, aren't they," Rasalas said unhappily, folding his arms to stare at the ground. "Monsters?"

They already knew the answer. There was a reason the maccoton had become myth.

"How many operatives are you hiring?" Challis asked instead.

"Upwards of a hundred, not including a score of officers," he answered promptly. "Mainly from Arrkagongol and Polescos districts. The FHF will fund the preparatory training for any number of candidates for the program, though provisions can only be made for a limited number on the expedition. And, I should mention, when we come back, those candidates will be expected to enroll in an introductory two-year association with the FHF as trainees."

Challis turned that last point over in her head. Whatever future mucking out the stalls had prepared her for, something as… pretentious, it seemed, as the Franken Histology Foundation itself had never occurred to her. With creatures that didn't exist.

Drunnel was watching her think. Rasalas was letting her think, but his head was slowly shaking back and forth at the floor. Decision, or disbelief. It might have been both.

"All we want," he said then, in a hard voice that tried to be convincing, "is to clear our hospital ledger."

The silence that followed was not an agreeable one.

"But, to clarify," Challis said finally. "If we join the program, the FHF covers the cost of preparatory training, whether or not we're even admitted after the two cycles?"

Drunnel winked. "Correct."

"And… if we are admitted, the success of the expedition means we enroll into the FHF."

"That's it. Those preliminary two years involve a payroll internship. Basic salary."

Rasalas' head snapped up, just two inches, but nobody in the room missed it.

Jakko stepped up next to the desk so he was no longer looming. Every movement, from his shifting weight to the way he lazily flexed his fingers and kept them near his belt, showed the Gannagens a feline grace that was as competent as it was dangerous. A windworking feline, Challis thought. Stronger than he looked and wearing a magic rope around his neck.

Rasalas was staring right at it. "Okay," he said warily. "What's the training for?"

Drunnel nodded, businesslike. "Two cycles of specialized instruction, maneuvers, capture techniques, and endurance training. The rainforest is a harsh environment for travel. We'll go on pterosaurs and mules, and have airborne and ground teams when we reach the plains. The Powder Ranch in Arrkagongol will provide the –"

Challis rose with a start, glaring at nothing. Both Haskes blinked at her in surprise, but Rasalas just braced himself.

"Mules?" Challis demanded.

The accident that took Maige Gannagen's life and flung the family headlong into debt had been six years ago. But given the shiver that ran through Challis and the sickening cold in her veins, it could have been yesterday.

"Yes, of course," Drunnel said slowly. "We'll be traversing the rainforest, and herding maccotons is hardly the same as herding pigs with a stick."

Jakko gave him a glance, furrowed with something like exasperation. But Challis just shook her head firmly. "I'm out."

"Chall," Rasalas said, his voice strained. "Just stop." He took her wrist and tried to pull her back into her seat.

"We'll sponsor thrike training, too." Jakko's tone was curt. "For anyone in the pterosaur program, from the windworkers down to the flux croppers."

The Gannagens looked at each other, dumbfounded.

Jakko had found them in the thrike stable, with windworking equipment, with an actual thrike. Despite not having cuffs, they were still dressed as croppers. Challis remembered each Haske's reaction to meeting her, as if they'd known everything about her. All but the little detail that the twins had been fired out of the pterosaur grounds just a few bells ago.

"Um," Rasalas began. "We… we can't do that either."

The room fell silent, until only the downdrafts in the distance could be heard. The Gannagens tried to make sense of the black looks coming from both FHF agents. Drunnel in particular had dropped the congenial attitude completely and regarded them with eyes of flint.

"I suggest," he said softly, "finding a solution to one or the other. This expedition will present a number of risks, and we demand a certain level of competence from our operatives. Failure at this stage does not bode well for you or anyone else involved."

Rasalas rose to his feet. He felt he should have done so earlier. That put him to height with Jakko, and even with Drunnel while the other was leaning back against the desk. Jakko was flexing his fingers next to his holster again. Nobody was quite meeting anyone else's eyes, but they were as tuned in to every movement as a roomful of cats.

Challis put a hand on Rasalas' arm. "We'll consider your offer," she said to the Haskes, stressing the last word. "It's a lot to think about. When do the training courses begin?"

"Thirty-six bells," said Drunnel. "Register before then and we won't have to take more… drastic measures. Your Raffar, Trent Gannagen – he is still in good health?"

A cold wriggle in Challis' stomach stopped her breath for a moment. Beside her, she heard Rasalas respond.

She interrupted, sharply, voice uncharacteristically loud. "What? What did you say?"

Drunnel's smile had returned, just like that. At least, his teeth were showing. "Just a question, my dear Challis. But consider it carefully."

Rasalas took her elbow in a hard clamp and started pulling her backward toward the door. Nobody stopped them.

"Why?" Challis asked.

"Because," Drunnel said, the flint back. "We need you."