The day following the expedition in Slagelse, several of both vessels’ Officers and Engineers found themselves gathered inside of Captain Gerig’s office. The pink teenaged unicorn was sitting behind his desk, chin resting on one hoof in a pensive manner as his Chief Engineer gave a presentation on potential modifications they could do to their barge carrier. As much as he loathed admitting it, Erik had been far quicker to accommodate to his transformation than he himself was despite the centaur mare’s injured status. Bandages were wrapped around his shoulder, the white fabric barely visible beneath his clothes; and his broken wrist was plastered.

Gerig still couldn’t wrap his mind around the fact that one: he had turned into a mare; and two: now he had to interact with objects using his mind. Seeing objects levitate around him at his command kept throwing him off regardless of how much he exercised with the ability. Him shrinking to the size of a large dog didn’t help his mood either.

Erik on the other hoof (hoof? He meant to think hand…) had seemingly managed to push most of the implications of his own changes to the back of his mind and hurry along with resizing a couple of his clothes for his new centaur body. The humanoid half was rather easy to dress as it was effectively just a smaller human upper body. The equine half though couldn’t just be clothed with refitted human attire due to its sheer size (unlike unicorns and batponies who could adjust a set of coveralls to fit their new frame). What his Chief Engineer had come up with was apparently called a dress sheet, something horse handlers dressed their horses in for competitions. Erik had copied the pattern and used it on some salvaged bits of nomex fabric to keep his quadruped body semi-decent.

And now the red skinned centaur was standing next to the office’s projector screen which was showing a cross section of the Rhine Forest.

“So this modification would remove the two foremost lighter stacks and replace them with containers. The cell guides we already have in place for the lighters would be supplemented by additional ones to make up a holding structure to easily keep them secured.”

“So that’s extra cargo?” Dilip interrupted.

“Not exactly.” Erik shook his head, one of his large ears twitching. He flicked a finger towards some passageways on the cross section. “My intention was to have these containers be used as modular compartments, at least for the bottom layers. The containers would be stowed sideways on, that’s two of them across the width of the ship. They would be connected to passageways on the sides and in the center of the vessel, which also come with connector pieces for water, electricity and firefighting systems. The passageways also allow us to access the cargo inside of the containers while at sea, which we currently cannot do with the most of our barges. By my measurements, that would grant the Rhine Forest a capacity of 144 forty-foot containers, or 288 TEU with a maximum load of 4200 net tons worth of cargo.”

“That’s nice and all.” Schmitt said with a frown. “Also solves your need for an armory while leaving options for additional berthing, workshops or anything you may want. But how do you intend to make it feasible?”

“First priority goes to building a watertight bulkhead between the barge section and the potential container racks, ideally with a cofferdam, double layer structure and bilge pumps. That’s the biggest part of the change after the passageways for the containers, the cell guides should be easy to make. I don’t foresee a need to change the ballast system or any negative impact on stability from the containers, but we may have to load more ballast on the fore end to compensate for changes in trim. The structure for the passageways is not that complicated either, but we will need to use a lot of rubber seals to prevent water ingress inside of the new compartments.”

“What if the water flows below the containers?” Dilip asked.

“The barge stowage sections already have vacuum pumps to evacuate water egress; the sheer capacity they can put out is enough to get us through the roughest of storms.” Gerig told the Indian.

“As he said.” Erik said before moving on to the next slide, one that showed a drawing of the Rhine’s gantry crane. “Now, since I doubt we can expect shore cranes to remain in working order, I also have plans for a modification to our crane system that would outfit it with a foldable extension on either side of the gantry. This, combined with a spreader piece on the crane should make it possible to lift containers, be they loaded on barges or on the quays next to the ship.” The centaur told his audience, pointing to highlighted drawings above the crane’s structure. “Now, the modular containerized compartments are one thing, and provided the plans are given the green light I will then move on to drafting the work procedure for their installation and a list of the required parts and materials. There is one more thing though. Amadi?” Erik asked another centaur, this one a stallion.

Said centaur stallion was the chief of Rhine Forest’s barge department and, just like Erik, a pony based centaur (contrarily to some other centaurs that had a deer half). Stallions were about the same size as mares for this species in particular, but with a stockier equine half and a distinctly more masculine humanoid half (in spite of the mares’ lack of breasts on their humanoid half). Amadi also had a pair of horns just above his large mobile ears, one of which he was currently rubbing pensively. The Liberian’s skin tone had turned from black to a dull red, which combined with his grey ‘mane’ and coat to make him appear older than his actual 34 years of age.

“Yes, I also have some potential modifications to present.” He told the assembled Officers as he walked up next to Erik and moved on to his part of the PowerPoint. It showed pictures of several small crafts: patrol boats, trawlers and even a hovercraft. All those pictures were laid next to a general drawing of the Rhine Forest.

“I believe we can go even further than what Erik here has proposed.” He began. “As you all know, we have a small fleet of six tugboats to manipulate and tow our cargo barges once they’re down in the water. My idea was to further extend that fleet of boats…” He pointed to the slide. “… with auxiliary crafts that would be able to fulfill any task we may need to do, while also having more range than the tugboats. Now, it’s not as simple as it sounds, our tugs’ hulls are designed in such a way that they can be lifted and set down safely without sustaining damage to their structure. Extending that to other vessels is no small matter, but I have already drafted several ideas that may make this viable.” He told them.

The centaur continued the presentation with the next slide, one that showed a drawing of a patrol boat held in place by what looked like a large cradle with floats, hooks for the crane and a simple pump system. Another drawing next to it showed the same boat but with the hooks on the deck and a… structure of sorts below the waterline that was supposed to keep it upright when the crane stowed it on board. The latter system was quickly rejected, but both Captains showed a lot of interest towards the concept in spite of how outlandish it may have seemed. Amadi’s idea even went further than just equipping the barge carrier with a fleet of small crafts when he showed them potential plans for a refueling system that would allow them to do fuel transfers with the small crafts without having to lift them onboard or rig a potentially leaky hose. It was really just an adaptation of navy transfer systems for replenishment at sea, but it had potential.

Shortly after the two centaurs' presentation, the assembled Officers devolved into a discussion on how to make it possible. Dilip was quick to offer Amandine’s crew assistance towards helping build those modifications which would be far more extensive than the workshop and armory they had built back in Antwerp. A lot of arguing concerned the acquisition of the resources needed to make the changes, as well as the boats Amadi wanted to add to the Rhine’s complement. The ships in particular would be far harder to acquire than regular parts and shipbuilding-grade steel.

They did eventually come to an agreement on the modifications, regardless of how large the endeavor would be. Someone even brought up the idea on how the Maersk HQ may have some intel on the location of shipbuilding components.

Before the assembled Officers had time to scatter, Dilip stood up and rasped his throat.

“There is one more announcement that needs to be made I believe.” He began. “It is something everyone on Amandine already knows, but I needed to ask for approval from our… secret contractor so to speak, before revealing it.”

Looks of recognition immediately appeared in the eyes of Amandine’s Officers while those of the Rhine Forest only sported a puzzled look. Were they not supposedly alone on earth now? So why was he speaking of a ‘contractor’ all of a sudden?

“This is something that involves an offshoot of the UN Security Council, a secretive organization going by the name of Human Preservation Initiative. That’s HPI for short.”

“Lemme guess.” Erik drawled. “Super secret group that survived the apocalypse by hiding in a bunker?”

“Basically. They didn’t get away with it completely unscathed, that much Angelo here can tell you. I could drag on for a while about them but passing you the memo will be shorter. What we did for them is helping them shut down the European nuclear grid and things progressed from there.” Dilip explained. “We have a contract with them now, we provide items they can’t get because they’re stuck inside their bunker, and they manufacture parts for us in exchange.”

“At least that’s the idea. We’re still waiting to make our first delivery.” Alejandro added. “They also gave us administrator access to several satellite services, mostly for weather, military-grade GPS and to locate survivors by tracking down satellite users.”

“And was it successful?”

“We have yet to try out the tracking.” Dilip admitted with a shrug. “Main thing is: there is a group of human survivors in America, and another somewhere in Asia, with which we sort of have a trade agreement. I asked them if I could bring your crew up to snuff with that, and they let us. One of their agents may soon contact you via satcom, but not a single word is to be said about them to other survivors if we find any, got it? I’ll send the memo once I get back to my office.”

Gerig crossed his forehooves and stared down pensively at his desk, a white strand from his mane falling down in front of the small unicorn’s blue eyes.

“That’s a game changer you’ve dropped on us there…” He muttered. “You do realize…”

“… How risky it can be to trust a secret group like that, yes. But the ability to trade art pieces -among other things- for parts could save us in the long run.” Dilip said.

The teenaged mare in a pilot shirt lifted his eyes towards the Indian. He could see the rest of his Officers behind Dilip, all of them with puzzled looks. He would have to address that later.

“At least you’re aware of that. What kind of stuff do they have you retrieve?”

“Art pieces are the most lucrative of all; they want to preserve human culture as best as they can, or so they said. We’ve got two TEU worth of paintings right now, and one sealed FEU with prototypes from a lost facility in France. They also value data banks, archives, and raw materials to a lesser extent. At least that’s the case for the contract they had us sign, I have no idea whether or not they’re going to offer such a deal to you.”

And that’s something they indeed would have to wait to figure out. In the meantime, the Engineering Officers of both vessels split off to go discuss the future modifications while the Deck Officers left to begin the daily expeditions around Copenhagen. There was a lot of work to be done, and today was also when they wanted to hit the big targets like the Maersk HQ and the UN City, in addition to doing some training.

A few minutes later, Vadim found himself inside of Rhine Forest’s infirmary with their doctor. The griffon had begrudgingly accepted his fate and went on with the advanced medical training under the French hippogriff’s tutelage. She had given the poor Ukrainian a lot of medical texts to wade through and study, and she also didn’t hesitate to question him at every turn to test his knowledge.

On the bright side, turns out he wasn’t that bad either. The single fact of knowing his medical abilities weren’t abysmally low at least managed to raise the grey falcon griffon’s morale, if only by a small margin.

“And this blood group you claim you discovered?” Camille asked. The doctor seemed particularly insistent on everyone calling her by her first name.

The information didn’t go only one way either. Vadim had a lot of medical notes and research he had made during the last few weeks to share with her, which made it so that his knowledge of post-Event species was better than Camille’s. His own notes on blood groups and medical parameters were a significant help towards the treatment of Rhine’s injured crewmembers.

“Group C as I called it, yes. As I said, I have yet to find an individual that doesn’t share the same group as the rest of the species he has turned into. In your case, I have found hippogriffs to be AC. The marker C, I have also found in group BC on gargoyles and group C on the sole unicorn I sampled.” Vadim told her.

“But by A and B…”

“I mean the very same A and B found on humans, yes.” The griffon said, drumming his talons on Camille’s desk. “I have done compatibility tests with blood samples I retrieved from a military clinic in Zeebrugge, and the blood was indeed transfusable without incident.”

“But so far, your sources only come from an admittedly small sample group. We need to extend that testing to the crew of Rhine Forest, and the same goes for medical parameters.”

“My data on those isn’t complete to begin with.” Vadim said. “I only have a few species so far, but the values are still widely different from humans. Look at the heartbeat of a resting griffon, the dual heart structure alone makes for completely different results.” He waved a talon above his notes.

“A resting griffon indeed. Do you have any values for parameters during and after physical exercises?”

“Not yet I’m afraid. I had the tests planned, but not the time to do them.” Vadim apologized.

Adapting Camille’s knowledge to the vast array of species that composed the crews would prove to be a difficult, lengthy process. Vadim’s talons had only managed to scratch the surface of an entirely new field of medicine, and even Camille was out of her field of expertise if she was honest. A lot of testing had to be scheduled, even though they were still limited by the equipment they had on claw. Camille should be able to do some more extensive blood tests, but nowhere near as much as what a shore lab would be able to, unless…

“So you want to raid a hospital?” Vadim asked.

“Not yet, neither mine nor your infirmary has the room for the equipment I have in mind.” Camille answered. The orange hippogriff was busily taking notes on her computer, all the while she had some manuals open on her desk. She flicked her head to get her blue crest feathers out of her eyes, an annoyed trill escaping her nostrils. “Those modifications they have planned, surely I can request a container or two to fit a lab when it’s done… Oh, and a MRI scanner too, we’ll need complete imagery to know what’s inside if we want to do our work correctly!” She added as an afterthought.

“I wouldn’t hurry too much with the imaging if I were you. Those modifications they have planned certainly won’t be done overnight, that much I can tell you.” Vadim warned her.

For all the good that warning did. The doctor waved away the Ukrainian’s remark and told him it was of no importance. With ideas already written down for her laboratory, Camille moved on to giving him his first lessons on medical treatments, the hippogriff beginning a long-winded rant on trauma to the digestive track and possible techniques for treatment.

A few meters away from the doctor’s office, still inside the infirmary, one patient was waking up. Of all the casualties that occurred after the reappearance of the Rhine, Sebastien Wouters might have been the unluckiest of all. The Belgian cadet’s injuries had resulted in him falling unconscious from the blood loss, thus completely missing most of the Event except for the scant few seconds that preceded the accident that brought him to the infirmary.

On the bright side, he wouldn’t be as roughly shaken as the rest of the crew; on the other hoof he had yet to discover the transformation wasn’t just a weird fever dream of his. And that very discovery was just about to occur as the parameters shown on the medical monitor he was hooked up to rose slowly.

Large eyelids fluttered groggily, revealing a pair of magenta eyes to the world. His mind was still foggy, trying to piece together what had happened and what were the blurry shapes surrounding him. His body felt odd, the sensations coming from his limbs… unnatural. Moreover he was completely sapped of any form of strength. A dull ache in his side and the telltale beeping of a heart monitor soon told him he had been injured, and brought to an infirmary, if not to a hospital. The tube he felt in his throat also told him he had been intubated.

He closed his eyes again. Opening them felt way too strenuous at the moment. He tried to focus on the conflicting sensations he was getting from his body. His ears felt odd, he was pretty sure they shouldn’t be twitching every time he heard something; and he couldn’t feel his fingers. He desperately tried to flex them, believing for an instant that whatever had sent him to the hospital had robbed him of his hands.

The motion, or rather the attempt at one, sent a tremor through his body which made the pain in his side spike abruptly. His eyes flew open and he let out a gasp which sounded more like a high-pitched whinny than anything he was used to hear from himself.

His whinny must have attracted some attention because not a second later he heard some rustling and mumbling close by. Blurry shapes clustered around him, with one prominent grey and blue one coming to his bedside. He felt a hand stroke the top of his head, but the touch felt odd, as if whoever owned the appendage hadn’t clipped their nails in years. His hair felt a lot longer than it had any right to be too, had he been out for so long? Still, the touch felt good and the grey blur made soothing noises to calm him down. He allowed his eyes to close once more.

“Seb’?” He heard. He recognized the voice as that of Carla, but the timbre felt different, rougher. Did his girlfriend take up smoking or something?

He tried to croak out an answer, but his parched, blocked throat only allowed him to release a groaning sound.

“Carla, that’s no good. You can clearly see she’s out cold.” He heard another voice say. That one belonged to one of the engine cadets, Frederik, the youngest of them.

Sebastien let out another groan to contradict the German, the effort feeling as if he was gargling drill bits. And did he just call him ‘she’?

“Shhh, don’t do that.” Carla told him, not stopping her stroking. “We’ll get you some water; that ought to make you feel better.”

“Your medical know-how astounds me.” Frederik said sarcastically.

“Shut your trap and go get the doctor Fred.” Carla told the other cadet icily.

“Yeah yeah, fine. No need to get angry over something like that. You get to tell him what happened, I’m sure she will like it.”

Sebastien heard the German walk away. His girlfriend let out an annoyed huff, hand wrapping around a lock of his hair (which shouldn’t be possible, he had never worn his hair that long).

“He’s right though…” Carla sighed, switching to Dutch. “Seb’, do you remember something err… bizarre happening before you lost consciousness? Just nod if something like uh, I don’t know… your fingers disappearing happened.”

They did. One moment he was working a winch, and the next thing he knew his fingers lost grip on the brake lever and everything spiraled out of control. He nodded feebly, the muscles in his neck still feeling like putty, but a dreadful feeling was starting to build up in his gut. Was he a cripple now?

“You were injured…” Carla explained. “Fell unconscious from blood loss, so it’s natural you wouldn’t remember anything of what happened…”

Oh no…

“Seb’, do you believe in time travel?”

Wait what?

His girlfriend must have sensed in confusion because he felt her hand stop stroking his hair for a second.

“I swear it’s not a prank.” She said. “We… sort of travelled a few weeks ahead in time. It’s mid-June now. But… you’ve got to see this to believe it. Can you try not to panic?”

He nodded.

“Open your eyes, slowly. But please stay calm; we’re all victims in this situation.”

What was she getting at? Victims? Sebastien struggled to open his eyes, everything around him was still a blur but he forced himself to focus and keep his eyes open until the fog cleared. He could recognize the blurry room he was in as Rhine Forest’s infirmary, and he was on his back in one of the beds, the curtains drawn around it and one grey and blue blur by his side. He slowly turned his head towards it, noting in passing that there were two dark red things in his vision, one above his eyes, and the other, larger, beneath. He forced himself to focus on the shape from where his girlfriend’s distorted voice had come, the image gradually becoming clearer.

The image becoming clearer didn’t make it any easier to comprehend. Instead of the tanned figure of his girlfriend, what he saw was some sort of quadruped avian creature dressed in the company’s usual set of white coveralls. The creature had the head of a seabird (a cormorant probably? He wasn’t sure) and was covered in grey feathers. A mane (or crest maybe) of blue feathers sat on top its head (or hers? Was this Carla?) head, which were the same color as the two eyes that were staring at him in sympathy. A pair of long, mobile feathery ears occupied the sides of its angular head which ended in a dark grey beak with a downward hook at its tip.

“Yes, it’s me, Carla.” The creature told him softly, catching on his confusion.

Then why was the back of his mind telling him ‘dude’ when he looked at her?

“Seb’…” She began slowly. “I’m not the only one that has changed like that. Everyone has. Fred’s like me, a hippogriff now…” She stood up (up until now she had been sitting on her haunches in a chair) and turned sideways for Seb to get a good look at her before sitting back down.

Wait like the hippogriffs in Harry Potter? They weren’t that colorful in the movie last he checked!

“Please, I want you to take this slowly. You transformed, like everyone. In fact you’re the same species as the Captain. A unicorn.” She told him. “Do not panic.”

Carla pressed a button on the side of his bed which made his head rise. Strands of spiky royal blue hair fell down on the edge of his vision, and Sebastien finally got a look at himself. If the creature claiming to be his girlfriend was right then the unicorn he had become was much smaller than he used to be: the bed around him felt gigantic. Above the white bed sheets, he could see two dark red furry limbs which ended in hooves. One was connected to an IV at the… elbow probably (if it was even called that anymore), and the other had a medical armband wrapped tightly around it that connected to the heart rate and blood pressure monitor above his bed.

She wrapped one grey claw around his hoof and gave it a gentle squeeze, the hippogriff bearing a soft smile on her beak (and how that was even possible, he had no clue). He could still feel her other claw stroking his head, the blue strands of hair on the edge of his vision rustling as she made swirling motions with the appendage.

“See? No need to be alarmed just yet. You’re a tough guy right? Nothing like that can get to you.” She reassured him. “Do you want to see your face?”

Sebastien forced a weak nod.

His girlfriend pulled out a phone out of her coveralls’ pocket, the sight of the item immediately erasing any doubt he had left that the hippogriff might not be Carla. No one else he knew had that graffiti pattern on their phone’s case, because she had painted it herself. She turned on her phone’s camera and pointed the screen at Sebastien.

On the small screen, an equine face with a short, softly curved muzzle stared back at him. Two large magenta eyes looked on in surprise, each of them having prominent eyelashes. At one point on his forehead, the dark red fur that covered his face traded place with royal blue, the hair lengthening in a spiky mane far longer than he had ever worn his hair. A small, soft-tipped horn poked out of that mess of an haircut on his forehead (hence Carla calling him a unicorn); and finally two large ears sat on top of his head, each the same dark red as the rest of his new coat of fur.

And by the appearance of the features on his face, one thought was nibbling at the back of his mind that Fred might have had a reason behind calling him a ‘she’. Still mute thanks in no small part to the tube in his throat, the injured Belgian conveyed to his girlfriend he wanted to pull off the sheets that covered the rest of his body.

“Are you sure you want to do that? There is no hurry you know…” She hesitated, eyes glancing in the direction of Doc Delacroix’s office. Fred was really starting to take his time.

Sebastien made an insistent noise.

Resigning herself to having to soothe a soon-to-be very distressed boyfriend, she reluctantly pulled the sheets off of Sebastien’s body in one swift motion.

The wounded unicorn’s eyes trailed down his transformed body in wonder. Bandages covered his barrel, but he was otherwise naked. Going past the bandages, his eyes landed on something he was pretty sure shouldn’t be there.

For he was damn certain he wasn’t supposed to have teats between his legs. The sinking feeling he had in his gut started mounting rapidly as his eyes scanned desperately for his dick, not finding it anywhere between his legs. He spotted a catheter tube filled with yellow liquid connected to a bag on the bed’s frame, his eyes followed the tube in hopes of finding it.

But the tube just dove between his furry thighs…

The final pieces of the puzzle clicked together in his mind, all thoughts grinding to a sudden abrupt halt.

“I’m so sorry Seb…” Carlas whispered, her claw squeezing his hoof.

Sebastien fainted.

While the Rhine’s cadets were having some transformation-induced drama, the rest of the personnel around the docks were actually trying to get work done. Artyom had finished building his kill house inside of a commandeered warehouse, and he had requested his first batch of trainees for that day. This time, only Nikola had been available to help him, Sri being occupied with assembling a shooting range somewhere else on the docks to give some basic weapon training to the sailors of the Rhine Forest. Bart had joined them to provide some input, his English having significantly improved in a short span of time. The stallion still wasn’t grammatically correct most of the time (and that was putting it mildly) but he could manage to get his point across in a pinch.

Following an agreement with Alejandro, Artyom had promised he would spare some time to do firefighting and emergency response training after the combat part. The crew had to get accustomed to using their emergency equipment and SCBA’s with their new bodies, or the next accident that occurred on board would spell their doom.

Thus now the blue dragon found himself staring down at a rat maze of a kill house from his position on top of a makeshift scaffolding walkway. The position allowed him to keep track of the group inside the plywood structure he had made for their training. Large sheets of plexiglass had been added as a transparent roof to keep the smoke in once they moved on to firefighting training, or just to keep stray shots from escaping the training area (they were only training with their FN 303’s, not with live guns, naturally).

Yes, he knew that was a wasteful use of plexiglass but he had found a couple containers of two-meters-by-three sheets and he would be damned if he didn’t put them to some use.

The structure he had come up with had been kept simple for the sake of the crew’s status as novices: not too complicated or with too many angles to watch out for, but with as many possibilities as he could think of off the top of his head to highlight certain types of approach. He had even gone the extra mile and made two different staircases and an ‘upper floor’ to force them to think vertically.

Not too shabby for something he had put together in one day.

The rooms and hallways were willingly kept narrow to mimic a ship’s interior. Lacking the time to do it and not seeing an added benefit to it, Artyom had kept himself from placing furniture inside except for the mannequins that served as their training targets. The sailors inside had been given simple instructions about it: red paint on the mannequin meant bad guy, blue was for non-combatants, and green for VIP when the exercise called for it.

Right now, he was simply having them walk through an exercise with red targets. Nikola was inside the maze, the gargoyle trailing behind the group of three sailors they were training and giving them instructions on how to make their approach properly.

“Learn fast.” Bart commented next to him, seeing one sailor shoot the first target in their path.

That first sailor was Ivan, the female osprey griffon that usually kept watch alongside Geert when they were at sea. The Ukrainian’s approach was correct, if a bit slow. His marksmanship left a bit to be desired, two of the three shots he fired out of his pistol at the target missing, but he was a beginner at this kind of training. Behind him, Danny and Nguyen followed; the parrot and the cat sweeping the corners with their own weapons, the carbine variants of the 303.

“Their basics in firefighting must translate reasonably well.” Artyom guessed. Damage control did train them in moving through enclosed spaces like that. “Oi! Keep someone watching your six!” He yelled at them, seeing all three trainees start to focus their aim in the same direction.

Danny was the one to react at that remark, gun swiveling to aim at the door they had entered from. The yellow feathered female parrot was clad in the usual orange coveralls of Amandine’s crew, with a flak jacket on and a pair of protective goggles. They didn’t need to wear hearing protection yet, not until they started using stun grenades for entry exercises.

Said parrot crewmember had quite a few ongoing rumors surrounding her recently. If the ratings’ grapevine was to be believed, she was at the moment the sailor that had gotten the most ‘daring ‘with her changes, so to speak. That or the story of her supposed one night stand with Carlos was complete bullshit. Artyom had a hard time believing the electrician could have managed to convince a formerly macho, middle-aged Filipino like Danny to ‘give it a try’. Her behavior hadn’t changed that drastically following their reappearance.

And yet there were multiple tales of Danny having been seen exiting Carlos’ room. Granted, the Russian vet’s refusal to believe the story was also linked to him having bet a couple bottles of liquor that Micha and Vadim would be the first couple to go at it.

“See something?” Bart asked him.

“Uh… No. Why the question?” Artyom said.

“Look on your face.” The unicorn shrugged.

“Just thinking is all, nothing important.” The Russian said.

Of the three sailors in the current batch of trainees, Nguyen might have been the least enthusiastic of them despite being the only one to have actually faced monsters. Artyom didn’t blame the brown furred cat for that; he was just a cook after all. In fact he’d consider himself pretty stupid to hold any of his fellow sailors to military standards, they weren’t soldiers. He only wished to train them enough that they would not accidentally shoot a friendly if backed into a CQB situation.

The dragon’s grip tightened around the walkway’s railing. He would not lose any of his shipmates to monsters.

“I have one idea.” Bart proposed as they watched Nguyen engage the targets in the next room, the cat making a decent effort of using the doorframe as cover. “Do you know…” He hesitated. “… Combat sports? Karate, Judo?” He asked him, making a chopping motion with his hoof for emphasis.

“Martial arts you mean?” Artyom quirked a scaled eye ridge at the blue unicorn. “I used to practice Systema in the military, but I haven’t done any since ’95. You want an expert in martial arts, ask Alejandro.”

Bart gave him an inquisitive look.

“The Chief Officer.” He explained. “He practices Brazilian Jiu-jitsu, should be able to come up with something if you ask nicely.”

“Bayonets maybe?” Bart proposed.

“That we can do.” Artyom nodded. “I’ll ask Niko and by the end of this training we can spare some time to show them some close range techniques to fend off melee attackers. That good for you?”

The stallion nodded. Nearly every monster they had met with the exception of the electric mites attacked in melee, so they’d better teach their shipmates some techniques to fend off attacks like that.

Down in the kill house, the trio attempted to make a coordinated entry into the next room. Keyword being attempted: Danny accidentally brought his clawed foot down on Ivan’s tail which made the griffon release a piercing squawk. Both of them tripped and fell down in a heap. Behind them, Nguyen didn’t catch on immediately and failed to see his sprawled colleagues since he already had his carbine shouldered and aimed.

On the bright side he didn’t fall. The downside was that the cat already had one clawed digit on the trigger in blatant disrespect of rule three. Him stumbling on his downed teammates made him press the trigger by accident, hitting everything but the target and landing a nice shot in the middle of Danny’s back (and it was at that precise moment that said parrot decided never to remove the Kevlar plates from her flak jacket again).

Artyom pinched the top of his muzzle between two claws and let out a long, drawn-out sigh.

“Will be long day uh…” Bart said.

And what an understatement this would be.

That day’s expedition to the UN City and the Maersk HQ did yield a lot of intelligence of all sorts. Both buildings were nothing particular to look at save for the UN building’s modern architecture and a collection of Maersk ship models (one of which found a place inside Captain Gerig’s office), but the information they got was a treasure trove of sorts.

The fruits of their research had been brought inside of Amandine’s cafeteria for processing. Roberto was among the three poor souls that were tasked with wading through and sorting all the documentation, with the assistance of the Rhine’s own secretary, a female gargoyle (as in: an actual female, not a former dude) going by the name of Monika, and their Logistics Officer, a cat called Bandile that had white fur with a black spot on his throat.

And even with the three of them it was no small task. The recovery teams had been thorough. Rahul had brought them coffee from the confines of his kitchen, and much as he disliked the Indian dog, Roberto was forced to acknowledge they would need it to sift through the mountainous pile of data.

The UN branches located in Copenhagen seemed all focused on humanitarian purposes and a lot of the data they had retrieved contained guides on the development of settlements, agriculture, basic infrastructure as well as how to assist developing populations. They also found some data on medical assistance from the WHO and UNICEF branches, the latter appearing to be a particularly prominent agency in Copenhagen. Several document referred to the supply division’s depot within the city, but weirdly enough none referred to the exact location of the building as if it didn’t even need to be mentioned. This frustrated the trio to no end as they worked their way through the documents; they knew the depot would hold some precious resources they could use and both Captains had been very clear that finding its location should take priority.

Roberto slammed his empty mug of coffee down on the table with an annoyed hiss. This was the fifth document in a row he was reading that mentioned the target but he still hadn’t found the tiniest clue!

“Frustrated?” Monika commented wrily.

The gargoyle was busy processing the data from the Maersk HQ, which was a lot less obscure and much quicker to sort through. Most of that data was already sorted by the company anyway so they only had to upload it on the ship’s server. The team in charge of the modifications to the Rhine had even already claimed all of the files regarding shipbuilding from Maersk’s former shipyard in Odense. Local intelligence files had suffered the same fate, the team being in need of quickly locating the materials needed for the modifications.

Funnily enough, female gargoyles like Monika seemed to be bulkier than males, which gave them a matronly silhouette. They did have breasts, but their mane (ashen grey in Monika’s case) didn’t extend to their neck like males. Oddly enough, they had antlers like the males but lacked a tail. The feminine features on their muzzle were unmistakable, the angles more rounded than on males. The pinkish skin on Monika’s muzzle traded place with a tan coat of fur somewhere around her neck.

“I just can’t seem to find that bloody depot!” Roberto complained. “You got any luck on your side?” He asked Bandile, the other cat being also busy with the UN files.

“Can’t say I have.” Bandile hissed. “It just doesn’t make any sense…”

“Damn right it doesn’t.” Roberto sniffed. “It’s like they don’t even think it’s worth mentioning at all. A depot full of humanitarian supplies and containerized units, but no fucking address!”

The Italian stood up to go set down the files he had been reading in the pile they had made for anything related to medicine. Just a couple more operational procedures and equipment lists from the WHO. Their collection of development aid manuals was growing quickly; at this rate they would have no trouble learning how to grow crops of their own if they wished to.

Roberto grabbed a new stack of documents and moved closer to the window where Rahul had set down a thermos of coffee earlier. After refilling his cup, the cat stopped a second to look at the landscape of the docks around the docks, his eyes landing on a white building off in the distance.

“Can you guys come over here for a second please?” He asked the other two in the cafeteria.

Monika and Bandile gave him a weird stare but otherwise complied silently, not really knowing what the Italian was getting at.

“I will have you know, I like to think of myself as a clever person. Today however, I do declare solemnly that we three have reached the rank of utter fucking idiots.” He announced, still not turning away from the window.

“Hey! Watch what you’re say-“ Bandile protested angrily before Roberto interrupted him with a soft tut-tut, one digit raised.

Roberto lowered the digit to point towards a building on the edge of the docklands. Monika and Bandile squinted for a second before their faces fell in embarrassment.

“Fine… We are idiots.” Bandile admitted while Monika just slumped down in a chair.

On the edge of the docklands, in perfect sight of both the ships and the UN city, was a large warehouse with the UNICEF logo emblazoned on it.

A couple floors above, the Captains were having a discussion around a cup of Dilip’s favorite blend of tea. The topic was nothing too serious; just idle talk for the two of them to confront their ideas against each other. They were sitting in couches around the coffee table in the Indian’s office, the seats normally being used when Dilip had to give presentations in his office.

“That’s some good tea Prateek.” Gerig complimented Amandine’s Captain, the pink unicorn holding the teacup in his telekinesis.

“I’m always on the lookout for good blends but Darjeeling always will be my first pick.” The pariah dog said, taking a sip himself. “But please… just call me Dilip.”

“Call me Raimund then.” Gerig told him. “There was one thing I was thinking about when they brought in the data from the UN building…” He began.

Dilip motioned for him to go on with his paw.

“We know people will start reappearing, correct?”

“Indeed, no clue how fast exactly but they do seem to reappear.”

“And now we have a lot of humanitarian data, and soon aid supplies. You also claim to have access to extensive satellite services…”

“… and you probably will as well.” Dilip completed.

“Irrelevant at the moment. What I mean is, do you think we should look into locating survivors more? Our ships give us access to the entire planet basically, and with this data, surely we can lend assistance to a great many colonies as well.” Raimund said.

“I’m not saying we shouldn’t…”

“Come on now! We have everything to gain from survivors getting back on their feet -or hooves, paws, whatever fits- quickly.”

“Do go on.” Dilip said, leaning back slightly.

“Think about it. We find a group, help them set up their colony, train them, and then we can start rebuilding the industry!” The unicorn claimed.

“The industry? You sure you’re not reaching a bit far there?”

“Not at all. Think about everything we need to run our ships. Food, fuel, parts.” He listed. “Food being the most basic of all, we only have to help a couple groups and they will soon be ready to give us their surplus food if we teach them how to grow crops with the manuals we have. I don’t know about you, but I sure appreciate fresh food in my plate. Go further, find certain groups of skilled survivors, train them, and restart an oil refinery, a factory, anything!”

“Sounds ambitious.” Dilip commented. “We’d have to find the survivors first.”

“Not a matter of ‘if’, only ‘when’.” Raimund told him. “You and I both know how important shipping is to the world, and we have the ships to bring these colonies anything they may and will need. One colony making a lot of food? A little surplus for us, the rest to supply more industrial colonies.”

“Are you saying we should start an empire?”

“A trading company.” The mare corrected him. “Trade is what makes civilizations thrive. We can either choose to lie down and have civilization collapse into isolated, backwater settlements or…”

“…Save what we can. Have those who come back find something noteworthy.” Dilip finished for him.

“Noteworthy? I can tell it won’t be just like before the Event, but give us some credit at least. We have to do this; you know we can’t subsist forever on salvaged resources. At one point or another, we will need manufactured goods, and if we don’t plan ahead I bet that HPI of yours will rob us on their prices.” Raimund said as he tapped a small hoof against the coffee table to make his point.

“That’s one thing. We still have to locate survivors you know, baby steps I’d say, baby steps.”

Raimund straightened up on his haunches a bit. In his rant, a strand of white hair from his mane had escaped the rubber band he was using to keep it behind his head.

“Which makes me think, we have all those satellite services, telecomms to attempt locating them but nobody has the time to do it with all the work we already have piling up on our collective back.” He raised his muzzle to stare right in Dilip’s eyes, the gaze in his baby blue eyes disturbingly intense coming from a teenaged mare. “Except for your latest rescuee, that is.”

“Not a bad idea.” Dilip admitted. “From what she told me, she has a bachelor degree, so she’s far from unskilled. If I fashion her a workstation, maybe in her cabin, I can probably have her comb through every available network and scan satellite pictures. Won’t be enough though, but I may have an idea to help with that.”

“Entertain me.” The unicorn said, spreading out his forehooves.

“Remember the research data I have on monsters and the Event? The demonic circles?” The dog asked.

“Some neat files, rather well made. Why?”

“One of my intentions with those was to trade them to the HPI for extra credits, and maybe ask if they’re interested in the medical data on the species we’ve turned into as well since my Third Officer was looking into that too. Now… what if we traded that intel for the locations of survivors? I’m willing to bet they have several such locations in their database.”

“That might just work. How complete is the data?”

“For now? Sufficient that I can give them a first batch, but I still have much to do before I can call it complete.”

“Then we’ll try tomorrow when they call me.” Raimund nodded. “And you will give your new radio operator a workstation?”

“I will talk to her about it.” Dilip stated before serving himself a new cup of tea. “There is one more thing though…” He began hesitantly.

“You sound like you’re about to walk on burning coals.”

“I might as well since this matter involves you directly.” He told the other Captain flatly. “It’s something I have noticed occurring ever since our crews came across each other. This wasn’t a problem when it was only my ship because they knew each other before the change, but we’re starting to have some issues with the genderbent sailors.”

“Explain.”

The problem wasn’t in fact too complicated to notice. If sailors from one ship could be expected to know their shipmates and keep treating the genderbent sailors like their original gender, such wasn’t the case with other crews. Several -thankfully minor- incidents had already popped up when newly-made females took umbrage at being called Miss by a sailor from the other ship. This wasn’t helped by the fact that some minded way more than others and that, contrarily to Amandine, Rhine Forest had started off with a mixed crew that had actual females and even in one case, a female-to-male transformee.

All in all it made it extremely hard to keep track of how they were supposed to treat who. They couldn’t rely on sight to figure out what they were supposed to call the person they were talking to, and it was unlikely this issue would get better as they found more survivors. Not with the 25 to 35% genderswap rate they had measured so far.

Raimund slumped in his couch and started massaging his temples with his hooves. This wasn’t the kind of issue he wanted anything to do with, yet here he was, directly involved in it.

“I’m just saying…” Dilip said with a shrug.

“It’s fine. I understand.” Raimund sighed. He grabbed his cup of tea and downed it in one go, the still warm liquid from his latest refill burning its way down the mare’s throat.

“Frankly, I want to leave that decision up to you. You having had your gender swapped means they will respect the decision. I can’t justify making it on my own.”

“We’re sailors Dilip. We’re practical folks. They won’t like it… but I say we stop calling a parrot a dog because it can bark, so to say.” Raimund uttered slowly. “They won’t like it, I won’t like it, but it’s necessary for the sake of practicality.”

“So be it.” The pariah dog intoned with a soft nod. “Now, it’s getting late and I still have to approve several expedition plans. Hopefully our guys should have located the depots and supplies we want by now…” He said, standing up.

Raimund hopped off the couch as well, stopping for a second to adjust her clothes with her telekinesis. She did have her pilot shirt and a pair of elastic shorts adjusted for her frame and tail, but they were still pretty loose.

“Still got some work ahead of myself as well. Gotta review the results of my crew’s weapon training for today.” She said.

“I heard they did well enough, your group of vets made sure of that. Do you want to come by later for dinner? I know you’re stuck on a vegetarian diet but my Chief Cook has a pretty good coconut curry recipe.”

“Sure, why not?” The mare accepted. Good cuisine was never something to scoff at.

Author's Notes:

Yeah, sometimes looking outside your window beats any kind of research.

I've been trying to keep my chapter length more consistent as of recently. I think the 15-to-16-page format allows me to put enough scenes per chapter to bring the story forward, but what's your take?