The province of Sweden that was connected to Copenhagen by the tunnel was known as Skåne (or just Scania in English) county. It was the southernmost of all provinces in the country, and also used to be one of the most heavily populated before the Event struck. Its location at the very south of the country made it the de-facto breadbasket of the entire country, and it showed to the convoy of trucks now headed for the base Micha’s team had located two days earlier near a town called Revingehed.

Fields and meadows were what greeted them when they left the direct vicinity of Malmo, some having already been seeded prior to their farmers disappearing. The area was rather flat, with only a couple gently sloped hills that rose above the rest of the plains. They could see a couple copses of trees here and there, mostly present around abandoned farmsteads and villages. The only activity they detected for the entirety of the trip were herds of roaming cattle that gave them a wide berth and only resumed their grazing once the loud vehicles left the area. The bulls in particular eyed them warily as they posted themselves as a screen between the large trucks and the vulnerable herds behind them.

Honestly, how cows would fare after the Event was a coin toss. They were pretty big mammals to begin with and thus would not have many predators… but several breeds could not reproduce without veterinarian assistance anymore. None of them knew whether the Swedish breed they crossed path with was such a case, and only time would tell whether the herds would thrive or dwindle away if the cows started dying giving birth to their calves.

They carried on along the highway until they eventually had to veer off the three-lane road and dive deeper into the countryside. The base they were aiming for was in the very center of the province, and the military owning the land there was probably the only reason for the presence of woods instead of fields in the area.

The forest around them didn’t even appear particularly ancient: it was mostly made up of birches, with the odd grove of willows or pines in-between, each tree separated by a reasonable distance from the others that allowed for good visibility. Yellowish grass grew high between the trees, along with tall ferns and nettle bushes, all that shrubbery easily tall enough to swallow quadruped species with the obvious exception of centaurs… which they hadn’t brought along on that expedition anyway.

A couple small wooden houses and cabins occupied small plots of land along the road to the base, their small lawns now in the process of being invaded by the surrounding forest. Their presence on what must have been military grounds would have seemed odd had it not been for the flagpoles on their porches bearing the Swedish colors. The flags had been left hanging there for so long now that they were tattered and heavily discolored, though still recognizable.

The group accompanying the convoy was actually fairly big by their standards. There were eight of them on that expedition, led by Rhine Forest’s Third Officer, Josselin. The French unicorn was riding in a unimog leading the way ahead of them, the vehicle being followed by one lorry with an empty trailer, and a Defender 90 trailing close behind to cover their rear.

Next to Josselin, in the seat underneath the turret, Bart accompanied the group. The stallion was quickly reviewing a short list of Swedish words he felt like might be useful on that trip like ‘gevär’, ‘vapen’ or ‘vakpost’. He was officially cleared of any medical issue now, and had thus been ordered to watch over Josselin’s back for the expedition.

His military experience should also prove useful to locate the armory, at least if he was correct in thinking there wouldn’t be too much difference from one NATO base to another.

Nikolaos was the one behind the wheel. The addition of the minotaur cow to their team composition turned out to be a wise choice when they finally reached the base proper. She literally ripped the gate open using the impressive strength her transformation had bestowed upon her. Angry as she was to have been turned into a female, she still had the benefit of size and strength to console herself.

A size advantage that was all too easy to notice when compared to the two unicorns she shared the unimog with. She was easily three times as tall as the tiny equines! With a snort, she casually tossed the broken and bent gate out of the way before walking back towards the convoy without a word.

With a brief word over the radio, Josselin had them drive the trucks to the base’s parade ground.

This was the center point of the base, a rectangular gravel-covered parade ground with buildings all around. As they dismounted, all eight of them could see the command staff’s offices in direct view of their vehicles next to a row of flagpoles. The relatively simply designed three-story tall structure was the highest building around, with the rest of the barracks never exceeding the two-story mark.

“Alright folks, time to split up and locate this armory.” Josselin said, trotting to the front of his gathered team. “I will be exploring the command building over there with Niko and Bart.” He said before lifting his carbine in his telekinesis and chambering a round, just in case. “Cadets, you two will be keeping an eye on the vehicles. Roger?”

“Aye sir.” Frederik and Carla both spoke up in chorus.

The hippogriffs were armed with the same suppressed MP5’s Frederik had been stuck with on the expedition to Malmo. Fred was actually the only one of the two to have volunteered to go on that expedition, Carla would have much rather stayed on the Rhine to keep working on getting Seb to socialize. As successful as the girl-turned-hippogriff-stallion had been at mending his relationship with the unicorn mare, he still had a hard time getting her to leave her cabin for extended periods of time save for visits to the infirmary. He had little to no doubt that the genderswapped unicorn would be hunkered down in her cabin by the time he got back.

He might have to ask Doc Delacroix for tips… when she wasn’t otherwise busy training Amandine’s Medical Officer.

“Sri, Anton, Thanasis…” Josselin turned to the other three sailors on the team. “You get to the other side of the base. I think I saw a couple warehouses there by the hangar buildings, so this might be where they put the armory for all we know. Try to find where they put the ammo too if you can, but no big deal if you don’t.”

The three of them responded with a curt nod before immediately setting off towards their objective. Josselin watched them leave before motioning for his own team to follow with a hoof.

That left the two cadets on their own in the middle of the parade ground.

Watching the trucks.

And all in all doing jack shit.

“You know I expected to actually get to do… more than that.” Fred commented idly as he sat down in the shadow of the lorry.

Sweden might be a Northern country, but that didn’t mean it was cold all the time. Summer was still summer, and the German cadet wouldn’t be surprised if the temperature managed to breach the twenty degrees by noon. Not much of a problem in normal circumstances, but with his yellow, highly insulating coat of fur and feathers? He could already feel the sweat building up.

“And what did you expect then?” Carla fired back before taking a seat next to the other hippogriff.

“Actually get to look for the stuff. I mean, I helped find the base in the first place when I went to Malmo.” He shrugged. “Thought my help would be valued more than just for watching the trucks.”

“Eh, on the bright side we get to lounge in the shade while they try to figure out Swedish military jargon.” Carla said. “Try to enjoy the moment, or do I need to remind you how the others are probably busting their backs in Copenhagen?”

“Except for Seb.”

“She’s injured, that’s different.” He pointed out.

“Is she?” Fred turned his head towards the other cadet. “I swear, that’s hard to notice considering how little your boy -sorry- girlfriend comes out of her cabin.”

“Is that an accusation?” Carla raised a brow at the jab.

“Just stating the facts is all. And yet you keep saying you’re trying to help her.” Fred said as he brushed his talons through his blue crest feathers.

“Which I’m doing.”

“For all the good that seems to do.” Fred snorted.

“I’m trying to take it slow with her…”

“Not all of us got to take it slowly last I checked. Captain Gerig’s pretty much in the same predicament as Seb’, if not worse, but I don’t see her hiding in her quarters because of that.”

“She changed from being built like an athlete to being a tiny Technicolor mare; she’s not hurting anybody by using her medical leave to stay in her cabin! You got to keep your gender and your hands.” Carla protested out loud. “I barely managed to mend things with her, so I’m sorry if I’m taking it slow so she doesn’t clam up on me, damn it.”

“And did it ever cross your mind that it would piss several people off that she’d get to mope inside her cabin while the rest of us have to actually work?”

“Let me repeat myself: she’s injured anyway, badly should I add. She can barely walk back and forth between her cabin and the infirmary, and I even have to help her up the stairs to the mess hall. The fuck do you think she could even do in that state?”

“Something! I don’t care what, update the charts, fill in some paperwork, anything! The welders alone are clocking thrice as many hours as usual.”

Carla glared at the other hippogriff.

“And why do you even care? Maybe you wanted to have your side torn open and half your bloodstream emptied, uh? For fuck’s sake, she’s not even the only injured that’s not working! Marta’s off duty as well, or did you miss the bipedal hedgehog nurse in a wheelchair?”

“Fuck you.” Fred said, snapping his beak.

“Try to come up with some actual arguments to back up your bitching next time, asshole.” Carla told the German with a sharp glare.

“I’ll remember that…” He clicked his beak. “… Carl.”

There was one sucker punch he didn’t see coming that day.

Turns out, the base they were in apparently belonged to an armored unit. How did they figure it out? Well, the tanks and IFV’s inside the numerous hangars in the part of the base they were exploring were one thing.

And that one thing appeared to have drawn the attention of Anton in particular.

“We don’t even need tanks.” Sri groaned.

“That’s not a tank.” Anton said from her position atop one of the several CV90’s inside the hangar they were in. “It’s an IFV.”

The CV90 was Sweden’s own homegrown brand of IFV, one specifically designed to operate in the country’s subarctic climate. The snow leopard griffon was sitting atop the heavily angled front plating of the armored vehicle, a frontal structure that was reinforced with enough composite plating to resist anything short of an actual tank shot.

And anything that got through would have to get through the engine block before it could actually threaten the crew anyway. The Swedes had a habit of favoring heavily armored vehicles, and this one didn’t stray far away from the doctrine.

Behind Anton was a very large turret (for an IFV that is) built slightly off-center of the vehicle. It housed the gun… and that gun really was nothing to scoff at. While many countries saw fit to equip their IFV’s with autocannons ranging anywhere from 20 to 35mm… the CV90 went even further by being armed with a much bigger 40mm Bofors gun. The very same flak gun that had been in service all around the globe for the last fifty years, proving its effectiveness several times over. It also had a coaxial machinegun and a remotely operated gun for the commander on top of the turret, but those 7.62 paled in comparison to the main gun.

“Doesn’t change my point.” Sri insisted. “We already have the Piranhas from Slagelse anyway. What would this bring us?”

“A big ass gun? The ability to go over 80 kilometers an hour cross-country? Or to sit inside and laugh at puny monsters clawing helplessly at the composite plating as you run them over? Come on, I could have asked for the actual tanks…” She waved a claw towards the row of Leopard 2 MBT’s in another hangar. “… but this one can actually carry stuff. Very safely at that, unless wood hounds can somehow use RPG’s and even then I’m pretty sure this thing isn’t scared of that.”

Sri rolled her eyes before turning towards Thanasis and giving him a pointed look.

“What?” The sphinx looked at her quizzically.

“Three of us. I don’t want it, she does. You get to pick whether or not I will have to explain why we came back with a tank and not just guns.”

The Greek glanced alternately between the widely-grinning Anton atop the IFV and the frowning face of his hippogriff colleague.

“Well…” He said slowly, rolling his head and shaking his mane. “It does look kinda cool.”

“You’re in your forties!” Sri cried out.

The sphinx just shrugged with his wings.

“Call it a midlife crisis then. I’ve never been inside a tank.”

“Fine, be that way.” Sri sighed. “But you get to look for the parts, manuals, ammo, and you find a trailer for the tank. I’m not doing any of that shit for you two.”

And thus, the vehicle fleet found a new addition to its roster in the way of a heavily armed, heavily armored Swedish battle taxi.

Still not a tank though…

Kids can be pretty sneaky when they want to.

She didn’t know when exactly, but the chick had slipped past Micha at some point during the day. She thought she could afford to have her play behind her inside her cabin while she worked on some papers at her desk.

Obviously, she couldn’t. Andy must have grown tired of the toys the Pole had found for her and had wandered off without her noticing. She was so encapsulated by her work on safety assessments and training preparations that the child had actually managed to leave using the door that was right next to her.

Talk about obliviousness.

It was only when she reached for her printer that she noticed the absence of noise behind her and the open door. Much swearing and running ensued, Micha quickly leaving her cabin to track down the bloody kid.

Not that she disliked her. Far from it. Andy was actually a pretty sweet kid that liked hers and Vadim’s company it seemed. The Ukrainian had been a bit concerned when she told him Andy had apparently eaten a pigeon back in Malmo, but she didn’t seem to have gotten any illness from the flying rat.

Technically Andy had her own cabin on board, and this was the first place Micha went to check. Maybe she had gone back there to get one of her toys… Or not. The small cabin was empty. Not even a week since she had taken the kid under her wing and she had already lost her inside a merchant vessel that was littered with potentially hazardous machinery. Fan-fucking-tastic.

Micha hurried along and scoured every single open compartment she came across in an attempt to find the runaway child. A couple sailors looked at her worriedly as she passed them in a hurry, but she didn’t take the time to stop and explain.

She eventually managed to find Andy inside the galley, the smell of food most likely having drawn the kid there. Hell, even then Micha could feel the smell of fresh bread and spices that permeated the air around the room.

Amandine’s galley was decently sized by merchant vessel standards. Its interior was nearly entirely covered in stainless steel save for the threaded aluminum plates on the floor that dipped slightly towards a gutter that ran all the way around the island occupying the center of the room. Pots and pans hung off racks above the island where Micha was pretty sure a large pot of soup was currently cooking.

Beside the door she had taken, there was also one that connected directly to a narrow corridor from which she knew the cooks could access the utility lift as well as the pantry and the walk-in refrigerator in which they stored part of their food supply. Another opening on the opposite side connected to the buffet and the cafeteria.

And amidst all that, Andy was comfortably sitting on her haunches in a chair watching Rahul go about his day preparing dinner for the evening. She even had a small loaf of bread in her claw, from which she was nibbling intermittently as the Chief Cook babbled on, describing what he was doing to the kid behind him. Rahul was wearing a white apron above his coveralls, as well a hair cap around his head and some white gloves.

“Rahul?” Micha interrupted him politely.

The black lab of a dog lifted his head slightly to acknowledge her before turning back to his soup as he dumped a couple sliced onions in the pot.

“Well hello there Officer. I suppose you’re there for the lil’catbird behind me? Good listener she is, that much I can tell.” The dog said, a small smile parting his muzzle.

“I’m so sorry, I just lost sight of her for a second and she was gone. I hope she didn’t bother you?”

“Don’t you worry.” Rahul waved off her concern with a flick of his paw. “Kid was just hungry, gave her some bread and bacon and then she’s the quietest kid I ever laid eyes on. That’s coming from a dad of four by the way. Vadim’s back there in the cafeteria peeling ‘tatoes anyway.”

She allowed herself to fall down on her haunches and let out a relieved sigh.

“God I was so worried for a moment. So many ways this could have gone badly…”

“Doubt it.” Rahul quipped. “Kid’s way too small to work the latch on the watertight doors that lead out of the accommodation, and anything dangerous in here is locked anyway. It’s not like she can go that far, much less wander off to somewhere like the engine room. Not without someone letting her out in any case.”

“I uh… didn’t actually think of that.” She glanced towards Andy who just returned the stare with her curiosity-filled eyes. “She is quite small…”

“I really doubt you can keep a kid that age locked up in her cabin anyway. No idea what age she is, but with a human kid I’d say it’s around the time they start roaming about.” He shrugged. “Take my youngest daughter back home, when she was four she somehow managed to sneak away and wander off to another neighborhood a whole two kilometers away ‘cause she wanted to see her uncle. Shame I wasn’t there uh…” He chuckled. “The face Sarita had on Skype I swear.”

“You miss them?” Micha cocked her head.

“They will be fine. Youngest one was seventeen now, and I know with the way my wife raised them they’ll know what to do when they reappear. It’s not like I can do anything about it anyway. Half a world away and they may not even be there yet.”

“You’re rather carefree about it…”

“It’s just not my type to worry too much. Not about things I have no input on anyway.” The bipedal black lab tossed a couple sliced vegetables in the cooking pot. “I just let it happen and see how I can make do.”

“Wish I could share the philosophy.” Micha shook her head as she walked up to Andy and ruffled her head feathers. “Gave me quite a scare you know kid?”

The griffon cub just chirped happily back at her.

“Eh Rahul, say… what’s with Vadim peeling potatoes anyway? You never use the stock unless it’s about to go bad, and we resupplied before the Event if memory serves.”

“Nguyen’s idea. You know the French MRE’s we have for those long expeditions?”

She nodded.

“Well, kitten was a bit peeved at being shown up by MRE food, so he took to actually reading some of the cook books we have. What would you know, now he wants to do something other than Asian food.”

“And it’s helped by Vadim and I being stuck on kitchen assistance for the foreseeable future. You got your potato peelers.” Micha rolled her eyes.

“Mayhaps.” The dog clicked his tongue. “On the bright side, you sneaking behind the Captain’s back to fly around brought us goulash. If the reactions to the menu I hung in the cafeteria during breakfast are to be believed, the crew may actually like that.”

Micha tilted her head.

“Why do I have this feeling of dread at the prospect of you two making an attempt at Western cooking?”

“Eh, blame Nguyen for the dubious spice choices, not me. I cook the strong stuff, not the weird one.” The black lab protested as he reached for a soup blender. “I actually remembered to take the lemons away before he got his paws on them this time.”

“That’s a relief… I guess.” She said.

There was an awkward pause that lasted for a few seconds before Rahul spoke up again.

“That’s a really good thing you’re doing for her you know.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Andy I mean. You looking almost identical to her is a plus but… consider the amount of children that will go unattended with the Event. Any that gets help, or even surrogate parents to keep an eye on them, is a blessing in my books.” He shook his head, shoulders sagging. “Knowing the sheer quantity of kids that had parents but will be condemned to become street urchins because of this… that’s just heartbreaking. I know we can’t help them all…. But I’m glad to be working under an Officer that’s willing to take one under her wing… Kinda literally in your case.”

“Thanks I guess… you know, there are many things we can’t help with in this situation… but you’ve heard the ideas that have floated around as of recently. We’re going to do our best to give people something to return to. Won’t be much, but you can be sure we’ll all do our best to prop up civilization.”

“A tall order for a small group like us.” Rahul commented before reaching inside a drawer with his paw. “Potato peeler, you know what to do.”

Talk about a callback to her time as a cadet. In all her time as an Officer she never had to lend a hand to the kitchen staff. She grabbed the peeler from Rahul’s paw and moved off to the cafeteria where Vadim was peeling potatoes to the tune of some classical music. Andy gingerly followed her, the child’s head starting to bob up and down as she heard the tune coming out of Vadim’s loudspeaker.

“Welcome to potato duty, hope you don’t mind the music.” Vadim said in Polish as he pushed the large bag of unpeeled vegetables he was going through towards her. Andy sauntered over to him and the Ukrainian gingerly ruffled her head feathers. “How’s the safety analysis anyway?”

“For all intents and purposes, it’s complete. Kid had me stop before the end when she snuck away… somehow.”

“Never had to deal with young children have you, uh?” He asked, pulling Andy on his lap and tickling her under her wings. The girl let out a happy laugh before jumping on the table to lay on her belly between the two older griffons.

“Because you have?”

“Sorta. I am… was the oldest of three siblings. Mother always used to ask me to keep an eye on them when she had to work in the evenings. Kids that age…” He eyed Andy who was poking the bag of potatoes with a talon. “Well, not that I know your age kid, but close enough. Anyway, at that age I’d say you either need to keep their attention solely on something so they don’t wander off, or you do something that doesn’t require all your attention so you spot them when they do wander off.”

“I’ll try to remember that. Doesn’t it feel weird to you?” She asked.

“What does?”

“That we… sorta wound up adopting a kid a mere days after getting together.”

“Not really. Kid’s better off being placed under the care of a couple, and she fits better with us than with Danny and Carlos don’t you think? I’ll admit… the resemblance is uncanny.” He took a look at Andy who just blinked back at him before letting out a yawn and resting her small head on her forearms. “You finding a child that just happens to share the same species as us two… I’ve been questioning whether or not higher powers are at hand with this whole stuff…”

“Superstitious now?”

“Just reading the patterns is all.” Vadim shrugged. “In these times it may not actually turn out to be as dumb as it sounds.”

Elsewhere on the ship, a blue dragon was seen stalking through the passageways of the accommodation. He had finally managed to free some time from his busy schedule, and there was one thing he knew needed to be done.

Rounding a corner, Artyom eventually came to a halt in front of cabin he knew belonged to Sri, at the very end of the passageway. At this hour the hippogriff ought to be back from whatever duty she had been assigned to if he remembered correctly.

Probably keeping watch on a checkpoint around the terminal.

He knocked.

There was some muted shuffling behind the door for a few seconds before his ears caught the soft clicking of the lock being turned and the door opened to reveal a somewhat damp Sri clad in a large t-shirt and sport shorts. The Indonesian veteran looked up at her friend with a flat look.

“Problem?” She slurred.

Well, the smell of alcohol for one. Last he remembered the Indonesian wasn’t one to drink on her own. A few beers to chat around during the evening? Sure. But the liquor he was smelling on her? That was a first.

“I don’t have a problem. You on the other claw…” The dragon crossed his arms. “… Christ’s sake Sri, I thought we were through with that already. What’s wrong?”

The female hippogriff stared vacantly ahead of her as she leaned against the doorframe.

“Wrong? Fucking everything is.” She said. “That’s all because of that thing the Captain agreed to with the pronouns.” She complained. She ruffled her wings in frustration, which only served to stretch the fabric of her t-shirt.

“Basically every single genderswapped crewmember is, I don’t see the difference with you.” Artyom honestly shrugged.

“’course you wouldn’t.” She slurred before retreating further inside her cabin to grab a half-empty bottle of rum, Artyom following her at a safe distance and closing the door behind him. “I was just getting used to the whole deal; ignore the part where I lost my dick and everyone treats me like usual. That I could live with… somewhat. But now?” She took an awkward swig from the bottle with some drops of the liquid dripping off the sides off her beak. “Talk about getting your beak shoved into your own shit. Oh Sri, you want to try and ignore the fact some weird-ass cosmic event took your dick? Lemme issue an order that pushed the exact fucking opposite, that’ll be great!” She cried out.

“Come on, I doubt he did that to spite you. It’s really just about being practical.” Artyom tried.

The blue scaled dragon discreetly took note of the several discarded bottles that littered the room. That might explain why they hadn’t seen much of her ever since Dilip announced the new pronoun dynamic.

“Screw being practical, I had a plan figured out and he ruined it.” The drunken hippogriff lamented before she flopped down on her bed. “As if that shit wasn’t hard enough to deal with in the first place.”

“Somehow, I doubt alcohol is the proper response to that problem.” He said, leaning against the wall by the bed. “I should know, what with how I ended up after Grozny.”

“Last I checked Chechens didn’t go around calling paratroopers Miss… then again that would have been pretty funny.” She chuckled. “You never really talk about what you did there.”

“There’s nothing worth talking about ’95.” Artyom shook his head with a frown. “Only misery, and much as I like my drinks, I know they never actually helped with the coping. I very much doubt this would change for a light drinker like you. It’s not a path you wanna go down, trust me. Unless you’d like to end up like those drunken vets living off the streets?”

“Suuuure, tell me off for trying to find a solution but don’t offer one.” She glared at him. “I’ve become a mockery of my own beliefs Artyom! A monstrous creature riddled with occult magic or whatever, and I don’t even know what I should be attracted to dammit!”

Artyom just took it in stride and raised an eyeridge at her.

“So that’s about religion now?” He asked. “You know… with our standards on board I’m surprised you’d actually have problems with that.”

“Contrarily to you I have calms about the things I do! I know I’m a bad follower…” She slumped. “Fuck’s sake, I might be the worst Muslim the world has ever seen. I drink, I don’t do Ramadan, eat bacon of all things… Doesn’t mean I don’t feel guilty ‘bout it you know? I try to make up for it; I pray err… sometimes… Well, I try to be a good guy. That’s what religion is all about right?” She asked him drunkenly.

“I wouldn’t know.” Artyom admitted. “I’m Orthodox in name only pal, haven’t opened a Bible in half a decade or so. That’s just too much of a hassle with all the work piling up. But if you really want my grain of salt on the matter… then I really doubt any religion had predicted this fuckery. Don’t expect any holy book to tell you what’s wrong and what’s right.”

“Sure helps a lot…”

“I’m no theologist, but if your ideology tells you you’re a bad person because of something that’s out of your control, then you should probably revise it.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s heresy Art’.”

“Maybe it is. Hell, go wear a headscarf if it makes you feel better, whatever suits you. And the sexuality matters? Can’t say I have it figured out… but if you’re still into women, or mares in your case I guess? Regardless, then you were that way in the beginning, so no big deal and it’s not really gay. And if you’re more into males after the change…” He shrugged. “Ain’t a big deal either, that’s just regular biology at work.”

“Now you’re just doing mental gymnastics to avoid laying blame on anyone.” She told him with a nonplussed look on her features. She stopped to down the rest of her bottle in one go, her motions haphazard from the alcohol in her bloodstream, some drops of rum accidentally landing on the bed sheets beneath her.

“So what if I am? The situation keeps me busy enough that I don’t want to start hating anyone for something they can’t control.” He said. “Don’t get me wrong, if anyone is going to start wearing rainbow-colored leathers or gimp shit, then I got one hell of an ass whooping in store for them… but that’s beside the point.”

“And what is your point exactly?” She asked, one claw blindly exploring the side of her bed in search of another bottle.

“That you shouldn’t get hung up on your ideology not fitting anymore because it sure as hell wasn’t made with any kind of foresight for cosmically-induced gender changes. Try to adapt it however you wish to… but no priest or imam could have ever forecast such a thing.” He said, rubbing his neck thoughtfully. “In any case, who’s ever going to blame you? The only other Muslim on board is Mohammed and if anything, he’s got a worse track record than you as far as piety goes.”

Sri’s claw halted for a second.

“I’ll uh… I’ll consider it okay?” She said.

Artyom knelt down by her bedside.

“Yeah, you’d better.” A small smile appeared on the edges of the dragon’s maw as his claw flew towards something outside of Sri’s vision. “I’m taking this by the way, alcohol really doesn’t suit you.” He told her, lifting up her last bottle of liquor.

“Art’ you fucking prick…” Sri grumbled.

“Compared to what I’ve been called in the past that’s rather mild.” He replied, already walking towards the door. “Sleep off the booze, tomorrow I’m taking you jogging for a good purging.” He concluded before leaving the cabin.

Sri just stared off emptily towards the spot the dragon previously occupied before a nauseous feeling welled up in her throat and she ran for the bathroom.

Yeah, she really should stick to the odd beer.

Up in her cabin, an orange dragon was pouring over the documents her fellow shipmates had obtained from the Maersk’s headquarters. Schmitt was still busy researching how to ‘fix’ spoiled fuel oil in the near future.

Maersk did have an offshore department, and she could easily find information on oil reconditioning inside their archives. Most of the processes she found documents on were about getting the right grade of lube or hydraulic oil, but she was confident applying it to fuel would pose little trouble.

Leaving oil in storage for a long time came with its own set of problems. Deposits formed inside, rust from the tank, wax, soot, and other kinds of particles that would clog up and foul engine filters. Granted, regular filters could protect the engine from bad fuel but only to a certain extent, but the months (if not years) of spoilage she was looking at were something no filter no matter the quality could circumvent.

And then of course was the matter of water accumulation which required its own step in the filtration process. It needed to be removed from the mixture before it could be pumped into an engine.

She grumbled and twirled a pencil in her claws before pulling out a sheet of paper and writing down what she had figured out so far.

· Water→ Hydrophobic filter
· Solid deposits→ Dissolvent +Mechanical filtration
· Microbial organisms → Biocides

She stopped at that line. There was no filtration system she could think of that would work on every batch of fouled oil they would find. Microbial infestations and deposits tended to vary and needed different substances to be removed properly. Maybe… she could design those filtration stages with a more modular system. That meant they would have to test each batch of spoiled oil they retrieved but it shouldn’t be too much trouble as long as they kept to large batches. How large exactly would depend on how quick she could test samples, but on a guess she wrote down at least a hundred tons.

But the reconditioning systems the documents showed her weren’t meant to be used on large quantities. She could see designs for hydraulic and lube oil, or even for diesel on small, trawler-sized boats, not for the amounts of fuel Amandine’s engine and generators chugged daily.

Schmitt’s claw went for a drawer in her desk and pulled out a used screwdriver covered in bite marks. That was the third one in two weeks she found herself chewing on to soothe her nerves. How her stomach was able to process bits of metal, she had no idea.

Chrome-plated tools did taste quite good though.

Back to the fuel filtration… She pulled out a blueprint showing a fuel reconditioning unit out of a folder, which she set down next to one of a fuel polishing unit meant for boats.

“Ok, so here, there, and there I got the different stages…” She whispered in Luxembourgish. “With that one I get 50 liters per hour, but the other one is at 600…”

Now she just had to upscale the whole design to the point where it could operate in tens of tons per hour, make it versatile enough to work both for lube and fuel, and make sure it would work every time regardless of spoiling level and different microbial infestations.

Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

Might need a few more screwdrivers to chew on though.

Thousands of miles east of Copenhagen, the sun was just about to rise on Japan, though this would have been rather hard to notice for the Kirin that was currently navigating his way through the Aokigahara, or Suicide Forest as it was known worldwide. Its thick canopy prevented the nascent rays of light from reaching the ground of dried leaves and twisting roots. Many fallen trees and branches littered the uneven, rocky floor of the forest through which dirt tracks carved a sinuous path. The combination of rocks and roots created a mess of a terrain with hundreds of nooks and crannies, some even hidden by moss and vines that basically turned them into small pitfall traps. All in all, this made it hard to safely navigate the bleak forest, particularly with the darkness that came before sunrise.

Hayate didn’t mind. The last month had made him well-acquainted with the dreary forest and he knew that if he wanted to do anything in the early morning it had to be before sunrise otherwise he would once again get lost in the thick fog banks that came in the morning. That and the young Kirin had recently learned how to use his antler to create light.

A whole month. Hayate could hardly believe it was that long already… his former life in Nagoya felt so far away now. A month ago he had been on a trip to the famed forest with his friends. He recalled his girlfriend calling him to take a look at some patches of flowers around a bend further down the hiking path they were following when all of a sudden…

He was alone.

He had fallen down, lost consciousness it had seemed. It had been noon, but he woke up in the evening, with all of his friends gone and the forest silent. His body had changed too, into something he would later recognize as the Kirin of legend when he got a look at himself in a puddle. For hours, he had called after his friends and wandered through the forest, losing his bearings and belongings in the process, unable to use his phone with his hooves. He had soon lost track of where he had gone, trotting on unsteady hooves through the gloomy forest for what felt like days, now left naked after an unfortunate wild bathing incident involving an underground river.

And then, when he felt like he couldn’t take it anymore; that lifting his newly-made hoof one more time would sap him of what little energy he had left, the spirits had appeared.

Well, he still wasn’t too sure if they were spirits, but when he had stopped by a spring to drink some water (at this point he was well past caring whether or not it was sanitary) he had caught sight of a small, icy blue wisp on the opposite side of the little pond. The little floating flame danced teasingly in front of him for a couple minutes before it floated away deeper into the forest.

Of course he had followed it. What else could he do at that point? The young Kirin had galloped across the surface of the pond (somehow, he had discovered he could walk on water at some point) and followed it eagerly. The little blue flame led him through thick shrubbery and numerous fog banks; Hayate completely ignoring the water clinging to the jade-colored scales on his back or the twigs catching on his mane; before he eventually started hearing the sound of running water.

A small stone bridge arching above a brook, with most of the stonework now covered in moss and lichen. That’s what the wisp led him to. It floated inside of a tall stone lantern… and then a path of those same lanterns lit up, each with a little wisp inside it, each its own unique color. Hayate decided to trust the spirits and followed the path they showed him.

Less than a hundred meters down the dirt path, a red torii rose up above him, the gate marking the entrance to a shrine in the middle of the forest. Further down the path, he was able to spot the red painted wood of the shrine with its moss covered shingles. Wisps of all colors of the rainbow floated around him as he explored the place, with its small graveyard for former kannushis, the main building with the altar and a single bedroom above it, and even a small lawn with benches for hikers. It was there that he finally located an abandoned cool box with enough food to sate his hunger.

But still no traces of anybody beside him. Hayate spared a bit of the food he found to make an offering to the spirits at the altar and thank them for their guidance. That day, he finally managed to rest in an actual bed in the bedroom above the shrine, the small room’s sole window giving the Kirin a perfect view of Mount Fuji above the forest’s canopy.

The spiritual guidance wasn’t a onetime thing it turned out. Over the course of a few days, which quickly lapsed into weeks, Hayate relied on the little flames to guide him through the forest. Sometimes he returned to that first shrine (each time either with an offering or to maintain it as a form of paying respects to his new guides); sometimes he found others, but always within the boundaries of the forest. There was plenty of food to be found in the ranger outposts or any of the multiple facilities built for tourists… actually he even managed to live off the land for a whole week under the guidance of one sparkly green wisp before he eventually reached a stash of canned food the forest’s rangers had hidden in a cave.

Life inside the forest was harsh, and with few luxuries… but he couldn’t return to the urban areas.

He had tried once. That mistake had almost cost him his life. The first hour in the city had been great, and he had managed to get a fair amount of supplies for his backpack (by then, the only item he had on him except for a red headband, clothes being somewhat redundant). But then…

Monsters.

Brightly colored porcupine creatures, they threw their quills at him; it was only thanks to the wisps that he managed to elude them long enough to return to the safety of the forest. That visit taught him a lot.

Cities were dangerous; monsters were roaming around.

The forest is safe; he had a deal with the spirits.

And he was alone.

That day, the young Kirin had dejectedly trotted back to his shrine, muzzle held low to the ground. Even the discovery of his ability to do telekinesis using his antler didn’t raise his mood and he went to sulking inside the shrine’s bedroom after making his daily offering.

Every night, the wisps would gather near the altar to consume the food. Hayate never dared to look… he was smart enough to know he shouldn’t.

That brought him back to the now. Hayate was walking down a path covered in fallen leaves and branches that should lead him to a new shrine. A pinkish wisp floated some ways ahead of him. Wisps tended to come and go but that one seemed to hang around him a lot.

He had decided to call it Sakura. The wisp didn’t seem offended by the name so it kind of stuck.

He managed to reach the shrine on the south-eastern edge of the forest before the fog rose up. Hayate had a quick breakfast of canned fish before he set to cleaning the shrine of its moss and weeding the gardens. Multiple wisps seemed to gather around him, coming and going to observe him as he tended to their holy residence.

But everything has to go wrong at some point, right?

Just as he clambered on the rooftop to clean it and remove the moss, the Kirin spotted a speck of dark red light which made a stark contrast with the blue sky. It appeared right above the Mount Fuji’s caldera.

Hayate quickly used his telekinesis to get a hold of some binoculars he had retrieved a week earlier from a ranger post.

The red light was… some sort of swirling mass of lightning. It twisted and turned high above the caldera, with arcs of lightning periodically striking down and kicking up plumes of smoke. It took minutes of observation for the lightning to start forming a distinct shape… something akin to Satanic demonic circles, though Hayate was no expert. A sense of foreboding rose up in the Kirin’s throat, though he elected to stay on the rooftop and keep observing. The wisps around him were starting to flickers alarmingly and fly around in a seemingly panicked state. Even Sakura somehow found refuge in his mane amidst the confusion running rampant in the shrine.

The circle eventually ceased its motions and stabilized. Its size must have spun the entire diameter of the caldera and the lightning that made out its limits created a low droning noise strong enough that Hayate could still perceive it despite the sheer distance that separated him from Mount Fuji.

All of a sudden, the air in the center of the circle turned pitch black. Not just a circle then… a portal. The droning noise disappeared at once, the forest stood still in anticipation. Moments later, Hayate witnessed in horror as a gigantic tentacle emerged out of the portal. The entire appendage was encrusted in black crystals and must have been as big as a freight train… and it was soon followed by more of them which could only belong to the likes of the worst of horrors to ever escape the mind of H.P. Lovecraft. Once its limbs were through the portal, whatever otherworldly creature they belonged to pulled and fell out of the portal with an earthshaking rumble that managed to knock over a few lamps in the shrine. The monstrous creature fell out of sight below the lip of the caldera as the portal slowly faded away, but Hayate still managed to spot four equine shaped silhouettes exit it before it closed off completely. Two with wings, one with a horn, and another that was just enormous, all standing in a circle atop a flying obsidian platform.

Hayate took off to the relative safety of the forest when he saw the horned shape look straight at him with pitch black eyes.

The horned equine just smiled, revealing a mouth full of black crystalline fangs. It always liked a good chase. It just might stay here for a while… Its horn lit up with red lightning.

The other three equines just departed in different directions.

The Kirin didn’t last long.

The portal in Japan wasn’t the only one to open that day. Another one of similar size opened just above Cape Horn at about the same time, disgorging another lovecraftian horror and a couple silhouettes before closing off. Just like in Japan, they split up in different directions, though in their case the black crystals and red lightning were replaced by sickly yellowish lightning and black tendrils of goop.

Several smaller such portals opened up all over the world as well. Some had witnesses like Hayate to spot their appearance, other went completely unnoticed, but in all cases at least one creature poured out of them before they closed off.

At one point above the Southern Atlantic, one such portal opened up to let an airship through. Any Equestrian pony would have been able to tell at a glance that it was actually a Storm Airship, one of the many military-class airships that had been built to serve the now dead tyrant known as the Storm King. Many of these had eventually fallen into the paws, claws or hooves of criminals, warlords and terrorists.

The old but heavily modified craft came to a rest high above the waves. At a glance, it was visible that the usual propellers of the old vessel had been replaced with shoddy looking thrusters, and that it bore a lot more weaponry along its hull than any airship of the same class ever had. There were also many black tendrils that wrapped around its hull and gas bag, like an infection of sorts. Its crew was no better, many of them being parrots that missed clumps of feathers and bore the same signs of the goop beneath their plumage. Other crewmembers, some grey hedgehog-esque creatures were missing quills or patches of fur and shambled around the deck with vacant eyes, their mouth dripping the same goop that infected the parrots.

Within minutes, the airship turned south and powered away from its initial position. Black storm clouds started to seep away from the gasbag and began to form a storm front with arcs of electricity going through them.

Author's Notes:

I've been in a writing frenzy recently to build up some buffer chapters in case I hit a writing block at some point. That should allow me up to one month of regular posting with only editing work being necessary.

On another front I'm on the fence about how I will narrate what goes on once I'm done with the Copenhagen arc. I already have future ports of call charted, but I don't know whether I will do as detailed a tale as in Copenhagen or go for a more brief narration before moving on to the next.