The Courtship of RD Rivero
Part 2
"I cannot believe they have come here, this is muy bien!" Spark chirped merrily, skipping along the sidewalk in
the bright morning sunshine. Behind the jubilant Azteca, her boyfriend Zhyan struggled to keep up.
"Why are you so excited? It's just a jewelry store, you know. We could write in anything we like and not have to
pay a quid for it!" he grumbled.
"Silly boy," Spark grinned at him over her shoulder. "It is not the thought that counts, it is how much you
spend on me! Besides, this place is very special to me." She paused in mid-skip to hand the winged Brit a flier,
which Zhyan scanned as they continued on their way.
"'Specializing in reproductions of ancient Aztec silver and gold metalwork'," he read aloud. "'Come see our
showcase of genuine relics from Central and South America. Sharky's Sparklies, 1313 King Kat Avenue, across from
the TCATGR Mental Health Center.'"
"And here we are!" Spark said, bouncing on the balls of her feet at the sight of the shop. "Come on! We must
hurry before everything good is taken!" Then she grabbed the archangel by the wrist and ran towards the door,
dragging Zhyan along behind.
The shop was plain, only a few display cases and a sign at the back reading, "You break it, you buy it." There
were no other customers. A chime rang from the back as they entered, and Shark and Thunderwolf came out to greet
them, smiling broadly.
"SPARKY!" Shark squealed.
"SHARKY!" the Azteca replied, and rushed over to visit with the ichthyoid. "Your shop is lovely! I want to see
everything, and Zhy will buy it all for me!"
"Uh, do I get a say in this transaction?" Zhyan asked timidly.
"No," Shark and Spark answered simultaneously, then the ichthyoid led her to the nearest case and began setting
out black velvet trays covered with bits of bright shiny metal.
"Women, huh?" Thunderwolf said, stepping up beside Zhyan and looking at their mates chattering enthusiastically.
"How would you know?" Zhyan smirked.
"Why do you think I gave them up?" Thunderwolf grinned. "But hey, I understand how it goes. Let me show you
something over here." Thunderwolf led the archangel to a display case full of silver jewely.
"What's this?" Zhyan asked.
"Silver layered on surgical steel ," the lion replied. "Everything we got in the other cases, but about 60%
cheaper."
"Really?" Zhyan asked, leaning over the counter.
"Yep," Thunderwolf replied, resting his hand on Zhyan's shoulder, by the base of the neck. "Here, take a closer
look." The the sabertooth slammed the archangel's face into the top of the cabinet, rendering him instantly
unconscious.
Spark jumped at the loud bang behind her and turned to see what had happened. "Zhyan?"
Thunderwolf, his hand concealed beneath the Englishman's long lavender hair, grasped the base of Zhyan's skull
and turned it side to side.
"He wants you to stay over there," the saberlion told the Azteca. "He's picking out a suprise for you."
Spark smiled broadly, then was distracted by Shark clearing his throat. "Would you like to sample some of our
new perfumes?" he asked.
"Oh, yes! I would like that much. Do you have anything for--evening wear?" she asked slyly.
"I have just the thing," Shark said, taking a spritz bottle out of the cabinet. "It's called, 'Dreams Come
True', and it's a guaranteed knock-out." He handed her the bottle, and Spark sprayed her neck, face and
shoulders, and inhaled deeply.
"It is a lovely scent," she said, handed the bottle back to Shark, and collapsed onto the floor, out cold.
"I'll get the rope," Thunderwolf said, letting Zhyan drop next to his drugged girlfriend. "What do you want to
do with bat-boy?"
"Can we eat him?" Shark asked.
"Naw, RD's afraid it would alienate the girls if we bump off their former boyfriends. Tie him up and leave him
in back."
Shark retrieved the rope and secured the archangel while Thunderwolf trussed Spark and, after taking her
infamous obsidian knife, dropped her into a large burlap bag.
"Nothing like familiar surroundings," the sabertooth noted. "One down, three to go."
******
The sun was high in the sky when Peachyra strolled out of the underground complex that housed her team of
Ferocious Females. She sniffed the air, savoring the rich, fertile aromas of her plants. One of her guardian
shrubs, blooming wildly, noticed it was being admired by it's mistress, and trembled lightly to produce extra
scent. Peachyra smiled at the plant and removed a flower from one frond, putting it in her hair. She could sense
the empathic communication from the nearby plants, all of them jealous of the honor. She laughed lightly and
headed down the lane towards the road.
A short walk along the dirt lane in the lovely countryside soon had the avatar humming cheerfully to herself.
Like the nature goddess she represented, she thrived on the warm sunshine and the feel of soil beneath her feet.
The warm glow in the heavens was matched by a warm glow in her soul as she contemplated her destination, and the
Hani warrior that was to meet her there.
She departed the lane and made her way across a lush field of rich green grass, listening to it's chorus of
welcome and joy. Soon, she entered a tiny wooded glade, isolated in the field, the favored campsite of Nakur Na
Chanur. She moved into the cool of the glen and sat down by the base of one of the majestic oaks, listening to
it's glacier-slow thoughts echoing in her own mind.
The plants surrounding her had no eyes, and could not see. But they could feel weight pressing upon them, and
the avatar percieved an echo of mild complaint from the underbrush as a large humanoid tramped inconsiderately
towards her. She smiled. Chanur was alot of things, but polite was not high on the list. She waited, listening to
the crunch of brush until, at last, the massive figure hove into view.
"Thunderwolf?" she said, perplexed. The saberlion grinned at her, and suddenly, Peachyra was very nervous. But
before she could summon her power to her, she felt a sharp sting in the back of her neck. She swatted it, and her
hand came back with a tiny dart.
"Nighty-night," Thunderwolf rumbled as Peachyra swayed for a moment, then toppled to the ground. Shark emerged
from behind a nearby tree, air rifle in one hand, burlap sack in the other.
A few moments later, when Chanur arrived, he found nothing in the glen but a single, crumpled flower.
********
"But whyyyyyy?!" TigrisHawk whined. "I'm a four-hundred pound predator with hand grenades all over my body. Why
do I need karate classes?!"
Axelle's slow, lethal smile, the expression she habitually wore, never wavered. "Because being big and being
able are two different things. Consider, I weigh a little over one-hundred pounds, and have no weapons. No claws,
no knives, certainly no munitions. Do you think you can take me?"
Tygris was slow to respond, knowing full-well her mentor always had something up her sleeve. "Maybe," she said
finally.
"Then prove it. Come for me," Ax said, and stepped back into an easy relaxed stance, hands forward, legs apart,
the left in front of the right.
Tygris was across the exercise room, and used the distance to build velocity. Three fast bounds and she sprang
at Axelle with a triumphant roar, realizing that her teacher had not yet moved out of the way of her deadly
pounce. Then Tygris was rolling across the cement floor, moaning, her paws clutching her tender belly as her
momentum exhausted itself and she slid to a halt.
"Once you're airborne, you can control which way you face when you land, but not where," Ax said, strolling over
to her injured apprentice, "If I'd had a knife in my hand when I punched you, you'd have been unceremoniously
spayed."
"You've got the body of a nature's finest killing machine, and mind of a human being. But until you learn to use
them together, instead of relying on muscle alone, you will be vulnerable in ways you can't predict."
"I don't... wanna... play... anymore...," Tygris wheezed.
"Alright, apprentice, you can take the rest of today off," Ax said magnamiously. "But don't question my
curriculum again, or next time I'll leave you a few scars to meditate on."
"Yes, sensei," the white tigress gasped as she stood up slowly. She turned to find Axelle already gone. With a
grumble, she limped out of the exercise room and headed for the compound's secret entrance.
"Geez, I never realized being a bad-ass was so tough," she groused. "I thought torture and assassination was
gonna be fun, but I'm working my tail off!" Irritated, she stalked out of the den and headed into the forest,
looking for a target on which to vent her predatory wrath.
She prowled swiftly and silently through the scrub, as only a tiger can. Soon, her sensitive ears detected a
whisper of voices. Silent as a ghost, she crept towards the sound until the words became sensible.
"She's headed this way," said a rumbling voice she recognized instantly as Thunderwolf. "I'll go lay in the
clearing and make like I'm wounded. When she goes for me, pop her."
Tygris was wondering who was getting popped, when she heard Shark chuckle, "TygrisHawk will never know what hit
her."
Tygris' belly clenched painfully. They were hunting HER! *Well, that little game just went straight to hell,
didn't it?!* she thought, outraged, and prepared to pounce from her hiding place and wreak gooey vengeance on the
impertinent--
Then she stopped as the voice of Axelle, and the lesson of this afternoon, floated back into her mind. She
realized she was thinking like a tiger again, with no consideration for tactics. She realized also that she had
been set to pounce on two of the most dangerous men in TCATGR, and even with the element of suprise, she probably
wouldn't have gotten very far.
"Okay, Tygris, think. What would Axelle do?" she whispered to herself. *That's easy, divide and conquer,* she
thought, and settled in to wait, listening while Thunderwolf went to the middle of a nearby clearing, laid down
on the ground and began to moan and curse. Meanwhile, she heard Shark crunch through the growth to the far side
of the clearing and settle into a sniper's position.
Tygris grinned; they'd done most of the work for her. Slipping out of her hiding spot, she ignored Thunderwolf's
calls and crept towards the point where Shark had gone to ground. After a few moments of thrashing, TW seemed to
tire of it and quieted down. Tygris peeped through the bushes to see the sabertooth playing dead in the clearing.
She smiled again, and moved closer to her quarry.
In moments, she spotted the ichthyoid crouching behind a tree and peering around it towards the clearing. His
back was to her, but by the way his shoulders were set, she could tell he ws aiming a weapon. He gave no
indication of noticing her as she crept up into striking distance and prepared to pounce.
"Suprise, Sharky!" she said. Shark whirled. In his hands was a tree branch. He was smiling.
"Wha?" was all she had time to say before a sharp pain stung her backside. She turned, and as the drug took
hold, saw Thunderwolf behind her, air rifle in hand.
"Man," he growled. "Axelle's just not training 'em like she used to." Then darkness overtook the tigress and she
was gone.
********
The moon was high over the docks, and in a seedy warehouse, a criminal mastermind was estimating her proceeds.
To some, in quieter moments, she was Ayanna, hyper cheetah. But when she donned her gray fedora and red power
tie, she was Spotface.
"Fifty bales of catnip at a hundred-twenty thunder-bucks per bale," she calculated, then went to the nearest
bale and sniffed the mint leaves long and hard. She shook her head, swayed a moment and grinned.
"Make that a hundred-fifty thunder-bucks! This oughta make Skat's potions a little more potent!" she chuckled.
Of course, catnip was still legal in TCATGR, but the feds outlawed shipping it. As an author, Spotface could have
grown it domestically, or written it into her own bathtub if she chose, but where was the fun in that? Besides,
the Turkish blends were el primo--
She froze. From somewhere in the warehouse, her sharp feline ears detected a whisper of movement, then a
high-pitched whine. Spotface sprang into the air, cheetah-fast, as a tiny dart whistled past her. Then she hit
the ground running, tearing hell-bent for thunder towards the warehouse door.
"Damndamndamn shoulda brought backup!" she lamented as she rocketed through the opening. She tried to veer right
, and realized to her horror that she was still going straigth. Flailing her legs, she lost her balance and
continued skidding along a gooey, oily path towards a pile of rubbish leaning against the door of the warehouse
across the street. She slammed into the mess, burying herself in a mountain of old paint cans and cardboard boxes.
Spotface thrashed in the garbage, desparate to regain her footing, but when she finally got her head out of the
mess, she was looking at Thunderwolf through a heavy rope net. Beside him was Shark, holding an air rifle. The
merman pointed the weapon at her, and that was the last thing she saw.
TBC