Bleeding Edge (DMFA SI/AU) (2024)

Bleeding Edge

by Chairtastic

: Surviving in a deathworld is not easy. Trying to uncover secrets kept by a deathworld is not easy. Leaving a deathworld better than when you found it isn't easy. To do so, you have to be on the forefront of progress, beyond even the cutting edge.

: This is an unlicensed derivative work of Dan and Mab's Furry Adventures (DMFA). As such this work and all its contents, concepts, characters, etc. are the legal property of DMFA's copyright holder, Amber Williams. At her leisure, she can ask this work to be discontinued, removed, etc. I post this legal disclaimer to very kindly ask that I not be sued, and to give Amber the legal right to lift or adjust the ideas posted here to her still ongoing work.

Glory to the house of tacos.

: This story will contain death of characters both minor and major, frequent violence, the implication of violence, and other unfunny topics. This story is rated as unsuitable for audiences below the age of sixteen (16). Also it's hella gay, hella furry. Furrae is a straight-up deathworld with bright colors and comedy tropes. It's been described as poison dart frog to Westeros' rabid wolf.

You have been warned.

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Chapter One: Bonds of Blood

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Nihi'lir Tuler Owona

On an island covered in dense rain forest, there were holes in the ground. Over two thousand holes in the ground, called cenotes. A little under four cenotes per square kilometer, completely excessive. They were filled with water, and some connected to each other through short underground rivers.

In the walls of these cenotes in the grounds, people had dug homes. They had windows, porches, walkways that connected subterranean homes. A little neighborhood, erroneously referred to as a 'homestead' by locals. They hadn't much liked it when their word use was corrected, either.

Nihi'lir knew what words actually meant, having come from a city where they had wonderful things like hieroglyphs and roads. He found out that complainers and educated folk got the worst jobs around the homestead.

"Man! You're teaching the young'ins how to swim with Giller today," he heard his wife shout from outside the house. "And no bellyachin' neither!" Her voice was haggard with age, like she had to put her whole chest into her words just to be audible.

He hadn't had the heart to teach his wife about double-negatives yet.

Nihi'lir, who had been previously cutting up breadfruit for lunch, stifled an exasperated grunt as he put the knife in the basin and pushed the breadfruit and the cutting board it rested on to the back of the counter-top. "Alright fine, but get me a coconut to use for cooking!"

"Get it ya'self, cookin's man's work!"

He rolled his eyes as he got his cooking stool put away.

His wife's family had odd little notions on the division of labor in a household. Euberta, his wife, would handle any of the craft work the house needed – repairs, tool-making, and resource allocation. Euberta jealously guarded those tasks, deemed 'women's work' in her culture.

To the point where she actively refused to teach Nihi'lir or their son how to do things like repair a hinge or carve utensils out of wood. Despite the fact that when whaling season rolled around she would be gone for five months.

But she seemed intent to have a backlog of repairs to gripe about when she came back from whaling. Perhaps it was the local religion, all the whaling women seemed to have that attitude, from what he'd heard talking with other husbands.

Or perhaps it was a raccoon thing.

Men were to be left at home to do domestic work, and to guard the home while the women went whaling. Repayment for the burden of pregnancy, childbirth, and nursing.

Nihi'lir fetched his son's sponge-noodle for floating and went to the boy's room to fetch him too. Their home was carved from the limestone around the cenote, with candles as their main source of light. Nihi'lir didn't need them, but his wife did. Raccoons were not blessed with low-light vision as mice were.

Even less so mice who had glowing eyes.

"Gemenes, it's time to learn how to swim!" He knocked on his son's door and shouted. "Put your toys away and get out here!"

Seconds, literal seconds, later the wooden door swung open and Nihi'lir had to look up at his son's excited face and feign excitement of his own.

Gemenes, like his mother and her family, was a raccoon. He didn't have unnatural colors in his fur as Nihi'lir did, but they had the same red eyes with that shone in the dark. They had the same leathery wings, and the same dense curly hair. All three the color of dried blood.

Nihi'lir was more obviously a creature – an innately magical being with unnatural coloration (in his case, shades of red), and wings. His wife's family were closer to the non-magical beings, enough to pretend to be beings if they cared to.

However, Nihi'lir was a mouse. Fully grown, he topped out at a hundred and six centimeters. His boy, six years old, was already taller than him at a hundred and twenty-four centimeters.

It made getting the boy to do things he didn't wanna hard unless Nihi'lir used magic. A temporary solution to an ongoing problem.

Nihi'lir held out an arm to stop the boy running off down the hall. "I know it's hot, but you have to wear pants. Lava-lava and shirts are optional, but pants aren't."

Gemenes' excitement melted like the spring thaw in that moment and he stomped off to get dressed.

"Meet me outside when you're ready!" Nihi'lir called as he started off toward the front door.

Their hole-in-a-wall house had a semi-enclosed porch attached to their neighbor's. Carved out of limestone, supported by breadfruit timbers, with a winding path outside that went from the surface to the water's edge. For the first time in three literal weeks, there was no rainfall – likely the reason for the swimming lesson.

Euberta, his wife, sat in a rocking chair at the divider wall between their porch and the neighbor's, while their neighbor sat on a rocking chair on her side. The two muscular elderly raccoons was totally involved in their conversation – they hardly noticed Nihi'lir leave the house until Euberta didn't see Gemenes with him.

"Man, where that boy at?" His wife asked, confused, and looked at the door.

"Give him a minute, he's getting dressed," Nihi'lir said and shrugged. "It's a hot day."

"He has to get that from your side of the family," she rocked back in her chair. "None of my kin have trouble with the heat." Unlike Nihi'lir who wore only small-clothes and a wraparound skirt, she was dressed like the heat didn't bother her.

Baggy pants, full-on shoes, a monochromatic striped shirt and oiled leather overcoat from the city. Like she was ready to go whaling that day.

Nihi'lir fought so incredibly hard not to roll his eyes, he just stood with his son's sponge noodle over his shoulders as he waited. When the acceptably-dressed winged raccoon came to the door, they set off for the water together.

Giller, his youngest step-son, was still older than Nihi'lir, so he handled the group of ten kids when they didn't want to listen. Nihi'lir mostly focused on the task of keeping them near the shore and far away from the river down to the next homestead.

The girls' swimming lessons focused on distance swimming and how to dive – skills they'd need for whaling when they got older. The boys' lessons were all focused on how to swim as exercise or how to fish underwater.

He was also on Gemenes-duty, as his father.

"Gemenes, stop! We don't try to drown people on purpose!" "Stop hitting your niece with your wing!" "Let go of her hand, Gemenes, let go!" "How did you make them cry?! Why did you make them cry?!"

Gemenes had inherited an unfortunate trait of his mother's – the immediate and vicious clap-back. Not always verbal, but always deserved according to the relatively little raccoon. When his nieces made fun of him for his wings, his eyes, or were just jerks as little kids tended to be – Gemenes responded like a demon.

It was no surprise when the lesson was over, the kids all left in their friend groups while Gemenes was left with his father and elder brother.

Giller gave his little brother a slight smack on the back of the head when they got out of the water. For a full-grown one hundred seventy-two centimeter raccoon, it was surprisingly gentle. "You gotta lay off that temper," he told Gemenes. "Ma don't like it when boys act like girls."

Again came the youngster's clap-back: "She's old, wait five minutes and she'll forget she ever saw it."

Nihi'lir was in the midst of wrapping his lava-lava back on or he'd have corrected the boy himself. But his mousy ears picked up another smack. He arrived on the scene just in time to keep his son from an attempt to bite his brother's hand off.

Not an exaggeration, mind. Raccoon teeth were surprisingly dangerous.

He shoulder-nudged his boy to get Gemenes' attention. "He of the tall-legs," the father said to his son. "Could you be persuaded to help acquire coconuts, on the promise of keeping one for yourself?"

Giller rolled his eyes at the theatrics.

Gemenes assumed a thinking posture, and thought for about half a minute. "These terms seem acceptable." He offered his hand to shake, cemented the deal, and bolted up the road toward the surface, still sopping wet.

"H-hey! Boy if you don't slow down you're gonna sli – There you go, right off the edge!"

--

Euberta Tuler

"Odette," Euberta said as she rocked in her chair on her porch. "I think… next whaling season. I'll go."

Her sister-in-law snorted and covered her eyes with her hand. "Well… I sort of expected it. You only ever missed whaling season on account of your adventurin'." Odette was more delicate-looking than Euberta. Longer hair, less muscle, less mean in the face. Traits that made her a good match for Euberta's baby brother for a wife.

Damn she'd made a good call getting them hitched.

"Nah, see." Euberta waved her hand. "I'll go."

The levity bled out of Odette quick. Her face hardened as she turned to look Euberta in the eye. "You have a new husband still unused to our ways, and a boy not ten years old. Don't be stupid."

Euberta kept rocking, unconcerned with Odette's piercing gaze. She looked out onto the path where her man and her boy went up to fetch coconuts.

Damn she'd lucked out when she nabbed him. Little feller, thin but not scrawny. Fur in shades of red with black marks like one of them mean cats – Sia-something. Nihi'lir called his pattern 'pointed', but Euberta pretended not to remember.

He was cute when he was annoyed.

And her boy… spittin' image of her, with his pa's hair, eyes, and wings. That side of the family said their kids would look like her mostly, but she hoped for more cute lil' mice like her man.

"I shouldn't have had that boy," Euberta sighed the words more than she spoke. "I'm too old. Make that little feller cry cause everything he do is too loud, or too silly, or too hard on my knees."

"Ya know when that kinda thinkin' woulda been good to do?" Odette layered some sweetness on her voice so it became extra nasty when she curled her lip and snarled. "Six years ago. Affore you brought a city-boy down here, affore you had a boy he's gonna look after without you."

Euberta nodded, sad with the situation and wishing she could whoop her own ass just a lil'. "Yeah."

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Odette pull her hand back to swat at Euberta, then force it down as she muttered a countdown from ten.

"What's gonna happen to them when you's gone?" Odette asked her, calm in her tone. "I got grand-babies to mind, I can't go managin' a house you left behind. You told any of your girls they need to come look after their step-pa and brother?"

"Was thinkin' I'd talk to 'em when we go out whalin', present it as a sort of contingency plan."

Odette pinched her face as she glanced at her sister-in-law. "What?"

"It's a fancy word Nihi'lir taught me. Means plannin' for stuff what might happen, but might not." Euberta interlocked her fingers as she rocked back and held herself in position to look at the roof. "...M' thinking Leda or Kur might be okay lookin' after 'em. And if they ain't… they can go live with Nihi'lir's family."

"That man's what… twenty-five, right?" Odette pointed at the distant winged mouse, on the far side of the cenote path, only visible by dint of his extra limbs. "What're the odds you dying on purpose to a skeljúngur makes that man's headwings go 'pop'? Or that little boy's misery from losin' his ma does it?"

Euberta thinned her mouth to a line. She'd married a sub-adult incubus. They had one set of wings for flight and shapeshifting when they were adults – and a second that sprouted from their head to allow mind-reading, emotion-reading, and emotion-eating. The second set popped out fully formed after the cubi (weird term for the race in general), got smacked with a strong emotion stick.

"His clan ain't misery or grief," she defended herself. "They said they were rage. So as long as he doesn't get mad beyond all reason -- "

"Like findin' out his wife killed herself, on purpose, to leave him to raise a son alone, on purpose, cause living with them is annoying and difficult?" Odette slathered her voice in sweetness, with no snarl followup.

The truth, sweetened so sickeningly, hurt worse than a bear trap.

Too defeated to lie, Euberta sighed. "Yeah. That. As long as he doesn't find that out, it'd be fine for a bit."

"...Assumin' that happens? Already a high bar because I ain't no liar, and neither are any of your girls." Odette raised her eyebrows high. "When our folk and cubi folk make youngin's they get both sets of powers. Who gonn' teach your boy how to manage your side of that hot mess?"

Euberta, in the midst of realizing she'd made a bad mess for herself and her family, feebly smiled and turned to look at her sister-in-law slash best friend.

"If you are thinking what I think you's thinking?" Odette leaned over the divider between their porches with her eyes narrowed. "I will come 'round there and beat you with my rocking chair."

Later on, when her man and her boy had come back from coconut hunting to finish cooking lunch, Nihi'lir pulled her close when Euberta came to get a bowl of breadfruit and coconut milk sauce.

"Do I want to know why you were being beaten with a rocking chair earlier?" He asked with eyebrows raised.

Lips swollen, one eye blackened, and covered in healing salve from splinters, Euberta shook her head in the negative. "Just women things, don' worry 'bout it."

"Tell mom she looks prettier like that!" Their son commented. "She has a reason to look like she lost a fight now!"

--

Euberta Tuler

For the first time in decades, Euberta was going to miss a whaling season. For two solid reasons. One, she'd busted her shoulder in a spar with Nihi'lir and couldn't very well throw a harpoon into a skeljúngur in that state. Two, the rage her kinfolk had felt before it became obvious it was a spar, and not a real fight had made her husband's headwings pop.

They'd known it would happen soon-ish, Nihi'lir's clan mark had already been present for years, and his twenties were soon to pass. The two of them had taken to spar so that Nihi'lir would be in practice when it happened.

Creature powers, once clear of a threshold, would go out of control for a time. That was how it'd been for all Euberta's family as far back as they could remember – and it was true of other creatures.

Nihi'lir had been summoned by his clan's elders to learn control of his new abilities – the bare basics of which would take months.

Of course, that meant she was on her own for looking after her boy. That hadn't really set in until she felt hungry the day after Nihi'lir left and she went to the kitchen. She looked at cupboards, stone chests, and the pantry door, then realized – she had no idea where the food actually was.

It'd always been – she'd bring in the food to the kitchen, and leave the man to sort it out. She was in her comfortable chair by the time processing started.

Her arm in a sling, she started to open cupboards to look inside. She found cups, plates, bowls, a spider, and a bin she'd seen Nihi'lir use for washing.

It wasn't until after she was done that she realized the spider had been the size of her head – and thus why that cupboard had a latch on it. She re-latched it swiftly.

How did she used to get food when she was an adventurer? Almost fifty years ago that was, the memories were foggy. She remembered being on the big island – hunting snakes in the trees.

It helped that she was part of a team back then.

"Hungry? I can make some --"

Gemenes, who had come up behind her without her knowing, spoke up suddenly enough to cause Euberta to jump.

Unfortunately, Euberta had age-old adventuring instincts on top of her eldest sister instincts. When surprised, her first response was violence.

That's how she accidentally punched her ten year old son in the face as hard as she could.

She was a seventy-three year old woman – her punches weren't enough to break bones anymore. But the end result was she had a sore wrist, a crying kid on the floor with a busted nose, and no idea how to correct the situation without a loss of face.

"D… don't you go sneaking up on me, boy!" She shouted at him as he used his wings to cover his head. "Get out of here! To your room, get! No supper, boy!" Anger was a convenient mask for confusion and shame. She hollered at Gemenes until he scampered off, still crying, to his room.

She stood in the kitchen in silence until the mask of rage began to crumble.

"Why did you do that?" She asked herself as she dragged her feet to the kitchen table. Euberta slumped into a chair and held her head in her one good hand. "Why did yo do that? He didn't do anything wrong…."

Nihi'lir would shout himself hoarse if he'd seen that. Any of Euberta's kids would know – that weren't how they was raised. Euberta never punched them like that. If Euberta's mama had seen her treat one of her kids like that, Euberta would get exactly what she gave Gemenes.

"Why did you…? Dammit, you stupid old woman, why did you do that?" Because she'd been startled, afraid. Because she realized how old she really had become – that she had started to forget how to take care of herself. Because she'd been reminiscing about her adventuring days, when reflexes like that were necessary.

Her tail hung listless as she bemoaned her own idiocy.

"How do I fix this… already said no supper – gotta work around it. Snacks, maybe? Teach the boy how to dodge a punch and call that punishment?"

Nihi'lir would have suggested she apologize, admit she was wrong, but those thoughts barely lasted a moment in Euberta's mind. Of course she should apologize, because she was wrong. But she'd never tell Gemenes that.

She'd go to her grave first. Apologizing was a man's business.

Euberta decided, she couldn't admit a mistake to her son. But it wouldn't be as unacceptable to ask help from her brother.

She went next door, explained to Odette and Rothbart that she'd made a mistake and needed help with the house, and came to an arrangement.

It involved owing her little brother a favor. One request, granted at a later date, no questions asked.

Rothbart, grinning ear to ear, looked over her kitchen and explained Nihi'lir's madness to her in a way she could understand. The terms of her request didn't extend to decoding his cookbook, however.

Her little brother prepared a simple meal for her and Gemenes, and departed to attend his own house's needs.

Neither Odette or Rothbart knew how to make up for the mistake Euberta had made with Gemenes, though.

She stared at the two plates of food laid out on the table, a perfectly prepared supper, and realized she'd have to at least cave on that. The boy needed to eat. Glum that she had to back down, Euberta made her way to the boy's bedroom door.

Knock, knock. "Boy, your uncle begged me to let you eat – get your ass out here and eat."

There was no verbal response. Just an indistinct sound of motion – shifting fabric? Had the boy curled up on his bed?

Again, knock. "Boy, don't make me come in there. You get out here and be grateful you got an uncle so good at talkin'."

No response again. But the noise was closer to the door. Obviously, the boy was a bit too much like her – proud and pouty.

She took a deep breath and twisted the knob. Her intent was to open the door and intimidate the boy into obedience.

What she got the second she opened the door was a cloth-wrapped wheeled wooden duck swung right at her face. Wham!

The cloth that wrapped the ducky had softened the blow to where it surprised her more than actually hurt. Euberta stumbled back into the wall, dazed, and fell to the floor once she had her back supported.

Her vision was in doubles for a minute, as she processed what had just happened. In her stunned state, she barely noticed Gemenes leave his room and go down the hall.

Euberta gradually recovered, stunned out of any emotional reaction. When she stumbled her way to the kitchen, she saw her boy pouring a drink for her, with a full cup already present at his plate.

Gemenes thrust his jaw forward as he tilted his head back at her. "I give as good as I get. Remember that." Defiant, lightly threatening. Unashamed.

Euberta felt moisture around her nose, and saw blood on her fingers when she checked it. Her boy had drawn her blood with a wooden ducky wrapped in a blanket.

She met her boy's eyes and smiled. "Alright," she said and left her nose bleeding. Suddenly, she didn't feel so old anymore. For just a minute, it was like she was in her twenties -- dealing with a rookie adventurer. "Sounds good to me."

An arrangement in place, the next few months passed amicably.

--

Nihi'lir Tuler Owona

Shapeshifting, as it turned out, was great. Finally, he could change the ratio of black and red in his fur so that the vivid green marking of his clan didn't clash so much. It also meant he could withdraw his backwings into his body to make himself taller – on eye-level with his boy.

Important, given he had to teach Gemenes how to fight.

"You're sure that healing spell will let ma get through the whaling season?" The winged raccoon asked his shapeshifted father as they walked through the jungle between cenotes.

Waves of unease and doubt rolled off him, which Nihi'lir had the ability to detect now. The headwings on an incubus or succubus allowed them to detect thoughts and emotions – even when hidden via shapeshifting.

Useful for parenting, or the unpleasant tasks he'd have to do professionally.

"I study with our clan's allies when I go away," Nihi'lir responded over his shoulder. "I'm not a healer to their standard – but I can make her feel young again for a while." Nihi'lir didn't have the heart to tell his boy yet that, most likely, Euberta would die early on in the season. Maybe after the first skeljúngur.

She wanted to die surrounded by her family, and one last whaling season would do that. Euberta had asked him to study magic that could make it possible when last he departed to his clan's instructors.

They hadn't been displeased to hear he wanted instruction from their allies in Jin's clan. But for a clan of ambushers, assassins, and warriors the desire to heal was an oddity. Unexpected, not unwelcome.

As they stopped in between two rows of breadfruit trees – they seemed to naturally grow in rows, freaky – Nihi'lir stopped to turn and smile at his boy. A wide, coy smile, that belied his violent intent.

Gemenes narrowed his eyes and shrugged off the basket he carried on his back. Breadfruit collection was off the table for the moment.

"Begin with the stretches – remember to hide their movement so your target doesn't realize what's going to happen." Nihi'lir applied the lessons of his assassination instructors, still fresh in his mind from his last visit.

Nihi'lir's parents were skirmishers, not assassins, so they'd taught more open combat stretches and stances. He would have passed those along to Gemenes, if the order hadn't come down that they would serve the clan differently.

Clan politics, ugh. He'd spare Gemenes from learning that until necessary.

Stretching done, Nihi'lir wanted the early spar to cover their previous lesson. To see how much the thirteen year old had remembered, yeah? He moved closer in the appearance of stretching his legs, then went oddly low to the ground to sweep kick.

Gemenes, still in his stretches, hopped over Nihi'lir's leg without much fuss. He didn't retaliate, though, and continued his stretches. Annoyance with a faint mix of pain were the emotions Gemenes gave off.

Nihi'lir narrowed his eyes up at his son. "Why are you still stretching?" Was he being led on for a surprise attack? Did Gemenes even know how to do surprise attacks?

"Got some pain, trying to work it out," Gemenes put his hands on his hips and bent his torso every which way to stretch it. "Feels weird." Small sharp spikes of pain filled his emotional profile.

Paternal instinct mixed with his healing knowledge immediately. Nihi'lir perked his ears up and gathered mana in his hands. "Hold still, I'll fix you up."

"Feels kinda like…." Gemenes bent at the waist and swung his leg on the way back up. The raccoon's shin connected with the side of Nihi'lir's head. "...Being kicked in the head." All at once, the pain he gave off stopped, replaced with amusem*nt and a sense of accomplishment.

Nihi'lir, dazed from the kick, blinked at his son until he noticed small bloody holes in his palms. The winged raccoon had used his own claws to trick Nihi'lir with pain detection. Clever little jerk.

Gemenes wore the same wide, coy smile Nihi'lir had used minutes prior. Perhaps it was genetic.

When Nihi'lir recovered, and picked himself off the jungle floor, he realized the absolute hell the clan's instructors would need to give Gemenes to make the boy feign respect. His boy thought he was hilarious, which ill-suited assassins in clan's worldview.

Perhaps not Owona's, though. She and Nihi'lir hadn't talked at length. She was busy, he was unimportant.

"Hmm, nah felt like a gentle nudge to me," Nihi'lir wiped some blood from his nose and cracked his knuckles with a wide smile. "Let me show you how being kicked in the head really feels." And so battle was joined.

Nihi'lir's training in healing magic meant the two of them could go just a bit more vicious in a spar than would otherwise be appropriate. Assuming his son didn't play a jokester and render himself immune to magic – always a risk – purely to make Nihi'lir look bad, all injuries could be treated quickly.

Once they finished their spar, they actually got to work collecting breadfruit. Breadfruit trees were tall, so lots of climbing was involved to get enough fruits to feed the homestead. Nihi'lir, with more magical training, could store more fruit than his son's basket could carry.

After the harvest, they went to each family in the homestead to deliver some breadfruit then returned home.

"How come everyone else got so many and we didn't?" Gemenes asked as they walked the path down to their home.

Nihi'lir let his headwings pop out for a moment. "Because you're the only one in the house who needs to eat them."

The adult and older teenage women had all already left for the whaling season that morning. Including Euberta, so the only folks in the homestead were men and children. There were no pregnant ladies that year, perhaps that was why Euberta decided this season was the season for her.

Perhaps it was that Odette, their neighbor and Euberta's best friend, had passed the year before. Nihi'lir would never know his wife's motivations – she had kept them to herself.

It didn't hit Nihi'lir until after he closed the front door that Euberta wouldn't come home. He'd given her enough healing to die in glory, surrounded by her daughters and sisters. But nothing short of a master healer could give her the vitality to return alive.

All the cheer bled from him as he settled in at home.

His wife had gone to her death, he'd known she would go to her death and so had she. Neither of them had said it out loud, or had proper goodbyes.

She hadn't given a proper goodbye to her son, or any of her older sons.

The last time he'd seen his wife would be the last time he saw his wife. Her last words to him would be the last words they shared.

With the disparity in their age and lifespans, it seemed obvious in hindsight. That she'd held out for thirteen years was a big accomplishment for her. When was the last time anyone in her family lived into their late seventies? It likely wouldn't happen again for hundreds of years.

Nihi'lir was snapped out of his reflection by a sudden shift in light, and a swell of emotional relief. He'd kept his body busy by carving up an ube for cooking, and turned away to look.

Gemenes was in the midst of dousing candles. He'd point, let loose a bit of cold air and frost, then out went the flickering flame. Each time, it felt like an old pain dimmed. The light wasn't the source of his son's pain, from what he gathered. It was the smell of smoke from the candles.

Neither of them needed candles to see – Owona's clan all had eyes that cast light of their own. During whaling season, they usually went without. The candles were for Euberta's benefit, and she was gone.

Never to return.

The realization didn't make Nihi'lir break down in tears. It made him feel heavy, but there was no cascade of grief.

Gemenes needed to be told, he was old enough to have an opinion on his mother's suicide-by-whale choice and Nihi'lir's enablement of it. If that meant the boy would hate him, so be it.

Nihi'lir put the knife down on the cutting board and hopped off his cooking stool. "Gemenes? Can you come over here…? We need to talk."

--

Gaia De'Tialdo

At the behest of higher powers, a winged cat left the peak of civilization to arrive at a backwater. She didn't bother to change her bearing, her dress, or her coloration – nevermind that no one had seen silk like hers, mistook her professionalism for arrogance, or ever saw a sky-blue feline before.

Gaia would, better or worse, be herself. Those that thought less of her for it likely would have thought less of her regardless.

Part of that was that, unfortunately, she had too much hope for people far from the heights of civilization. A backwater was a downgrade from the palaces of Hishaan, she had assumed it would be enough of an upgrade from the wilderness that people would live there.

The town of Crowfalls was the greatest population center on Lostkeep Island, a spot where jungle paths converged from centuries of cultivation. And it had, at most, ten percent of the island's total population. Three thousand seven hundred people, not even in the same magnitude of order as Hishaan.

The people she'd been assigned to find weren't there, and what information she could find pointed her west-north-west. In that direction there was a satellite town, the older settlement of Lostkeep.

Gaia had thought: 'Oh! They live in the namesake town for pride's sake, even if it's less developed' like a sensible person. But no. A gryphon-cart ride later had her find that while her assignment's relatives lived there, they did not.

It was then that she learned they lived in a hole in the ground, out in the jungle. Like animals.

"Next opportunity I get," she muttered to herself as she trudged through the jungle in heels, cleansing herself of mud every ten paces with magic, "I'm going to send the council a strongly worded letter signed with the name 'exploding runes'."

Regrettably, the 'living in a hole' thing was based on sound logic. The island was dotted with cenotes from frequent rainfall eroding limestone, to the point where all the rivers were underground. Lostkeep and Crowfalls had resident creatures and enough population to make them unlikely targets for demon rampages or gryphon depredation.

But being underground, people could live in smaller communities without being visible on flyover.

It was offensive on a spiritual level, but it worked.

Gaia followed the instructions she'd been given and came to a cenote with a hidden path that traveled along its edge. It was gratifying to hear her heels hit stone, not mud, for the first time in hours.

Everything she saw about the settlement as she walked the path was pure pragmatism. The stone had been sculpted with magic to support a roof that artificially shrank the cenote's surface hole and covered the path. Channels to the side of the path were obviously designed to collect rainwater, then funnel it down to the pool of water to keep the path dry.

The homes were all simple affairs, made of breadfruit wood and stone worked by magic. Next to no ornamentation. No art visible outside the homes. A place the residents wouldn't grow attached to – that they could flee without regrets.

Disgusting. It assumed failure, by design. Shameful.

She sensed fear and confusion long before she saw the residents. They likely heard the clack of her heeled shoes, and saw her shadow pass in front of their windows, and thought she was a demon come to rampage.

They'd only change their mind when they saw her feathered wings, and believe her to be an angel.

Their assumptions were not Gaia's obligation, though.

She stopped at a home that carried some graffiti carved on the exterior wall. An arrow inside the incomplete shapes of a rectangle and circle overlaid – Owona's clan symbol. Gaia stepped to the door and knocked three times, hard and heavy so there would be no failure to hear her.

As the door opened, Gaia's eyes narrowed. There was a young man, a raccoon of natural color with the telltale trait of Owona's clan – black sclera, glowing eyes. Red, in his case. Unfortunate, it would clash terribly with his clan's mark wherever it was.

Blinding bright green and anything on the red side of the spectrum just did not go well together. At least he was mostly grey.

Bare chested and barefooted, clothed only in an odd skirt held on by friction. The pattern was colorful, at least, a design of tiger lilies. The young man kept his bat-like wings flared so something smaller behind him couldn't get through. She was told her assignment had a child, perhaps that was it.

Yet, he hid his headwings. Curious. Gaia let hers slide from shapeshifting and pulled aside a shoulder strap of her dress so her clan mark was visible.

Against the blue of her fur, a white circle that linked to a downward facing trident stood out in a complimentary fashion.

The raccoon blinked and recoiled. "Cyra?" He asked, like he recognized her.

Gaia arched her eyebrow. How many blue feline succubi had been out this way for that to be the case. "No. I'm Gaia De'Tialdo. I've been sent by your clan leader the De'Tialdo clan council to carry out a contract."

The small figure behind the raccoon finally got under his wings enough to be visible. They were much redder than the raccoon, half his height, a mouse, and… had headwings. "Ah, I'm Nihi'lir – this is my son Gemenes."

Gaia looked at them, the mouse less than half her height, and the raccoon at most a couple centimeters shorter. Her knowledge of being culture said they did not lightly cross species divides – and she knew this to be a raccoon settlement.

The reason for their remoteness made sense, in hindsight. A more populous settlement might have lynched them.

"Come inside," the mouse said. "Before the neighbors convince themselves you're a threat and pounce."

Gaia glanced to the side and saw several raccoon men, all more akin to beings than Gemenes. They were afraid, no more or less than when she'd arrived. But they all had mana collected in their hands, ready to fly.

"I think I shall, as soon as your boy moves?"

--

Nihi'lir Tuler Owona

The news had come, Euberta had died to a skeljúngur after they'd beached it. The whalers would drive the armored whales onto shore, where their speed and protection meant nothing, then kill and butcher them where they lay.

Euberta died stabbing the whale's tongue, so that it would bleed to death rapidly. Per tradition, she was given a sea burial to repay the ocean for its bounty.

As a widower with a child, he would be allowed to keep his home until Gemenes was fully grown – then he'd have to leave whenever a newlywed woman of the family decided she wanted to live there rather than build her own home.

Amazon tribes, ugh.

For a while, Nihi'lir had forgotten to absorb the emotions of his neighbors so he didn't need to sleep, which resulted in him passing out in the living room. It had been nice to dream of how things could have been different.

But he was woken up by a knock at the door that Gemenes got to before him. They had a guest of the Hishaan De'Tialdos. Very wealthy, prestigious, and not ones from the frontier.

She looked like she'd just come from a boutique in Hishaan proper -- dressed in green silks that complimented both her blue fur and white-blue feathered wings with a satchel bag as her only accessory.

Gemenes had mistook her for someone, 'Cyra', he'd called her. Odd since Gemenes hadn't left the rain forest a day in his life.

Still – Nihi'lir let her in and showed her to the kitchen. It was appropriate to offer tea to travelers.

From her satchel bag, Gaia produced a letter sealed with their clan's symbols in colored wax.

"Gemenes, could you make the tea for us?" Nihi'lir asked as he sat down to read the letter. Unlike the tall-legs he had to sit on his knees to rise above the table.

"Must fight the urge to make 'one lump or two' jokes," the teenager muttered as he took the kettle to collect water. His emotions read as uneasy, confused, doubting.

Nihi'lir left that alone, and opened the letter. His headwings and ears flared up as he read on, then folded close to his head as he looked over the parchment to meet his guest's eyes. "You can't be serious."

"I would not be sitting in a hole in the ground if it wasn't serious." Gaia rolled her eyes. Vivid green, like her dress, like the leaves of a palm tree – the opposite of Nihi'lir's. "Your wife is elderly, she will pass soon. Your son is a decade from being an adult." Her eyes narrowed. "And it would appear that this culture is not as supportive as your clan had hoped."

"So you want me to send him off to an adventuring school that's not even built yet?"

"As the architect building said school, I'll have it completed in a week or less." Gaia's headwings and ears betrayed none of the annoyance that radiated off her. "Most of the prep-work is already done. The land is bought, the official notifications are being sent out, and we have Taun's and our clans promoting it to the mainland guilds."

"Sending a thirteen year old off to adventurer school in a city he's never been to, surrounded by strangers is not going to end we -- "

"Oh, you're sending me to school?" Gemenes returned to the kitchen with a full kettle and set it on the fire pit. A bit of magic, and the coals flared up. "Score, finally get to leave this place and you can finish up your schoolin' too."

Gaia glanced at the boy then smirked at Nihi'lir's stunned expression. "Not going to end well, I believe you meant to say?" Cats and smug expressions went together too well. Much too well.

"Pa, no one in the family likes me," Gemenes explained while he shaved tea off the brick and put it aside for when the water boiled. "I spend most of my time trying to figure out magic on my own, or helping you with chores. Ain't got friends or anyone I'd miss here – other than you."

That was something that would've devastated Euberta to hear – that her entire side of the family were akin to strangers for their boy.

"I mean… I knew the girls didn't like you being so aggressive, but…." Nihi'lir set the letter down and folded his hands in front of him.

"But the moms of all the boys didn't want them hanging out with someone who makes it less likely they'll get a good wife." Gemenes cracked his knuckles. "Which I definitely do, since I kept trying to teach them how to throat-punch people."

"...You know, that actually works as a flirting maneuver against demons." Gaia couldn't help adding to the conversation. "Also, is it normal to keep your home this dark? I'm having trouble seeing just a bit."

Nihi'lir sighed and got up to get the candles from the closet. "Sorry, sorry, Owona clan things…."

"While he's doing that, since he and Ma were never willing to talk about their adventuring days – how socially acceptable is it to defeat rampaging demons by subjugating them and adding them to an ever-growing harem?" Gemenes asked the question as soon as Nihi'lir left the room.

"It… depends on what stage of their rampage you do it, I guess?" Gaia seemed bewildered by the question from her tone of voice and confused aura. "You'd want to do it when they're in the property damage phase, not the substantial body-count phase – why?"

"I have it on good authority that the majority of demons that adventurers encounter are actually half-breeds and thus more likely to be colorful twinks."

Nihi'lir froze in the middle of candle-grabbing to whirl around and glare into the kitchen. Gaia had her eyebrows raised and her headwings half-folded from the word choice.

Gemenes saw them and raised his eyebrows in surprise. "Oh wait, Twink Territories might be around – does that make calling people twinks culturally insensitive?"

"Yes, extremely," responded both adults in wildly different tones of voice. Surprised yet professional for Gaia, outraged for Nihi'lir.

"Aw man, that means I gotta call 'em bishounen or femboys. I gotta shelve all my 'I want that twink obliterated' jokes too." Gemenes glumly added tea to the kettle and set it aside to steep. "That sucks."

Gaia slowly turned to look at Nihi'lir with extreme concern. "You've… taught your thirteen year old son what bishounen, femboys, and harems are?"

"No! No, I didn't! And right now I'm wondering if my wife committed suicide-by-whale partly to escape having that question asked of her!" Nihi'lir grit his teeth and brandished the candle in his hand toward the ground. "When I get down there, old woman, you and I will have words!"

"...I feel I should be concerned that you're convinced both you and your wife are bound for the pits of torment. But considering what our clans do for a living, I'm struggling to see any alternative. Really, I'm just curious what she did to deserve it."

"Well, she unleashed me on all of you," Gemenes commented as he got the tea cups from the cupboards and dragged out the palm sugar dish. "That's pretty heinous in my book. But, while Pa's lighting the place up… one lump or two?"

---

Glossary!

: A rocky planet with three moons, whose globe is still unmapped at the time of the story. Lots of maps whose edges have 'here there be dragons' unironically. Furrae is a colorful deathworld where multiple powerful species compete for each other, and might makes right is the foundation of all governments. Magic abounds, both wild and tamed, and civilization takes forever to reach certain milestones.

: A category of non-magical anthropomorphic animal people. Remarkable for their natural coloration matching non-anthropomorphic versions of their animal, high reproduction rate, and inventive nature. Their birth rate can be as high as one per year, where creatures usually average one per century.

: A category of magical anthropomorphic animal people. They tend to have colorations that are not naturally occurring, and unique abilities according to their race. Tend to call the shots on Furrae, and live very long lives.

: A race of creatures known for their natural ability to pick up thoughts, emotions, and shapeshift. Cubi children are born with their backwings formed, but manifest a second set of miniature wings from their heads above the parietal lobes. Males are incubi, females are succubi. All cubi have a clan, identified by a mark on their bodies that they cannot shapeshift away no matter their form. Can have bat, feathered, dactyl, and dual wings.

: A race of creatures known for their violent tendencies, natural strength, and carnivorous diet. Typically dark-colored, with horns regardless of species, and bat-like wings.

: A race of creatures known for their excellent use of propaganda. Genetically similar to demons, they're only different culturally in their perceived benevolence by other species and solitary lifestyle. Typically, they are brightly colored with feathered wings.

: Third largest island in the Comia Atoll. Present population is estimated to be thirty thousand. Part of the United Republic of Mostalsia.

: A species of toothed whale that grows between twenty to forty-five meters long. Covered in protective armor, and capable of extreme speeds in open ocean. Hunted by whalers on Lostkeep Island and from the Swiftkeep Union for meat, oil, shell armor, and bone.

: A cubi clan noted for being nondescript, stealthy, and for unarmed combat. Frequently seen as skirmishers, assassins, spies, and adventurers. Known for their black sclera and glowing irises.

: A cubi clan known for their support of the dragon-city of Hishaan, largest city in the Comia Atoll. Typically all members are feline with bright blue fur and hair.

: A massive archipelago comprised of three islands arranged in a ring around a shallow sea, with a fourth island within the ring. The south island comprises most of the landmass in the atoll, with the north island and Lostkeep island making up roughly a quarter put together.

--

Cast!

: Race, REDACTED. Age at time of death, 76. Species, raccoon. Occupation, retired adventurer, whaler, matriarch. A fist-mage, before the term 'gish' came to describe the fighting style – mixing melee fighting with spell-casting. Favored element: Blood.

: Race, murine incubus. Age, 32. Species, mouse. Occupation, retired adventurer, house husband, assassin trainee. Primarily a martial artist, gradually working magic into his combat style to become a gish. Favored element: Darkness.

: Race, feline succubus. Age, 981. Species, domestic cat. Occupation, mystic architect, troubleshooter. No combat data available.

: Race, REDACTED incubus (adolescent). Age, 13. Species, raccoon. Occupation, being a Chair and an asshole. Likely to develop into a gish, like his parents. Favored element: Ice and blood.

--

DMFA is something near and dear to my heart. It got me started on being a furry, on being queer. It introduced me to my first chatroom based game which let me be a stupid kid and figure myself out while being stuck out in the country with no car and dial-up internet. I'm writing this because I love DMFA and wanna play in that sandbox a lil. Hope you enjoy reading me being silly in a colorful deathworld.

Here's the link so you guys can read it yourself, DMFA: May/16/2024: Thats the way I like it and I never get bored.

And here's a map of Comia Atoll for your viewing pleasure.