A birthday gift for cyricdravane! I just adore drawing his Glitchcat T@bun!

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Jacob’s heart stopped as he looked in the security camera monitor. Although he had never met her, he knew the face he was staring at. The yellow sclera of her eyes, the characteristic face with the white crack of fur between them. That horrible mechanical syringe arm, a caustic green solution of her own invention sloshing around inside of it. He had seen her on television before; death and destruction followed in her wake and that made for great TV for the twenty-four hour news stations. The only difference between then and now was that the sense of comforting detachment the TV usually offered was now gone. T@bun was staring into the camera, directly into it, and Jacob felt like she was staring into his very soul.

The wolf slammed his fist down on the alarm button, sending red lights and klaxons blaring throughout the building, the heavy footsteps of soldiers mobilizing. Part of Jacob’s mind still couldn’t believe it was her. T@bun, in the fur. Jacob’s mind raced to what the containment plan was for, specifically, a T@bun attack. Shoot her, was what came to mind. Most of it was based around the assumption that she wouldn’t attack an entombed victim in a box. Or a corpse in a box.

Jacob’s mind went to his briefing as the Glitchcat ducked down out of sight of the camera. Privileged information he knew. The box. It was a coffin-sized box of ruined concrete and rebar that had collapsed shut on itself during one of T@bun’s terror raids. It disappeared during recovery efforts a few days after the attack; robotic cats stealing it away from the rubble in the night, according to the one witness that was tracked down. Three months after that, Schr0 started showing up along with T@bun, wherever she could be found.

Some scientists and intelligence folk had somehow found the potential source of Schr0’s powers, which involved teleportation and reality manipulation. The box of rubble, sitting in the middle of the facility. A special operations team was sent in to raid T@bun’s lab; and came back with their prize. The box. The scientists and the facility he was ordered to protect at all cost wanted to see how it provided Schr0 with her powers, but all they could determine was that it either had a live cat within it, or a corpse. They were going to try to open it tomorrow.

Screams issued out through the halls. Agonizing screams of a painful, lingering death. Jacob was in the middle of barking some orders to group up at various chokepoints, when T@bun appeared in the view of another camera; the entrance to the laboratory. How had she gotten so far inside already? She and the camera were both specked with blood, the Glitchcat giving her predatory stare directly into the camera. She held up a bloody finger, rubbing it against the lens, coating it with a line of gore. It was a message of some sort, Jacob thought, but what was it? Why?

T@bun slipped from the image of the camera again, leaving the crimson mark on the lens. More screams. T@bun was inside the labs, the heart of the facility. Jacob did his best to coordinate a defense against her, amidst sounds of splashing, tearing, explosions. Terror, pain, suffering. The pitter patter of metal claws, signaling her horde of robotic minions. Why was she here? According to the guys in intelligence Schr0 fell off the radar almost immediately after the box was taken. Was this raid about Schr0?

Jacob wouldn’t believe that, even if it was true. He had read the psych profile as part of his briefing. A few things characterised the mad scientist. Her insanity, for one, and with that came a pathological ability to not care about anyone but herself and her machinations. Most of the reason why no defense against T@bun had been planned was that she wasn’t supposed to be able to want to attack The strike destroyed her lab, there was proof of that; but even if she had resources in reserve, she shouldn’t care about a bunch of rubble. If it affected Schr0, she couldn’t care about Schr0…

The chatter on Jacob’s radio consisted of panic. All the fireteams that Jacob commanded that weren’t dead were scattered and disorganized. Jacob hurriedly tried to reorganize them. He grabbed his sidearm and radio, and stepped out of the room, to regroup with the remnants of his company, to organize a last ditch defense.

A cold metal object struck the wolf in the side of his face as he exited the room, knocking his jaw out of alignment with a snap as he crumpled, the pistol flying out of his hand. As sudden as the blow was he felt himself lifted up, to be thrown back into the office he had just departed. He rolled onto his back, his jaw and back alight with pain, only to stare up at green eyes with yellow sclera and that wicked white crack between them, and that predatory grin. T@bun, once on television, then on monitors, was standing over him; his blood specked on her syringe arm. A valve built into her palm opened up, and before she could spray that deadly green liquid on him Jacob wheezed out a broken “why?”

T@bun stopped in her tracks, her smile fading. “You know, captain, I think you get to live. When your reinforcements come they’ll find only you alive. Do you want to know why?”

Jacob just laid there, groaning, in pain, his world spinning. T@bun answered anyway. “I need you to convey a message to your superiors. As the highest ranking member here, I hope they will listen to you.” Jacob, in turn, moaned out “...Wha?”

T@bun’s face contorted instantaneously into that of vicious, scowling anger. “Do not. Ever. Fuck with my Schr0.” T@bun punctuated her words, the emphasis slamming into Jacob like her metal fist did thirty seconds ago. The world went blurry for Jacob, his jaw throbbing with the warm sensation of blood pooling up around his tongue, flowing out of his mouth. He blinked, and like a ghost T@bun was gone, replaced by a robotic cat.

Jacob’s world went dark, the alarms in the background fading to silence.

Story and T@bun © cyricdravane
Art and Schr0 © Blueberrysnow