The Swan's Song.

Introduction

"Everything has a reason. Everything has a meaning. Be careful when reading between the lines."

XXX

"The waiting. The insufferable time between missions spent doing nothing makes me want to jump off a bridge." The inner workings of the mind of Lieutenant Callie Faraday were an enigma to most who met her, including herself.

As a tiger shark anthro standing roughly at six foot even, she felt her reserved composure break at the prospect of having to wait once more for the wheels of bureaucracy to get moving. She leaned against the wall of the squad room, watching over her girls.

"It's bullshit. I'm sorry, but I'm getting tired of doing nothing! Every minute spent with our thumbs up our asses is another minute that those fuckers organize and plan against us!" Callie looked over to the lowest ranking and most recent member of her squad, Echo Parsnip.

She was a spotted hyena and quite vocal about nearly every aspect of her life. Such a mouth earned her quite the ability to communicate effectively and that is why she was the squad communications soldier. She was tall as well, just an inch over Callie.

"Oh, quiet down, you. There must be a reason this time. Command has never deliberated for this long and we all know it. We've gotta wait our turn to know why." Said another voice. Echo scoffed.

Callie looked over to the source of the voice, who was their sniper. She was a dire wolf of solid black fur by the name of Ava Hampshire, and the tallest of them all at an astonishing seven foot. She was currently cleaning her rifle, a hefty piece of equipment called the MRAD.

Callie thought it was overkill watching her targets get cut down one at a time, but it got the job done.

"Doesn't make it any less unbearable." Said a fourth voice. Callie looked over and saw her team medic and lifelong friend, Rita Cross. Rita, short for Rosalita, was a snow leopard and the shortest of the group at a 'measly' five foot eleven.

"You can say that again." The fifth voice was the team support gunner, a mountain lion by the name of Ana Zhukov. It was short for Anastasia, and she preferred the shorter version.

Ana was a mountain of a woman with short responses and was very to the point. No time was ever wasted with her. She slapped the feed tray of her M240 down after inspecting it.

Callie looked over to the sixth squad member, Isabella Wedemeyer, or Izzy as she liked to be called.

Izzy was a rattlesnake and stood as tall as they did. She was the squad grenadier. Besides her shotgun, she carried enough explosives and grenades to take down a battleship. Quietly, Izzy chuckled and scratched her scales around their diamond patterns.

"I wonder what General Brixleys' cooking up this time." She remarked. Callie sighed and shrugged.

General Brixley, their grey wolf base commander, was always more of a thinker rather than a doer. While not an insult in any way, Brixley spent an inordinate amount of time planning each mission to a level considered redundant. Her plans had plans, backups having backups.

While it was slow, it was always appreciated because it was a rare event that someone got seriously hurt or killed during one of her ops.

Except for when they came into contact with the human group which had come from the depths of the forests itself.

"D Platoon and Sako Squad...report to Ops for briefing. I repeat: D Platoon and Sako Squad, report to Ops for briefing." The PA system connecting the entire base called for them.

Callie raised a brow and picked herself up off the wall.

"God damn, let's go."

XXX