Chapter Text
A black hyena with blond spots wearing a dark cloak walks through the woods. His name was Cackle, a mercenary traveling to his next mission. It was a fairly simple mission, intel retrieval. What the intel had wasn’t for Cackle to question. This was a trivial mission for someone of Cackle’s talent, but Cackle had been trying to keep his head low for the past couple of years. Suddenly, something hits him right between the eyes, bursting into a cloud of dust and blinding him. While he cleared the dust from his eyes, he felt a hand brush past his waist. Reacting almost immediately, he grabbed the hand and threw its owner to the ground with surprising ease. As his vision cleared, he saw his assailant: a small, light-blue ocelot. He was clearly a child, no older than six from what Cackle could tell. “A kid?” he said, confused.
“Let go of me!” shouted the boy.
Cackle heard a voice call from the brush ahead of him, “Slinger!” as another pellet rocketed towards Cackle. He easily dodged it this time, knowing where the attack was coming from.
He let go of the ocelot, only to pick him back up by the scruff of his neck. Then, he lunged in the direction of the voice he had just heard. Driving his arm into the brush he pulled out a slightly older looking biscotti wolf pup by her scruff as well.
Now thoroughly scruffed, the two children slumped down, defeated.
“So, two kids setting up an ambush in the woods?” Cackle began. He turned to the light blue ocelot, “First off, you should have taken more time to identify your target.” He gestured to his belt, now visible since his outstretched arms held his cloak open, which had multiple knives and small firearms, “I’m quite well armed, and you didn’t even locate my wallet. Even if I reacted slower, I still could easily pull a knife or gun on you before you could get anything.”
Cackle turned towards the biscotti wolf, “And you. Not only did you give away your position by calling out to your comrade here, but you made the mistake of basically trapping yourself in the brush. You had no way of escaping or changing position without revealing yourself.”
He placed them both back on the ground and closed his cloak once more. “Still, you’re both pretty good.”
The ocelot’s eye’s lit up as his tail curled in interest, “Pretty… good?”
Cackle smirked, “Yeah, that’s still a pretty impressive maneuver for a couple kids you age. Keep at it a few more years and maybe you could pull one over on me.” He began to walk past the two children, “I’ll be on my way, good luck with that though.”
“Wait!” the ocelot grabbed onto his cloak, “Mister! You have to teach us!”
The wolf joined in with her soft voice, “Yeah! Please teach us, mister!”
“Huh? Sorry, but I don’t think your parents are going to like you hanging out with a guy like me.”
“But we don’t have parents,” said the wolf, solemnly.
The ocelot gasped, “You can be our dad!”
Cackle visibly recoiled at the suggestion, but as he looked at the two, he couldn’t help but see something familiar about the two. The voice of an old friend began to echo in his mind before he quickly dismissed it. “Absolutely not,” he said after a moment. “Hey, shouldn’t the town up ahead have an orphanage? Why are you two out here mugging travelers?”
The wolf shuddered, “Scary men took everyone. No one will do anything about it…”
“Scary men, huh,” Cackle pondered for a moment, then kneeled down to the wolf, “Hey kid, I just so happen to be on the lookout for some ‘scary men’. What’s your name?”
“Whisper,” the wolf said.
“Well then,” Cackle stood up, “Whisper, Slinger, mind leading the way?”
As the trio walked deeper into the town, the two children began huddling closer to Cackle. He noticed that they were becoming more tense, afraid.
Eventually, Whisper grabbed Slinger and pulled him under Cackle’s dark cloak. “Over there.” A small hand stuck out of the cloak and pointed at a sign labeled ‘St. Mercy’s Orphanage’ in front of a quite sizable building.
Cackle squinted at the sign for a moment before looking down at the children cowering under his cloak, using his hands to prevent them from rubbing up against any of the weapons on belt. “Hmm, better drop you two off somewhere,” the hyena mumbled to himself. He looked over at the other side of the road and saw a small cafe.
He crouched down to Whisper’s level, “Hey kid, there aren’t any bad people in there, are there?” Cackle pointed to the cafe.
The wolf looked over for a moment, as if thinking, before turning back to him, blue eyes meeting blue eyes.
Slinger interrupted, “No one in there works directly with those people, but they’ll sell us out if questioned.”
The hyena thought for a second, “Hmm. I might have something for that. Just stay in there.” Cackle guided the children into the cafe. He quickly noted the only two customers who wore matching uniforms and the nervous looking barista.
The two customers eyed him suspiciously as he walked up to the counter.
“W-Welcome, how can I h-help you?” the barista stuttered.
Cackle opened up his cloak, revealing the children huddled together, “I need you to watch these two kids for a while.”
The moment he mentioned kids, he heard two chairs squeak as the other customers began to stand and approach him.
Listening carefully, Cackle waited for the right moment. Without looking behind him, he quickly grabbed the two would-be assailants and bashed their heads against the counter. Both men slumped to the floor, unconscious.
Whisper and Slinger looked on in wonder as Cackle quickly searched the bodies, disarming them and taking any ID cards they held. He noticed that they both had handcuffs. “Hm…” Cackle looked at the barista, “Is there anyone else in this building?” He spoke almost as if he were giving an order rather than asking a question.
“N-no…” the barista glanced around nervously.
“Are you sure? Because I’m about to go to the back to get some things to tie these guys up with, and if I see anyone else that I don’t know about,” He gestured to the two unconscious men, “I’ll have to deal with them.”
The barista considered her options for a moment. “M-my coworker is t-taking a break in the back. Please don’t hurt them,” the barista whimpered.
The hyena preemptively put the handcuffs on the men and pocketed the keys, then he looked down at the two children, “Wait here for a minute.” Walking into the back of the cafe, Cackle felt a sharp pain on his skull and heard a snap. Cackle stopped, largely unphased by the attack, and calmly turned to his side, finding the previously mentioned coworker.
“Don’t hurt me!” the second barista shouted, desperately holding a now broken broom to defend themself with.
Cackle sighed, “Just get me some dish rags to tie those two jackasses out front and we’ll be good.”
The barista slowly scooted over to a closet, never breaking eye contact with Cackle who looked on patiently. They quickly reached in, grabbed a sack containing the dish rags they use throughout the day, and tossed it to Cackle.
“Thank you,” he said, dryly, before heading back to the front of the cafe and finished tying up and gagging the two men who had attempted to sneak up on him.
He pointed to the first barista, “You, watch the kids until I get back.”
The barista simply nodded as Cackle took his leave to cross the street. Picking up the weapons he had previously taken off of the men on his way out.
As Cackle walked up to the orphanage, he noticed a card reader poorly attached to the doors’ handles, likely placed recently. He could probably break it off if he wanted to, but figured that he already had the ID cards and might risk triggering an alarm.
Easily entering the building, Cackle was immediately greeted by a thin, yellow tiger in a fine suit. “Finally! You two are b- Who the hell are you!?”
Cackle wasted no time bringing the tiger to the ground.
“Hey! Get the hell offa me!” the tiger screamed. “Ax, Shiv, where the hell are you two! You’re both so fired after this!”
“Shut up already,” Cackle shoved a spare dish rag in his mouth, stopping the tiger’s cries for now. He then pulled the tiger’s jacket off, tore off a sleeve. and tied his arms around his back with it, finally dragging him back up to his feet. “Now I’m going to take that out of your mouth, and you’re going to co-operate with me.” He pulled the rag out of his mouth.
The tiger just seemed offended, “Do you KNOW how much this suit costs. I’m SO billing you for this, not to mention any teeth you chipped with that little stunt.”
Cackle pulled a gun on the man, “If you’re going to talk so much, at least say something useful. Where are the kids? What’s with this whole operation?”
“Oh!” The tiger began to realize the severity of the situation. “Th-there down the hall. Second door.”
Cackle slightly gestured to the hall with the gun, “Well, get a move on. I’m not letting you out of my sight.”
The tiger grumbled as he shuffled off to where he had pointed, “Didn’t need any of those worthless kids anyways…”
After slowly walking to the door, gun pressed against the tiger, opening it with his free hand. Inside he saw about a dozen children and one adult, a capybara, all caged up in a makeshift prison. Cackle positioned the door so kids did not see the gun. “Don’t worry. I’ll get you all out. I just have to deal with this guy first.” He glanced back at the tiger, noticing that his eyes kept pointing towards the next door down. Cackle left the door slightly open and proceeded to the next door.
“Hey, wait,” the tiger interrupted, “I gave you what you were after. Let me go!”
Cackle remained silent as he entered the next room. Inside he saw a computer on one end and an operating table on the other. The table had surgical tools on the side, though the state of the room suggested that they have yet to be used.
The computer drew Cackle’s main interest as he began walking towards it. The tiger grew relieved as his captor holstered his weapon but worried as he approached the computer.
“W-wait! We got off on the wrong foot. This is just a big misunderstanding. I-I can help you,” the tiger stuttered out.
“Just shut! Up!” Cackle grunted out. He pulled a flash drive out of his belt and plugged it into the computer. A small red light lit up on it.
“No, no! Really! I can tell you why we’re here, who we’re working for, what’s on the-HMPH,” The tiger was once again gagged before he could continue pleading.
“I said. Shut. Up.” After a moment of silence the light on the flash drive turned green. Cackle took it out, picked up the computer tower, and smashed it on the ground. He then picked up the hard drive and snapped it in half. “That’s all I need.” He looked around the room again. Seeing the surgical tools once more, Cackle’s mouth pointed into a sinister grin. “Wait here.”
The tied up tiger grumbled as Cackle left the room, taking a ring of keys off of his captive. He went back to the makeshift prison room and unlocked the barred door. “All of you get out of here.” As children hurried through the door, Cackle stopped the worker who locked up with them. “There’s two other kids hiding out in the coffee shop across the street. Slinger and Whisper.”
The woman seemed relieved to hear that, “Oh, they're safe, thank goodness.”
Cackle walked back to the room with the tiger, picked him up, and placed him on the operating table, a look of fear taking over his face. “Alright Lucky, or is it Stripes now, or maybe Streak. You go through names pretty quickly.” Lucky only grew more scared as Cackle rattled off his pseudonyms. Cackle looked over at the tray of surgical tools. “I know what these are for, but the lack of blood around here probably means you haven’t cut into anyone yet.” He removed the gag from Lucky’s mouth one last time.
“Please don’t hurt me,” Lucky weakly pleaded.
Cackle grabbed a clamp from the tools and leaned into Lucky’s face. “I told you to shut up.”
“Then he came back out and adopted us!” Slinger said, cheerilly.
Smithy the lion looked onto the wolf and ocelot siblings worriedly. Whisper was juggling her knife in one hand, which only heightened his concerns. “That was… quite a story… I feel like you skipped over a few parts.”
“He never really told us everything that happened in the orphanage,” Whisper chimed in, “Just that he got everyone out and took care of the tiger.”
“When you say ‘took care of him’ do you mean?”
“No,” Whisper replied, “Cackle says that death is too easy a punishment for some people.”
“You said that to a child?” Dr. Nemis had just finished hearing the full version of the story.
Cackle smiled, “On that day, I started their training to be perfect soldiers. Hasn’t gone perfectly but they’ve made progress.”
“Ugh, well, as impressive as removing someone’s tongue in such conditions is, I’m not in the business of making ‘perfect soldiers’. I’m trying to help people.”
“And failing to do so, based on my intel. GUN would pay a pretty penny for this tech. Wouldn’t be the first time you’ve made weapons for them,” Cackle was practically threatening him.
“Never! Not this.”
Cackle walked towards him and placed a hand on the side of Nemis’s face, running his fingers down the side, “Come on, doc. This can just stay between us. I don’t have to tell anyone else.”
The doctor lingered for a moment, “Not while he still has two perfectly good eyes already.”
“That can be handled,” Cackle stuck his hand out, waiting for the doctor to extend his own.
Dr. Nemis looked at Cackle’s hand for a moment, and then took it into his own.