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Another world, whether you like it or not (Lounger x MellowYellow)

L

Lounger

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Joined
Nov 21, 2013
Alex Karish was a genius. He had graduated from college with multiple PhDs by the time he was 10 years old. Now, 6 years later, he was a top researcher in the field of Interdimensional Physics, a field of his own discovery and design. His latest project was an attempt to construct a functioning link with another dimension. Not necessarily a portal as some of his colleagues wrongly assumed, but simply a connection, perhaps a way to see or get some kind of reading from this other world. It would be the first step in creating a portal, perhaps for exploration or to perhaps find a way to extract resources or energy from other dimensions, relieving the pressures of this worlds growing need for more and more. Of course he was working alone, nobody else could even come close to understanding his theories or calculations. He'd had to invent an entirely new kind of math when he was 11 in order to cope with the increasingly complex formulae.

His work had been going well recently, he had even constructed a prototype generator that would create the beginnings of a connection to another dimension. Today he had put the finishing touches to the device and the programming, rooms filled with supercomputers humming as they were pushed to the limits by his programs. "Ok..." Alex grinned slightly as he folded his arms, looking over the machine one last time, before reaching out to tap one last button to begin the sequence. With a gentle hum the machine powered up, gradually beginning to draw more power.
Everything went well at first, the air at the centre of the machine beginning to blur and distort, energy occasionally crackling across it. It was working....it was working! Unfortunately, the time Alex had to celebrate was short lived at best. There was a beep on one of the computers, Alex looking over just in time to see that the lab generator had malfunctioned and sent a power surge into the grid, right into his machine. Before he could shut it down though, the safety fuses all blew out, the surge continuing directly into the machine. The crackles of energy suddenly expanded, then converged into a central point. For a brief instant there was complete silence, before the energy rippled out in a wave, engulfing Alex who vanished in an instant, leaving behind a lab filled with now fused equipment.

When Alex opened his eyes, he found himself somewhere rather....different. The cold metal walls, floor and ceiling of the lab were gone. Instead he found himself in what seemed to be a field, a beautiful sky above him, pink clouds drifting across the sky. "Wait, pink clouds....?" Alex looked up and frowned. "What the hell...? And how did I get here...? Wherever here is..?" He looked around slowly, the grass in the field silver in colour, glistening in the sunlight. ".....Am I dead?" He started to look around slowly, taking a few steps.
 
It was a hot and musky kinda day, and even moving from the canyons out toward the grassier planes offered little relief from the heat. Things had been rough this summer- between sparse rainfall and a sparser birth rate it seemed that life in the modest frontier town of Finnegan's Wake was getting harder and harder to support. At the very least though Galil felt she could go out hunting, bring back some fresh meat for the townsfolk.

Her skavil, a deep green six-legged insect roughly comparable in size to an earth camel, raised it's scaly neck up and sniffed the air. The feelers and tendrils of the creatures mouth seemed to freeze up. "What'sat fella? You catch a scent?" the anthro asked. She narrowed her eyes where her creature was glancing and wheeled the six legged creature into a swift canter clipping and clopping along the hot grassy plain.

Then she stopped, gripping the reigns of her creature when her exotic eyes came to rest on the strange figure who looked nothing like anything she had ever seen before. "Uh... hey there stranger?" she asked, speaking surprisingly in crisp English.
 
Alex had knelt down to study the grass, plucking a few strands to get a closer look. It didn't feel like regular grass either, but how was this possible? He doubted he was in a coma, the sensation of this grass was completely unfamiliar, that much he was sure of, and if it wasn't familiar then his mind couldn't be drawing on his experiences to create something like this. "So....dead and in some kind of afterlife? Or....could something have happened with the dimensional connector...? The power surge could have caused this....an overload..." He frowned, then blinked as he heard something approaching from behind.
Quickly Alex stood up, turning around and gasping at the sight he saw. A giant insect, being ridden by some kind of....creature. Female but....definitely not human, almost like some kind of animal human hybrid. And then it spoke! English no less. "Um...hello..." Alex backed up a little, his labcoat swaying in the very gentle breeze. "Who....what...are you? And where am I...?"
 
"Fella I could ask ya the same question. Ain't never seen nobody like you before now... As for where you are... Well this area here is the shaded plain. Big ol' stretch of grass that reaches for about ten acres. The town's behind me. Finnegan's Wake is what we call it, or what the ol' settlers called it at least." The furry young woman swung off her skavil, the creature giving a few snuffling hisses from the shifting weight. "I'm Galil. I'm a rancher, and a Vulpa" evidently some kind of fox-like creature.

"So ya mind tellin' me who you are?" She casually adjusted her cargo-coloured short shorts, the motion making the knife on her hip and the gun in her holster jangle. "Hm... never seen a person like you... are you a... a male by any chance?" she asked. She'd only ever heard of males in stories, and the curiosity was plain on her furry face.
 
The Shaded Plain? Finnegan's Wake? Alex had never heard of such places before....certainly nowhere near the lab. More and more he was beginning to think his theory of a malfunction within his machine caused by the power surge was responsible for this situation after all....that he really had somehow been pulled into another dimension. Of course that then raised the question....how in the world would he get back?
"Me?" Alex snapped back to reality, having gotten caught up in his own thoughts. Though it caused him to also notice her knife and gun.....well, it seemed this woman wasn't to be trifled with....she was armed and likely dangerous. "I'm...Alex..." He backed away a little as she dismounted the creature. "Am I a male? Well...yes, I am....why do you ask?" What a strange question. He was obviously a male, wasn't he? He didn't look like a woman did he?
 
"Holy smokes, a real life male in the flesh! Alex, I might not know what species you are, but your gender is just what we need around these parts!" Galil said, brandishing a broad grin that showed him the tows of sharpened fangs that made up her mouth. Well it was a friendly smile at least. "Sorry, maybe I'm gettin ahead of myself a bit. If ya want I can give you a ride into town on my skavil so you can get your bearings. Ya don't look heavy, so this fella won't mind too much. And I have no doubt the others in my humble little town would welcome a newcomer like yourself in with open arms."
 
Well, it seemed that he had given the answer she was looking for at least, though her reaction was more confusing than anything else. His gender was just what they need around these parts? What in the world was that supposed to mean? Then there was those fangs....she wasn't baring them menacingly, but even so it was somewhat....off putting. "Well...." Alex mulled over her offer for a moment. Whilst he was hesitant to trust her, and even more hesitant to climb on the back of that creature, he didn't really have much of a choice. If he refused then one of three things were likely to happen. She would kill him for his disobedience, she would ignore his decision and forcefully take him anyway, or she would accept it and just leave him there all alone with no idea where he was or where to go. "Very well, I'll go with you..." He took a few slow steps forward, his eyes darting between Galil and the Skavil, as if waiting for either of them to jump him as he continued to get closer and start to climb onto the creatures back.
 
Again the creature made a small snuffling noise as the young genius climbed upon it's back, and its strange noises grew a little more intense as Galil clambered onto it's chitinous back. "Let's get goin then," Galil remarked, unaware of the internal mental debate Alex was having with himself over this current situation. The six legged creature set off into a trot, coming away from th vast grassy expanse of the planes and moving into a dusty canyon that wound about in an awkward and somewhat jagged pattern. "Hey, Alex, you hungry? Thirsty? Feel free to help yourself to some of my stuff." Her hands gestured to the saddle bags, mostly to the canteen of water and the plastic bag of jerky-like strips of meat.
 
When the creature started to make odd noises Alex stopped all movement for a few moments, though when it didn't try to throw him off he slowly and carefully resumed his climb until he was sitting in place. Not exactly the most comfortable place he'd ever sat, but it would beat walking at least given that he couldn't see anything that looked like civilisation anywhere in sight, whatever direction he looked in.
As the creature moved he quickly grabbed onto it to keep his balance, the odd movement very new to him. He'd never even ridden a horse back home, so a giant insect was completely out of his realm of experience. "Hungry? Ah, no, I'm fine thank you" Alex was rather hesitant to eat or drink anything right away, he didn't know if things here would be poisonous to him or not yet, he needed the opportunity to study things first. He looked around as they left the plains and entered some kind of rocky canyon, zigzagging down it. "This place we're going, is it very large?" A large town or city would mean more potential for useful technology, though he wondered just what level of technology existed here. The handgun seemed to indicate at least an industrial level of technology, but he was hoping there would be something more advanced, it was possibly his only potential way back home.
 
"Big enough. Wake is gonna be eighty years old soon, and it's become a pretty good tradin' spot. Zeppelin's have been towin in supplies from all around the country, giving us the means to expand. And ever since the railway linked to us then we've gotten a bit more sturdy. Had to be to handle influxes of travellers." She paused in her explanation, glancing up from her skavil to see the canyon widening and opening- the way clear so they had a perfect view of the town of Finnegan's Wake. Considering how much like the rustic Wild West this place looked like, this place was decently large.

The buildings stretched out and seemed to be mostly built of wood and in some cases brick and mortar. A few water towers dotted the area, and at the right edge of the town both could see the long stretch of a railway. Most of the transport was done by these skavil creatures, either ridden single or hitched up to carts. Surprisingly however there did seem to be a few motorcars or trucks parked on the dirt roads- sleeker and more tapered in the front than the cars back in his dimension. Evidently the engines were different- smaller and less bulky. However what also came as a surprise when the creature trotted into the town was that almost every citizen, regardless of age or species, seemed to be a female.
 
So, they had Zeppelin's, that definitely linked in with his theory of at least an Industrial level society. A railway as well, a further indication of an Industrial level society...there would be some technology at least, but none of it particularly useful to him, and he didn't exactly have the time to bring them up to the level he would need. When the town came into view he didn't hold out much more hope, especially when he saw wooden buildings, not a good sign at all. But as they entered the town, there were occasional signs of more advanced technology. Definitely some kind of motor vehicle, but what kind of motor he couldn't quite tell, it certainly didn't look like internal combustion at least. So...it seemed this place was somewhere in the region of 50 to 100 years behind his world.

"So....do you have large cities too? Or is this town more or less the biggest place you have?" He hoped there might be some kind of Capital City, perhaps a place with more advanced technology. At the very least he needed an electrical supply and computers to even begin to recreate his device. "Hm..?" He looked around and raised an eyebrow. Women....women everywhere he looked. "Do...the men in your society normally work during the day away from the town? I don't see any men here at all besides myself"
 
"We got cities, but they're far out. This whole territory has been gettin' colonised over the last one hundred years, so some areas just ain't settled at all. About eighty miles up is Ozymandias, biggest city I ever done seen. Probably twice the size of Finnegan's Wake and getting the most traffic from ferries and zeppelins. Nice spot, they've been setting up a Petrevite grid to handle lighting and electricity for every buildin. We's hopin' to build one ourselves in time," she rattled on, only to pull her Skavil to a halt by one of the larger buildings; one with a white brick and mortar base and a second storey forged from wood boards. The sign at the front read, in white paint, 'Town Hall.'

"Huh? Well I done told ya," Galil said. She slid off her beast and then hitched it at the nearest post. "Male population has been dwindling out here for a while now. Just not gettin born as much, and the futas aren't quite as fertile. That's why seeing a male like yourself was such a big deal to me," the toned furry explained.
 
"A Petrevite grid?" Alex raised an eyebrow, wondering what in the world Petrevite was. It must have been some kind of natural resource. Perhaps some kind of equivalent to coal if it had something to do with electricity production. Still, at least they had electricity, that was definitely a good start. Though if the cities were only just setting up a grid, the chance of computers was slim to none.
He was rather relieved when the Skavil came to a stop, the boy slowly and carefully dismounting and looking up at the building. Like the spoken language, it seemed to be English. An amazing coincidence, or perhaps he had ended up in a dimension with at least some similarities to his own. When he got back home he'd need to investigate that further.

"Dwindling? I see..." He nodded, then blinked in confusion again. "...The Futas? The...I'm sorry what? I'm not familiar with that term" He shook his head slightly, clearly having no idea what she was talking about. "So...a male like me is a big deal...?" He started to look around slowly at the various....'people' that were definitely staring at him. "I....see...so...now what...? I suppose you've brought me here to figure out what to do with me...?"
 
"A futa... ya don't got that back home? It's a lady that's born carrying a gentleman's 'endowment' between her legs if ya know what I'm saying. They help some with makin' offspring, but they ain't as fertile as men," Galil said. She led the way toward the double doors and pushed open the painted red material to allow Alex access to the town hall. "The mayor'll wanna know just who... and what you are. I'm sure she'll let you stay, and ya can even crash in my pad."

With that she led him into the building, humming and swishing her fluffy tail.
 
"No....we certainly don't get that back home" How could such a being exist? Well, these people clearly weren't human, but even so, to have a third gender like that, it went against everything Alex knew of human biology. He followed her towards the doors, then slowly stepped through when she opened them. "At your place? Thank you..." Alex was grateful to Galil for all she had done so far, but deep down he couldn't help also feeling somewhat suspicious of why she was doing all this. In his world, someone wouldn't go to all this trouble for nothing, they always wanted something, and he had to wonder if she wanted something too.
 
Given what he had seen thus far, this place was surprisingly clean with its polished tiled floors and the patterned wallpaper slid along every wall. Some even sported paintings, classic works of art either depicting important individuals or major events in history. Galil opened the doors leading into a well furnished office adorned with bookshelves, a currently empty fireplace and a large oak desk framed in the light of the window at the back window. "Mayor Lee, you ain't gonna believe this! I was out hunting, and I found this short hairless fella out by the plains. That was shockin' enough, but the big news is that this fella is a male!"

Mayor Lee turned, and Alex would find himself staring up at an exceptionally tall and curvaceous bovine woman, dressed in a fine silky white shirt and a black pencil skirt that stopped at her knees. "Well I'll be, he really is a male... but I have no clue what species he is..."
 
Alex took a moment to study the artwork as he passed it. It seemed culture in this world was fairly similar to his own, the paintings seemingly depicting similar animal-like people for some reason, or a major event from the towns history. He followed Galil into what seemed to be an office, a rather luxurious office at that. Even his office back home didn't have a fireplace, not that he would have any real use for such a thing. It would just be space taken away from bookshelves or workspace after all. "Ah...hello.." Alex blinked as the new woman turned around, having to look up due to how tall she was and how short he was. The smart clothing she wore was rather at odds with...well....how else could he put it, the fact she was a cow.

"I'm human, that's the name of my species" Of course he doubted it meant anything to them. Clearly it seemed humanity didn't exist in this world, evolution had taken a radically different path to the one he was familiar with. "And no, I'm not entirely sure how I got her either....wherever here is in relation to my home" He figured it was probably best to keep the details about his inter-dimensional experiment a secret for now. He needed to gather more information before he could trust anyone with the truth of his situation.
 
"A foreigner, I see..." the cow-woman replied with a small nod. She seemed to know he was holding out on her, but she either had the tact not to reference the fact or simply didn't care enough to really ask about it. Mayor Lee was a very busy woman, and with how unimposing this figure was then it seemed there was no need to ask much of him. "Well I'll formally welcome you to Finnegan's Wake in that case. I'm Mayor Yang Lee and I'm pleased to meet you. If there's anything that can be done for you while you're here, then feel free to ask either me or any of the townsfolk for it."
 
A foreigner? Well that was certainly one way of putting it that was for sure. "I'm Alex Karish...thank you for your hospitality Mayor Lee" At least the people still seemed friendly enough, for the time being at least. He'd have to be careful though, he didn't know what might offend them or potentially make them turn on him. When she mentioned if there was anything else that could be done for him, he was about to say that there wasn't at the time, but his stomach grumbled loudly before he could talk. He had skipped lunch for his experiment, plus the journey on the Skavil hadn't exactly been short. Now that he had time to start calming down, his hunger was certainly kicking in. "I suppose....I need something to eat. Though I'm afraid I don't have any currency on me to pay for...well....anything actually" He hadn't been carrying any money at the time of the accident, and even if he had he very much doubted it would be accepted here.
 
Mayor Lee gave an uncharacteristic snort of muffled laughter at Alex's growling stomach, the taller female evidently finding it to be a little cute of him. "Well... that's a vice we all share. Don't worry, work is plentiful around here- I'm sure Galil will spot you a few meals in the meantime," the towering bovine said. Her comment earned a small nod from the foxy huntress, and she seemed to have no real objection to giving him some food.

"Sure thing Mayor Lee. Can't have this guy starvin... and if he's got the guts for it, I can pay him for a little help during my hunting jobs," she said. Galil grabbed her ring of keys from her belt, jangling the iron pieces slowly "If you want I can bring you by my place and cook you up something. I'm no pro, but it's better than an empty stomach."

The mayor nodded at the duo "Of course. And Alex, if you do find yourself in need of work then I can oblige you I'm sure."
 
"Well...I'll accept your kind offer, thank you Galil" Alex nodded slightly, glancing between the two. "I'd be happy to work, however I'm not cut out for more...physical tasks. In my home I'm a scientist, I generally use my mind, not my body" He shook his head a little. The closest he'd come to physical labour was assembling various pieces of technology he had designed and that nobody else could understand the blueprints for, though he did go out of his way to make them useless to anyone but himself so that was hardly surprising. "I'm sure there's something I can do to help out somewhere though, but for the time being I think food is what I need before I can do anything..." His stomach grumbled again, the boy turning away from both women quickly before starting to head for the door in order to hide his embarrassment.
 
"Scientist eh? Well I'm sure you could put that brain to work overseeing one of the garages or working near the trainyard.... but heck I'm no expert in this area. You'll find something I'm sure," the taller woman said, walking alongside the shorter male toward her home. It was a bit of legwork to get from the mayor's office to her home, and the brick and mortar house admittedly wasn't as impressive. It was big, even had a shed out the back of it where she cleaned her kills. Upon opening the door Alex would be greeted by the smell of exotic spices, and on several walls he could see some taxidermied animal heads and pelts. "So, anything particular you want? Jerky? Soup? I ain't a chef, but sometimes just being filled is enough."
 
Overseeing a garage or a trainyard? Hardly seemed like a good use of Alex's talents. But still, he needed money before anything else. He might have to reduce himself to tasks that were beneath him for a while, until he could get some money. That or find some other way to make the cash he needed. He was beginning to form a plan. Get money, get to the biggest and most advanced city he could, then start work on trying to recreate his dimensional connector in order to try and find a way home.
As he entered Galil's home he was momentarily overwhelmed by the odd smells. They were a very unfamiliar scent, certainly unlike anything he'd ever smelled back home. The animal heads and pelts on the wall, they surprised him somewhat, given that the 'people' here were part animal themselves as well. Still, it wasn't for him to judge. "Well, soup is fine with me really" He glanced around. "And thank you again, I'll find some way to repay you, though I've got no idea how just yet"
 
"Well you're a smart cookie, you'll find a way." For a smart guy he sure was fuckin' dense... the regular remarks of his gender should have made it goddamn obvious how he could get around here. The foxy furry made her way over to her kitchen, which in reality was just a series of cabinets surrounding a fire pit. She set up a spit and then put a pot over the newly crackling fire, letting it steadily heat up a big black cauldron of bubbling light yellow liquid. Smelled like chicken, and the smell grew nicer and stronger as Galil began to ad some spices of different types to the concoction.
 
Alex followed her towards the kitchen, the unusual design earning a raised eyebrow, before he just found a spot to sit down and watch her cook. The smells were certainly unusual, he'd never smelt spices quite like it, they made him feel somewhat tingly in some cases. "It smells good....unlike anything I've ever smelt before, there's nothing like that back where I'm from" He smiled and leaned forward to get a better smell. "I suppose this place has some very different herbs and spices to the ones we get back home, I just hope they taste as good as they smell"
 
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