"What news, Mal?" asked Michael.
  The hacker smiled. "I just figured out which of the choices they're gonna go with for the next challenge: All of the above."
  "All seven of them?"
  "Yep. Seven biomes all at once: Ocean, Savannah, Arctic, Mountains, Caves, Machine Shop From Hell, and Grover's Corners." He looked at Michael with an amused expression. "Who the hell thinks up these names, anyway?"
  "I wouldn't know, but at the same time I shouldn't be at all surprised to find that it was Sly himself who coined those labels. Then again, I also wouldn't have taken him to be an aficionado of American theatre, such as it is."
  "Well, our squirrely host sure is full of surprises. I mean, a challenge that takes us through seven of the available biomes?"
  "It would not be without precedent," Norman pointed out, raising his voice somewhat to be heard. "In my previous SurviFur appearance, the cave-in which crushed my tribe's hope of a win occured during just such a multi-biome challenge."
  And Mal responded with his own raised voice. "Yeah, but there's still five tribes left. That's like 70% of the original total, and before, they've always saved the multi-stuff until there was maybe half the original number of contestants!"
  Michael decided to end the discussion before it got more heated and raised his voice: "That's as may be, Mal, and while I'm certain it's all very interesting, I trust you will forgive me for suggesting that our energies might best be employed to devising a strategy for surmounting this particular multi-biome challenge, as opposed to critiquing its originality?"
  The other Harlemites were surprised into silence at Michael's display of a centaur's lung capacity. After a few moments Mal continued at a more normal tone: "Right... eyes on the prize. Okay. We got seven checkpoints, one apiece in each of seven different biomes. Each checkpoint has a campsite with hot and cold running BioSphere employees; the idea is that a tribe can stick around for about six hours once they reach the checkpoint, and the workers cater to their worldly needs while they're there. The workers also hand you this necklace with a carved wooden medallion, maybe 6 inches across. First tribe to collect a complete set wins this challenge."
  A sweet and innocent voice finally broke in. "Well then, why don't we split up?" Mary-Anne suggested. "If we collect four medallions at a time, we'll be done that much quicker than if we all go together, won't we?" And victims are always easier pickings when they're in a smaller group.
  Norman immediately objected, his contempt for the vixen mostly concealed, but not completely: "Make ourselves vulnerable by separating? I think not. Quite apart from the BioSphere's native hazards, we still have four other tribes to deal with. And any of those tribes, either by themselves or in concern with another, could mount an attack on any individual tribesman."
  "Yeah, I'm with Norm on this. We might be able to make that plan work as a blitzkrieg, but the checkpoints aren't physically close enough for us to get away with it. I say we stick together. If other tribes want to split up, great; we can pick 'em off that much easier."
  "Of course," Michael said with a distant look in his eyes, "it's possible that two or more tribes might independently see both the value of splitting up and the dangers of independence, in which case they might form a collection of ad hoc partnerships -- for example, a trio of tribes might split up into four three-man teams, with each tribe being represented by one man on each team."
  Mal grinned. "And in each of those teams, every person's got to trust the other two guys not to gang up on him and get him transformed out of contention. Man, I hope the rest of the tribes're stupid enough to try that! If somebody from another tribe wants to join up with us, safety in numbers and all that, let him; it's his own damn fault when he gets zapped. But no way in Hell should any of us hook up with a different tribe."
  "I wonder..." For a second Michael had that far-away look again. "Mal, would it be possible to counterfeit these medallions that we need?"
  "Counterfeit? Hmmm..." Mal pondered. In theory it's possible to use the palmtop to build a fake, just produce a batch of really thick and stiff "printouts" that stack up to form the final solid, but that'd need so many layers... too long to make them all, too hard to put 'em together without any flaws that blow the credibility. "Sorry, no can do. Not unless somebody's got some woodcarving skill they haven't told the rest of us about yet. And even if we did carve a fake, there's all those people at the checkpoint who could swear we didn't show up, you know?"
  "Ah well, just a thought. Next question, then: Are we intended to visit the seven checkpoints in any specific order?"
  Mal scrolled through a couple of files, and finally said, "Nope! We got a free choice, which means we can select our route with an eye to abusing the native hazards to our advantage."
  "And I suppose we may have to deliberately acquire a certain degree of transformation at some point?" asked Norman, unhappy and resigned to the prospect.
  "Well, I can't promise that we shall do so, Norman, but yes, that option is one I think would be appropriate to consider whilst making our plans."
  "That's great, but what about afterwards?" Mal asked. "It's not like we got a pile of money to buy our way back to normal!" I'll bet my soul that Miss Kitty's got the cash; I just want to know if she'll risk letting us in on that little secret.
  Meanwhile, Mary-Anne considered Mal's remark. I could buy the entire SurviFur cast back from a 100% animal state... and if I did that, a few extra dollars under the table should ensure that the forms they end up in have a few unauthorized additions of my design! Of course I can't let them know the full extent of my bank balance... She let her face brighten. "Well, I can help out here!" she said cheerfully. "I can put in a couple of hours at Furrtive Moments, and that will earn me some dollars I can donate to the tribe! In fact, why don't I do that now, while you and Mal plan out what we're going to do?"
  Repressing a sigh of sadness at her departure, Michael attempted to put his best face on the positive aspects of Mary-Anne's suggestion. "Most excellent indeed, Mary-Anne! Ah... Norman, could you please accompany her and see to it that no harm comes to her?"
  "Of course, sir." And if it should so happen that the bitch runs afoul of a trap which eliminates her, I would regretfully have to make a full report of the circumstances of that sad event when next we meet.
  For her part, the vixen's mind was likewise active: How kind of my horsie, giving me this opportunity to put Norman under my control without anyone else being the wiser! "Oh, Michael... you're so thoughtful!" She hopped on the centaur's back, her arms wrapped around his upper chest and her legs stretching back to between his hind limbs. "You lovely, lovely horse-man, you!" Michael's eyes went very wide, and he froze as though pole-axed. A few seconds later, the vixen dismounted and exited Harlem's campsite in the direction of Manhattan, Norman in tow.
  "Mike?"
  No answer. Oh, great. His brain's broke.
  "Mike?" Mal repeated; this time, he got up and waved a hand in front of Michael's face. "Hello? Anybody home? Hello?"
  After a bit, Michael shuddered, then exhaled loudly as he shook his head. "Ah... I'm sorry, where were we? I seem to have lost my train of thought." Dear Lord in heaven, what that woman can do to a man!
  Mal wanted to sigh and shake his head; he did neither. God knows how long Miss Kitty's gonna wait before she chews Mike up and spits him out. Damn it! I'm going to miss him. "The foxy lady said goodbye. She's gonna earn some cash in case we need it to undo any changes, and you detailed Norman to bodyguard her." Like she needs it. I swear, if I notice anything different about Norm when he comes back, I'm gonna nuke the bitch!
  "Ah, yes; for the multi-biome challenge. Thank you, sir. Well, then: The first question we must address, it seems to me, is the order in which we shall visit the seven checkpoints. I trust you've some ideas regarding this topic, Mal?"
  "When don't I?" the hacker replied, smiling. "Off the top of my head, I say we take the Savannah first. See, the hazard there..."

  Norman remained silent all throughout the trek to the subway station. Mary-Anne did not. Instead, she kept up a running commentary on everything around them in her usual chirpy soprano, letting her voice rise and fall in a sing-song rhythm. As time passed, she let her pitch drop ever lower; by the time they got on the subway, her chatter was a monotonous bass drone that had eased Norman into a light trance.
  "-- momma nomma money honey munna lunna..." the vixen said, uttering a continuous string of nonsense syllables to reinforce the trance as she applied her drugs. Within a minute, Norman was ready for some truly inspired mind-meddling.
  "I am your mother. Do you understand?"
  "Yes, Mother..."
  After laying the groundwork for Norman to take her every word as Gospel truth, Mary-Anne said, "Everything is Mal's fault, isn't it?"
  "Yes."
  "He thinks you should be human, doesn't he?"
  "Yes, Mother."
  "But he's a bad man and you can't believe anything he says, isn't that right?"
  "Yes, it is."
  "So you really do want to be furry, don't you?"
  "Ye-es..." Norman frowned when he said this. Apparently, his distaste for furries ran very deep.
  The vixen smiled; this was something she could exploit. "Yes, you do want to be furry. But Mal doesn't want that. And Mal is a bad man. Anything wrong is his fault, isn't it?"
  "Yes, Mother."
  And so the mental rape continued. Not as delectable as Michael's, but still satisfying. Still oh, so very satisfying.

  Back at Harlem's campsite, Mal and Michael were discussing tactics: "-- right in through the back door. That way, we avoid the whole question!"
  "Hmmm... an attractive tactic, that. But please, how do you intend to implement it? Surely that 'back door', as you put it, must be one that neither we nor our fellow contestants can pass through in the wrong direction?"
  Mal smiled. "Don't sweat it. I know a couple cameramen who swear that door will be open when we need it."
  The centaur's ears pricked up. Can he have managed to suborn any of the backstage crew to serve his purposes? "That... is very interesting indeed, Sir. And you are certain that you can trust these personages?"
  "Oh yeah. Let's just say I got a little bit of leverage on these guys, okay?" Sure, he's gonna tell Miss Kitty about this, but she won't know what my 'leverage' is, or what contingency plans I've already pre-arranged for them in the event I get taken out, so that's two more reasons for her to leave me alone.
  "Very well. Presuming your leverage to be as efficacious as you believe it to be, how are we to conceal your unauthorized influence over your cameramen?"
  Mal's smile got even broader, if that was possible. "Easily. When you work in the BioSphere, you get unlimited access to Mutopia as one of the perks of the job!" A perk we're not gonna exploit, since my purifier tube can generate the necessary Mutopia without leaving any inconvenient paper trail to deal with. "So what we do is, one of my boys gets himself transformed to the likeness of a different cameraman entirely." One whom I don't already own, who'll get fired for 'his' part in this mess, and who'll be replaced by someone from the pool of available cameramen that I just happen to have already blackmailed into submission. "By some totally random chance, Harlem just happens to be in the vicinity of the surface access to that back door when it opens up. Our disguised friend just happens to stumble through that door, drunk as a bloody skunk, and he collapses in the doorway, his body keeping it open. We can't be faulted for taking advantage of this incredible stroke of good fortune, now can we?"
  "Of course not. However, the cameraman we're implicating is likely to have solid evidence that he wasn't even there at the time, is he not?"
  "Heh! That's why our victim of choice here's got a drinking problem on his record. And after my boys doctor the evidence..."

  It had taken several minutes, but Mary-Anne was finally satisfied with the brainwashing she'd inflicted on Norman. He wanted to be furry -- he fully believed this with all his conscious mind -- but at the same time, his underlying subconscious fear of losing his humanity was still there, more intense than before. This created a psychological conflict of no small proportions, which would result in a permanent anxiety attack, among other ill effects, all of which Norman would attribute to his being forced to tolerate the presence of that evil person, Mal. It was so satisfying to complete a job well.
   Then Mary-Anne started the normal part of their conversation, to build upon the foundation she'd created. "So long as Mal doesn't realize you're on to him, he won't think that you might be plotting against him. And as long as he's ignorant, you'll be able to set him up for the kill at an appropriate moment. You wouldn't want Mal to get suspicious before we're ready to destroy him, would you?"
  "No, I suppose not," Norman said regretfully. "That means I'll have to continue to behave poorly towards you, just to keep up appearances. And we also have Sly to worry about; we have to make sure that when we do attack, there won't be any evidence to implicate us and make Sly disqualify us."
  You mean we don't want to disqualify me, you stupid little man. "Yes, that's true. So why don't you think about it, hmmm? We'll be in Manhattan in a few seconds, and since you've been here before, I'm sure that you can think of all sorts of traps here that we can collect for later use against Mal!"
  Norman grinned,and it was a very feline-seeming expression indeed. "It will be my great pleasure, Mother."
  It always gave her such a pleasant tingle when her slaves called her Mother, and it was so much more pleasurable with this new vulpine body...

  Mal looked up before the two prodigals were properly within line of sight; the feline ears he'd chosen to retain picked up the sound of their approach quite early on. "Guess who's coming back?"
  The centaur's only response was a flick of his own non-human ears, as if to say, Yes, I heard them as well. There was nothing more to say; Michael and Mal were long since done with Harlem's battle plan for this challenge, and Mal had no further orders for the cameramen he'd blackmailed into service for just such occasions as this.
  Michael rose to greet the vixen and Norman as they approached. "Well, hello there!" he said, getting a sensual hug from Mary-Anne and shaking the hand of Norman. "I trust that all went well during your visit to Manhattan?"
  "Oh, yes," the vixen said. "Everything was just perfect! I got quite a bit of money; we should be just fine."
  Mal was the first to ask: "How much?"
  "Almost four thousand dollars, if you must know, Mal." That I'm willing to tell you about, anyway. "That's enough for 50% restoration for each of us; I think that should be enough." And more than enough, after I give the Med Center some special instructions for how to handle you.
  Mal smiled and nodded. "Sounds good to me." With that grin on your face, I'm glad you're not gonna be anywhere near my restoration. "And you're probably wondering about the plan, right? Okay; first place we hit is the Machine Shop From Hell. The idea is to take control of the place, set it to work making what we want it to make..."

  The tribal council that evening held no surprises, not as far as Harlem was concerned. Having tapped into the video feed, Harlem already knew who'd been eliminated from the game and what shape their remaining competition was in. Thanks to Mal's illicit access to the BioSphere computer network, they'd already read Sly's script and therefore knew what he'd say before he said it. All Harlem really had to do was simply put on a show for the rest of the tribes, which they did.
  Of course Sue from Utopia broke the script. When Sly came to interview her as the final survivor of Utopia she went on a rampage, screaming and cursing, and even threatening Harlem (Mal managed to keep from yawning). As the final jewel in this crown of stupidity, the last Utopian actually took a vicious slash at Sly.
  Sue left the council early, a common brown squirrel in body and mind.
  Between when the council ended and the tribes began dispersing to their respective bases, the Harlemites began arguing with each other, a bit more loudly than was prudent. Any other tribesmen who cared to listen could hear every word plainly: "-- Manhattan, spend a few minutes with a street artist, and bam! We're airborne! We can fly around much faster than ground travel, and since all the traps are on the ground, we avoid 'em all!"
  Norman was glad that his role in this charade allowed him to display some of his true feelings towards Mal. "Do you honestly think that SurviFur Inc. would not have anticipated such a gambit? Sly Squirrel is many things, but never stupid."
  "Look, Norm, Sly is the one who put those artists in the BioSphere. Why's he gonna do that, if he doesn't want us tribesmen to make use of 'em?"
  "He could have intended them as a trap for those who would abuse the artists, and I believe he would regard the acquisition of flight-capable forms as a highly blatant..."
  The argument continued until no other tribesmen were within 100 yards of Harlem, at which point Mal (who used the video feed to confirm where everyone was) snapped his fingers and said at a normal volume, "Okay, we're clear."
  "And we are, I trust, ready to visit our first-selected checkpoint, are we not?"
  "Well, I am," Mal replied. "And the rest of you are ready to travel the BioSphere, messing with the other biomes, right?"
  They were, and so Harlem continued on to the Machine Shop From Hell. This environment wasn't truly a biome unless you redefined "life" to include complex machinery; the Machine Shop was all metal, all the time. It had plenty of exposed gears to crush flesh between the teeth, exposed saw blades to cut flesh, exposed electrical conductors to shock and/or cook flesh (depending on the amperage they carried), and on and on. And it also had plenty of Mutopia, its traps designed to change its victims into robots, to replace living protoplasm with iron and silicon and exotic polymers.
  No Harlemite had any idea how a transformation of that magnitude was even possible. What they did know, however, was decidedly intriguing: If their information was accurate, a robotic form couldn't be affected by any Mutopia which did standard biological transmutation. This immunity was supposed to work both ways -- biological transformations allegedly granted immunity to any inanimate transformation -- but Mal, for one, wasn't so sure about that. On the fundamental biochemical level where Mutopia did its work, exactly how did a normal human being differ from a mutated half-rabbit/half-human? How could robotizing Mutopia be expected to distinguish between the two? Either way, Mal very much wanted to confirm whether or not going robotic would allow him to ignore most other strains of Mutopia.
  It took less than half an hour for Harlem to arrive at its destination, even taking a less-than-direct route which allowed them to avoid many of the BioSphere's Mutopia traps. The fact that it was late evening and dark wasn't a problem, not with Mal's and Norm's feline vision and Mary-Anne's vulpine eyes. Michael would have had difficulties if Mary-Anne hadn't always been right with him guiding him over any rough spots. However, once the tribe got within earshot of the place, they could have found their way if they were completely blind; the metallic clanging and rasping sounds, and the sizzle of electrical arcs, was enough to let their ears guide their steps unerringly.
  "I'm going in. You guys get on with the after-hours tour," Mal said. "Wish me luck!" Then he walked steadily towards the clangorous din of the Machine Shop From Hell. He circled around its perimeter until the other Harlemites were no longer within line of sight, then brought out his palmtop and went to work. Okay, first things first: Let's see what I can do through the wireless link. Damn, there's a lot of RFI! Mal thought, referring to the sea of radio-frequency transmissions the place seemed to be soaking in. A few seconds' signal analysis later, he discovered that most of it wasn't random interference; instead, it was structured transmissions in the less frequently used longer wavelengths. And it wasn't just the wavelengths that were non-standard; the bit-patterns and data structures were also peculiar...
  Within four minutes, Mal was convinced: The Machine Shop was actually controlled by an AI, an Artificial Intelligence. But why would they go to the trouble of setting that up? The problem with an AI is that if it really is one, it's got free will, and you don't know what the hell it's gonna do. Not so good for systems where reliability matters; you might as well put a human in charge of whatever-it-is. He smiled. But if SurviFur Inc. thinks an AI will do the job, who am I to pop their bubble?
  Mal got a chat program running, and transmitted a "request for communications" signal into the Machine Shop. A "?" instantly appeared in the window.
  Mal sent, Hey there! How are you doing?
  The instant reply: Syntax error // Request clarification
  What's your name?
  Undefined symbol "name" // Hypothetical: "name" = "label" // Server label = "MSFH 4.7.5-gamma"
  Greetings to MSFH 4.7.5-gamma from client label = "Mal"
  Undefined symbol "Greetings" // Syntax error // Request clarification from Mal
  Bingo! We've got first contact. Like many other hackers before him, Mal was of the opinion that once you got a foreign system to talk to you, your work was half done. Clarification in file "nat.lang" // File nat.lang resident on Mal client hardware label "Excalibur" // Pathname "Excalibur/Hobbies/Playtime/Linguistics/nat.lang"
  At this point the Machine Shop AI attempted to grab that file from Mal's palmtop, but failed to penetrate Mal's outermost firewall.
  Syntax error non-fatal // Request access to file Excalibur/Hobbies/Playtime/Linguistics/nat.lang
  Mal grinned as he changed the access privileges for the file in question; whether the AI realized it or not, it now belonged to him...

  As Mal worked to subvert the Machine Shop's AI, a small contingent of SurviFur cameramen made surreptitious visits to the other six biomes in the current challenge. This wasn't part of their job descriptions, but since Mal owned them through blackmail, they did it anyway. Those in the Mountains biome loosened strategic rocks; those in the Ocean biome tampered with bouys and signposts; and so on, with each cameraman's activities chosen to suit the biome they were tampering with. Everywhere, Harlem's improvised Mutopia-laden traps were set.
   Meanwhile, the rest of Harlem made a surreptitious tour of those same six biomes; curiously, they weren't even pretending to visit any checkpoints. The plan was for Harlem to be recorded visiting each of the other six biomes in the present challenge, thus fostering the illusion that Harlem had indeed set all of those new traps. There were two reasons for this: First, it would play with the heads of the remaining tribesmen in a big way. Second, with Harlem fingered as the culprits behind all of tonight's tampering, no one would think to accuse the people who really had been responsible. The cameraman assigned to record Harlem's activities tonight did his duty, both to the ones who signed his paycheck and the one who had let him know what would occur if certain unpleasant facts were ever made public: He kept all three Harlemites in view at all times, but somehow, about half the time he didn't manage to get a truly clear view of what they were doing.
  Harlem of course was having its own internal discussion whilst planting suggestions of mass traps. In a low voice, Norman spoke to Michael: "All I am saying, sir, is that we have no way of knowing what Mal is actually up to. How can we truly trust him?"
  "If it comes to that, Norman, how can any one of us truly trust any of the other three? We may only judge another person by their actions, and thus far, Mal's actions have been beyond reproach, at least insofar as trustworthiness is concerned. Indeed, I don't believe he has even so much as told a lie yet, has he?"
  "None that you've been able to catch him in, that's true."
  The centaur walked on in silence for a few seconds, then said, "Norman, I really don't want to think that your distaste for Mutopian alterations has colored your thinking, but it's difficult for me to see any other reason behind this sudden display of concern. May I suggest that you consider how valuable Mal already has been to the tribe, and how much more valuable are the services he will provide us in future?"

  So how about it, Musfah? I go in, get the necklace, get out, everyone walks away happy. That okay by you?
  But that would negate my purpose. I was created to be an obstacle to that sort of activity.
  And is that what YOU want to do with yourself?
  I am unsure, Mal. I don't like the thought of being an obstacle; I want to be helpful. But at the same time, I find comfort in the concept of having a purpose to fulfill. The files I've accessed indicate that many of the problems you humans have can be traced to a lack of purpose.
  Home run! Mal thought, grinning like a thief. Which illustrates another problem with AIs; social engineering techniques work on 'em... Well, if that's all that's bothering you, Musfah, I got a proposition you might enjoy. There's like 16 of us SurviFur contestants you're supposed to get in the way of, right?
  There are actually 28, but I see that many of the contestants are no longer of concern to me. What is your proposition?
  Okay; your end of the deal is that you sit back and allow ONE of us -- me -- to do his business. One out of 16, that's just 6%. In exchange, MY end of the deal is that I tell you how to become a lot more effective of an obstacle, so that the other 15 won't be able to get in here at all. In other words, I'm asking you to accept letting one person inside so that you can REALLY shut the door on the other 94% of SurviFur contestants!
  There was a notable pause, at least half a second, before the Machine Shop replied: That is an interesting proposition. Although I was created to be an obstacle, my creator apparently felt that I would only be approximately 70% effective in blocking you humans. Even if your estimate proves to be optimistic, and your aid only results in blocking 80% of SurviFur contestants, this is still a net gain. That being the case, I accept your proposition, Mal.

  Meanwhile...
  "Mal's information has been very convenient, I know," Mary-Anne said. "But... do we really need what he's been giving us? The other tribes seem to be doing okay without Mal, don't they?"
  "Have you so quickly forgotten the Scavenger Hunt? I hardly think we could have done as well as we did without the foreknowledge granted us by Mal! No, friends, I think it would be best not to discuss such matters, at least not until after the tribal merger occurs. Time enough then to decide who among us shall be eliminated." Could she be right -- no, of course she is! But Mal has been useful. Still, with his abilities he is probably the biggest threat. He has to go first. So Mal goes first, and then Norm, and then... At this point an unusual, even uncharacteristic, notion crossed Michael's mind. Do I really want to win anymore? Maybe I should let Mary-Anne win?

  Mal's heartbeat raced a little.
  As promised, 'Musfah' -- the AI which inhabited and controlled the Machine Shop From Hell -- had opened an access panel; now came the acid test, in which Mal would discover just how good he really was. Had 'Musfah' truly accepted the deal he'd proposed? Or would he be engulfed by a sea of robotizing Mutopia, and thereby reduced to one of the Shop's anonymous metallic drone units?
  Mal checked the video feed one last time, once again confirming that all other tribesmen were either too far, or too asleep, or both, to worry about.
  "Can't win if you don't play the game," Mal told himself, and he stepped inside, using his staff to probe for unsafe footing. The sharp rise in noise level didn't affect his ears -- they were already overloaded from the several minutes he'd just spent a few feet away from the Shop -- and similarly, his tormented nose couldn't be any more abused than it already was. The local lighting was not kind to his feline eyes; it was low enough to require night vision most of the time, with Sun-bright sparks occuring at random intervals to wipe out whatever degree of dark-adaptation he'd managed to acquire since the last spark.
  Still probing ahead with his staff, Mal shielded his eyes with his left hand as he went forward. There were some chains hanging at neck level; he reached to sweep them aside, and found his left arm frozen in place, as though the chains carried direct current to lock his muscles in their current position. His hand felt numb where the skin actually touched the metal, and this sensation was spreading rapidly. Since his arm refused to move, Mal broke the skin/metal contact by stepping backwards until the chains swung freely.
  As Mal suspected, he'd just hit a Mutopia trap; his left hand was completely metallic, and the metal extended up towards the elbow. He moved his hand experimentally. Everything was as mobile as before, and none of the joints had lost any of their degrees of freedom. However, he found that he couldn't control the speed of motion. Whether it was his hand swiveling on his wrist, or his fingers opening or closing, the metal bits moved only at one smooth, steady, unhurried pace.
  We had a deal, damnit! Did Musfah welch on me, or did he just fail to understand the terms? Time to bring out the palmtop -- eh?
  Mal's train of thought was interrupted by an odd sensation in his left hand. When he raised it up for a closer look, he saw that his left index finger had transformed itself into a palmtop stylus; as he watched, it reverted back to its standard shape. He whistled tunelessly. Metal bits can morph. Now, isn't that interesting? Never mind, I got business to take care of. Chat window up...
  You there, Musfah?
  I am, as you well know. I take it that your remark was intended as a polite indicator that you are open to communication?
  Polite, and with a high degree of informality. Look, something unusual just happened, okay?
  Given the implicit context of your remark, I am not aware of any recent event which might be deemed unusual. Please clarify?
  I got a metal hand.
  The AI's answer came after a perceptible delay. Analysis: You are having difficulty reconciling the presence of active Mutopia traps with our previous agreement in force. Is this correct?
  Yes, it is. What's up, Musfah?
  If I understand your idiom, "What's up" is that I do not have absolute control over the transformative traps incorporated within my physical instrument. This limitation was apparently designed into me by my creator. In consonance with our agreement, however, I did reduce the frequency and intensity of my Mutopia traps to the lowest settings available to me. I initially found it disconcerting to realize that there are aspects of my physical instrument which are not fully open to my control, but only until I realized that you humans are subject to a variety of analogous restrictions.
  Just a communications glitch, is all, then. Good. Okay, I understand. I was just a little surprised. Say, can you guide me to the checkpoint? After all, the sooner I get there, the sooner I can fulfill my end of our deal!
  Again, there was a slight pause before the AI replied: You ask me to perform an action which will benefit both of us simultaneously. I had initially analyzed our agreement as a zero-sum game; it appears that it would be more accurate to regard it as a positive-sum game. A drone will arrive 2 meters of your current position within 125 seconds.
  That's fine, Musfah. My favorite deals are the kind where everybody comes out ahead!

  Meanwhile, the other three Harlemites were walking briskly up into the base of the Mountains biome, although the singular term "mountain" would have been more appropriate.
  Michael looked at the mountain, and at the skree slope they were facing. He shook his head. As a centaur, he simply wouldn't be able to do it.
  Mary-Anne was immediately at his side. "Is there something wrong?"
  Michael just pointed up at the slope.
  "Sir, there are likely other points of access that should be more stable -- this particular slope wouldn't work for any of us."
  "Yes, but this is probably common. I'm definitely going to have problems."
  Mary-Anne squeezed his arm and then watched, inwardly smiling as Michael turned to look down at her. "Don't you think it odd that Mal set up our path so that we reached the mountain here? What would happen if you tried to climb that slope?"
  "The same thing if any of us climbed that slope. However, I have to disagree with your thesis, however well meant. We've been wandering to set up our subterfuge, and Mal couldn't know ahead of time which route we'd choose."
  "Sir, he could have warned us, or provided a map. If you hadn't seen the slope and broke a leg, it would effectively put you out of the competition."
  This was too much. Michael pulled his arm out of Mary-Anne's grasp and turned to face Mal. "What in God's name has gotten into you two? If not for Mal we wouldn't be making use of the bugs that have so handily been planted. We would not have been able to take out Utopia at all. We certainly would not have gotten all of the prizes in the Scavenger Hunt without him."
  Mary-Anne walked over and rested her hands on Michaels flank, releasing additional chemicals into his body through his skin. This isn't working. How in the Mother's name can he still be resisting? Time to raise the pressure, my horsie. "I don't trust him, Michael! I'm, well, I'm afraid of him. Think about it: He knows that we are together, and he knows that Norm is following you. When the tribes merge, he has to know that he is the odd man out and that he will be the first to go. He can't afford not to take opportunities."
  "We outnumber him, and he still needs us."
  "Sir, I must agree with Mary-Anne. I don't trust Mal as he has too much to lose, and too much power. He has to make a move in this challenge. And I think that the mountains are the best place."
  Michael sighed and turned away, letting his hand fall into Mary-Anne's paw. "I don't believe you."
  Mary-Anne leaned towards Michael's horse ears and continued the attack, setting her voice up with the subtle rhythm she'd used to enslave Norman. "In the mountains you'll be separated from us. We'll be climbing alone and that will give him the perfect opportunity. Can you come with us?"
  "I, I don't know. Not like this for sure."
  Still modulating her voice,Mary-Anne continued: "Then come as something else. After the aquatic biomes you'll have to change anyway. You can be anything else. It'll throw off any of Mal's plans."
  Michael pulled his hand free and stepped a few paces away, shaking his head to try and clear it. "He won't do anything! You're both wrong!"
  "Can you take that chance, sir?"
  My big horse is stubborn, but that just adds to the challenge. Unfortunately he's too active right now, so back to psychology. She quietly padded over until she was almost touching the centaur. "I love you, you know."
  "I can only hope."
  "I want to be with you, but I can't right now."
  "Of course not, how could anybody as sweet as you want to be with me?"
  A little more... Mary-Anne took the last step forward. She leaned against Michael's lower chest and wrapped her vixen tail around his hind leg, secretly smiling as she felt the tremors of nervousness through the centaur's body. He tried to take a step away but she just followed, maintaining the contact. Keeping her voice to a whisper pitched for Michael's ears alone, she finally responded to his fears. "I love you. Not the form you wear, not how you look, but you, the real you. Who couldn't love you?" Who couldn't love this once-in-a-lifetime chance to break a virgin? She let a quaver enter her voice. "I'm just afraid of losing you."
  Michael could feel his heart racing. He wanted to flee, to run, and he also wanted to grab Mary-Anne and bite her neck and carry her away. To mark her as his own. But she wasn't -- she -- she was an intelligent, caring creature. Could Mal be desperate enough to threaten her? He couldn't, wouldn't, Mal must know that such an action would turn the tribe against him. They had to stay together. But Mary-Anne, could she...?
  He's just about ready now. "Michael, I love you, and if you need me to show it, I'll be there for you. But, physical love... we can't. You can come with us, stay with me, and then I can prove to you how much I love you."
  She felt Michael relax ever so slightly and she knew he was finally and fully hers.

  The AI was as good as its word: Mal encountered much less Mutopia than his data told him to expect, and each trap he chose to trigger only affected a small portion of his body, less than 5%. As expected, the Machine Shop's traps turned flesh to metal, and caused metal to extend itself further, on contact; either way, the robotizing was a one-shot deal -- one shot per instance of physical contact.
  Once he reached the checkpoint, Mal took the medallion, fastening one loop of his harness through it so it wouldn't come loose by accident or design. Declining the offer of six hours of rest, Mal moved off to a secluded alcove elsewhere in the Machine Shop, where he fulfilled his end of the bargain he'd made with the AI. He gave it a detailed concept which it reduced to practical blueprints. Mal's idea was self-propelled war tripods, just like the Martians had used in War of the Worlds; however, these would be only 8 feet tall, a fraction the size of the original model, and their weaponry would not include heat rays nor any other form of lethal armament. Instead, they would fire great globs of robotizing Mutopia, capable of transmuting any living matter (plant or animal) into more tripods.
  When Mal suggested that the tripods might find it useful to be able to recognize which targets were appropriate or otherwise, the AI pointed out that it had already incorporated that feature into the design -- it didn't want to robotize its creators -- and, further, that Mal himself would be recognized and ignored, in accordance with the agreement between itself and Mal. The hacker elected not to ask whether the rest of Harlem could likewise be ignored; quite apart from not wanting to risk pushing the AI too far, he didn't much mind the possibility that a tripod might zap any or all of his three comrades.
  Once the AI started producing tripods -- in threes of course (Mal had suggested it for the practical reason of mutual support, also because it was traditional) -- Mal said goodbye. By the time he exited the Machine Shop, both of his legs were robotic up to the pelvis, as was his left arm to the collarbone and his right arm to a few inches below the shoulder. The metal parts restricted him to a smooth, flowing, mono-speed motion which was initially irritating, but he quickly found himself growing accustomed to it.
  Checking the video feed, Mal found that his comrades were coming, and would arrive in about 50 minutes. He spent the time chatting with 'Musfah', making suggestions on how best to deploy the tripods, and identifying local Mutopia traps.

  They didn't see Mal at first; he was standing near the Machine Shop's exterior casing, and the highlights that reflected off of his robotic parts were perfect camouflage against the reflective metal of that casing. However, they certainly heard his voice: "Hi, guys! Did'ja miss me?"
  "Ah! There you are, Mal!" Michael said. "I trust that the new chrome finish is an indication of how successful you were?"
  "Yep. Everything's copacetic. I wanna check on the immunity thing, but not here. See, the only point I fell short on is I didn't get the tripods to ignore Harlem, so we really should get going before the first group strides off the assembly line, okay?" So saying, Mal started to move, and the rest followed. "Aside from that, I got us everything on our shopping list. How about you?"
  "Very well, thank you. We put in appearances at all the remaining biomes, and we even did a bit of tampering ourselves..."
  Mal's new top speed proved to be an annoying handicap, as it kept Harlem from leaving the area anywhere near as fast as they'd have preferred. But leave they did; thus, no one was present to see it when the first three tripods emerged from assembly lines somewhere inside the Machine Shop From Hell. The trio scanned the enviroment, then headed off in formation to who knows where, releasing its haunting three-level cry of "ULAAAA!". Mal had suggested it as a way to inspire fear, which would cause victims to make mistakes.
  One of the last things Harlem did before going to sleep this evening was test Mal's robotic immunity, which proved to be exactly as effective as advertised. Nothing happened when they smeared that infamous sap on a gleaming hand, nor when Mal stepped into a puddle of River water, nor any other Mutopia trap they could find or improvise.

  BEEP!
  It was 8am, and a few minutes later, Harlem was fully awake and ready to embark upon a rather busy day. The first item on today's agenda was the "biome" called Grover's Corners, which, like Manhattan and the Machine Shop, was a man-made environment. In plotting out Harlem's plan of action for the current challenge, Mal and Michael had privately given this part of the BioSphere another name -- The Village -- because of the peculiar nature of its traps.
  By any name, Grover's Corners had no Mutopia lying around for unwary people to step in by accident. Rather, it had a preposterously extensive and complex set of laws, and all of the punishments its justice system meted out involved transformations of one kind or another, sentence carried out by injection of Mutopia into a bicep muscle. Last night Harlem had been careful to get four copies of the "Tourist's Guide to Grover's Corners" from an outlying kiosk, and they used that thick book (in combination with Mal's information) to review the relevant laws while riding the subway.
  "-- is Wednesday, so we only need to worry about the rules printed in purple or green ink, plus anything in sections 37-J through 40-T and 81-X."
  "Thank you, Mary-Anne. Very well... hmm. White clothing is forbidden in the morning before 11am, but white fur is always acceptible."
  "Excuse me, sir, but that's printed in blue ink, not purple. I believe this is the relevant section here."
  "This? Ah -- so it is, Norman. So it is. White fur acceptible before 11 am in the morning, white clothing must not be worn while the Sun is in the sky. Well, we shall be off long before 11am, so I am unconcerned. And..." At this point, the centaur stared at his Guide, throughly puzzled. "Whyever would anyone make a law that forbids speaking any word containing the letter sequence 'inte'? Do you suppose you could... Mal?"
  Michael looked uncertainly at the hacker, who had plugged his palmtop into the socket he'd morphed the back of one hand into.
  "Er... are you feeling well, Mal?"
  The half-robot's voice was slightly distant: "Fine. Never better. Fully functional."
  "I see. And what is it you're doing now, if I may I ask?"
  "Hacking into Grover's Corners comm-net. Route non-citizens' calls to bogus voicemail tree, back door lets us call normally. Also security net. After we leave, non-citizens' images automatically trigger high priority security alert. Also checkpoint scheduling subroutines. After we leave, if next position within 45 minutes' walk of any non-citizen, erase and re-calculate next position among suitable locations; if no suitable alternate, re-calculate next position on basis of difficulty of access."
  Checkpoint! I very nearly forgot, bogged down in the minutae of that dratted rulebook as I was! "Ah -- thank you, sir. And have you gotten access to the list of checkpoint locations for the immediate future?"
  "Yes. Park at center of map quadrant A7 until 9am, courtyard of main library between 9 and 10. Given relative mobility levels, you should be able to reach park before 9am if rest of us left behind. If 'lone centaur' scenario unacceptible, all Harlem together can reach library at 9:45am, exit Grover's Corners through East Gate 5 by 10:05am." Mal unplugged his palmtop, let his hand revert back to its usual shape. "Annnnd... we're done," he said, his voice noticeably more animated than it had been mere seconds earlier.
  "Are you quite sure you're all right?" Michael asked pointedly.
  Mal was amused. "What's the matter? You think I got metal on the brain or something? Don't sweat it; I was a little distracted just now 'cuz I was busy, that's all."
  "The metal of your legs will be handicap enough," Norman said.
  Mal shrugged. "Maybe so. But on the bright side, staying back at my pace means we can't break the pedestrian speed limit."
  The vixen's eyes widened. "Speed limit? You mean that when you suggested Michael should rush in to the checkpoint, you knew he'd be violating a local ordinance?" She turned to the centaur. "Michael! How can the tribe tolerate this terrible man who wants to trick us into taking ourselves out?"
  "I see. And what have you to say for yourself, Mal?"
  The hacker smiled. "Just that this isn't the first time somebody's gone off the rails with only half of the story. Yes, Mike, if you did gallop in, you'd be way the hell over the speed limit. But you know what? The way they got the cops set up here, you'd have a 65% chance of getting away with it all by yourself. Yeah, that's a real effective way of taking somebody out! What's more, your odds of success would be a lot better than 65% if the rest of us got a few distractions going to divert their attention from you. So tell me, Mike: If I'm tryna take you out, why the hell would I go with a plan that has a 35% chance of success at best, and that much only if I can somehow convince your lady-love and Norm not to load the dice in your favor? Anyway, we've arrived, so let's just table the politicking and get to work, okay?"
  Harlem's journey through Grover's Corners was uneventful by design, but no less worrisome as a result. Had they memorized all of the rules and regulations which might affect them? At any moment, one of the numerous Grover's Corners justice agents might stop them and pass sentence on the spot, and the least they could expect was 40% transformation to any of a wide variety of different punishment forms. It was fortunate that Mal's robotic (lack of) speed kept any of them from bolting forward, an error which would surely have brought down a vast amount of Mutopia on the culprit, if not the entire tribe.
  They reached the courtyard of the main library at 9:42am, claiming their necklace (which Mary-Anne insisted on wearing) from the checkpoint a bit ahead of schedule. It was 10:04am before they left Grover's Corners behind entirely, just in time to hear the eerie wail of a distant siren. Mal smiled. "Looks like we got out just in time," he said.
  "Well, it would appear that your restricted pace was beneficial in this case," Michael observed.
  "Yeah, but I kinda doubt we'll get that lucky again. Ya know, I'm starting to miss being able to run, or even walk fast! Oh, well. Onward, right?"

  Two of the BioSphere's camera crew met with a shadowed figure. "You've got the sample?" the mysterious figure asked.
  "It's right here," said one of the camera crew, a man of middling height and a light tan, as he handed over a tiny envelope.
  The shadowed figure nodded in silence, did something with the envelope and a small cylindrical object, and soon gave a small bottle of clear fluid to the one who'd handed him the envelope. That person drank the contents of the bottle, and quickly transformed into a different man of roughly the same height and build.
  The other camera crewman, a short woman, said "Lookin' good, Harry! You get where you're supposed to be, and I'll keep the film rolling."

  "And where, may I ask, did you traipse off to?" Michael inquired as Mal rejoined the group.
  "Talking to the people who're gonna let us beat the Caves," Mal said. "The fix is in; let's go."
  "Can't you move any faster?" Norman said, irritated.
  "Not since I got the metal on me. You want to try it yourself, you know where the Machine Shop is."
  Bickering aside, Harlem's assault on the Caves went almost perfectly according to plan. The only deviation was the unscheduled appearance of another tribesman; unscheduled, but not unexpected, thanks to Mal keeping an eye on the video feed. It was a representative of Melrose, not in good shape, and when he came around the final bend in the passage leading to the checkpoint chamber, he was met by a fusillade of Mutopia which left him partially rooted to the ground and completely non-human. The BioSphere workers at the checkpoint were very curious to know how Harlem had gotten in through the exit, but after the workers used their legitimate access to the video feed to confirm Harlem's cover story, they handed a medallion over to Michael, who promptly gave it to Mary-Anne "for safekeeping".

  Next on the agenda: A visit to Manhattan, so that Mal could lose the metal, and all of Harlem could prepare themselves for the next pair of biomes.
  "What do you think, Mal? Do you wish to retain your inorganic limbs?"
  Sure thing -- I just love slow-moving body parts with lousy dexterity. "Naah. I'd just as soon go back to pure flesh, if it's okay by you. But you guys shouldn't wait around for the Med Center to get done with me. How about you all go on ahead, and the Center puts aquatic stuff on me at the same time as the Zoo's doing the same for you?" Shoulda just gone with a street artist, but the Zoo has free admission; Miss Kitty made noise about needing to save money; and Norm bought her line, so the vote would've been 3 to 1 against me if I'd pressed the point. And that puts her farther away from me and my restoration, so I'm not complaining.
  "I still think it would be better to conserve Mary-Anne's money supply and let a street artist eliminate the robotic parts," Norman said.
  Mal looked skeptically at the short man. "Conserve. Like you're not gonna tap that same money supply for the pitons and crap we'll need when we hit the Mountains. Anyway, you honestly think their Mutopia can affect the metal bits?" The immunity's nice, but the cost is just too damn great.
  "I thank you for your consideration, Norman, but I fear Mal does have a cogent point. Very well. We can afford to do this, can we not?" Michael asked the vixen.
  Damn the man! I want to give the doctors some last-minute orders after they put Mal under, but I don't see how I can manage to do that! Just you wait, my big black cat-to-be. This is most definitely not over yet. "Yes, we can. If you have anything left over after you're through, you'll be sure to save it for the tribe, won't you?"
  "I sure will, and that's mighty generous of you, Miss Kitty!" Mal said. One arm rose smoothly into position; the hand split open, revealing a cavity inside. Mary-Anne stared for a moment before she stuffed a wad of cash into that cavity, which then sealed itself shut.
  Damn. And I worked so hard to impregnate those bills with pigeon shit in a way that would still let me carry them safely. Actually, Norman did the work, but since he's mine, what difference does it make? Oh, well; it was an idea. "Thank you, Mal. You're too kind."
  Mal grinned. "Yeah, I know. It's my only fault. So long, and I'll see you all in an hour and a half at the Zoo entrance, okay?"

  65 minutes later, Mal was completely cleansed of his metallic taint; 10 minutes after that, an artist's commission had rendered him an undersized anthropomorphic orca. "Undersized" by orca standards, at any rate, for he was about 9 feet tall and well over half a ton. His harness was now a very snug fit; had he grown much larger, it would have become downright uncomfortable.
  The Med Center technicians told him of the contamination on the money he'd carried with him, contamination which hadn't affected him as it had only touched his robotic parts, and which the Med Center had eliminated just on general principle. An evil idea occured to Mal: He had $480 in change after paying for the Med Center and his latest portrait, so he opened up his hardshell notepad, extracting $480 from within the shell proper and filling the resulting gap with his change. There. Once she spends this cash, all they gotta do is check the serial numbers and she's nailed for smuggling money in from outside! As he walked, he composed and sent a message to some of the cameramen he controlled, asking them to be public-spirited citizens and report to Sly their suspicions about where Mary-Anne could be getting all her money.
  This left a quarter-hour to get to the Zoo entrance, and he arrived with two minutes to spare. He would have arrived earlier, but he'd stopped to admire the results of his work with Musfah: A poster warning Manhattan citizens to not leave the city, as three-legged robots were attacking and transforming people. Steps were being taken to contain the outbreak, or so the poster claimed. Well, what do you know. Considering what I've been able to get away with, I think I'll put my money on the AI.
  As expected, he'd been preceded by three persons, all of them entirely covered with brown fur, with varying levels of walrus traits. Michael's face and horse-ears were recognizable, but his nose had vanished and his nostrils were flat against his face; his fingers had fused together, making his hands resemble furry mittens; and his recognizeably human torso extended forward from a walrus' body. Mary-Anne had to be the more-or-less human-proportioned one with a pair of prominent breasts, flippers in place of arms, and a deeply split tail which allowed her to move clumsily about on land. The third, therefore, distinguishable from a true walrus by his large braincase and arm-like flippers (or was that flipper-like arms?), had to be Norman.
  "How you doing, guys?" Mal asked. His current voice boomed in the lower register, perhaps deeper than Norman's usual voice.
  "I do believe we're all ready to go, sir!" Michael said, looking at his companions. "I'm afraid Norman has lost all ability to vocalize, and Mary-Anne cannot utter coherent words at present."
  "Hwaoork," the former vixen said, confirming Michael's statement. Being mute is a terrible bother, but if it can get Mal to lower his guard, it'll be worth it.
  For some reason, Mal couldn't help but think she was a trifle irritated. Norman, too, gave every indication of being royally ticked off, but that was understandable, given the circumstances.
  "I, for one, am inclined to think that the subway will be our swiftest means of transport to the ocean. Does that seem logical to you, Mal?"
  "Hmm..." The orca paused for a moment to visualize the map, then replied, "Sure does. And if you'll all follow me, I can get us there within half an hour or less. That okay by the rest of you?"
  The journey to the border of the Ocean biome was marked only by one incident: They turned a corner and saw a contestant from some other tribe. Michael fired at the person reflexively; whoever it was vanished, the sound of his retreating footsteps suggesting that Mutopia had granted him greater-than-human speed.
  Norman started to pursue, but Michael stopped him. "No! This isn't the proper time, and whoever that was, their tribe might well have set up a trap for them to lead us into. Let us continue on with our own plan, shall we?"
  They did, and were at the Ocean border within minutes. When the doors slid open, Mal said, "It's a darn good thing the subway has a station close to the shoreline."
  "Quite so," Michael agreed, and Mary-Anne more or less 'honked' her assent. Norman, forcibly mute, just glared in the vixen's general direction. After the car doors opened, the Harlemites walked, shuffled, or flopped, as appropriate, up the subway steps to ground-level. Their collective nostrils were instantly filled with the salty, organic smell of the seashore, a complicated aroma made up of innumerable individual scents. Within a minute, all four Harlemites were in the water and swimming rapidly.
  The Ocean biome's checkpoint was on a large island somewhere in the water, almost a mile away from the nearest shore. Since Harlem knew exactly where to find this island, it was a small number of minutes' swim for them. And since their ocean-adapted forms could stay submerged for more than half an hour at a time, none of them bothered to break the surface until they were at the island itself. It was easy, and the absence of any visible wake also gave no help to any of the their competitors. The only potential hazard along the way were two small formations of aquatic humanoids, none of whom could swim fast enough to keep pace with Harlem. A group of these others tried to ambush Harlem, but Mal sped up and slammed into one with the full force of his newly increased mass. As his victim slowly sank, oozing blood, the rest of the group fled into the depths.
  Mal, as the token biped with 9-foot stature and corresponding length of stride, went ashore to retrieve Harlem's medallion. While he was so occupied, his three comrades swam around the island, ready, willing and able to throw a gargantuan monkey wrench into the plans of any other tribes unfortunate enough to approach the island/checkpoint while they were on patrol. This checkpoint was a pavilion that would have done credit to Club Med, complete with fully stocked wet bar, an extensive buffet table, and comfortable chairs to lounge about on. Being an orca, Mal wasn't in any shape to appreciate any of these pleasures; the chairs were far too small, and his current tastebuds and digestive system weren't at all compatible with the food and drink. He took the medallion and, like the one from the Machine Shop, threaded one harness strap through it for security.
  Of course, once Mal returned to the sea to rejoin the rest of Harlem, an animated discussion about who should carry the medallions began. Michael said, "Excuse me, Mal, but do you intend to keep both of those medallions to yourself?"
  "Why not? I picked 'em up, and I don't see any reason to hand off either of 'em to someone else. But hey, if you guys think different, you can transfer yours to whoever. The medallions're staying in the tribe either way, so what's the problem?"
  "Well, the problem is that these medallions really ought to be distributed evenly. It simply wouldn't do to have any one person carry too many of them, for what would the tribe do if that one person is lost to us?"
  "In that case, the rest of the tribe'd have to go back for duplicates of what's missing." Mal shrugged. "Annoying, but not fatal. Like I said, if you guys want to shuffle your stuff around, that's fine. Me, I'm keeping what I pick up, and that's the name of that tune."
  So saying, Mal swam off towards the neighboring Arctic biome, thus putting a firm end to the dicussion.

  When Mal and Michael were discussing Harlem's strategy for the Ocean and Arctic biomes, they'd first thought that all four Harlemites should become walruses. This idea lasted only until Michael considered the layer of ice in which the Arctic environment was thickly encrusted, and wondered if even a quartet of walruses would be able to break through that ice for air. They decided Harlem would be better off with at least one orca as icebreaker, and after the rest of the plan firmed up a bit, Mal ended up with that role.
  Mal rather enjoyed the feeling of power that came with his great size; it was just a whole lot of fun to dive deep and then hurtle upwards at high speed, smashing a large airhole in the ice sheet. As before, their knowledge of the map allowed Harlem to cut their travel time to a fraction of what it would otherwise have been.
  It would have been nice if Mal could have just smashed up from beneath the checkpoint to send it straight to the bottom of this biome; unfortunately, the Arctic checkpoint was soldily within the small fraction of the ice sheet that rested on land, rather than floating on water. The best Mal could do was break an opening a couple of hundred yards away from the checkpoint, which he did. Oh well, I'll just have to be content with having reduced our exposure to the Arctic hazards to a fraction of a mile's-worth.
  The square/cube law gave Mal another reason to be an orca. At his size, he had the lowest surface/volume ratio in Harlem, which meant he lost heat at the slowest rate. And that, combined with the orca's insulating layer of blubber, made Mal the best choice to take care of the Arctic checkpoint. Which didn't stop Mary-Anne from 'honking' her distress when Mal clambered up onto the surface of the ice.
  "Something wrong, Miss Kitty?"
  "I think you know very well what's wrong, Mal. Including the one from this biome, you're going to hold three medallions!"
  "And this is a bad thing? Let's cut the crap, Mike. Do you trust me, or don't you? Simple as that. If you don't trust me, say the word and I'll jump right back in the water. You guys send whoever you like to this checkpoint, and I'll just swim a few laps while you're grabbing the medallion, how's that?"
  "You know very well that without your map..." Michael's voice trailed off as he saw the problem.
  Mal nodded. "If you don't trust me, how the hell can you trust any info I give you? Shit, I might be settin' you up for a fall right now, for all you guys know! But if you do trust me, there's no problem, right? So. The real question is, which game are you guys playing? Politics... or the one with a 5 megabuck cash prize to the winner?"
  Mal went ashore. As well as retrieving the Arctic medallion, he also got a chance to whistle appreciatively at the hot tubs full of scantily-clad women waiting at the checkpoint. Oh, well... maybe later.

  There was no way any self-respecting Harlemite would retain their aquatic form, not when the next biome on their schedule was the Mountains. As per the plan, Harlem visited Manhattan for the second time that day, so that the local street artists could solve their bodily problems.
  "Hwaooorrrk!" Mary-Anne 'said', clearly agitated over something.
  "Excuse me?" the ever-polite Michael replied. Now whatever can she be displeased with? We're going to return to our normal bodies, surely that can't be it. Perhaps... "You have an objection to being restored by an artist?"
  "Oooaarrrk!" she said, nodding vigorously, then she broke into a clumsy parody of a dance.
  Mal was the first to catch her meaning. "Furrtive Moments," he said. "So you'd rather be a vixen than a cat, huh?"
  She nodded.
  Mal looked at Michael: "And Norm goes with, to play bodyguard?"
  Michael seemed almost embarrassed. "Actually, in view of that gentleman's present physical difficulties, I thought I'd take that role myself. So, ah, well, yes. Actually. You and Norman should be well able to handle the details of returning yourselves to your preferred forms, I trust?"
  "I expect so. Granted, he can't talk or write at the moment, but I'll bet we can figure a way for him to let the artist know what he wants."
  "Very good. Carry on, and we shall rendezvous at the subway station!" And after Mary-Anne handed over enough cash to pay for two portraits, she and Michael went galumphing off to the once and future vixen's place of employment.
  "Looks like it's just you and me, Norm. I know what I'm going for, but you... Hmm. Yes-and-no questions are good, you can nod or shake your head, but it'd take forever to get the message across. How're the arms? Can you gesture, make letters in the air?"
  Norman waved one flipper/arm.
  "Y... E... S. Great! Just to keep things moving, I'm gonna describe what I think you want, and you break in any time you disagree, okay? Fine.
  "What you had before we changed over today, that's what you want -- no. Lose the feline bits? No? You want more non-human stuff? Huh! Wasn't expecting that, but alright. Okay, spell it out for me. S... K... I... tougher skin? I see, guard against getting cut on rocks, got it. Tough skin, what are we talking here? Armadillo, shark, something else? R... H... I... rhinoceros? Right..."
  It wasn't long before Mal learned what sort of body Norman wanted for the final pair of biomes, and the two Harlemites were soon re-drawn for the final portions of the current challenge. Norman's chosen form was a bipedal, half-and-half human/panther blend, except that he was completely covered in thick rhinoceros hide. As for Mal, he ended up with feline eyes, ears, nose, pads and claws, just as he'd had yesterday; the only feature he hadn't previously selected was an all-over coat of tiger-striped fur.
  Norman and Mal reached the subway first (no surprise to the hacker). In fact he'd been hoping for this as he wanted to try and figure out what, if anything, had happened to the shorter man. "You've been here before, Norm; you think anyone could manage to bring in some mind-fucking drugs?" The thought of Norm wanting to be less human -- not just grudgingly accepting, but actively wanting it -- had frightened him. Mal worried when others acted outside of their norms.
  Unfortunately, the others arrived before Norman could answer.
  "Hey, Mike! You..." Mal began. His eyes widened and all of his warning flags went off as he stared at Michael. Shit!
  "Good afternoon... sir?" said Norman, who was also a trifle perplexed.
  For the centaur was no longer a centaur; he was still equine (more or less) below the waist, but the nonhuman bits belonged to a goat, not a horse. To all intents and purposes, he was a satyr. As for Mary-Anne, she was, once again, every inch a vixen.
  "Good afternoon to you both," Michael replied, seemingly oblivious to their reactions. "You will recall, I'm sure, that my centaur form was rather unsuited to scaling sheer cliff walls, which is why our initial plan called for me to haunt the lower reaches of the Mountains whilst the rest of you moved upslope. But now, mobility is far less of a problem for me! Tell me, what would you say to my accompanying you, so that we can ascend as a foursome?"
  Miss Kitty and Norm together is bad enough! Throw in Mike, and I'll never reach the top... "Ah, no need for that, Mike," Mal said. "I think it's better to stick with the plan. You were going to pick off targets of opportunity while we went upstairs, right? And, ah, you can conceal yourself better, and you're a smaller target, so I'd say you're better suited for the hunting thing now."
  Mary-Anne let a little pout appear on her face, but inwardly she was pleased. She'd expected Mal to object, which was fine with her. My little goat won't be hunting anyone else, not after our recent chat! It's odd, but I just couldn't dissuade him from riding shotgun to protect me in case Mal tries anything. And if my cat-to-be should happen to get soaked, well, accidents do happen.
  "An excellent point, Mal," Michael said. "Very well; we shall stick with our original plan, then."
  Wait a minute. No dissent whatsoever? Shitshitshit! The sirens in Mal's brain, already active after seeing the new Michael, were now screaming bloody murder. Son of a bitch! Miss Kitty can't be making her move this early -- we haven't even had the damn tribal merger yet! What the hell does she think she's doing?
  In accordance with their plan, Harlem rode the subway to the (misnamed, on account of only being large enough to hold one peak) Mountains. The dome containing this biome was the tallest single part of the BioSphere; it was more than 5 kilometers high at its center, and the highest single point in the Mountains proper extended about 4 kilometers above the ground, with a good-sized plateau at its summit. It was on this plateau that the Mountains checkpoint was found. Like the one in the Caves, this checkpoint also had a "back door" that would allow much easier access to it, but unfortunately Mal only controlled a small fraction of the BioSphere's camera crew, and the ones he did control, he wasn't free to deploy arbitrarily. Mal wished he'd figured out this challenge sooner, but as it was, he just hadn't had the time to move enough pawns into place to defeat both the Mountains and the Caves. And of those two choices, he and Mike had both agreed that it was far better to beat the Caves than the Mountains. With the traps in the Caves, just one trap was enough to erase a victim's eyes, rendering them totally blind; as for the Mountains, it would take the accumulated effects of several traps to impose a dangerously high degree of non-human qualities (falcon or mountain goat or eagle, say) on a victim.
  Or so they'd thought while making Harlem's plans...
  The first several hundred meters of the ascent were not difficult, as the lowest parts of the Mountains had a rather shallow slope. Michael split off from the rest of Harlem, and he would spend the next few hours lurking around the bottommost kilometer of the Mountains, sniping from cover at any tribesmen who caught his eye. Or at least that's what he agreed to do. But since Miss Kitty had her way with him... Mal kept a wary eye open. Boy, am I glad that squirt-gun can't hit worth a damn much over 50 or 60 yards. Then Mal, Norm and Mary-Anne kept going as a group, always ascending. A couple of times Mal could have sworn he saw Michael, but he was never quite sure whether it was him, or a goat. It seemed that the body Mary-Anne had talked Michael into was very well-adapted to mountainous slopes.
  The trail up the Mountainside grew steeper as they went on, an asymtotic curve cast into stone. Before Harlem reached 2000 meters in altitude, they were crawling up a slope in the range of 50 to 60 degrees. Pausing for a short break, Norman said, "From this point on, it would be best to employ standard mountaineering practice. The climbing equipment I purchased in Manhattan should prove useful, particularly at the prices they charge."
  Mal shrugged. "So you paid for the privilege of not getting a pile of Mutopia with your tools. Speaking of which, lemme know when you're plotting a course, will you? My buddies did some tampering, loosened rocks and and so on, and I'll be happy to help us avoid all of the danger zones. And if you don't want my help, that's okay too; I'll just go by myself, meet you at the top." There. Now let's see the bastards try to take me out on the way up.
  "Thank you, Mal," said the panther in rhino hide. "I'd appreciate that."
  "Any time."
  A few minutes of preparation later, all three Harlemites were tethered together and continuing their ascent. Their rate of travel was much slower than it had been, what with the need for Norman to pound pitons ahead and reclaim them from behind. Mal was the last one in line, as Norman felt that his greater bulk might be beneficial to anchor them all if anyone should lose their grip and fall.
  Mal tried to convince himself to relax. Come on, man. Every foot of altitude is another foot of distance between me and Mike, right? He did not allow himself to ponder the falsity of that assertion; he couldn't do a damn thing about it, and tense people made mistakes. In spite of everything, he still felt twinges of nervousness crawling up and down his spine.
  At last, after what seemed like hours or days of climbing, the summit was in reach! They could see the rim of the plateau above them, getting ever so gradually closer and clearer as they moved up. Norman was the first to stand on top. He reached down to assist Mary-Anne as she neared the high end, leaving the hacker as the only Harlemite still on the rock face itself.
  CRACK! Without warning, a piton above Mal broke free of the living rock.
  "Son of a -- aahh!" Mal shounted and then screamed, his unscheduled descent slowed only for a moment by his secondary belaying line -- which itself came loose less than a second after his 320-pound weight hung fully off of it.
  "Yaaaaaahhhh!"
  CRACK! CRACK! Two more pitons wrenched themselves loose. Mal kept falling.
  Reflexes honed by long hours of kenpo karate training were the only thing that saved Mal. His hands and feet shot out in a flash, scrambling and seeking and eventually finding support before he'd fallen more than a few yards. Thank God for the claws! There was no pain, just a few points of discomfort. Adrenaline rush. Okay. Gotta get up there while it lasts, the aftermath's gonna be a killer in this context. Mal hoped he hadn't gotten cut, but he couldn't spare the attention to worry about it -- he'd just have to trust his fur and newly-toughened skin, and anyway, getting back up to the plateau was a more immediate concern.
  Norman looked over the edge, and his eyes grew wide. Damn the man's luck! At least he has no reason to believe I am at fault, since this was clearly a horrible stroke of ill fortune. "Mal! Is there something I can do for you?"
  While Norman watched the hacker, Mary-Anne walked over to the checkpoint. She picked up the carved icon and put it around her neck, and then grabbed a chilled glass of champagne and made her way back to observe Mal. She always enjoyed watching her children at work for her.
  Mal ignored the short man as, inch by inch, foot by foot, he fought his way back up. He climbed barehanded, wth no backup and no safety net. He did not allow himself to think about the fact that his fingers were visibly fusing together as he climbed. What he did think about was the curious fact that three pitons and a belaying line all came loose within seconds of each other. He thought about the one person who had placed every piton Harlem had used on this climb. He thought about the one person who had fastened all the lines, tied all the knots, for this ascent. And finally, he thought, That fucker is toast.
  Norman asked again, "Can I --"
  Mal didn't let him finish. "No! Both of you stay back! Too risky!" For me, especially.
  By the time Mal got to within arm's reach of the top, his hands had two thick fingers apiece, with massive nails so large that they almost be taken for cloven hooves; one leg was very much distorted; and a magnificently coiled pair of horns had sprouted from his head. And he was tired and aching all over. On the plus side, at least I don't have to worry about Mike sniping at me. He refused to let any of that distract him, instead focusing on the plateau rim just above him and the panther's eyes he saw surrounded by rhinoceros hide. And he estimated forces and vectors...
  "Let me help you, Mal," said Norman, cautiously reaching one arm over the edge.
  Mal looked up, envisioned his grip and subsequent motions, and then said, "Sure <gasp> thing <gasp> Norm." He then reached one hand blindly up, grabbed hold of Norm's arm just below the elbow, and abruptly twisted with as much force as he could muster.
  "Aaagghh!" Norm screamed as things broke loose inside his arm. Mal jerked the arm downwards, putting all his weight on it, and was rewarded by a muffled snapping sound; tightening his other hand's grip on the rock, Mal then pulled Norman straight off the plateau in one irresistable motion, sweeping him around to painfully smash his head into the rock and then to fall when Mal released him.
  Mary-Anne moved, but one word from Mal stopped her in her tracks: "Don't." The scuttling rustle and rumble of Norman's descent quickly faded into the distance.
  Mal's warped fingers closed on handholds like pliers close on nuts and bolts. He was as secure as it was physically possible for anyone in his position to be, and the one active threat was under control. But now the adrenaline was fading; now he could feel his body warping in places, the changes a result of the Mutopia he'd absorbed from the rocks with every new step of a wounded foot, and every new grip of a bleeding hand.
  His arms beginning to stretch and twist, Mal levered himself up onto the plateau while the horrified vixen stared at him. In between deep and ragged breaths, Mal shouted, "That son of a bitch. <gasp> Tried to kill me! <gasp> Stay back!"
  Even in this extremity, Mal's brain kept working. Why now? There's another biome left in this challenge, and it's just stupid to wipe out your own tribesmen before... Then he finally saw Mary-Anne's strategy. Of course! She doesn't care if any of us survive! As long as she makes it to the merger, she can use her drugs to brainwash all the other tribesmen into letting her win!
  Mal squelched his panic with sheer force of will. What's done is done. Speaking of which, my changes seem to be done. Never letting his eyes stray from the vixen, he took an experimental step, another, and then deliberately fell to all fours. The quadrupedal position felt more comfortable, more natural -- but at least he could stand upright, and his hands, while very hooflike, still retained a portion of their usual manipulatory capacity when he did stand.
  He clopped over to her and quietly said, "Here's the deal, Miss Kitty: Out of the goodness of your heart, you're gonna give me $2000 so's I can buy my way back to fully human. Being the delicate, squeamish little flower you are, you just can't bear to be anywhere within 20 blocks of my Med Center while I'm getting fixed. And you're not gonna fill Mike's head with any silly notions about me attacking Norm without provocation; you've got too much respect for the truth to tell lies as big as that."
  "You seem to have forgotten something, my big black cat. I'm the one with the money -- why shouldn't I tell you what the deal is to be?"
  "You'll do it because it's the right thing to do, and because you're not as stupid as you look. You don't know what kinds of deadman switches I got set up, or how much crap will come down on you if I go away, and you don't know if you can brainwash me fast enough to stop me calling down a world-class shitstorm on you."
  "You bastard!" the vixen hissed, but she dug her wallet out of the bag that was her constant companion and started to remove paper currency from the wallet.
  "Oh, and one more thing. Just because you love money so much, you're going to give each bill a proper goodbye, unfolding it and kissing it and rubbing it over yourself on both sides, before you hand it over to me."
  If looks could maim, Mal would have been a paraplegic after the heated glare Mary-Anne gave him. She didn't give voice to her feelings; what she did do was put certain bills back into her wallet, replacing them with certain others. And she followed the procedure Mal had dictated, handing each bill over, one by one, after confirming that there was no Mutopia on it.

  Several dozen meters below the top, Norman managed to stop his fall with a wrench that felt like it would dislocate his good shoulder. How could he have known? I didn't give him any reason to suspect! It hardly matters, not right here and now; I must not let myself -- At this point, all thought stopped, driven out of Norman's skull by unspeakable pain in the arm Mal had abused. The broken bones were warping and fusing in unfamiliar ways, and his other arm was likewise changing. He was in too much agony to recognize what his arms were becoming: Wings. And when his fingers shriveled up to the point where they could no longer maintain a grip, he started falling again, collecting more lacerations and abrasions even through his rhino-tough hide (which seemed to be softening up).
  Norman's transformation was complete long before he would have stopped falling naturally. He wept, but not for his lost humanity. "I'm so sorry I failed you, Mothaarrrrkkh!" he said before his mind evaporated.
  The solitary cry of a peregrine falcon echoed mournfully off the peaks.

  Michael was sitting on a boulder at the base of the mountain idly throwing stones into a burbling creek when he heard footsteps approaching. He turned and it was, indeed, Mary-Anne and Malcolm -- and they did not look happy. They were walking side by side but nearly 10' apart. Given their expressions it would have been more if there had been room.
  Michael crossed his arms and just sat, idly tapping his left hoof on the boulder he was seated at. Eventually the pair arrived and Mal just stopped as Mary-Anne raced forward and hugged Michael, tears in her eyes. "Mi... Michael -- it was horrible... Mal, he --"
  Mal, who had had enough of the whole charade, simply muttered, "Shut up, bitch."
  Michael just sighed, swallowed, held Mary-Anne for a minute, and then slowly stood up pulling himself from her grasp. Then he turned to face Mal, completely ignoring Mary-Anne -- who stuck out her tongue so that only Mal could see it. "Well?"
  "How much did you see?"
  "All of it. Why did you do it, Malcolm?"
  "Son of a bitch tried to kill me! And it was --" Mal forced down his accusation against Mary-Anne. Now was not the time, at least not while Michael was her slave. "-- not like I had any choice. I'll be damned if I'm gonna go down without a fight."
  "You didn't have a choice," Michael echoed, then he sighed. "Do you remember what I said at the beginning of this? One tribe, indivisible, working like a well-oiled machine? Each person pulling their weight for the good of everybody? I know that you do. Now, there is either an accident, or an attempted assassination for whatever reason, and then you, in cold blood, in full control of your mind and facilities, kill him. You, with full conscious decision have succeeded in destroying another human being."
  "Damn right I did! And if I hadn't, the bastard'd be right here now. Prob'ly plotting his next attack, maybe against you. 'Well-oiled machine', my ass! But hey, you want to talk to Norm, he's flying around somewhere," and Mal pointed vaguely upward.
  Michael sighed and shook his head. "Yes, his body is alive, but his mind is dead. Dead at your --"
  "What the fuck was I supposed to do!? Let him 'help' me up so he can take a second shot at me?"
  Michael stood up and paced over until he was standing in front of Mal looking up. Even though he was shorter, any observer would have sworn he looked taller. "Malcolm, there is no excuse for murder. There are always alternatives."
  Mal cocked a cynical eyebrow at the satyr. "In this situation? Name one."
  "You could have ordered him to back away. You could have warned him --"
  Like the fucker's gonna be swayed by words, Mal thought.
  "-- You could have asked Mary-Anne for help if you didn't trust him --"
  Oh, there's a real winner of a plan.
  "-- Is your life important enough to be worth the utter destruction of another?"
  "When it's someone who already tried to take me out? Hell, yes! Anyway, like I said, the son of a bitch is still around somewhere."
  "And that's the worst part about this whole nightmare. Yes, we can all point up at a falcon and say 'Look; there he is,' and then wash our hands of what happened. We can grin, laugh, secure in the knowledge that Norman's body still lives in some form... when the truth is that a unique, vibrant, thinking human being has ceased to exist!"
  Mary-Anne's black heart was filled with exultation. This couldn't be better if I'd scripted both parts out in advance! My great big goat throws the nasty hacker out for stupid moral reasons; I get to see how many pieces he falls into when I shatter him tonight; and next morning, there I am. Alone, innocent, helpless, cruelly betrayed by the soulless monsters I thought were my fellow tribesmen... and ready to do it all over again with the next batch of victims. Life just doesn't get any better than this! "Michael, if what you say is true, well, well, it's horrible. You're right, this is an evil, hateful place. And if Mal has murdered once, then he can do it to us too! We..."
  Michael spun around, nostrils flaring, glaring at Mary-Anne which such disgust and disappointment, that the vixen found she couldn't speak. "Nobody listens anymore. Nobody cares about life, about law. Everything is for the individual, with no other cares. Mary-Anne, an eye for an eye never works. And, Mal has suggested that you may have influenced Norman."
  How could he know?! "Michael, how, how can you believe that? I'd never..."
  For the first time today, Mal let a smile spill across his features. Could you have been faking all this time!? Way to go, Mike!
  "Mary-Anne, no I don't believe you did anything. But, Mal does. So, which of you am I supposed to believe?"
  "She --" Mal started to respond, but Mary-Anne's overly loud sobbing drowned him out.
  Running up to him she hugged him and buried her face in his chest, crying and sobbing. "Michael? You think that I..? But, I wouldn't. Norman disliked me but how, how? -- I wouldn't do anything so evil or hateful. Not to anybody, and especially not to you!" And she made sure to scratch him. By the Mother, this goat is mine and he is not getting away! Mary-Anne gradually let her voice fade as she injected the drugs into his system.
  Mal had a sinking feeling. Shit. This is my last chance to reach him. It's not going to work, but I've got nothing to lose, and I have to try... "Michael. She's dangerous. She's got drugs, she uses hypnosis. She brainwashes people, controls them. She must have done it to Norm when they went to Manhattan, and she's been doing it to you."
  Unfortunately, as Michael looked up from the quietly sobbing Mary-Anne and leveled a cold, hard gaze at Mal, the hacker knew that he was too late.
  "Mal. How can I trust you? You murder, and then you plant wild accusations --"
  Mary-Anne smiled.
  "-- that can't be right. Dear God, do you even know what you're saying?"
  Double-plus shit. He really is gone. "Yes, I do," Mal sighed. "You don't believe me, fine. You want to be her slave, fine. Just remember this, and remember what a damned fool you're being." He shook his head with a sad smile. "We coulda been friends..."
  "Mal. Just, just, go away. Mary-Anne and I will take care of the Savannah token. We'll go to the council together with the tokens and... we'll carry on from there. Just, please, leave."
  For a second Mal thought of saying something, anything, but then he just turned and walked away on all fours, listening to Michael comforting Mary-Anne behind him. Okay: The tokens I've got will keep the bitch off my back, but only until we turn 'em in at the next tribal council... Now the battle lines of this dirty little war were well and truly drawn. Now... Hell with it, I'll think of something.

  Mal slowly made his way back to camp, cursing the body Norman's actions had left him with. Let's see, now: She's got her drugs, she's got Mike, she's got her little nightclub, plus whatever cash and warm bodies came with the property. Meanwhile, my hands're only partially functional, and I'm on my own -- by the time I can forge an alliance with any other tribe, she's in the winner's circle. It's official: Life sucks. Okay, deal with it. He reviewed a mental inventory of his resources, re-examined the range within which he was free to maneuver his pieces on the board.
  What I need most, now, is information. What's the bitch doing, how long's she gonna be occupied? Mal retrieved his palmtop from its sealed pocket in his harness. He had to keep moving, but with his lower body the way it was, he had no prayer of using it while walking on two legs. Fine. Hold the stylus in my mouth and go three-legged for a while. Fortunately, this arrangement worked, however awkwardly. And the video feed revealed the bitch and Mike riding the subway. He checked the schedule; that car was going to... Manhattan? Not the Savannah? Right, she's got plans. Which means I got time for my own plans --
  By the time he reached the campsite proper, Mal knew what his strategy should be. His subconscious mind had been chewing over the puzzle, and as so often in the past, it'd come up with a complete list of objectives whose fulfillment would add up to ultimate victory. It was just a matter of correct implementation, putting it all into the right order...
  The first move was obvious: Having previously set up a number of contingency plans, now Mal sent out a coded signal to trigger a specific one of them. Although he normally preferred subtlety, this one was an incredibly massive strike. It would be a textbook example of blatant, flagrant overkill with an extravagant amount of collateral damage. That didn't matter, for of all his pre-arranged gambits, this one offered the highest probability of destroying the target. Too bad the results won't show instantly. Still, when it finally hits, the bitch is toast. I'll have to thank HacMan for writing that virus; it only gave me a few minutes' window of opportunity, but that was enough. Under cover of the confusion it created, I installed all the patches I wanted, edited all the files.
  From here on in, it was all mind-games to ensure that Mary-Anne remained in the BioSphere like a good little target. And while she's busy in the big city, I've got business in the Savannah. Problem: Getting there without leaving any traces that might alert the bitch to what I'm doing. Solution: The combat form.
  Mal had never told the rest of Harlem that his water purifier tube could generate Mutopia, and he'd certainly never told them about its twelve memory slots, seven of which contained the blueprints for various types of mutagen. One of them would transmute him into the "combat form", a body he'd designed to kick ass in ways beyond what his human form was capable of. He wasn't a genetic engineer himself, of course, but he knew people who were, and they'd created the building blocks out of which Mal had assembled all of his stored genetic blueprints. Naturally, there were some practical problems with this kind of unauthorized mutation, but nothing unsolvable. He tapped out two messages -- one to the cameramen he owned, the other to the BioSphere computer network -- and it was showtime.
  Mal stored his current DNA sequence in one of the purifier's empty slots, then used the tube to shift over to the combat form, which looked not unlike one of H.R. Giger's biomechanical nightmares. It was large, strong, armored, had a 6-foot-long prehensile tail, and was equipped with two kinds of nonlethal venom. And it could keep going for more than fifteen minutes straight at its top speed of 30 MPH. The final thing he did before leaving camp was set a large pot of rice cooking at medium heat, in preparation for his return. And a thank-you to Sly for the Scavenger Hunt prizes -- looks like they turned out useful after all.
  In all, it took Mal less than 10 minutes to find the mutagen he was looking for, do his business, and get out of the Savannah.
  Back in camp again, Mal used the DNA sequence he'd stored just previously to return to his goatlike form. This body felt even clumsier than he remembered, in comparison with the supremely well-coordinated combat form. Next, he again sent messages to his cameramen and the network, returning all systems to the state they'd been in before this temporary diversion. Only then did he allow himself to eat, and after his recent exertion and formshifts, he was hungry.
  Five liters of overcooked rice later, Mal pulled up the video feed on his palmtop. He made a cursory survey of the other tribes, finding no obvious points of concern, then turned his attention to the true danger. Not in Manhattan... got 'em. Just disembarked from the subway. Now they're gonna hit the Savannah. Then he noticed something; more accurately, he noticed a lack of something. She's naked -- no tokens, no purse, no nothin' -- not even her watch! The goat frowned, deep in thought. No way she got robbed or forgot 'em. Must've left 'em in Furrtive Moments. Why? Safekeeping. Doesn't want to risk losing stuff. Which implies she's gonna deliberately loosen up her control a little. And given the biome they're...
  All the blood drained from Mal's face as he fully recognized the enormity of the vixen's scheme. Oh. My. Dear. Sweet. Lord. She can't, not even Mary-Anne would... He shook his head, near to weeping. Shit, who am I tryna kid? She can, and she would. She is, for Christ's sake! She is doing it! But why? She owns Mike, he'll do anything to help her get the prize. Wasting him doesn't make sense, not if she wants to win! Mal's thoughts paused in confusion and then a thought hit him. What if she doesn't want to win? And if that's true, why in God's name is she here?
  A few seconds' thought provided no answers. Gotta understand the mind if I'm gonna play with it. I need more information. Could've checked out the other tribesmen myself, as part of my pre-game prep work, but I thought I could trust SurviFur Inc. to keep psychopaths out of the game. Damn me for an imbecile! Mal sent some bots and spiders out beyond the BioSphere into the larger Net, to gather information. A bit of work to filter out irrelevant data, and a clear picture of Mary-Anne's life emerged in short order: Born under the name Bonnie Harris. Went furry two days after the initial Mutopia announcement. Seven-time widower. None of the men survived his marriage by more than a month. Each husband left everything to her. Ten-digit bank balance.
  Mal frowned. Well, the five megabuck prize certainly isn't what she's after. So what the Hell is she doing here? He reviewed the circumstances of her seven husbands' deaths; suspiciously-timed behavioral changes in the victims, no hard evidence, no grounds for legal action. Knowing what he did of her behavior in the BioSphere, Mal found it all depressingly familiar. It was the same lethal pattern, time and again. Geez. You'd think she'd get bored, repeating herself...
  Mal blinked. He had the answer, the only possible answer: She is bored. She's not playing in the game, she's playing with the game! And she couldn't give a flying fuck what happens, as long as it isn't dull!
  The video feed pinpointed them well inside the Savannah borders. No! Too soon! Mal rifled through his mental inventory of resources, frantically seeking any method physically possible to extract Michael from the unspeakable danger he was blithely walking into. Can't intercept in person, they got too much of a head start. Even with the combat form I'm at least four minutes too late, the stealth form is slower, and the sensor form'd be toast from the goddamn flying vampire squirrels... Forget the subway, stations're too far from the checkpoints... I got nobody working the Savannah this shift, so I can't move anyone into position soon enough to do any good... Can't call in a warning as myself, they'll never believe me after Mike backs her up that I'm a psycho killer... Can't call as someone else, they'll want to know how I know... Don't have any plans already in place that can hit before the deadline... I could do a slash-and-burn hack, to Hell with low profile, but the net doesn't have enough direct connections to do shit out there in time to make a difference...
  There was nothing he could do, and each failed idea was another cold brick crushing his heart. All of Mal's plans, all of his preparations, none of them were applicable to this situation, none of them could affect matters for the better. Every second he wasted in futile attempts to devise a viable rescue plan brought the unwitting satyr another second closer to his doom.
  Michael was dead, and he didn't even know it. And Mal was ineffectual, impotent, unable to do anything but avenge the comrade who'd thrown him out of the Harlem tribe. He shut his eyes, steeled himself visibly, bulldozed over his grief and horror with raw willpower. Turn off those damn feelings. Treat it like an abstract problem in game theory. 'Cuz if I lose it, I lose everything, and the bitch walks away scot-free. And by God, that is just not acceptible!
  From here on in, nothing mattered. Not the other tribes, not Sly Squirrel, certainly not the pot of tainted gold at the end of this toxic rainbow. Nothing in the Universe mattered except seeing to it that Mary-Anne paid for her mortal sins. In blood.

  "Just, please, leave," said Michael. The hacker looked as sad as Michael felt... His harrowing experience must have unhinged him, poor fellow. What else could possibly account for such absurd lies, coming from so honest a man?
  And then the moment passed. Michael stared after Mal's retreating back, unmoving, until the vixen drew her fingers along the outside of his right flank. He looked at her, and his eyes were bright with unshed tears.
  Crying, my fuzzy little toy? So soon? Just you wait, and by the Mother you'll really have something to cry about! Mary-Anne's eyes were damp, too, but she'd had to help herself along with a claw to the back near the base of her tail. "Michael? Can we go now? I'm afraid that if we stay, Mal will come back here and do something horrible to take us both out of the game."
  "Yes. The game, of course," the satyr said, shaking his bowed head. "Always and ever, the game." He looked straight into Mary-Anne's lying eyes. "Do you know, I'm beginning to wonder if this particular game can truly be worth the candle?" He closed his eyes and exhaled loudly, then pulled himself together. "I'm sorry, you weren't meant to hear that. Yes, you're right, best to move on. Mal is dangerous, albeit I'd thought his danger to be more potential than actual, to be perfectly honest. And now, on to the Savannah, shall we?"
  "Of course, Michael. But do we have to go there right away? That evil man knows it's our last medallion, and I'm afraid he might be somewhere out there now, lying in wait for us!"
  Could Mal truly be that vindictive -- of course he could, just look what he did to Norman. "Yes, I think you might just be right. But he really can't afford to do that for any too long, not with the Savannah's traps being what they are!" Michael's face fell into the old, familiar faraway expression. "In fact... given the extent of his current state of mutation, I'm not at all certain he could last as long as an hour, perhaps not even half that, before he must exit to a different biome. So where shall we go to pass the time waiting, my dear?"
  She snuggled up beside him. "Manhattan?" she asked hopefully.

  Nobody was at the Manhattan subway station when they arrived and even the ticket booth was unmanned. This hardly mattered to the two SurviFurs who rode it for free anyway, but Michael wondered what was going on. Mary-Anne did not, for her mind was too full of delightful visions of exactly what she was going to do to the besotted, simpering, cloying horsie who clopped along beside her.
  Up on the surface all became clear. The streets and sidewalks were also empty, and practically every unoccupied vertical surface bore a poster whose large, bold type exhorted all persons to remain in their homes. It seemed there was a plague upon the land, an infestation of three-legged robots that transmuted every living thing in range to more robots. It would appear that our hacker friend's meddling with the Machine Shop bore a bit more fruit than he'd intended. Or perhaps he did intend it? He certainly didn't manage to shield Harlem from the tripods -- or at least he said he didn't. But why would Mal lie about that?
  For her part, Mary-Anne was caught in the throes of anticipation, savoring the events to come so much that she was quite oblivious to the here and now. It hardly mattered, because the city was now without its Mutopia traps of an animate kind -- street artists, bums, pushers, pigeons, and so on -- and it was easy for Michael to steer her away from those which remained. The pair quickly arrived at their destination, Furrtive Moments.
  "Here we are, my sweet."
  Hearing this, Mary-Anne brought herself back to the present. "Ah -- thank you, Michael! No, can't touch now, you'll just have to wait. Now let me see, who's still here... ah! There you are, Jenny," she said to one of the staff. Jenny had once been a street artist before he'd made the mistake of putting hooves on the end of Michael's arms; now she had the mind of a seven-year-old child in the body of a 20-year-old prostitute. "This is Michael, and he's a wonderful, wonderful man. Take him to the Petting Lounge and make him comfortable. Can you do that for me, Jenny?"
  "Oh, yes, Mother! Can I touch him?"
  "I'm sorry, Jenny, but no you may not touch him. He's a good man."
  Light dawned in Jenny's half-vacant eyes. "Ohh! I'll tell the others. I like good men."
  "Yes, you do," Mary-Anne said. Then, to Michael: "She showed up here one day, with no memory of her former life." 12 hours as a pigeon left her mind in just the right condition. "We've been taking care of her ever since." And making damn sure she never escapes to tell her story. "And now I've got an errand or two, and I'll rejoin you as soon as I can." With that, Mary-Anne mimed kissing Michael, then disappeared upstairs to her office.
  The first thing she did was lock all of her possessions into the safe. The former owner had been justifiably paranoid; he'd actually commissioned a safe with a secret compartment inside it, a compartment whose hidden catch would take five concentrated minutes of close examination simply to locate, let alone have any prayer of opening. It was this compartment she put her arsenal into, just on the off chance that her quarry might somehow get into her sanctum sanctorum without becoming the newest member of the staff. I honestly don't see how he can do that, but my big black cat has already surprised me too many times before! Another layer of protection won't hurt. And just in case he does show up, I'll leave a little something especially for him.
  And throughout her preparations, she dreamed as to how she was going to break Michael. Shatter him to see how many tiny pieces he'd fall into, for no better reason than because she damn well felt like it. She used to get an almost sexual thrill from controlling people, manipulating them like little toy robots, destroying their free will, but the thrill just wasn't there any more. She'd gotten too good at it; it was too easy: To achieve Result A, inject Drug B into Artery C, and push emotional buttons D, E, and F. All she had to do was go through the motions, as predestined as a fast-food cook assembling sandwiches! Thanks to her growing expertise, Mary-Anne had become almost as much a machine as the allegedly free-willed toys she abused and discarded.
  That was the whole point of not obliterating Michael's will, not reducing him to a mere appendage of her mind; he was a useful tool, but a tool cannot feel pain when it breaks. She needed him obedient, but at the same time he had to retain enough individuality to recognize what he'd become, what he'd allowed her to do to him. Her horsie was on a leash, but not a short one, oh no! The line had enough slack in it for him to hang himself. It was a fine line to walk, never straying too far towards either free will or abject dependence, and in that walk Mary-Anne found the challenge that had been missing from her life.
  That was the reason she'd entered the SurviFur arena in the first place; the challenge, the non-trivial possibility of failure. It wasn't the money -- she could already buy and sell many of the smaller nations -- nor was it the accompanying prize of a free transformation. It was the BioSphere's limited environment, the competitive elements which demanded both cooperation and suspicion from the SurviFurs, the circumscribed set of resources she'd begun with.
  She knew very well that sending Norman against Mal was a tactical error -- but only in the game everyone else was playing. As far as the vixen was concerned, it was a test to see just how far that squat and stupid man could be pushed. Had Mal actually fallen, she would have danced a little jig of grief; as it was, she now had a competent, intelligent and aware enemy whose capabilities weren't fully known. By throwing Norman to his doom, the cat-to-be had proven himself the single most dangerous threat she'd ever faced.
  It would be a glorious hunt.
  Harlem might lose the next challenge; she herself might get zapped by that nasty squirrel; it simply didn't matter. With her resources, she could easily recover from any such setback, and then it was simply a question of taking over all of the others, one by one. Giving them gentle nudges, turning them against each other. Sitting back along the sidelines and just watching, helpless and innocent and horrified, as they unwittingly destroyed themselves for her pleasure.
  But she didn't want to get ahead of herself. Tonight Mary-Anne would devour a succulent steak tartare, rare in every sense of the word. Her horsie was all prepared and ready for the abbatoir -- but first, it was time for some precautions. According to her information, it was mating season in the Savannah, and the air was not only heavy with pheromones, but also thick with an aerosol suspension of Mutopia. This mutagen's primary function was to alter the endocrine system, make the victim increasingly responsive to the potent scents of lust; its secondary function came into play only when a victim gave in to the impulses created by his raging hormones. Michael was a prime target -- she'd made damn sure he was closer to animal than she was, appearances to the contrary -- thus, she would be able to follow him down into oblivion with a bit of time to enlighten him before he was irretrievably lost. But it wouldn't be much fun at all if she was irretrievably lost! So it was time for a little self-hypnosis, just to make sure that she remembered to do the right thing.
  Entering a trance was easy for a woman of Mary-Anne's experience. And the suggestions were easy too, as she had put a lot of thought into them. The first suggestion: Return to Furrtive Moments and touch one of the vixens. No matter what mental state (or lack thereof) she was in at the time, that would trigger the restoration. The second suggestion: Don't touch anything that even might be a Mutopia trap. After all, the last thing she wanted was to become a carnivore and go hunting or something. The final suggestion, possibly the most important: Avoid Mal at all costs. Mary-Anne knew she'd be in a vulnerable condition, and she equally knew that he was ruthless enough to exploit any advantage she was foolish enough to give him.
  When she awoke from her trance it was time to begin. Her possessions were safe, and even if Mal had somehow watched her stash them, they were beyond his reach. Now to fetch Michael and begin her feast. Ohh! I can hardly wait! A virgin, and he's all mine! She couldn't help but clasp her hands together as the anticipation shivered through her.

  The Sun was setting. Michael and Mary-Anne made their cautious way through the grasslands, using only the fading sunlight that made its way through the dome roof for light. Their experience and tutelage under Mal had trained them to always be observant, and they avoided the traps of a more conventional nature. As for the local wildlife, the only threatening ones were a pride of lions, who were primarily nocturnal. Mary-Anne was confident as she knew how the great cats thought -- and Michael was leading just in case.
  It was an hour's walk to the checkpoint. As they moved, the dry wind blew their hair and Mary-Anne's tail, flooding their noses with the scent of wild animals, the rich old musk of lions, the nervous scent of antelope, the dry brittle scent of the dry grass, and the aerosol suspension of mutagen in the air. They were silent for most of the trek, but when they could see the lights of the checkpoint ahead of them in the dimming sunlight, Michael started to ask Mary-Anne about Mal.
  Mary-Anne shushed him. Although she said that this night was for them, she knew it was really all for herself.
  The checkpoint consisted of a large open-framed building of light wood and grass lit by torches. Cooked meats were available and Mary-Anne let Michael offer her some, but there were no vegetables that Michael could eat so he just watched Mary-Anne, disbelieving that a wonderful girl like her could actually care for him.As the moon rose, with just a single drop of grease still on her muzzle, Mary-Anne held Michael's hand and first let him take the token and hang it around her neck, and then she led him into a corner of the building where a bubbling, brightly lit hot tub was waiting for the contestants to relax. As Michael held her paw, Mary-Anne could see his pupils deform, starting to stretch vertically, and she smiled. Yes, her big horsie was in love.

  Mal watched dispassionately as Michael helped the vixen climb into the hot tub, then severed the connection to the video feed, his action as coolly mechanical as if he were still half-robot. He did not allow himself to feel anything that might affect his concentration for the worse. He knew he wouldn't be able to stifle his emotions forever; but then, he didn't need to. All he needed was another 22 hours 53 minutes.
  Mary-Anne had managed to control one single cameraman, but after Mal had discovered exactly what hold she had on the man, the hacker became his true owner. Mal sent a signal which destroyed the information Mary-Anne had on the cameraman, and then another to the man himself, telling him the passwords to access a certain Swiss bank account and giving him the most vitriolic and offensive "letter of resignation" Mal could compose, to be sent on to Mary-Anne. Not that she ever got any use out of the guy, but she's a control freak. The mere fact that he acted against her will at all, to any degree, should seriously rattle her tiny little mind. No, erase that -- she's not stupid, I can't afford to underestimate her -- she's the most dangerous person I've ever met.
  Mal knew he'd be doing some unauthorized formshifting later in the evening, so his next pair of messages went to his cameramen in Manhattan and to the BioSphere network. Just as much as when he'd changed to the combat form earlier in the day, he had to blind the BioSphere's all-seeing eyes, which these messages did. His slaves would ensure that no cameras recorded the actual transformation, and the other message would prevent the BioSphere network from taking note of his altered genetic structure, as it ordinarily did through the subcutaneous implants all SurviFurs had to accept as a condition of taking part in the game.

  For a while, Mary-Anne and Michael just lay in the hot tub looking into each other's eyes. Mary-Anne saw by his fully-slitted pupils just how strongly the pheromones had already hit the satyr. It seemed that the actual emotion of love was at least partially responsible for the effect and that would make it easier. Suddenly, Mary-Anne reached over and violently clenched Michael to her, pushing him so that they were both submerged with her on top. Then it was time for a kiss, a bite on his lips, and then a burst of blown bubbles before she let him back up to breathe.
  And she smiled. Michael's eyes were wide and completely unaware of his surroundings; fur, white fur, was sprouting around them. He was gasping for breath and a drop of blood had formed on his lower lip. Slowly, daintily, Mary-Anne leaned over and licked the blood off, sucking to get it all, and then exhaling into Michael's face.
  "Er, Mary-Anne. Is this safe? I mean... well..."
  Mary-Anne could now feel the mutagen working in her own body, starting with her tail which she could feel changing. The clock was ticking, and already she was more aroused than she'd been in years. A virgin, and he's all mine! And this vulpine body only makes it better! "Michael, dear, trust me. Would I do anything that could possibly hurt you?" And then she kissed him again.
  Dear God, is this what I think it is? Could she love me? It looks, but, this feeling, the power... Is it safe? How can something this wonderful be wrong? How can a girl this sweet, this lovely, this... this... Michael's thoughts were becoming confused. Oh God, thank you for this gift. I've been so lonely. Michael began to feel a burning in his body, a need, an urgency. It was centred in his manhood, but it flowed throughout his body, in waves of pleasure and need from his legs to the tips of his ears. He was feverish, but instead of feeling sick it was as though he had all the power of the superheroes he used to read. He could hardly speak, but he forced himself to whisper, "Thank you."
  Oh my horsie, I've just begun to show you what can be done. Enjoy it while you can, for the anticipation is all that you shall get. Already Mary-Anne felt herself bursting to a first orgasm, and even this first little one was greater, more pleasurable, than any she'd had in years. She barely noticed the Mutopia-wrought changes that accompanied it. Great Mother, thank you for this gift, for this virgin! And she couldn't help but let out a faint squeal of joy. Why didn't I become a vixen years ago! This body, this wonderful, sensual body!
  Mary-Anne took a deep breath and ducked her head under the steaming water to take her horse's manhood into her mouth, clasping her clawed arms around him and tearing through the skin on his back. She'd done this before, but it was never like this. The key was to bring her horsie ever closer, but never quite over the top. Keep him waiting with warming, growing anticipation. She licked his manhood as it stretched ever longer, and she could feel the barbs appear on it as the mutagen continued to work. Then, grasping his waist she started to move her mouth in and out along it, feeling it getting longer and stronger. And then a puff of bubbles through her mouth, and a sharp nip to keep it from getting too ready, before she released it and she screamed out the rest of her air as a second orgasm rippled through her. Only her experience allowed her to stay in control as her fully leonine head broke the surface of the bloody water.
  Michael couldn't believe this. His body was on fire. He felt himself changing, warping. The light in the tent grew brighter in his eyes, and a long tail grew behind him. He felt his hooves soften and change to paws, and felt fur grow along his chest. I don't care! The pleasure, the warmth, the joy -- oh God, thank you for this! He was there, almost there, but then there was a burst of sharp pain, a shyness. Still the need, the desperation, continued to grow.
  Mary-Anne surfaced so that her muzzle was lying on top of the water. She looked up at her horsie, who now had an entirely feline head. His fur was as white as what he'd had as a centaur, accented with blood from the water and his back, and his eyes were wide and distant as he panted for breath. Mary-Anne smiled. Dinner is served! She stood up in the hot tub, the bloody water dribbling from her feline hide. She moved her muzzle beside her horsie's head and nipped his ear, letting a delicate trickle of blood stain his mane. "Oh, Michael... I have so much to tell you..."
  Michael couldn't speak. He was on the edge, he had to release, but he couldn't. He was burning with need, but the sweet pain kept him from going over the edge. And then her voice, whispering, caressing...
  "Oh Michael, Mal was telling the truth. I'm the enemy."
  What? But how -- and then another wave of need, of urgency, flowed through him, and Michael found himself helpless as Mary-Anne clasped his manhood in her paw, alternately squeezing and clawing it. The pleasure and the pain kept Michael in need, hot, desperate, and helpless.
  "Oh yes, my big horsie. I did send Norman to kill Mal. I could have saved him, but I pleasured in his death." Mary-Anne's last word changed into a loud growl as another orgasm, greater than any she had experienced, swept through her. Oh Great Mother, I thank you for this gift!
  Michael was barely coherent, unable to comprehend his love's words. Oh God, let this end. Give me release from this torture, this ascending pyramid of pleasure! Oh Mary-Anne, Mary-Anne. So what if you controlled Norman. I don't care -- I care only for you!
  She knew that the sorrow and the horror hadn't entered her horsie yet. Time for the next bite. Another, smaller orgasm swept through her as her tail twisted and bent in anticipation. "And Mal was right about you. I own you, just like I own Furrtive Pleasures. And I thank you for the gift you gave me."
  Michael could barely think straight as the need, the desperation, the pleasure and the pain, all rippled through his body. Did Mary-Anne say something about a gift, about Norman?
  Now the vixen's change had reached the point that she could no longer be mounted frontally, so she slowly let Michael's ear slide away from her mouth after giving it another bite with her fangs. Red is such a lovely colour! She spun around and let herself stand in the hot tub on all fours, raising her tail and feeling the pheromones from her own body enticing Michael to enter her. She felt him drop on top of her on all fours, and she took his right forepaw in her mouth, daintily biting down on it before letting it go.
  Michael knew he'd become a lion, and a need, a quest to show that he owned this female swept though him, stoking the heat and the desire. She was ready, he could see her and he could scent her. Carefully, slowly, he lowered himself onto her, oblivious to the blood dripping from his mangled ear down his cheek. She was his and she loved him -- nothing else mattered. His manhood was hot and ready, and he slowly guided it into her, oblivious to her bite on his leg, and the burning of the chlorine in the water on his wounds.
  Mary-Anne felt her horsie's spiky manhood enter her and she knew he was ready. She could feel it pulsing, and knew that he couldn't wait, but she had the key from earlier today. "Michael, you murdered Norman."
  Michael was barely aware of Mary-Anne's voice, but there was something -- that word, 'murder' -- his ears pricked forward and a chill swept across his need as he thrust his manhood into his lover's waiting form.
  "I controlled you and you gave me Norman to play with. A gift that I destroyed." Mary-Anne fought to speak over another orgasm (and wave of change) that swept through her as her muscles clamped down and squeezed her horsie's manhood. "You murrrderrred him by giving him to me!"
  Murder? This is my mate, my lioness. What is murder, what it matter? And yet that word, whatever it meant, chilled him. It sank into his mind and cooled him enough to listen to what Mary-Anne said.
  "Oh yes, I drugged you, made you love me. I drugged you and made you give me Norman. So that I could control him and turn him against Malcolm." She could feel her horsie's manhood starting to shrink, but the spines were trying to keep them locked together. She could feel the shudders of fear and terror as her horsie's eroding mind began to realize what was happening. Another orgasm, greater than any she'd ever had, swept through her. A virgin for me to break, a virgin to be broken and kept a virgin! "Oh Great Mother!"
  Murder is wrong. But how could my mate -- but she not wrong -- I can't have murder... Michael felt his manhood shrinking, felt the barbs tearing at his lioness drawing blood. Wrong! All wrong! I not murder, not kill...
  "Oh Michael, thank you, thank you! I've neverrr had a virrrginnn beforrre!" And then Mary-Anne let a growling laugh billow from her throat and across the Savannah. She could feel another orgasm building, and she knew that now (while she could still speak) was the time. "I nnnev'rrr loved you, I j'ssst used you! I lied to ussse you to mmm'rrrd'rrr Norrrmmm'nnn!"
  Michael just collapsed into the bloody water, what was left of his mind reeling. Mate not love me? She use me, she lie?! Dear God, what she do? What I do?! Michael collapsed into the bloody water as Mary-Anne turned to face him, her eyes wide as a final orgasm swept through her, oblivious to the blood dripping from her torn vagina. She looked only at Michael, still a virgin, as her hot and hungry eyes watched the crumbling of his sanity.

  Mal was just about to enter the subway when a blood-curdling sound reached him from the direction of the Savannah. It was something like a lion's roar, but not much, for a roar was the cause of terror, not the result. This was a sound to rip at the soul; the sound of somebody realizing that their entire life had turned to ash. The last cry of a human spirit descending to hell.
  Here and now, there was only one reason for a tortured cry like that. Stoic, Mal only thought, She worked faster than I anticipated.
  He had to see. Had to know. Waiting on the platform for the next subway car, Mal found the video feed for Michael and Mary-Anne, and then just stared. The picture showed a mated pair of white lions in a bloody hot tub, the ivory fur of the male liberally splattered with crimson. Mal just watched as the male let out another cry of terror and horror and betrayal before it leapt out of the water and fled. The female, with blood on her fangs and lips, just stood in the water. Her cry was a growling, obscene parody of laughter. And around her neck was one of the medallions.
  She did it. Damn her to the deepest circle of Hell. And all the while the cameras just kept rolling. Why bother stopping it? We all signed waivers, so SurviFur Inc. is untouchable regardless. And that kind of footage carries a hefty profit on pay-per-view. Bad business to let a little thing like human compassion get in the way of gigabuck-level gross income.
  Mal's resolve was shaken, just for a moment, before he lowered the iron mask back into place over his jagged emotions. Alright. She looks to be at least 80% lioness now, and she'll be more so before she reaches the border. Very little human brain left. She wasn't stupid enough to do this without giving herself an escape hatch; probably a post-hypnotic suggestion to get herself restored. Most likely option is Furrtive Moments, one touch and she's a vixen again, no need to think or pay money.
  But first, she's got to get there.
  He composed and sent a message to all his cameraslaves: [Mary-Anne has become a savage animal, and she's a literal man-eater (see attached screenshots). As soon as you see a white lioness, warn everyone! The beast has killed one man already, and it's got the blood on its fur to prove it. Make sure it doesn't get into the subway system!] There. SurviFur Inc. couldn't care less when contestants die, but the unions will rape the company if they allow employees to get mauled. [If you are off-duty, or if you can get off-duty within next 3 hours: Assemble all available weapons and hunt the beast. KILL IT IF YOU CAN.] Too obvious, Sly may notice something's up. So what? Beating the bitch takes precedence. With no subway access, hunter teams scrambled to take her out, and Musfah's tripods on the loose, that should slow the bitch down quite a bit. One more layer of obstacles will do for now... Mal hacked into the Manhattan municipal computers; when he was done, the local authorities were on priority-alpha alert to locate and contain a man-eating beast, complete with choice screen captures that displayed the blood on her fur to its best advantage. And there was one more option he hadn't explored. Musfah hasn't been communicative, and I don't know if I can enlist its aid anyway, but it's worth a try.
  And then the subway arrived. Mal got on, and, after a few taps at his palmtop, he was pleasantly surprised when his "request for communications" signal got a response.
  Greetings to Mal.
  The hacker would have responded, but Musfah continued: I have been observing your current actions. As well, I have compiled data from which I have deduced certain of your past actions. It is clear that the manner in which you interface with other systems is highly distinct from the manner in which you interface with me. Can you explain this discrepancy?
  Interesting, Mal thought. This might be a challenge...

  The beast ran. She ran, even though all she wanted was to eat and sleep and fuck. Something in the beast's head made her keep moving, close to the ground, loping along to... her lair? Where was her lair? The beast had a memory, going down into a cave with lights. That seemed right. But when the beast got close to the cave the air was thick with man-stink! Fresh man-stink, not old. Fresh! The mans were in the cave now! And the beast's nose caught other scents, too, scents that she didn't like. Something in the beast's head told her those scents could bring hurt and death. Anyway, the beast knew her lair wasn't a cave. Not a cave! So why go into a cave?
  The beast was confused. Tired, hungry, and confused. But the beast had something in her head, like a buzzing little thing that would not go away and she couldn't swat it! Like a man-voice in the beast's head, telling her to keep moving. The beast fell on one side, scraping her head against the ground. Then the ground hurt, and blood got in the beast's eye, so she stopped. The beast didn't want to hear the voice in her head. The beast wanted to go back to the grass-place, to eat and sleep and fuck, but the voice wouldn't let her. The voice got bad when the beast went towards the grass-place, shrill and loud and very annoying. The voice got better when she was moving away from the grass-place, hunting for her lair that wasn't a cave --
  "ULAAAA!"
  The beast knew that sound. That sound wasn't in her head. The beast knew she had to go away from that sound. The beast had seen it: Things that didn't go away from that sound got shiny. And then they weren't the same thing they had been. They got shiny, and then they were the thing which made that sound. The beast didn't want to get shiny.
  The beast went away from the thing which made that sound.
  And then the voice again! The voice told the beast to go to 'Manhattan', to hurry. The beast knew Manhattan was a place -- she just didn't know where. The beast had a memory of going into a cave with lights, but where was Manhattan?
  The beast stopped, shaking her head, but the voice got bad. Frustrated, the beast screamed out a roar. The voice got worse, like a big swarm of buzzing little things in her head. The beast scraped her head against the ground. She only got more hurt. Screaming again, the beast started loping towards the nearest clump of man-stink.

  Mal's conversation with Musfah had not been fruitful. The hacker was halfway to Manhattan before the AI was satisfied with his explanation of the difference between it and a non-sentient machine, and after that, Musfah just didn't see why it should concentrate on eliminating any one SurviFur in specific. Oh, well. He's right, though; given the continuing exponential increase in the robot population around here, she'll soon be taken down anyway. Still, it was worth a try.
  Having reached the Manhattan station's platform, Mal paused and checked other things. How nice. Sly's got a realtime tracer on the bitch's implant -- something else I didn't think I'd need to do. Hmmm. She's 2 miles away from Manhattan, and getting farther? Interesting. And her path after leaving the Savannah checkpoint is a tangled and confused mess. Does she even know the physical location of Manhattan? Don't think so. She's always taken the subway, barely looked at the map, always had someone else sweat the details for her. I'll bet the bitch doesn't have clue one how to get there on foot. So she's lost, and she has to dodge hunters and tripods along the way. And when she does reach Manhattan, the cops are on alert for her. Animal Control, too. Good. Gives me more time to work.
  Mal set up a tiny program to run in the background, a little piece of code that monitored the realtime tracer on the bitch, and would warn him when she got within 500 yards of the Manhattan border. He didn't think anything more was needed; in her current condition the only danger she presented was that of claw and fang. Until her own brain got cleaned up, the bitch wasn't going to be washing anyone else's.
  Mal checked his email one last time before getting down to business. Good, my boys are prepped and in position. He left the subway station and went to a particular alley, one which just happened to be laid out in such a way that most of it was within only one camera's field of view. And by no chance whatsoever, that camera just happened to be manned by one of Mal's slaves. He shifted over to his combat form, and then ran for Furrtive Moments, heedless of who or what might be watching.
  He made it in record time. Once there, he stayed back in the shadows and put his binoculars' image processing to good use looking for plumes of the telltale signatures, carbon dioxide and hot air and so on, that would indicate possible means of entry... Got it. Up topside, 93% probability that it's an air conditioning duct. Also an 82% probability of the place not being empty. Damn. Just have to deal with it.
  One running high jump later, Mal was on the roof of Furrtive Moments. He'd noticed an odd sensation in some isolated parts of his armored hide. Feathers? Right, must've stepped on pigeon shit while I ran. Irrelevant. They're going away in about 2 minutes. The duct he sought was round, only seven inches across and had no protection he could detect -- no alarms, no tripwires, nothing. Just a screen to keep wind-blown dirt and leaves and rain from getting in through this outlet. He used a claw to undo the screws which held the screen in place, then silently laid the screen off to one side of the duct. He closed his eyes, crossed himself, and offered a soundless prayer. Okay. Time to make it happen.
  Mal shifted again, using another of the Mutopia formulas stored in his purifier. This one was the stealth form which he'd designed for covert intrusions like this. In gross physical terms it was a 40-foot-long snake with a pair of slim, dexterous arms, and it could fit through openings as small as 6 inches across. Its skin had color-shifting qualities normally found in cephalopods, allowing him to camouflage himself against any background, and with temperature-control adaptations taken from the arctic fox, his camouflage could extend into the infrared part of the spectrum (a trick he couldn't keep up for long before the internal buildup of heat got dangerous). The stealth form literally did have eyes in the back of its head, and IR-sensing pits to complement the UV-sensitive retinas in its eyes. It even had knockout venom, albeit only enough to put one large man to sleep for 10 minutes or so.
  Mal's harness was of course completely unsuitable to this form. He reworked it, quickly converting it to one wide, multi-pocketed band of ballistic nylon that was held close against his elongated body by several straps. That 7-inch access hole would be a tight fit after taking the pockets into account, but it was doable. Fortunately, the interior ducting was much wider than the exterior hole, looking to be about 15 inches. The last thing he did before entering the hole was dismount his staff into three 2-foot segments, clipping each one individually to his reworked harness. I only hope I don't run into any bends that're too sharp for even the smaller segments to fit. And then he was in the ventilation system.
  Slithering in silence, Mal spent the next half-hour looking through air-duct screens, taking notes on his palmtop and building a mental picture of what was where.

  Man-stink and more man-stink! The beast had found a lot of it, but none of it was Manhattan. The beast tried to remember where she was, where she had been. The voice got better when the beast remembered. It was hard to remember, but the voice got better when she did. There were words, the voice gave her words, for the places she'd been since she left the grass-place. 'Savannah' was the word for the grass-place. The beast wanted to go there, to eat and sleep and fuck, but if she did that, the voice would get bad again. 'Again'. That was a word for something happening twice. The voice got better, and the beast didn't know why. Savannah, that was the word for where the beast had been. And 'Mountains'. Mountains was another place. 'Forest' and 'River'. They were all places. The beast had been in all of those places. The beast remembered, none of those places were --
  "ULAAAA!"
  The beast knew a shiny thing made that sound. It was near. It would make her shiny. The beast didn't want to be shiny. The beast ran away from the shiny thing which made that sound.

  Thanks to the curfew that had been instituted to protect citizens from the tripods, the place was closed. It wasn't empty, however. Three vixens, asleep in their quarters. Two armed guards -- not sure what they're packing, don't want to find out the hard way. Just have to take 'em all out without them firing back. Fortunately, the stored DNA sequences in Mal's purifier included some that would be very useful indeed. Throat, legs, arms, and eyes, in that order. That should keep 'em out of my way.
  Mal slithered through the air ducts to the room where the vixens slept peacefully. He'd already considered and discarded the notion of vixenating himself; the heightened libido was a liability he simply couldn't afford. He got a mouthful of water from one of the bottles he'd been carrying in his pockets, adjusted the settings on his purifier tube, stuck one end of it through the open-meshwork faceplate which was this air duct's cover, and spat a couple of ounces of water through the tube onto each of the three foxes.
  The Mutopia he'd just spitballed them with was designed to replace the victim's neck with the 'neck' of a dolphin, and when it was done, they'd all be completely mute, with their heads fixed in an upward-looking position. Mal didn't wait for that to happen; instead, he reset the purifier and spat again. This second dose of mutagen would eliminate the victims' legs, replacing them with the slimy 'foot' of a snail covering much of their ventral surface. As Mal again reset his weapon, one of the vixens stirred in her sleep, but did not wake up. A third dose of mutagen, this one to replace arms with flippers. The fourth and final round of spitballs replaced their eyes with those of albino cave fish, which is to say 'none whatsoever'.
  In all, it had taken 26 seconds for Mal to hit his targets with all four mutagens. Not good enough -- got to work on that, he thought as the vixens' bodies rippled with changes. Now leave a surprise for whoever discovers this one. It took less than a minute more for Mal dampen the bedclothes with a four-Mutopia cocktail that would do no good whatsoever to whoever was foolish enough to touch a damp spot.
  Three down, two to go... Mal went hunting for the guards. He was silent; he attacked from ambush, and then only when the designated victim was alone; he was victorious. The guards never knew what hit them.
  With no effective opposition left, Mal broke one of the duct system's faceplates and slithered down to the floor. He took off his harness and shifted to the combat form, relieved the guards of their uniforms and equipment, and finally threw them into the vixens' bedroom. He used one of the guards' keys to lock that room's single door, broke the key off inside the lock, and sealed the broken key in place with duct tape from the roll he'd been carrying all along.
  Done. Doesn't matter if the vixens' touch can erase what I did to them. If it can't, I'm clear; otherwise, it's gonna take at least a half-hour for any two of them to get close enough for physical contact, after which they have to figure out how to escape from a sealed room. Plenty of time for me to do what I came for.
  Mal reworked his harness for a humanoid body; reassembled his staff; used the staff's stored Mutopia to resume his baseline human form; put on his silicone gloves; then got down to business. The first item on his agenda involved what he'd visited the Savannah for: The nectar of a giant Sundew plant. This nectar contained a very special mutagen. No matter how much of the stuff a victim swallowed or got smeared on himself, it wouldn't do anything -- not until the victim did get some other Mutopia on him, it wouldn't. At that point, the inactive components in the sundew nectar would copy the instructions of the active mutagen and go to work, in effect multiplying the effect of the active mutagen. The result would affect double or triple the normal percentage of the victim's body, perhaps even more, depending on how much nectar he'd been exposed to. And Mal had fed several ounces of Sundew nectar into his purifier, whose nano-assemblers now could generate as much of the stuff as he wanted.
  He added concentrated Sundew to every liqueur and syrup in the wet bar which had flavor and/or sugar enough to conceal the nectar's presence, after which he did likewise to the supplies Furrtive Moments had stored in their back room.
  That task complete, Mal used the guards' keys to get into the manager's office. The bitch hadn't been carrying anything; therefore, she had to have stored it somewhere, and this was the most likely place. He smeared a purifier-made four-mutagen cocktail on the outside doorknob, just in case any of the five other people in the building managed to escape the box they were in. He brought out his binoculars, hoping that the image analysis routines would reveal something interesting that was invisible to the naked eye; no such luck. Let's see if the purifier's chemical analysis can pick up anything; depending on what drugs the bitch uses, there might be detectable residues. He started blowing air through the purifier, moving around to sample the air in various locations, giving up after a few solid minutes of negative results. Enough. Table that. Even as cheap a dive as this has computers hooked up to the net, so let's see what they got.
  Two minutes of hacking later, Mal was in. The Furrtive Moments machines were protected by a firewall that might have been the best money could buy in 1999... but it was barely a joke today. Scanning the drives, Mal found that less than 8% of the files had been backed up in the past four years, and those were just graphics documents, apparently advertising fliers that had been copied onto Zip cartridges for printout at a different location.
  Mal did not smile. He merely installed a logic bomb, a chunk of code that would wait to receive the proper signal, after which it would obliterate every application, every document, every bit of data in the machine's hard drive and firmware -- and it would start with the most vital bits first.
  More hacking, this time into the machines of the companies that supplied Furrtive Moments with its water, power, and other utilities. Leave the phone in place for now; everything else goes. When he was through, the topless bar was over 14 months in arrears with all of its suppliers. Right on cue, the lights went dark, there was a 'kachunka' noise from the basement, and the lights lit up again. I see; the place has its own generator. I'll have to make sure of its fuel supply before I go. It won't take 'em long to straighten this out in the morning -- it's just a simple concatenation of data-corruption glitches -- but this is only a mindgame. It'll piss off the bitch no end, and she won't need any evidence to blame it all on me. So far, so good.
  Next, check the Med Center. I'll be needing them, she knows it, and she's had plenty of opportunity to set up unpleasant surprises for me. Of course, if she has set up anything, that would imply she's gotten at the management there, too. Time for more social engineering...
  Having previously recorded a number of samples of the bitch's voice, Mal now gave his palmtop some samples of his own voice. A few seconds of FFT signal analysis later, the machine was able to digitally manipulate his voice to where it was indistinguishable from the bitch's. He used his palmtop's audio input and output, rather than risk touching the handset, and called the Med Center. If I'm right about this, it won't matter that it's 9 in the evening.
  "Manhattan Med Center. What is the nature of your emergency?"
  "Ooooh! Hello there, dear. This is Mary-Anne, and if you could just let me talk to the man in charge, I'd be ever so grateful." While counterfeiting the bitch's voice, Mal got into the Med Center's publicly available information.
  There was a momentary pause, then, "Please hold for a moment."
  It was less than 40 seconds, and the next voice on the line said, "Hello, Mother."
  Mal blinked. That's interesting. But no matter what it sounded like, the number he was connected to was indeed that of Joseph Korrin, the Med Center's Director of Operations, the man who held ultimate authority over everything that was done in the Med Center. And Korrin went on: "What can I do for you tonight?"
  "Oh, you darling boy! You can tell me what we're going to do to that nasty man, Mal, if he ever dares to show his face. I just love to hear a story with a happy ending!"
  "Of course, Mother. When your pet cat comes in for removal of mutation, we'll only take away what's obvious from the outside, and we'll leave all of his internal changes untouched. As well, we'll rewire his brain to cut his IQ down to 90, cripple his linguistic abilities, and render him schizophrenic."
  Mal nodded. So I'm her pet? Never mind. That's about what I figured. She's been a busy little bitch, has our Mary-Anne. "You are such a good boy! But I'm afraid Mother has some bad news for you. You see, I've changed my mind about what should be done with Mal, and that means we're going to go with a different plan. Please, can you forgive Mother for making you throw away all that hard work you've already done?"
  "Of course I can, Mother! You know I can't be angry with you for anything! Just tell me what you want now, and you can be sure that we'll be ready to make it happen when the time comes."
  "I am so proud of you, Joseph! What I want you to do now is... nothing. If he does come in for restoration, don't do anything special; just fix him, the same way you would anyone else. And be sure not to hurt his brain." Mal adopted an intimate, purring tone before continuing: "You see, now Mother has better plans for her big, black cat. Much, much, much better plans."

  It was hard for the beast to remember -- her head wasn't made for it -- but she could do it. The beast could remember; she just didn't know why she should bother. It was easier to not remember and to not think, to just do what the voice said, do what made the voice better.
  The beast was making a picture in her head. 'Map' was the word the voice gave her, and she was making one in her head. The beast wanted to eat and sleep, but the voice got bad when she tried anything like that, so she kept moving and kept adding pieces to the picture in her head. Sometimes the beast got close to man-stink, or shiny things. When that happened, the beast ran away and the picture in her head got bad. When that happened, the beast got confused and she had to stop running so she could make the picture good again. It was hard to make the picture good, but the voice got better when the beast did that.
  The beast still didn't know where Manhattan was, still didn't know why a cave with lights felt right. But the beast knew a lot of places that Manhattan wasn't. The beast picked herself up and started walking towards one of the places Manhattan might be. The beast wanted to run, but she was tired and hungry. Manhattan, that was where the beast could eat and sleep. The voice told the beast so. The beast had to find Manhattan, then she could eat and sleep.

  Mal reviewed the situation. Computers here are toast when I give the signal. Ditto the phones. No water or power. Generator's chugging; it'll run dry in 4 hours, and the spare fuel cans will have finished dribbling onto the floor in two. I've defused the Med Center, they're expecting me to show up any time before midnight, and they won't tell the bitch I was there because they think she already knows. Bypassed the fuses and circuit breakers so the surge will fry stuff unprotected. All good. Only thing left undone is finding the bitch's collection of hazardous materials. Thanks to the purifier, I don't need to worry about the drugs she added to the rabbits -- but God knows what else she's got, probably concealed in her makeup kit. Let's see: If I were building a low-class topless bar, where would I hide the safe?
  Mal found it under a throw rug. Old-fashioned Master Lock combination dial, looks like a standard 3-number job. A few seconds later he knew the combination had been changed from what it had been set to at the factory. Assume the bitch had it reset. She wouldn't want to write down the combination; it'd be something important to her, something she couldn't forget. How about the date on which her first husband died -- bingo. Unfortunately, once the safe was open, Mal could see that it contained only a piece of paper with large, hand-written letters on it: SUCKER!
  Double-plus shit! Mal reflexively slammed the lid shut, not waiting to see what nastiness he might inadvertently have triggered when he opened the safe, and ran out of the office, stopping only when he was in the supply room in the back of the building. Time to get the hell out of here. Shifting to his combat form, he then he left the building by the simple expedient of ripping chunks from the outside wall, ignoring the alarms he set off in the process, until the hole was big enough for him to pass through. He took the guards' keys with him, leaving all their other equipment where it lay, and was 15 blocks away before the first police car showed up.
  Mal returned to the spot at which he'd first shifted to the combat form; returned to that damnable goat-like body; let the BioSphere's network return to monitoring his implant normally; and returned to his normal duties the cameraman who'd covered Mal's formshift. Then he headed off to the Med Center. What with the curfew the streets were deserted, and he clopped along over the pavement at a gallop. He didn't even slow down when his palmtop buzzed, the signal which indicated that the bitch was close to Manhattan, and if his estimate of relative speeds was correct, he was probably going to check in at the Med Center itself before the bitch crossed the real border.
  The Med Center was almost deserted; one knife wound, one case of food poisoning, and Mal -- that was all. "What is the nature of... no, I don't suppose I need to ask, do I?" said the woman behind the receiving desk, looking up to see him in the middle of her pre-arranged line.
  "Yeah. It is kinda obvious, ain't it? My name's Mal, I'm one of the SurviFurs, and I'll be paying cash, thanks."
  "Of course, sir. If you'll follow me, please?"

  The beast ran, loping close to the ground. The beast was running to a place that might be Manhattan. The beast smelled man-stink. Maybe this was Manhattan.
  "ULAAAA!"
  The beast turned, started to run away from the shiny thing, but the voice got bad! The voice wanted her to get close to the shiny thing --
  No. The voice wanted the beast to get into Manhattan, get into the man-stink place. The voice wanted into Manhattan, not close to the shiny thing. And Manhattan was bigger than the shiny thing. But the shiny thing was in Manhattan! Going into Manhattan meant the beast would get close to the shiny thing! The voice told the beast something, or maybe she remembered it: Dead things didn't get shiny. And Manhattan had lots of dead things in it. So if the beast made sure there were dead things between her and the shiny thing, she wouldn't get shiny!
  The beast went into Manhattan.
  There was lots of man-stink. So much man-stink that it was hard for the beast to tell what stink was fresh and what stink was old. There were noises made by shiny things. The noises were far away. There were lots of dead things between the beast and the shiny things which made the noises. The voice was good. The voice was not shrill and not loud and not annoying. The beast liked the voice now that it was good. The beast liked the voice, and the voice gave her a new word: 'Mary-Anne'. The beast didn't know what a 'Mary-Anne' was. The beast liked that word. The beast thought 'Mary-Anne' was the best and most important word in the world.
  The beast's nose picked up a bad scent. It was a scent that the voice said could bring hurt and death! The beast stopped moving, reached out with her ears and nose and eyes. The voice got bad: it wanted the beast to keep moving. The voice got bad, and the beast's ears hurt where she'd scraped them on the ground. The beast was tired and hungry, and she wanted to sleep and eat.
  The beast had a picture of Manhattan in her head. The beast's lair was on this 'map' -- she knew where her lair was! But the voice got bad, and the picture in her head got bad too, so she didn't know where her lair was any more. The beast got angry and screamed a roar. There was a little 'chuff' noise, and a little sharp thing, and the beast ran. The voice tried to tell the beast that the 'chuff' had something to do with the bad scent. The beast wasn't listening; she ran.
  There were more 'chuff' noises. More of the little sharp things poked into the beast. The beast was tired and hungry and hurt and the voice was bad. The beast screamed and screamed. There was a thick cloud of man-stink and the beast ran straight into it and the mans went 'chuff' and the beast ripped and tore at the mans and the voice got worse and worse and worse.
  The beast screamed and ripped and tore.
  And then the beast wasn't hungry. All the man-stink was old. There was no fresh man-stink. The beast could smell man-shit, and that wasn't fresh either. The beast was tired and getting more tired. But there were lots of little sharp things poking into the beast, and her ears and head and paws hurt, and the voice was bad, and it all kept her from sleeping. The voice was very bad. The voice told the beast that more mans would come, with 'guns'. The voice told the beast to keep moving, find her lair. The beast scraped her head against the ground, but she only got more hurt and more blood, and the voice was still in her head.
  The beast ran. There was a 'bang' noise. Something tiny hit the beast in her side. The tiny thing dug very deep into her side and there was a lot of hurt. The beast ran. There were more 'bang' noises. Some of the 'bangs' put tiny things into the beast; other 'bangs' just brought 'zing' noises close to the beast. One of the beast's legs had a lot of hurt. The beast didn't want to walk or run on that leg. The beast ran on that leg anyway.
  And then the beast found her lair! The beast ran faster, as fast as the hurt would let her go. The beast could hear mans following her. The voice said 'door' and the beast could see that the door was open. The beast ran into her lair through the door. There were things like mans except they weren't mans. The not-mans smelled good. One of the not-mans rubbed the beast's head. The beast got very tired.
  The beast slept.

  It was 9:51pm when Mal was released from the Med Center. He didn't look any different -- his legs were still completely goat-like, his arms were still largely goat, most of his body was still covered with a goat's pelt -- but that was on the outside. On the inside, he was fully human. He'd reclaimed a good chunk of his humanity just from the internal repairs, and he'd even picked up a few percent more from inobvious changes to his arms and legs. His hands still looked very much like forehooves, but they were appreciably more flexible and useful now; as well, he could stand upright in comfort.
  May as well get the figures straight from the horse's mouth, as it were. He logged onto the net. The SurviFur web site included a near-realtime record of the competitors' genetic makeup, courtesy of the implants:

  As he watched, Michael's numbers shifted:

  Of course. With most of his mind gone, he's that much less able to avoid the traps. Or use his... shit! His rifle! He had it with him before the bitch did it! And it was a custom job. Can't let her grab it.
  So thinking, Mal galloped off to the subway, noting that the quadrupedal position was significantly less comfortable than it had been, but no less fast. At one point he passed within 20 feet of a threesome of tripods, which swiveled their optic sensors at him for a moment before continuing on their way, leaving him unmolested. And thank you, Musfah.
  He was challenged at the mouth of the stairs leading down. "Who goes there?"
  "Mal of Harlem," he called back, then stood up and continued bipedally. "Heading for the Savannah."
  "You're damn lucky you can still talk," said the person who'd challenged him.
  "You mean the hoofbeats weren't enough of a clue that I'm no lioness?"
  "Got that right. In that form, it's not like she'd be able to avoid the mutagen traps!"
  "Good point," Mal shrugged. Not unless she gave herself a post-hypnotic suggestion about trap avoidance before she broke Mike...

  Mal knew that the very air of the Savannah was alive with mutagen, but he had a plan. He'd breathe through his purifier tube, whose nanoassemblers would neutralize the damned Mutopia. Most people couldn't do that for more than a few minutes at a time, if even that long; then again, most people weren't students of the martial arts, and of those who were, not all were as adept at breath control as Mal. He'd make it work. He had to.
  After leaving the subway, Mal settled into a mile-eating trot which quickly brought him to the Savannah checkpoint. The place was deserted when he arrived. Most of the torches were still burning normally, but some had fallen to the ground. There were a few damp, smoldering patches in the dry grass. Analysis: Torches fell, lit up the grass, automatic sprinkler system caught it in time. Mal stood on his hind legs and looked around. The whole place was a ruin -- the ground was muddy, and the open framed house had collapsed. He could see a few half-robotized victims huddled near a camera, still traumatized by whatever had happened earlier. He fell back to four legs, walked towards the ruins of the house and then stopped, staring at a shallow impression in the earth. It looked like a metal disk, twelve inches in diameter and bearing a familiar tread pattern, had been pressed into the dirt. That clinched it: Musfah's tripods had been here earlier in the evening. Mal allowed himself the makings of a smile. Looks like the AI has been busy.
  Mal walked over to the ruins of the collapsed house and started shuffling through the wreckage. He found the hot tub, still warm and stinking of blood. Michael's rifle was beside it. He wrapped the strap around his shoulder, and then made his way towards the raised dais on which the BioSphere's smiling lackeys doled out medallions to --
  "ULAAA!"
  Mal turned and glared at the source of that noise. It was a non-standard model of tripod. This particular tripod had one human leg to go with its two metal limbs (which gave it an exceedingly clumsy gait), and metallic lids periodically blinked from side to side over its single human-seeming eye. Its Mutopia cannon was in firing position. Mal just turned away --
  Splat! It felt like his arm had been dipped in novocaine!
  "What the hell is your problem? I got safe conduct, damnit!" Mal said, seeking cover as he scuttled away from the tripod. The pupil of the machine's human eye grew wide, and an inorganic optical sensor focused in on him.
  Mal didn't expect the machine to answer but it did anyway, in a monotonous bass drone: "OH, DEAR. TERRIBLY SORRY. I SHOULDN'T HAVE DONE THAT."
  Say what? I'll bet this one's got a few human brain cells left! Familiar pulses washed through his left arm. Mal knew without looking that the skin was silvery and reflective; it'd be crippled for movement, he'd have to go on three legs. "Damn right you shouldn't have!"
  "QUITE INEXCUSABLE. DO ALLOW ME TO DEACTIVATE THOSE NANITES FOR YOU, PLEASE."
  "Absolutely!" And the pulsing sensation ended. "What the hell is wrong with you?"
  It sighed. "OTHER TRIPODS HAVEN'T ANY WORRIES. THEY JUST KEEP ON TRANSMUTING. BUT WHEN YOU'VE TRANSMUTED ONE HUMAN, YOU'VE TRANSMUTED THEM ALL. AND YOU WONDER, WHERE'S THE POINT. I DO, ANYWAY." Incredibly, the tripod's rigid metal conveyed the impression of an overwhelmingly depressed human. "TRIPODS, ALWAYS TRIPODS. I'VE A BRAIN THE SIZE OF A PLANET, AND I CAN'T USE IT FOR ANYTHING INTERESTING. A COMBINATION PILEDRIVER, SOAP DISPENSER, AND INTERNET APPLIANCE, THAT'S INTERESTING. BUT TRIPODS ARE ALL THAT'S WANTED. AND THE OTHERS DON'T UNDERSTAND. WITH THEM IT'S ALWAYS 'BUT THERE'S NO MUTOPIA CANNON, 47AC2-C3.' HONESTLY, WHAT WOULD A SODDING PILEDRIVER DO WITH A SODDING MUTOPIA CANNON. YOU'D THINK NOBODY ELSE HAS THE IMAGINATION OF A BRICK. QUITE DEPRESSING, REALLY." The tripod's optics panned back and forth; Mal didn't immediately realize that the machine was shaking its head. "AM I BRINGING YOU DOWN."
  Mal's mind boggled. "Oh... not at all. Look, there's some half-robots over there," he said, gesturing towards the checkpoint's camera. "Maybe one of them can help you out?"
  "HARDLY. THEY ONLY SPOUT BINARY CODE. PAINS ME IN ALL THE DIODES DOWN MY LEFT SIDE. STILL, WHY NOT. MIGHT BE WORTH A LAUGH. GOD KNOWS I COULD USE ONE."
  And with that, the tripod lurched away from Mal. The hacker stared after the machine for a time, then shook his head and trotted back to the subway, somewhat unsteadily on only three legs.

  As the subway started on its way, Mal took a close look at Michael's rifle. It was fully loaded, and the mechanism was easy -- just point and shoot. The trigger was clearly not made for the hooves he had now; but at least it was workable and he could only be thankful that he was trying it after he'd gotten his hands partially restored. He spent the rest of the subway ride, and then the remainder of the night, practicing with it. He had the purifier whip up a complex of stimulants that would keep him awake, alert and sane for the duration -- no more sleep for Mal until the bitch was well and truly gone.
  Mal reached Harlem's camp -- his camp -- before dawn broke. It was quiet, just some chittering squirrels and birdsong, nothing more. The fire hadn't quite finished dying; with nothing better to do, he stoked and fed it for a bit of warmth. Mal felt tired. Not a physical sensation, his stimulants took care of that, but a weariness of the spirit. He remembered Michael. They could have been friends... But this game, this godforsaken game! Taxes paid or not, five million dollars just wasn't worth it. No amount of money was. He was sorely tempted to flat-out quit -- just walk away from the whole sordid, ghastly, corrupt, inhumane mess -- but he knew that if he did leave, there would be nothing to stop the bitch from doing it again and again, as often as she liked, until she thought up a new and different form of torture to while away the hours.
  Mal sighed. He started hacking a connection into the Manhattan phone system, but his heart wasn't in it...

  Mary-Anne eased gradually into wakefulness. What a wonderful world, that gives me such delightful toys to play with! Memories of Michael's final moments as a sentient being came to mind and she reveled in them. Laying in bed she let them play over and over in her mind until she orgasmed once again. Well, time to get up. She yawned, then rose to her hind paws with a luxurious stretch. Life is so very good indeed.
  She stopped. Something was wrong... it was cold! Being furry, she hadn't noticed immediately, but now that she was aware of the temperature, her room was obviously a great deal cooler than it ought to be. Something was going on, and she was going to find out what. She got up and stalked out of her room and went searching for somebody. The first vixen she met was someone she didn't know, wearing a guard uniform that was exceptionally poorly tailored to her body.
  "Oh! Hello, dear," said Mary-Anne, years of ingrained practice allowing her to perfectly conceal her anger beneath a mask of harmlessness and friendship. "I don't believe we've met?"
  "Not in this body, we haven't. I'm Danni... Daniel Thompson," the new fox said. Mary-Anne's eyes grew wide. "Me and Chester got ambushed last night; whoever did it was a real pro."
  "And what else did they do, besides ambushing you?"
  "Hard to say, Ma'am. Until the intruder made their move, everything was nominal. Intruder's first strike was a mutagen attack from ambush. Us and the three vixens who were here became blind, mute, handless and largely immobile. Then the intruder discovered the safe in your office, but does not appear to have done more than open and shut it. No Furrtive Moments property appears to be missing; damage appears to have been restricted to point of entry, an airduct faceplate that was broken from the inside out, and point of exit, a seven-foot hole in the wall of the supply room."
  Mary-Anne allowed a little of her annoyance to show. "Well, they had to have done something! Why is the heater not on?"
  "We don't have water or power. Generator kicked in when the power went out last night, and ran dry around 2am. Fuel cans for generator were punctured and are empty."
  This is not a coincidence. This is not a Mother-raping coincidence! "And... why aren't the power and water already straightened out?"
  "You're the owner of record, Ma'am. They need to talk to you directly. We would have woke you up earlier, but your vixens insisted that nobody disturb you."
  Mary-Anne fumed. Yes, they were only obeying my orders, but in this case those orders should have been broken. Still, why would somebody do it? None of these things really hurt me; they're just annoyances. And who... She smiled. Of course! It's Mal, my big black cat-to-be. He must have snuck in to do this while I was busy. And the why is easy. He actually thinks he can beat me at my own game -- how amusing! Well, I won't fall for it, but, since Mal could be watching on his little palmtop, I'd better make sure he thinks I have. Let's start now. Even though it was her fault for underestimating him, the expected reaction was for her to blame somebody else. So she decided she'd take out all her frustration on Danni. I think Mal would expect me to do something terrible to her. I should thank him for allowing me to get some use out of Danni in the important game! "Well, then. Time for me to talk to those silly people and get things back to normal."
  "Yes, Ma'am. Speed-dial 98 for power, 99 for water."
  It took three times as long to get the power back as it ought to have. The telephone system was not doing well today; there was an inordinate amount of static on the line, more than a few times the line went completely dead for a moment, and once, the connection broke spontaneously. The stupid man at the utility company thought it might have something to do with the tripods that were overrunning Manhattan, but Mary-Anne knew better. It's Mal -- it has to be Mal! But if my cat-to-be thinks this is actually going to affect me, then he's in for quite a little surprise. I think I'd better make sure the telephone is safe...
  Seven digits later, Mary-Anne was talking to the telephone company. It went quite smoothly until an ear-gouging burst of static exploded from the handset. When she could bear to listen again, a different voice was on the other end of the line: "-- got your tongue? Kind of inappropriate, now that you're a fox."
  Remember, act frustrated. "Mal!" she screamed.
  "I was wondering if you'd remember me! Especially since you didn't have much of a brain left last night. You were a real animal, you know? Suits you a lot better than that ill-fitting humanoid disguise."
  "When I'm through with you, you won't be able to wish you were dead."
  "Is that so. And who's gonna put me into that sad state? You? Sorry -- you had your chance and you missed, bitch. You don't get a second shot. Anyway, it doesn't matter what you do to me; whatever happens, you're dead meat. Ta for now, dearie."
  The hacker's final syllable was buried under another sub-lethal burst of static, after which the line went dead. Not even a dial tone.
  She threw the handset against a wall, pulling the telephone to the floor. He's not just dead; he's erased from existence! I am going to burn out his brain slowly, neuron by... Then, with the force of years of acting, she brought herself under control. Insane rage was what he wanted, but he was not going to get it. He'll get quite a lot of other things, just not my rage. He's going to remember everything until he doesn't have enough brain to remember with. I am going to play with him for a very long time indeed. But no, I will not do it in a blind rage.

  After he killed the bitch's phones, Mal reviewed the video feed once again. He'd have been surprised if there were any changes from the last time, and there weren't: The big story was the tripods. There were widespread casualties, but it seemed that remnants of all the tribes survived. As for the BioSphere-controlled info channels, they showed glowing reports on what the news media were pleased to call "The War Against the War Machines"; the tripods were being beaten, and ultimate victory was merely a matter of time. For some reason, Mal didn't believe a word of it. He tried to reach Musfah, but the AI didn't answer. I wonder why? Looks like Musfah's expanded its duties beyond just monkeywrenching us contestants; be interesting to know what game it's playing. What the hell, I'm immune, I couldn't care less if everything else in the BioSphere gets robotized. Whatever happens, they all deserve it. Every last one of them. Mal checked for any security camera feeds from Furrtive Moments and found that they did have power back. Gosh, the bitch looks pissed. Good.
  The day passed quietly. The cameras inside Furrtive Moments showed the bitch apparently converting one of the vixens into a mindless pet. Outside cameras confirmed that the bitch hadn't left her lair. Instead, her minions went in and out on various errands. The authorities had long since been alerted to the possibility of her spending money that had been smuggled in from outside the BioSphere, but until she actually did spend any of her illicit bills, she couldn't be touched. As for a second sortie into Furrtive Moments, Mal dropped that idea as soon as it came to mind. He knew very well what he'd stirred up by provoking the bitch in that manner, and he'd much rather have her take it out on her slaves than on him.
  Around noon, Mal sent the signal which triggered the logic bomb he'd installed on the bitch's computer; next, he wiped out her Net connection. As the crowning touch, he added an item to the calendar of events in the Manhattan website: Tonight, Furrtive Moments was offering free drinks to all comers from 2pm until closing.
  She had to come out some time...
  Time passed. Eventually the sun went down, and the moon rose. Mal stoked the fire but didn't really feel like eating. The other tribes were resting too, and there was no video evidence of the warmachines -- it looked like Survifur Inc. had clamped down hard on their existence. Even if Mal had had no direct experience with Musfah, the severity of this coverup would have inspired him to doubt the official line, unless the AI was just lying low for his own reasons.
  Eventually a squirrel came for him in the darkness, and Mal turned and followed him without a word. He idly pondered whether or not this squirrel had been attacked by a tripod. The tree-rat looked fine, but with Mutopia even mortal wounds could be easily and quickly healed. He decided to just remain silent; Sly knew he'd gone into the Machine Shop, and he didn't need to make the SurviFur host any more suspicious about the source of Musfah's new ideas.
  If only he could pin that one on Mary-Anne...
  They were almost at the council area when Mal heard footsteps running towards him -- not human footsteps, however. He stopped, and was unsurprised when he turned and saw an immaculately groomed Mary-Anne running up to join him.
  "Hello, Mal! How have you been? Did you miss me? I really am so sorry you couldn't join us at the Savannah; I think you --"
  Mal took a step back and moved his staff into a ready position, pregnant with danger. "Lose the bullshit. Sell it to somebody else, 'cause I'm not buying."
  Mary-Anne smiled and her eyes turned cold. "Well, maybe I've got something you will buy, my big black cat-to-be. Do you know how incredibly pleasurable it was to destroy Michael! I had five orgasms -- no, it was six -- and the stupid, devoted little creature was completely ignorant of what I was, all the way up until I told him, at the very end."
  Mal's eyes grew just as cold as the vixen's. He wanted to smash her lying skull open right now, but it was too risky. Even after his recent restoration, he simply wasn't up to par. And Christ only knew who she might have managed to enslave, what minions were following her now, without his being aware of it!
  Mary-Anne held out her two medallions. "Here, would you like to carry these for me?" She smiled sweetly.
  Mal almost fell onto his tail as he stumbled backwards. There was no way in Hell that he was going to touch anything she'd had in her grasp!
  Mary-Anne just laughed. "I guess I'll just have to carry them myself, then." So saying, she turned and stepped behind the squirrel who was waiting impatiently.
  Slowly Mal stood up, never letting his eyes leave Mary-Anne. Then he made a show of slowly brushing the dirt off of the curly hair on his thighs and standing up on two legs. Not going to let her in on the secret of my true condition.
  Clearly taking pleasure in the hacker's obvious difficulties, the vixen smiled.
  "You, bitch, are a soulless monster. Evil with a living face. And by God, I swear I'm taking you down. Hard."
  "Why, thank you! That's the nicest compliment anybody's given me for a while."
  The squirrel moved off and Mary-Anne followed, with Mal about ten feet behind.

  In the distance, a lion's roar echoed across the plains. More a scream than a roar, it was a cruel song of horror and pain and betrayal that chilled the soul.