It' a wild Birthday stream! Playing some DMC 3 Special Edition! https://twitch.tv/natacalico

THE STREAK! IS OVER!

VF day 2, in which I realize I'm gonna have to dig into my stable of OCs to draw something for day 3

[Length: 3065 words]

"The cargo is ready, sir!"

He snapped to attention. The mouse had been so focused on his work that he hadn't even noticed the guest in his office. It was a canine, floppy eared and on the shorter side with brown, almost copper fur. He was wearing the federation marked clothing that denoted him as part of the transport unit of the compound's staff. Eleos swallowed to wet his throat, realizing that he'd been staring at his work screen for what had to have been hours. "The container is secured and everything has been inspected?"

The canine nodded. "Twice over. We're ready to depart at your word, sir!"

Eleos furrowed his brow. The canine noticed it and immediately tensed up.

"Oh uh- and we're of course waiting for the habitat to give final clearance. Of course." The canine said, sheepishly.

"Good." Eleos sighed, reaching a hand to his face to rub the fatigue out of his eyes. "You can use the spare time to run a second inspection on the ship. Can't be too careful."

The canine nodded briskly. "Yes, of course."

He reached over to a stale glass of water to his side and took a quick sip, noticing the dog was still standing by his desk. Eleos raised an eyebrow inquisitively. "Was that all?" he asked.

Once more, the canine tensed up. "Oh uh- am I dismissed?"

"Oh uh-" Eleos straightened out his back. "Yes. Dismissed."

Again, the canine gave a brisk nod before turning and heading out of the office. Eleos watched as he marched out, not relaxing his posture until the federation worker had left. Once he was alone again, the mouse slumped back into his seat and let out a deep sigh. As much as he appreciated how strict and organized the federation was, he would likely never get used to behaving within their organized code of conduct. He still felt awkward every time he had to bow or salute.

He glanced over to his screen again. One more habitat heading out, leaving only a few hundred more to be relocated. The mouse could scarcely believe he was so close to seeing an end to his monumental work.

When he was first tasked with overseeing this facility he'd thought that it was an impossible task. After all, relocating thousands of cities to other planets was unheard of, but that's exactly what he was but a few months away from having achieved.

The mouse took another sip of the stale, room temperature water to wet his throat. He stood up from his desk and walked across his office. it wasn't a grand office by any measure, but it was certainly more than Eleos had ever thought he would ever warrant. Enough room to walk around in but far too cramped to be extravagant. The biggest luxury within it was likely the window overlooking the facility. Eleos took a position in front of the window to see the work taking place.

Far below on the grounds of the facility he could see a feline city, having been moved there over the course of the week. When he'd first started his work here he'd dismissed this idea outright as something completely impossible to do. To be fair, moving entire cities off the planet was unheard of until now. How wrong he was.

It was a drastic measure, but it was all they could do. The mouse could still remember the dread he felt when the planetary conditions were first inspected on their first days of working to re-rehabilitate the feline planet for the tiny species. While the federation strictly forbade interfering with pre-warp species outright, this was a special case due to the felines already having been interfered with by the rodent empire. There wasn't any more damage that the federation could do even if they tried.

During the long period where the federation wrestled the planet out of the grips of the rodent colonizers, Eleos's kinsmen had done whatever they could do to try to force their claim on the planet, with their ultimate goal being the eradication of the feline species. After all, how could they be in violation of federation species law if there was no species to infringe upon?

While the various cities and governments of the feline planet had been devastated before the federations intervention, it paled compared to the cruelty the rodents showed when trying to deliberately exterminate the minuscule cats. Whereas before, feline cities had only been destroyed to make room for the expansion of the colony or various facilities, the deliberate attacks were far more cruel and swift. Eleos still felt a pit in his stomach when he saw the remains of some of the cities, nothing but a series of craters. Entire continents razed and eradicated, chemicals dumped onto the most habitable regions to make them unlivable for smaller life forms.

As if that wasn't horrid enough, the felines were left with nothing that could be described as a functioning government anywhere on the planet. Their infrastructure, institutions, chain of commands, all systematically snuffed out. It had taken them months just to build up something akin to a working command structure for the felines.

The most daunting of their realizations, perhaps, had been the estimation of how long it would take to clean the various chemicals out of the soil and make the planet habitable to felines once more. Decades of work, and that was with the estimation that their technology would advance over time.

As it stood right now, there wasn't enough space on the planet to sustain even the meager amount of the feline population that remained. There was little other choice than to bring the felines elsewhere.

Eleos watched as trained federation staff milled about the large square. a 5x5 foot container with a small feline city within it. This one was known as West Doboria, housing around 729 thousand felines. It was the twenty first city to be relocated off world. The mouse sighed, a content but also concerned sigh. This was a solution but it was far from the desired one. When he'd started his work here he'd had dreams of restoring the felines back to their former glory, that he could help make this horrible event he took part in somehow right. But as the months came and went he realized that it was nothing but naivety. The best he could hope for was being able to give the felines their planet back in his lifetime. Until then, they would have to exist as small souvenirs from their home world.

Until then, he would make damn sure that every single feline left would have the greatest chance at life he could possibly grant them. Of course, such a task was a bit more than a single mouse could accomplish.

Eleos turned and walked back to his desk, feeling his leg cramp up from the strain. An old wound from the torture he'd suffered from his own kinsmen. A reminder. He took a seat back at his desk to take what had to be the fifth precautionary glance over the various files for host candidates.

Of course, they couldn't just send a pre-warp species anywhere and hope for the best. This had to be a controlled process from start to finish. Before him, Eleos had a list of people deemed qualified by a select committee made up of himself and federation experts in everything ranging from habitation to xeno-biology that could take up the important task of care-taking the feline habitats off world.

It was a varied list. Multiple species from multiple sectors. Despite having been assured by the federation experts time and time again, the mouse couldn't help but be skeptical about some of the choices. How did a rich philanthropist even make the list, or a film star? Eleos had to swallow back his doubts. He'd already driven the federation experts up the wall with frustration by demanding intensive, bordering on invasive background details on each person. Though he doubted that if he didn't have the backing of Admiral Anhur that they would even give him the time of day. Something the towering bee had told him echoed in his head, that the federation was no less dependent on the authority of power than the rodent empire.

If there was something about each candidate that would warrant a dismissal, Eleos would find it. Everything had to be perfect.

A shrill beep sounded from his screen, grasping the mouse's attention from his papers once more. At the top of his screen he could see a flickering notification telling him that someone was calling. A familiar face. With a smile, Eleos answered the call.

"How are you still awake?" The video feed of the lynx chuckled. "I already know you mice don't sleep less than any other rodent."

He laughed. "Just taking one last look over the caretaker candidates."

Spes laughed incredulously. "That's what, the fifth last look?" The lynx smirked. "You need sleep."

"I'll sleep when I'm done." He argued. "I need to be sure."

"Like I told you yesterday-- I'm sure and Anhur is sure." Spes shot back. "The only holdout is you and you don't even live in one of the cities."

He opened his mouth to argue but the speck of a cat had a pretty sound argument. After a few seconds of fumbling his words while the cat stared in amusement he found a sliver of reason to throw back. "Well, you know who you're going to be with."

"True, true." Spes admitted. "And he made one of the worst first impressions imaginable. Even if each candidate isn't 100% perfect from the start, there is quite a bit of room to improve."

The comment stung a bit, thinking about the past he had with the felines always did. But seeing the lynx joke about it did give him the impression that they were slowly getting beyond that. "Fine-"

"Besides-" Spes continued, turning in his seat to look out a window. "Every time you finish a document you start pacing around your office and that keeps some people up here."

Eleos perked up, his face turning slightly red from embarrassment. He glanced over to the corner of his office as he heard Spes laugh heartily from his monitor.

As previously stated, his office wasn't big. But it did have enough room to house one of the feline habitats. In the corner sat a small city. One of the first ever constructed. He cast the city a smile, knowing that somewhere within it was a speck of a cat staring back at him in amusement.

"Alright." Eleos conceded. "If i haven't found anything yet, there probably isn't anything."

"Exactly!" Spes agreed. "This will be fine. Trust me, I think I have a knack for knowing a good giant from a bad giant."

He couldn't help but smile at that. "Thanks."

"Now-" Spes clapped his hands together. "Go get some sleep. We dont want you falling asleep at your desk again, do we?"

Eleos blushed more. "That was one time."

"And it was hilarious. You should see the memes." Spes joked.

"Wait, memes?" the mouse asked.

Spes flashed him a toothy grin. "As in jokes our city has been making on our internal network. They're quite good. Here–let me show you."

He watched the cat tap his dataslate a few times before turning it towards him. On screen was a rather unflattering image of himself, sleeping at the desk with his cheek on the desk and his mouth wide open, a stream of drool running out. The image had been edited, with a spaceship edited in headed towards his open mouth and the text ‘Space, the final frontier’ written on it in a fancy font.

Eleos cracked up in laughter, needing to wipe a tear from his eye."You'll have to show me some in the mo-" Suddenly, another notification popped into the corner off his screen, another incoming call. Eleos could barely contain his reaction when he saw the name. "I gotta go."

The lynx's face lit up as he stared out the window, practically standing from his seat. "Is that who i think it is?"

He quickly glanced back over to the tiny city in the corner. Even after a year with them there he tended to forget how good of a view they had on everything he was doing. "Could I maybe get a little bit of privacy?"

Spes laughed. "Not in your life. You guys are a cute couple."

"I'm hanging up now." Eleos said, feeling his face flare up.

"Tell him I said hi!" Spes smirked right before the feed cut off.

The mouse let out a flustered but content sigh and tried his best to rotate his chair and screen to get at least a little bit of privacy from the 1.1 million something felines that might be staring at him. He certainly didn't want to repeat what had happened a few weeks back where he'd been surprised with a very private call where the felines saw way more of his significance than either of them intended...again.

He took a deep breath and answered the call.

One screen a familiar face. A rodent face with red fur and sharp ears with tall tufts on the tips. "Hey!" Erebus beamed.

"Hey!" Eleos replied, already leaning forward to the screen, as if wishing he was in the room with the squirrel. "I'm so glad to see you!"

Erebus smirked. "Of course you are, I'm wonderful!" He winked.

Eleos laughed. "No arguments here. Spes says hello."

"How are they holding up?" Erebus asked. "I mean- I know they're probably the best taken care of felines in the galaxy right now but I figured it was polite to ask."

The mouse smiled wide. "They're doing quite fine. Spes tells me you've got something of a fanbase in their habitat."

Erebus's face lit up redder than normal. "T-they do?"

"You left quite an impression on them last week." Eleos smirked.

The squirrel had to bury his face in his hands. "Oh stars. I was hoping they hadn't seen that."

"Consider it a lesson." Eleos laughed. "You're gonna have to get used to having so many people watching you at all times. Are you nervous?"

"Extremely!" Erebus admitted. "Like every time I think about it I feel like I'm gonna vomit from nerves. Is that normal?"

Eleos nodded. "If you are gonna vomit, make sure to do it in front of the habitat. It's a terrible first impression and you can only go up from there."

The squirrel burst out laughing.

"But seriously-" Eleos continued. "I trust you completely with this, as does Spes and Anhur. You can call me any time and I'll help in any way I can."

Erebus nodded slowly. "Thank you." The squirrel took a deep breath to compose himself. "I still can't believe you got me onto the list."

Eleos smirked. It had been quite a feat indeed.

Officially, his boyfriend was a wanted spy being held by the federation in a secure location until he could be forwarded to the rodent empire for questioning. Though that request had been pending for the better part of a year due to a certain high ranking bee constantly using his authority to delay it again and again and again. Eleos had fought tooth and nail with the federation staff to get Erebus onto the list of caretaker candidates and after half a year of argument they finally relented. Of course, this had angered the rodent empire that had caused a diplomatic fiasco that Anhur had described as a more vicious battle than the one that took his arm.

While he was sure that Erebus was more than capable as a caretaker and he trusted the squirrel with his life and the lives of others, his motives for getting him through had not been so altruistic.

Since Erebus was technically a federation asset, or as it was more accurately known, a prisoner charged with espionage, he wasn't exactly allowed many chances to communicate outside his living arrangements. If he was on their caretaker staff then he would be given a direct link to the administrator of the feline habitat project, a direct link to Eleos.

"I'm so happy to see you." Eleos said softly, his face so close to the screen that it stung his eyes a bit, feeling the warmth radiating from it.

The squirrel smiled. "I missed you too." His eyes narrowed, focusing on something. "I should let you sleep. The habitat is arriving early tomorrow and I'll probably be calling you twice every hour."

Eleos smirked. "You'll do fine. It's really not as much work as it sounds."

"Says the guy who looks like he hasn't slept eight hours in a year."

He laughed. "Well, to be fair, I'm dealing with over two hundred of them. You'll have a contact within the habitat who can help you, just stick to what they ask for and you'll be fine."

"Alright~" Erebus mused. "I'll still be calling you though for mental support."

"I'm sure." The mouse smirked.

There was a moment of silence while the two stared at each other, for a moment they had felt like they were in the same room. After a few seconds of staring, the squirrel broke the silence. "I love you."

"I love you too." Eleos replied, holding a hand to the side of the screen, cradling it close.

The squirrel let out a very sharp and uncontrolled giggle. "Go sleep you dork."

"Alright, see you tomorrow." Eleos sighed. It took far more willpower than he thought he had to shut off the feed. The mouse let out a long sigh and cast a glance at the city in the corner of his office. Spes no doubt had watched the entire thing. He gave the entire city a quick nod before he got to his feet and walked towards the exit of his office.

Tomorrow another habitat would find its way to a capable caretaker and a city would be transported off planet to another. Seventeen down, one hundred eighty five left. A monumental task that the mouse was finally starting to see the end of. One day at a time, Eleos thought to himself before he stepped out of his office to head to sleep.