The ARK Pgs. 01-30

"What the!" "Damn, they're huge!" At the top of the steps were two security guards holding large leashes and on the end of the leashes were two massive predators, a Bengal Tiger and a black Leopard or Black Panther. Art continued, "Their names are Thor and Loki" Art gave the security guards a nod, and they quickly bent down to unclip the leashes from the cats' collars. Things went a little frenzied at that stage, especially from people sitting closest to the main entrance. Both cats let out a roar, a deep primal growl that didn't do much to calm this crowd.

"Please don't be alarmed; my boys will not hurt you. "The cats started making their way down the aisle, moving slowly, sleekly with the grace of Lords of the Jungle. Occasionally turning sideways to look at the people seated, they headed towards the stage.

"Thor and Loki are the first 2 prototypes of our bioengineered Technological animal range. Both have the exact attributes physically of their living counterparts, but they don't sleep, don't eat, and never forget, all our animal guards are equipped with the latest surveillance equipment. Basically, they are large robotic cats. They will look, act, smell and will be programmed to act accordingly around their live counterparts as instructed by the leading animal specialists in the world."

The guests sitting closest to the aisle were visibly shaking. The cats had made their way halfway down the walkway. "THOR, LOKI Sit" straight away, both cats respond to Art's command.

"If anyone had noticed, my son Ab is sitting behind a laptop here. He commanded the boys; these 2 have also been biometrically linked to me as protectors. which means they are connected to me verbally, and by my smell and sight, boys come!" Art commanded, and both cats sprang to life, ran down the last of the steps, and leaped onto the stage. Circled Art and eventually sat a couple of paces behind him on either side, watching. The crowd loved the display and the natural grace of the animals finding it hard to believe they weren't real.

"The ARK will be protected by animals such as these, including eagles and other birdlife especially designed for surveillance. It will also be protected with the longest fence since the Great Wall of China" Art shares a giggle with the crowd," equipped with the latest high tech and also a joint special police force from both Somalian and Ethiopia's military. Poaching will not be a problem; these sentinels will never be distracted" at this point, the crowd let out a roar of laughter and giggles, Art could see that they were looking behind him at the boys and knew Ab was up to something,

"Let me guess?" Art enquired from the crowd. "Loki is licking his genitalia." Art slowly looks over to Ab sitting behind the lap top laughing with the crowd. Then, Art swiftly turns back to the crowd, "I might have an opening for a new CEO in Africa; soon," Immediately, Loki sits up perfectly straight and military, which brings another round of laughter and applause from the crowd.

"There will be later stages that will allow access for the public to enter and see the animals. Also, online live feeds to keep up with our progress, there is so much more, so we will have media releases and blogs on our web pages to answer any questions."

Art turns and takes a quick peek at Thor and Loki, then turns back to the mic with a smile. "Well, I suppose we must get onto the important part of the evening, the reason most of you are here... the AZTECK scholarships" cheers and more whistles from the excited recipients.

"This year, I apologise for the cryptic response. This year you all received the' you were successful response to applications,' but nothing else except an invitation and free pass to the expo and today. There were a record-breaking 326 successful applications, the highest ever given out by AZTECK" more whistles and cheers, "Congratulations to you all, as you leave the foyer, there will be desks out there for you to line up and collect an envelope with your name on it. In these envelopes, there are instructions of further incentives for you." There was a collective shock through the crowd and an electric fever pitch that could be felt as the recipients waited on every word Art was saying.

"In addition to your scholarship, AZTECK has released another 100 million dollars to the scholarship fund." Woos, gasps, and nervous chatter was fever pitch now, "In the envelope, there are offers to fund your research. Instant job offers to join AZTECK and finish your studies while working with us. In addition, some of you have been offered funding and training, working in the ARK." That was it, the crowd erupted, the recipients and families were on their feet clapping and cheering this giant of a man and his generous company. Art let the cheering go on for a moment, then addressed the crowd again. "Once again, congratulations to our hard-working scholarship entries, and thank you very much to our media friends. I hope we didn't give you too much to write about; Ab will address you shortly to tell you about times for the press releases. Again, thank you all, especially my staff from the expo who hung around today", more cheers and wolf whistles from the crowd.

People started making their way to the foyer to collect their envelopes and read them to their excited friends and relatives. Then, the media began packing up and moving towards the side of the stage, waiting to hear from Ab. As Art was about to cross the stage, he noticed a small crowd was gathering at the front of the stage, hoping to attract Art's attention; Art was never one to walk away when requested to speak, especially from future staff members. His staff generally loved their boss, a hard taskmaster, but cared for his team and gave them a great work environment.

As Art approached the front of the stage, one young lady called out, "Mr. Damani, may we meet Thor and Loki?" "But of course. Ab, can you switch the boys over to me, please?" "Yes, father." As Ab replied, he was sitting himself down behind the computer again; after hitting a few keys, he nodded to his father that the boys were under his control.

Art issued a command, "Come boys," it was said in a gentle but firm voice, to which the big cats responded immediately. "Move to the front of the stage and lay down." The cats did precisely as requested and immediately were inundated with pats and strokes of their fur. One person caught Art's eye; she was in the second row of people trying to push past the crowd to get a stroke of the boys. Art was good with faces; she was Ms. Rosi Jensen from Colorado. Art remembered her from her work and her portfolio from the scholarship application. As the young lady managed to squirrel her way to the front of the line, Art addressed her, "Hello, Ms. Jensen, good to see you here." Rosi froze and slowly looked up, mouth open, with that 'the rockstar knows my name look.'

"Hello, Mr. Damani, how did you know who I was?" she inquired. "I've been following your work and am very impressed with it," Art said. Suddenly, everyone stopped what they were doing and looked at Rosi, wanting to see who this rockstar/tech god was impressed with. Rosi felt everyone's eyes on her but managed to get out a "Thank you, Mr. Damani. I do have a quick question about Loki. His fur feels so real, but there is a certain shimmer to the ends. Are they made from optic cables?", "Very impressive, Ms. Rosi," Art replied.

Once again, everyone stopped and turned to look at Rosi; with that, the rockstar/tech god called you by your first name look. Art answered by saying, "Maybe I could answer that better if you take up your offer to come work with us" Rosi kept stroking the side of Loki before the penny dropped. "Offer, what offer???" Rosi turned, shocked. "You obviously haven't collected your envelope yet; I'll say no more. I wouldn't like to spoil the surprise, "Art sheepishly replied.

Rosi let out a high-pitched squeal and did what her own personnel Happy Dance was. "Yes! Yes!" Rosi let go with a fist pump, but as she turned, she did something that had Ab and Art talking about for hours that night. She ran her fingers through the fur on Loki's head, between his ears, nothing unusual with that, except that Loki must have got a whiff of her, her pheromones, instantly Loki started brushing up against her arm and purring like some giant kitten.

Art was instantly gobsmacked; he turned towards Ab, as Ab was crossing the stage, he had noticed it too, their eyes met, and they gave each other a nod, and a look of 'We will talk about this later.' Loki was different from Thor; Loki was equipped with a prototype hormone sensor. He was being trialed to detect people's moods and their actions according to those moods relating to these smells. Loki was training for aggressive behavior in animals and people, but he also had, as part of the program, a range of other emotions he has to work on yet, but there was the proof, 'it does work' Art reflected.

Art stood up from his crouched position and spoke to the small group at the stage, "You will have to excuse us now; AZTECK waits for no one, even me; I will say goodbye and thanks for coming today." Art turned to the boys and commanded "follow," Then he and the boys walked off the stage. As he was about to leave the scene, he could hear Ms. Rosi Jensen screaming, "Mum, Mum!" as she ran up the stairs to the front foyer. Art exited the stage with a grin on his face.

That evening over dinner in Art's penthouse room, Art and Ab discussed the exciting developments of Loki's behaviour with Ms. Jensen, "So you're saying that Loki started behaving like that, after Rosi's arm brushed across Loki's face," "Yes" Art replied excitedly.

"It was like he smelt something from her pheromones, marking her as a friend, just like he does for me," Art continued. "That's incredible, that is exactly like he is programmed to be able to do ... but there are also concerns," Ab replied. "Such as?"

Art felt a mood changer coming, but he knew what the problems were, but he wanted to see if his son could make all the connections. "One, he was in Father mode, which does have that protection for you, and people around you, but to go into a Baby Kitten mode, to someone else, is not what we thought the reaction would be,"

"And 2?" Art enquired. "Well... that process had been switched off on his program, till it was worked on more" Bingo! Art thought he had put it all together. "Well, we will have to put Loki back in straight away, we will need that looked into, and we will need more safety protocols to freeze him in case he goes out of his programming by himself again. The last thing we need is an AI Armageddon" Art started laughing, and Ab joined in.

"I don't think we are anywhere near that yet" Ab insisted.

"All good, anything else to report, Mr. Hub master?" Art enquired

"One little issue in America, I'm waiting for a response to my directive, so I won't bore you with any details yet, other than that all is in their parameters of production, Africa is actually ahead of schedule two weeks,"

"Brilliant, just brilliant. My son is very proud of you; you are doing an excellent job. I'm so proud. I will shout for dinner tonight."

Ab laughed. "Very funny, the dinner is always booked to your room,"

"Well tonight, I... sort of changed it to yours" Art put on a sheepish grin and laughed.

CHAPTER 5 - My Home, My Castle...sort of

The waves gently rolled in with their mini thunder and broke close to shore; as families walked along the sand with children collecting seashells, couples strolled along the golden sand, planning beautiful futures that included many days on this piece of paradise. A beautiful beach day, light breeze, sunny day as the horizon was dotted with recreation fishing boats. The seagulls were happy. With this weather, more people meant more scraps, but the sea breezes, sunshine, and even the loving embrace of a wife or the laughter of his family couldn't seem to shake Mike's mood.

In the two weeks he'd been home on leave, he had mowed the lawn four times, washed the car twice and the house once, not to mention the two and a half-hour exercise session on the beach in the early hours of the morning, but he couldn't sit still, the restlessness and the itch in the back of his skull, that unscheduled patrol. So he enters his study and sets about to figure out who was behind that extra patrol. It's not as if he hadn't come across unscheduled patrols before, accidental discovery, or even team failure, so what bugged him about this one? He thought if he wrote it down and everything he remembered from that day, something may pop up.

It was the boy's joint birthday party; even though they were born two weeks apart and on different years, Mike and Samantha often held joint parties to save family and friends from coming back and forth weeks apart for separate birthdays. The boys didn't mind it; they were tight, they had usual sibling rivalry stuff, but they shared a lot of interests, and their friends seemed to respect them for that.

Even though Mike got up early to work out on the beach, he came home and started setting up decorations and cleaning up the yard for the party this afternoon. Once he got it in his head to go to his study to jot down a few notes, he didn't notice the hours slip away or Sam slip into the room behind him.

"Maldives!" Mike jumped and nearly fell off his seat,

"Geez!" he yelled as he jumped.

"Startle you, did I?" Sam enquired slyly

"No, I'm alright," Mike weakly replied

"Well, that's debatable," Sam replied snootily.

Trying to change the point of attack, Mike enquired, "Maldives? You said the Maldives",

"Yes, the Maldives in February would be the best," Sam said."

Still not in the same game as Sam, Mike had to keep enquiring, "what about the Maldives in February?".

"For our holiday, our family holiday to celebrate your retirement," Sam stated firmly.

"Retirement???, Who said I'm retiring???" Mike felt trapped; he knew he had stepped into one of Sam's verbal traps and couldn't think quick enough to get out. The shark was circling the poor little turtle, and the turtle had nowhere to turn to; all he could do was wait for the bite and hope it didn't hurt.

"YOU said!" Sam stated. "YOU, said to me, eighteen years ago when we got married. The day I bring my work home is the day I retire! So, in the Maldives in February, we can take the boys out for an extended school break ".

The trap was sprung, and the shark had snapped its powerful jaws, 'killed by my own words,' thought the little turtle; he didn't stand a chance. All Mike could get out was "I, ahh," and then the front doorbell rang, and Mike jumped out of his seat,

"I'll get it, dear, and I'll be back in a jiffy" 'saved by the bell,' Mike thought, I'm still in the shark's belly though, this conversation isn't going to blow away too soon. As Mike ran down the hallway, he passed the boys going to the door. ZZooom, as dad flew past, the boys thought, 'WHAT the??' they both turned and looked down the hallway and saw their mum standing there. Arms crossed, standing in the doorway to dads' study, with the NUMBER 4 look on her face. The boys had come to number mums' facial expressions; she didn't need to say anything because she had a facial expression for it. So now they knew why dad was running; everybody runs from NUMBER 4! The boys turned back to look at their father, who didn't have time to pull up on the lovely polished floor. The boys squinted, braced their bodies for the impact, THUMP, OOOOW as dad hit the door frame. The boys couldn't help but laugh; they knew it must have hurt but laughed just the same.

Mike opened the door quickly to see Seb and Smith standing there surprised. "Did you just run into the door?" Seb asked, surprised.

"Ah yeah, newly polished floor, couldn't stop, sturdy door frame though" Mike hit the door frame to emphasise what he was saying.

"Ok, if you say so, Mike." Standing in the doorway facing his friends and teammates, he could see the change of expression on their faces, and then a sudden chill ran up his spine when from over his shoulder came a voice,

"Hi Sebastian, Hi Zikmund," Samantha cheerfully greeted, but Mike could still hear the icicles hanging from each syllable of Samantha's words,

"Hi, Sam," they both greeted in unison.

"Everything ok, you two?" Seb enquired

"Yeah, everything's gre..." but before he could finish his sentence, Samantha spoke over him, "I caught him working!" Samantha stated.

"What? work work?" Seb enquired with a shocked look on his face. "At home?" Smith added, also stunned, "Yes at HOME, WORK WORK," Samantha stated again.

"You don't do that, Mike... EVER!" Seb cautioned, "Never ever," Smith added. There was no written special forces rule that said you couldn't bring your work home, but you never did in this house with Samantha Madden as your commanding officer.

"Zikmund, here's a list of things we need for the party tonight. Could you please pick these up for me and take this one with you" Samantha puts her hand on Mike's shoulder. "And don't bring him back unless my husband comes back with him" Samantha had that ice chill in her voice again.

"And make sure you all don't get arrested this time," She gives Seb a hard stare. "I swear it wasn't our fault last time; they started it," Seb implored to Samantha.

"I'll send the boys with you to chaperone; Boys, grab your hat and shoes, please,"

"We'll bring Mike back Samantha, and the groceries," Smith assured Sam

"I know you will, Zikmund" she smiled at Smith; he liked Sam; she was the only one who bothered to use his real name.

" I will, too," Seb stated in a not-so-sure voice.

The boys came racing out past their dad and crash tackled into Seb. "Hi, Uncle Seb," the boys said in unison.

"Hell, Oli, we will have to start calling you Point Break soon if you get any bigger," Seb pointed out.

"Fresh air, saltwater, and roids, Sargent 2 Planks, that's what a good soldier needs. "Oliver offers a salute; Seb returns the salute, then shrinks to the stare Samantha was giving him.

"Kids these days where do they get this stuff... television pfft," Seb states with a shrug.

"Hmmm," Samantha returns.

The boys offer Smith his usual greeting, "Hi Smithy," with a few fist pump bombs.

"Ok boys, off you go, have a good time" Samantha hugs them, and the boys start for the car.

As they all turned for the car, Seb says to Aidan, "How're your grades going, Adi?" Aidan replied, "Excellent, Sargant sir, better than Oliver's, I'm Officer material!",

"Why would you want to be like those wan..." Seb looks over his shoulder and sees Samantha is still in earshot and staring at him; he decides to use a different word, "people,"

"Cause dads one, Uncle Seb," Aidan stated

"Good answer, my boy, good answer"

The shopping centre was a bit crazy today, with shoppers snatching up bargains for Mother's Day, which was coming up soon. The team's battle plan was to get some drinks, sit down, and find the items Samantha wanted. As Smith laid everyone's glasses on the table, Mike says to the boys, "Don't tell your mother we had these, or she'll crucify me for filling you up before the party." The boys only offered some mumbled assurances as they had already started on their jumbo thick shakes.

Mike was staring at his thick shake as if it wasn't there. "Well, what was all that about this morning," Seb asked,

"Just a misunderstanding, no biggy," Mike said, trying to be nonchalant about it.

"It didn't look like a misunderstanding to me; Sam looked like she knew exactly! What she was going to kill you for!" Seb stated

"Dad got a number 4," Little Aidan said to the table, nodding his assurance of what he saw.

"Shit!" Seb lowered his voice, realising that came out louder than what he had proposed,