Training Day
A Savage short story
By Strega

	Ratbat was sparring with the Golden Maid as Savage talked to the cop.  The Maid was in her usual anime-esque skin-tight outfit, which left only her hands and face (saving the domino mask) exposed. Her hair was cut short these days and bound in a knot behind her head. Having swallowed half a dozen of her clones some time back, Savage knew that the her golden glow made her unnaturally smooth to the touch and very tough...but not especially hard to digest.  He guessed that once each clone suffocated in his stomach, the field faded.  He knew for certain that mere unconsciousness did not cause it to drop, for he had cuffed her too hard in one of their matches and knocked her out cold.  

	The field also increased her strength.  She and Ratbat were evenly matched, he with his were-rat powers, wings and sword and she with superior strength and better fighting skills.

	Ratbat was much improved in just the last few months, both in his tinkering skills and his fighting ability.  The newfound popularity of the Feral Four made it easy to find sparring partners among the city's other heroes.

	“I am aware of the provisions of the Carson act,” Savage rumbled to the cop.  “We are registered vigilantes.  All our paperwork is in order.”

	The Maid parried Ratbat's sword with her armored wristband, which had a long tonfa-like protrusion running up her forearm.  Her riposte would have dented his furry skull only a week or two back, but he caught it on the sword and followed through with a thrust.  Back and forth they went, momentarily at a stalemate.  It was very distracting.  Savage shook his shaggy head and tried to concentrate on the policeman.

	“I'm sorry, I didn't catch that.”  He was stretched out on the cracked parking lot outside the garage, occupying much the same space a car would have.  From nose to tail-tip he was twenty-one feet long, and thankfully he was finally back down to fighting weight.  It'd taken months to work off the thousand pounds of fat he'd accumulated during the clone crisis.  He weighed only a ton and a half now.

	“There's a rumor on the streets that you eat your partner there on a regular basis,” said the cop, nodding toward Ratbat.  The rat's head turned as he heard his name, and the Maid took the opportunity to kick him through the side of a rusted-out van.  Savage winced: right in the groin.  She was a believer in realistic training -- he could take the punishment, and a supervillain would have done the same thing.

	“That is not a rumor,” he rumbled.  “It is quite true.  For reasons of his own Ratbat wishes to be eaten, and I oblige him.  As you can see, it does him no lasting harm.”

	“Hold, hold,” Ratbat said as he climbed out of the van.  It was hard to keep a Were down, even if you kicked him in the balls. He ducked as the Maid took another swing at him.  “I said hold!  Let's take a break.”

	The rat joined Savage and the cop.  Ratbat was just a hair under six feet tall, discounting his ears, and wore a leathery outfit that featured a rat's head and utility belt.  Down his back ran the scabbard for his sword, which to the eye was a traditional Japanese weapon but which was made of post-space-age materials.  His current set of wings, the third generation model, consisted of articulated segments that could fold up behind his back when not in use.

	“It's true, Savage eats me about once a week.  Twice some weeks.”

	The cop looked from one of them to the other.  To the eye it did not seem that Ratbat could fit into the tiger's mouth in one piece, but it was well known now that Savage was perfectly capable of swallowing a man whole.  The biggest thing the other heroes had directly seen him eat was a 500-pound clone of the hero Callus, but it was thought that he had eaten his own clone as well.  And pretty much everyone had seen the security camera footage in which his clone, in his 12' tall semi-humanoid form, had gulped down a cop with one quick snap of his jaws.

	“You let him eat you?”  The cop wasn't writing anything down, so it seemed unlikely he was going to charge them with anything.  The two heroes relaxed a bit.

	“It's more that I ask him to eat me.”  The rat smiled.  “Sometimes I insist.”

	“Wait, wait.  Why in the world would you do that?  Doesn't it hurt?”

	“Being digested hurts.  Being swallowed doesn't.  I enjoy it, actually.”

	The cop winced.  “I don't want to think about it.  How can you still be alive?”

	“I'm a were-rat.  Only a few things can do me permanent harm.”  The current research on Weres suggested that their vulnerability to (usually) silver and magic was more a psychological thing than a supernaturally-induced weakness.  A rare few had managed to suppress or change that weakness to something else.  Silver and magic could shut down Ratbat's or Technocoon's fast healing powers, which was why the rat's gray costume was lined with bullet-resistant materials. Merely touching silver with bare skin gave him a rash, even in human form.

	Ratbat continued.  “I can regenerate nearly any amount of damage.  I just regenerate back from--” The cop held up his hand.

	“I don't want to know.  I really don't.  I just want to confirm that it's consensual on both sides.”

	“It is,” Ratbat said.  “In the event that somehow I don't regenerate after being eaten, my will explicitly states that Savage is not at fault.”  That had nearly happened the first time he'd been eaten; Savage had been badly hurt and when he was that stressed he processed food with uncanny efficiency to provide calories for his own healing ability.

	Ratbat turned and waved to the Maid, who was drinking from a reusable water bottle.  A moment later they were sparring again.  His newest trick was a weight tied to the end of his hairless tail.  By spinning his body he could lash out the tail and mace-like tip, and his opponent had to guess whether it was the mace, a kick, or his sword that was coming around.  Of course, occasionally the Maid would catch his tail and play “rat flail” with him, but it had still increased his win percentage.  

	“Don't look at me,” Savage rumbled.  “One day he just walked over and climbed into my jaws.  A while back Technocoon got swallowed by some beast, so he knew he'd recover after being digested.  It's a fetish or something.”  He shrugged.

	“As long as you don't make a habit of accepting just anyone who wants to climb into your mouth,” the cop said.

	“I very much doubt I need to worry about that,” said the tiger.  “As long as you don't tell anyone about it.  I am not fond of the idea of becoming a four-legged suicide booth.”

	“What do you eat normally?  Besides your partner?”

	Savage tilted his head quizzically.  “You must be new on the beat.  Sometimes I get scraps at the meat packing plant, but mostly I eat stray dogs or rats.”

	“Now I get it,” the cop said.  “I've got a friend in animal control and he says this district has the least stray dog calls in the whole city.”

	“A tiger has to eat,” Savage said reasonably.  “I know who has pet dogs, and I leave them alone, but then these strays show up.  If they are obviously feral I eat them, then they are replaced by stray dogs from other parts of the city.  Sometimes I eat feral cats too.”

	“So you never buy food?”

	“With what money?  Thanks to the generosity of other heroes we own this garage, but neither I nor Ratbat work.  What would I do for a living?  Serve as a taxi?  Let people ride on my back for tours of the city?  I am told my gait is nausea-inducing until you get used to it.”  He wasn't wearing his saddle at the moment.  “Can you imagine what it would cost for me to buy food?  Occasionally someone donates a meal or two, like bones and scraps from the meat plant.  A couple of years ago they got a shipment of diseased cattle and I disposed of some of them, as I am immune to such things.”  Savage licked his chops at that memory.  “And the dog pound, and the zoo...well, they have provided me some meals.  Please don't pass any of this on, I don't need PETA protesting outside my front door.”

	The cop did not raise the issue, but even a new beat cop must hear rumors.  Sometimes a criminal was at large who was so violent, so dangerous, that if something unfortunate happened to him they looked the other way.  Heroes who would otherwise easily subdue unpowered criminals found themselves killing in self-defense.  There had been investigations into whether some signal was given to the heroes to let them know when to not turn someone in.

	The meat packing district was one of the most run down in the city, and it'd be a nest of gangs and organized crime if it weren't for the vigilantes.  Savage was among the longest-serving of the volunteer vigilantes in the district, and if from time to time a particularly violent criminal simply vanished from the streets – and perhaps got a short tour of the giant tiger's digestive system – no one in law enforcement would shed any tears.

	Savage's ears pricked up as the remaining members of the Feral Four arrived.  Technocoon flew  in on his jetpack and Couatl arrived under his own power, the multicolored feathers on his wings resplendent in the sun.  Both landed on the roof of the garage, which now sported a few pieces of lawn furniture.  The roof wouldn't support Savage's weight, but it made a fine patio for the smaller members of the Feral Four.

	Couatl settled his coils, his forked tongue flicking as he watched the rat fight the Maid.  The feathered serpent, too, had helped rid the world of mindless clones, though his smaller size and much slower digestive system meant he'd only disposed of three copies of the Golden Maid.  He had been offered a Brass Monkey but he said he preferred the smaller, easier to swallow female hero.  Unlike Savage he had a human form and a life outside the team. So did Technocoon, though the advantages of his were-raccoon form led him to stay in it much of the time.  Just now the raccoon was checking his high-tech gear, readying his wrist blasters and strength-augmenting armor for his coming bout with the psionic serpent.

	Finally Savage's sparring partner arrived.  The cracked asphalt bulged and flowed as seven feet and a ton of Stature grew up out of it like a silent volcano..  The rock man presented a smooth, granite-like exterior, with garnets for eyes and a simple slit of mouth.  Somewhere under that rock was flesh, but it wasn't anything like human flesh.  The government rated Stature's powers as “class 3”, which made him among the more powerful of the local heroes. He grew more powerful as the years went by and it was speculated that he might eventually graduate to the “big leagues” occupied by Galvanic and his ilk.  Savage was also rated class 3, but his powers did not match well against Stature's in a confined area like this.

	Savage rose to his feet and stretched.  The beer-keg sized force field generator on his collar hummed as it switched from standby to active mode, for he was sure to face clouds of abrasive sand, hails of bullet-like pebbles and larger stony projectiles.  Savage did not expect to win today's match, but besides being excellent exercise, Stature had offered to use his powers to repair the weed-split pavement.

	He nodded to the cop, who gave him a polite wave and climbed back into his car.  Ratbat allowed himself a sly smile as he sparred, though the distraction let the Maid land a heavy blow on his ear.  Savage was going to be tired and hungry by the time the sun set, and Ratbat looked forward to helping the cat with one of those problems.