My heart beat wildly. I paced anxiously up and down the hall of the medical center. It was two months since the final battle with Reuben. In the room on the far end of the hall, Crystal was giving birth. But from the sound of it, she was being tortured.

"Chill," said Cow, rolling his eyes. "Rabbits have been giving birth since there have been rabbits."

"Yes, but births go wrong," I reminded him. I sped up my pacing until I was half-running through the tunnel of dirt. The screams from Crystal's room quieted. I felt relieved, then panicked. What happened? I raced into the room just as a medic was coming out. I skidded to a halt, showering him with dirt. The grey lop-ear coughed, sending up another small cloud of dust, and shook out his ears.

"Your mate is fine," he assured me. I ducked in. Crystal was lying exhausted on a bed of ferns, and curled up against her snow-white stomach were two tiny kits. They were tiny and pink; they looked more like pigs than rabbits. But I could see patches of darker fuzzy fur on one.

"This one is going to be white," I commented. Crystal nodded, smiling proudly.

"And this one is going to have brown patches," my mate added. "She looks like you."

I snorted with amusement, but I didn't say anything.

The medic cleared his throat and said it was time to leave and let Crystal sleep. I reluctantly left. Hannah, another new mother, asked me to watch her kits while she took a nap. I led the five tan-colored bundles outside. As they jumped around each other, I watched and felt the weak early-winter sun warm my back. A snowflake drifted in front of my eye. A stiff breeze ruffled my brown fur and chilled my ears. I stood up. Moving around would warm me up. Besides, with winter coming we would need to store food, especially with the new kits.

I headed into the forest and picked clovers, grass, and dandelions until I couldn't carry anymore. My military holster had been replaced with a utility belt that contained a small first aid kit, pouches to hold food, and a slingshot. We had no need for guns anymore, since we had no trouble from enemies since the battle. However, we still needed to carry weapons in case of predators. At the moment, I was weighed down with food. By the time I reached HQ, the sun was beginning to set. It was setting earlier and earlier. By now, the wild rabbits would begin to wake up. We should have been nocturnal, but our ancestors came from a laboratory. They had no sense of time when they escaped, so they had to create their own schedule. This habit has been passed down through the generations, and nobody's bothered to change it. What did it matter anyway?

I nodded a greeting to the sentry and disappeared into the underground tunnel that led to the main room. Three hallways branched out from the large circular room.

To the left was the dormitory maze. It was called a maze because new tunnels were always being added and expanded. The structure of that part of HQ resembled a tree limb. It was mostly called the Maze. Not surprisingly, maps are attached to the walls at various intervals. There were separate sections for males and females, and a nursery hall for kits.

Directly across from the entrance was a long hallway known as the strategy department (called the Control Room because from there, we kept in contact with the other bases and gave orders). This hallway glowed with the light of various electronics, some stolen from humans and modified for rabbit used and some made from scratch. The Control Room included the map room, where detailed maps showed the layout of the surrounding forests. There was also a conference room for military meetings. Several storage rooms, designated for things like uniforms and weapons, were at the back. There were two communications rooms. You need special permission to enter that hall.

Finally, to the right, there was the medical ward (the Ward). It was another long hallway, lined with rooms for sick rabbits. Then there was a hallway that ran perpendicular to it. This was lined with rooms for the treatment of the sick and storage rooms for medicine and food. Laboratories for scientific experiments and inventions were also found along that hallway. But most rabbits hung out in the main room. There was only one level to the structure; we had learned from previous experience (Reuben blowing up half the base in a day) that it was easier to evacuate a single-level structure.

I made my way down the Ward to put away the food I had collected. Then I made my way through the Maze to my room. Because there were less people here than there were in the previous base, each rabbit had his or her own room. Each room contained a nest, which was actually a basket woven from tree bark and filled with ferns, moss, and the owner's own fur. There was also a sapling stump that served as a table, and another basket for any personal belongings. My own basket was empty, but that didn't concern me. All I needed was my friends and family, although half of my family was in the paws of the enemy.