"In the World Between Us and Them" -a title I was unhappy with even then- was written for the APA "Furthest North Crew". As one of my first fiction attempts, it's hardly one of my best. The story was inspired by the wondeful "Fayetteville" universe, created by Mick Collins. He wrote several stories in the milieu, which affected me very strongly, presenting a world where a childish, whimisical humanity had created a whole society of genetically-modified beings, the therianthropes, or "theris", and then gotten bored with them and pushed them aside like unwanted toys. More poignant still, the theris had been specifically tailored to love us, to want to serve us and be our friends, and couldn't help that fact, despite the fact humanity didn't want them anymore. Most humans in the Fayetteville universe were either uncaring or hostile towards the theris, with the exception of his protagonist. Leon, the main character in my story, is basically myself, transplanted into "Fayetteville", with an eye towards what I would have been like in a world like Fayetteville, influenced by my moral outrage and empathy for the therianthropes.The two therianthrope characters, Plato and Admetus, were inspired directly by two Terrie Smith prints of characters of the same name; thier bright eyes and animated expressions had captured my imagination in a way not many charcter designs had, up to that point.
     It's an interesting side-note that in certain ways the "Fayetteville" universe reads almost as a prequel to the relatively successful novel "Forests of the Night", by S. Andrew Swann, which came out quite a few years later. Swann's world and therianthropes (called "moreaus" or "morries") is a much darker and angrier world, humanity's genetic children having learned a rather smoldering dislike of thier negligent "parents", most startling and pointedly voiced by the motto "Off the Pink" sported by some of the moreaus in the novel.