Far From Home

Book 1

Dangerous Paths

Copyright Dan Clarke 2014

All rights reserved.

Including reproducing book content in whole or in part

For more information contact djclarke_ya@yahoo.ca

Table of contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5
Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Preview: Fire Bird

Prologue

Major Star flew through the wall at super sonic speeds, the shattered, half melted bricks hit the hired guns hard enough to break bones and knock them flying. In the center of the warehouse stood a glowing red machine as large as a bus.

Doctor Anarchist calmly walked out of the control room, his armoured suit whined with every step, cracking the cement floor. His face shield was opaque, it was a point of pride for him that only Major Star knew his real face, he was intent on keeping it that way. “You're too late, Major! My dimensional bomb is almost ready to break the dimensional barriers. Soon everyone will realize the glorious nature of chaos!” he yelled. Drones fell from the ceiling, their mini-jets shaking the room.

Major ignored the laser firing drones. His glowing heat field could easily handle them for a short time. All his focus was on the glowing bomb, he flew at it fists first stretching out his heat field, ready to destroy it no matter the cost.

He bounced off of a force field, out of control he flew through another wall. Shaking his head, grimacing in pain and a realization that he was almost out of time. The drones came through the hole still shooting. Taking a deep breath, he blew a blazing hot stream of plasma at the robots, melting most of them. Rising on a jet of plasma he flew back into the warehouse.

The Doctor was waiting for him, firing a newly invented freeze ray cold enough to dampen even the hero's heat. The blue ray hit the hero in the chest, encasing him in ice. The hero’s skin turned blue damping out his fire in bitterly cold ice. He fell to the ground groaning in pain. The Major had been in similar situations before, many of them due to Doctor Anarchist. The super villain wasn't going to take any chances this day. He kept firing, creating an ice mountain around the super heated hero. The doctor looked at the timer, one minute left. One minute and he would have his goal of anarchy and chaos, true freedom, spreading throughout the multiverse. Best of all it would be unstoppable. Still shooting he began to laugh.

Thirty seconds. The machine was glowing almost as brightly as the sun, soon, soon it would shred the dimensional barriers.

The villain stepped back, something was wrong. The small glacier was glowing red. There was a loud crack, the ice shook, splintering, lines appeared on its’ surface. Small streams ran over the smooth ice, creating waterfalls. “NO!” he screamed, even as he kept firing. “I'm so close!”

With five seconds left on the count down, the ice exploded, filling the room with boiling water and steam.

Three seconds later, the warehouse was as hot as the center of the earth.

With one second left, just as the machine was about to explode, it melted.

The multiverse wasn't shredded. But it wasn't left unscathed either. Millions of cracks opened up, creating temporary holes through the dimensions. Releasing energy that wasn't meant to interact with ordinary matter. Many of these holes did nothing more than move some trees, rocks, water, parts               of buildings. Other opened up around much more interesting things.

Chapter 1

“PATRICIA! Did you scoop the kitty litter yet?” my mom shouted.

I sighed, and paused my video. “I'm doing it now, hold your pants on,” I called back. As I walked to the basement, I thought about how unfair everything was. I didn't even like the stupid cat, why should I have to scoop up its crap?

Suzy, my little sister stuck out her tongue as I walked past. She was supposedly doing homework, I'd believe it when I saw it, but it was enough of an excuse to give me the job. Even though it was her cat. It didn't matter that I'd gotten my homework done early either. That just made me available to help out around the house more.

Yeah my life sucked.

The basement was crowded with junk, and from the smell I bet Mittens, yes it was named Mittens, hadn't just used her box. Still, not my problem, Mom could worry about all the old clothes and garbage we had down there. Whenever her and Dad complained about the mess, I helpfully suggested making a bonfire, for some reason they never agreed with me.

Over in the corner of evil, Mittens was meowing and pawing at her crap. “Move over furball, the janitor is here,” I told the black and white cat. I grabbed the scoop and bag, filled my lungs with only slightly rancid air, held my breath and went to work. The stupid cat rubbed up against my leg. I tried to kick it but it refused to leave me alone. The big clumps smelled even worse as I lifted them into the bag. Even though I wasn't breathing, the stench crawled into my nose and made itself at home.

Finishing in record time, and turning blue in the face, I tied up the bag and backed away trying to only take little breathes. It was a vain hope that that would make the smell less intense. The cat followed me every step of the way.

“There! Are you happy now flea bag?” I said, still trying to kick the thing away.

The cat suddenly stopped, it's hair stood up and it hissed. I stopped and started to look around, expecting to see a rat or something. I didn't even have a chance to turn my head, when there was a flash of light and a loud crack.

The last thing I heard was Mittens howling and someone screaming.

**

If you want to wake up in the worst possible way, wake up with a gun pointed at your head. It's a sure sign your day is going to suck.

“What is that thing?” a soldier shouted, his very large gun only a few feet from my face.

“Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! Don't shoot! I give up!” I shouted, putting me hands up, and trying not to piss my pants.

“George, don't shoot. They'll want to question it at the base,” a guy said behind me. “You speak English, so you should understand me, roll over and put your hands behind your back. If you try anything else, we will shoot to kill.”

He spoke with a very slight drawl, something I really only heard in American military movies. It wasn't quite what I expected to hear in Southern Ontario. Still, he had made sure I wouldn't be shot, yet, so I decided to follow his instructions and roll over. I heard the jingle of metal and something clicking, then for the first time in my life I was handcuffed. To top it off something was really tickling my face, mostly just below the nose. It was bad enough I scraped my face on the floor, that just made it worse.

Realizing I couldn't do anything about it, I glanced around, and was shocked. I was still in my basement. The kitty litter was ten feet from my face, the washer was beside me... change that half the washer was beside me, it was leaning against some crumbling asphalt. What happened? I realized that I had been looking up at a blue sky when I came to.

What happened?

They lifted me roughly to my feet, straining my shoulders. “Hey what's your problem? I'm going with you!” I shouted.

I didn't hear their answer, I was too busy wondering about my voice. It was high pitched, sounding as whiny as my sister, and the words were slurred. I coughed trying to clear my throat, and got another surprise. My teeth were sharp, really sharp. I had vampire fangs.

Crap, what had happened to me?

They started marching me to an armoured car, it didn't look like a Humvee, it was too low to the ground, like it was built for speed rather than strength. It was hard to walk, it felt like there was a rubber hose or something stuck in my pant leg. And my sweat pants wanted to fall down. I really wanted to tighten the string, but I sure as hell didn’t want the soldiers messing with my pants. I managed to snag the back of my pants on the tips of my fingers, and held them up that way. It was odd, I felt the weight of my pants on my fingers, but I couldn't really feel the fabric. Something was seriously wrong with me.

“Guys, can I go to the doctor? I think there's something wrong with me. Honestly I don't even know why you're arresting me. What did I do?” I asked.

“Under the United Republic of America, you are an illegal alien and have no rights or privileges as per the emergency ordnance of 1978. So you will shut up and follow orders or you will be executed,” the apparent leader said. His heavy eyelids and his flat tone made it seem like he was bored with everything and just wanted to get home, but I heard his heart beating almost a mile a minute. How could I hear his heart beating?

I saw a few people looking out their windows, when they saw me looking back they ducked away. Somehow I'd gone from a small town to a city full of boring grey bricks and graffiti. “ What are you talking about? What is the United Republic of America? I'm from Canada.”

“There hasn't been a Canada since the Third World War. Now for the final time, shut up,” the guy in charge said, tightening his hold on his gun.

George, the soldier who'd wanted to shoot me opened up the back of their armoured car. A man was already in there, as soon as he saw me he started screaming. “Shut up, Conrad! You're in enough trouble already,” the trigger happy man said, pointing his gun at the man.

“Get in there,” they ordered. I climbed in. I couldn't stand up straight in the tiny box, the seat was barely large enough to hold me with my hands behind my back. At least the man had shut up, he was scrunched up in the corner, shaking from something, I figured it was drugs, but he wasn't screaming. The car started up, banging me painfully into the door. We hit a bump and I came down hard on my ass. I screamed in pain. Something in my pants really, really hurt. I couldn't tell what it was, it felt like the rubber tube that was going down my pant leg. But that made no sense. How could I feel that?

We hit another bump and my scream was even louder, more like a yowl, as I came down on the exact same spot. I slid off the seat and curled up on the filthy floor. It was better than dealing with the pain. The junkie brought his feet up, as if he was afraid to have his feet anywhere near me. We spent the rest of the long ride like that, me on the ground trying to figure out what had happened, and him pissing himself, literally, in fear.

**

After a long ride, we finally stopped, I was pulled out first and there were five armed soldiers waiting for me. See what I mean when I said the day was going to suck. No one said anything except to bark orders, stand up, come here, move slowly, they were shouting so loudly it hurt my ears.

They pulled me out by my arms, yanking me up by my handcuffs as I stumbled so I didn't slam face first on the pavement. It hurt, but I wasn't going to give them the satisfaction of hearing me yell. There was a click behind me and George came back in front of me holding a metal chain. “If you try to run, I'll stop you and lieutenant McCarthy will shoot you. Do you understand?” gun boy asked.

I nodded my head, scared, confused and angry, and my pants were falling down again. We'd stopped inside some garage full of other armoured cars just like the one that had brought me there. I saw some other soldiers and apparent prisoners walking around, they all looked at me with wide eyes, pointing, muttering and in the case of most of the soldiers, nervously putting their hands on their guns. What the hell was going on?!

Another car came in, it was moving slowly the back end was sagging, and the brakes whined as it pulled to a stop. A man dressed like my own lieutenant came out and started shouting for support and heavy weapons. Apparently they'd been waiting, because a heavy metal door that looked like a bank vault opened up and a group with guns that would make a swat team envious trotted out, circling the car with their weapons raised.

They cautiously opened the back, and started yelling for someone to get out. The heavy car shook and creaked. A metal foot bigger than my head appeared, followed by a second foot. It looked like a robot was slowly and clumsily coming out. Massive legs followed, it looked like they were covered in a badly twisted car hood. I looked around, even gun boy was standing there looking shocked. Finally the robot was free of the car. It was actually a teenager like me. He looked like a cyborg from the belly down. His upper body was covered in a hospital gown, his face was covered in blood but I couldn't see any bruises or cuts. His feet were firmly planted on the ground, but his human half was wobbling like he was about to pass out.

“What is that?” I asked in wonder, forgetting all about my strange voice.

The lieutenant turned back to me, “That's what were going to find out. Just like we're going to find out about you. Follow me.”

I followed him, through a set of heavy metal doors, and a number of guards all of whom looked like they had itchy trigger fingers when they saw me. There was a long line of doors, we seemed to walk half a kilometer before we finally stopped at one that looked exactly like all the rest and stepped inside.

It was right out of a Hollywood movie, one way glass along one wall, a large video camera on each corner of the ceiling, a long metal table with one steel chair bolted to the floor and two plastic chairs opposite it. There was something that looked like my parents ancient tape recorder also bolted to the table.

Looking at the reflective glass, it turned from a confusing dream into a nightmare. I saw George holding my chain in his bony, scarred hands. The lieutenant was watching me closely, holding his gun firmly, but trying to look casual about, that was about what I expected. Then I saw myself.

Where I was standing was something that was wearing my clothes. I had on my black Super Mario shirt, and my comfortable old track pants, my Mom kept telling me to throw away, but they were huge on me. My shirt, which was usually comfortably loose, was almost falling off my shoulders, my furry, white shoulders. I looked up towards the reflections face, my chin was smaller, and furry white like my shoulders. My lips were pitch black along with my cheeks, nose and forehead. My eyes widened, the reflections almost glowing orange eyes did the same, its' huge pupils widened even more, just like cats eye. The cat ears twitched, they weren't tall, but very wide. Wiggling my ears the reflections ears did the same, the little crystal studs  looked like mine. The reflection had a mane of black hair in place of my hair longish blonde hair.

Stepping forward, George tried to pull me back. I barely noticed. There was a snap and my hands touched my face, the handcuffs hung from my wrists like bracelets. I couldn't believe what was happening. My fingers touched the soft velvety fur on my face. Opening my mouth revealed the fangs I'd felt with my tongue.

There was a click behind me, it sounded like a gun being cocked.

Turning around both soldiers had guns pointed at me. “What happened to me?” I sobbed.

“Sit down, and we'll try to figure it out,” the lieutenant said with some emotion in his voice for the first time. He sounded sympathetic with his low voice.

I started towards the chair, but just before I sat down I thought of something. Pulling my loose pants away from my butt, I reached in and grabbed the tube that had been causing me so much trouble. It was furry. I pulled it out revealing a black tail with a white tip. My pants were sitting right at my butt crack, but that was the least of my worries at the moment.

I was too shocked by everything to let something as simple as a tail worry me anymore. I just sat down on the metal chair slipping my tail through the opening in the back, and stared at my small, clawed hands. I found that when I flexed them, the pointy nails would extend half an inch, but if I was relaxed, they were about my usual length, just pointier.

A woman walked in, she was dressed in a green military uniform with a knee length skirt, which looked very formal. The two soldiers saluted her and moved to the door standing at attention. The woman sat down across from me, and turned on the recorder. “Hello, my name is Samantha. We have a lot of questions for you and we would appreciate your help,” she said, looking me in the eye without any fear. When I didn't respond she continued, “What's your name and age?”

“Patricia Sawyer, and I'm sixteen years old. Can I call my parents?” I asked.

She pulled a notepad out from her pocket. “What are your parents names? Where do they live? And what's their number?”

“They're Samuel and Marcy Sawyer. We live in Chatham, Ontario,” I told her along with our address and phone number.

She handed the paper to George, who took it wordlessly and left the room. Turning back to me she said, “We'll get in touch with your parents as soon as possible and inform them of what happened. Now, I'm guessing you didn't always look like this, am I right?”

I nodded, focusing on her calm, business like voice to keep control. My hands went to my lap, so I wouldn't look at them anymore. “I don't know what happened. I was in my basement, there was a loud noise and then I woke up here looking like this.”

She nodded her head as if in thought. “Officers McCarthy and Tritt were contacted about a possible explosion. When they arrived they found you there, in a depression that matched a section of a basement. What do your parents do?”

“My Dad is a vet who mostly works on farms, and my Mom is a part time accountant,” I answered.

The questions continued like that for a while, how many people in my family, how old was I, how many people lived in my town, what was the main industry, who was the president. That last one confused me, since we had a prime minister, when I told her that she started asking me a lot of questions about the government and recent history. Quite often Samantha would ask a question that was almost exactly like one I'd already answer. I only realized later she was trying to see if I would make a mistake with my answers.

After what seemed like hours, George came back with a thin file folder. Samantha took while I gratefully rested my dry throat. She placed a map in front of me it was of Chatham, but it said it was from 1970. “Patricia, where in Chatham do you live?”

I looked it over and pointed at a spot in the southern part, where the map said it was a farmers field. “Right there. Why don't you have a better map?”

She didn't answer, instead she pulled another map out that was much more up to date, showing a city. Comparing the two, she nodded her head with a large frown. “What type of juice do you like Patricia?”

That was an unexpected question. “Grape is OK”

“Can you get Patricia some grape juice, please?” she asked the guards. Turning back to me she looked concerned. “Patricia, are you sure you remember everything clearly? Are you making a mistake or lying to protect someone?”

“No, I've told you everything I know. I just want to go to the hospital so they can fix whatever happened to me,” I said, my shock was starting to wear off, fear and exhaustion was replacing the numbed panic.

George came back with a bottle of grape juice. Opening it, I gratefully took a swig draining half the bottle. I hadn't had a drink for hours and with all the talking my mouth felt as dry as dust. It also hid the tremors that were starting to run through my body.

“Patricia,” she said, "you're in Chatham right now, but it's called Haven, after being rebuilt around a refugee camp. The original Chatham was destroyed in a firestorm during WW3.”

“What WW3?! What are you talking about?” I cried, leaning forward. I was barely understandable even to myself with the way my teeth changed how I talked.

Samantha placed her hand on mine. “I'm not sure where you're from, however I do believe you're telling the truth. But here there was a WW3, and it was disastrous. Not as bad as the worst-case scenario but bad enough. We'll do everything we can to help you, but you're going to have to stay calm and help us as much as you can.”

“YOU'RE LYING!” I screamed, slamming my hand down on the table hard enough to snap it in half.

Her chair tipped back sending her sprawling to avoid the falling table. The two soldiers ran up to grab my arms. I wrenched my arms away, sending them to the floor. Things were starting to turn black, I staggered to the door wanting to get away from them, and whatever sick game they were playing. I didn't bother opening it, I just shoved it so hard it flew off its' hinges. Sirens erupted, deafening me. The sound of running boots filled the air. The room started to spin.

The last thing I saw was Samantha running towards me holding her hands in the air as if to stop somebody. She was shouting but it all sounded like gibberish. My head hit the ground and the world turned dark.

Chapter 2

I woke up from the strangest dream with a massive headache. Rubbing my face I felt fur and whiskers, sharp claws poked my skin.

Dammit, it wasn't a dream.

I opened my eyes, even though I really didn't want to. The bed was hard, the blanket was scratchy, although that might have been my fur, but it was warm, and it felt safe, I could happily lay there for hours and hours until everything turned out to be a dream. Possibly alcohol related. But no, I needed to see what was happening, and maybe find an aspirin. Samantha was sitting beside my bed. She wasn't armed, and she smiled when she saw me. So I guessed I was really awake and this wasn't a new nightmare.

“Good morning Patricia. Here take this, it will help your headache,” she said, handing me two pills and a glass of water.

I swallowed the pills and drank the water hoping they'd act quickly, my head felt like a balloon. “Please call me Pat. So why did I pass out? And did I really break a door down?” I asked in a whisper, everything was hazy like after having surgery.

“Your grape juice was drugged. Sorry about the headache, it's an after affect of the tranquilizers. And yes you did break a reinforced metal door off it's hinges, after breaking a metal table that was 3 quarters of an inch thick,” she said as if it happened everyday.

“You gave me a roofie!” I shouted, and instantly regretted it.

She frowned, “If you mean drugging you yes. You were in distress, showing increasing symptoms of panic. You have extraordinary strength that we're still not sure of the limits of, and had even less of an idea during the interview. And we were about to inform you of some distressing information. It was either drug you, or hope you didn't suffer the natural reaction of panicking.”

“So where am I now?” I asked, deciding to drop the subject.

“A government hospital. We've already done a full physical on you to see if there is any way to turn you back into a human,” she said.

I looked around the cement room. It didn't look like any hospital I'd ever seen. There was no TV, the walls were unpainted cement, an open door showed a very simple bathroom and sink, there was a small desk, and a chair that Samantha was sitting in. “This is a hospital?” I asked trying not to sneer.

She nodded. “I'm not sure about your dimension, but we don't have the resources to waste on frivolities. This room is clean, secure, and can be used as a surgical room if necessary. Now if you would like we can discuss what happened to your body, as far as our doctors can determine at any rate.”

Very slowly I nodded. I really didn't want to know what happened, but I knew that was just fear. I had to learn how I'd become a cat girl sometime.

“According to the top doctor in the city, an act of god. You told me that you were with your cat when this occurred, and it appears you were melded together when you somehow came to this world. It must have changed your very DNA which is why you have the fur, claws and tail. How you came to have inh- superhuman strength we are still trying to determine. In all regards you are extremely healthy,” she said, smiling encouragingly. It didn't help much.

“What do you mean this world?”

“Have you ever heard of the many world theory?” I shook my head. “Some scientists and writers believe that there are other dimensions where things happened differently. This world had WW3, your world didn't. You've just proven their theory is correct. Somehow you and others have passed between the dimensions and landed here, with unique gifts.”

Some gift, I thought, looking at my fur covered hand. “What happens to me now?”

Again that encouraging smile. “We're going to transfer you to a special hospital in New England soon, where you'll be looked after by the best doctors we can provide. You will also be placed with several others who seem to be in a similar situation as you.”

So there were others like me. I wondered if they came from earth, my earth. Something clicked in my head. “So the robot guy will be going there to?”

“Yes. His name is Christoph and he says he is seventeen years old so you have two things in common.” She opened a file on her lap for a quick glance at something. “In the North American continent, at least the parts controlled by the U.R.A, the United Republic of America, there have been four other people with unexplained powers and/or appearances that arrived like you. Around the world, we have very shaky reports of several more similar incidences. However that will change, as we get actual confirmations, and that could take months or more in some areas.”

I wondered how many more people were suffering like me, how many of them had had their entire identity ripped away. “Is Christoph really a cyborg?”

“No, somehow he can weld metal to his body, shaping it into a type of armour. He's as confused as you are, but he looks completely human.”

“Lucky bastard,” I muttered.

“Are you hungry?” Samantha asked.

My stomach growled at the thought of food. “Very. What's on the menu?”

“We aren't sure what your body can accept, so we're going to be fairly cautious about several things. According to an expert in feline physiology we contacted, felines can't have chocolate or alcohol, they also require a high protein diet. So we going to stick to the basic food groups, with large meat portions, and later we can see how you handle small amounts of questionable foods,” she explained.

I sighed, “So Oreo's are out until further notice.”

“Oreo's?”

My jaw dropped. “You don't have Oreo's here. Two chocolate cookies with a white cream filling in between.”

“Sorry, I've never heard of them,” she said. “I can get some sugar cookies, or peanut butter cookies for you as a desert if you want.”

“Yeah, OK,” I said with a pout.

Samantha went to the door and talked to a man outside. I noticed he looked heavily armed with a bulky vest. They weren't taking any chances with me getting away. I wonder how many people were guarding the metal bender.

She closed the door and came back to her chair. “You have total access to the hospital library, just let me know what you would like to read and someone will bring them to you. We can't let you leave this room except for showers and tests, I'm sorry to say. We don't want to cause a panic amongst the other patients.”

“Do you have internet?” I asked, I really didn't want to waste time reading a paperback book.

“What's that?”

How do you explain the net to someone who's never heard of it? “Well it's… You have computers right?” She nodded. “OK, good. Take a computer and connect it to another computer, so they can share information. Well the internet is tens of millions of computers all connected to each other, with servers, uh storage areas, also connected to it. So you can share videos, stories, information, songs, almost anything with just your computer. It's like TV, books, radio and more all in one.”

“Well that would make my life a lot easier,” she murmured to herself. “No we don't have anything like that.”

Worst world ever. “OK, can I have a few newspapers and some history books?”

“Done. Do you need anything else, I need to file my report soon. But if you need anything simply press the button on the bed,” she pointed at a doorbell type buzzer glued to the metal frame, “and a nurse will be in to help you.”

“Just one question, why will you be sending us to New England?” I asked.

“There are two reasons. First it's isolated, a number of nuclear bombs were destroyed or detonated prematurely over the area, also Boston and Halifax were major targets and hit several times causing a severe fallout problem. This caused most of the survivors to flee. The radiation has long since faded, but it's still fairly desolate. You won't be bothered there. Second there is a major government research facility in the area. I can't tell you where, it's a state secret, but it is a vital partner in biological research which is reclaiming parts of the world that have been declared uninhabitable due to biological, chemical and nuclear weapons.

“Great!” I said, trying to sound enthusiastic. So they were sending us to a nuclear wasteland next to a government research lab. I was so filled with confidence hearing that.

Worst. World. Ever!

***

The next two days were boring. Even for a hospital it was boring. And since as I found out, it was a military hospital things were even more boring and strict then at a regular one.

I couldn't leave the room except for exams and a shower on the first day. The two heavily armed soldiers made sure that I didn't think about leaving. They didn't talk to me unless I asked them a direct question, and even then they answered in the least amount of words possible. If I asked something other than a yes or no question they usually told me to ask Samantha, or as they called her Captain Blake. When I left the room two more soldiers joined them, and they were just as untalkative as the rest.

The nurses were a little better, they would talk to me and answer anything I asked, but they always seemed afraid. The best would hesitate a little before saying anything that wasn't medical, the worst would wipe their hands on their pants after touching me and seemed afraid to turn their backs on me. Not exactly a confidence booster. The doctors were no better. They were too fascinated by me to act scared, but having old men and women looking at you muttering how fascinating or impossible something was, and not explaining why it was impossible or fascinating goes from being frustrating to scary after about five minutes. I felt like a little kid at the doctors, hearing all the scary terms yet having no idea what they meant and wondering if I was going to die.

Samantha was the only person who spent any time with me and actually talked to me like I was normal.  Generally we talked about history. I was in a bizarre world, so I figured it was important to know why it went all wonky. I got a few history books and read them between and occasionally during the exams, then I talked about it with Samantha.

“So the Vienna Pact invaded Greece from Italy and Yugoslavia. While West Germany and the Bavarian Republic were invaded from Poland and East Germany. And all this happened because the Soviets thought that the Atlantic Self Defence Alliance, wouldn't strike back because all three countries were only friendly with them. Is that right?” I asked on the second day.

“It's a little more complicated than that,” Samantha said. “From 1974, the Vienna Pact had suffered crop failures throughout their territory, starting with Ukraine and spreading outwards rapidly. By 1978 many parts were on the verge of a famine not seen since the end of WW2 in 1946. They needed to distract the people, get new food sources, and fracture or destroy ASDA.”

I'd read about the crop failure, but the books hadn't said it was that bad. “But when they invaded, ASDA sent in a its' own forces and actually invaded Italy. Why?”

“We're not too sure of the exact reasoning,” she admitted. “Most of the records from those four weeks were lost in the war. Every capital was destroyed, so we only have a few survivors of those meetings, most of whom were only there for some of them. But the most common thought is that if we hadn't defended our allies they would attack France, the Middle East and the Republic of China next, which were very important to us. Did your world have anything like our Restless Peace?”

History had never my strong point, but I'd done OK in it. So we spent the rest of afternoon comparing my worlds Cold War with their Restless Peace.

**

One of the only fun things was training. I’d never been very physical, but I liked to jog, play frisbee and did pretty well in gym class. Since they'd seen me break a metal table they were really curious to see how strong I was. I headed to the gym with what I liked to call my honour guard of four soldiers. It was like every other room, a concrete box with only the most basic equipment, weights, some treadmills and exercise bikes, and padded area for people to practice fighting.

A trainer had set up several types of weights for me ranging from barbells of five, ten, and twenty-five, along with a larger bar of a hundred kilos. As I looked at the weights I was a little worried. I'd never really done any weight lifting, and they looked heavy, the big bar weighed more than I did. Since I now looked like I had the body of a skinny, twelve year old girl who'd only just started puberty, they seemed even bigger and heavier. As the trainer demonstrated how to properly lift the weights, I fidgeted with my sports bra. That reminded me of a big disappointment. I'd been happy with my body, now all the curves I'd worked on with dieting and jogging were gone. I almost didn't need a bra anymore, and the fur was itchy under the bra straps.

While a camera man taped me, I stepped forward and wrapped my furry white hand around the smallest dumbbell. I lifted it easily, doing the arm curls ten times as instructed. “Are you sure this is five kilos,” I asked flipping the dumbbell into the air and catching it in my other hand.

“Yes it is. Now try the next one,” the trainer said pointing at the ten kilo weights. I almost couldn't tell the difference, it felt like I was lifting a heavy textbook. The heaviest barbell made me actually have to concentrate a tiny bit. I could lift it pretty easily, but I wouldn't try throwing it up in the air. It was really strange watching my skinny furry arms tensing up and showing the muscles beneath the skin. Looking at myself in the mirror, I wouldn't think I could lift five kilos without straining something, but here I was lifting twenty-five kilo's without any real strain. I liked it, not even the strongest boys in my school could do this.

Next up was the hundred kilo bar, which was a little over twice my weight. They strapped a thick belt around my stomach. It was suppose to help support my spine and keep it from getting damaged; on a man it would cover about the middle of their stomach nicely. On me, it went from my waist to my ribs.

I bent my knees like I'd been shown, grabbed the bar with my palms facing out, took a deep breath and lifted the heavy weight over my head. I put a bit too much force into it, and almost fell over backwards as I overbalanced. But once I got my feet under me, it wasn't very hard. I wasn't even shaking from holding it. Shifting the weight, I held it rock steady with first one hand and then the other as everyone of the big soldiers and trainers stared at me open mouthed.

At the end of the session I was bench-pressing about one thousand kilograms. We had to stop there as the bar looked to be on the verge of developing a permanent curve. My honour guard was increased by two.

**

Exams of all kinds filled up most of my time. They took my blood, looked me over inside and out, measured every part of me they could, cut my hair, took urine samples, x-rays, cat scans, MRI's, ultrasounds, and other uncomfortable tests. I tried to listen in as much as possible, but there were so many medical terms, phrases, and jargon, I never quite knew what they doing except in the most basic of ways, sometimes not even that. By the morning of the second day I just tuned them out, letting my mind drift away into an unthinking fugue

When I wasn't being tested, I listened to the radio. The music was strange, it was all songs about loving your neighbours and getting along, which sounded a lot like the hippy songs from the 60’s my grandmother would listen to. The other popular music was military marches, lots of horns and drum lines, and someone usually a guy singing about how great the country was and how honourable it was to defend it backed up with a choir. Not anything like the modern pop music I liked. The news was mostly boring things that didn't make much sense. Celebrities I didn't know, talks of rebuilding cities, reclaiming lost farmland, and things like that.

So while I kept the radio on for background noise, or sometimes with a soldier reading one of the history books, I exercised. I was feeling so antsy, not being able to do anything or even look outside, it was either that or pace, it was like I couldn't sit still for more than five minutes. I kept looking at the door wanting to get out and run, it was almost claustrophobic, which is something I had never experienced before. The first evening I got one soldier to count for me as I did push ups and sit-ups. I managed to reach a thousand of each before I had to stop and take a break. I could also run on the spot for two hours. Of course after doing them I needed a short nap, but going from being a slightly healthier than normal girl, to super woman, I was pretty damn impressed.

**

Just after a supper of boiled, tasteless chicken, corn and beans on the second day I had a new visitor.

Samantha knocked on my door and came in as soon as I shouted a hello. That was one thing I liked about her, she respected my privacy. The nurses and doctors would walk in without even a knock, catching me naked a few times. I was covered in fur, so there wasn't much to see, but I still could barely bring myself to look at my body, I didn’t want anyone else seeing all of it unless they were looking for a cure.

Samantha was all smiles, and I saw a guy looming over her, a teenager by his face who was looking at me as if I was an interesting science experiment. Not cool. I straightened my hospital gown, a real gown not a backless one, covering my thighs a little more, and tried to look nonchalant. They still didn't have real underwear for me that would fit around my tail, the best they could give me were some tight-ish boxers with a hole punched in the back for extra appendage. I had to be VERY careful about not flashing people when I was sitting. With my fur covered face, and the fact that I couldn’t move my facial muscles quite as much since my change I could pull off a great poker face, even with a really cute guy staring at me.

“Pat, I want you to meet someone. This is Christoph, he came from another dimension like you did,” Samantha said, stepping aside to let the guy in. He was built like a line backer. Unlike me, they had real clothes that fit him, although the shirt seemed to be really tight around the shoulders. I’d have been intimidated by him back home, not just because of his size, he looked like he could rip a phone book apart with his hands, but he with his curly brown hair, a nice strong jaw, and muscles that were bigger than anyone I had ever seen, he was hot. But I wasn't exactly in the right mindset to look at potential boyfriends, and as for his size, when you have claws and can lift a thousand pounds it’s pretty hard to be physically intimidated.

I rolled to my feet, trying to ignore the fact that I only came to his chest, . “Hi Christoph. You’re the metal man I saw when they brought me in here aren’t you?”

He frowned for a minute, cocking his head a little in thought. “Hello Pat. I am the metal man, and you are the cat girl. They showed me your picture this morning. You look very interesting.”

Now it was my turn to concentrate, he had a thick accent that sounded German-ish. “Thanks. Where are you from?”

“Not here,” he said with a chuckle. “I'm from Austria. But I spent the last year in Detroit at the Gorbachev-Reagan United Hospital. You?”

“I'm from Canada, right here actually, just not here, here,” I said lamely. He started to chuckle. “What are you laughing about?” I demanded.

“I am sorry. It is hard to believe you are as strong as they say you are. You are so small,” he said, still chuckling.

I scowled at him. “I'm stronger than I look.”

“And I am certain the mice are very frightened.” His dark brown eyes were practically laughing at me.

I felt the fur on my neck rising, those were fighting words. I held out my hand again looking him straight in the eye. He accepted the challenge and enfolded my tiny hand in his massive one. Immediately he was squeezing as hard as he could. It felt like his fingers were solid metal, it actually hurt a little. I started squeezing back, I didn't have nearly as good a grip, so I used simple power. It went back and forth for a minute, both of us grimacing as our fingers turned white. Well mine already were, but under the fur my hand was tingling from lack of blood.

Just as I was about to cry uncle, there was a crack, Cristoph wrenched his hand back, muttering something that sounded angry and waving his hand around.

“Are you alright?” I asked, startled and afraid I might have broken something.

“I'm OK Just a little broken. I will be fine in a moment,” he said, holding up his hand letting me see his pinky finger was bent a little bit at an unnatural angle. There was a nasty crunch as he bent it back into place.

I looked at Samantha who didn't seem very concerned. “It's one of his powers, he can heal remarkably fast.”

It was true, the look of pain left his face after at most thirty seconds, and in only a minute or two he was flexing his hand as if it hadn’t been broken just moments before. “That's cool. I wonder if I can do that?” I said.

“It is cool. I like it. And I was wrong. You are very strong. Stronger than me even, maybe I should be, be...” he paused, nibbling on his nice lips as he tried to think of the right word.

“Jealous?” I suggested.

“Yes. Maybe I should be jealous.”

“Well I'll give you my strength, but you'll have to take this fur,” I joked.

“No,” he said. “Drying myself after a bath would take far too long. I will be satisfied being the weak boy.”

I had to laugh. “It only takes an hour or two, and a lot of towels.”

Samantha smiled at us, before pulling a folder out of her shoulder bag. “I have good news for you both. Everything has been organized and you’ll be leaving here tomorrow for the special hospital. There are three others you’ll meet who are about your ages. None of them come from your worlds, and one of them only speaks a very strange dialect of Latin along with another language we haven’t begun to decipher. It may be difficult for you all at first, but we hope you’ll become friends as we try to work out what happened.”

“The Latin guy, does he come from some crazy Roman dominated world?” I asked.

Samantha shook her head. “His name is Pulam. And no he isn’t. Actually he seems to be an American Indian. From the very basic conversations they’ve been able to have, it appears that except for a few years of brief contact, possibly refugees fleeing Europe, the America’s had almost no contact with Europe. I have some pictures of him.”

She reached back into her bag and pulled out several pictures. The top one was a young man, with long, shiny black hair wearing bulky red clothes that were a mix of leather and wool. He was surrounded by seven children, who were wearing brown tunics that hung almost to their knees. They had the same reddish brown skin, but their hair ranged from his dark black to dirty blonde. He was looking at them sadly.

“You said he. As in one. Who are these children?” Christoph asked.

She pursed her lips. “That’s where things get strange.”

We both looked at her. I was a cat girl and the weak muscle man could heal almost instantly, how could things get stranger? Then she showed us the next picture.

A child was being absorbed by his body. The skin wasn’t broken, they were joined together as if they were the same body. The childs' head had already entered his chest, and the rest seemed to be following. It was like some bizarre Siamese twin and a heck of a lot creepier than my face. The next picture showed the man extending his arm a few meters, it had a lot of joints, like elbows, and wrists, most of the arm looked like it was made from childrens' limbs. His hand was somehow attached to a too small wrist right at the end. A third picture had his upper body and arms bulging with muscles, they didn’t look natural. Large thigh like muscles were laced around his chest. He was lifting some heavy weights. Not as much as I could lift, but it was more than most people could.

I felt a hairball rising in my throat. “What the hell is that thing?!”

“When you somehow passed through dimensions, most of you seem to have melded with something that was in contact with you. Generally this was living organic material, or in Christoph’s case the robots in his bloodstream. Pulam, is a teacher or guide, we’re really not exactly sure. When he was transferred to this dimension, he had a group of children with him. They melded together, and he is the dominant personality.” Samantha looked as ill as I felt at hearing that. “He can let them out and use them almost like puppets, or shift the muscles and bones in his body to change himself. However, when he desires, the mass disappears. We have no idea how that is possible, but it does.”

Christoph said something in his own language. I could guess what it was, because I probably saying the same thing under my breath. I thought I had it bad, this was something from a Stephen King novel.

“Please tell me the others are more normal?”

“More normal than him, yes.” I didn’t like how she said that. “There is a twelve year old girl Michelle, she is from the Caribbean’s, but was visiting New York just before she arrived here. For some reason she has not changed physically, however she has some unique psychic capabilities.” I looked at the picture she pulled out, it was a little girl with crinkly black hair, and a tanned complexion. She was wearing a full-length blue dress that went from her ankles to her neck, but left her arms bare. She was holding a china doll tightly to her chest.

“Psychic powers?” I asked.

“She can enter peoples memories. She did it accidentally when the police found her, and she can apparently do it on command.”

Christoph frowned. “She can read minds?”

“We’re not sure,” she admitted. “Michelle says she can’t, but really we have no way of knowing.”

Note to self, don’t think about embarrassing things while near the girl.

“Who’s the last of our merry little band?” I asked.

“That would be Nathaniel. He arrived near Montreal. He speaks a strange dialect of English, with an hour or two of practice it’s understandable.” She produced a picture of a chinless boy and a sloping forehead. His skin was brownish with a tinge of green, and his hair was dark green.

“His skin what’s wrong?” Christoph asked.

“It’s chlorophyll, he’s part plant. Like Pat is part cat.”

I shook my head in amazement. “Jesus, we’re even weirder than the X-Men.”

“The old, or the new X-Men? The new X-Men are very, very not normal,” Christoph said.

“We’re a five man band, so the old ones,” I said, thinking about the comics I'd started reading after seeing the first Avengers movie. Then I looked at him. “Wait you guys have the X-Men?”

“Oh yes. They are very popular since 2010. That is when the movie came out. There was a second one in 2013. Storms origin story came out now. I hoped to watch it. Now I cannot.”

“Our first X-Men movie came out around 2000. Most of them have sucked they didn't follow the comics at all. Do you have the Spider-Man movies?” I asked.

“Only one from 1998. It did very badly. No one wanted to make hero movies then. But Superman came out in 2005. That was very good.”

“You had a good Superman movie?! You are so lucky. Of course we had Batman and the Avengers, nothing can beat those,” I said.

He smiled. “Really. Do tell.”

We didn’t notice Samantha leaving, as we started debating who had better movies.

Chapter 3

I woke up later than usual on the third day. Christoph and I had talked pretty late into the night, mostly about comics, our homes and ourselves. The comics were different, but not drastically so. His world had changed from mine in the late 1980’s, when the Cold War had ended with an actual agreement between NATO and the Warsaw Pact. Apparently some terrorist group had made a disease, which killed wheat before it could grow and released it all over Europe and North America. The leaders had three choices, starve, go to war with each other or make a deal to keep each other alive and hunt down the bio-terrorists. They’d made a deal.

So a lot of our mutual comic book characters were the same, and the universes weren’t completely different. We had a nice base to start from and just kept comparing characters and introducing new ones. It had been the funnest thing I’d done since arriving here. Even better the day was going to be easy, no tests, no exams, and we’d be leaving for New England just after lunch. I had been getting sick of needles and doctors.

Then Samantha came in with a large suitcase.

“I have some good news for you Pat, we finally have a complete wardrobe for you,” she said with a broad smile.

I jumped out of bed, “Oh, thank god! I was worried I’d be wearing hospital gowns for the rest of my life.”

“I thought you might say that. These clothes were designed to accommodate your tail and fur,” she said opening the suitcase. “We've got you several dresses or skirts, they're the best way to keep from rubbing your fur the wrong way. We've heard you complain about that before. So we have five skirts and dresses for you to wear when you’re ready.”

My ears perked up, I didn't have much of a body to show off anymore, but I figured I could still rock a nice skirt. She pulled out an ankle length split white skirt, a knee length tight blue skirt, and a knee length black skirt that looked pretty wide at the hem. Then she pulled out a red sundress with short sleeves, and a knee length, sleeveless black dress. The tight skirts had buttons and holes at the back, so I could slip my tail out. I wasn't sure what that would look like but it was better than trying to keep it shoved down between my legs all the time.

“We're not sure if these are the styles you would wear at home, but they're good for meeting politicians and other important people, which you will be doing on occasion. If you want something different you can draw or describe it and we'll see what we can do.”

Shirts were next, loose blouses, tank tops and t-shirts in a couple of colours. Then there were the things I really wanted, pants and shorts. Each of the pants had been modified like the skirts for my tail. The jeans were a little on the loose side for my fur. I'd decided on the first day there was no way I was going to shave or wax my legs. With all the fur I had, I'd live with the hairy look.

Then there was the underwear. They were granny panties. Kind of loose granny panties, with a hole for my tail at the back. “Is this what every woman wears in this world?”

“No, but we thought the loose fit would be best for your fur. Some of the designers were thinking you might like a thong, but you're probably going to be working out a lot, so it was considered a bad idea.”

“Thanks, they'll do,” I said. “The rest of the clothes are really nice. Can you thank whoever designed them?”

She smiled. “Of course, and I'll see if I can get you some nicer underwear. I'll leave you to put them on and then you can go meet Christoph, he’s in the exercise room.”

“Thank you,” I said as she left..

Stripping out of the blue hospital gown, I put on the ugly underwear, and a pale blue sweat suit, we'd probably be doing something physical, so there wasn't any reason to dress up. I couldn't wait until there was something, anything else to do other than read, exercise or listen to bad music. I stepped out into the hallway after packing everything back into the suitcase. Samantha took my hand as soon as she saw me. “You look great, Pat. I'm going to miss you so much.”

“You're not coming with us?” I asked.

She shook her head, “I'm sorry Pat, my family and job are here. But I'll write to you and once things get settled down we could visit each other. You can meet my son.”

I suddenly realized I knew almost nothing about her. I'd never thought to ask about her life, and she hadn't told me. Still she had been the nicest person I'd met on this world, I leaned in and gave her a hug.  “Sure I'd love that.

The two of us, plus my honour guard walked to the gym to meet up with Christoph. I was really hoping to see him bend some steel, that was a lot cooler than my claws, even if I could kick his ass.

**

“OK you two, time for a shower, lunch and then your helicopter will be ready for you,” Samantha said, as she came into the gym.

I grunted as Christoph and two others took the weight bar from me and put it on the floor with a loud thud. It weighed 1500 kilos, four hundred more than Christoph could lift, and it was definitely my upper limit. Christoph had made the bar especially for us. His skin had released some grey goo, which slithered over the metal changing its shape and melded two weight bars together seamlessly. It was twice as thick and a lot more durable than they had been. The slime was gross, though, especially when it oozed back into his skin. Considering my face, which at best could be called very exotic, I couldn't really say that much.

Taking a big drink I got to my feet. “Thanks Samantha. Christoph, you want to have lunch in my room? I can’t go to the cafeteria, I scare the normals apparently.”

“That would be good.”

We went our separate ways. However I was a little upset to see that Christoph only got two guards with him, I wasn’t the one who'd come in with a bloody face. I shrugged it off however, figuring things would be better when we finally got to New England. Reaching my room, I realized I wasn’t smelling too badly. I didn’t sweat nearly as much as I used to, which was one reason I needed to drink so much more to keep cool. A quick wipe with a washcloth, and a change of clothes into the pretty red sundress, and I was sitting on my bed listening to a man singing about how much he loved his neighbours and country.

Christoph arrived ten minutes later, his short hair wasn’t damp, but I smelled his shampoo. My sense of smell was a lot better now, and I was starting to notice individual scents, not just a jumble of confusing smells that made my nose run. “I hope you like meat,” I told him.

“Love it, why?”

“Because my new body needs meat. I don’t eat many vegetables, or I get an upset stomach. I’m glad I wasn’t a vegetarian. I think we're getting chicken today.”

He actually licked his lips in anticipation. “My sister would hate that. She is a vegan.”

Something had been bothering me since I saw his powers in use earlier. “Why exactly do you have nanites in your body?”

“It was an experiment. I was in the hospital, broken neck, paralysed in my whole body. They hoped the nanites could fix me. It didn’t work very well,” he said, sighing as he did. “Then this happened, and they work very well.”

“Damn. How did you break your neck?”

“Skiing accident when I was ten.”

The food arrived, saving me having to think of something else to say. We moved onto talking about our favourite foods from home, as we dug into the rubbery chicken legs and beans. We both agreed hospital food sucked.

**

Samantha was there to walk us to the helicopters. “I will write to both of you to make sure everything is going well. Try to work with the doctors as much as possible, and before you know it we'll have this thing figured out.”

We both waved to her, but I wasn't so confident that we'd ever solve our little problem.

The helicopter was too noisy to talk in, and my ears hurt from the noise even though I was covering them with both hands. When we reached the airport and were moved directly onto a small plane, I was feeling exhausted despite, or possibly because of my nerves. As Cristoph looked out the window like a little kid, I curled up in my chair and went to sleep.

Chapter 4

I woke up as the plane landed and saw that Christoph had fallen asleep as well. He was holding a metal spoon that flexed and bent in his unmoving hand. I was really glad he hadn't been touching any metal part of the plane. I put my seat belt back on, which was a little awkward with my tail. I had to either sit on it, which wasn't very comfortable, or sit with my butt forward leaving a few inches of space for it to come out at my side. I wondered if I could get it cut off.

Sitting on my tail, I saw Christoph had woken up as well and was hurriedly putting on the seat belt. He was having a bit of trouble with it, like he hadn't done it before. Considering the whole being paralysed in a hospital, he was probably pretty rusty with it. But he figured it out quickly enough.

A soldier in a dress uniform escorted us off the plane once we landed. I'd never been to a military airport, it looked pretty similar to a normal airport, just smaller, with a lot less people, a lot more razor wire fences and soldiers wandering around. A car was waiting for us on the runway, a man in a nice suit stood by the back door, smiling. “Hello, Cristoph, Pat. I'm Mr. Stephenson, I'll be your liaison with the URA government,” he said, his smile somehow getting bigger.

“Hi. So can you tell us where exactly we’re going?” I asked.

He opened the door and motioned for us to get in. “We've set up a nice building for all of you that's nearby. It used to be a school, but we fixed it up as housing for the officers. However since you amazing people have arrived, we've decided it would be put to better use helping you learn about your abilities.”

Christoph's brow was furrowed, I figured he was trying to translate everything Mr. Stephenson was saying, the man loved to talk quickly. We all got into the car, it was a bit of a squeeze considering Christoph’s big shoulders. I found myself pressed up against the door almost sitting on his lap, which wasn't quite as bad as I thought it would be. He was nice and solid, I could hear his heart beating faster as our arms touched.

“Is everyone else there already?” I asked as soon as I got my tail settled comfortably beside the door, trying to put the very close contact out of my mind. There was no way this guy would be interested in a freaky cat girl.

“Yes they are. Since you had the furthest to travel you’re about two hours behind everyone else,” he replied.

During the twenty minute drive to our new home, it was explained what we would be doing. Since all of us were young adults, we would have private tutors. It wouldn't match our classes back home obviously, but we'd learn the basics in everything, and if we had any special knowledge that they didn't know we were expected to share it. Well that wasn't a problem for me, I could set up a blog pretty quick, and was a whiz at all the social media, but there was no way I was building a computer anytime soon. And the stuff I'd picked up from helping my Dad sometimes with his job was very basic veterinary stuff.

Of course there would be more examinations. I figured by the time they were done, they'd have enough of me to build a second cat girl. And finally we could wander through the west wing of the building without any restrictions except for entering each other’s rooms without being invited, and we could have fun on the grounds, so long as we didn't cross the fence. Which was guarded by the military.

By the time Mr. Stephenson finished telling us the rules and expectations we had arrived. I looked at the two fences topped with barbed wire, the soldiers and dogs marching along the outside, and the imposing gate where even now the driver was talking with the guard. I wondered who would want to break in to get us. Or if they were there to keep us in.

Looking at Christoph I saw the same question in his eyes.

**

It was a two minute slow drive to the house. The lawn was perfectly manicured, and looked great for playing soccer or frisbee, I could probably pull off some pretty awesome tricks now. The house itself loomed over the field; it was a beautiful white mansion, with a fountain in front. Some military trucks were in front of it, and men were unloading equipment. As we got out, I got the stares I was rapidly getting used to. Fortunately an officer barked an order and the men got back to work. We entered through the large double wooden doors, into a large foyer. My sandals squeaked on the black marble floor, and I had to stop to take it all in.

Twin stair cases went to the second floor, each one could have ten men walking side by side. The wooden banister was polished so carefully I could almost see my face in the wood. Ornate doors led off to either side, and large windows as big as my parents garage door, let in the sunlight. A chandelier hung from the ceiling, it seemed like a thousand beads of glass hung from it, a bright frozen rain.

Mr. Stephenson saw the look of wonder on both of our faces. “It's something isn't it? Follow me please, Michelle, Nathaniel and Pulam should be in the rec room. They were told to expect you.”

We followed him up the stairs, as we walked to the rec room he pointed out the different areas, the most important being the bathroom. We passed a few people who were busy cleaning or running errands.

“Those are the valets and cleaners,” Mr. Stephenson explained. “If you need anything just press the button by the door in any of the rooms and someone will be there shortly to help you. Don't abuse it please, but if you need a snack at night once in a while that's fine.”

Cool, I had a servant. The situation was starting to look up.

We finally arrived at the rec room; it was large and looked like something I'd see in a picture from my parents childhood. There was a pool table, some old style arcade games, a ping pong table, bean bag chairs, a 28 inch TV with a VCR, a big, bulky stereo, and a stack of board games.

A Native American with black hair sat on a beanbag chair across from a young girl with black corn rows. The green guy was sitting on a comfy chair, his short legs propped up on a footstool and he had enormous arms that looked nearly as thick as Christophs’ crossing his barrel chest. Their eyes were closed, but the girl waved us over. We both grabbed a beanbag and sat down looking at each other curiously.

Then we ended up somewhere else.

I jumped up and looked around, there was a bonfire blazing in front of me. chickens and small pigs wandered close by. All around us were wooden houses painted bright red. I looked up and saw the stars more clearly than I'd ever seen them before. I took a breath and it smelled clean. Waves broke against the shore close by.

“Sit down, please,” someone with a deep voice said.

Turning back to the fire, I noticed Christoph had gotten to his feet as well. The three people we’d seen in the rec room were sitting on benches watching us curiously. Here, the guy Pulam, was wearing a loose red shirt, and leather pants, seven silver strands left his back, leading to some children who were running around the abandoned houses. Michelle had a long black cotton dress, her arms were uncovered and the chill in the air didn’t seem to bother her at all. Nathaniel was wearing brown jeans and a shirt that looked like a black silk blouse. As I sat back down on my own log I peeked at myself and found I was still wearing my sundress.

“Uh, hi,” I said lamely.

“Where are we?” Christoph asked.

“This is my home, Stewck. It's much more peaceful than the cities and towns of this world, don't you agree, Christoph, Pat?” the black haired guy said.

I looked around again, “It's very pretty. You’re Pulam right?” I asked, trying hard to get the pronunciation right with my not quite human teeth. He nodded and I noticed Michelle was watching me closely, trying to hide a smile. “You're Michelle aren't you?”

“Yes," she whispered, blushing.

I must have looked confused, Pulam spoke up while smiling pleasantly. For having a freakish power he didn’t seem creepy. “She wants to know if she can pet your fur. Since we arrived, she's been talking about how pretty you are.”

Suddenly I felt as embarrassed as Michelle, who had covered her face with her hands. I walked over and sat beside her. “It's OK, you can touch my fur. You like cats don't you?”

Very slowly her hand moved to my arm, barely brushing my black and white fur. “It's so soft,” she whispered.

“Yep, and it's a pain to keep clean,” I told her, as she petted me.

The green boy smiled. “Hello, I’m Nathaniel of the Ta'ergh Clan.” His voice was high pitched, more like a woman with a squeaky voice.

“Excuse me, how come I can understand all of you perfectly? We were told most of you speak English with a stranger accent than me.” Christoph said.

“I’m not sure,” Michelle admitted. “But when I mistakenly entered Pulam’s memories, we were able to speak perfectly. So we have stayed here talking all afternoon.”

I looked at the weird assortment of characters who were here. “Well that’s strangely convenient. So if we ever get homesick Michelle, you can drop us off at a memory of home for a while?”

She nodded. “I haven’t practiced very much. I have been busy trying to learn as much as I can about this world and all of it’s differences, but with a some thought and a bit of luck, god willing, I can go to the right one.”

“You’re too hard hard on yourself, Michelle. You have a gift, don’t down play it,” Nathaniel said, hitting his leg with a meaty thump for emphasis.

The girl blushed. “It’s not proper to boast about such things. It’s unfashionable of a lady, and turns men into braggers.”

Despite what she said, I noticed she had a slight smile that was definitely prouder than she wanted us to see. “So what do you guys like to do for fun? Christoph and I both love comics and movies, but I don’t think we have anything like the movies you guys do.”

“Movies?” Nathaniel asked.

“What are comics?” Pulam asked.

Christoph jumped in as I thought of the best way to explain. “Movies are films, uh moving pictures that you can show on a screen or a wall. Showing things that have already happened. It’s a good way to tell stories. And comics are books made almost entirely from pictures.”

Green guy’s face lit up as soon as he heard films. “Oh, we only call them films. I love sports films, my clan is part of the largest film businesses in Thilia.”

“Thilia?” It was my turn to ask.

“What you call America. The bigger part, north of the land bridge,” he explained.

“Oh North America. Gotcha.”

Michelle spoke up at this point. “I’ve watched one, a movie that is. It was black and white not like the ones I’ve seen here. My Papa took us all to the theatre for a treat. It was Romeo and Juliet. It lasted a whole hour.”

Christoph, Nathaniel and I all looked at each other, not quite sure what to say, she seemed so proud of actually watching a movie. I wondered what type of world she came from that they were so far behind. “That must have been really nice. Maybe they have some videos here we can watch together,” I said, trying to fill in the silence.

“That would be wonderful, Pat. Thank you!” she said, throwing her arms around me. “My friends back home will be so petty once I tell them everything I’ve done and seen here.”

“I have many beautiful stars and animals to watch,” Pulam said, with a wry grin.

“I like the animals to,” Nathaniel said. “My clan has a large tract of land in the north for our families. We go hunting there every fall, and keep many farms there.”

He leaned forward. “What do you hunt, Nathaniel? My people are mostly fishermen and farmers.”

“Bison, black bears, wolves, moose, and last year I was able to hunt some wild hairy elephants for the first time.”

Michelle furrowed her brow. “Hairy elephants? I have only heard of African and Asian elephants.”

“In my world, we have elephants in Thilia, America. They are smaller than the ones in the south, only a little larger than a large bull. Most of them are in herds, but there are still some living wild. It’s a great honour to hunt them. They’re very smart and can be dangerous. Since I spotted it first, I was given it's wool for a coat and my mother received the choicest meats."

“Damn, you have mammoths. They’re extinct in my world,” Christoph said. Everyone else nodded in agreement.

“That’s too bad, the domestic ones are very profitable, and even now are still good for cheap labour,” he said. It was hard to tell what he was feeling from his squeaky voice, but his eyes, already shaded by his prominent brow seemed to turn a little darker.

“Papa has plantations on several islands and even in Confederacy of Southern States,” Michelle said. “I’ve visited them sometimes on holidays.”

“The Confederacy?” I said, remembering my history class about the American Civil War.

“Oh yes. It’s one of the richest countries in the world. Only the Kingdom of Brazil, The Empire of British India, and the Empire of China are richer. My Papa is always talking about how he wants to expand, but with the refugees from the north he is finding it impossible.” Despite what she’d said about bragging earlier there was definitely a large hint of pride in her voice.

“Why are there refugees'?” I asked. Even though it wasn’t my world, the thought of Canada being a battleground didn’t sit right with me.

She made a cross on her chest, and spoke in a whisper. “They’re escaping the Wastes.”

“The wastes?”

The world went blurry, and we were standing in a place that looked like Greenland. Rocks and tough grass surrounded us, there were small bushes, and tree stumps as well. As I looked harder, I saw that the ground was actually covered in the rotten remnants of trees cut almost to the roots. In front of us there was a gigantic snow bank turned to ice, that stretched for as far as the eye could see, it was dirty and rose from a couple of inches at the edge we were standing at, until it looked like a like a giant ridge of ice on the horizon. The bright sun didn't feel very hot, but shining on the ice it was blinding. A large river flowed out from under the ice pack, its dark, frigid looking water was speckled with chunks of ice.

"Where are we?" Nathaniel asked, like all of us he was unable to take his eyes off the ice river.

"This is the St. Lawrence River on the edge of the Wastes," Michelle said. "My family travelled to a nearby city two weeks ago. We are from the Caribbean Free Cities. And my Papa is trying to enter the cod market here. We visited this place with some guides, my mother, brothers and I. The locals call it the Devil’s Fountain. It didn't cost any money at all, we just traded them some oranges and they did everything for us. I'd never seen so much snow, we get some snow in winter, but this was the first chance we had to see the Wastes.” She suddenly looked around nervously, as if she was afraid she'd said too much. I patted her shoulder she reminded me of a nicer version of my sister.

"You guys got hit by an ice age, when did it happen?" Christoph asked, as he bent down to touch the cool ground.

"My tutors say that in 1834 there was a volcano that exploded in the middle of the continent, destroying America and covering the world in darkness. Father Pierrot says it was god punishing us for our sins. The Wastes started expanding then all over the world, and they get bigger almost every year." She shuddered a little. "When I was told where I was, I couldn't believe it was so warm and green."

The world blinked and we were at a large house, it was at the top of a small hill overlooking a sea of houses that covered almost everything until the mass of humanity met the ocean. The ocean itself was busy with old-fashioned steamers and sailboats. Birds flew over the harbour in massive clouds. "This is my home, Refuge."

"Where are the people?" I asked.

"I have trouble showing people, especially when I have more than one person with me. Usually the streets are so full of people you can't even walk a horse."

I believed her. The streets were so narrow you might get two small cars to drive past each other, if they were very careful. The cobblestones were covered in dirt and mud. It didn't smell nice, more like a gas station bathroom that hadn't been cleaned in a few years, with a trace of rotting fish. The houses were packed so tightly together they looked like one long town house, made of old wood that seemed to be scavenged from anything available. Only Michelle's house looked well built, with sooty white paint, small windows that were well cleaned, and a tall metal fence.

“Come on, I want to show you my room,” she said, waving for us to follow even though we didn't move as the scenery shifted again.

"This is your room?" Christoph asked looking around.

"Yes, it's very pretty isn't it? Mama decorated it with the finest paints and cotton from Brazil," she said smiling so happily I thought she was about to glow.

"Why is it so blue, shouldn't it be pink and white?" Christoph asked.  I rolled my eyes, of course all girls had to just love pink.

She stared at him absolutely shocked. “We only use white at funerals and for mourning. It’s not a respectable colour for clothing. And pink isn't a good color for girls, it's too active. It's better for boys. Anyways I prefer blue, it's soothing."

She pointed a wall full of dolls, mostly girls but a few boys, and like she'd said most of the girls were dressed in different shades of blue, while the boys had on pink or red for the most part. Weird. “These are my dolls, I've had most of them since I was a baby. Sometimes my friends Maria, Mai, Peggy and Susan will come over and we'll spend the day after our lessons, acting out Shakespeare scenes with them. Do you like A Midsummers Night Dream?” she asked.

Wow a twelve year old who likes Shakespeare, I was definitely in another dimension. “I've seen it a few times,” I said, as Christoph rolled his eyes. Nathaniel looked uncertainly at everything, and Pulam was running his fingers against the silk sheets.

Her face lit up, “Could you play with me later? I don't have any dolls as pretty as these ones, but they gave me a few nice ones when I arrived. And I have my favourite one as well, she wasn’t hurt when I arrived here.”

“Sure,” I said, trying to sound enthusiastic.

The young girl looked around the room, and I thought I saw her wipe away a tear. “Lets see your room, Pat,” she said.

Before I could object, we were there in my room. My dirty room, with clothes and underwear on the floor, my laptop on the desk and a lot of selfies and pictures of my friends and I plastered all over the walls. Including a few that had been blown up of us at the beach in our bikinis. Looking at my human face, my real body, my fingers gently ran over the photo's. The pain I'd been pushing back for the last two and a half days came roaring to the fore. I might never go home again, never look human again.

“Michelle can we please not enter my mind without asking?” I said, blinking back tears.

Nathaniel and Christoph were both looking around, focusing a little too closely at the beach pictures for my comfort. Pulam was looking at my laptop. Michelle was openly staring at the picture of me in a bikini smiling for the camera without a care in the world.

“Michelle! Can we get out of here!”

Instantly we returned to the campfire. Michelle was staring at me like I'd grown a second a head. “Was that you in those pictures?”

Wiping my eyes, I nodded. I didn't really trust myself to speak.

“How could you go out in public wearing so little?!”

Christoph answered for me. “She was wearing a bathing suit, it's enough.”

Her dark cheeks were turning darker, “It's scandalous! Don't your people worry about modesty at all?”

“Jeez it's just a bikini,” I told her, getting irritated. “We go swimming in it. What do you swim in?”

“When I swim, I am covered from the knees to the neck. It's proper and more becoming.”

I was about to make a smart ass comment about what I thought of that nonsense when Nathaniel broke in.

“It's not that bad, Michelle. In my world, the women of my people, wear less when relaxing, only covering their waists.”

That made the girl stare in absolute shock. “But what about men?”

The green guy laughed. “If men cause problems, they are hit over the head. Our women are stronger than you, and not as skinny.”

“What do you mean our women?” Pulam asked.

He pointed at us. “Your people, the Quick. My people are called the Strong, or Thilians.”

Christoph’s head snapped up. “You’re a Neanderthal?!”

Nathaniel nodded. I just sat there staring in amazement my annoyance with Michelle totally forgotten. I thought they’d all died off thousands of years ago.

“What’s a Neanderthal?” Pulam asked, looking confused. Michelle looked just as lost.

Christoph tried to fill them in. “They were another type of human, but they died out almost 40,000 years ago. We have some of their DNA in us, but that’s it.”

“DNA?” Michelle asked.

“Uh, let me get back to you on that,” he answered. “How can a Neanderthal speak English? There shouldn’t be anything like the language in your world.”

Nathaniel thumped his chest. “My people have lived in Thilia long before your people came. They didn’t survive in the rest of the world, but here we did well. And then people like you,” he pointed at Pulam, “arrived and we joined together. Then Europeans came from Scandinavia, and we learned all we could from them, trading and even fighting them. When the English finally came in the 1600’s my clan and our allies traded with them and we defeated the clans and countries to the Great River. Now the English speak our language and we speak theirs.”

“Europeans, they are the people from across the sea?” Pulam asked.

We nodded. “Have your people ever heard of it?” Nathaniel asked.

“We know of it. It’s a land of the dead,” he said. His hand made a complicated gesture in the air. “Some of my ancestors fled there, when the spirit Lucifer and his evil overran the land of man. They found safety here, in the arms of M'Kmu who is beside us all, and above us all.”

I was suddenly feeling that my world wasn’t so bad compared to a lot of the other options.

Michelle yawned, trying to cover it with her hands. “If you’ll excuse me, I think I need to rest. This is the longest I’ve ever tried this and,” another yawn, “and it is very tiring. I’m very sorry.”

We all nodded, telling her not to worry. We came back to the real world. Pulam smiled at us and stood to help Michelle stand up. She staggered to her feet, and took his arm with a thank you, they left the three of us alone. Nathaniel said something, but I couldn’t really understand most of it. I thought I heard the word film and watch. Since he was pointing at the tv, I smiled and nodded.

Heading for the movie rack, I decided I needed something to take my mind off of the bad memory. Since the guys probably didn't want a romance, and Nathaniel wouldn't understand something with a lot of talking, there weren't many options left. “So war movie, action movie, or sports movie?”

“Fighting film,” Nathaniel said, miming punching something.

“That is good,” Christoph agreed.

“It’s unanimous, fighting movie it is,” I said, searching for one that looked good.

Chapter 5

The next morning there was a knock on my door. Struggling to wake up, I blearily opened it and found myself looking at a little kid, who looked like she could be Pulams' sister. She was smiling at me as if I was Santa Claus. “Uh, hello,” I said, rubbing my eyes, while my tail hung limply almost touching the floor.

She waved at me, pointing down the hall and mimed walking with her fingers. “Ok, let me get some pants on,” I told her, pointing at my naked legs. She nodded but didn’t get out of the doorway. I went to the closet and grabbed a pair of track pants, everything else could wait, my shirt wasn’t really dirty and the loose fur on it was a fact of life I was quickly getting used to. She grabbed my hand with both of hers as soon as I was done, and started dragging me down the hallway. I was barely able to close my door she was in such a rush.

In the hallway Michelle in her nightgown, Christoph and Nathaniel, both in boxers and shirts, were all being pulled along by excited children. The kids were gesturing at each other and smiling, but not speaking, it was creepy. “Anyone know what’s going on?” I asked.

Nathaniel looked back at me and spoke quickly, it seemed like he was almost whistling the words rather than speaking. I could get a few parts “…Pulam… children… from the…”

“These are the children inside Pulam,” Michelle repeated in a vaguely French accent.

I had the sudden urge to pull my hand away, but the girl had a death grip on it. “Any idea where we’re going?”

“No.” Christoph replied as we headed down the stairs.

My nose and ears twitched as I smelled sausages and heard pans rattling. “I think it’s breakfast time.” I was proven right a few seconds later as we headed down the hallway leading to the kitchen. We arrived at the dining room where a large hardwood table was loaded down with food. There was scrambled and boiled eggs, buttered toast with jams and peanut butter beside it, sausages, bacon, fried potatoes, waffles and syrup, porridge, six different kinds of juice, milk, and hot water with some tea leaves beside it. My mouth watered. Pulam and three other children were already seated.

When they saw us they stood up gesturing at the free chairs in unison. We all sat down, smiling at the food. Pulam and the children joined hands and looked up at the ceiling, he began to say something, it sounded like a song and they repeated it. Michelle for her part bowed her head and began to pray quietly. It didn’t sound like any prayer I’d ever heard of, she was asking god to keep her and those she cared about warm and in the light of the sun. Nathaniel, Christoph and I waited for them to finish, not sure what to do.

After a minute everyone was done, and we dug in. Nathaniel grabbed a second plate, as he put food on his plate, mostly meat with a bit of porridge, he put a tiny spoonful on the second plate, making a complicated gesture with his left hand and three fingers each time.

“Why didn’t you pray?” Michelle asked us.

“I am…offering…First One,” Nathaniel said, pointing at the second plate.

“That’s how you pray?” I asked slowly.

He nodded, smiling so widely it seemed like his face was going to split. Satisfied that his soul was at least not in danger, Michelle turned to look at Christoph and I.

“I am an atheist. I don’t believe in god,” he said.

“I go to church at Christmas and Easter, but it’s not a big deal,” I told her. At her shocked expression I shrugged my shoulders. “Sorry.”

She didn’t seem to know what to say about that. Instead she grabbed a piece of toast and loaded it down with orange marmalade. Happy that we weren't going to be getting into a religious discussion, I grabbed some toast and made the worlds largest bacon, sausage and scrambled egg sandwich. Michelle kept her eyes on Pulam and the children, they were giving each other food, pointing at what things they liked, and making faces of delight and disgust as they tried new foods. They never spoke.

Mr. Stephenson and another person walked in as we were eating. “Hello everyone,” he said, speaking more slowly than he had yesterday. “Today is a free day for you. Feel free to explore the grounds, one of the valets can show you were the sports equipment is. The East wing is still being set up for the infirmary and testing rooms, so please don’t go there until tomorrow. Is everything to your liking?”

We all nodded. Michelle bowed her head and said “Yes, sir,” very primly. He smiled, said a few things about hoping we would like it here and to ask for help if we needed anything before leaving. The other man who was kneeling beside Pulam was talking quietly in what I assume was Latin combined with a lot of gestures. All the children watched him silently, which was clearly making the man uneasy. He left a few minutes after Mr. Stephenson.

We finished breakfast fairly soon after. “So what do we want to do today?” I asked.

“One moment please,” Michelle said, closing her eyes.

Something felt different. We were still at the table, which looked like a disaster area but the house was as silent as a grave, it felt empty and cold. I wanted to grab someones hand just to know there was someone alive here. It didn’t feel anything like what we’d experienced the day before.

“Hello. Can I touch your tail?” the girl who’d come to my room asked. I jerked a little at suddenly hearing her voice.

“Ok,” I whispered, bringing my tail up so I could tickle her nose. It was really strange how I new how to control my tail, I didn't have to think about it anymore than moving my hand. In fact if I did try too hard to control it, I usually ended up sending it into spasms. “Um, Pulam what exactly is going on?”

“These are my students. I was teaching them the ways of the spirits when we heard the thunder. We huddled together and we became one,” he said it calmly, as if it was an everyday occurrence.

Christoph was bending a spoon for two young boys. “We were told you controlled them.”

“No. I don’t control them. They need me, they get tired easily and must return to rest. But I am only their caretaker, they see, hear, feel and taste what I do, we talk to each other and decide what needs to be done. As their elder, I have the final say, but I listen to their ideas and suggestions.”

“Doesn’t that get confusing?” I asked, smiling awkwardly as another child came up to pet me.

He sighed. “It is not easy. M’Kmu, blessed us, making us one, before we arrived at our final home. But few who have been blessed like this have a restful life. We simply must try to do the best we can.”

“Others have had this happen to them?” Nathaniel asked excitedly, his voice squeaking more than usual.

“The stories tell of people who have been blessed, joining their souls to the spirits of animals to gain their strengths.” His eyes looked off into the distance. ”Saint Alvin was one such, the most powerful since M’Kmu joined himself to a babe. He led his people from the shores of the old lands, where so many died from the disease and pestilence of Lucifer. They say he had been joined to an Elohim who guided his steps. Despair followed him, as his wife and children died. But he continued, and found a land of safety where his people and those he met could live in peace together becoming greater together than they were apart.”

“So this is an act of god?” I asked.

“Everything is. We may not understand why it happens at first, but eventually it becomes clear.”

I looked up. If this was part of some big plan, I really could have done with not being a cog in it. For all my complaining, I had been quite satisfied with my old life. “So what do we do today? Personally, it’s a beautiful day so I want to pull out a Frisbee and see what I can do.”

“I don’t know what a Frisbee is, but I want to get into the sun. I have only had a small window to look out of for two days. I need light! I’m wilting!” Nathaniel said, pretending to swoon.

Pulam and Christoph both nodded agreement. We looked around for Michelle, who had vanished from her chair. She was sitting in the corner with the four girls, somehow she’d gotten a doll for each of them and they were playing quietly together. I did a double take, my sister was ten and hated dolls, along with all her friends. It seemed off watching a twelve year old playing with them.

“Excuse me Michelle, can we get out of here? We want to go outside now,” I said.

We were back in the dining room, while some cleaners watched nervously from the door. We left quickly to get dressed. I noticed that Michelle and the girls walked together touching each others hair and clothes with interested expressions. The three young boys were watching me and Nathaniel, I couldn’t really blame them as my tail twitched.

**

We agreed to meet outside after thirty minutes. I grabbed a pair of shorts and a tank top. The day looked like it would be a scorching May day, I briefly considered ditching the tank top for just a sports bra, but I really didn't want to be quite that exposed, even with the fur. Since that took all of five minutes to accomplish, I spent most of the time combing my fur, trying to get rid of the itchy, loose fur. Three large clumps, and twenty minutes later, I headed for the hall. Christoph and Nathaniel were both there waiting already, wearing shorts and in Christoph’s case a t-shirt.

Michelle came out as we tried to explain what Frisbee was to our Neanderthal friend. She was wearing a short, for her, knee length, navy blue dress, that left her shoulders bare except for two thin straps. It looked a bit like a sack. The four young girls followed her out, looking tired but happy. They had yellow ribbons in their hair and tied around their wrists. She saw me, and while her eyes widened, she kept quiet.

The four silent girls who had been watching us, suddenly looked at each other. They went to Michelle and each one kissed her cheek in turn. “Good bye,” said oldest one who'd petted my tail, as they headed for Pulam’s room.

Pulam came out a moment later along. He didn’t seem as happy as he had been at breakfast.

**

I caught the Frisbee with both hands as it headed straight for my head, and then I started falling back down. Normally this would be a problem, as I was at least twenty meters in the air. Instead I twisted head over heels so that I was upside down, looking at the rapidly approaching ground, and tossed the Frisbee towards Pulam. I didn’t see what he was doing, I kept spinning so that I landed feet first and rolled across the grass before coming back onto my bare feet more gracefully than a gymnast.

By the time I turned back, Pulam was flicking the Frisbee at Christoph. It went wide, by about fifty meters. The Austrian ran faster than an Olympic sprinter and dived through the air to catch it before it hit the ground. I could see the gouges he’d left in the dirt where he’d hit. Jerking himself to a sitting position he threw it to Nathaniel, who caught it awkwardly.

He threw it hard enough that I heard it cutting through the air. My hand whipped out, and I caught it from the bottom with my claw, causing it to spin around my finger like a pro. I sent it flying at Pulam, about three meters above his head. His legs bulged with muscle, letting him jump high enough to catch it with his outstretched hand. He landed badly, falling forward, a leg extended from his pelvis, keeping him upright. He threw it to Christoph, actually managing to get it on target this time.

Michelle cheered from the sidelines, where she sat on a blanket. We’d offered to let her join us and not throw it so hard, but the sight of us jumping impossibly high, and throwing the Frisbee hard enough to take a head off seemed to put her off and she was content to watch.

It had taken a bit of time to get everything going. Teaching Pulam, Nathaniel and even Christoph who hadn’t played in years, wasn’t too hard. Either we were just really good with our eye-hand coordination or whatever had changed us had really helped. In my case it was definitely the latter, I could picture where it was going to be with ease and always knew where I was, I hadn’t missed a catch once, and it went exactly where I wanted it to go. None of us were getting tired either. We’d been pushing ourselves pretty hard for the last three hours and except for two five minute breaks for drinks, it had been continuous. Nathaniel if anything seemed to be gaining energy.

But the sun was getting pretty high in the sky and my fur was getting hot. “Time out!” I cried.

We all went to the blanket where there were several bottles of water and juice. I popped open a water, not quite trusting the juice and drained it. Pulam sat down tossing the Frisbee into the air. “Fun!” he said, grabbing his own bottle.

“Want to play more?” Nathaniel asked.

“No. It’s too hot,” I said, wiping my head and panting for emphasis. “There is a pond, that the valet said is leech free, want to go swimming?” miming it for Nathaniel and Pulam.

Christoph poked me in the ribs. “Don’t cats hate water?”

“I’d be more worried about you rusting, cyborg.”

Finishing our drinks we headed for the pond.

**

We reached the pond which was big enough to go swimming in. It was surrounded by beautifully manicured grass. With some trees for shade. Throwing off my tank top, I ran over and did a cannonball straight into the middle of the water, cooling off instantly in the pleasantly warm water.

I came to the surface, smelling like a wet cat, but not caring in the least. Michelle was running off to the house, while the guys took off their shirts. I swam close to the shore, until I could get my feet on solid ground. “Where is Michelle going?” I called.

“Don't know. Said she'd be back soon,” Christoph said, his pale skin practically glowing in the sun. Dropping his shirt on the ground, he slipped off his shoes and headed for the water a lot more sedately than I had.

“Whoa! What are you guys doing?!” I shouted, turning away from Nathaniel and Pulam who were stripping completely naked.

“We are going for a swim,” Nathaniel said, confusion clear in his voice.

“You guys have shorts on! Keep them on. No skinny dipping allowed.”

Christoph was laughing his head off, but I heard him talking to the other guys. I didn't look around to see what he was doing until he yelled at me. “It's OK Pat, you can look now. No skinny dipping.”

They were coming to the water in their shorts, clearly amused at my expense. “Pat, you are almost as bad as Michelle,” Nathaniel said with a smile.

“I just met you guys, I don't need or want to see that,” I said. Although seeing them enter the water was pretty nice. Even Nathaniel who was only fifteen and green, was well built, with nicely sculpted muscles. Pulam was already swimming like a fish, his long legs kicking the water with smooth, easy strokes. Christoph was beside Nathaniel, sitting in the shallows splashing the water idly.

Swimming over to the two guys, I splashed them. “Hey you two, are you scared of a little water?”

“I can't swim,” Christoph said, blushing.

Nathaniel shook his head. “I'm too heavy. I would sink.”

Well that was a good reason to not go swimming. “Ok, Christoph come here, I can teach you to swim.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, its easy. Come on, if something goes wrong I can throw you back to shore.”

Hesitantly, he walked into slightly deeper water, until it was around his stomach. I noticed him glancing at my chest, not that there was much to look at now. “Alright,” I said, pushing him gently backwards,” lets try something easy just to get you used to the water, lie on your back. Don't worry I'll hold you so you don't sink.”

He took a deep breath, clearly working up his courage. Leaning back, I held onto his shoulder and the small of his back, he was heavy. His feet rose up, and he started sinking like a stone. Grunting I just managed to keep his head from going completely under the water. My feet slid on the muddy bottom. “How much do you weigh?”

He got to his feet quickly, wiping the water from his face. “About two hundred and fifty kilograms.”

My jaw dropped. “How?!”

“They think my bones turned to metal. With that and the nanites, I am very heavy.”

I looked at him with new eyes, he was big, but that was insane. There was no way he could possibly swim with the metal in his body. He and Nathaniel were definitely land lubbers. “I'm sorry Christoph, you're going to need a life jacket if you want to swim. A lot of life jackets.”

“That is too bad. I wanted to swim with you. I guess I will just watch.”

If I could have I'd have blushed. Fortunately at that moment, Michelle came running to the pond, she was wearing a cape which kept opening up revealing a black bathing suit with a skirt that reached her knees. Like me she tossed off the cloak, and dived in headfirst. I had thought Pulam was a good swimmer, but Michelle cut through the water faster than any of us. She didn't even come up for air until she had reached the other side.

She surfaced giggling. “Who wants a race!” she shouted.

Chapter 6

That night I laid in bed trying to sleep.

The bed was comfortable, it was also huge, at least a king size. I felt lost lying on it. In the darkness that wasn't really dark to my eyes, more shades of grey, I stared at the edges that stretched off into the distance, nothing like my much smaller, cozy bed back home. The walls were bare wood paneling. It was like a really fancy hotel room with a wardrobe against one wall, a small bathroom, and a nightstand and a desk. There weren't any pictures of my friends and I, none of my old comfortable clothes lying on the floor.  Even my new clothes were neatly put away, picked up every day while I was out and returned neatly folded by the end of the day.

This wasn't mine, and I had no idea how to make it mine. I really didn't want to put up any pictures of me on the wall.

On the first night, I'd put a towel over the bathroom mirror and moved the full length mirror into the hallway. I was reminded of my change, every time I looked at my body, combed my fur, or twitched my ears or tail. Seeing my face had proven a bit too much to handle, and after having an hour long crying jag, I wasn't ready to deal with another one every time I looked in a mirror.

The night was too quiet. Even to my ears. There was the sound of people talking outside, and the chirping of insects, but they were very faint. I couldn't hear my dad snoring, or the clicking of a keyboard as mom did her work. Even the crappy music Suzy played just across the hall would have been a nice reminder of home at this point. I wondered what they thought of my disappearing. How would they explain the corner of the basement disappearing? Had they been hurt when part of the foundation disappeared? Were they holding a memorial service in my honour at school? Had some poor person appeared in my place as confused and changed as me?

I wasn't going to sleep anytime soon. Giving up, I went to the window, opening it wide. The night was cool, especially after the hot day, but I didn't feel cold. There was at least one benefit of having a fur coat.

Something was moving on the roof. Glass clinked together, someone made a shushing noise. Curious I crawled out the window, using my claws climb up the side of the building. Despite being on the third floor, I didn't really notice. If I had thought about it I'd have been petrified of falling. But like with the tail and the jumping earlier, it was so natural I just did it as if I was crossing a street.

In the darkness I saw two people moving, each one holding a bag. “Pulam, Nathaniel? What are you guys doing out here?”

Pulam pulled a bottle from his bag and mimed drinking it. He shook the bottle at me as if asking me to join them.

“We're forgetting things tonight. Join us?” Nathaniel asked slowly so I could understand him.

Aside from a few glasses of beer Id had at a couple of parties and a small glass of champagne or wine my parents let me have occasionally, I'd never really drank. The warning about alcohol Samantha had told me flashed through my mind, but at that moment forgetting seemed to be a good idea. “Sure. Where did you get this stuff?”

“Pulam is very quiet on his feet, and their is a lot of drinks for the staff. We borrowed some.”

Sitting down on a relatively flat part of the roof, we opened the bags. There was strange mix of drinks, two bottles of white wine, expensive looking brandy, something that looked like water called baijiu, and a few other bottles of alcohol I'd never heard of. I took a bottle of wine with a smile of thanks, and used a claw to pop the cork. Nathaniel opened the brandy, while Pulam took the baijiu. Tapping them together, we started to drink.

I had drank less than a quarter of my bottle when the singing started. Nathaniel with his squeaky voice, started singing something in his own language that sounded a lot like an opera. After a few minutes of listening, Pulam joined in. They weren't singing the same song, but between Pulam's baritone and Nathaniel's soprano, they went together pretty well.

It sounded sad. Like they were emptying their souls as they sang, crying openly and unashamed as they sang. I wanted to join them, but I couldn't sing a note and I'd just spoil it. I sat watching them, wiping the tears from my eyes

They stopped after awhile, breathing hard, draining their bottles.

I didn't feel like drinking anymore. Exhausted, I could barely keep my eyes open.  Putting the cork back on the bottle, I tried to think of a good way to thank them. There wasn't one, I gave them each a hug and headed back to my window. We'd barely said two words to each other, but it was nice to know I wasn't the only one feeling lost and alone.

My feet had just hit the window sill when a quiet voice called my name, surprising me so much I almost fell backwards and the wine bottle started to slide out from under my arm. A quick twist threw me and my precious bottle into my room. Taking a second to collect myself, I looked out the window to see Michelle leaning out her window.

With great care, so that I didn't slur too badly, I asked, “What's up Michelle?”

“Was that you singing on the roof?”

I shook my head, a little more exaggerated than I would have liked. “Nope. That was Pulam and Nathaniel. We were just talking.”

“Do you think I could join them?”

Even with my buzz, I knew letting Michelle have a drink was definitely in the bad idea list. “They were going back to their rooms, sorry.” At that moment, they decided to start singing again. Louder this time. Crap. “How about you come to my room? Just us girls.”

That got a smile. She vanished and by the time I reached the door she was there, holding her doll, waiting to come in. “Come on in,” I said.

She sniffed the air. “Is that wine?”

With the bottle sitting on the floor there wasn't much point lying. “Yes.”

“Can I have some?”

“No.”

I expected her to put up a bit of a fight, but she just shrugged and went to sit on the bed. I sat beside her waiting for her to say something. Instead she put her head on my shoulder and grabbed my hand in hers. My chin rested on the top of her head, while we sat in the dark.

“I miss my parents,” she whispered, fighting back tears.

“So do I.”

“Do you think we'll go home soon?”

Tell the truth, or lie? “I hope so. I really, really hope so,” I said, nuzzling her hair.

She didn't say anything for a few minutes. “What if we can't?”

“I don't know. I guess we'll have to see what happens.” I hated not being able to comfort her, but I didn't even know what to say that would comfort me. The exhaustion weighed down on me even more, I couldn't find the energy to lie. She wrapped her arms around me, my t-shirt quickly got damp.

Hugging her in silence, eventually we both fell asleep.

Chapter 7

I walked on all fours through the pitch black maze, focusing on every sense except for my useless sight. Over the last week my senses had just kept improving as I became used to them. Now I could hear quiet conversations from down a hallway perfectly, smell what someone had eaten for breakfast by just sniffing the air around them, and notice slight changes in the wind with my whiskers.

We were testing them to their limits today. I had to track a smell through a maze without touching any booby traps, and using my hands as little as possible. I stopped at a crossroad, my whiskers shook slightly from an almost undetectable breeze. It was coming from the right, and I didn't feel it coming back from the left, so the left passage had to be straight for a while, or possibly there was a grill there. I took a deep breath, opening my mouth so I could taste the air as well. The air was clean, without the musky smell that I was suppose to follow.

I thought about it for a few seconds, if I couldn't smell anything it must be downwind and the breeze had destroyed the scent in this part of the maze. Joy.

Blindly I turned to the left, my ear's trying to detect any changes in the slight taps of my claws against the plywood floor. If it sounded hollow there was probably a booby trap under it, some of the traps also whined or ground slightly as they charged up or swung to face me. I'd already been shot once in the ass by a paint ball when I had put a hand down on a small button, now I was taking it slow and steady yet ready to run.

One of my whiskers bent, making my face itchy. Stopping dead, I brushed my other whiskers, which extended past the sides of my face by an inch, over the spot. If I was judging the itchiness properly, very questionable, there was a single bar blocking the path. I could squeeze past it but it would be a tight fit.

Leaning as far to the side as possible, inched past it. My loose fit, long sleeve military shirt touched the bar, but nothing happened. As I was carefully pulling my khaki clad legs through trying not to bend my knees, the floor gave way, making me tumble five feet to the very lightly padded ground. I managed to land hands first and swung my legs around so my toes touched down. It wasn't graceful, but it didn't hurt.

“Not bad,” Frank, my instructor said, walking over to give me a hand up. He could have come straight from a Hollywood military movie, but when he wasn't yelling at someone over a stupid mistake, he was a really funny guy. Although he had a habit of starting to tell a story of his time in Britain, only to stop suddenly as he remembered I was a teenage girl.

“Thanks,” I said, blinking my eyes as they adjusted to the natural light.

He put the hinged floor back into position. “So you fell through the hole. Why?”

I thought back, “I felt a bar in there with my whiskers. I thought that was a trap and avoided it by leaning over to the right side as far as possible.”

“And?”

“And I focused so much on the bar that I ignored everything else,” I said with a sigh.

He nodded. “You made it through three quarters of the maze, and only got shot in the ass once, most people would fail by the first bend. You're senses are amazing, but you have to keep using all of them all the time if you want to get better.”

“So one more time?”

“Nah, you've been practicing all morning, take a break before lunch. Pulam is in room 303, Christoph is in the garage and Nathaniel is in the garden you can watch any of them if you want. Just don't be too noisy when you go in,” he told me.

“Thanks, Frank. See you later,” I said. As I walked out the door, Frank was already yelling at the operators to start changing the maze around, preparing it for my next session tomorrow.

Pulam was closest, but despite seeing the ‘kids’ regularly at breakfast, and getting to know him better, actually seeing his powers in use was creepy. It was weird watching all the things they put him through to see the full extent of what he could do. Let’s just say he would make a lot of money in horror movies. Christoph would be fun to watch, his power armour was one of the coolest things I’d ever seen, but the smell of gas, motor oil and other things did a number on my sinuses. Nathaniel it was.

After quickly changing my clothes, to something more comfortable, I opened my window and jumped down to a second floor balcony and then the ground. It was the fastest way to the garden, and after a morning of crawling through narrow tunnels, I needed to stretch my legs. A quick bounding run brought me to the garden, which was a pretty large piece of land full of flowers, bushes, a hedge maze, and even a vegetable garden, along with a chicken coop and a couple of goats, rabbits and two milk cows. Apparently growing your own food was a pretty big deal here. I couldn’t get too near the animals, something about my smell spooked them. To be fair when I smelled them my mouth started to water, so I can understand why they’d be nervous.

I loved to sit in the garden alone and smell everything, forgetting what had happened to me. Michelle and I would come out here and practice our English homework, which thanks to Mrs. Thomlinson’s love of literature and Michelle’s nearly photographic memory of pre-1800 plays, was currently Shakespeare. We’d haul out a few of her dolls and re-enact the plays using them as props. If I ever got home, I figured I’d be able to surprise everyone by reciting ‘A Midsummer Night's Dream’ with dolls while using the proper accent.

Nathaniel was at the hedge maze, writing on a large piece of paper, while touching one of the bushes. I took off my sandals, and began stalking over to him, being as quiet as possible, staying on the rocks that made a meandering pathway through the rich, green grass. I could sneak up on almost anyone in the house, except for Michelle, who seemed to always know when someone came within a few meters of her, but outside it was a challenge for me to surprise the Neanderthal. Some of the researchers saw me, but they didn’t react, knowing the game we played on each other. I think they approved as it challenged us to learn more about our powers.

Noiselessly I got behind the bow legged boy, about poke him in the back, when he shifted to the side so I could see the paper he was working on. It was a map and there was a dot on it, with the words 'Hi Pat!' I took a few seconds and saw that the dot was when I had brushed some flowers with my tail about 20 meters back. He was getting good.

Everyone smiled, fortunately they were too professional to laugh. Nathaniel undoubtedly had an enormous grin as well, but he rarely laughed out loud at jokes that were at someone’s expense. He said that it was impolite. Graciously I stepped away, and found a nice patch of grass on the ground to wait until he was finished.

“Done,” he said a few minutes later. I got up to see what he’d been doing, while the researchers brought out another map, comparing the two. Each one was marked with dots. They were identical in every way. One of the researchers spoke into a radio, “Come back in, we’re done here.”

Nathaniel was standing there, looking way too full of himself. “I succeeded?” he asked in fairly understandable English. It still sounded more like singing with a lot of whistling especially with his vowels, but as long as he spoke slowly we could understand almost everything.

“It was perfect. How did you detect the furthest ones? We thought they’d be well out of your range,” one of the researchers asked.

“It was easy. The roots are so tight here, it’s like a festival dance. I just reached out and felt what didn’t feel right. Trying to match it to the map was harder.”

The man nodded in understanding. “Good work. It’s almost lunch time so go and have some fun, we’ll try to make this more challenging for you tomorrow.”

“I await your challenge,” he replied, waving both hands in a complicated downward gesture, which was his way of saying goodbye to adults. “How was your training Pat?”

We walked away from the researchers, and I rubbed my butt where the paintball had hit me. “Got shot in the ass and fell down a hole, but I was able to track a scent most of the way through a pitch black maze full of traps.”

He smiled at that bit of news. “I want to show you something.”

I watched as he closed his eyes and opened his hand. There was a strange smell that overpowered the roses surrounding us. My mouth started to water, and my knees went weak. My throat and chest began to vibrate as I purred. My nipples hardened, and a heat rose in my pelvis. I reached out for his hand, wanting to be closer to the smell.

The source of the smell disappeared, but I could still smell it in the air. A part of my mind regained enough control to panic. I jumped backwards about ten meters, to get away from the scent. Shaking my head, I jogged to a fountain and put my head into the water, trying to clear my foggy brain. The shock of the water did it, I could think clearly again. Shaking the water off, I glared at the boy. “What the hell was that?!”

He looked scared and his face was bright red. “I’m sorry Pat! I made the smell for catnip. I thought you would like it. I didn’t know it would do that. I wouldn’t have done it if I had. I am very sorry!”

“Promise me you’ll never do that again,” I demanded. I was shaking with fear, I’d felt like a different person, like a puppet.

“I promise. I just thought you would relax, like smelling vanilla or chocolate.” He looked like he was about to cry.

I breathed in the clean air. “It’s OK So how did you do that?” I asked, trying to get it back to something less scary.

“I smelled like a rose this morning when I was making a dying rose bush healthier. We researched and I can make plant chemicals on my skin. Any kind at all.”

Jesus, I thought, he was a walking drug lab. Or a great party guest. “That’s cool. So we can expect the gym to smell nicer when you work out, I suppose?”

The nervous tension slowly eased as we made our way back to the house for lunch, but I couldn’t shake the unnatural feeling. What new tricks did my body have waiting for me?

**

We both had to go to our rooms before lunch. Nathaniel wanted to change, and I need to dry my fur. My job was harder, and required a hair blower, so I told him to go down without me. About fifteen minutes later, I was ready to face the world again. Michelle was just leaving her room as I came out, dressed in a modern knee length skirt and blouse, it was still very conservative, but it didn’t hang off of her. Despite her dark skin she looked pale. “Are you alright Michelle?”

“Yes,” she said faintly, in her accented English. “I'm just tired after all the testing they had me do this morning. Once I eat I will feel better.”

I took her hand. Even though she thought my clothes were scandalous for anyone but a simple fisherman's wife, since she'd cried in my arms a week ago, I was the one she wanted to spend the most time with. Probably because I reminded her of her cat, and I was a girl who didn't look much older than she was. She'd confided in me that Christoph and Nathaniel scared her because they were so large. And with Pulam, he was nice and he liked to tell her stories, but they had very little in common except for being able to talk freely. She didn’t seem to mind his powers though, probably because she mostly spent time in his memories where the children could play with her. So I was her new best friend.

She liked to brush my fur while I could read a book or watched a movie that she wasn't interested in. As long as the movie wasn't too violent she'd sit quietly for an hour or two just brushing or petting me while I watched whatever I wanted. Having grown up with instant entertainment I couldn't figure out how she wasn't bored, but she insisted she didn't mind, it gave her time to think.

So I returned the favour, with the plays in the garden, and acting like a big sister. Now my instincts were letting me know something was wrong, but they weren't very helpful in telling me what it was.

“Want to fly?” I asked.

That brought a smile to her face. I picked her up, firmly grabbing her under the arms, and started racing down the hall holding her over my head. Michelle was laughing like a little girl as we ran past servants, doctors and soldiers who moved quickly out of the way. We'd done this often enough over the last few days that people knew to step aside when they heard her laughter.

We reached the stairs, but rather than taking them, I swung the girl into my arms, slowed just enough to make sure the foyer was clear and jumped over the side with a shout of “Look Out Below!” as Michelle shrieked in delight, her face pressed tightly into my shoulder. We hit the ground and my knees bent until I was practically sitting on the floor. I jumped forward keeping the momentum going so that my knees weren’t destroyed with such an abrupt stop, by the time we reached the dining room I was at a normal walking speed and Michelle was able to breath normally again.

Everyone was already there waiting for us. The table was laden down with hamburgers and hot dogs, boiled carrots, potatoes and corn, and a wide assortment of breads, juice and condiments. My mouth watered as I smelled the food. We'd discovered I couldn't taste sweets very well, so only the sweetest juice tasted good to me, everything else was like water. But the way I tasted fats, oils and salts more than made up for it, I could taste the hamburgers from across the room.

Once we sat down, Michelle and Pulam did their prayers, then Michelle connected our minds. We'd found there were different levels she could enter, the first time had been what we called full immersion, it was like a lucid dream and very hard on her. But there was another looser level, where we entered her mind, but we could still do simple things in the real world and talk to each other freely. Eating was OK, as long as you didn't mind spilling the occasional bit of food, so it was best to eat finger food, while doing this. We also couldn't travel through a memory. It was mostly used as a means to help everyone talk properly.

While the rest of us talked about what we’d done, and Nathaniel showed off his new trick, Michelle barely said a word. I also noticed that she only picked at her food. She didn’t eat much to begin with, especially compared the four of us, who were much more physical, but she only had one or two bites, before she pushed the plate away. I wanted to say something, but knowing her, the attention would just make her clam up even more. I’d need to find some time to talk to her privately. Which probably meant it would have to wait until after our shared English class.

This was turning into a really bad day.

**

Ms. Tomlinson sat across the table from Michelle and I, her wrinkled face seemed set in stone as we stumbled our way through act one, scene three of A Midsummer Nights Dream. Usually I was the one who made mistakes, but today Michelle was doing just as poorly as I was.

As we finished butchering Shakespeare, our tutor stood up, glaring fiercely. With her thin face, short straight hair, bony frame, thin lips, and black old fashioned dress, she looked like an old style teacher who came back From the dead to punish poor students, you expected her to either beat you with the pointer anytime you made a mistake if you were lucky or rip out your soul if she was feeling mean. Today seemed to be a rip out your soul kind of day.

"Pat, I expect you to make a mockery of the English language, but Michelle, you are usually my one delight of teaching. What is wrong with you today?" she asked.

"Sorry, Ma’am. I'm not feeling very well today," she answered.

"You have history this evening, correct?"

She shook her head. "No, Ma’am. Pat has history, I have arithmetic."

"Well go see the doctor before then. And if you have to go to bed, arithmetic can wait. If Mr. Hu complains tell him to talk to me," the old battle axe said.

"Yes, Ma’am. Thank you, Ma’am," Michelle said sounding as surprised as I felt.

Her face turned hard again. "Very well, you are both dismissed, but when I see you tomorrow, I expect you to be able to recite the assigned passages. Have a good day."

We said our goodbyes and headed back to our rooms. We usually had two classes in the afternoon and a third one in the evening. Michelle and I got off easier than the others since English was our native language and our dialects while different weren't difficult to understand unlike Nathaniel. Everyone else had to take a fourth class in languages, which according to Christoph was very boring. Poor Pulam only had English class and then he and Michelle worked with another instructor on learning about the modern world.

That combined with the examinations and tests in the morning, meant we were being kept too busy to really think. Which was actually a good thing, we didn't have much time to think about what we'd lost, and we were so tired by the end of the night we'd sleep pretty easily. There had only been one other night of drinking on the roof, and aside from some nightmares I was doing OK

The only person who seemed really happy was Christoph, he acted like a kid in a candy store every time we went outside or we did anything physical. I guess after spending so long hooked up to machines to survive, not having to worry about it was probably like a wonderful Christmas present. Lucky guy.

As we left the small study, I grabbed Michelle's hand. "Ok, what's wrong?"

"I'm just tired," she said.

I heard her heart beating faster, not a good sign. "You can tell me, shorty, I won't tell anyone."

She didn't answer me, just stared at the ground as we walked, playing with her long black braids. Even the use of her hated nickname didn't work. It was clearly time for something bigger.

I smiled as big as possible. "I know what it is. You have a boyfriend. It’s Nathaniel isn’t it? He’s only fifteen, he’s the perfect age for you. And he’s sssooo handsome.”

"I am not," she gasped. Her old fashion ideas of dignity thoroughly insulted.

I let go of her hand and skipped ahead of her, my tail held high "Michelle has a boyfriend. I think we should celebrate, we can have a cake and ice cream. You and Nathaniel will have the place of honour, and you'll have to kiss of course. It's a very big thing when a girl gets her first boyfriend."

If looks could kill I would have exploded on the spot. Fortunately she didn't have that power, so I was safe. "If you'll tell me what's wrong, I promise I won't say anything."

"Fine, let's go outside for a walk," she said.

**

We sat by the pond to watch the ducks and enjoy the warm sun. Michelle still marveled at how warm it was, and I'd discovered that I like the sun as well. Despite the fur, the sun just made me feel better even if I got hot more easily. We sat in silence for a bit, I was content to let her build up the courage to talk.

Finally we went into her mind. Strangely we weren't at her home or one of her usual spots, we were in one of the training rooms. Unlike the training rooms for everyone else, which were very physically oriented, this was plain. There were comfortable chairs, pleasant paintings, a small bed, large throw pillows and candles. It smelled nice to.

"This is where you practice?" I asked.

"Yes. It's meant to be calming. To help me concentrate," she said, sitting down on a pillow.

There was a long silence, as she stared at nothing. "What happened today?"

"Th- they made me me do something. They made me do something I didn't want to try, something bad," she said, I saw tears welling up in her eyes.

I noticed that she was staring at the bed. Claws popped out, my throat vibrated in a silent growl and my tail started to slash from side to side. "What did they do?"

"They made me change a memory," she whispered.

"What?"

"They had a soldier come in and lay down on the bed. I entered his mind and we went to a childhood memory, it was about him playing with his dog. He loved that dog," she said. "Dr. Francesca, asked him all kinds of questions about the dog, and we kept seeing all these happy memories. Then I was told to remove one memory of the dog. Not an important one, just a walk through a park. I didn't want to, but it seemed OK, they told me it was OK The soldier didn't know what I was going to do. So I pushed the dog. I told it to go away, to go home. It hurt at first, it didn't want to go. But finally there was a pop and it walked away into the bushes."

Damn, I thought, she could change memories. Her powers no longer seemed so harmless. "Well you just changed one memory, that's not bad. You need to find out what you can do, so you don't do something by accident."

She was crying. "You don't understand. After I did it, we went to the other memories, but they were all changed. He was by himself walking through a park, he slept alone curled up under the blankets during thunderstorms, he went hunting without anyone to talk too. The beautiful black dog who had been his best friend was gone, as if it didn't exist! When he left he wasn't smiling and joking like he had been. He glared at me like he wanted to kill me. He didn't know what I'd done, but he knew I'd hurt him." She ran over, throwing her arms around me. "I don't want this power, it's evil! And I'm evil to for doing that!"

I stroked her hair, trying to make sense of it all. Could she create memories like she could remove them? Could it happen by accident? She could remove memories that drove a person crazy, but she might be able to add them as well, or take away a memory that kept a person stable. Jesus, she was powerful. "It's OK Now that you know what you can do, you just have to avoid it. You did something bad, but it was an accident. Accidents happen, and you didn't kill anyone, so it will be OK," I whispered in her ear.

"What if they make me do it again? Dr. Francesca talked about getting more subjects to try it on. I don't want to do it again!"

"Don't worry. I'll talk to Mr. Stephenson tonight and tell him you aren't going to do that test again. If they try tell them no and come get me." I tried to sound tough, "Between me, and the guys we can keep you safe. And we'll protect you."

"Really?"

"Really. You're like the good little sister I never had, I won't let anything bad happen to you," I said giving her a squeeze.

She held onto me for a while longer, wiping he runny nose on my shirt a few times, making me glad this was all a dream and not real. As we sat there I tried to think what I would say to Mr. Stephenson.

Chapter 8

I tried to think about the best way to talk to Mr. Stephenson, he seemed like an OK guy, but very busy. He’d stop by to ask us either individually or as a group how things were going, but unless it was something he considered really important, he would pass us onto one of his assistants and head back to his office after listening for a few minutes. I used to always hate talking to my teachers or even worse the principal, I always thought they’d know one of the many things I’d done wrong and call my parents. But talking to a government official who might possibly be able to order you thrown into an even more secretive military lab for dissection, that made the whole intimidation factor about a thousand times worse.

So my stomach was doing belly flops as I knocked on the door to his office. Really only the memory of Michelle crying and calling herself evil kept me from bolting. I’d known her for just over a week, but I’d grown to like her and not just because we were all in this weird story together. His secretary told me to come in. Hesitantly I stepped inside, the secretary a very stern looking woman looked up from a computer that covered most of her desk, “How can I help you?”

“I need to speak to Mr. Stephenson, please. It’s important.”

“Please sit down and wait. He’s in the middle of an important phone call right now.”

I sat down and started playing with my tail. It was a nervous habit I’d picked up since I didn’t have a phone to play with while I waited. It was better than twiddling my thumbs. After what seemed like an hour, but according to the clock was only ten minutes, I was let into the office. I’d never been in it before, the walls were lined with pictures of Mr. Stephenson meeting a variety of people. I didn’t know most of them. Although I did recognize the president of the URA, his face was in the front of every textbook, and hung in every office. The picture of the president and Mr. Stephenson shaking hands had a place of honour in the middle of his wall.

“Please sit down, Pat,” he said, motioning to a chair. “How can I help you?”

I cleared my throat, trying to work some spit into my suddenly dry mouth. “I have a problem. Well actually Michelle has a problem. She doesn’t like some of the tests her doctor is running on her.”

A look of concern came to his face. “What exactly is wrong with the tests?”

“This morning she removed a mans’ memory. She didn’t want to, but Dr. Francesca insisted. Now he’s talking about trying it out again. She’s really unhappy about it,” I finished lamely.

“I’m sure Dr. Francesca has only her best interests in mind. We need to learn what all of your limits are if we’re to find a way to return you to normal, and avoid any accidents.”

I took a deep breath. “She was crying on my shoulder a few minutes ago, calling herself evil. You know she can do it now, that’s enough.”

He tapped his chin, studying me closely. I forced myself not to hunch down or squirm under his gaze. “Very well. I will inform Dr. Francesca this evening that this area of research is completed. We don’t want to hurt or distress any of you, more than you already have been. Thank you for bringing this to my attention Pat. Is there anything else?”

I shook my head, not quite believing that it was that easy. “No. Thank you, sir.”

Mr. Stephenson walked me to the door. “Remember if you or anyone else has any concerns, don’t hesitate to come to me. It’s what I’m here for.”

I thanked him again and made my escape.

**

At dinner, I got to see Mr. Stephenson again. We were just starting to dig into a wonderful salmon when he stepped into the dining room. “Michelle can we enter your mind?” he asked.

Almost instantly we were in her mind, waiting to see what he had to say. “Thank you. Everyone tomorrow we are going to have some visitors come by to see how everything is going. They are aides for various military and government officials, who will ask you questions, watch you train, and then we’ll have official banquet for dinner. That means it’s a black tie event, so you will have to dress up formally,” he said looking at me.

I could understand his look, although I really didn’t appreciate it. All the boys had dressed up in what they considered nice styles at least once or twice, mostly on the first day of meeting their teachers. Christoph seemed to take special pleasure in looking nice when he wasn’t fooling around or training and wore a nice pair of trousers and a button up shirt almost all the time. Michelle always wore clothes that at worst could be called old fashioned, she also worked on her hair religiously making sure it was in place, with nice hair pieces and braids. Then there was me. I combed my fur two or three times a day but that was mostly for comfort. I also wore shorts and t-shirts or loose jeans, track pants and my sundress. The nicer dresses and skirts Samantha had given me were collecting dust in the wardrobe. I wasn't anywhere close to hot anymore, so there was no reason to dress up in the nicer outfits, they just reminded me of what I wasn't.

I nodded meekly.

“Don’t worry about anything they just want to get to know you a little and see how everything is going. Just act normally and it will be fine.” We all nodded, none of us really had any questions. “Ok, thank you for your time, and remember if you have any problems come talk to me, my door is always open.”

With that he left us to our supper.

“Why do they want to watch us?” Michelle asked.

“Look at this house, the personnel, the equipment. We must be costing a lot of money. They want to see if we are worth it,” Christoph said.

Pulam looked thoughtfully at the table. “What will happen if they are not happy?”

“I have no idea.”

“I wonder how many people will be here? I don't really want a lot of people watching me,” I said.

“Don't worry about it, Pat. You will be much... cooler than me. All I can do is talk to plants and make a few chemicals,” Nathaniel said, patting my arm encouragingly.

“Great!” I said, trying my best to sound enthusiastic. Sure I liked showing off around friends, but I'd never really liked being in front of a lot of people. And these guys were going to be deciding our future, or telling whoever was in charge of our future about us. If we screwed up it could destroy everything. At the very least they might separate us. The thought of being stuck alone in a single room with only guards and doctors to talk to made me shiver. I wasn't happy right now, but given the alternatives, it was about the best I could hope for. At least I liked everyone here.

I stayed quiet as everyone else tried to guess what would happen in the morning.

**

The next day started off normally, but once we headed off for training it went downhill. I was hoping to get another chance at the maze. It was kind of cool and a heck of a challenge trying to learn how to use all of my senses. It wasn’t nice getting a paintball in the butt, but other than that, it was awesome. I also think the cat in me was coming out. I was purring at the smells, and stalking just like a cat. I wasn’t sure how to feel about that. It was freaky when my body seemed to take control without my brain consciously doing anything, but that was good because if I did think too much, I wouldn’t be able to do all the jumps and moves I was now capable of.

And I was showing off a lot of moves that morning.

Unfortunately I wasn’t doing anything complicated. We were outside at an obstacle course, and I was showing how high, how far, and how quickly I could jump. After you’ve jumped about twenty or thirty meters straight up trying catch a Frisbee and throw it accurately while upside down, just trying to go for height is boring. After the twentieth time of being asked to jump in yet another way, I took a swipe out of a nearby post.

“Pat what is your problem?!” Frank yelled at me in his best drill instructor voice, while the aides looked at me nervously and talked amongst themselves.

“This is boring! We’ve already got all of this on tape, why don’t we show them what I can really do?” I complained.

“This is the program we were asked to go through, so you will follow it.”

A woman wearing an expensive looking suit came up. “Excuse me. Pat what do you think would be a good way to demonstrate your powers?”

I was too annoyed with the situation to be nervous, so I told her. “Lets see me in action. Don’t just have me jumping and lifting weights, give me a challenge not stuff they do in gym class.”

She turned to Frank, “I think the young lady has a point. Apparently some of her companions feel the same way. So lets see what we can do to liven things up.”

Fifteen minutes later I was running across the field trying to catch three frisbees' thrown by soldiers that were nowhere near each other. I dived about ten meters to catch the first before it hit the ground, rolling to my feet, tossing it back with barely a glance. The second one was really high, too high even for me to jump. Instead I jumped to the top of one of the bars they’d set up for me to climb, and then with the extra fifteen meters jumped at least forty five meters high, barely catching the Frisbee on a claw. I sent it back with a quick backhand. My knees ached when I hit the ground, but I didn’t let that stop me, the last Frisbee was about to land. My claws ripped up the grass as I ran on all fours to catch it. I caught it as it started to brush the grass. To show off I did a back flip and threw the Frisbee at the soldier. Looking down I realized my shorts and shirt were badly stained, I was breathing a little hard to, but the observers looked impressed.

Before I realized it the frisbee’s were back in the air. With a smile I ran to catch them.

**

After lunch, we didn’t have class, instead we were once again in the yard. Large mats had been placed on the grass, Pulam, Christoph, Nathaniel and I were wearing a variety of clothes. Nathaniel and I were in tight wrestling outfits. Pulam was wearing shorts, and Christoph was wearing metal. Literally he was geared up in what we called his power armour. He stood almost three meters tall, metal plates covered his body, like a big, bulky robot, even his head was covered with something like a football helmet. He could have made spines and needles, but this was a friendly match, so he avoided those.

Michelle was not taking part, she was sitting with the observers practically jumping up and down with excitement and talking to some of them. I think every camera and recording device in the house was placed around the impromptu ring. It had been decided that Nathanial and Pulam would fight first, and then Christoph and myself. My claws and strength made it too likely I’d hurt someone without armour, and it would be very difficult for Pulam or Nathaniel to do anything against Christoph without going for his eyes. We would also fight second, because everyone was pretty sure that by the time we were done, there wouldn’t be much left of the area.

Pulam stepped to the center of the mat, his skin rippled as muscles bulged outwards. His legs and arms became longer making him look a little like a monkey or spider. He held his open hands in front of him, palms outward, like he knew how to fight. Nathaniel did some stretches, and faced off with his hands in large fists keeping his head low, a little like a boxer. I really had no idea who would win. As a Neanderthal, Nathaniel was really strong, not as strong as Christoph or I, but against anyone who wasn’t a professional body builder he had the edge. With the sun shining down, his powers also gave him a boost, he simply had more endurance and energy than he did while inside. But Pulam had a lot of muscle himself, and his ability to extend and bulk up his body almost instantly was a pretty big advantage. That they both knew how to fight made it even more uncertain.

They nodded to each other, and the referee dropped his arm starting the fight. There weren’t many rules, no gouging, no breaking bones on purpose, and if someone went limp the fight stopped.

Nathaniel moved in swinging. Pulam pushed the fist to the side, stepping backwards. His foot lashed out, aiming for Nathaniels’ knee. The stocky boy seemed to do a pirouette avoiding it, managing to get closer to Pulam at the same time. I flinched at the sound of fist hitting flesh. Pulam jumped back, holding his arm against his ribs protectively. Already a nasty bruise was forming

The Neanderthal didn’t wait for him to recover, pushing his advantage. Pulam used his long arms to land a punch on Nathaniels' head. A third arm extended from his stomach, It looked like three arms and fists combined into one. It hit Nathaniel’s chest like a pile driver, sending him to his knees. Pulam jumped on top of him, arms and legs extended from his body seemingly at random, grabbing, punching and hitting nerve points. It looked like the fight was over. Nathaniel was covering his head, trying to only use his legs to get away. It wasn’t going to happen.

The ref stepped up about to stop the fight, when Pulam suddenly jumped away, yelling and almost certainly cursing. His skin was red and little blisters were forming all over. Nathaniel stood up bruised and battered, his own skin looked oily. A medic came running over. “It’s poison ivy!” Nathaniel shouted. The medic snapped on a pair of gloves and quickly led Pulam into the house to be cleaned off. Nathaniel followed stripping out of his oily clothes as he did. The fight had lasted about a minute.

“I’m glad I wasn’t fighting him,” I told Christoph. He just nodded.

“Ok, you guys step up,” Frank said. “Remember no killing each other, and avoid the audience.”

We didn’t bother going onto the mat. We were going to fight a little farther away. “Ready?” I asked, standing just out of arms reach.

He slapped his metal chest. “Oh yeah.”

“Go!” Frank yelled from well back.

Christoph charged me, swiping the air with his giant arms, tipped with three blunt fingers. I leapt over his head. If I was going to win, I couldn’t let him get a hit on me. He spun around, with a lot more grace then something his size should have. Ducking another blow I ran between his legs, he stepped backwards trying to see what I was doing. As he raised his foot, I grabbed it and lifted, he toppled over with a bone jarring crash. Grabbing the metal plate on his leg, I started pulling. He rolled, kicking at me at the same time, his foot looked about as big as me. I jumped at the same time the kick connected. It hurt, but nothing broke, and with the adrenaline going it wasn’t slowing me down.

He rolled to his feet, his armour plating hung loose, but I could see it moving back into position. He was faster than I thought. I ran at him, keeping low, focusing on his damaged leg. Christoph’s hand got wider as metal from his arm flowed like water to turn it into a metal net. It was all about timing. He swung down, I jumped up.

Landing on his shoulders, my claws dug into the gaps of his armour. One hand grabbed his helmet and ripped it off with a screech of metal. I didn’t get a chance to do anything else. I saw panic in his eyes. A hand grabbed my tail and tossed me through the air. I yowled. It felt like my tail was going to rip off. I flew about forty or fifty meters, almost hitting the observers. Ignoring their screams of fright, letting myself roll along the ground, rather than risk hurting myself by stopping suddenly, I was off again charging the metal man. I hissed at him, and noticed my fur was rising. It felt natural so I went with it.

I saw that one of his arms was looking quite a bit thinner then the other. The hand was larger made for grabbing, but something in my mind told me to go for it. Letting instinct take over, I hunched low to the ground, running on all fours. Christoph saw me coming and braced himself, his smaller, thicker arm in front of his face, his longer arm ready to snag me out of the air. He waited until almost the last second before making a grab for me. I did the last thing he expected and slid under the fingers, my whiskers actually brushed the metal fingers, we were so close.

My arms circled his wrist, I almost got whiplash as I went up into the air. Using the momentum I swung around, clamping my legs around his arm. Grabbing the base of his hand I wrenched it upwards, using my own body as a fulcrum. My shoulders hurt and my hands went numb, but even before he could stop his swing, the hand was broken, hanging by only a few centimeters of metal. Then I had to jump away again as his other arm came down to swat me like a bug.

I was breathing hard by this point, and Christophs’ armour was looking pretty beat up. We watched each other, trying to regroup. “Ready to quit?” I shouted.

“You haven’t hurt me yet! But you are bruised!” he called back.

He was right, my ribs were starting to hurt, and my tail still felt like it had almost been pulled off. He dropped his broken hand to the ground, little tentacles came out of the stump. He charged me, and I ran away, heading for a copse of trees. I leaped into the tree’s, and kept going, while Christoph battered his way through the low branches looking for me. I waited for him to get into just the right place, and silently jumped at his head. Somehow tentacles caught me, wrapping around my body and legs a blunt spike rested against my throat. But he hadn’t counted on my momentum. My hand was on his face, claws poked his skin.

“I won!” we both shouted at the same time.

At that moment Frank and some other soldiers came up running. “I believe we can call this a tie,” he said.

Chapter 9

I walked into the infirmary nursing my ribs, walking stiffly because my spine was starting to feel like it had been stretched out an extra couple of inches, and saw Pulam and Nathaniel being looked after. Pulam’s body was well scrubbed, and a nurse was coating him in an ointment that smelled awful, he had a smile on his face despite the blisters and the way he twitched as his rashes were touched. He pointed at Nathaniel and then himself, “Good fight?” I just nodded while lowering my stretchy top, revealing a sports bra so the doctor could look at the bruise.

Nathaniel was getting stitches put on a nasty cut over his eye, his green skin was a blotchy black colour where he was bruised. “Who won your fight?”

“Tie. I got my claws around his head, but he caught me in some tentacles and had a spike to my throat. His armour is tough.”

He smiled, “I wish I could have seen that. It must have been better than my own easy trick.”

“It was actually pretty cool. We can watch the video later. But don’t be too hard on yourself they declared you the winner. They said Pulam is the better fighter but you thought on your feet.”

He blushed, his cheeks turning a reddish green, but nodded at the compliment.

Further conversation was cut off as the doctor guided me to a separate room for some reason and then started parting my fur to get a better look at my bruise, making sure nothing was broken. While that was happening, the well-dressed observer who had recommended making the day more challenging, came in. Turning to the doctor she asked, “May I ask Pat some questions?” When he nodded, she smiled at me. “I must say you were very impressive out there Pat. We saw your agility and knew how strong you were, but it was still a remarkable achievement seeing you do so well against Christoph.”

“Thanks,” I said, not sure what else to say.

“Have you thought about what you want to do while you’re here?” she asked.

I shrugged. “I thought we’d just stay here until we found some way to fix this or send us home.”

“Well it hasn't even been two weeks, and our best researchers are studying the results, but the estimates all say it will take years to discover what happened to you and how. We are still developing the theories to even discover how the most basic changes work. In your own case, we know you were melded to your house cat in some way. But the mass difference should have left you at most with some minor changes, instead your DNA was completely rewritten in a way that kept it viable. Our geneticists, who are quite good, are split between ripping out their hair trying to understand how that happened and jumping for joy at the possibilities.” She paused to let that sink in.

My stomach sank, and my ears drooped a little. I knew that we weren’t going to have some quick fix like you saw on tv. I’d woken up from enough nightmares, and then spent a few hours staring at the ceiling, thinking about that. But to hear it laid out so plainly, that was hard. “So we probably won’t be going home for a long time?”

She patted my hand. “Probably not. I’m sorry, but you have to look at things realistically.”

“What happens now?” I asked in a faint voice.

“You are all very special people, who have incredible powers. There are situations where you could put your powers to good use.”

“Like a group of superheroes?”

“Yes,” she said without any hesitation. “There are disasters where you could help people, when getting heavy equipment and large groups of rescuers is not possible in the time required. Also there have been situations similar to yours, that have not ended so well. Animals, and even people who have come from other dimensions with unique powers who have proven resistant to regular means of combat without risking a large amount of collateral damage.”

She couldn’t be serious, we were teenagers. “We’re not exactly trained for any of that. What exactly can we do to help?”

Reaching into her shoulder bag, she pulled out a file folder. “This was the village of Green Springs in the Carolina District. A day after you arrived, a woman washed up on shore, when paramedics went to help her she attacked using watery blasts. By the time the District Militia arrived she had surrounded herself in a wave of water that was six meters high and capable of putting out a jet of water that could disable armoured cars.” She showed me a series of photo’s of a small town that looked run down but peaceful enough. Then it showed a woman wearing a wet suit, water was shooting from her hands. Blurry photo’s of people being knocked down by a wall of water rushing down the street, houses collapsing as jets of water crashed through walls, something similar to a Humvee overturned and dented and the woman in what could only be described as a wave laughing. “We were forced to level the village after evacuating less than one hundred of the five hundred and thirty inhabitants. The rest were drowned. We aren’t sure if we killed her, wounded her, or if she escaped.”

I picked up one of the photo’s taken from a plane, showing the place where the town used to be. It was rubble, without a single building standing. “What could we have done to stop that?”

“It took six hours to stop the massacre. We had almost no warning, and if she hadn’t taken the time to torture a number of the civilians we would have been too late to even try to stop her. When the soldiers did arrive they had to use our strongest non-nuclear weapons, simply to stop her. You and the others could have been there in two hours, with support, and you would have had the chance to save hundreds of people.”

“But we’re kids,” I insisted. “What could we do against someone like this?”

“I’m not sure,” the woman admitted. “Maybe seeing some of you would calm her down enough to listen to reason. Before she created the water armour, you or Pulam could use your agility to knock her out or possibly kill her. Christoph’s armour would keep him from being knocked down as easily as our armoured cars. He can also seal his armour to be waterproof and attack her hand to hand. Nathaniel could produce a toxin on the fly that would affect her even inside her water armour. Michelle could enter her mind and reason with her or force her to stop fighting. What you do depends on the situation, but having five people with your powers able to help, might have saved the lives of over four hundred people.”

“I-” I needed time to think. “I really don’t know. This isn’t… anything that I had thought of doing.”

She seemed to understand, patting my hand once more. “We understand this is a lot to ask. You aren’t a citizen, you aren’t even from our dimension, you are all very young, and we are asking you to risk your lives to help us. Please believe me that we wouldn’t be asking this if there was a better alternative, however unless we want to risk destroying more towns and possibly even cities whenever someone or something from another dimension comes to our world, there isn’t one. We will discuss this with everyone as a group tomorrow morning, but you have the closest ties to everyone in the group, and we thought it best to talk to you first.”

“Really?” I asked, honestly surprised that they thought I was so important. “I think Christoph or Michelle are closer to everyone. I mean I can’t even talk to Pulam without Michelle’s help.”

“Believe me, you are,” she insisted. “So I’d like you to consider this, if you say no it won’t affect anything. But if you do try, it will make a difference in more lives then you can imagine.”

“Ok, I promise to think about it, and we’ll see what everyone says tomorrow.”

With a thank you the woman left. As I was leaving with a clean bill of health, I noticed one of the photo’s she’d shown me had fallen from her folder, it was a picture of a mother and her baby water logged and drowned.

Subtle, I thought. But I couldn’t shake the sickening feeling it left me with as I went to change for supper.

**

I’d been hoping that I’d be fairly relaxed or at least tired for the banquet, that was about the only way I figured I’d be able to get through having to meet so many important people. But now that I knew they wanted us to be some kind of Teen Titans, I couldn’t stop thinking about how absurd the situation was. We weren’t trained to fight, the most we had done was play fight a bit. Sure we had special powers, but that didn’t make us soldiers or anything. Tomorrow when they told everyone we could just say no, no one would want to be part of it. Well maybe Christoph, he seemed pretty gung-ho to take on any chance to do something risky. But Michelle certainly wouldn’t, and Pulam was too sensible. I wasn’t sure about Nathaniel, he would probably go with the majority. That would be OK

There was nothing to worry about.

So why couldn’t I stop thinking about it?

I was saved from those thoughts when Michelle came running up, wearing a beautiful floor length baby blue gown. It glittered in the light, and while it covered her shoulders reaching up to her neck, the arms were bare. With the little diamond tiara sitting on her thick, curly hair, she looked like a Disney princess. She had a bit of makeup, making her lips a little shinier, there was a bit of purple under her eyes, and the little bit of acne on her cheeks was covered up. She also had some sparkling nail gloss on, which added just the right amount of glamour to her look. She looked cute. From the look in her eyes, it was now my turn, and she was happy to help out.

I was jealous, there was no way I could dress up like her in this body. We reached my room and the knee length black dress was on the bed already. I tried to picture myself in it with my black and white tail. I couldn't do it. I kept seeing my old body, smiling without any fangs, getting ready for the prom.

Michelle saw me frowning. “Is it alright? I think it looks very pretty, and most of the women are are wearing dresses like it.”

“It's fine. I just... I just wish... It's fine. Lets see how it looks on me.

I went to the bathroom and had a quick shower. My fur was covered in grass, and I was a little smelly from sweat. Surprisingly my bruised ribs where already feeling better. After ten minutes with hot water loosening the cramped muscles, I could move normally with only a tiny ache.

The next half hour was spent with two hair blowers and combs going over my fur with Michelle's help. It was odd trying to slip on a tight dress with a tail. The tiny zipper at the back started just above my tail, leaving a small hole to slip the annoying thing through. Getting everything in place wasn't the easiest, I had to squirm a bit to make get my fur comfortable. But once everything was in place, I had to admit it fit well, whoever had designed it was really good.

Since there wasn't a full length mirror in my room we had to go to Michelle's, and for the first time since being arrested I saw my entire body in the mirror.  My white fur stood out in stark contrast to the black fabric, while my black fur seemed to blend into the colouring, giving it a strange appearance of chaotic elegance. The black dress itself, didn't have any gems, glitter or even embroidery, yet it didn't look plain, it had a simple elegance to it, as if telling the world I was good enough and didn't need any fancy things. It showed off my figure, making it look better than it really was, without looking painted on.

I looked good.

Well I looked good if you liked cat girls.

I tried to smile, my fangs made it look like I wanted to drink someones blood. It also made my nose wrinkle. Cat’s don’t do much with their faces, so my muscles were locked up a lot more tightly than you’d find with a regular human face. Damn this was going to be hard.

“You look so nice Pat!” Michelle said.

Blinking my irritated eyes, I turned to her with a non-toothy smile. “You think so?”

“Oh yes! I wish I could look that good. You should be able to get a dance very easily with Christoph.”

“Dancing! With Christoph!”

She nodded. “Of course. This is the perfect time to start courting. You are always talking to each other, back home your mothers would be discussing the future arrangements already.”

Thank god I couldn’t blush. “Where we’re from, guys and girls talk like that all the time, it just means we’re friends, nothing more. Believe me.”

“It must get confusing. How do men and women act around each other when there aren’t any rules or standards?”

“Uh. Well, we have rules and things. But it’s more about… um. We just try to treat each other nicely and… and… it just works!”

She shook her head in confusion, but fortunately dropped the subject. She took a wide piece of masking tape and started removing some loose furs from the dress, while I fussed with my fur. As we worked, I thought about what it would be like to dance with Christoph. We got along great, I had a lot more in common with him than anyone else here. And he was handsome, especially the way his eyes lit up when he was laughing. Back home, I'd have definitely drooled over him at school from a distance, along with every other girl.

But he wasn't the problem. I was. Once we left this place, he could have any girl he wanted, they'd throw themselves at him. What chance did I have with him? I wasn't even human anymore, dating me was practically bestiality.

It was better not to think about it. We were friends and that was good enough for me.

What came next surprised me.

Michelle grabbed me, pushing me towards a makeup table that was covered in more makeup than I had back home. I hadn't worried about makeup at all since the change. What could I do when I had fur all over my face. As she pulled out a bag of new makeup I had to ask. “What exactly can we do with makeup? It doesn't exactly go well on fur.”

“You're lips aren't furry,” she told me. It sounded like she was talking to a child. “Since most of your face is white, I think a pale peach is best. Just to enhance your lips.”

I put it on, and looking at myself in the mirror it did help. Michelle was busy holding earrings up against my head, looking at me with a critical eye. I still had my studs in, I didn't think they looked very good on my huge ears, but they were from home, and I didn't want to lose them. But the girl was holding up real diamonds and jewels that looked almost as expensive as my moms' car.

As I stared at the jewelry trying to figure out how much it all cost, Michelle made her decision. “Here, these will go best with your dress.” She handed me a pair of diamond stud earrings, that were fairly small, but had a beautifully cut diamond in the center, ringed by sixteen smaller diamonds, held together by white gold. Very gently I took out my earrings and put the new ones on. They glittered in the light. I was afraid to move my head, thinking about how much they would cost to replace.

“How did you become so good with makeup?” I asked my friend as she looked at a row of bottles. The way she was eyeing me, and choosing just the right things made her look like a professional makeup artist.

Grabbing my hand, actually pushing my claws out to get a better look at them, she answered me almost absentmindedly. “My mother has been teaching me since I was ten. I’m still too young for most decorations, but as soon as I turn fourteen I’ll be able to make up myself as well as anyone. Without looking like a dockside girl or a clown.”

Well that made sense. “I don't think we'll find any nail polish that goes well with cat claws.”

She clucked in irritation. “Your right. It’s a shame. But I was given some glitter that I think would look very nice. I was just hoping we could have the same colours,” she said, showing off her glittering nails.

That could work. I held out my hand, letting the expert get to work.

**

We got downstairs about fifteen minutes before supper was suppose to start, There were about three dozen people there, all the observers, the doctors, scientists, administrators, and a few of the people in charge of our training. As we stepped inside all eyes turned to us, mostly me. I locked me knees and had to resist the urge to kick off my black ankle strapped sandals and bolt. A few of the observers came over looking eager to talk.

“Hello you two. We’d almost decided to send out a rescue mission to find you,” a man said, engulfing my hand in his.

“Sorry, we had to get cleaned up after the fight today,” I said, trying to sound more confident than I felt.

“Well don’t worry, that was one of the more impressive things I’ve seen in my life. You have quite a lot of fight in you, I respect that.”

He put his hand on my shoulder and guided me off into the banquet hall, which I’d never actually visited. I saw that two women had taken Michelle in the opposite direction. I gave her a 'please help me look', but she was in her element, talking away.

The man didn't notice my look, and kept talking. “Did you do any military training in your world?”

“No. ”

“That’s a shame, your country is missing out on your talents. But their lose is our gain, I suppose. My name is Mr. Brown.” He still hadn't moved his hand, and actually got a little closer.

“Thanks, Mr. Brown.” I started looking around for someone to rescue me.

He saw me looking around. “Oh you must be thirsty. Do you drink?”

After the hangover I'd gotten from drinking with Pulam and Nathaniel had left me puking for half the morning, I was really over alcohol for the rest of my life. “Not really.”

“Shame, your friends Nathaniel and Pulam appear to be able to handle a bit of wine.”

I shrugged, hoping he'd get the hint and move his hand. “I was told with my new biology, if I drink very much I could get poisoned. It’s better not to risk it.”

That made him pause. “Well I can see how that would put a damper on having a little bit of wine. Don’t worry we have plenty of other things to drink.” He waved at a passing server, finally moving his hand. “A Roy Rodgers for the girl, and a whiskey for me please.”

Taking the opportunity I put a bit of space between us, even as curiosity made me ask, “A Roy Rodgers?”

He smiled, happy to explain, and fortunately not putting his hand back on me. “Cola, grenadine syrup, and a cherry on top. Too sweet for me, but it’s good if you want to avoid alcohol without looking out of place. What do you think of everything so far?”

“We all appreciate the help we’ve gotten. It’s very generous,” I told him honestly.

He nodded, but he suddenly didn’t look all that happy. I wasn’t sure if I’d answered wrong, maybe he was expecting more, or maybe he thought they were being too generous. “Yes it is. We are investing a lot into all of you. With everything else we need to do some people are starting to wonder if it’s worthwhile.”

I didn’t know if I was suppose to say anything. Or even what I could say. It wasn’t like we had asked them to do this. He kept talking, “Don’t worry, don’t worry. We won’t throw you out into the cold. We have some big plans for you, you won’t be bored here for much longer.”

Our drinks came back at that point, and I gratefully took the chance to turn my attention to something else. The drink was sweet even for me, if I’d had my regular taste buds it probably would have been almost undrinkable. “Ah I see your sparring partner is trying to catch your eye. I’ve held you long enough, Pat. It was a pleasure meeting you.”

With that he was gone, and Christoph was coming over, he looked good in his tux, but I was pretty sure if he stretched his shoulders he’d tear his coat. I’d never been so glad to see someone in my whole life. “How is the party going for you?”

He looked at me with a smile, his eyes eventually reaching mine. “Interesting. Everyone is asking me what it feels like to use my powers. How this world compares to mine. And what I plan to do in the future. Yourself?”

“They want to make us into superheroes,” I told him quietly.

His eyes widened. “Really?”

“Yes, they’ll tell everyone about it tomorrow. And I think I was just warned that if we said no they won't be very happy about it.”

He took a sip of his wine. “That is interesting. Not good, but I can understand them wanting us to help out.”

“Any idea what we should do?”

He shrugged. “Wait. See what they have to say. Then decide.”

Mr. Stephenson picked that moment to tap his glass. “If everyone can please be seated, supper is about to be served.”

A server came over and motioned for Christoph and I to follow him. Christoph held out his arm for me. Trying not to smile too widely I took it. I knew he was just being nice, but it felt nice holding him. He was solid, even if the rest of the world seemed ready to change just as I was getting my feet under me. I saw Michelle beaming at us as we walked together.

We were seated together at a large round table with some high level officials, the lower level observers were seated at smaller tables around the hall. Everyone else was served a salad with a bit chicken cut up into it, mine was almost entirely chicken with a few pieces of lettuce for colour. Mr. Stephenson once again stood up, tapping his glass for attention. “Before we begin, I would like to thank everyone for coming to see the work we have done here. I realize that this has all been rather unexpected, but I’m sure you’ll all agree this is a most interesting and beneficial endeavor. And I would like to thank the five young people who have worked with us so eagerly, despite everything that has happened. A toast to Pulam, Christoph, Pat, Nathaniel, and Michelle.”

Everyone raised their glasses to us, I smiled and watched as my friends looked as unsure of what to do as I did. I decided to copy Michelle and duck my head in embarrassment, although she seemed more happy then embarrassed. The toast done I grabbed my fork and started eating, hoping people wouldn’t talk to me.

The dinner went better than I had hoped. There was talking, but Michelle, Nathaniel and surprisingly Pulam did most of it. I hadn’t realized at first, but the person sitting beside Pulam was a translator. So Pulam was having a lively conversation about his country and beliefs with three others. Nathaniel was comparing movies and how they were made with a young woman. Michelle was laughing at funny anecdotes and stories from at least half the table, somehow keeping the stories coming with only a few comments. Christoph and myself were happy to remain in the background, not being used to this type of party.

I was listening to everyone else talk, I didn’t really notice what we were eating, but by the time we got to the desert a fruit salad with ice cream, I was exhausted. Unable to stop myself I was yawning pretty badly. “Are you tired already? It’s not even eight o’clock.” Someone whose name I couldn’t place asked.

“Sorry, with everything I did today, I’m a little tired,” I said.

“Pierce, it’s perfectly understandable,” another man said. “If I had to fight a giant robot after spending the morning running around, I would have refused to come to dinner. Pat, I hope you had a wonderful time, today was most interesting. And I’m sure I stand for everyone when I say we won’t hold it against you if you want to leave early.”

“Thank you very much. I hope to see all of you again soon,” I said standing up.

Christoph stood up as well. “If you will excuse me. Today was tiring for me as well.”

We both left, Christoph again insisting on offering me his arm. As soon as we were out of the banquet hall, I dropped it and let out a huge sigh. “I’m so glad that’s over.”

“I think it was nice,” he said. “I liked the company.”

“You barely said two words in there.”

He smiled at me, blushing sweetly. “They weren't the company I was talking about.”

My face heated up. This couldn't be happening. “I-I had a good time to.”

His large hand slipped around mine, squeezing it tightly. “You should dress up more often. It makes you look very pretty.”

I felt my tail rising as my heart beat a mile a minute. “I should get back to my room. I need to get this makeup off, and I'm ready to collapse.”

Silently I screamed at myself for being such an idiot, but I couldn't think of anything else to say, even as Christophs' smile shrank a little, and his hand loosened. “It has been a long day. I am ready to collapse to.”

We walked tiredly back to our rooms, not saying much. Resisting the urge to kick myself, it was for the best my mind insisted. He was only interested in me because I was the only girl nearby. There was no way he would date me if there was any other choice.

As I got ready for bed, I made sure the towel covering the bathroom mirror was extra tight.

Chapter 10

At breakfast the next morning, Pulam and Nathaniel were happy enough, although both looked like they hadn’t gotten much sleep. Christoph blushed a little when he saw me, but acted pretty normally otherwise. Michelle however was not acting normally in the least. She didn’t even bother picking at her food and this time everyone noticed. But despite everything she refused to talk about it. Even when Pulam stepped out for a minute and returned with some of the girls, who still wore the yellow hair bands Michelle had given them, it didn’t get more than a smile.

It was with that happy attitude that we were led to an office as soon as breakfast was done.

The woman I'd met the day before was waiting for us. The room was empty except for some comfortable chairs, we sat down without a word. Pulam and Nathaniel looked around curiously, Christoph gave me a knowing glance. Strangely Michelle was sitting there perfectly still, her hands clutching each other so hard it looked like it hurt. The woman smiled widely, and spoke to Michelle, “Can you enter my mind please.”

We were in a room exactly like the one our physical bodies were in, but this one had a table with file folder for each of us, as well as a blank screen hanging on the wall. I opened the folder and saw the same pictures I’d seen the other day, plus a written description of it. I had no idea Michelle could do that. Peeking at Pulam’s folder, I saw the exact same pictures, but the writing was in some language I’d never seen before. I thought I could make out an A and possibly a B, but it was like some very exotic calligraphy. I wasn’t sure if this was a memory of a real file written in his language, or if it was like our speaking and translated by some unknown means.

“Good morning everyone, my name is Cynthia Johansson. I’m here acting as a representative of  President Clayton of the United Republic of America. I’m sure most of you are curious why I am here, so I won’t waste any time. You were not the only ones who arrived here from other dimensions, we have had a number of incidents over the last two weeks of people and animals who have attacked and killed both police and civilians that they came in contact with. If you could open your folders to the first page I will go over the worst such incident.” We opened the folders, and she explained about the attack on the village. I focused more on the others, having heard it all before. Everyone looked grim, Michelle was pale, wiping her eyes with a handkerchief.

Finally she was done explaining the massacre. “I’m sorry I had to show that to you, but it is important to understand why we are about to ask you to do something we would prefer not to. We sent in a company of militia, they were close by but it took four hours to get them there and another two hours to get them organized. Once there, because they did not have the weapons or abilities to deal with this water wielder, they were drowned and battered in their vehicles. We believe with the proper training you can act as a special force to deal with threats such as this, either stopping them or keeping them occupied until the military can respond appropriately.

“Each of you are remarkable. With your talents you can do things no ordinary person can even dream of. Disabling, eliminating or negotiating with the threat before it has the chance to kill so many people.”

Pulam spoke first. “You have helped us a great deal. I will help you, but before we kill anyone we must give them the chance to surrender. I will defend your people to repay the help you have given us, but I will not murder. If these others are like I was when I first arrived, they are merely scared and confused, they deserve the chance to find peace.”

I stared at him in shock, I had not expected him to offer his support so easily. He seemed to dislike the more violent movies, and while he could fight he didn’t seem to find it special or very noteworthy. My jaw dropped as I heard the next voice speak up.

“I’ll do it,” Michelle said.

“What!” I hissed.

She looked at me, her dark eyes looked like bottomless pits. “Your world is safe, Pat. In mine we have to worry about pirates, raiders and worse. I’ve been trained to defend myself and provide medicine. I’m only a novice, having been trained for only a single year, but I know what my duty is.”

“Thank you both. We will of course encourage all attempts to end a situation peacefully, within reason, before escalating things. That is one reason we want you to be part of this Michelle despite your young age.” She turned to the rest of us. “And what do you three say?”

“My clan would disown me if I denied you help. I am on your side until I can return home,” Nathaniel said.

Dammit, this was not how I thought things would go. I wanted to say something, but with Michelle volunteering I’d look like a coward. I turned to Christoph still not willing to say anything. He was staring at a picture of bloated and waterlogged bodies being put onto a truck. “I’m in,” he said simply.

All eyes turned to me. With everyone else signing on, and the threat of losing all of this if I refused, there wasn’t much choice. “When do we start training?”

**

The training didn’t start that day, instead we spent the morning discussing what we would be doing for the near future.

As it was explained with a slide show and everything, that I still wasn’t sure quite how it worked since we were in someones’ mind, we were to be a rapid reaction squad. If an emergency arose, that was outside the usual job of the police or military we’d be called in to deal with it. They had three reasons for wanting us.

The first two reasons fit together pretty closely. There was a good chance problems could come up because of language and fear. Seeing teenagers, who, at least for some of us, looked normal, wouldn’t be so intimidating, so there was less chance of someone panicking at seeing us. Throw in Michelle’s power and that would solve the language problems. If that didn't work, as long as Michelle could get into a persons mind, it generally made their physical body go to sleep, creating an easy take down. If that didn’t work, the rest of us could take a beating and dish it out pretty well. If they were expecting regular humans, they were going to be in serious trouble. We’d potentially be saving a lot of lives.

The third reason was more for the public. Despite the best efforts of the government, news of ‘super humans’ was getting out. The government wanted to stop any signs of panic, and one way to do it was to have their own ‘super team’. This also had the advantage that we could start appearing out in public without having people freak out at seeing us. This was really nice for Nathaniel and I, but Michelle, Pulam and Christoph could all see how much fun being celebrities could be.

I had to admit that even though the thought of fighting things that might want to kill me was terrifying, as the meeting went on I was feeling better about it all. They were going to train us in tactics, fighting, negotiations, and weapons, and provide us with armour, weapons and other things. It was kind of like living out a comic book fantasy. Now if only there wasn’t the little problem of risking my life.

By lunchtime we had a good idea of what was expected and what we had to do before we went out. We still had to do regular classes, but most of our time was going to be spent on training. Sometimes we’d train together, but we were also going to get some specialized training suited to our talents. I was really curious to see what Michelle had meant by saying she was trained in self-defense. I didn’t see her as the type to get into a fight, and the thought of her punching someone seemed ludicrous considering how small she was.

**

Lunch was quiet, we were all too busy thinking about what we’d agreed to, to really say anything. Michelle actually ate something, but she was acting a bit like a zombie, just going through the motions. She left early, and I followed her without a word to the guys.

“Ok, Michelle, spill it. What’s wrong? Are they making you do something to peoples memories again?” I asked as soon as we were alone.

“I’m not feeling good, can you help me to my room?”

I put my arm around her, not quite lifting her up and helped her up the stairs. “Do you want to go to the doctor? This world might have some diseases you’re not used to making you sick.”

“I’m just tired from last night. I’ll take a nap and be ready for class, trust me.”

Frowning, I nodded. “Fine. But if you feel worse, I’m dragging you to the doctors kicking and screaming.”

We reached her room in silence, and I helped her to bed. “Can you stay just for a little while, Pat? I want to see my home again, but I don’t want to be alone.”

“Yeah sure,” I said, laying down beside her on the massive bed, holding her hand as we entered her memories. Something was wrong, we weren’t at her home. Instead we were in an office. A man wearing a mask was standing motionless before us. “Where are we?”

“At the banquet, after we were separated a woman asked me to demonstrate my powers. So I did. It seemed OK, we just talked a little and then left. But last night when I slept this memory came to me. I know she put it in my mind, but I don’t know how she did it.” She was starting to panic.

Giving her a hug, I said as firmly as I could, “We’re in this together, Michelle. I said we would always help you, so show me everything and then we can think about what to do about it.”

She didn’t answer, instead the man started talking. “Michelle, you’re in trouble and so are all of your friends. If you want to survive you will have to be very, very careful. When you wake up, the government is going to offer you a chance to help them protect the world from dangerous people like you and your friends. This is a partial lie. You’ll be fighting people like you, some of them will be dangerous, some of them are insane, but some simply want freedom, for themselves and the people of this world. The U.R.A says it’s a free country, but it isn’t. Those in power have been in power for decades, the elections are shams. Anyone who speaks out about having the same party ruling for the last thirty years disappears and their family starves due to rationing restrictions and bureaucratic problems.”

The office changed, they were in a camp surrounded by barbed wire. People who were skin and bones were being led from shacks by heavily armed guards. Those who stumbled were kicked, if they fell they were hit with batons and dragged away. Some had sickly coughs, others cradled broken arms, vicious bruises, and festering cuts. They all had a hopeless look as they limped and dragged their feet through the dust. It looked like a concentration camp.

“They’ve lied to you about other things. You aren’t the first people to arrive here. The first dimensional crossover was a year ago. That’s why they had everything prepared for you. You and your friends are now in the middle of an elaborate plan to deal with people, like me, who are not from this world and want to break the stranglehold of this dictatorship.”

We left the camp, and were in a lab. A woman with golden skin, was cut open revealing complex circuitry. She was still alive, her face twisted in pain. Another lab, a lizard man lay dead, a gunshot to his head. Another, a child looking as if he was asleep, sand dribbled from his mouth. Another, another, another, dozens of people dead or dying.

“When you are offered the chance to help the government, take it. We cannot rescue you right now. You are too heavily guarded, and I’m quite certain you won’t trust us. So work with them, learn as much as you can, spot the lies and the threats. If you falter or refuse, you will end up here. Once you are ready, contact me, you’ll know how and I will have my people set up a rescue.”

The masked man appeared before us, his eyes were intense. “Good luck, you’re going to need it.”

Chapter 11

I sat with Michelle in her old room in her mind, trying to work out what we had just heard. There wasn’t anything in it that I could deny, we barely knew anything about this world, just some history, a bit of the society and government but only what we’d been told. How could we honestly say what was real and what wasn’t? If he was telling the truth, we could be just a breath away from being dissected in some lab. If he was lying, we could end up spoiling everything if we trusted him.

This was not good.

“Michelle, do you really want to join this team and fight?”

She nodded. “If I didn’t know about this, I would still do it. I am trained with pistols and I know how to stitch and mend wounds. It’s part of my duty to help the city or ship when attacked. This is the same, just larger.”

“Ok then, we’ll both stay with them. But whenever we can we need to learn more about this place. They’ll have to let us out eventually even if it’s just to fight. We can talk to people we meet, look at magazines and newspapers, things like that. We can also start talking more to the regular soldiers and staff,” I told her.

“Won’t they wonder why we’re doing that?”

“We don’t come right out and ask about this stuff. Just tell them that now that we’re going to be going out in public we’d like to know what their homes are like, what fun things there are to do, and things like that. We won’t get a full answer, but we can start learning.”

“What about the boys, should we tell them?”

That was a tough question. The more people knew the more likely we’d let something slip. But if they knew they could help with finding out the truth, and if we had to run it would better if they knew why. That was the deciding factor, we were all in this together and we would probably live longer if we were all on the same page. “Lets tell them, they deserve to know.”

She hugged me hard enough to make me grunt. “I want to go home.”

I kissed her forehead, hugging her back. “So do I. Believe me, so do I.”

**

Pretending that everything was fine, we headed to English class. There was a surprise waiting for us there, one of Pulam’s children, the oldest girl, was sitting off to the side. “Lilha!” Michelle said in surprise going to hug her friend.

I tried to smile, not exactly comfortable with the newcomer. I’d never learned the names of any of Pulam’s children. They liked petting my fur, but I never really talked to them, apparently Michelle had. It made sense while the rest of us usually talked to Pulam when we could, Michelle would wander away more interested in playing with the children.

“I study English. Best study. Listen here,” the girl said slowly and carefully.

“How did you learn so quickly?” I asked, speaking as slowly as she was.

“All us listen. Talk English between. Study fast fast. I listen here. Pulam, others study…” she frowned and put her hands together.

“Together,” Michelle said, grabbing both our hands.

Lilha kissed her cheek. “Yes! Pulam, others study to-get-her.”

Eight minds working together, that had to make it easier to learn. “Pulam can see and hear everything you do?” I asked.

She looked confused.

“Pulam can see and hear… you?” I asked again, pointing at my eyes and ears.

“Yes!”

I shook my head, how did he keep sane with so many different things coming to his mind? Ms Tomlinson came into the room with two novels, she looked at the new girl and gave a slight smile before looking back at Michelle and I with a look of relief. “Because we are going to be acting as a way for Pulam and… his children to study English we will move to 20th century literature. Pat, have you read The Old Man And The Sea?”

Holding back a groan I nodded. Now I’d be helping Michelle with remembering the story instead of the other way around. Lilha leaned forward, listening intently as we began reading. At least the boring lesson would help take my mind off of everything else.

**

At the end of class, Michelle and I walked with Lilha out together. “Lilha, can you come with us?” I asked, pointing at the three of us and then to my room.

“Yes. I can, friend!”

“What is Pulam doing?” Michelle asked.

“Study English,” she said her in slow way, she seemed to clip the words short forcing me to finish it off. “Talk lots lots. Book. Chair. Put book on chair. Sit on chair. Pick up book.”

“Is it fun?”

She cocked her head at Michelle, obviously without a clue what fun meant.

I stepped in. “Is study good?”

“Yes. No. Talk good. Study…” she rubbed her head like she had a headache.

“Study is hard.” I told her.

“Hard?” She tapped the wall. “It hard.”

Michelle nodded. “Yes, it’s hard. But studying is hard to.”

The girl muttered something to herself in her own language frowning, and tapping the wall at the same time. By the time we reached my room Lilha had stopped frowning. We sat down on the bed and Michelle did her thing, putting us in my room. The girl looked faded out, a silver cord hung from her back, disappearing into the air. “Thank you for letting me study with you Michelle and Pat. It was very fun,” she said.

“We liked having you, Lilha,” I told her smiling. Then it was time to get serious. “We need to tell you and Pulam something important but he has to keep it a secret it’s very important. If we show you will he see it, but not let anyone know?”

She got a far away look in her eyes, a few seconds later she was back. “He said it’s OK He is keeping the others from seeing while they talk to the teacher.”

“Ok, Michelle can you show us the memory. Lilha, we’re about to show you something that is scary, but you have to listen and see some of it. We’re right here, and it can’t hurt you,” I said, putting my arm around her. As the memory played, I expected to have her shove her face into me, but while she looked unhappy and gasped a few times she watched all of it trying to catch every detail.

As it ended she turned to Michelle. “Pulam wants to know how you got this memory?”

“A woman gave it to me at the banquet last night. I don’t know how, I only saw it as a dream later.”

“Only you and Pat have seen it?” she asked. We both nodded. Her voice deepened becoming older, more masculine. “Lucifer and his spirits take many forms. Are those we are with now evil, or is this an attempt to make us doubt ourselves. We need to show the others, and learn more.”

“We already planned on that,” I said. “We’re going to start asking more about the people and country pretending to be curious. Maybe ask for some newspapers and magazines.”

“We can do that as well. And we can ask more questions because we don’t understand so much of this new world,” she said in the same deep voice and a grinned. “I will also have the children explore the grounds, they can spot the best means of escape, where the warriors are and similar. The warriors do not seem comfortable around them, as well as assuming we are stupid because we are not familiar with all their tools. Can you make a map of the grounds in your mind, Michelle?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never done it, but I can try.”

“Good. I must return to my studies. We will discuss more later, after you have told the others,” Pulam said through Lilha.

I watched as Lilha’s regular expression came back. “Can you and the others do all of that? Don’t you get tired being away from Pulam for very long?”

“We’re getting stronger now. I’m the oldest of us, and I can be away for over two hours. We can do what we need to do,” she said, there was no doubt in her voice. “Can you keep this a secret?”

“Yeah, we can. It’s not going to be fun, but if what Michelle was shown is true, we don’t have much choice,” I said.

Michelle stared at the man who still stood there motionless. “God helps those who are prepared. We have to be prepared. I wonder if we can collect some weapons.”

I shook my head. “They’ll have everything accounted for, and we’re probably being videotaped and recorded all the time.” The thought of being videoed naked didn’t make me feel any happier about the situation, but there wasn’t much I could do about it, so I just tried not to think about it.

“They can make them that small?” Michelle asked, disbelief was clear in her voice.

“In my world they can put a camera in a thick pair of glasses. They aren’t nearly that good here, but they can hide it easily. So don’t say anything outside your minds,” I warned both of them. “Come on, it’s time to get ready for supper, we might be able to tell the Nathaniel and Christoph if we hurry.”

**

“You’re serious?” Christoph asked.

“You saw the memory yourself. We don’t know if it’s true or not, but we can’t take any chances,” I said. Nathaniel nodded his agreement, his large hands clenched into fists.

“Why would they want to go to all this trouble, if they’re just planning on killing us?”

“Because they aren’t planning on killing us unless they have to,” I explained. “As long as we work with them they won’t want to kill us. But if we decide to stop, suddenly we aren’t worth anything to them except science experiments.”

“If this is actually true.”

“Yes. That is why we want to learn more before deciding anything,” Michelle said.

Christoph sighed and put his hands on his hips. “But if we ask the wrong questions they may suspect something and we could lose all of this.”

“But if we just do whatever they want, we could be sending people to their death by working with them,” I said, unable to remove the images of the death camp from my mind.

“All the evidence we have is a memory implanted by someone we’ve never heard of and know nothing about. Don’t you think we’re putting a bit too much faith into a possible terrorist?” he said, jabbing a finger at the masked man.

My tail cut through the air in irritation. “What part of ‘we want to learn more,’ don’t you understand?”

He ran a hand through his short hair. “Pat, we have a good thing going here. Whey do we want to risk messing it up? As long as they don’t ask me to kill someone, I don’t see what the problem is. So far they’ve been dealing fairly with us, we owe them the same respect.”

“Oh of course,” I said hitting my forehead, “lets go and ask if they have death camps and have been experimenting on people like us. That will go over really well with Mr. Stephenson won’t it?”

“We don’t have to ask them about it,” he said, rolling his eyes. “We can show them the memory and explain that it was implanted during the banquet. Show them that we are on their side, just like they’ve been on ours.”

“And if the man is telling the truth, they might decide we’ve become a danger and they’ll blow up the house with us in it.”

“We don’t need to act paranoid about this, this isn’t a Hollywood movie. What did Pulam have to say?”

“He agreed with us,” I said, smiling as I got a point on him. “He’s going to start asking questions, and using his kids to scout out the area in case we need to leave in a hurry.”

Christoph put his head in his hands. “Nathaniel what do you think of all of this?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “My clan often uses secret plans and sabotage in business, and faces the same problems. They don’t tell the elephants trunk why it is doing something, they simply use it and if it becomes a risk they cut there loses. It is up to the individual or group to survive or die. Personally I’d prefer to survive.”

“So everyone thinks there is a big conspiracy out to get us?”

“Someone is, and we can’t be sure who it is right now. So do we wait and hope, or ‘carefully’ make plans just in case?” I asked. Honestly even though he was cute, Christoph was really irritating me.

He threw his hands up in disgust. “Fine. I won’t help you, but I won’t rat you out either. Just try to keep out of trouble.”

“Thanks, Christoph,” Michelle said. I just nodded, I wasn’t happy with the stubborn idiot.

No one was in a good mood at supper, and I could barely pay attention to the tutors that night. When I finally got to bed, I spent half the night tossing and turning, or waking up from nightmares of being dissected, seeing my new friends killed, and the worst waking up at home only to have my parents scream as they saw my new body.

Chapter 12

Michelle held the small handgun, leaning most of her weight on her right foot. After making sure no one was on the shooting range, she pulled the trigger ten times in almost as many seconds. The earplugs I was wearing kept the noise from hurting my sensitive ears. I couldn’t say the same about the roar of the shotgun Pulam was firing off to the side. There was a rattle as Michelles’ target came back to us on the electric rail. All ten holes covered a space about as large as my hand. The instructor looked it over and whistled in approval. “This is good, Ms. Antrobus. What type of pistol did you train with back home?”

“A Haitian Manufactury Barracuda Revolver. It uses a heavier bullet than this, and the recoil is much worse. This feels more like a gun for young children,” she said.

“Well, when it comes to pistols I don’t have much to teach you. So lets get Sergeant Cooper to start you on sub-machine guns,” he said.

As he introduced Michelle to her new trainer, I watched Pulam who was fumbling to load his shotgun. He kept moving his hand up the barrel, and when he pumped the gun it was pretty slow.               “Pulam, this isn’t one of your muskets. Ignore the barrel, and remember what I showed you,” his instructor told him.

“It hard. Learn shoot ten years old.” His English had really improved since I'd met him three weeks ago. He held up the shotgun, glaring at it. “Gun too different.”

“It is different, but easier and faster. So keep studying.”

There was a boom, I turned to see Nathaniel holding a gun that was about as long as Michelle was tall, fifty meters away at another part of the open air range. I could see the target he was aiming at, but it was really small, from Nathaniel’s whooping, which was almost as loud as the gunshot, he’d hit the target. Out of all of us, he was the best shot with all the guns, although Michelle was almost as good as he was with handguns. He claimed it was from all the hunting he did. Whatever it was, I didn’t want to get on his bad side if he had a gun.

“Pat, your up.”

I took the large pistol from it’s holster at my side, checking to make sure it was empty, put in the clip without too much trouble, held it two handed as I'd been taught and brought it up. It was huge, but I barely felt the weight. My pupils shifted in the sunlight, dimming it almost as well as a pair of sunglasses. I focused on the target, took off the safety, and breathed normally. Between breaths I pulled the trigger. The recoil was practically nothing to my muscles, even though when the instructor demonstrated it had rocked him backwards. I shot twenty times, took out the clip, pulled the back the slide to make sure it wasn’t loaded, put the safety on, and then put it back in the holster.

When the target came back, I wasn’t impressed. The bullets were all over the paper. “Alright Pat,” the instructor said with a sigh, “lets’ try that again. And aim this time.”

**

There was grunting and shouting all around me, as we practiced hand to hand fighting. I was getting frustrated with Al, my instructor. It was too easy for me to accidentally put a fist through him or torn out his throat when I attacked him. So I had to hold back, and he was making a fool out of me, dodging every strike, throwing me around the mat, and yelling instructions as I fell on my face.

Taking a break from another humiliation, and nursing a bruised rib, I looked around the field were everyone was being taught hand to hand combat. It was pretty interesting.

Christoph, stripped to his waist, was surrounded by three men who were hitting him with lightly padded staffs. They weren't holding back and despite the padding he was bloody, of course the cuts and bruises only lasted a few seconds thanks to his healing factor. He was standing perfectly still except for his head which was flicking back and forth trying to watch all of his attackers at the same time. Metallic tentacles came out of his arms, writhing in the air like snakes. As a staff came at him, one or more tentacles would try to stop it. I winced in sympathy as a hit got through and the staff actually broke against his arm. It didn't seem to hurt the big guy, but I was glad I wasn't being trained like that.

A high pitched laugh dragged my attention away from Christoph. Nathaniel and Pulam were fighting each other using practice knives. Pulam’s was more like a short sword, as long as his forearm, while Nathaniel was using a short dagger that was mostly a triangle like blade he held as if he was about to punch someone with it. They were both sweating and had some nasty bruises, despite the repeated orders not to attack each other with so much force. I was faster than either of them, but I was quickly realizing that while Christoph and I were the strongest and able to take a lot more punishment, when it came to skill, Nathaniel and Pulam had us both easily beat.

Michelle was on her own, being taught how to dodge and anticipate what her instructor was going to do. He didn’t hit her, but from the way he was moving it looked like he was aiming to kill. No one expected a twelve year old to fight hand to hand with an adult, she just had to know how to survive until she could enter their mind or shoot them. That thought made me sick. She didn't seem to be against killing to protect herself. She'd told me how often pirates attacked ships, farms and smaller villages on her world so everyone was expected to know how to fight, but I didn't want her to have to do it. I didn't want any of us to have to kill someone. I just hoped that if we really did fight someone, they'd feel the same way.

God, what had I gotten into? More importantly, how could I get out of this?

“Break's over, Kitty,” Al said. I tried not to roll my eyes or glare, Kitty was better than the first nickname he'd given me.

I turned to face a thin man who towered over me, his body was covered in muscles and I didn’t like the look in his eyes. He’d been teaching me how to actually fight for over two weeks now, and today I was suppose to hit him. For the last twenty minutes I'd been trying to do just that, with no success. He could tell exactly where I was going to hit and either blocked or dodged, making me look like an idiot.

We nodded to each other and instantly I was lunging forward, my fist and arm perfectly straight, going more for speed than anything. He moved faster than I could blink, stepping to the side and knocking my arm down. I spun, driving my nails into the mat for balance, sweeping with my leg. A hand slammed into my chest, knocking me back, throwing off my kick. He moved in, pushing me with his open hands, keeping me off balance. Finally I was able to jump back out of his reach.

Getting down on all fours, I growled, circling him, looking for an opening. He faced me, his hands ready to slap me down if I tried to get close. I ran at him, trying to catch him around the waist. He didn’t move, but as I was about to hit him, his hand reached out, pushing me face first into the mat. My arm swung out trying to at least hit him as I fell. I hit his forearm, and while it didn’t stop me, it slowed my strike enough for him to dodge.

“Is that the best you can do, Kitty Cat?” he asked, scorn dripping from his words. I heard him moving backwards.

This was getting well past embarrassing.

Getting up we circled each other again, I knew he was getting ready to attack, I could see his muscles tensing. But I had no idea what he was going to try, his eyes were totally focused on mine. I moved backwards, wanting to give myself a bit more space to react. My foot touched a crease in the mat. I realized that I was at the very edge of the center mat, the one he was standing on. I got back down on all fours, not taking my eyes off of him again. His legs flexed, My claws tore into the mat, and I pulled it up as hard as I could. He wasn’t expecting that, he fell hard on his back with a shout of surprise. I pounced.

Somehow he got his foot up, kicking me very hard in the stomach. I was sent flying through the air, but as he pushed me up, I felt my lunch coming up. I hit the ground rolling, and saw my sadistic instructor jumping to his feet, blinded, spitting and cursing, smelling of half digested hamburgers. Running up I kicked him in the ass as hard as I could without seriously hurting him

“Got you!” I said, wiping my mouth.

**

The hundreds of soldiers in the military base were wearing civilian clothes and wandering around the base as if they were having an ordinary day in town. I watched everything from my carefully concealed spot on the highest building on the base. Lilha was beside me, focusing her attention on what Pulam and the other children were seeing, and reporting it to me.

Through my binoculars, I saw Christoph carrying a cloth bag of groceries which concealed a paint gun and five kilo's of steel. He was trying to look casual, as he looked over the heads of most of the people. A little boy with dirty blonde hair walked by his side looking bored.

A little more searching showed Michelle and Nathaniel and a young black haired girl sitting by an intersection, drinking some pop and talking. Despite the heat, Nathaniel was wearing a long sleeve shirt and a hat. Makeup covered his green skin, making him  look darker than Michelle. I couldn't hear them, but from how they were acting it seemed like they were waiting for a friend, trying to look in every direction at once.

Across the base, Pulam was looking at a small piece of paper as he walked, looking at buildings and hastily made street signs. He stopped suddenly jerking around, and started walking purposefully back the way he'd come. Lilha tapped my arm.

“Target is by Pulam,” she said, pointing at the spread out map beside us.

Taking a quick look and a few seconds to get the location straight in my head, I said, “The target is in sector A, heading north to sector B. Christoph can reach him on the corner of Fleet St. and Central Ave.. Michelle and Nathaniel go to South Central Ave.”

I took a bit more time to make sure everyone was going where they were suppose to. Pulam's children were perfect for sharing information without using radios. Adding in the extra seven pairs of eyes, with the added benefit of being children and thus not really noticeable unless they did something strange, and Pulam was really earning his keep.

Unfortunately I was only on lookout and back up duty. Where Nathaniels' skin could be covered up with makeup, my fur, ears and whiskers made it impossible for me to blend in without wearing a bed sheet. Speaking of which, Nathaniel and Michelle were taking the scenic route. “Michelle, Nathaniel, turn right at the next turn and go faster.”

The black haired girl who was right beside them, passed on my directions, and they started running. Now that everyone was heading the right way, I looked for the target. This was suppose to be a tracking challenge, not a take down, so I wasn't suppose to show up at all. If there was going to be a fight, I'd be jumping across the rooftops like a martial arts movie, trying to avoid scaring the normals until the last minute.

There was the target, moving as nonchalantly as possible. I looked at the photo of him, just to double check, the mustache, the grey coat, the glasses, everything was practically identical. Three children all boys with the similar reddish tan skin, were following him. They were holding what looked like baseball cards in front of them talking to each other. As I watched through the binoculars, I saw them glancing at the target every few seconds, passing on the information psychically to Pulam and the others.

While we were the only children and teenagers on the base, everyone had been instructed to treat us normally unless we did something odd or obvious. So I noticed the target looking at his followers, he didn't do anything about it. I on the other hand had to speak up. “Lilha, tell the boys to stop looking so much. He noticed them.”

The boys stopped being quite so noticeable. I started looking for the others, but with how the buildings were set up, I couldn't see anyone except Pulam who was behind the target. A minute later, Christoph was in front of the target, walking in the same direction, after a single quick glance to find the guy. About thirty seconds later, Michelle and Nathaniel arrived within spitting distance of the target.

Picking up the radio I used it for the first time that day. “Target is surrounded on three sides, and didn't notice us. Over.”

“Agreed. Ending exercise. Good work. Over.”

Lilha was grinning from ear to ear. “We did very good, yes?”

Giving her a high five, I grinned just as widely. “You did very good.”

**

That was pretty much how we spent the next month, Training and doing exercises for most of the day, with tutoring filling in most of our so called free time. Lilha spent more time outside of Pulam,  getting up to five hours of independence in the evenings. She mostly spent it with Michelle and I practicing her English. This gave me a chance to stop playing with dolls so much. Sure I was able to say that I was practicing the English homework, but I hadn't played with dolls in years and they really didn't interest me.

So I spent more time with the guys, trying to find new ways to use our powers, watching movies, playing some of the arcade games, and reading. I really wanted a girl my own age to talk to. There were only so many action movies and video games I could take.

Christoph and I were back to normal. He didn't mention the conspiracy which I knew he was still annoyed about, and for the most part he stopped acting like he had a crush on me. I did the same. But a few times we forgot.

**

We were tired after a day of training to be superheroes, Michelle was asleep already, I'd put her to bed personally. Pulam and Nathaniel were doing something together, it was just Christoph and I relaxing in the rec room talking.

“You're kidding me! You didn't have a girlfriend back home?” I asked, kind of amazed.

“I was not so handsome back home. I couldn't exercise, or move, so I was fat,” he admitted, his face practically glowed red. “Very fat. Not many girls are interested in a fat man, especially one who cannot even kiss without help.”

I couldn't picture him as fat. The nanites in him had done a good job of sculpting his body into solid muscle. “Well, now you'll get all the girls you can handle as soon as we go public.”

He smiled faintly, looking at me closely. “Yes, I believe you are right.”

Sitting back I had to wince, I'd taken a nasty fall that afternoon and my back was still out of joint. At his look of concern, I shrugged, which brought about another wince. “Don't worry, I just fell while doing an obstacle course twenty meters up, and hit a few things on the way down. It will be better by tomorrow.”

“Lie down,” he told me, getting to his feet.

I twitched my ears at him. “What?”

“Lie down, I will massage it. I watched my caretakers massage me everyday, I know how to do it very well.”

I'd never gotten a massage from someone, unless a shoulder rub counted. It sounded interesting, and it couldn't hurt. Making myself comfortable, I tried not to keep my tail still. I wasn't nervous, this was just a friend giving me a massage, I told myself.

His hands were surprisingly gentle, as he gingerly touched my back. A small yowl came out when his fingers pressed on the cramp. The bruise had already healed, but the muscle was still a hard ball of tension. He began pressing around the edges, working his fingers into the flesh that was only uncomfortable, not in pain.

I wasn't sure what he was doing, but the kneading, pressing, and rubbing seemed to be helping. I couldn't help it, I began to purr. Feeling his breath on my fur, the heat from his body, his strong hands ending the pain, it was the most relaxed I'd felt in weeks. I felt sleep beckoning me, a comfortable fog of pleasure filled my head.

“You like?” he whispered.

Turning my head to look at him, I smiled in total bliss. “Wonderful.”

He started working inwards, forcing the cramped muscle to let go. His leg almost touched my face. Closing my eyes, I drifted away again. My hand reached out and touched something. It was warm and comforting. It smelled right. The amazing hands on my back stopped moving. I groaned, demanding he keep going. The massage started up again, my purring got louder.

Something brushed the fur on my cheek. Not opening my eyes, I turned my head a bit making a small questioning noise in my throat. Something brushed my lips. It was soft, warm. I opened my mouth instinctively, caught up in the moment. A tongue hesitantly entered my mouth.

My arm let go of Christophs' leg, circling his broad shoulder, my fingers played with his short hair, holding him me in place. A hand as large as my head cupped my cheek, another pressed against the small of my back.

Opening my eyes, I saw his face, his eyes closed, clearly happy about the situation. I wanted to keep going, but something in me panicked. This couldn't last, there was no way it could last. I pushed him away, not hard, but enough to stop the kiss.

“Ok! That's enough.”

“Was I kissing badly?” he asked.

“No. It-it was good. But, but...” My brain couldn't seem to work. Taking a breath I thought of something. “You're my friend. Let's keep it that way please.”

“You seemed to like it.”

My emotions were not being nice, part of me, most of me liked what had happened, but that little voice in the back of my head kept reminding me that I wasn't human anymore. “Sorry, I am really not ready for this. Just think in a few more weeks, we'll be making our big debut. You can get a girlfriend who isn't hairy, and doesn't need a flea collar,” I tried to joke.

He gave me another faint smile. “You are right. I'm sorry, Pat.”

“Don't worry about it.” I hated to see him looking so down. “Just so you know, for not having kissed before, you did pretty good.” Where the hell had that come from?

The smile got a bit bigger.

“Any clue what new plans they have for us tomorrow?” I asked, hoping to get things back under control.

“I heard from...”

We chatted like that for a little bit longer before heading off to bed. I was glad to keep everything nice and friendly, I really wasn't ready to date. And as soon as we were back outside, any relationship we had would probably fall apart, there was no way anyone could stay with me when there were normal people to date. It was for the best.

I slept like crap that night.

**

Except for that one bad night, we would almost always go to bed tired, sore and wondering when it would all end. But even with all the training, all of us, except Christoph, were busy trying to learn as much as we could about our new world.

As promised, Samantha wrote to me every week, asking how I was, what I thought of the classes, the training, the teachers and my friends, and a few other things. I’d write back within a day or two, and each time I’d ask questions about the world, nothing special, just movie stars, singers, what the cities were like, and most importantly I asked for some magazines and news papers. The next letter came with a stack of books about fashion, celebrities, technology, national news, and city magazines from all over the country. We also started getting a few newspapers every morning with breakfast. Of course none of them came out and said anything really bad about the government. But as we read over them, we got a better idea of what to expect.

Nathaniel and Michelle pored over the business news. Both of their families were big in business, and they’d had at least some experience in it, even if it was just hearing their parents or family talking. They couldn’t tell us much, but they started getting an actual picture of the society, what cities were important, who was important, what people wanted to buy and similar stuff. One thing they noticed was that a lot of the same names popped up when talking about business and government, either they were the same people, or they were relatives.

I focused on the technology, and we all read about the culture. Even Christoph joined me in reading about the latest movies and tech news. We figured out that while the military had equipment that was comparable to the early 1990’s of our worlds, almost everyone else was stuck in the 1960’s or ‘70’s. The movies in the rec room, which were all about the heroic soldiers of the URA, police stopping criminals and terrorists, or a heroic government official stopping a disaster, were the typical fare of the entertainment industry. Comedies and romance were also big. Maybe one out of a hundred movies were something that made the government look not so good, and none of them showed the government or officials as outright evil.

The talks we had with the soldiers and workers weren’t very productive. From piecing together our conversations we learned that there were rations and people didn’t have as much as they wanted. But they all said they were trying to rebuild not just the URA but the world, so some hardships were too be expected, and each year things got better.

Not much to go on.

By the end of the second month, we realized we weren’t going to learn much of anything. We weren’t going to stop, but we let ourselves start to relax a little more. There weren’t any more messages from the mysterious masked man, and our instructors and everyone else seemed ecstatic with how things were going.

And then we got our first mission.

Chapter 13

We were eating lunch when Mr. Stephenson came in, he looked worried and had a folder under his arm. "Hello, everyone," he said. “I just received a call from the Director of the New York District, along with a fax. We need you to help contain an extra dimensional creature that is rampaging near the reclaimed town of New York.”

He handed us some photos of what looked like a furry dinosaur, one of the long necked types. It had black and red feathers all over its belly and neck, with what looked like stone shell on its back. Strangest of all was the box on top of the shell and two large guns strapped beside it's neck. From the picture it was hard to judge how big it was.

"This creature appeared three hours ago in the town of Ash Springs, close to New York. It destroyed half the town before police were able to lead it away." More pictures showing houses and buildings that had been flattened. "It's immune to small arms, grenades, and anti-tank weapons. We are preparing to call in heavier ordinances, but that will take several hours and it is moving towards the reclaimed areas of New York. If it reaches there, it could cause an untold amount of damage, and even more damage will occur when we destroy it."

“So we have to kill it?” I asked, staring at the pictures.

“No. It will require very heavy explosives to kill it, and you aren’t trained in explosives. What we want you to do is keep it away from built up areas, most importantly New York. We will have you in the area in an hour, and then you just have to keep it occupied for three to five hours.” He pulled out a map of area. I’d never been to New York, but I knew it was really built up. This map looked strange, New York was tiny, with a lot of grey around it declared uninhabitable in large letters. There weren’t many towns or cities nearby, just more grey with a few roads and some towns and villages. It was depressing.

“As of fifteen minutes ago, the creature was here,” he said, pointing in a grey area. “It’s moving slowly but steadily to New York and will be there in no more than three hours. We want you to move it this way.” He pointed at a large grey area that was absolutely deserted. “If you can keep it there, we’ll be able to bomb it safely.”

“Let’s get going then. We don’t have time to waste,” Christoph said with a smile.

We headed to our rooms to get our clothes, while a helicopter roared outside. The guys looked happy to be getting into action. Michelle and I weren’t nearly as eager.

**

We landed in a small clearing where a military truck was waiting for us. We’d read over the reports from soldiers who were tracking the dinosaur, and were told of the plan. I was going to scout out the area, and act as the bait if we needed to get its’ attention. Christoph would be artillery throwing rocks and trees if it got too close to me or to draw it in another direction. With his strength and his ability to lengthen his arms for throwing, that wouldn’t be a problem. He could also shift his armour into something a little more protective in a few minutes if we had to tackle the monster head on.

Nathaniel would stay back and try to track it through the plants, and if worst came to worst, he could try to create a smell or chemical that could make it run in disgust or follow a track. Pulam as the second fastest of us would be my back up if I ran into trouble. And Michelle would stay back, acting as our radio girl.

I didn’t like the plan. Any plan where I’m bait is a bad plan. But if we could get it going in the right direction, I wouldn’t have to worry about being eaten or crushed for too long.

I hoped.

In the back of the truck a soldier who had fought the creature were waiting for us. He told us that it was basically invulnerable, shrugging off everything they had thrown at it. It chirped like a bird, and followed fast movements. It had a nasty bite, could turn a brick wall to dust with its tail or feet, and liked to tip trucks over with its neck or body. They also believed it was made of stone.

All in all, it was bad news.

We saw buses and trucks full of people driving in the opposite direction. They'd been evacuating the towns in the area since the creature showed up. None of us were excited now.

About twenty minutes later we were close to the monster, we could hear a strange whistling in the distance. The soldier looked up. "We're close. Remember we want it heading to the northeast, there's only a few villages that way and they've been evacuated. We will be observing you from a distance ready to move in and help if you're injured, so don't worry about us."

We stopped and could just see trees swaying less then a kilometer away. Christoph grabbed a big pile of metal that was strapped down at the back of the truck. It oozed over him, first coating his skin and clothes, then building up, braiding cords of metal together, strengthening around his chest, spine and head. He grew in height, his arms became easily 6 feet long with wide metal hands for throwing, or for gouging. In five minutes he'd gone from human to machine.

Stepping out, Christoph picked up Michelle and Nathaniel, and we ran towards the creature. I bounded along on all fours, Pulam made his legs longer, and ran beside Christoph both of them using long, loping stride. Soon we met up with a small squad of soldiers who were following the beast.

When they saw us the tired men jumped and began raising their weapons. "Hey, we're the good guys. You should have gotten a report that we're here to help you," I said. I'd been elected as spokesperson since I spoke English most like the people of this world. Michelle was a close second but we figured they'd balk at listening to a twelve year old in person.

The captain waved at his men, "Keep an eye on the monster. Command will be a little upset if we lose it. I was told to expect you. It's just a little surprising."

"Believe me, we understand completely," I said. "Now where is the monster headed?"

"As you can see it's headed due east which will bring it to the outskirts of New York. Since it's attracted to noise and buildings, as soon as it reaches the freeway, it will most likely start heading into the reclaimed areas. With the woods like they are here, we can't easily get men in there to lead it away, at least not without a large number of casualties," he said. He looked at us with his eyebrow raised, it seemed like he was expecting us to chicken out.

“Ok, we’re going to get in front of it and lead it to the northeast following the old highway. Make sure everyone knows what we’re doing and stays out of the way.”

"That's really rough territory. A town was destroyed at the bend, and it's almost impossible to navigate," the captain said.

"For you. But we can move very fast on foot," I told him.

"Alright than," the captain said. Before we left he gave us his radio frequency so we could stay in touch with him.

**

A quick run got us to the road ahead of the monster. From the crashing of trees we were able to get a pretty good idea where it would come out at, so Christoph, Nathaniel got into position to lead the monster their way if there was problem. Michelle headed off a little ways ready to keep us organized. With that done Pulam and I went into the woods, towards the invulnerable creature.

Yeah, I'm really smart.

It didn't take long to reach the thing. It smelled like a turkey, a really big turkey. Even without the falling trees, and the occasional bird like chirping, I could have led us right to it. I saw its head first, it was a bit like a very big ugly vulture with a parrots beak. Having seen a telephone pole bitten cleanly in half, I knew that the mouth was something to avoid.

Pulam pointed to a thicket off to the side, and made his way there, while I headed towards the dinosaur. I wasn’t happy about this. One chomp from that sharp parrot beak, a stomp from the elephant like legs, a swing from its downy black neck, or a thwack from its long red tail and there would likely be no more me.

The road was close. I'd have to act quickly to get it going in the right direction, so I went with the direct approach, AKA the suicidal one.

I was wearing special flexible sandals, which protected my feet but I could use my claws for traction and climbing. Jumping up into a tree right in front of it was easy. A couple meters up in the air, less then thirty meters away from its big, black beak, I roared at it. With my mix of cat and human vocal cords I could make an interesting roar, that was irritating to the ears and let people know a predator was going to rip their throat out.

That got the things attention.

It opened its beak and whistled in a tone that made my eardrums want to bleed. As I covered my ears it seemed to move at light speed, the head clubbed the tree I was standing on, snapping it in half. I managed to jump away tumbling to the ground, into a pile of branches. That was the good thing, because the monster proceeded to stomp the tree I had been standing in flat. The bad part was I had been thrown to the west, and the creature was looking at me even as it turned a fairly large tree into splinters.

Whistling another challenge the monster charged.

I was stuck in the downed branches without any fast way to get out. “Little help here!” I screamed into the radio.

Its' body broke the tree's like they were toothpicks, it's massive weight made the ground shake with every step. With all the branches under and on top of me, I couldn't gain any traction to jump out, and there was nothing strong enough to grab onto and pull myself out. I was forced to wiggle out a few inches at a time, that caused a small problem as in about five seconds I was going to be turned into paste.

Pulam came racing towards me, shouting from eight mouths, shooting his shotgun as he ran. The dinosaur turned towards him, whistling again. My ears were ringing. Seeing that I wasn’t about to die, my saviour turned and ran as quickly as he could into the bushes, in the general direction we wanted it to go.

Then a two meter long trunk struck the dinosaur in the side, just below it's stony armour with a dull thud. Christoph had somehow judged where the dinosaur was perfectly. I could have kissed him if I hadn’t been trapped in the branches. The creature whistled in anger spinning around to face it's new attacker. This wasn’t so good as it made the dino almost step on me. I got a very good look at the monsters butt as it's back legs kicked dirt and debris onto me. It's tail swung so close it's tiny feathers tickled my nose.

My brain didn't have time to think, so the suicidal part of me took over, again. While the monster charged away, it's telephone pole size tail was inches from my nose. I needed to get out of the branches and get back into action. I did the obvious thing and grabbed its tail in a bear hug, driving my nails into the cracks of its’ stony hide.

I don't think it even noticed me while it charged back towards the road. The branches and sticks ripped at my fur and clothes, leaving some nasty bruises and scrapes, but nothing was broken. I started climbing up, ducking my head as bushes, branches and felled trees rushed past. My claws felt like they were going to be torn out by the roots, my nose and lips seemed like hamburger where I'd slammed face first into the rough, granite like, pale yellow shell. I took some time to curse myself for being so stupid as to climb a rampaging dinosaur, but I managed to get onto the things back. Now I just needed to figure out what to do.

From my position I couldn't see what was happening, and I'd been shaken up so much I didn't even know what direction we were heading in. A boulder shattered against its’ shell sprinkling me with gravel and driving dust into my eyes. I heard someone shouting from my radio, it was Michelle. “Pat! Are you OK?!”

I hit the button, while clinging with one hand for dear life. We’d hit the road, it looked deserted, but I smelled something like the worlds biggest pine tree in the wind. “Alive. Plan?” was about all I could get out, as the dinosaur reared up and ran towards the smell.

“We’re in the woods. Nathaniel made a scent of what the creature was eating, trying to get it in the right direction. Pulam is following it, so is Christoph. Where are you?” Michelle asked.

“On the dinosaur. It’s made out of stone.” It was a little easier to talk now, the dinosaur was looking for the wonderful smell. “I’m going to try to get into the cockpit on its’ back, maybe I can control it or something. Try not to throw anymore stones while I’m up here.”

I climbed up the shell, and had almost reached the open door when the creature whistled. It was going to make me permanently deaf if it kept doing that. It spun around and began running down the road in the wrong direction, I was bouncing so badly, it was all I could do to hold on. I looked up and saw a helicopter flying in the distance. A tree hit it on the leg, making it stumble. I was thrown forward, my hand reached out catching the door of the cockpit, I felt my hand bruise against the hard metal. Painfully I crawled inside and sat down on the padded seat, holding onto the armrests. Another boulder hit the dinosaur, uncomfortably close to me, it sounded like a bomb going off. The air was filled with the smell of pine sap.

The chair looked like it had been made for a human. It was well padded, and even though none of the buttons or symbols made sense it resembled something like the cockpit of a fighter. There was even a joystick in front of a tv screen. From the red buttons on it, I had an idea that it controlled large guns mounted on either side of the creatures neck. Right now however the controls were dead. Over the smell of my own sweat, fear, and the smell of the dinosaur I noticed something else, blood. Looking down the brown leather seat was covered in cracked and dried blood. A shotgun roared from the other side of the road.

With the helicopter rapidly disappearing, boulders being thrown from one side, a noisy gun on the other, and a smell it seemed to like filling the air, the dinosaur was turning around in a circle, confused and angry. I picked up the radio again. “Michelle, can you enter an animals mind?” I asked.

She came back quickly. “It's not easy, but yes.”

“Good that thing was controlled by humans, if you can make it think you're its’ rider it might stop,” I told her.

She didn’t get back for so long I started to wonder if she’d heard me. Finally she said, “I would need to be right beside it and it's moving too fast. I can't do it.”

“You'd be safe in the cockpit, it's armoured and we can close the door so you wouldn't be thrown out. Once you're in it you can do anything you want.”

“I-I-I can't get up there.”

“That's where I come in. Want to fly?” I asked, trying to smile.

**

While the dinosaur was distracted I jumped off it’s back, aiming for a somewhat clear spot where I could roll into the trees. Pulam fired his shotgun just as I jumped, making sure I wouldn’t be noticed. Nathaniel and Michelle came running up to me. The Neanderthal smelled like the worlds largest air freshener. “Get ready, I’ll make sure it's going in the right direction for you. It really likes my smell,” he said. He handed some straps to me from his bag, before taking off, somehow making himself smell even stronger.

“You ready Michelle?” I asked. She nodded, but she was shaking and biting her lip. “Don’t worry, I’ll be right beside you. If anything goes wrong, I’ll make sure we get away safely. Trust me.”

By the time Christoph reached us, Michelle was strapped firmly to my chest. We sat down in Christophs’ oversized throwing arm. The girl was trembling with fear and hyperventilating, but she she wasn't complaining. Since I was ready to scream in terror, I didn't make any jokes, just wrapped my arm around her and waited. The dinosaur, which had begun tearing up the nearby area, saw something and we could feel the ground tremble as it charged. That was Pulam and Nathaniel getting it into position. We went soaring into the air, and then the dinosaur came into view.

I had thought the monster was loud, it had nothing on a terrified kid screaming at the top of her lungs right beside my very sensitive ears. I was pretty sure that my eardrums popped, but I didn't have time to check as all too quickly we slammed into the hard, rocky shell of the monster. I cradled her body against me, covering her head with my arm, like I did when we jumped down the stairs. My free hand tried to grabbed some kind of handhold as we skipped over the back of the creature.

My fingers caught a small crack in the stone plates. I felt a claw snap, and heard a loud crack, it was like my hand was on fire. I yowled, but didn't let go. Michelle kept screaming as the dinosaur bucked a little, annoyed at our presence. “Hold on, I'm going to start climbing,” I told her. The two meters climb to the cockpit was the hardest thing I'd ever done. I was moving on all four as the monster ran with its swaying stride, trying not to fall off or crush Michelle between me and the shell. It was a great workout.

After what seemed like an hour we were at the cockpit. Michelle unstrapped herself as I clung to the door. Sitting, she tried to strap herself down, but the seat straps were far too large for her. After fumbling with them for a few seconds she gave up and just grabbed the arm rests as hard as she could. She closed her eyes and entered the dinosaurs mind.

I couldn't close the door, and I wasn't about to sit outside, so I held on for dear life ready to catch Michelle if the monster jumped or anything. My broken finger was swelling up before my eyes, my ripped off claw was bleeding and throbbed in pain. The palms of my hands and my toes, which weren't covered in fur, were rubbed raw, cracked and bleeding from the tough hide, and razor sharp feathers. All in all I looked and felt like hell. The air was full of pine sap again, once more confusing the dinosaur. I couldn’t see Pulam anywhere.

For some reason the dinosaur was still active, even though Michelle was as limp as a rag doll. She didn't look scared or in trouble, so I didn't want to risk doing anything that could ruin her concentration, but it was nerve wracking just waiting for something to happen. Finally the dinosaur stopped moving. With a heavy sigh it sat on the ground and began ripping bushes and small trees out of the ground, shredding them with its’ beak and swallowing everything in large, noisy gulps.

Michelle opened her eyes. In the short time she'd been in the dinosaurs head dark circles surrounded her eyes, and it looked like she was ready to fall over. I grabbed her shoulder to keep her sitting upright.

“What happened?” I asked.

“It was angry. It had lost its’ rider and it was so angry. I had to make it think I was its' rider. I can control it, we don't have to kill it,” she said, her exhausted face beaming.

I picked up my radio, she was too tired to do much. Giving her a hug I smiled back, “You did good, Michelle.”

Chapter 14

Michelle was patting Lusca, her name for the dinosaur, on its' bald vulture like head, while it cooed in pleasure. I wasn't nearly as relaxed as she was, having been on the wrong end of that beak just two days before.

“You're saying it was domesticated by non-humans?” a scientist asked.

“Yes. They were like humans and apes. They had golden fur and pink faces. I couldn't understand anything they said, it was very strange, but I could tell what they meant.” Her eyes became unfocused, a little more slowly than normal, she raised her arm and made a weird whistling grunt.

Lusca rose on its' back legs, its head was twenty meters in the air. The large elephant like feet trembled trying to hold the enormous bulk upright. After a minute, it came down with a bone jarring thump. The wires that peeked out from under its shells where the two guns had been shook a little. On the first day after capturing it, engineers had worked hard, stripping everything they could from it. Only the cockpit and the seat remained.

A group of soldiers came up snapping a massive chain around its back leg. The long neck whipped around, whistling a challenge, just before it bit through the steel chain as if it was butter. The soldiers fell back with shouts of fear.

Michelle made a harsh whistling sound, still semi-immersed in the dinosaurs memory. Instantly Lusca calmed down, whining pitifully. She patted its head again, clucking her teeth.

“Michelle, can you please get out of sight? We want to see if we can control it,” the scientist said.

We both went behind some trees about a hundred meters away to watch. The scientist pulled out a recorder, plugging it into a stereo on a bench nearby. Pressing a button the whistling grunt to make it stand up rang out clearly. The creature whipped its head around, looking for something. Not seeing what it wanted, it started stamping the ground.

Frantically the scientist played the harsh whistle that Michelle used to scold it. It only made the situation worse.

Lusca gave an ear piercing whistle, bringing its foot down on the stereo. Opening its huge beak it leaned in as if to bite him in half. Grabbing Michelle I jumped towards it, while she whistled as loudly as she could. The change was instantaneous, the beak slammed shut and Lusca came bounding towards us like a giant puppy. The scientist screamed as the tail almost hit him, but having to change his pants was better than dying.

It stopped right in front of us, the beady eyes alternating between glaring at me and giving goo goo eyes to Michelle. Gently putting Michelle on the ground, I backed away very carefully hoping it wouldn't decide it wanted a little snack. Or remember that I'd had the audacity to challenge it the day before.

“Do you think they'll let me keep Lusca?” Michelle asked, hugging her new pet.

“I think so. You're the only one who can control it.” As I watched the girl and her dinosaur I realized something had been bugging me. “What does Lusca mean?”

“A lusca is sea serpent people believe live in the water around the Caribbeans'. My father says they're only sailor superstitions, but I love hearing the stories. It seems like a good name for her.”

I couldn't disagree with her. Someone called my name, looking up I saw Christoph waving to me from a safe distance away. Grateful for a chance to get away from Lusca the happy dinosaur, I said goodbye to Michelle and hurried away.

“Hey what's up?” I asked, giving him a hug.

He stiffened for a minute, before wrapping his arms around me. An electrical pulse ran up my spine, I actually started purring. He smelled nice. God why did I wait so long to give him a hug?

“I just wanted to know how the dinosaur is doing. I heard it getting angry.”

“They were trying to get it to do things without Michelle there. Lusca didn't like that. Any idea when our little holiday will be over?” I asked, nuzzling his chest with my head.

He tried to gently push me away, I dug my claws into his back, just hard enough to let him know I didn't want to let go. Giving up, he patted me on the back. “I asked Mr. Stephenson today, we should be back to our training tomorrow or the next day. They're still reviewing everything. How is your finger?”

“It's fine. The nail has almost grown back.” Finally letting him go, I showed him my finger and claw. The finger was still sore, but the break had healed up over night, my claw was taking longer. A sharp little point was just popping out from my fingertip, compared to the carefully clipped longer nails, it was barely noticeable.

I grabbed his hand again. “So what are we going to do today?”

“I was about to go back inside to watch movies with the guys. Do you want to join us?”

“Definitely!”

We walked hand in hand, towards to the house. He was talking about something, but I was only half listening if that. My hand was busy tracing the muscles on his arm. Looking up I had to resist touching his jaw, his brown hair looked almost blonde in the sunlight. When he smiled at me, I noticed the dimples for the first time. I smiled back and actually giggled a little, not quite believing I was so close to such a good looking guy.

We reached the rec room, Nathaniel and Pulam were already sitting on the long couch, watching some war movie. I jumped over the back of the couch to land beside Pulam, not caring that my sundress rose up showing everyone my underwear.               Throwing my arm over his shoulder, I patted the empty spot beside me for Christoph. As soon as he sat down, I put my legs on his lap, letting the yellow dress slide up my thighs.

“Are you alright Pat?” Christoph asked.

“Never better,” I told him, arching my back a little. I started purring again, pulling Pulam a little closer to me.

We watched the movie, like that. My arms around Pulam, while my legs rested on Christoph. My tail flicked around, with a mind of its own brushing Christophs' chest and neck. Nathaniel kept looking at me out of the corner of his eyes, while the other two twisted awkwardly in their seats. I had them pretty well trapped with my body.

As soon as the movie was over, Pulam got up almost knocking me off. “I'm sorry. I must go,” he said and left the room.

Pouting, I leaned over to Christoph, a low growl in my throat. “Do you want to do something with me?”

“I-I-I,” he looked like a mouse in front of a cat. “I need to do something to.” He practically ran out of the room.

“Bye Pat!” Nathaniel said already up and heading for the door.

I watched them go, not understanding what their problem was. “Well this sucks.”

**

The next day I didn't get out of bed. What was the point? Everyone was avoiding me for some reason. I just wanted to hug someone but the moment any of the guys saw me, they became so defensive, it wasn't any fun. It didn't help that my stomach ached.

I opened the window hoping some fresh air would help, I could smell breakfast being cook. The smell of it made me need to vomit. I ran to the toilet but nothing came up. It was just dry heaves and nausea. Finally giving up on that, I crawled back into bed, with the blankets thrown off, only to pull them back on when the hot flashes vanished. The radio was on, I couldn’t concentrate on the songs. My body itched. Actually not my body, just my pelvis centered on my crotch.

Closing my eyes, I tried to go back to sleep. But the moment I closed my eyes images flashed through my brain. Movie stars, singers, soldiers, my friends, they were all there, at least all the male ones, totally naked and begging me to come to them. I groaned, biting my lip hard enough to draw blood. I grabbed the sheet tearing it to shreds.

Rolling out of bed, I barely noticed that I was naked. My nose twitched, I smelled something good. My mouth watered, I could barely breath. Heading for the door some still sane and rational part of my mind grabbed a housecoat from the back of a chair. My hand fumbled with the door knob, I needed to see what smelled so good. If I didn't get it, I'd just die, I knew it. Finally the door opened.

I stalked down the hallway, eyes closed, literally following my nose. My housecoat was wide open, I didn't care. The smell was coming from a door, breathing deeply, my nose planted against the crack I began to moan. I didn’t know who’s door it was, I didn’t care, I needed to get in there.

The door was locked. I shoved it opened, there was a crack and a shout from the other side. The smell intensified. Christoph was standing there, sweating, half naked. I purred, walking closer to him. The images in my head intensified, it was only him and me now. He said something, I didn’t hear it. The robe slide from my back. I grabbed him by the shoulders and kissed him, rubbing my body against his. There was a shout, I ignored it.

Hands touched me, it felt like the greatest thing ever.

Chapter 15

I woke up in the doctors office sick and sore. Everything was so hot I felt like I was roasting to death. The light shining in from the big bay window was way too bright, I wondered if I could manage to walk over and open it, at that moment a quick death seemed far preferable to living.

A nurse was sitting beside the bed watching me, with a concerned but strange expression. I'd seen her often enough but never really talked to her, she was always too professional to be approachable. She saw the expression on my face and quickly handed me a basin. At first I was confused, but three seconds later my stomach roiled and the little bit of food in me came out.

“Thanks,” I muttered, wiping my mouth on the damp cloth she handed me.

“You're welcome, Pat. Drink this please,” she said handing me a glass of milky medicine. I drained it. “How are you feeling?”

From my matted fur, bleary eyes, drooping ears, and my runny nose, it was probably easy to guess how I felt. Still I humoured her. “I wish I was dead. What happened? Did Lusca the happy dinosaur stomp on me?”

She actually blushed, I didn't think nurses or doctors were capable of that. “Um, no. Let me get the doctors to explain.”

She hurried out taking the basin with her leaving me confused, worried, and still feeling like our dinosaur had used me as a chew toy. My stomach cramped up again, but it wasn't too serious this time. Shit, this was worse than a period. I realized I couldn't remember when my last one was.

Doctor Pitt and the counselor almost all of us avoided, walked in. This was more serious than I had expected. They both sat down and didn't seem quite sure what to say. Afterwards I couldn't really blame them for being nervous, no one had ever dealt with someone like me. “Ok, doc. I'm feeling sick all over, I'm too hot, and can't remember why I'm here, what have I got?' I asked.

“All of that is probably from your hormone therapy. We had to do a crash test with various hormones hoping to get yours back to normal levels, and your body is still trying to deal with them. Within the next two or three weeks we'll have it figured out and this won't happen again,” Dr. Pitt said.

“Uh, hormone therapy. Why?”

The counselor took over. “Your cat was spayed, correct?”

“Yeah, thankfully. I hated the only cat we had, a whole pack of them would have driven me crazy,” I answered with a grimace.

“So you aren't aware that during certain periods female cats go into heat?”

My heart forgot how to beat for a few seconds, and I suddenly needed to throw up again. The memories came back. They didn't rush back, they didn't make much sense or go in any particular order, but I remembered a lot, the feelings, the thoughts.

I’d jumped on Christoph, straddling his waist, grinding my naked body into him. Pulam, Nathaniel and Michelle all came in wondering why Christoph was yelling for help. At the time they’d only been so much background noise. My claws had torn away Christophs’ underwear. It had taken all three of the guys to get me on the ground, at which point some valets and soldiers arrived. They’d needed the extra bodies to keep me under control. The doctor had arrived then and stuck a needle into me knocking me out.

I covered my head in the blanket. The memories didn’t let me go, they laughed at me. I'd pretended I was still human. That I was still a girl with a bit of a hair problem. But it wasn't true. None of it was true. I had been right to avoid being more than just a friend to Christoph. Now there wasn't even the chance of still being friends.

My memories and actions shredded that thin straw of denial I’d been clinging too for so long.

I wasn’t a girl anymore. A girl wouldn’t throw herself at a guy like I had. I remembered, it was disjointed, confusing and blurry, but I wouldn’t have cared what guy it was, Pulam, Nathaniel, the doctor, Mr. Stephenson. Christoph was just the first one I smelled.

Someone touched my covered shoulder. “Pat I know this is hard for you, but we’re here to help you,” the counselor said.

“Go away,” I said, my whiny, high pitched voice cracking. “I’m just an animal!”

**

Christoph came into the doctors’ office. I could smell him from a mile away, and his heavy steps were obvious. I curled up into a tighter ball, tucking the blanket under me until I was totally hidden. I couldn’t face him or anyone. I couldn’t control myself. I couldn’t trust myself. I wasn’t Patricia Sawyer anymore. That person died weeks ago, replaced by whoever this mockery was. I wasn’t a girl. I wasn’t even human.

“Pat. How are you feeling?” he asked. The concern was so obvious in his voice it hurt. I couldn’t look at him. He’d never look at me the same way again. I wasn’t his friend anymore, I was the cat girl who’d tried to rape him. Who could possibly respect me after that?

“The doctor explained what happened. And Nathaniel told us how you reacted to the catnip. It wasn’t your fault. You couldn’t help it.”

He kept talking I didn’t listen. ‘I couldn’t help it.’ Who the hell used that line anyways? You used it when you played a trick on a friend, or said something stupid trying to make someone laugh. Animals couldn’t help themselves. Pathetic lowlifes couldn’t help themselves. The fur rubbing against the blankets, the ears folded back against my head, whiskers tickling my face, they proved I wasn’t me anymore. I was a mockery, a mistake.

Eventually he left. At some point a tray of food was brought in, it smelled like cardboard. It was taken away a long time later, and the lights were turned out. I got up and walked to the bathroom, my unnatural eyes turned to slits when I turned on the lights. Looking in the mirror I looked at my body with a clear mind. My whiskers stood out to either side of my face. My blood shot eye looked at them, balefully.

I grabbed them. My lips and cheeks seemed to buzz at the touch. I pulled.

It was worse pain than anything I’d ever felt, as if I’d lit a gasoline fire on my face. I didn’t stop, biting through my tongue to keep from screaming. I collapsed to my knees; little sobs of pain escaped with the blood dripping from my face and mouth. Whiskers fell from limp hands. I stared at my black and white face, now flecked with red. It looked better without the whiskers. A little more human.

I wanted to be human again. I needed to be human again. I remembered seeing Michelle looking at me as I struggled to stay on Christoph. She’d been horrified, crying, disgusted at the sight of me yowling in need. I had promised I’d protect her, that she could trust us. How could she trust me now?

There was a crunch, I looked and saw my hand had punched through the wall. The wooden panels cut my skin, my hand hurt a little. It felt good. I was in control of something at least, even if it was just the destruction of myself. I’d already been destroyed. Whatever ‘I’ was didn’t matter. Might as well destroy it to. I punched the wall again.

Again.

Again.

Again.

My bloody fist stopped a centimeter from Pulam’s chest. Someone was sobbing, gasping for air. It took me a minute to realize it was me.

I looked up at him, barely able to see through the tears. He reached out slowly, gently lifting my bloody and bruised hands to the light. “Did it help?” The pain hit me then. I grabbed him like a lifeline, crying into his shirt as he led me out of the destroyed bathroom.

We ended up on the bed. I couldn’t stop crying. I wasn’t sure what I was crying about. The humiliation? The loss of control? My old life? Fear? Knowing I’d never see my family again? My humanity? Maybe all of it? I cried enough to fill an ocean, and still the tears wouldn’t stop. Pulam didn’t speak as I cried, he stroked my back, cradling me in his arms, letting me soak his shirt.

Finally, an eternity later, the tears stopped.

Still hugging me, he handed me a glass of water with a third arm. I struggled to hold it with my bruised hands, my swollen fingers couldn’t bend properly, they had almost no strength in them. He helped me drink. When I finished, bloody drool was dripping down the glass. I realized Pulam’s shirt was covered in tears, snot and blood. He didn’t seem to notice, all his attention was on me.

I looked away, not willing to show anymore of the pain inside me.

“You think life over? You are a monster?” he asked.

“How do you know?” I asked.

“You speak very, very loud. Did no stop when I come. I listened. I feel same way,” he admitted.

My head turned unwillingly to look at him. “You think you’re a monster?”

He nodded, a few tears rolled down his face as he sniffed. “I hold children in me. I'm not human. I try be good, but don’t know. Children say I good, but are children them, or me?” When I didn’t, couldn’t, answer him, he gave me one of his little smiles. “Old life over. I know. So make new life. If I monster, I will be good monster. I help friends. I make difference. You help friends. You help Michelle. You smile, make other smile. You push, keep friends have fun. You a good human.”

My ears flicked. “I’m not human. Not anymore.”

“Then good monster. You good. Good friend. Good person,” he insisted. I slumped against him, too tired to deny what I knew wasn’t true. I’m not sure if he took that as acceptance, or simply as good enough. “May I fix hands?”

I nodded. He didn’t move, but a hand stretched out from his back, grabbing a first aid kit from beside the nearby desk. Still holding me with his main arms, two more hands pulled out some disinfectant. I hissed as he put it on my cuts. The hands were obviously childrens, their touch was soft and delicate, pressing just hard enough to wash the blood and dust off, trying to be as gentle as possible.

We sat in the dim hospital room, two monsters, far from home with no idea what the future held.

Chapter 16

I woke up well past breakfast time in my own bed. I wasn’t sure how I got there, the last thing I remembered was taking some pain killers for my hands. They were still bandaged up, but the bandages were loose, best of all I could flex my hands with only some pain. When I stood up I saw that I was still in my hospital gown. There were blood stains on my fur, and I could feel the matted hair all over my body. Heading for the bathroom, I took the bandages off and seeing the damage I'd done to my hands the long slashes where I'd cut myself almost to the bone, I had to throw up.

Ripping the hospital gown off I crammed it as far into the garbage can as possible. Then I had a long, hot shower, scrubbing every part of me. I really wanted to wash the fur off, but I'd promised Pulam I wouldn't hurt myself. It wouldn't do much good anyways.

After I dried myself off, I went to the wardrobe. It was already a scorching hot July day, wearing something light would make sense. I grabbed the baggiest tracksuit I could find, knotting the waist so tightly it almost hurt. Taking a few minutes to get my panic under control I left the room.

Nathaniel was waiting outside the door reading a book. He didn’t comment on my sweat suit. “Feeling better?” he asked.

I nodded. “What are you doing out here?’

He waved his left hand, wiggling his fingers at the same time, his version of a shrug. “They wanted to get you back into training, said it was the best thing for you. We said no. I thought I should stay here to make sure they didn’t bother you.”

“Thanks.” My stomach growled. “Is there any breakfast left?”

He reached into his pocket, pulling out something wrapped in a napkin. I gingerly took it from him, making sure not to touch him. I wasn't sure why I did it, but after last night, I wasn’t up to physical contact, it seemed too personal. Unwrapping it revealed a tea biscuit with ham chunks baked in. “Thanks,” I said as I bit into it.

“If you want more, we can go to the kitchen. But you need to see the doctor for more medicine.”

We started walking down the hall, I noticed he was limping, favouring his left leg. A hazy memory of my kicking someone rose up in my mind. The person had yelped in pain, their voice almost as high pitched as my own. I looked away, wanting to apologize, but not sure how to say it. ‘Sorry for almost breaking your leg, while I was crazy with lust.’ It didn’t really sound good, even in my head. It was just one more thing for me to worry about. “Where is everyone else?” I finally asked.

Nathaniel grinned, his greyish green eyes flashing with laughter. “In the rec room. We decided we needed a festival.”

“Is that allowed?”

Another hand wave. “We have worked hard with no break for over a month now. We are taking a relaxation. There will be a dinosaur ride later.”

I was about to say something when I saw Mr. Stephenson coming down the hallway, he looked less than happy. “You’ve finally decided to wake up then. Did you enjoy your beauty rest?”

Normally I’d duck my head, apologize, and act shy. But I didn’t want to, maybe later I would, but not then. I felt my fur rise, a growl rose in my throat. “Haven’t you ever heard of taking a break?”

“We don’t have time to relax, you and your friends are too valuable. We need to get you fully trained as soon as possible whether you like it or not.”

Nathaniel stepped up beside me, he was actually shaking. I heard something from his hands, almost like leather stretching and a faint popping sound. Glancing down I saw thorns like you’d see on a rose coming out of skin. “We stopped a dinosaur. We are ready if something else happens. We can take one day to play. What is so important we must train until we fall, and when we are sick?”

Mr. Stephenson stood his ground, frowning even more fiercely. “You’ve been busy reading your magazines and news papers, but you have no idea what is going on in the world. We are struggling for survival, trying to rebuild everything, while others are tearing it down. We are hoping, praying even, that you five can help us keep order, so that more innocent people don’t have to suffer. Because believe me, the barbarians are at the gate ready to destroy everything for their own selfish desires. Simply because of who you are, you’re caught up in this.”

I tried to breath normally, not showing the fear I suddenly felt. “Who are these barbarians?”

“Terrorist groups, revolutionaries, criminals, too many to count. They were created in the years after the war, surviving in the uninhabitable zones, and just across our borders. They’ve already tried to get people like you working for them. They know about you, and they want you to join them or die.” He let that sink in for a minute before continuing. “We gave you a choice to work with us. Now we’re doing everything we can to make sure you stay alive and can actually bring some good into this world. If we’ve pushed you too hard, its simply because we know what you will have to face. And you’ll be facing it sooner then you thought possible. So by all means take a day off, but next time give us some warning.”

He turned and walked away.

“Come on, Nathaniel, we need to talk to the others. And be careful with your thorns,” I told my friend. He looked down at his hands, his mouth falling open in surprise at the brown and green barbs that had erupted from his skin.

**

I hated how everyone was watching me as we sat around a warm fire inside one of Pulam’s memories. They’d been happy to see me moving about, Michelle had run up and given me a big hug, which really didn’t help the stomach cramps. Christoph had smiled ‘very’ shyly, and said he was happy to see me looking better. We’d went into Pulam’s mind right away to make sure we weren’t overheard by anyone, and because I wanted to get the attention off of me. Unfortunately since I was the one who passed on Mr. Stephensons’ message, everyone was focusing on me. Sitting there, hunched down in my baggy clothes, with my arms crossed protectively in front of me, I probably didn’t look very confident.

Christoph was the first to speak. “He didn’t say anything about who these groups are or where they come from?”

“Nothing.”

“So which of these groups did the masked man come from?” Pulam asked, staring at the sky.

Suddenly Michelle flinched, slapping her arm. I squawked in pain as something bit my very sensitive cheek. Then everyone started jumping up and down slapping at themselves. The memory shattered and we were back in reality.

The room was full of flying bugs. So many that it was almost impossible to see through the thick, black swarm. Everyone was yelling in pain. I grabbed Michelle in my arms and ran for the door as fast as I could, I wasn’t going to bother opening it, we needed to get out as fast as possible. I misjudged where it was, and slammed my arm into the door frame, so hard I shattered the wood. It felt like I broke my arm. There was still enough momentum that the door opened. Michelle took more of the impact than she should have though, I felt her go limp in my arms.

In the bug free hallway, I turned around, “You guys out here!” Taking a second I saw that Michelle was covered in small trails of blood, from dozens of bites and stings, her eyes were closed and there was a nasty bruise forming on her head. Despite the buzzing, I could hear her heart beating normally. Breathing a sigh of relief, I still needed to get her somewhere safe, the bugs were coming after me again, and my claws wouldn’t do anything against the swarm that had to number in the thousands. Running down the hall cradling the precious cargo in my arms. I couldn’t seem to run in a straight line, my balance wasn’t off too badly, but there was definitely something very wrong with me. The alarms started blaring, making my ears fold back in pain.

Something was crashing through the walls, Not nearly as fast as I was, but it was noisy. I unsheathed my claws. Soldiers came running down the hallway armed with guns. They had less chance of fighting the buzzing swarm then I did. “Go! Go! They’re bugs!” I shouted, hoping they’d understand. They took one look at the swarming mass of bugs, and stopped running. As I went past them, not slowing down in the least, they fell in behind me, yelling into their radio. We passed a fire extinguisher, two soldiers grabbed it, firing foam at the insects, trying to slow them down. I glanced backwards when I heard them screaming. The bugs blanketed them, I saw them writhing in pain still firing the extinguisher.

“Pat! Door on the right! Get in!” one of them shouted.

I spun so fast, I nearly fell, only my claws digging into the hardwood floor kept me upright. Opening the door, I saw a sprinkler system was soaking the room for all it was worth. The soldiers shoved me inside as they barged into the room, slamming and locking the door behind them. One of them grabbed Michelle from me, placing her gently under a table. He pulled a small first aid kit from his belt and started looking her over. Breathing hard, and squashing some bugs that were caught in my fur, I turned to the man in charge. “What happened? Where are the guys?!”

“I have no idea what happened. The bugs appeared from nowhere, and attacked you immediately. Pulam and Christoph made are in another room like us. Nathaniel is missing,” he told me, keeping his gun trained on the door. “You injured?”

“Just some bites. My fur protected me.” The buzzing outside the door was getting louder. Something rattled the doorknob.

“Pat,” something said. It sounded like a thousand mosquitoes buzzing in tune, forming words with their wings. My skin crawled. “Pat, I want to talk to you. Open the door and we can talk like civilized people.” I didn’t budge. There was no way I was going to open the door. “Very well. You have powers I want. You are working for the wrong side now. Join me and I’ll give you more money and power than you can dream of. This is a pathetic little country in a backwards dimension. We can rule it. You won’t have to jump to the tune of some ignorant little men. Consider what we can accomplish together.”

I heard people shifting behind me, the heartbeats of the soldiers sped up. I couldn’t smell them thanks to the water, but I was pretty sure there were at least two or three guns pointed at my back. Spitting water out of my mouth, I shouted back, “No deal!”

“What do you want Pat? Tell me what you want and I’ll make a deal. I can be very generous.” I kept my mouth shut. After a minute of silence, it spoke again. “Are you worried about those puppets behind you? They are less than nothing compared to us. Watch.”

The soldiers started screaming, slapping their clothes. Guns dropped, as faces twisted in agony. I saw a hornet as large as my thumb crawl out of a shirt, stinging the man I’d been talking to in the throat. I crushed it between my claws, but it was too late, the soldiers were down, some were clawing at their throats trying to breath. “YOU ASSHOLE!”

“Now, Pat. I could have killed you and your friends just as easily. But you are special. So tell me what do you want? Christoph seems quite eager, he has ambition.”

I could smell the death around me despite the water. Some of the soldiers were still moaning in pain. “Give yourself a body and fight me,” I snarled.

There was an explosion outside the door, followed by a series of bangs that despite the running water and the door between us deafened me. The radio blared to life. “Security Team 1, report. Over.”

Grabbing the radio I hit the button. “This is Pat, the soldiers are dead! What’s going on!”

“Are you OK? Over.”

“I’m fine, but Michelle is unconscious, she was stung and hit her head. She needs help.”

“Wait. We’re clearing the way with tear gas and stun grenades. Do not leave the room. We’ll be there as soon as we can. Out.”

Clipping the radio onto my soaking wet pants, I went over to Michelle to see how she was doing. Her eyes opened as I lifted her legs up a little to help the blood flow to her brain. “How are you doing?” I asked.

“Ow. You hit my head,” she accused me groggily.

“Sorry about that, I was off balance.” I tried to smile, she was talking and remembered what happened, that was a good sign.

“Why is it raining?”

“It’s keeping the bugs away. They’re clearing the hallways now, as soon as they’re done we’ll get you to the doctor.”

“What did it want?” she asked.

The radio came to life again before I could answer her. A human voice spoke, it wasn’t afraid, it was cold, full of malice. “Good bye everyone. I’ll be back soon. I expect an answer from you then, or I’ll destroy you. You can rule beside me, or die. Choose wisely.”

The water stopped, the door was unlocked and a group of soldiers came in. A medic headed straight for Michelle, while the others turned to their fallen companions. “Come on Pat, lets get you to the infirmary, make sure you weren’t poisoned or bitten.” On weak knees I followed the soldier. I smelled blood, fear, death. Valets, soldiers, aides, secretaries and researchers were scattered in rooms and on the hallways, covered in stings and bites, contorted from the pain they felt before they died.

I saw Christoph and Pulam come out of a room guided by their own soldiers. Pulam was pretty badly bitten, but he was walking normally. Christoph was clutching his arm, it looked broken, and despite his healing factor, it was badly bruised. “What happened to you?” I asked.

He grimaced as he spoke, “Had to break through a couple of walls. I couldn’t find the door. Finally reached a room with these guys, and then the water started. Did Nathaniel and Michelle go with you?”

“I grabbed Michelle, but she was knocked out when I ran into the door. She should be OK I don’t know what happened to Nathaniel.” My stomach was feeling queasy and it had nothing to do with the hormones. From the crestfallen look on both of their faces, the guys were feeling as bad about leaving our friend behind as I was.

We reached the doctor and were quickly dealt with by a nurse. Christoph had his arm set, I was given some pain killers. Pulam took a bit longer, they spent a few minutes swabbing his bloody bites with peroxide and gave him a double dose of painkillers. Then we were ignored as more people came in who were in much more serious condition then we were. We went into the hallway to wait for Michelle and news on Nathaniel.

Michelle came first, being carried on a stretcher. I put my ear to the door as the doctor looked her over. He said it was only a concussion, and ordered a nurse to put her in bed and watch over her. We all breathed easier knowing it wasn’t as serious as we’d feared. Then we had to wait for Nathaniel, it didn't take too long.

My nose twitched as it seemed like an herb garden had exploded. Looking around I saw Nathaniel coming down the hallway flanked by two soldiers who were grimacing and trying to walk beside him while staying as far away as possible. His clothes were drenched in something other than water, his skin gleamed in the light as if he was covered in oil. It didn’t seem like there was a single bite on him.

“Nathaniel, what happened to you?” Christoph said as soon as he was close enough not to shout.

“I saw the flyers, and just started making my own go away spray. There are lots of plants that do it, so I used all of them. Sorry for the stench,” he said smiling a little. “Where is Michelle?”

“She got hurt. Not too badly but I ran into a door with her. I don’t know how I did that,” I admitted.

“You don’t have whiskers,” he said.

I looked at the ground. “Yeah, I got rid of them last night.”

“Cat’s need their whiskers to help with balance and judging things,” Nathaniel said.

“Really?”

He nodded. “I had eight cats. One lost its whiskers in a fight, it was bumping into everything until they grew back.”

Great, I thought. It was my fault Michelle got hurt. “Lets get out of the way, more people are going to need the doctor and we can’t do anything here.”

Sadly we walked down the hallway, thinking about how many people had died because of us, while we'd been helpless.

Chapter 17

We sat in one of the spare rooms, with the window sealed tight. We had seen too many body bags being dragged away to want to talk. And many of the things we might want to talk about were off limits until Michelle came back as they edged into dangerous territory. I really wanted to lean on Christophs’ shoulder, but I wasn't sure if he'd accept it. Would he think it was still the cat part of me wanting to mate, would he be disgusted or scared of me. Or would he know I just wanted to be close to someone I trusted. So I perched on a chair listening for anything that sounded like a bug. We had all changed our clothes and had quick showers to wash off the blood. Nathaniel had taken the longest, trying to remove the oily scent from his skin, so he didn’t smell so bad, but there was still the scent of bug repellent on him and his skin was a little oily. Pulam had brought out some children who were busy running around the room making sure there were no large cracks in the wall.

Finally Christoph said something to break the silence. “How can we fight bugs?”

“Without being prepared, not much,” I said. “The water worked, but I don’t think any of us can make a rainstorm.”

“My chemicals are only defensive. I don’t know any that can kill bugs,” Nathaniel said with a frown.

Pulam started tapping his fingers. “Fire. Water. Smoke. All kill bugs. We do not have. Michelle enter bugs mind?”

My claws punctured the leather upholstery of the chair as I clenched my hands. “And I knocked her out before she could try.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself, you got her out in one piece. The worst thing she has is a headache,” Christoph said, patting my shoulder. I tried not to flinch as he touched me. Christ, why was I so jumpy? Didn't I want him to be my friend still. I shook my head trying to clear my head, things were too confusing.

“We need to go somewhere else. When fighting an enemy we can’t defeat, run away and buy time, come back stronger,” Nathaniel said.

Christoph considered that for a second. “That will be hard, unless Mr. Stephenson agrees.”

“Where is he anyways? Shouldn’t we be getting some more attention since we’re the ones the bug guy was after?” I asked. It was true, we had five guards outside the door, and we could hear military vehicles pulling up outside with soldiers being ordered into position by very loud officers, but that was it. No one was ordering us to a safe room, we weren’t being given weapons, we didn’t know if the attacker was injured and on the run, or if it had just flown away. The not knowing was worse than anything else. For all we knew we could be swarmed again any minute, or when we went to bed that night.

“I want to know why it chose today to attack,” Christoph said. “Just after we were told about the terrorists who want us, we get attacked.” He shook his head.

Nathaniel flinched, Pulam became stone faced, and I tried to control my racing heart. All of us had been thinking about conspiracies and that any wrong word could get us sent to a government lab, so we had learned to control our tongues. Christoph hadn’t. He just didn’t talk about it, so we hadn’t spent the time helping him keep secrets with nudges, hasty interruptions or dirty looks. “I’m sure there is a good reason, Christoph. You shouldn’t be so paranoid,” I said, maybe a little too hastily.

“Maybe they were told about the bug man. Or a threat, and they wanted to keep us from worrying,” Nathaniel said, now that he’d had a chance to think of an excuse. Pulam nodded firmly in agreement.

Realization came to Christoph’s face. “You are probably right,” he agreed, a little too loudly.

“Do you think we could get some smoke grenades or something like that? It will at least give us something to defend ourselves with,” I said, eager to change the subject to something safer.

We started talking about that and different tactics we could use to escape a similar attack. With the little information we had we mostly just repeated ourselves and went around in circles. It was frustrating, but safe.

**

With the soldiers in place we weren’t allowed out of the room except to go to the bathroom.

Since there were only a couple of books in the room, and we were there all day, missing lunch, we were pretty irritable. I’d only eaten the tea biscuit for the whole day, and with my increased metabolism I was ready to start gnawing on my own arm. Combine all of that with feeling guilty over hurting Michelle, my realization that I was all alone with three guys who I’d attacked the day before, and the growing nausea and hot and cold flashes from my haywire hormones, I was ready to kill something. The guys seemed to sense my agitation, after a few attempts at getting me involved in a game of cards, arm wrestling, or just talking, they left me alone to stare out the window. My tail was moving like a snake, and the fur kept standing up almost at random, which we’d all discovered meant I was pissed off. I’d decided to never play cards if there was money or embarrassment on the table, after the second time I ended up having to wash Nathaniels’ clothes, despite having servants to do it for us.

I was at the point where jumping out the window and making a run for it was preferable to one more second of thinking how the guys had seen me totally naked. The tracksuit I had on was too hot. I wanted to take off at least the shirt, but even with the sports bra on underneath, it wasn’t going to happen. Instead I had the sleeves rolled up as high as they would go, my claws ran along my arms, scraping away the loose fur. A few times I flinched as my fingers pulled at the fur hard enough to hurt. It was probably best that I didn’t take off my shirt, seeing more of my fur was the last thing I wanted.

Finally the torture ended and the soldiers let us out for supper. As we walked down the hall, there were soldiers everywhere. Several of them had tanks on their backs, and strange guns that looked like a cross between a flamethrower and a water gun. When we went past the doctors office, two soldiers took me inside for my hormone shot. Michelle was resting on a bed, a cold cloth covering her forehead. She smiled when she saw me.

“Pat, how is everything?” she asked, wincing as she spoke.

“We’re doing good,” I said as quietly as possible, while a nurse rolled my sleeve up and prepared the needle. “We’re worried about you, but everyone is fine.”

“Don’t worry about me. It’s just a headache, I’ll be fine in a few days.”

I was about to say something else, when the nurse interrupted. “Alright Michelle, you’ve talked enough. Just rest and you can talk to everyone tomorrow.”

She nodded, and I shut up, turning my head away from the needle that was ready to pierce my arm. I could face a rampaging dinosaur, but a needle freaked me out, I was some hero. The needle went in, and surprisingly quickly it was all done. It seemed like Michelle was asleep, so I gave her hand a squeeze and left as quietly as possible. The soldiers followed behind me all the way to the dining room, which I could smell from the staircase.

The food wasn’t much, sausages, corn and bread, but there was a lot of it. None of us talked, we were too busy stuffing our faces. By the time we finished, every plate was picked clean, there wasn’t a lot of mess, we were very careful about not spilling. As we sat there, letting the food digest, Mr. Stephenson walked in looking terrible.

Running a hand through his normally well-groomed hair trying to flatten it. I didn’t need my nose to tell me he’d been sweating, but I could smell that it wasn’t sweat from working out, but fear. “Hello everyone. I’m sorry that we kept you in the dark today after the attack. As you can no doubt understand we were busy trying to find ways to secure the grounds, as well as deciding what happens next.”

He put a file on a clear spot on the table. “Late last night, we were informed that this location had been compromised. One of the revolutionary groups, the Brotherhood of Patriots, was able to obtain information about you. We knew they were going to launch an attack soon, but we thought it would be no sooner than next week. Most likely during a mission, or using more conventional means. We did not suspect that they had a dimensional being of this power working for them.”

I picked up the file and quickly skimmed over the first page. Several things were blacked out, but letter was warning him to expect an attack within the next two weeks. There were a few other papers, but I didn’t bother looking at them as he kept talking.

“Since we don’t have a realistic response to this creature, we have decided to move you for your own safety. We’ll be splitting you up, as that will keep any single attack from being completely successful, and it will make keeping you secure easier.”

Suddenly I knew what it meant to have a target on my back. If we were separated, only one of us could die at a time. It would also be easier to keep us under control. I didn’t care what I’d done, I wasn’t about to be separated from any of my friends. “NO!”

“I beg your pardon?” he said, clearly not used to being yelled at.

“We’re not splitting up,” I said, standing up. “You want us to be a team, we need to be together. Come up with a new plan.”

“Pat, I realize you’ve had some hormonal issues recently, but please-“

There was a snap as I tightened my hand around the back of the chair, shattering the hardwood. “This isn’t about any hormones. The only thing that has kept me sane are these guys. You want me to go off by myself, surrounded by soldiers with people hunting me down? Not happening!” I heard the chairs shift behind me. I didn’t dare take my eyes off of Mr. Stephenson, my heart was racing, and only my anger kept me from shaking in fear.

“Pat’s right. We stick together,” Christoph said, putting his hand on mine. “You put us together, you’re not separating us.”

“We together for reason. Keep together,” Pulam said.

A cracking sound let us know that Nathaniel wasn’t happy about the turn of events either.

Mr. Stephenson frowned. “What will you do if the swarm attacks again? How many soldiers have to die trying to protect you. What will you do if you watch one of your friends die from being stung to death? Be realistic here, this is the best chance at surviving you’ve got.”

A growl rose in my throat, my runners tore as my claws extended, cutting into the thin rubber soles. Christoph tightened his grip on my hand, trying to keep me calm. “If you are worried about the soldiers, we can leave now with Michelle. We won’t bother you again.”

Mr. Stephenson raised his hands trying to keep us calm. “Now don’t be hasty, Christoph. I’ll contact my superiors and let them know of your concerns. I’m sure we can come up with a satisfactory solution. Please just be patient. For tonight follow the instructions of the soldiers, and be ready to leave, as a group, quickly.”

For some reason everyone looked at me. “Ok. We’ll have our bags packed and ready to go.”

Without another word we left the dining room and headed for our rooms. After the long and exhausting day, we were exhausted. I really wished that Michelle was with us, having her to look after would have taken my mind off of my own problems. But she wasn’t, because of me. As we reached our rooms, we said goodnight to each other and quietly went inside. I stared at my large bed, it was too big to be comfortable. I almost always woke up curled in a ball under the blanket in the very center of it. It still looked like a hotel room, impersonal, uncaring, empty of life.

Thinking about what they wanted to do made it hard to breath, like my chest was constricting. I’d lost my family, my life, my body, now they wanted me to lose my friends. The sterile walls loomed over me, closing in. I ran to the window. It was locked, I slammed it open. The cool wind made my ears fold back, but I could breath.

The sky was cloudy, and the night was moonless, even my eyes could barely make anything out. It was like I was alone in the world. Sadness weighed down on my shoulders, smothering me, crushing me. Tears welled up in my eyes. I walked out of the room, and went down the hall to a door that had been hastily repaired.

I raised my hand, but my arm wouldn't move. My fist hung in the air, ready to knock but the muscles behind it refused to do anything. Something was holding me back. God, I wished that Michelle was alright. I leaned my head against the door, tears hit the floor.

The door opened up, Christoph looked at me in surprise.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” I said, falling into his arms.

Chapter 18

Christoph held me as I cried. I hated myself for crying, it wasn’t me. I almost never cried back home, but since coming here since losing myself, the tears seemed to be waiting just behind my eyes. It made me cry even harder. He didn’t try to tell me it would be alright, or not to cry, he didn’t pick me up either thankfully. He just stepped back, closing the door, blocking the world out. The tears weren’t as bad as when I’d been with Pulam, but they were just as uncontrollable.

“What will we do?” I asked when I could finally stop crying.

“Stick together. Watch everything. Learn what we can do. Make sure we do whatever we can to survive.”

“What if we can’t?”

He was silent for a while. I listened to his heart beating, the straining of his metal-laced bones and tendons as he moved. “If we get separated, we do whatever we can to get back together, even if we have to fight an army. If we can’t, we make sure whoever did it, regrets it to their last breath.”

“You-you mean it?”

There was a longer pause. “I didn’t have much of a family life. I spent most of my time in hospitals and long-term care facilities all over the world as my parents worked to find new doctors and come up with the money for new treatments that might cure me. It wasn’t a sad life, I had friends, and things, but a family wasn’t really in it. These last two months, we’ve spent almost every hour of the day together, talking with each other, learning about our lives, crying over what we’ve lost. I won’t let anything happen to any of you. And if that fails, then yes, I’ll kill them. I’ll make it quick, but they will not live long to enjoy it.”

I looked at him with new eyes. He always seemed so happy with what had happened. I assumed it was just because he wasn’t paralysed anymore. I didn’t realize he looked at us this way, especially with how he hadn’t joined in our little conspiracy. But now he was talking about killing people to protect or avenge us. I could feel his body tensing as he spoke, it was like knowing a bomb was ready to go off. “Thank you.”

“You would do the same.”

I thought about that. When Michelle had first told me about being forced to change a memory, and I’d thought she’d been abused, I’d been ready to rip out someone’s throat. I hadn’t been able to help anyone else when the swarm attacked, but I’d been trying to save Michelle then, and opened the door for others to follow. Tonight when they’d talked about separating us, I’d wanted to attack Mr. Stephenson; only Christoph’s hand had stopped me. I nodded, not looking into his eyes.

If someone asked me even a month ago if I’d be willing to kill someone outside of a computer game, I’d have said no and wonder what they were smoking. Now, it was becoming almost an instinctual backup plan. I shivered, was that the cat part of me coming to the fore, or was I always this bloodthirsty at my core, and it was only coming out now that my life was shredded. Maybe it was a mother bear instinct. Whatever it was I didn’t like it. But I didn’t know how to stop it.

With everything happening, I didn’t know if I wanted it to stop.

“Where do you think we’ll end up next?” he asked.

This was a bit easier to answer, thanks to our research. “Probably a big military base. Just outside a city if they still want us running around playing hero. It looks like every major city has a military base, they say they’re to help with disasters and problems. They double as police to.”

“That makes sense. If they want us to be on tv, showing the people what we can do for them having us readily available is smart.”

“Maybe we can even go out sometimes,” I said a bit wistfully.

“That would be nice. We could probably get into all the good parties.”

He yawned, which set me off. My ears and tail drooped down, my limbs suddenly felt like they weighed a ton. “I should go. Thank you.”

“What for?”

“For being you.” I hoped he’d understand what I meant. I didn’t know how to put it any other way.

He shrugged, scratching his hair nervously. “You’re welcome.”

With a final pat on his shoulder, I took my leave. Something was niggling at the back of my head though as I closed his door. I looked around, wondering what else could be bothering me. My eyes settled on Michelles’ door. Trusting my instincts I tried to open her door, surprisingly it wasn’t locked. Turning on the lights, I looked around, and saw the dolls. The favourite one, Mary, the one Michelle had brought over with her, sat on the bed. Whenever she was feeling upset, missing her family, or had a headache from studying so much, she would hold the pretty doll, with its’ elegant blue dress, combing the blue black hair. I picked it up, giving it a hug. It smelled just like her. I knew why she hugged it, it seemed like everything would be alright, that you were loved.

There was something I needed to do. I walked to the doctors office.

A nurse looked up as I came in, she looked as exhausted as I felt. “Do you need something Pat?”

“I just want to give Michelle her doll. I think it will help her,” I said.

“Alright, but please be quiet, she just got back to sleep.”

Following the nurse we walked to the back of the infirmary, where I’d been yesterday. Michelle was curled up in bed, looking small and fragile. As gently as possible, I raised her arm putting Mary under it. Michelle didn’t wake up, but her arms clenched the precious toy in a death grip. Covering her up a little better, I left the room, with a silent thank you to the nurse.

Feeling better, I went back to my room and collapsed.

Chapter 19

It was still dark when I woke up to someone banging on the door, I was already rolling out of bed before I even opened my eyes.  Frank was at the door in full combat gear, “Pat, get dressed and come with me.” A quick glance showed soldiers at the other doors giving the same command.

“Are we under attack?”

“No, but we know who did it. Now get a move on,” he said with a very nasty grin. He closed the door so I could have some privacy.

Throwing on clean clothes and sandals, I was out the door a minute later brushing my fur to make it look a little more presentable. The guys were out as well. For a second I looked around for Michelle, before remembering that she wasn't going to be doing anything for at least a few days. We went to an office where Mr. Stephenson was waiting for us. There were files on a table with our names on them. Sitting down I looked at mine, and the first thing I saw was a series of pictures of different people.

“Good morning,” Mr. Stephenson said giving us a moment to get settled. “I'm sorry for waking you up so early, but this is very important. The person who attacked you yesterday was sent here under orders of a criminal group called the New Order.”

“I thought they were the Brotherhood of Patriots,” Nathaniel said.

Mr. Stephenson nodded in agreement. “Those were the ones who stole the information, but they have ties with the New Order. Apparently that is where they get a lot of their manpower. We now know that the New Order has at least two dimensional entities working for them. The Swarm that attacked yesterday which was a complete surprise, and the person in the photo before you. You'll be going after him.”

“Which one?” I asked looking at the dozens of pictures.

“We believe all of them. He's a shapeshifter.”

I forced myself to breathe normally, acting as naturally as possible. That was how the masked man had gotten the memory to Michelle at the banquet that now seemed like ancient history. They'd known we were here practically from the beginning and could have attacked at anytime. Why hadn't they? In fact he'd said that they would help rescue us, so why attack at all? It didn't make sense.

My attention was brought back to the present as I heard my name.

“I'm sorry Christoph, Pat has to be there. The target can change his appearance in seconds, we believe the only way to track him if he gets outside is by scent. Since tracking dogs are not available, we're going to have to rely on her senses,” Mr. Stephenson said.

“I can do it.” I not only could do it, I had to do it. I needed to know what was going on, and this person might be the only way to get the answers.

“But you're sick,” Christoph insisted.

I was touched by his concern, but it wasn't going to stop me. “I can deal with it. The shots help a lot.”

“The only person not going is Michelle,” Mr. Stephenson said firmly. “What needs to be discussed right now is the mission. We have very good information that the target, who's name is 'Lange' is currently in the city of Richmond. He will be at a known safe house for the rest of today meeting certain associates and contacts. This information is brand new, so we don't have as much to go on as we would like, but here is the basic plan.”

For the next hour, we went over floor plans, potential problems, known threats and more. During the middle of it all I was taken aside to take a whole slew of medicine to deal with the hormones and their side effects. I'd thought the monthly visits were annoying enough, but this was definitely a lot worse.

We were still going over the information when we got loaded onto a plane. The sun was just rising, looking at it through the light mist the orangy red orb looked angry and malevolent.

**

Even with the air conditioning on I felt miserable.

The muggy air had hit me hard, plastering the fur to my skin. It was made worse because I was wearing a long coat that covered my body and my hands, with a broad brim hat placed firmly on my head to conceal my looks. Sunglasses hid my orange eyes. When I saw myself in the mirror I realized I was anything but inconspicuous.

Nathaniel was wearing his makeup, which from the way he was desperately trying not to scratch at it must have been annoying him just as much as my own get up. Pulam and Christoph were much more comfortable since they were only wearing regular trousers and shirts.

My hand reached out to hold Christophs' as we waited for the driver to reach the command center, which was close to the safe house. There would be civilians close by, they didn't want to let the target know we were coming until we were actually in the building. Since we really didn't want to kill anyone, that could make things tricky.

The car stopped and we got out, trying to look normal. We entered a small office building and were greeted by a man in a shabby old suit once we were past the lobby. “Come with me, don't speak.”

After climbing three flights of stairs we came to a busy office, full of soldiers readying weapons and body armour. A small group of people in suits were talking over radios and telephones. Our guide sat us down beside a large pile of steel. Christoph put his hand on top of the steel, grey ooze crawled over the pile, liquefying it. It slowly covered his body in steel plates and tentacles.

Our guide pointedly ignored the strange display. “There are fifteen members of the New Order, inside the building. They are lightly armed, but we believe they have at least a dozen other members nearby, with heavier weapons ready to help them escape as soon as you begin your attack. Because of your powers, you will go in first and we will ensure no one gets in or out. Your primary mission is to capture Lange.”

We waited for him to tell us something we didn't know.

“Pat, here is an item that we got from Lange during the last attempt at capturing him. Please smell it so you'll know who we need.” He handed me a sealed bag with a torn scrap of cloth, there was some blood on it.

Unwillingly I tore it open and took a deep breath. It was a weird mix of flowers and sweat. I tried not to think about it too closely. Like the jumping and climbing, this was something that was better left to instincts alone. My human brain just got in the way. The cloth touched my nose, so I could really get a good whiff. Little undertones of scent filled my nostrils. There were a lot of smells that I knew could be important to learning more about him, but I didn't know how to put them into words or separate them from each other. I had to be satisfied with knowing I could follow him through a crowd as long as I could smell him.  “I'm ready.”

We went over the last minute details, but other than getting a better idea of how many people were on each floor there wasn't anything to discuss. Pulam and Nathaniel headed downstairs, their light body armour concealed under their baggy shirts. Christoph and I went upstairs to the roof. I went first, since I was worried he might break through the stairs with his heavy body. I fidgeted with the specially made light vest, armoured gloves and pistol they'd given me. The vest would help a bit if I was shot at, while I'd be able to keep most of my agility. Christoph didn't have to worry about that, he had more armour on than a medieval knight. The tentacles were a bit too hentai for my liking, but after seeing him practicing with them, I knew they would be very useful.

The radio crackled. “Team One in position. Team Two waiting on your mark.”

Before Christoph could respond as Team Two, I spun around jumped onto his broad shoulder and kissed his helmet. “Don't get hurt.”

I couldn't see his face, the quiver in his voice told me everything I needed. “I- Don't you get hurt either. Team Two ready.”

“GO!”

We jumped across the roof and headed for our first real fight.

Chapter 20

Christoph slammed through the stairway door. His arms rose up, protecting his head from gunfire even as he sent his tentacles forward. There was a scream and the shooting stopped.

Jumping over Christoph I saw a man lying on the floor, a solid ring of steel as thick as my thumb encircled him keeping his arms tightly trapped at his side. I threw the pistol on the ground back to the tin man so he could absorb it.  My ears twitched, a door opened up from below. Jumping over the  rail, my fist hit the shoulder of a man, breaking his collarbone and sending his gun to the ground. Pulling the pistol from my waist, I shot him in the stomach. He collapsed with a groan as a taser like charge went through his body.

A quick peek showed the hallway was empty. Going on all fours, I scampered down the hall, using my ears to listen for possible threats, and trying to smell out Lange. There were footsteps from the office to the right. I pointed it out to Christoph, as I went to just beside the door.

The floor creaked. Christoph saw me pointing at the wall behind which the man was getting ready to come out. His large metal fist went through the wall, there wasn't enough time for the man to scream as his body was introduced to the wall at high speed.

A bullet ricocheted off of Christoph. I turned on the attacker, cursing myself for not watching our back. Jumping low, I caught the shooter completely off guard as he fired over my head in a panic. Grabbing his arms, it was easy to slam him into the wall hard enough to make him drop his weapon. The stun gun came out and a second later he was out for the count.

Sniffing the air, I caught the scent of our target. “Christoph! Follow me.” We headed down the hall, Christoph watching for threats, as I tried to figure out where Lange was. I could hear some screaming, and a lot of coughing from downstairs.

Following my nose, we came to a corner, the smell was really strong here. I moved foward when suddenly Christoph was grabbing my tail, yanking me behind him. A small hailstorm of bullets hit the wall, and Christoph, I almost fainted when I realized if he hadn't pulled me back I'd be dead. We huddled at the corner, breathing hard.

“I think Lange is over there,” Christoph said.

“Yeah. Any idea how to get there?” I asked breathlessly

“I keep there attention. You go through the window.”

It seemed like the best way. Trying to get through the guards head on was possible with his armour, but he still needed to see and that meant a bullet could kill him. If I could take them from surprise it would help even the odds. The gun I'd tossed him earlier came out of his arm, without looking he took a few shots down the hall. I hadn't known he could do that.

I headed for the nearest office with a window. Climbing outside, I tried not to think about how tiny the cracks were, and how far below the ground was. At least this was an older building, and not a skyscraper. Using my claws, I started making my way to where the bad guys were holed up, peering in each window before moving on. After two minutes of inching myself along, I saw a woman sitting calmly in an office while guns roared just outside her door. Conveniently the window was open.

From years of watching movies and comics, I smelled a trap. Unfortunately I also smelled the target, and there wasn't much I could do unless I wanted to keep hanging by my nails while certain death waited below. With a sigh, I grabbed the side of the window and swung myself in as quickly as possible, aiming for the woman. My hands circled her throat claws ready to squeeze, and waited for someone to shoot me in the back.

“Pat, I presume,” the woman said, her voice a little strained.

“Your Lange?”

“Yes. You can let go. I'm not armed, and I don't want to hurt you. If I did I would have poisoned you at the banquet.”

I loosened my grip a little. “So you're the one who gave Michelle that memory. If you don't want to hurt us, why did you have the bug man attack us.”

“That wasn't us. We've never seen him before, and didn't even know he existed until he attacked you.”

“And I should believe you why?” I snarled.

“Come with me and I can tell you everything. We know more about the dimensional crossover that caused all of this, than anyone in this world.” When I didn't say anything, she filled in the silence. “Newton, the man I work for, isn't from this world either. He is developing a way to travel back through the dimensions, he can send us home.”

“I can go home?” The longing and pain inside of me which I'd pushed away for so long, started chipping away at the strong mental walls I'd built up almost unthinkingly.

“We can all go home. But this government will do anything to capture Newton. They want to control everything, and they'll use him to create new weapons so they can take over the entire world.” She eased herself out of my grip. I didn't stop her. Pushing long blonde hair out of her eyes, she looked straight in my orange eyes. “I've read all about you Patricia. It was my job back home to understand how people think, what makes them tick. You want to go home to your parents obviously. You're worried about Michelle especially, seeing her as your younger sister. You have a crush on Christoph but your worried about what will happen when he is around a fully human girl. You hate what the government is having you do but you can't let your friends get hurt. That's why it was probably you that insisted on keeping the message secret, you don't trust them, or us. In fact outside of your little circle of friends you don't trust anyone, and you will kill to protect them.”

“Are you reading my mind?”

She smiled pleasantly. “No. I just pay attention. Back home I was an FBI profiler. You should be interested to know our worlds are almost identical. The first major change I could find is that in my world Hillary Clinton is president. I've read almost everything about the different groups the U.R.A. Government has created, and there is another person from your world.”

“Different groups? Wait there's someone from my world here?” I asked.

“You think you're the only ones the government is controlling?” she asked. “They've been working on a strategy to get their own super powered groups since the first dimensional crossover. You're group number three out of five others. You're the youngest ones that they are actively using, but not the youngest they've captured.”

A man appeared out of thin air. “Lange! It's time to go.”

I turned on him, claws out. “Where the hell did you come from?”

“No time to explain. You can come with us, or you can stay here, choose now,” the man said.

“I'm not leaving without my friends,” I said. “And I can't let you go either.”

Lange walked over to the man, a box of yellow light surrounded me before I could grab her. A punch cracked it, but it didn't break. “I'm sorry Pat, but that isn't happening,” she said. “If the government doesn't kill you ,we will meet again and I hope you'll see me as an ally. Coyote, lets go.”

The man set a small metal ball on the floor, before taking hold of Lange. As I watched they vanished. The shooting outside stopped and the cage vanished. As Christoph, Nathaniel and Pulam charged through the door, the metal ball exploded in a cloud of smoke. My nose, eyes and mouth started to burn it was like eating the worlds hottest chili pepper after getting dunked into a swimming pool of bleach. Gagging, crying, barely able to breath I ran for the hallway.

**

No one was happy with us as we made our way onto the plane. We were wheezing, struggling to  see despite spending several hours at the hospital trying to get rid of the chemicals. Even Christoph was having trouble dealing with it, I was so bad they had to wheel me to the plane in a wheelchair.

By the time we got back home, we could only crawl into bed hoping that sleep would make everything better.

Chapter 21

The next morning I could breath again, I could still smell bleach, and my eyes were too dry, but that was the worst of it.

Instead I had to run to the bathroom before I threw up. My stomach was doing flip-flops and my fur was too hot. A glass of water didn’t do anything to make me feel better. Throwing on a t-shirt and shorts, all I could bear to wear, I staggered to the infirmary. A nurse I’d never seen before was going over some files, she jerked back when she saw me. I didn’t think I looked that sick when I’d washed my face.

“Oh, you’re Pat aren’t you?” she said.

“Yeah,” I croaked. “I’m feeling hot, sick and I just threw up.”

She opened up a file with my name on it. “Oh yes, you’re on a hormone treatment to deal with… heat. I have some medicine that should help with the nausea. Just a minute.” She went back into the little pharmacy looking for the medicine.

Not sure how long she’d take, I went to see if Michelle was awake, I hadn't been able to see her yesterday night. She was probably worried about us. I was also hoping she could get out today so I could tell everyone what I'd been told.

The bed was empty. Maybe she had been able to go back to her room yesterday, I thought happily.

But as I went back into the infirmary I saw her doll Mary sitting on a desk. After what Lange had told me, I was filled with dread seeing the doll sitting there all alone. Shaking, I picked it up. The comforting feeling was gone. My fear intensified. Clutching Mary to my chest I could practically taste the terror and pain coming from it. My tiny whiskers, already rapidly regrowing, twitched. I turned on the nurse, fangs bared, growling like a wild beast. “Where’s Michelle?”

She turned white. “She took a turn for the worse, we had to send her away to a proper hospital. There was swelling in her brain.”

Closing my eyes, I tried to stop the growling. It made sense. Concussions were tricky, it could have been worse than they thought. Very slowly, trying not to snarl, I asked, “Why didn’t you tell us?”

“It was done around midnight. Mr. Stephenson didn’t want to wake you up. He was going to tell you at breakfast.” Her hands were shaking so much I was afraid she’d drop the little glass bottle she was holding.

One deep breath, I forced my lips to close, hiding my teeth. Another breath, I sheathed my claws. A third, I tightened my neck muscles, cutting the growl off. A fourth, I was ready to speak. “Thank you. Can I please have the medicine now?”

She poured me a small glass of the stuff. I don’t know what it tasted like as I drained the glass, the fear cut through all the unimportant things. I left without a word, holding the doll in a death grip. I knocked hard on the guys doors, not caring if they were awake or not, not even caring if our rooms were bugged. “My room now!” I said as they came to the hall, yawning, scratching and rubbing their red and irritated eyes.

“What wrong?” Pulam asked.

“Michelle’s gone. They said she was got worse so they took her at midnight.” That got their attention, everyone was instantly awake.

“Will she be alright?” Nathaniel asked.

“I don’t know. The nurse didn’t know much. Mr. Stephenson will tell us at breakfast apparently. But she left Mary.” I held the doll up so they could see.

“So?” Christoph asked.

“This doll is her favourite. It came from her world, she wouldn’t go anywhere without it.”

“Maybe she was unconscious and couldn’t hold it. If it was serious they wouldn’t take time with a doll,” Nathaniel said.

I rubbed my forehead, trying to figure out a way to explain it that wouldn’t sound crazy. There wasn’t any, so I just laid out the facts. “Last night, when I gave the doll to her, it felt comforting. Like everything would be alright, like being held by your mother. This morning, it’s full of fear, pain. Why?”
They looked at me like I was talking gibberish. I gave the doll to Pulam. “Hold it, tell me what it feels like?”

He held it to his chest like I had. A frown came to his face, I didn't know if it was from the doll, the belief I was overreacting, or something else. He held the doll for over a minute, completely silent. “It feels bad. Touch it,” he said, handing it to Christoph.

“Maybe I feel something,” he said. He didn’t sound happy about it, the way he scowled, it seemed like he was angry with himself for not feeling it.

Nathaniel was last, we silently waited to see what he would have to say about it. After five minutes, he gave up, handing Mary back to me. “I don’t feel anything. Sorry.”

I didn’t know how he couldn’t feel it, the fear and pain was as intense as ever. “It’s there. She’s afraid and hurting.”

“If she was really hurt, then those feelings make sense. But how could she put those feelings in the doll?” Nathaniel asked.

“She’s psychic, maybe its something she can do,” I said. It should have sounded lame in my ears, but honestly with everything we could do, it was logical.

“OK, that could work. But why can’t I feel it, and why is it so weak for Christoph?”

I had to think about that one. “She was closest to me, and Pulam’s children. She, she told me that you and Christoph always frightened her a little because of how big you are.” I felt terrible admitting that, she’d asked me not to tell anyone when she told me. But this was an emergency. “Maybe it only works with those she’s closest to.”

“Makes sense.” Christoph admitted. He looked at the clock. “It’s breakfast time, lets go eat and we’ll get the answers directly from Mr. Stephenson.”

“Wait,” I whispered. “Yesterday Lange talked to me. She told me that there are more groups like us. That the government had this prepared months in advance. And she said her boss was close to finding a way home.”

“We talk later. Now find where Michelle is.” Pulam said.

Everyone agreed to that, and with worried looks went to get dressed. I was as dressed as I needed to be, still feeling too hot. So I just sat on the bed, holding Mary to my chest, praying for the first time in ages that I was freaking out for no reason.

**

Mr. Stephenson was waiting for us at the table. The two broken chairs had been replaced or repaired, we didn’t bother sitting. Christoph spoke for us, I didn’t trust myself, everything in me screamed danger. “What happened to Michelle, Mr. Stephenson?”

He looked like he’d been expecting the question. “When Pat hit her head, there was more damage than we thought. Her brain was swelling and she had become disoriented. The doctors declared it an emergency and she was driven to the airport to be airlifted to a proper hospital less than fifteen minutes later. We did not tell you, because we thought you deserved a good nights rest after the exertions of yesterday.”

“Can we see her?” I asked.

“For security reasons, we would prefer only having one person visit her, possibly two.” I opened my mouth to speak, but he pointed at me and kept right on talking. “Not you Pat. I’m sorry but this is a civilian hospital and you would panic the patients and staff.”

“Pulam and I will go together,” Christoph said.

“NO! I need to go! I HAVE to see her!” I shouted.

Mr. Stephenson looked angry for the first time ever. “PAT! We have done our best to make you all comfortable and as safe as possible. We have agreed to every one of your demands. Now it’s time for you to grow up and stop thinking the world is out to get you. Pulam and Christoph as the most human looking will go to the hospital, let Michelle know that you are thinking of her, and return by tomorrow morning. You and Nathaniel will stay here. That is FINAL!”

Nathaniel and Christoph grabbed my arms, I felt the strength in their hands. I could have broken free, but I’d have to hurt them. I wasn’t quite that far gone. I closed my eyes, and tried to breath. The hands loosened, but didn’t let go. It was probably smart of them.

“When do we leave?” Christoph asked.

“In two hours. Bring an overnight bag,” he told them.

I didn’t open my eyes again until he’d left the room. I sat down at the table, placing Mary on my lap, smoothing her dress out like I’d seen Michelle do a hundred times.

Christoph touched my shoulder. “It’s going to be alright Pat. We’ll make sure Michelle is alright and call you as soon as we finish talking to her.”

“Be careful,” I whispered. Picking up my fork I started to fill up my plate, despite my lack of appetite.

**

I watched Pulam and Christoph drive away in a limo from the top of the house, Mary at my side. I’d asked Nathaniel to give me some space so I could think. He’d agreed, but looked at the doll in my hand strangely. I couldn’t blame him. I should have given it to the guys so they could give it to Michelle. But something told me I had to keep it. The same weird feeling I’d had all morning since finding it, had screamed at me not to let it go.

What was happening? I felt like I was going insane.

Just a few days ago everything had been normal, well as normal as possible, then it had exploded. Why had that bug monster attacked us? Was it from the government trying to make us support them by giving us a threat? Lange's group to send a message? Or a third player?

Who wanted to help us? The government seemed to be good guys, but what type of government would ask teenagers to fight for them? Why couldn't' we actually get out and see more of the world? Everything we saw or did was controlled by them, so who knew what they were hiding. But could we trust self confessed rebels, who wanted to tear down the government? What would they have us do?

Jesus, what were we thinking? We were just teenagers, and we wanted to find the conspiracy and then what? Fight the government? Destroy the terrorists?

We were idiots for thinking we could do much. This wasn't some novel.

People had died the other day, and now I was seeing conspiracies everywhere. Thinking a doll was trying to tell me something. Arguing with a person who would decide our future. What was I doing?

Picking up Mary I brought my arm back ready to throw the stupid doll off the roof. The fear seemed to run straight through my arm right into my brain. I couldn't throw it away. Even if I was completely insane, Michelle would want her back. Slipping the thing into my shirt, I hopped off the roof, going from windowsill to windowsill. I had to do something or I'd start ripping out my fur.  As soon as my feet touched the ground I began to run, heading off without any real idea of where I was going. I just needed to work off some energy that was all. In long, ground eating strides, I circled the house, wishing there was something to distract me.

A shrill whistling got my attention. The barn holding Michelle’s dinosaur Lusca, was off to the side. That would help a little bit. I turned and ran to the group mascot.

The large, dinosaur didn’t look happy. His feeding stall was full of food and the small stream they’d built the barn over provided it with enough water, but was stomping on the ground and swinging it’s long rocky neck like it wanted to break something. The guns had been dismantled, so it didn’t look quite so much like a weapon of war.

“Hey Lusca,” I said, standing far enough away to jump if it charged me.

The vulture like head looked at me balefully, then it got a whiff of the doll. It made a soft twittering whistle, stretching its neck to get closer to me. I scratched the bald head, using my claws so it would actually feel something through the thick hide. “You miss her to don’t you. Don’t worry we’ll see her soon.”

My blood turned to ice as I heard Michelle crying, “PAT!”

Chapter 22

“MICHELLE!” I cried, looking all around trying to find her. Lusca began whistling, sharp, loud, almost mournful.

The world disappeared, and I was in a memory. It was blurry, confused, like my own memories of attacking Christoph. I was in the infirmary, it was dimly lit, shadows shifted and moved randomly along the walls and floors, forming inhuman shapes. Michelle huddled in the bed, struggling to lift the blanket up, but her hands kept slipping. Mary was in her arms, held against her chest so tightly it looked ready to break. Three people, their faces hidden in shadows stood over her. Their fingers looked long and sharp, flickering from one position to another with no movement in between. Snow swirled around them.

“No. I want my Mama.” My heart shattered as I heard Michelle moan.

A raspy, gravely voice spoke, seemingly from nowhere. “What were you planning?”

We went to the memory of the masked man. Demons growled all around us. Someone screamed.

The world flickered. Nathaniel, Pulam, Michelle and I pored over magazines and newspapers. Ice covered the pages turning our hands blue with frostbite. We discussed what we had learned, and what it could mean. The three creatures leaned over us, snake like tongues flicked in and out of their mouths.

“Show us what the masked man showed you,” the voice said again.

“Please. Go away. Go away. Go away! Go Away! GO AWAY!” Michelle shrieked.

The memory shattered into flashes of talking, shadows and dark faces, each one trying to be heard and seen over the dozens of others. I tried to hold Michelle, but my hands went through her like a ghost.

“To dangerous.”

“How are you feeling, Michelle?”

“Is it salvageable?”

“Help me.”

“You’re going to be OK It’s just some medicine.”

“Papa!”

“More groups- No psychics...”

“Remove her immediately. -otocol 452.”

“Let me go home. Please.”

“Michelle what do you know?”

“-others… problem… -treme caution…”

“HURTS!”

“ETA four hours… ready for arrival.”

“HELP!”

I passed out.

**

A harsh whistle woke me up.

My claws scraped against the dirt, my chest heaved painfully. I couldn’t stop growling. Footsteps came towards me. I jerked my head up, soldiers were coming at a jog, they had assault rifles on their back. They moved like people ready for a fight. Frank led them, and Al, my hand to hand instructor was right behind him.

“Where’s Michelle?” I growled.

“Pat, you’re confused and scared,” Frank said. “Lets go to the infirmary and get you looked after. I was told it had to do with the hormones.” He came closer, holding his hand out as if dealing with a dangerous wild animal.

“Frank, where is Michelle?” I smelled fear. The soldiers behind Frank and Al shifted their feet, making sure they could reach their guns. “Where. Is. Michelle?”

He reached for his pistol. I roared, leaping at him, claws outstretched. Before they could bring their guns to bear I was in the middle of them. Luska shrieked ramming the heavy fence and walls around it, causing the ground to shake and some of the soldiers to fall back in fear. I didn’t have time to think, and nothing in me was going to hold back. Frank fell to the ground clutching his chest, a red stain covered his jacket.

Cloth and flesh tore, screams of pain filled the air. They weren’t expecting me to fight like this. They’d seen me holding back most of the time, trying not to hurt anyone. Not this time. I saw red, howling as I felt bones shatter under my fists. People hit me. I heard the crack of a bullet. But I was a blur, weaving between the soldiers, never staying still.

Metal screeched, followed by a thud. We were knocked off of our feet. Lusca whistled her ear rending war cry. A soldier was cut in half by the dinosaurs’ beak. Two more flew through the air landing several meters away, unmoving. An alarm wailed. Lusca roared a challenge storming off to see what the new threat was.

Before I could get to my feet, someone landed on my back, grabbing me under the arms, trying to pin me down. From the smell it was Al, using every bit of his skill and mass to keep me down. “Stay down Pat, or we’re going to kill you,” he shouted in my ear.

I twisted my neck, further and more easily than humanly possible. There was less than a second to see the look of fear in his eyes, before I buried my fangs in his face. He pulled away, howling in agony. The handful of remaining soldiers ran for their lives. Taking Frank’s pistol, and shoving Mary into my shirt, I ran for the house. Nathaniel was in there, and I had to find out what had happened to Michelle and where they were taking Pulam and Christoph. Spitting blood from my mouth, I stayed low, hoping that Lusca was attracting all the attention. From the sounds of machine guns and grenades, it seemed like he was.

Someone started firing at me. I twisted and jerked from side to side, not even thinking about what I was doing, speeding up as I ran, tumbled and dodged. A window was rapidly coming closer. Grabbing an ornamental rock, I threw it as hard as I could at the glass and jumped through the hole. The jagged edges cut my legs, but not enough to slow me down. Stopping for a second, I heard fighting from the second floor of the house. Breaking the door with my body, I bounded on all fours, jumping off of walls to turn corners, never presenting anyone with a clear target.

Some bullets whipped past my fur, mostly from behind, I didn’t stop. Nathaniel was yelling, sounding almost like an opera singer. I smelled hot peppers, and half a dozen other smells I couldn’t identify. I heard a group of soldiers come running towards me from the kitchen. Pulling out the pistol, I fired wildly ahead of me and then down the hall. Forcing them to take cover. The staircase was just ahead, I jumped to the second floor.

A panicked shot rang out, hitting the floor at my feet. It was barely enough warning. I dived at the group of soldiers who were turning to face me, bullets whizzed over my head. My shoulder connected with a leg, it wasn’t enough to slow me down. In the middle of ten soldiers we fought tooth and claw. My claws were harder, my teeth sharper. I didn’t know what blood was mine, but I knew I could still walk and Nathaniel was almost on top of me.

Crawling out of the pile of wounded and dying men, I saw Nathaniel and a young girl. For a second I thought it was Michelle, but then I saw the yellow ribbon in her blue black hair, her red pants and shirt. It was Lilha, Pulam’s child. What was she doing here? More importantly how was she here so far from Pulam? She had a pistol, but her face was pale. Nathaniel was limping, dragging his leg behind him. His skin was rough and brown, wooden, splintered and cracked, from so many wounds, golden sap like blood stuck to his body. Thorns covered his hands and forearms dripping with foul smelling chemicals.

I ran over to him, trying to ignore the intense chili smell, that made my eyes water and hurt. “Can you run?” I asked.

“No. Get Lilha out of here. They have Christoph and Pulam. She told me just before the alarm sounded, warned me. But not enough time. This hurts!” he roared, through clenched teeth.

“Come on I’ll get you out of here,” I said, about to pick him up.

He jumped away, sprawling on the ground. “Don’t touch me! I’ll kill you! Get Lilha out of here. She can lead you to Pulam. Get him free, they may have Christoph and Michelle at the same place. Me to if I live. Find help.”

“I’m not leaving you!”

“You can’t move me! And I can’t go much further. I’ll guard your back until you get out. When fighting an enemy you can’t defeat, run away and buy time. Come back stronger.”

I saw tears of pain falling from his green eyes. Lilha grabbed my hand, forcing me to look at her. Fear filled her eyes. “Come on, Pat! Soldiers coming!”

Nathaniel got back on his feet, holding a bloody assault rifle. He grew larger, his skin thickening, splitting his clothes, filling in his wounds. Short black wooden knives grew out of his hands. I gagged at the smells coming from him. A soldier peeked out from a door; Nathaniel shot him. The soldiers I’d heard coming from the kitchen started firing on us from down below. I ducked down covering Lilha with my body.

My friend fired down on them, even as his wooden body splintered. With a roar, he jumped over the railing, arms and blades spinning. The soldiers started coughing, gagging at the chemicals. Blood sprayed from vicious wounds. Where he hit, flesh reddened and blistered. Someone shot him in the back. Nathaniel fell to his knees. They started hitting him with their rifles, beating him down, shattering his body.

Lilha was hitting me, yelling at me to run. I did.

We jumped out a second story window. Lusca was at the gate of the grounds, battering apart the military vehicles that were trying to stop it. I could feel the ground shake with every explosion. Cradling Lilha, I ran the opposite way. I wasn’t crying, there wasn’t time for tears. But I swore that I would rescue all of them, or make everyone pay.

**

Lilha and I rested under a thicket of brambles, beside a small stream. I’d been running for hours, barely slowing for anything. Now my body let me know I was injured and exhausted. I tried not to scream as she prodded a bullet hole on my upper arm, wanting to see if it had hit the bone. Looking at Michelle’s doll, I hoped she wouldn’t mind the blood stains on it. It still screamed in fear but the pain seemed to have stopped, or maybe it was just overpowered by my own.

“Lilha, do you know where Pulam is?” I asked.

“He is over that way,” she said pointing to the west. “Far, far away. He saw a sea, in the plane, and many trees.”

I groaned. “He’s on the Pacific coast.” How were we supposed to get there?

Clutching Mary, I looked into her glass eyes, seeking some kind of answer. The doll, like the night was silent.

To be Continued

April 2015

Far From Home:

Lonely Roads

About The Author

D.J. Clarke, also known as Dan Clarke by most people, and Daddy by his daughter, has recently begun transferring the strange stories in his head to paper.

He has taught English in China, translated bad English to better English, written about hairstyles wedding dresses, and ghosts, despite rapidly heading towards baldness, never wearing a dress, and not believing in ghosts. He also went to university for five years studying History, and has yet to do a job that required that degree.

Despite being a generally happy person with a wierd but funny sense of humour, his writing tends to run to the dark side where it then proceeds to torment and mock the sufferings of his main characters. This is one reason he sleeps with one eye open, because if his main characters ever come to life, he is a dead man.

One reason he likes to write on the darker matters, is that you can best get to know how strong a person is by how they act when they're afraid. Will they take the easy way out, collapse or fight back? He doesn't have a preference for any reaction, he can work with all three types of characters, and believes that when done properly all of them are interesting not only to himself but his readers.

Thank You For Reading

Thank you for reading. If you liked this book, please leave a review and tell your friends. If you didn't like it, please let me know why. I listen to all my readers and I am always looking to improve my craft.

Remember, reviews are the life blood of a writer, the more I get the faster I write.

Thanks

D.J. Clarke

Preview of

Slave of the Fae

Book 1

Fire Bird

Available now on Kindle

Chapter 1
Caught

I walked behind Ryan following the twisting, muddy path through the woods. He broke the pine branches that blocked the path, making it easier for me to follow along. My brother was a year younger than I was, but you couldn't tell that by looking at us. He was tall and well built, he looked like he was seventeen, and it was disturbing hearing the girls at our school talking about how dreamy he was. Whereas I was the tall, scrawny, sixteen year old girl with short curly hair, who was never invited to a dance, because as several people loved to point out, I was a carpenters dream.

“Ryan, how much further is it?” I asked, getting my hand covered in sap as I grabbed a thin tree trunk to step over a fallen log.

He pointed up the path which seemed to go up a hill at a 90 degree angle. “It's just up this hill, Annette,” he said. “Believe me it's worth the climb.”

Wiping the sweat from my forehead I slowly followed him. Even in my shorts and t-shirt, with about a litre of bug spray, the august weather was hot. This had better be worth I thought, there was a nice deserted beach, with a cool breeze and a clean lake waiting for me back at Grandma and Grandpa's cottage. But Ryan had seemed so excited about some old carved stones he'd discovered, that I'd finally agreed to follow him. As the mosquito's swarmed us, despite the bug spray I was rapidly regretting my decision.

I fell twice going up the hill, coating my hands and legs in the the black mud of northwestern Ontario. Combined with the pine sap already covering me, I was going to kill my brother slowly and painfully if this wasn't the most amazing thing in the world. He was already halfway down the ridge on the other side when I made it to the top. He waved at me and pointed at a ring of granite boulders in the center of a clearing. It looked odd.

By the time I made it down the ridge, I was ready to sit down and take a break. Taking a drink from my almost empty water bottle, I staggered over to Ryan and his rocks. I had to admit they did look cool.

The clearing was surrounded by tree's, you could only really see the rocks from the very top of the ridge, or by standing right on top of them. Emerald green moss covered the ground, it looked so pretty I didn't want to step on it, but the red granite boulders caught my attention. Each one was placed about two meters apart from its neighbour in a circle that would fit a good size house. The boulders were almost perfectly smoothed, none of the bumps and cracks you usually see on boulders. Each boulder had holes on the inner side.

I needed to get a better look. I gingerly stepped on the moss, it was like stepping on snow, my foot went into it all the way to my knee. Thick roots bounced under my weight like a net, If I wasn't careful it was easy to slip off the roots and break a leg on old stumps and rocks hidden under the pile of moss.

“See! I told you you'd want to see this,” Ryan said looking at the nearest rock.

Grabbed his arm to keep my balance, I leaned in for a better look. The granite had been carved. There were stick figures with bows and arrows, above them was something that looked like a monster. Big teeth, an enormous face, and a body made of clouds. A hand span below those carvings was a crooked line with eyes, little stick figures were lying beneath it. A shiver ran down my spine.

“Those aren't the coolest part, listen to the hole,” he said.

I held my breath and put my ear close to the hole. A cold breeze froze my ear, it was like standing near a drafty window in a blizzard. Looking in there was only a small circular hole that went in maybe a foot or two. “How is that possible?”

He shrugged. “No idea. But get down here and feel this one.”

I touched the hole he was pointing at, it was about knee height. Instantly I pulled my fingers back with a little shriek, it was burning hot.  “What is this thing?” I asked.

“They're all like this, every hole does something different,” he said grinning. “That one over there on the little rock sounds like water. The biggest one, with the ten holes makes a different animal sound whenever you get close. It's awesome!”

Looking around the stones, I didn't think it was so awesome. They seemed to be watching me. The sky darkened a little as the last of the rain clouds from yesterday moved across the sun. “Come on Ryan, lets get home. We can call up some scientists or something and you'll get your face on the news as the discoverer.”

“Stop being a chicken, Annette. This is too cool, lets look around a little bit and take some pictures.” He pulled out his camera and started taking pictures.

At that moment I really wished my phone worked this far out in the woods. The wind rustled through the branches of the trees, and the grass rustled strangely. It was just my imagination, I told myself. I'd never been afraid of the woods before, it was just the really freaky stones making me nervous. Hoof beats echoed in the distance.

That wasn't right. There weren't any horses for at least 100km's, and none of them would be this far in the woods. The rocks, roots, mud and pine tree's made riding a horse on anything except an actual road practically impossible. “Ryan did you hear that?” I asked, putting my back to the stone.

“Hear what?” he asked, busy tracing out a carving on another rock. “This looks a lot like Native American art. Maybe this was some kind of ceremonial spot. I wonder how old it is?”

Normally I'd have been fascinated by it. But everything about the spot was screaming danger at me. The cold wind from the rock was getting stronger, freezing the sweat on my skin. The bottom of the rock seemed to glow from heat, I smelled smoke. I turned to Ryan and jumped in shock, he was there but he was a little boy. He looked exactly like he had when he was five years old.

“R-Ryan?”

The sun blinked.

“Annette, what happened to you?” he asked in an old mans voice. I tried to scream as I saw the hunched and wrinkled man standing where my brother had stood seconds before, only an ancient haggard cough escaped my lips. My throat felt as dry as dust. Covering my mouth, I saw my hands were thin and bony, paper thin skin was stretched over them ready to crack and peel if stretched too far.

Wolves howled in the moonlight. Ryan was normal again, as was my hand. “RUN!” I yelled at Ryan.

We raced up the path. I had a head start but Ryan quickly blasted past me, running confidently over the muddy ground. Tree's cracked around us, branches that hadn't been there on the way down slapped at my face, leaving itchy sap in my hair, tangling my clothes, scratching my arms. Rain poured down from the clear sky, making the already slippery path impossible to run quickly on.

A horn blew off in the distance. The hoof beats I'd heard earlier were quickly coming closer. Red eyes watched me from the thick bushes on either side. As I clambered up the last few feet to the top of the ridge, I looked back and saw a raging blizzard, shadows moved within it, some seemed to be running, others shadows soared on the wind. Hawks screeched over the howling winds.

Ignoring my tired muscles and the fear that made me want to curl up and scream I ran as fast as I could, not daring to look back again. I could hear them they were laughing far off in the distance, bells jingled ahead of me, hooves stamped the ground on either side, I felt hot breath on my neck. The sounds made no sense. I heard a horn blow right beside my ear, almost making me fall, yet as I looked to my side there was nothing but tree's.

And my stupid brother, who was a member of the track team, who'd dragged me into the woods in the first place was disappearing into the distance on his long legs. Stupid, stupid jerk.

Dogs started barking and growling, nipping at my heels. I tried to run faster, my breath was ragged, I was slowing down despite my best efforts. Even with my long legs I'd always been the slowest in gym class, and that was going to get me killed.

I never saw the rock that sent me tumbling to the ground.

What I did see was the muddy path coming up to meet my face. The flash of a horses hoof shining like the full moon on a clear night. Ivory white fangs dripping with saliva inches from my face. A face as beautiful as an angels with smiling blood red lips. The hem of a dress, as blue as the sea, waves of golden light singing and dancing with every step the wearer took. I saw all of that and more, as the fall took an eternity. My outstretched hands aged and wrinkled, turning to dust before my eyes.

The rain that had fallen the day before turning the dirt to mud rose up, the thousands of drops of rain reformed, first muddy black, then clean and clear, rising up into the sky to form clouds once again, leaving the ground it's usual loamy dark black of the northern forest. A young black bear walked backwards ahead of me, It's large head looked at me curiously and it began running in fear, jerky, unsteady, flickering in and out of existence. A pine cone caught fire, burning brightly, popping open from the heat, a green sapling rose in it's place, growing in the time it took me to hit the ground into a tree that touched the sky.

I fell, sliding through the mud, painfully scrapping over hidden rocks and sticks, strong thread like roots of pine trees caught in my outstretched fingers, snapping under my momentum but leaving painful welts on my hands. A net flew from the tree's covering me. I screamed, trying to throw it off. The silk like silver strands wrapped around my hands and arms, tightening like a snake with every movement. Constricting my legs, encircling my body. Before I realized it, I couldn't move, I could barely breath.

Men and women circled me. They wore jeans and cowboy shirts, silver armour that looked straight from LoTR, animal skins, and khaki’s. I saw their faces and closed my eyes. They weren't human. Some had skin like tree bark, cracked, rough and thick, the grey colour of the pine trees that surrounded us. Others had bird beaks, or insect eyes. A few looked almost human, but their eyes were too big, the mouths too small.

I would have pinched myself if I could have. This had to be a bad dream, there was no way this could be real. Just a dream, just a dream, just a dream.

I kept telling myself that, as they lifted me off the ground, tying the net closed with what felt like ropes of ice. I felt myself being draped over an animal, it's hair seemed more like grass, but it smelled and moved like a horse.

My eyes never opened, I couldn't open them for all the money in the world at that point. Even as the animal began to move, and the creatures around me congratulated themselves, I couldn't open my eyes. It was just a dream. It had to be a dream.

Chapter 2

Make It Dance

I don't know how long we walked, time seemed to stretch. One minute I'd be hungry wanting lunch, then it would seem like I hadn't eaten in years, my stomach cramping and growling like the dogs I couldn't see. The next second I'd feel tired and bloated as if I'd just eaten six bowls of maple ice cream. My eyes still wouldn't open, but sometimes the light would be blinding burning my eyeballs even with them closed. Just as quickly it would be blacker than the windowless basement of my parents home at night with the lights out.

Birds I'd never heard before chirped happily, and owls hooting. Wolves howled, while partridge beat their wings. The sun warmed my back, and a cool night breeze froze my spine. Rain fell on my feet, the sun beat on my head.

Tears rolled down my face. What was going on?

Finally, the horse stopped and someone grabbed me. They didn't take me out of the net though, and I was immediately put on a broad shoulder like a sack. It didn't feel right though. It was hard, not muscle hard, it was rock hard, with sharp edges, bumps and ridges. I opened my eyes, but that didn't help, I just saw something red and dark grey, like the granite rocks along the highway. It flexed and moved with each step. I tried to turn my head, but the silver ropes kept me trapped, I wondered if this was what a bug felt like just before being eaten by a spider.

There was music ahead of us. It sounded like a fiddle. I'd heard something like it before, my parents listened to Celtic music every time we drove more than a few minutes. It sounded something like that, but there were echoes and different sounds I couldn't place. It got into my head and danced around causing me to shake, seeing colours that weren't there, tasting things that I could only vaguely remember a second later.

Where was I?

We came to a stop, and I was put on a floor of liquid silver. It wasn't hot, and it wasn't wet, but ripples formed under me. I lifted my face from the cool surface, drops of silver fell from my face, dripping back onto the floor, becoming smooth once more. The net flowed into the floor, I jumped to my feet, but the thing that had been carrying me slammed me back to the ground. It's thick, blunt fingers rubbed my skin raw, there was strength behind it, it seemed like it could crush my skull as easily as I could break an egg. My face touched the silver, it entered my nose, oozing into my sinuses, down my throat.

I choked, coughing screaming, desperately trying to breath, my hand hit the creatures leg it was cold and as effective as hitting a rock. The massive hand holding my head still lifted slightly. I threw up the silver liquid, snot and tears ran freely, absorbed by the floor. A rumbling voice, what you would get if you banged a bag full of rocks together whispered in my ear, “Silence. Show respect for the lord and lady, or I'll crush your skull like a grape.”

I tried to stop crying, I was still choking, trying to clear my throat, but I was as quiet as I could be. I didn't dare look around, closing my eyes again, I prayed that this would end soon, that it would just be some horrible dream.

“Welcome back my hunters,” a booming voice said. “What prizes have you brought for my queen? A bird perhaps. Might it be another vicious bear or a lumbering moose, maybe yet more wolves?”

Ripples appeared near my face, the blue hemmed dress I had seen earlier was just visible, the golden lights were muted and still. “My liege, we have a most wondrous gift for you. A human child,” a woman's voice said. She sounded like a bird singing, long whistling vowels, hard chirped consonants.

There were gasps all around the room. Rustling and jostling sounds filled my ears, voices spoke in a strange language, from the tones it sounded like cursing. Something in me wanted, needed to look around, yet another part held me paralyzed with fear. It really didn't matter anyways, the stone like hand held me firmly in place.

“You speak truly?” a woman's voice whispered in the wind, the voice surrounded me I could hear it not only in my ears but my bones. It felt cold, like a winter breeze just before a blizzard.

The woman spoke again in her strange voice. “My liege, my lady, I would not speak untruths to you. Magdi, present our prize to our lord and lady.”

My neck strained as I was lifted by my head. Before I could shout in pain I was placed on my feet. The hand didn't go away. Instead it bent my head slightly so I had to strain my eyes to see who the lord and lady were.

The man looked almost normal. He had darkly tanned skin and long straight black hair, like a Native American. He wore a golden fur robe which covered everything except his hands and face, a silvery bow rested on his seat, which looked to be a living tree covered in moss and brilliant green leaves. He was cleaning his long, almost claw like nails with a black stone knife. His eyes were pure black, I couldn't tell if he actually had eyes that were black or if they were empty sockets leading to a the depths of space. They looked at me and my soul shivered.

The lady was less human than he was. She was wearing a long black dress, which looked like something you'd in movies for parties and things. It covered her pale blue skin, and was covered in glittering frost. Her eyes were enormous, as if a cartoon girl had come to life, they were a beautiful sky blue, yet white misty clouds swirled in them disappearing at times and then coming back leaving the entire eye a milky white. Her icy white hair blew in a breeze I couldn't feel, tinkling like a wind chime with each tiny movement. She was beautiful, but as horrifying as the man.

“My, my, my, you have done well Calandri,” the man said with smile, revealing sharp dagger like teeth. “Now the only question is what shall we do with this human? My love do you have a suggestion?”

The blue lady stood up from her simple chair of clear ice and blinding white snow, and walked towards me, every step she took turned the floor to ice, which quickly melted once more into the liquid silver. She touched my chin, it felt like metal during the middle of winter when the temperature reached minus 40 Celsius. My teeth began rattling at her touch, my eyes seemed to freeze in their sockets.

“Let us see if the human can dance,” she said in her windy voice.

There was a cheer and wild applause from the things surrounding the room. The stone creature, Magdi let go of my head, as the fiddle music started again. I looked around trying to get rid of the pain in my neck. The things weren't human. Like the faces of the hunters who had caught me they had the bodies of humans, but they were all the colours of the rainbow. Some of them looked like they'd once been tree's or bushes, with leaves and moss for hair and limbs that were solid wood or thorn covered vines. Others looked like golems, dropping bits of sand and mud when they clapped or they were rock like like Madgi, clapping in slow, powerful movements as unstoppable as an avalanche. There were half human cat girls, and people with the skin of bears, or antlers like a deer.

I started to cry.

Calandri, The lady in blue with the golden lights came over to me, her red face was furious, her fiery red hair crackled like a bonfire. “Do not embarrass me human, you must dance or I swear you will suffer horribly.”

I couldn't form the words to tell her I couldn't dance. In gym class when we had to practice dancing I could never remember the steps. Whenever my friends tried the dance moves they saw on tv, I just sat back and clapped, because I had two left feet. The thought of dancing in public, especially for these creatures, the thought was so terrifying I wanted to wet my pants.

The fiddle music faltered and their was an angry rumbling from the audience. I stood their tears pouring down my face, staring at my muddy shoes, wishing that the nightmare would end. This couldn't be real, there was no way this was real. It just had to end sometime.

“Calandri, your gift doesn't seem very talented,” the lord said, his fingers tapping his throne with a loud click.

The red woman bowed low, “I am sorry my liege, she is young and untrained. I'm sure some time under the lash will train her properly.”

A wooden face man wearing a suit of white bark with moss for hair, stepped forward. “If I may my liege, this creature is hardly made to dance. It is too bony, too awkward, too tall. It needs to be molded properly before it can learn to dance under the Lady Calandri's tutelage. I humbly request the chance to improve her.

My eyes went wide, what were they talking about? How could they improve me?

The ice lady clapped her hands in delight, making her hair jangle musically. “A fine idea Jasper. Please begin at once, and Calandri you may teach your new toy to dance properly. We expect to see great things soon. You may depart with our blessings.”

Calandri grabbed my arm her touch almost hot enough to burn, and dragged me painfully from the room. Jasper followed, smiling happily. I struggled to stay on my feet, sobbing in fear as they led me away.