Harry felt his face turn acutely hot. He’d figured it would only be a matter of time before someone asked him the question and now that it was here…
“We just met, but, well, she’s cute, yeah…I’d like to get to know her. Wife her…?”
His voice trailed off and Jason gave a thoughtful nod. “It’s sort of weird in a way, but you know, if you like her, it’s totally cool. I mean,” he ducked his head and his voice got low, “have you ever had a girlfriend?”
“No.”
“Me either,” Jason replied. “The games are my friends, you know? I figure one day I’ll meet someone…maybe. But…” he paused for a moment, “I think Anastasia’s really nice. It isn’t every day you meet someone like her.”
Harry started to say something to the effect of his friend living his life in a fantasy world full of elves and pixies and other strange make-believe creatures. To him it meant denying reality. He’d always done things in the most practical way, been a good kid, and never gotten into trouble…except for the fateful experiment that had cost him his future.
Now his whole existence had been turned upside down and he’d entered into a very fantastic yet realistic scenario in which he cared for—yes, admitting the truth to himself—even liked, Anastasia. A riot of emotions ran through him, but the strongest of them was…affection. Yeah, he dug her, and dug her hard. “She’s fine, just like she is. Does that answer the question?”
“It’s close enough.”
Jason gave him a shrug as if to say do whatever you want, but then added, “If you really wanna do something, don’t sit on the fence about it. Wise man say, pick chair and sit in it.”
He went back to his game. Harry stared at him and realized his friend was right. Pick a side and go with it. He ran the scenarios again, but found himself thinking too much about Anastasia, and the equations got all jumbled up in his brain.
Harry then wondered how his lady companion’s features would change if the reversal process actually worked. He was close, very close, but the final answer wouldn’t come easily and required more thought.
She was Russian…Russian ancestry…what breed of cat had she been mixed with? He called up a website on Russian cats and found a dizzying assortment of Russian Blues, Blacks, Whites and tabbies, Ussuri, Donskoy and Siberian.
However, try as he did, he found the cat genes in her DNA resisted typing, so after channeling his creative powers in a different direction he simply took them out and subbed in human ones. Within an hour, a more recognizable girl’s face appeared.
He kept refining the image and a tap on his shoulder startled him and he whirled around. His cat-lady friend stood there, a questioning look on her face. “Is that supposed to be me?” she asked.
Harry nodded. “I think so. I went on your facial structure and my own idea of what I figure you’d look like.”
Anastasia leaned her face in closer to look at her computer image. It showed a young woman perhaps twenty years of age with a pretty, angular face, deep-set brown eyes and high cheekbones. Long, dark hair completed the picture. She stared at her maybe-image for a long time and then sat down on the floor.
“So that’s what I might have been,” she said softly and her voice began to quiver. “I never knew. I don’t remember who I am, what my face really looked like or even if I had parents.”
Tears fell from her eyes and she hastily knuckled them away. Her voice shook with the realization of someone who’d had their life stolen from them. “I don’t know who did this to me or why. I don’t know if I was a good person or someone rotten. I woke up looking like…a mutant and now…all I’ve got is an image of what I might have been. All I want is to be normal again, look like someone instead of a…a freak.”
She sat there crying quietly. Jason shut off his game and mutely stared at the floor while Harry simply felt helpless. Finally, as a gesture of support, he touched her on the shoulder. Her body stiffened briefly and a second later, she patted his hand. “If it makes you feel any better,” he said quietly, “I think you look pretty.”
Anastasia’s voice came out dully. “You mean pretty good for an animal.” She wiped away more tears and yet they still hung from her eyelids like drops from an early morning rain shower.
“No, you look pretty.” The words suddenly tumbled out of him, but he meant it. To him, she did look gorgeous. “You really do.”
He hadn’t meant to be so direct, but the way she looked at him, her lips moving but not forming words, and the way her eyes caught his as if staring into the depths of his very soul…something was happening and then realized it had to be…
“Don’t say anything,” she whispered, and leaned in closer.
Oh man, he thought. Her body heat seemed to reach out and envelop him in an invisible embrace, and the clear and sweet warmth of her breath puffed against his face. Talk about animal attraction in the first degree! It was as if her body gave off its own aura, a kind of drug that enticed him. His heart started to pound and his breath caught in his throat as they moved toward each other…
Only to be interrupted by the sound of the doorbell ringing followed by a knock at the front door. Jason had picked his head up to stare at the ensuing lovefest and peeked out the window. “Crap,” he whispered fiercely, “we got company! The men in blue are here. I told you contacting the Feds was a bad idea!”
“Mr. Parham,” a voice called from outside, “My name is Officer Meadows. I’d like to ask you a couple of questions.”
Oh hell, Harry thought. They traced the call!
He grabbed Anastasia’s hand, ran to the doorway, took his shoes, and then they ran upstairs to her room and took refuge under the bed, flipping down the bed cover as they did so. He strained his ears to pick up the sounds downstairs and heard the sound of the door opening and Jason’s voice. “Yes, officer, can I help you?”
The cop mentioned the police force had been searching every house at the behest of the FBI. “You’ve been watching the news, haven’t you?”
When Jason replied that he had, Meadows sounded almost apologetic. “It’s an inconvenience, I know, but we have to.”
Tracing the cop’s movements from the thud of his footsteps, Harry heard him walk into the main living room, the dining room, and then he heard the sound of heavy footsteps trodding up the stairs. Anastasia growled slightly and he gently put his hand over her mouth. “Shh,” he whispered. “He’ll be gone soon.”
In the darkness, lying next to her, he became aware of her presence even more so than before. Her yellow eyes shone out and practically illuminated the dark space they’d boxed themselves into. She took his hand away from her mouth, but didn’t let go of it. “Okay,” she whispered back and fell silent.
The sounds of the policeman’s shoes clomping from room to room grew louder. The officer then entered their room and he stopped just outside the bed. “Hey,” he called out, “do you keep a cat or a dog? There’s a lot of fur here.” A series of sneezes followed. “Does your pet shed or something?”
In the darkness, Anastasia started to growl again. The policeman stooped down and her noise—it came from her belly and seemed to fill the room—got steadily angrier. She slowly extended her claws, ready to strike. The bed cover went up and so did Harry’s fear level as the cop asked, “Hey, kitty, you want to play?”
Anastasia suddenly yowled and Harry didn’t know if she was scared or she wanted to scare the cop away. It didn’t matter. The sudden explosion of rage terrified the living crap out of him. From downstairs he heard Jason’s strangled reply. “Yes, sir, I’ve got a cat. She was abused by her former owners…she doesn’t like strangers.”
The yowls continued, and Harry did the only thing he could think of under the circumstances and also did what he’d wanted to do only moments ago—he twisted his head over and kissed Anastasia right on the lips.
Her eyes widened in shock and slowly closed in a lazy, sensual way. Her tail, powerful and flexible, slipped around his waist and pulled him even closer to
her. They lay together, still locked in their embrace, and finally the bed cover dropped and they heard the policeman go downstairs.
“Yeah, your cat’s got problems,” the cop said. “Thanks for your cooperation.”
The door shut, but Harry’s mind was focused on the girl in his arms and he didn’t want to let go, now or ever. Unfortunately, moments like these were precious and few as ten seconds later Jason called out, “All clear!” and reluctantly they broke the lip-lock with each other.
She cleared her throat quietly. “That was some kiss,” she murmured. “You want to tell me why?”
His mind whirled with emotions, and whether it was pheromones or mutual attraction—call it whatever you wanted to call it—he did like her, and who cared if she was the first cat-girl he’d ever kissed?
“I, uh…you make me feel better about being…me,” he said. He hesitated and then blurted out, “I like you and I think you’re hot.” It was probably the wrong thing to say, but Anastasia nodded slowly.
“I, um, woke up before and heard what you said to your friend, the part about wifing me,” she said. “Is that how all high school students talk?”
Well, actually Jason had mentioned the wifing part first, but whatever. “I can’t tell you. I haven’t been to high school in a long time. But,” he hesitated, “I’m into you now, and I, uh, I hope you’re cool with that.”
She ducked her head briefly and then locked her eyes onto his. “That’s how I feel, too,” she said, and stroked his face with the very soft fur on the back of her hand. “People say that cats are fickle, you know? But I’m not a cat, and I know what I like.”
Embarrassed and yet not, he mumbled, “Uh, yeah,” and scrambled out from under the bed. She followed him and they walked downstairs together, arms around each other’s waist.
Jason observed their entrance and nodded as they reached the bottom. “I see things between you turned out okay,” he said, a smile on his face. “It’s a little fast, but hey, whatever makes your day brighter.” He wiped nervous sweat from his forehead. “Cop’s gone, by the way.”
Harry nodded. The cop had gone…but someone new had entered his life and her name was Anastasia.
An hour later, he was back at work on the computer running his simulations. His girlfriend—yes, it was official—sat beside him. An occasional purr came from her mouth and periodically she rubbed her face against his shoulder. Their host busied himself with his computer games and then went to work on his own computer. He had to send out e-mails to his various online buddies, and the morning passed quickly.
Jason glanced up from his computer just in time to see her rub her head against Harry’s chest. “Well, gotta hand it to you, bud. You sure have a way with the ladies.”
Anastasia smiled. “You have a way with compliments. Keep laying them on.”
He laughed, but abruptly a sober look settled over his features. “I’ll save them for later because I’ve got bad news and worse news,” he said. “Which do you guys wanna hear first?”
“Does it make a difference?” Anastasia asked.
The gamer shrugged. “Not really, but I figured I should give you a couple of options.”
Harry figured there weren’t many options. “Okay, give us the bad news.”
Jason swiveled the computer around to face them. A screenshot of a map showed police checkpoints all over the city, at the airports, the piers, and the bus terminals. “The bad news is everywhere is cop city. The worse news is that Manhattan’s gonna go on lockdown, at least that’s what the online sources are saying.”
Yeah, worse news was worse news, Harry thought. He couldn’t stay here anymore, and didn’t want Jason’s life to be ruined. It was bad enough his life and Anastasia’s life had been screwed. He couldn’t risk someone else getting hurt.
“We have to leave here,” he finally said. “Your parents are going to come back soon and we can’t be sure the thing that attacked us won’t track us here. You’ve helped a lot already.”
His friend gave them a long, lingering look and dropped his gaze to the ground. “Yeah, okay,” he muttered. “I’m gonna miss the company, though. I don’t get houseguests too often.”
Harry guessed his friend never got any visitors at all, but then again, he was the same way…or had been. Now, with the addition of someone special in his life, he felt slightly more confident to tackle whatever came their way. Jason had been a good friend, though, and he owed him big time.
“So where can we go?” Anastasia finally asked. She pulled back from Harry and carefully cleaned her whiskers with her hands.
Harry had an idea. “If I go to downtown Manhattan and sneak into FBI headquarters, I can grab some of the equipment in order to run more extensive tests. My computer isn’t enough. What do you guys think?”
“Plan for failure,” Jason muttered. “New York is now fascist city, man. The cops will be watching everyone.”
Anastasia also had a skeptical look in her eyes. “I like you, Harry, but we need something that’ll work.”
For a moment, depression ruled. “Well, we have to do something,” Harry said. “You got a plan?”
Jason sat lost in thought for a few seconds, swiveled the screen around, fingered the keys, and finally snapped his fingers. “I got it!”
Hurriedly, he tapped in a few commands, and then pointed to the screen. “There,” he said. “Tell me it isn’t foolproof.”
Harry walked over to stare at the information and waved to Anastasia. She came over, and when she saw the website, she started giggling. “I don’t know if I should get pissed off at this idea or laugh at it.”
“Trust me,” Jason said with a grin on his face. “You’ll fit right in.”
Chapter Seven
Killing Time
The streets were crowded. They’d started out from Jason’s house at three, and reached midtown Manhattan at around five in the afternoon, Harry let out a sigh of relief. The trip downtown had taken around two hours, and every second the tension mounted more and more, punctuated by glances out the window by all three occupants and comments from Anastasia of “are we there yet?”
“No, not yet,” Jason replied and glanced nervously in the rearview mirror. “Relax, will you?”
“Don’t tell me to relax!” she snapped. Harry kept quiet, mainly because his body was once again overheated due to the clothes he wore and also because he’d been labeled Public Enemy Number One.
“You’re gonna need a disguise,” Jason had told him after breakfast had finished.
It had taken a long time to get everything ready—time Harry could have used to work on his reverse matrix formula—but in the end, even his girlfriend figured he could pass. Just before leaving, he looked at his outfit in the mirror, turned around to look at the back, and then swiveled to face front again. “I look like a dork,” he lamented.
“It’ll have to do,” Jason told him wearily. He’d been working on the makeup and costume effects without a break. He took the time to roll his shoulders and shake out his tired hands. “Listen, once we get there, I’ll walk you as far as the entrance and then split, okay? You guys need money?”
Reluctantly, Harry nodded. “Whatever you can spare, it would be cool.”
The tall teen shrugged and pulled out his wallet. He riffled through the bills, took out a wad of twenties, and handed it over. “It’s food money from my parents,” he said. “Pay me back when you can.”
Harry’s thoughts returned to the present. He’d heard of these conventions before, but had never thought of going to one. Jason’s eyes shone, though. He probably attended them all and knew everyone on a first name basis. “We’re going there?”
“Trust me.”
Driving had been an adventure. Since the news of the bear-man broke, the police had come out in full force, in cars, on foot, and on horseback. He saw a number of teens—none of whom resembled him at all—hauled over and searched from head to toe, heard their protests, took in the yells of “police brutality”
and “hey man, I didn’t do nothin’ wrong!” and felt guilty others had to suffer for a crime he himself hadn’t committed.
Anastasia moaned, held her belly and rocked back and forth in the back seat. Her sounds got louder and more frequent as they went along and Jason nervously glanced in the rearview mirror. “You’re not gonna get carsick again, are you?” he asked.
“Just shut up and drive.”
Their journey continued, although they did get stopped once. A cop—young, blond and earnest looking—waved them over to the side of the curb and squatted down to look inside Jason’s car. He glanced at the young couple in the back and asked with a smile on his face, “Now what do we have here? Reunion at the zoo, or is it something kinkier?”
“We’re on our way to a cosplay convention, sir,” Harry replied, attempting to be as polite as possible under the circumstances. He took a deep breath to quell his nerves, but Anastasia’s moans got deeper and then she started breathing heavily like a cat about to heave. Her back hunched up and either she was about to spew or upchuck a furball. The cop took it all in with batting an eye.
“Is she in heat or something?” he asked in a lame attempt at sarcasm.
Anastasia didn’t see any humor in his remark. “I’m carsick, you idiot,” she replied in a throaty, angry voice and Harry grabbed her hands in order to keep her claws from coming out. She shrugged him off effortlessly and stared at the policeman, her eyes riveting him to the spot. “If you want to see me hurl, stick around. I’ve got pretty good aim.”
A look of alarm crossed the policeman’s face and it seemed he decided that he wanted to keep his uniform clean. “Have a nice time,” he said. “Cool contacts you have,” he added, and waved them through.
Relief flowed through Harry and he knuckled the sweat away from his forehead, careful not to smudge the make-up too much. The cop hadn’t gotten suspicious even though Anastasia’s eyes were a dead giveaway. “That was close,” he opined.
His girlfriend shrugged and settled back into the seat as they got underway again, still holding onto her stomach. “It was as close as I want to get.” Then she stopped and blinked. “Y’know, maybe this is a memory. I don’t know who I am, but my body remembers what it’s like to get carsick.”
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