by Tiffany Foxe
He was near tears, not in sorrow, but anger.
“Look, I’m sure you know a big bloodbath is in our future if we don’t find her,” explained Cecelia.
Ralph gathered his composure.
“I know. She’ll return. She has nowhere else to go,” he said.
“I hope you’re right.”
She started for the door when Ralph continued.
“Cecelia.”
She turned toward him.
“Thank you...for being there for your cousin. If you hadn’t…” he shook his head.
She shrugged.
“What is family for?”
***
Sophie waited impatiently for the centrifuge to finish with the blood sample. She had left Emiline on the ninth floor while she came down to the lab on the fourth floor to analyze the sample. She leaned against the table with her arms folded, tapping her fingers while she watched the centrifuge. It felt like watching molasses pour out of a jar on a cold day. The centrifuge finally finished and Sophie grabbed the sample and continued her task. She needed an answer, fast.
Emiline stared at her own reflection in the bathroom mirror. She had grudgingly complied with Sophie’s decision to stay on the ninth floor while she checked the blood sample. Yet, all of the waiting with nothing to do was driving her crazy. The longer she waited the more she doubted her own innocence. If she could go on this long without even knowing what she really was, or that the man she grew up thinking was her father wasn’t, how could she trust her own judgment? If she could be fooled by her fake father and unaware of the existence of such a disparate form of herself, how could she be certain she didn’t kill those people? She couldn’t bear to stand there and wait for an answer any longer. She headed for the elevator and pushed button number four.
Sophie finished loading the results on the computer. She opened an image of the DNA from the crime scenes to compare beside Emiline’s DNA strand. She leaned in closely and studied the two samples as the computer ran a cross-check analysis. She felt a buzzing in her pocket and pulled out her cell phone and answered.
“Hey.”
Emiline stood in the elevator waiting for the doors to open. The elevator stopped, the doors slid open revealing a vast and well stocked medical facility. As Emiline took in the various pieces of equipment before her, she figured it could easily pass for a hospital. She slowly moved forward, taking in the sites and searching simultaneously for Sophie. She moved toward a dimly lit doorway at the end of the room and heard a woman’s voice. It was Sophie, but who was she talking to? She quietly moved closer to the door and strained to listen.
“Yeah, I just got it. I’m looking at it right now.”
Em could see two images of DNA on the the monitor that Sophie viewed. Sophie leaned closer toward the screen and carefully looked each image over. She held the phone to her ear, but didn’t speak. Em looked at the images, too. She searched for any discernible variations between the two images, but to her, they both looked the same. She shrugged it off. She didn’t know much about DNA, anyway. She may as well have been looking at code for a computer program.
“It’s a match,” said Sophie.
Emiline’s heart dropped. Her blood matched the crime scene samples. She was immediately overcome with shock and fear. This couldn’t be right. How could she not remember being there? How could she not remember doing such horrid things? How could she not have control over her own body to prevent them from happening? How could there possibly be a part of her that she didn’t know about? A part that was a killer? A part that acted on her behalf without her knowledge or consent?
She slowly stepped back away from the room. She felt faint. Her steps quickened and she turned around and staggered toward the elevator. Hearing a noise behind her, Sophie briskly dropped the phone from her ear and pivoted toward the elevator. Em opened the elevator, went in, and pushed the button for the first floor. She pushed the “Close Doors” button. The doors were stubbornly slow. Sophie, still fixated on the sound at the elevator, put the phone down on the desk, and walked toward the noise. She caught site of the elevator doors closing with Emiline inside gawking back at her. Sophie began to sprint toward the doors, weaving around this and that. They closed before she got there. She rushed back to the phone which was still connected and picked it up.
“She’s gone.”
Em let out a sigh of relief as she stood in the elevator, but the moment was fleeting. Thoughts rushed through her head. This couldn’t be happening. She had always played by the rules, kept her head down and her nose clean. She felt like she must be dreaming. A nightmare was more like it. Her world had spun upside down and she was left yearning for her former self, her former life. The one where she wasn’t a murderer, wasn’t a monster, the one that she had complete control over. All she wanted in that moment was for things to go back to the way they were, where everything made sense and the most mundane activities currently sounded downright dreamy.
The elevator doors opened, and she was glad to find no one waiting for her on the other side. She cautiously poked her head out to see if anyone was in the lobby. Nothing. She sprinted out of the elevator, through the front doors of the building and onto the sidewalk of the street. She didn’t look back. She ran around the corner and hopped onto the Max just as it was leaving. She sat down in the train and tried to catch her breath. She felt safe in public. They wouldn’t come after her with witnesses present. At least, she hoped they wouldn’t.
Chapter 8
Emiline stood before the PCPD building and gawked at its dominating presence. She stood there many times before and felt nothing but comfort and security. Now, all she thought of was her impending loss her freedom. She was determined to turn herself in. She just wasn't too clear on how to properly explain her guilt without being laughed at or presumed insane. She took a deep breath and slowly advanced toward her unwelcome fate.
She anxiously exited the elevator onto the second floor. She gazed across to the far side of the building to her captain’s office. The door was closed. She shuffled towards her doom, taking in her surroundings one last time. Detectives moved to and fro, flipping through papers, writing reports, bringing in suspects and witnesses. All were preoccupied with their own matters, their own puzzles and problems. She passed her and her partner’s desks. Jack wasn’t in. She was glad he wasn’t. She approached Reynold’s office door, raised her hand and made a fist to knock, but was unable to do anything further. She stood paralyzed, fist in the air, unsure of what the next few moments would bring, but certain it was undesirable.
“He’s not in,” said a woman from behind.
Emiline turned around. It was Dr. Phobos. She stood, coffee in hand, inspecting Em’s obvious hesitation. Em immediately felt the weight lift from her shoulders at the sound of these words. There was time. She didn’t have to turn herself in just yet. The feeling of relief was instantly bombarded with the pang of guilt.
“He’s in a meeting, then he’s gone for the night.”
Em struggled to gather her composure, gave a curt nod and sighed with relief. She got back into the elevator. Dr. Phobos stood gawking at the elevator doors. The door to the captain’s office opened. Reynold’s poked his head out and looked around. Phobos’s eyes met his.
“Phobos, you seen Zadok?”
She shook her head.
“No.”
***
Ralph called his two henchmen and told them to back off of Emiline. He wanted them to keep watch for the time being. He knew she needed to come to him on her own. The two men watched her leave the precinct and get into her car. They got into theirs and followed a safe distance back. Sophie crouched on the edge of a nearby rooftop and watched Em and the two men that tracked her.
Em pulled up to a white house with a small yard on the southeast side of town. She parked on the street and walked up to the door and knocked. Another car pulled up and parked at the end of the block. It shut off its headlights, but no one got out. The front door opened and E
miline went inside. Hours went by and one of the men in the car pulled out his phone and made a call.
“You sure you don’t want us to do anything?”
The other guy kept his eye on the house.
“Okay,” he said with an air of disagreement in his voice. He hung up and shrugged.
Both men returned their focus towards the house.
Emiline awoke the next morning to the sunlight unapologetically intruding on her slumber. She felt groggy and foggy-headed. She instantly sensed something was off. She found herself lying face down on the floor, and she knew this wasn’t her floor. She pushed herself up and looked around. She gasped. Blood covered the floor and her arms. She searched for the source. She was relieved to learn it wasn’t hers. She looked behind her. Jack laid prone on the floor, his neck covered in blood, a trail of red ran behind him for several feet. He had obviously tried to crawl or pull himself toward safety. Red paw prints and stray pieces of white animal fur laid scattered about the floor. Em stared, mouth agape, at the bloodbath about her. Her lip quivered.
She stumbled to her feet and made her way into the bathroom. She turned on the water and frantically began scrubbing the bloodstains off her hands and arms. She caught a glance of herself in the mirror. All around her mouth and neck were painted dark crimson in dried blood. Her stomach churned. She immediately doused her face with water, then grabbed a bar of soap and washed her face until raw from scrubbing. She hurried back into the living room and looked at the body, her partner, motionless, bloody, eyes wide open. She went back into the bathroom in a panic and stooped over the toilet. She dry heaved but nothing came up. She leaned back against the wall and slid to the floor, appalled at what she had done. She sat and stared at the wall in a daze. A faint noise from the living room snapped her back into the present. She crawled to the doorway of the hall and peeked into the living room. It was Jack’s cell phone. She got up and looked at his phone sitting on the coffee table. It was Reynolds. Em felt her pulse spike.
She hurried into the bathroom and grabbed a small towel by the sink. She wiped off everything she had touched. The faucet handles, the doorknob, the floor. She went into the living room and looked around for obvious traces that she had been there. No footprints in the blood, only pawprints. That was lucky. She wiped off the coffee table and countertops. She grabbed her jacket, threw it on and zipped it up to hide the blood on her shirt. She checked for her phone and keys in her jacket pocket, stuffed the towel in her coat and headed for the door. She looked out the peephole. She didn’t see anyone outside. She pulled a corner of the towel out of her pocket and used it to crack open the door. She turned to get one last look at her partner, then left. She briskly got into her car and drove away.
One of the men in the car at the end of the block woke up, stirred by the sound of a car driving by. He hit the other guy in the arm who instantly came to in a disgruntled fashion. They both noticed Emiline’s car was gone. They filled with panic for failure was not something Ralph took kindly to, especially considering who it involved.
“Where is she?”
“I don’t know.”
The driver got out of the car and surveyed the street and houses. He walked up to Jack’s house and strained to peer through the blinds. He tried the door and found it was unlocked. He opened it and looked inside. He quickly shut the door, turned back to the car and waved for his partner to come over.
***
Sophie stood looking out the window of the ninth floor of her apartment. Luce waltzed out of the elevator with an air of displeasure.
“Is there a problem? Are you bored, again?” Luce questioned with displeasure.
Sophie turned to view her uninvited guest.
“Does playing cat and mouse bring some sense of excitement to your monotonous life?”
Luce walked over to Sophie and slapped her across the face. Sophie clenched her jaw. Her eyes briefly burned with hatred.
“Feel something now?”
Sophie stood silent.
“How many times has she slipped through your fingers? I could see your cause for refrain in the beginning, but now that you know who she is…you’re one hundred percent sure.” She threw her hands in the air. “I don’t get it,” she shook her head. “You never lose anyone.”
“She doesn’t know what she’s doing when she shifts. She didn’t even know she was shifting until the other day,” Sophie contended.
“I don’t care. She murdered Ally and Yophiel … She will pay for it. They will pay for it. You know how they are. Give an inch...”
Luce was right. The Sons did have a habit of pushing every possible boundary and limitation. They didn’t appreciate any outsiders giving orders no matter how logical or ethical the reasoning. Still, this issue breached Sophie’s personal sense of ethics.
“I don’t feel right about it.”
“Then, I’ll put someone else on it,” Luce said curtly.
“No...I’ll do it,” Sophie said with an air gloominess.
“Then, make it right,” Luce demanded.
***
Emiline stood anxiously at the front door of the Sons’ mansion. She took a breath and knocked on the door. She watched the wind rustle the trees around her as she waited. The door opened.
“Dr. Phobos?”
Cecelia greeted Emiline from behind the door. Em entered and followed Cecelia into the sitting room opposite the front door. Cecelia made a pot of tea for them both and explained that she was Emiline’s cousin, and how they had only recently found out that Em was Deloris and Ralph’s daughter.
“You did the right thing by coming here,” said Cecelia.
` “The right thing? The right thing would be to turn myself in...but I...I couldn’t do it...and look what happened. I murdered my partner. If I had just turned myself in last night...”
“You can’t turn yourself in. What would you say? ‘Oh, by the way, I’m a werewolf.’ You’d end up in a psych ward.” She took a sip of her tea. “Or worse, they would believe you and they’d begin hunting us down. That would put us all at risk.”
“I wouldn’t say anything,” Em mumbled.
“You really think they’d just let it lie? I mean, if they actually believed you, that is. You think they’d just lock you up and you’d do your time? You would be the government’s favorite new pet project. They would try to replicate you, brainwash you, and use you for their own agenda. You’re a covert ops’ wet dream. With no trace of human involvement in a high profile assassination, they could target whomever they wanted. You could easily infiltrate, shift when needed, and shift back. And, they could wash their hands of it. The government would have complete deniability.”
Cecelia leaned forward.
“You can’t tell anyone what you are. Your life depends on it. Our lives depend on it.”
“I have to do something,” Em resolved.
“I can’t just keep…”
“You don’t have to,” Cecelia interjected.
“You can control it. We all can. It takes time and practice, but we can show you.”
“That doesn’t make up for what I did.”
Cecelia set her cup down.
“I know. That should have never happened...We take responsibility for that. We didn’t know about you. If we had known we could’ve been there for your awakening.”
“Awakening?”
“It’s what we call when we first start shifting into our other form. It happens around the age of thirty.”
Em gave a woeful sigh.
“It’s a very...trying time, I know. Your senses are heightened. Your smell...hearing. Your strength increases. Gaps of time go missing that you can’t explain and you find yourself completely overcome by your desires. It’s because your other form is taking over. It’s kind of like you have multiple personalities, and one runs the show while the other takes a back seat. But, once you learn to master your wolf, you realize it’s still you the whole time...just a different part that you didn’t know you had...a str
onger, faster, more carnal version of yourself. It’s the part of you that lacks serenity, always in turmoil.”
“So...the wolf is still me...just less inhibited?”
“Exactly. Less reticent and keenly aware of what it is you really want.”
“You’re not saying that killing Jack is what I actually wanted? That somewhere deep down I wanted...” Em shook her head. She couldn’t finish the sentence. “No…I wouldn’t hurt anyone.”
Cecelia nodded as she contemplated how to properly explain the situation.
“I know….I know. You ever have an argument where in that moment you think things, feel things that you wouldn’t otherwise?” She poured more hot tea in her cup. “Just...let me teach you how to master it. You can stay here. This is your home, now...if you choose. You will always be welcome here.”
Em gazed undecidedly at her host. She didn’t have much choice. She couldn’t go home to her apartment. She was certain the cops would be coming for her anytime for Jack’s murder. She knew there had to be plenty of evidence she was there, from blood and hair samples to prints and eyewitnesses that could place her and her car at the scene that night. The Watchers were after her, as well. She had killed two of them, and she knew their policy on such transgressions were never lenient. Her options were pretty much nil.
Cecelia pressed on.
“It’s not a danger once you learn how to tame your other half. We all had to learn.”
Em knew she needed to get a grip on this new side of herself, but all she wanted to do right then was pay penance for her grievances, to turn herself in and suffer as she had made others suffer. She had two options on that route: turn herself into the police which put the Sons at risk, or turn herself into the Watchers which meant certain death for herself. At the moment she wasn’t willing to do either. Penance would have to come later. She agreed to stay.
