by Mel Todd
"What?" He blinked at her as she wanted to beat her head against the wall.
"Food? You were going to stop and get the rest of the stuff since I had the meat we were planning on grilling today."
"Oh, fudge. I completely forgot. I’ll go get it. Give me an hour."
"Not an issue, Toni’s running late anyhow. Hey, has Charley talked to you at all? He’s acting funny."
JD tilted his head then shook it. "No. He hasn’t said anything either way. But he doesn’t ping me too often." Ping had become the term they used for the mental speech. Telepathy just seemed too fancy.
"Okay. He’s acting funny."
"I’ll talk to him when I get back? Hey if we do this again, you mind if I invite Perc? I’ve talked to him a few times, and I think he’d enjoy this."
McKenna shrugged. "Tell him to bring food. But that is about it."
"Will do. Headed out. Be back in a few."
She watched him go, too many questions in her mind. JD rarely forgot things, Charley was hiding something, and now she had more stuff to worry about.
~Is it so much to ask for just a normal easy life?~
[You are a commander. Your life will never be that.]
Wefor’s voice made her shudder.
~I’m not. I’m just me. A police officer. Not a commander. I don’t have any troops and no one listens to me. So, can we drop that commander stuff?~
[No. It is a part of your cellular structure. You can not avoid it forever. But you still have time until you will be forced to deal with it.]
That comment caused her to freeze but following up on it would open doors to things she didn’t want to deal with. Not right now. Pushing the thought away she instead headed to the third spare bedroom where she still had boxes of stuff stored. She needed to figure out what she wanted to keep, what she needed to purchase and what could be dumped.
The ping in her mind pulled her out of her perusal of miscellaneous junk in a box.
~We’re here. Coming on in.~
~Okay.~
She rose and went to meet Toni, making it to the kitchen before the twin missiles impacted her. Two sets of arms hugging her around the hips.
"We missed you." Jessi said holding her tight while Jamie just nodded in agreement.
"I missed you two, too." She ruffled hair on both heads, looking up as Toni walked in a bag in each hand. "Charley is out on the deck."
"Okay," they said, but hugged her a moment longer before they released her to tear out to the back.
She looked at Toni with sharp eyes, noting the circles under her eyes.
"You okay? You look like you shift into a raccoon, not a cat."
"Oh, very funny." Toni mock glared at her, or at least she thought it was a mock glare. "Been haunted with the craziest dreams, of having to learn where stuff is by smell. I guess I took in too much of what you told me happened in that place. Just the dreams won’t quit."
"Oh crap," McKenna muttered. "We never told you."
Toni had stopped mid motion of putting stuff on the counter. "Told me what?"
"Well it turns out when you link with something through the nanobots, if you leave the connection open at night it will pull others dreams into yours. I had to make sure my links were shut off at night or I’d get pulled into Charley’s dreams."
Toni sagged in relief then froze. "Wait that means I’m seeing their dreams?" Her voice cracked a bit as she asked the question.
McKenna flinched but nodded. "Yes. That sounds like what I had them do, to appease our captors. Training to seek. Speaking of which. Don’t be surprised if they can smell drugs and guns on anyone. I’m running into it already and plan on teach JD how to scent them."
"Oh." Toni went quiet as she continued putting stuff on the counter. Some chips and fruit snacks for the kids, and more cheese. With all of them except JD being primarily carnivores in their animal forms, they’d found a preference for protein over carbs. But they still needed a different array of vitamins than the animals did, so they had to remember to eat stuff that didn’t call to them anymore. On the plus side, except for JD, the sugary stuff didn’t really call to them.
"I saw an image, it was odd and distorted, but you were naked covered in blood?"
The details of everything hadn’t been released, and McKenna hadn’t told Toni everything, not wanting to layer in guilt or other issues.
"Yeah. That was an object lesson for the kids." McKenna didn’t know if she wanted to apologize or not, so she said nothing, instead working on checking on the meat that she had marinating.
"I’m never going to be able to repay you." Toni whispered.
"Stop it. I did it for them, for me, and to refuse to give that idiot any more power. I’m fine. Advantage to shifting. Hey, one without a negative… wait, nope there was a negative there too, dammit."
Toni gave her a blank and McKenna explained about the conversation from the other day with JD.
"How does healing have a negative?"
"Stupid bot healed my tubes being tied. Which means I can get pregnant now. I was not thrilled when I heard that."
Toni snorted. "True, but that would mean you’d have to be getting some to be worried about it."
"Point." McKenna looked up as the back door flew open and Jessi stormed in.
"He won’t tell you, so I will."
"Jessi, don’t. It is my problem. I’ll handle it," Charley ran in behind her protesting, his face white. "I can deal with it."
"No. This is adult stuff. Let the adults handle it. After that week I don’t want to deal with adult stuff." Jessi turned to face Charley. "You trust McKenna right? And my mom?"
Charley hesitated but nodded slowly.
"Then trust them. They aren’t like your parents. They’ll believe us, they’ll listen."
Amused at first McKenna, felt her heart clench in her throat as the argument went on, but instinct kept her mouth shut. That didn’t stop her from shooting a question to Toni.
~Is this what being a mom feels like?~
~That mix of terror and pride? Yep. Welcome to the club.~
"Fine," Charley all but shouted, then slouched hunching his shoulders tight.
"Stop it. McKenna never hit us or got mad at us. Even when they beat her. You know this. Why would you think she would change now?" Jamie’s voice asked softly as he put a hand on Charley.
Charley took a deep breath and looked up at McKenna.
"I had a reporter approach me yesterday at the store with Toni."
Toni stiffened at this turning to look at Charley. "Why didn’t you say anything, when was this?"
"When you took Jessi to the bathroom, and Jamie and I were waiting outside."
"Oh god, McKenna, I’m so sorry."
McKenna waved her hand. "He’s ten, he can be left alone outside a bathroom for a minute. What happened?"
Still looking at his feet, McKenna had to resist the urge to pull him into a hug wanting to solve all his pain.
"He said he knew where my parents were and knew about what happened at the place. He wanted an exclusive about living with the shifter cop. And if I did, he’d let the cops know where my parents were." He didn’t look up at McKenna.
"So why didn’t you tell me. Do you want to talk to him?"
Charley’s head jerked up his eyes wide. "No. I don’t want to know where my parents are. I want to stay with you. I’m just worried he’ll realize that isn’t a reason for me to talk to him and change it up. That if I don’t talk to him, he’ll tell the cops where my parents are. I don’t care. If I never see them again, it would be too soon. I’d rather go back to that place than live with them again." The last part came out in a low whisper and McKenna felt her heart break.
In two steps she reached his side. In a move born of the ache in her heart she pulled him into a hug. "Charley, listen to me. You only have to go back to your parents if you want. I’ll fight for you and your right to choose. You can talk to the reporter if you want, but don’t ever do anything because of a t
hreat. I’m not letting you get taken from me, and I will always come back to you. You hear me?"
The tense boy in her arms melted, and she held a wiggly boy who buried his face in her stomach. "Promise?"
McKenna could sense how much he needed to hear he wouldn’t be left behind.
"If I have to, I’ll cross a continent to get back to you. I’m not going to leave you behind or let you get taken from me. Promise. I’ll always come for you. You’re the only person who gets to choose when you leave me."
Two pairs of sniffly kids wrapped their arms around them and McKenna looked to see a sniffling Jamie and grinning Jessi wrapped around the two of them. "See, I told you to trust our adults."
"Did I miss something?" JD’s voice echoed through the kitchen. From her angle she couldn’t see him, but Jamie pulled away, and she heard Toni moving.
"Just a little level setting on what it means to be loved."
~Loved?~
The word rang in her head and McKenna smiled.
~I love you, Charley.~
The burst of joy in her mind from him became an advantage to being a shifter with no drawback.
Chapter 18 - Options
New York City seems to have gotten a new serial killer. Since June, a body every other week has been showing up, and all the signs are either a shifter is doing the killing or someone that is trying to mimic a shifter. Each body has been female, between twenty-five and forty and has been ripped open. The wounds resemble what claws would make but somehow deeper and longer. Police are asking that you travel with friends and don’t go out alone. ~ New York Times
After a clearing of throats, McKenna stood up and went to help JD put food on the counter, giving them space for a minute.
"So, Charley, why don’t you tell us exactly what happened?"
All three kids climbed up at the bar in the kitchen and McKenna set cheese and pita chips in front of them, at least with shifter kids you never needed to worry about spoiling their appetite.
Charley sat between Jamie and Jessi, and she elbowed him in the ribs even as she focused on the food.
"So, Jamie and me where standing there waiting for the girls, and this guy approached us. I’d seen him in the store, following but not following us if that makes any sense. I mean it just looked like he had the same pattern for going through the store. Toni goes up every aisle checking her list."
McKenna darted a look at Toni and she shrugged, rolling her eyes.
"So, he walked up and said he was a reporter. I mean neither of us said anything just looked at him. He didn’t give off creep vibe, but I didn’t know what to say. He then asked if I was the kid the shifter cop took in. He wanted a story about my time there. When we still didn’t say anything he tried to smile." Charley rolled his eyes. "That smile people who don’t know how to talk to kids get." Jamie nodded in counterpoint but focused more on the chips.
"What happened then?" McKenna coaxed, but didn’t look at Charley, instead feeling him in her head.
He shoved some cheese in his mouth before responding, and McKenna felt JD tense. She kicked him with the side of her foot.
~No, let him tell it in his own time.~
JD subsided, and she pulled the meat over, checking it one more time, to make it look like her attention wasn’t focused on the ten-year-old at her counter.
"Then the guys says he knows where my parents are and if I give him the story, he’ll let the cops know so I can get my family back and not have to stay in foster care. At this point I just wanted him to go away, so he handed me his card, saying call him and he’d meet me. He left just as Toni came out."
"Hmm, sounds like you did everything right."
She ruthlessly squashed the desire to ask him for the card, call the guy, and threaten to skin him alive if he ever came near Charley again.
"So, did you want to talk to him?"
Charley made a face she’d only seen on comedy video’s where the kid had tried something new and gross.
"No. I don’t want to talk about it. I mean Julia is okay, and she doesn’t make me feel like a baby talking about it. But I don’t want to anymore. I just want it gone and done with."
"Okay. That’s your call."
"What? I could talk to him if I wanted?" Charley looked up at her with arched eyebrows.
She felt the protests of both JD and Toni in her head and she squashed both them without taking her eyes off Charley.
"You were the one that lived through it. Don’t you think you have the right to talk about it if you want?"
"You wouldn’t tell me no?"
McKenna ducked her head and then shrugged. "I’d ask if I could be there and maybe warn you about stuff. But, Charley, you lived through it. I don’t have the right to tell you what you can or can’t share."
"If you were me?"
"Nope. But then, me and reporters don’t get along so well."
JD snorted at that, but McKenna ignored him.
"Well, I don’t wanna talk to him. Here, you deal with him. Grown up stuff just sucks." He dug in his pocket and pulled out a card pushing it over to her.
"You mind if I talk to him?"
Charley shook his head shifting in his seat. "Nah, I just don’t want to tell my story. I just want to be Charley. Can we go play now?"
"Yep, get. We’ll start cooking here in a bit."
The two boys were up and moving, but Jessi shot a look back at the adults with a half-smile before she scampered after them.
McKenna looked at the card twirling it between her fingers. "He won’t give up. If he went to the trouble to track Charley down, he will keep trying for something. I think we should meet him and talk to him. If nothing else find out what he knows about the parents. They will never get their hands on Charley again."
The memory from the dreams washed over her and bile slid down here throat.
"You sure?"
"Yeah." She looked up at JD. "Never leave an unknown at your back. And if he’s staking out grocery stores, he’s hungry."
"I am so sorry, I swear I never noticed him," Toni protested again, a frown creasing her brow.
"Why should you? You didn’t have a reason to worry about it. So, don’t. Though I swear, I’m starting to think we need to create a shifter martial art form."
[One exists for the warrior forms, Kaylid must know how to use their strength and speed.]
"Why does that not surprise me? I’m not worrying about it now." She glanced at the other two. "Have either of you tried that form yet?"
"No," they both said in unison, then shrugged.
"I didn’t want to do it with the kids around, they might try to copy me," Toni admitted. "Besides it didn’t seem like anything I needed to worry about right now."
"Didn’t want to do it alone. Kinda wanted Wefor around just in case something went sideways."
"Valid. Okay, we’ll worry about it later. Not like it is going to be anything we need in our lives."
"True. You calling the reporter?"
"Yeah. See if I can meet him tomorrow. But running out of time, Monday is back to the daily grind, and I’m actually ready for it."
"Want me to come with?"
"Say yes. I’ll take the kids so you can deal with the creep. Besides, if I saw him, I might deck him or worse. I’m never going to the bathroom again." Toni sighed, worry and stress coating her words.
"Our kids are better equipment to handle things than most. Let it go. They are good kids, smart, brave, and know when to run. They’ll be fine."
JD and Toni looked at her and smiled.
"Our kids. Sounds good doesn’t it." Toni smiled as she said it and McKenna flushed, but it did feel damn good.
"We have burgers to grill and food to eat. Let’s leave this for another day. I’m starving." JD said, but she felt a pang of something in the connection before he shut it down.
Chapter 19 - Interviews
In a story that seems more fitting for the tabloids than national news, there have been multiple bodies foun
d. Some had been missing since the first appearance of shifters, but one of them had a witness to the horrific story. Eighteen-year-old Mike Wallace had not changed when the wave hit, but he swore he felt like he should; arguing with his parents and high on PCP, he began to shift in that way we’ve all become familiar with. But rather than reforming into an animal, his body stopped locked into an amorphous blob of flesh. By the time medics arrived no pulse or brain activity could be found though they aren’t even sure if what remained had either. His parents have donated Mike’s remains to the local scientist to study. ~TNN European news
"Yes, I’m calling for Carlos Lucient?" McKenna looked at the number on the card tapping it on the counter. Toni had taken Charley and the twins to a park with orders for them to run until they were exhausted, and in human form. There was something about the three of them that seemed almost like they were connected at a level even the nanobot connections didn’t explain.
"Speaking. How may I help you?" His voice had a polite inquisitive air and McKenna tilted her head a bit considering.
"This is McKenna Largo. You contacted my foster son yesterday."
The line held an anticipatory silence, then he spoke. "Yes. I really want to know what happened while you were taken. The rumors abound but no one knows anything. All the other parents are refusing to let me speak to their kids. He seemed to be a possibility especially if I could find his parents."
"Did you?"
"I know where they are. But I’ll admit he didn’t seem that excited which surprised me. Foster care sucks. But…" the man trailed off, his silence inviting, but McKenna didn’t bite, not the way he probably hoped. And she found the flat statement about foster care interesting.
"I’d like to talk to you. There is a coffee shop near here. I can be there in fifteen minutes." She lied, as she provided the name and address, she could be there in five. Since she didn’t know where this man lived and letting him know how close to home it would be didn’t seem wise. The expanded time provided space.
"I can do that. I’ll meet you there in fifteen." Excitement filled his voice as he hung up.
"What’s up with the funny look?" JD asked as he put up the remains of lunch, not that there were many. That reward money might be spent all on food at the rate they were going.
