by P. S. Power
Lenore nodded then, suddenly. It was a sharp, but pleasant seeming movement.
“I can mention that, when we meet? Now, what plans does everyone have for the rest of the day?”
For her that was going to be making calls and staying with Karen. Her friend. Sitting around, waiting to change, or to be able to, was going to be deathly boring, if there was no one there to entertain her.
The rest of them all had things to do as well. Mainly being out of the room. At first, she thought it was about her, which it was, a bit. Only a little, as it turned out. When she read their minds, it was mainly about actually doing their jobs, instead of getting away from the source of all evil that was her.
That wasn’t friendship, truly. It also wasn’t abject hatred or high-level fear.
She decided to count it as a win for the day.
Chapter six
That evening was spent in the back of a frozen treat shop, largely chatting on the phone, doing some light business, while alternating with a steady stream of things for Karen to listen to. Really, they could have watched television, if Keeley had wanted to bother doing that, instead of bonding. It was nearly worth trying, by the time that the girl could change shape. She did, at least, choose to move into her girl shape.
That meant getting clothing for her from her apartment, but Keels was fine running a simple errand that way. The hardest part was forcing herself to stay interested in Karen. The best things about her, that she was a Human who had been given shape shifting powers, if limited ones, weren’t that fascinating, really. She simply wasn’t that powerful in meaningful ways. Oh, she was doing better than Kevin had as a regular Human man who liked to call himself Karen, certainly. At least power wise, which some could mistake as being interesting, for about ten minutes.
That didn’t mean there was a lot going on in the other person’s head all the time. She mainly sat all night, wondering about what to do with her new abilities and questioning internally what she should do about the new job that Keeley was setting up for her.
That one was, at least, amusing to understand, once her mind was read on the topic. She really wasn’t certain she’d make a good secretary. She was more than willing to give this Don fellow a try as far as sex went, however. She’d been born a man, after all, and then basically turned into an Alede. Both of her soft forms, the more Human ones, had normal, but full power, sexual interest. That didn’t exist in the metal form, but Karen wasn’t an idiot. She got the idea that, especially as a woman, she could have a lot of sex.
She wouldn’t be able to get a disease from it, either. Or get pregnant. If she wanted to do that, it would take making some real alterations to her system. She had all the right parts for it, but her eggs didn’t shed in a normal fashion. Keels hadn’t thought to arrange that for her, or even check to see if that would be wanted. Kevin, however, could have kids, if he wasn’t careful about it. Or, she supposed, if he just wanted some little ones around.
It wasn’t her business. She could see what the others wanted to do that way if the girl ever decided to try and have kids. Until then, it wasn’t a thing that needed to be discussed.
At five in the morning, she finally got to take the other girl home, simply stepping into her little apartment with her, since doing that once or twice wouldn’t make that big of a difference to the space. It was on the fourth floor and was, Keeley noticed, not nice, really. In fact, the whole place was sloppy and smelled, more than a little bit. There was even some trash in certain places. Just laying on the floor, instead of even having been placed in a bag to indicate it might be going out soon.
Making a face at the now soft looking white woman, one who was holding to an extra pretty face, since she didn’t get a choice for the moment, Keeley sneered.
“Clean and scrub this place up. You’re stepping up in the world, at least possibly. People might be coming by at random times. It’s one thing to be humble economically. Being a slob will make you look bad. That reflects on the rest of us, as well.” She shrugged then, figuring the girl was going to need some sleep soon. “Also make sure to get with Kait Swanson and arrange for her to visit Don at four this afternoon.” That might not happen, but if it didn’t, due to Karen flaking out, then Keeley was cutting her off.
She didn’t really feel like holding her hand in the way that making a slow person truly great would require. That didn't mean a bit of help was a bad thing for her to be doing. Keels was just not going to want to bother with more than a tiny bit of aid that way.
It was early in the day, but she was more than willing to call on people who were wasting their time sleeping, so it didn’t matter too much. This time she called Calley Hale. The Shifter President.
After seven rings, not going to voicemail, the phone picked up on the other end. Karen just went to the tiny kitchen and came back with a tiny white grocery bag. That started to be filled with garbage. It was a good use of resources, so Keels nodded.
Calley sounded tired, for some reason. As if she’d really been sleeping.
“Hale here. What’s up?” It was casual for a President. Then, so was the rust haired Bat Shifter.
“Thomson, here. Rome noticed some new talent she wants put into battle camp. The rest of the duties as well.”
There was a disgruntled noise.
“Thomson? Oh. Got it. Um… Yeah. She called earlier. Last night. Karen from Yoghurt World can do this gender swap thing, like an Alede and I guess turn into a metal woman now? That doesn’t really fit, but Avery wants it, so… You know, why not, right? Plus, anyone that’s going to be on our side is cool with me. I’ve been half considering letting mages and even regular people in, if they want. I’d have to work out healing powers for them, so they fit, but it would be inclusive, don’t you think?” The woman was teasing on the policy idea.
Shifters were too bigoted to allow that to happen. Not all of them. Enough that they wouldn’t put up with Humans being part of the organization. Not normal ones. Then, the same group of people probably wouldn’t really notice Karen being there at all. She had different shapes. That was all they really cared about.
They didn’t worry about people being different as much as they did people being less. Like regular Humans, who weren’t naturally powerful. At least they hadn’t been. Some of them were breaking that mold, now.
That got Keeley to chuckle a bit.
“Good. I figured that would be the case. Avery does good work that way. Staying on top of things? Now, on a personal level, have you been sleeping with Ravi yet?” She knew it wasn’t the case. Interestingly, instead of acting scared, the Bat Shifter merely chuckled softly. It was kind of sexy.
“Nope. Not yet. I haven’t even gotten a call from him. I should make up an excuse to get with him. A party or something? The big problem there is his super-hot girlfriend. Oh, speaking of which, Ginger wants to bang. You, I mean. Possibly Ravi. Scotty wants in on that, too. Mainly with him. That thing with you being an ex-Demon kind of weirds him out still. On the good side, he really thinks you might be trying to actually do it. Now, at least.”
That was fair, really. Keeley was living her own life and wasn’t totally certain that the whole thing wasn’t actually a trick of some sort. She probably wouldn’t truly believe it until a very long time had passed. Part of her kept expecting the rest of her kind to show up in her house, attacking her for being so easily taken in.
That probably wasn’t going to happen, of course.
“Neat. All of it. Still, call Ravi. He can take you places, which will get him to think of you as a friend. As long as you don’t pay him, I mean. I’m not getting rid of him though, so keep that part in mind. You can have a taste, but if you try to take the whole thing, we will have words.” Interestingly, Keeley kind of thought she meant it. Not just the part about keeping Ravi, either.
That, if Calley stole him away, or tried, the answer would come in words, not instant death or enslavement. It wasn’t that she didn't care about Ravi, either. She did. It was simply
that Calley was, in some strange fashion, one of her people now as well.
Sure, when she dug into things, she realized that anyone else stealing her boyfriend would end up dead someplace, or at least be tortured fairly well, but no one had ever claimed she was a good person. It was just interesting to find that she wasn’t naturally going to be evil in every single case. That was kind of an improvement on her part.
From the handpiece, Calley snorted.
“Uh huh… Sure… Except you know the girl code. If you can’t keep your man, then you don’t deserve him. I mean, granted, hooking him up with a couple of extra side pieces isn’t exactly going to hurt, but he’s still a Human male. If you do this wrong, he’ll think he doesn’t really matter to you.”
That was, of course, simply the truth.
“I know. Well, let me see if I can get with him today. We totally missed each other yesterday. It seems like the Human government is after me a bit.”
That got a cough, which was followed by a yawn.
“About the terrorists thing the other day? That one… I don’t know how the Humans will jump on that, but it’s being received pretty favorably in the Shifter community. I can put out some feelers and see what’s going on that way? With the U.S. Feds. I have some actual contacts, if you can believe that.”
Keeley didn't think she’d need the help, but nodded anyway. Not letting people be there for you was a good way to drive them away.
“Thanks, Calley. Now, I need to sneak off to Paris to get some clothing for the day.”
That wasn’t her real plan, but the idea that Calley Hale’s phone wasn’t tapped by the NSA was silly on its face. As the Shifter President, the Bat probably couldn’t go to the restroom without five different agencies knowing exactly what she was doing there.
To that end, Keels was planning to make certain that she didn’t have a SWAT team coming at her when she went back to her place. Not that a Human team like that could get in. Not without help from either some mages or her own people. A lot of it.
That was just to get past the filter around the place, too. It was too well armored to easily be taken down with weapons, either. A rocket could pass the warding spells, but the armor in the walls of the place would do a lot toward stopping the thing. Enough firepower would eventually take it down. Of course, that only worked if she wasn’t there.
The phone made a staticky noise for a moment, then the Bat managed to sound a lot more focused. Less playful, too.
“Got it. I’ll put my ear to the ground and see what I can find for you. I can just call that into Dern, if I get anything?”
That made a lot of sense, really.
“Sure. That works. Or, I guess you could get with Ravi, if Will isn’t around. That or just call me back, but that makes it harder to set up a bootie call. Obviously.” Not that either man was going to be easy to crack that way. They were, in the end, too honorable for truly casual things.
Which was going to end up being a problem, if they couldn’t get their acts together. Will was the head of Division Six. There were some groups that would simply expect him to have sex with them, if he was ever negotiating with them. That he said no probably wouldn’t be a deal breaker with all of them, but it might just make things a bit harder than they had to be.
The Alede were like that. They’d still work with you, if you didn’t want to have sex with them. They just couldn’t understand why you wouldn’t want to. Even if you were from a different species.
They weren’t the only people like that, either.
There were more groups that would require some kind of personal combat, with the main requirement of most groups being something akin to public speaking. The trick there was that Will could handle himself in those regards. It was the just the sex one he was lacking. The first time he had to do a man because of that was probably going to be a problem for him, as well.
Ravi, on the other hand, wasn’t a leader of anything. The issue there was more of a personal one. A thing they needed to have a talk about, soon. After all, she’d been blunt about the fact that she was planning to have sex with anyone she wanted. When she wanted. She’d even suggested, several times, that he had the same right that way. She wasn’t going to keep him from seeing to his needs or anything like that.
He simply hadn’t internalized it as being a real thing yet. Or, more to the point, he figured that it was real enough. That Keeley could get any guy and possibly any woman, she wanted. Even the ones who might not be interested for some reason. He really just figured that if he tried it, she’d use it against him, then break up with him.
That wasn’t the deal they had in place. Hence her needed to actually make sure he understood the real rules. Probably several times.
Calley sounded pleased enough with her words. As if she agreed.
“That, dealing with Humans, can be hard. Not that most Shifters are better that way. A bit, if you explain things to them first. I’ll let you go. Thanks for the heads up. Let me know when Karen is ready for camp. She should probably have some kind of training first. Do we dump that on Rome, do you think?”
Keeley did think that would be fair, but she knew Avery was going to be busy in a few weeks, so might not have time. The shows she was on were all about to come to an end.
“Nope? The Vampires will have that, I bet. She works for them directly, even if you have a good claim on her too. She’s a joint project.” Keeley grinned then, as the girl made a face. Her back turned, as she tidied the hell hole of an apartment. “Maybe Troy can handle it for us? He’s a Trickster, but he’s gotten some good military style skills going on. He still shoots, as a hobby, even.” Karen was going to be able to run after all.
Even lift things that were heavy for a regular person her size. Not super-humanly so, but enough that in her lady form she was about twice as strong as she looked. The same was true of her male shape. That made her the equal of a lot of Shifters. In her metal form… well, the rules there just didn't apply, really. She was literally as strong as the world could handle, in that shape.
Hale grunted once.
“That one… I slept with him, you know that? I’d thought he was a Human at the time. A while back. I’d blame him for tricking me, but, you know how that is… Trickster. It’s right there in the name.” She didn’t sound that put out by the idea, really.
Keeley just nodded a bit. She’d never gone down that particular road, herself. For some strange reason. He’d been around and willing, even after she’d figured out that sex was fun. It didn’t make a lot of sense to her that she hadn’t gone there, to be honest.
When she focused on the memories though, it all seemed to make perfect sense to her that she hadn’t, at the time. In fact, it was nearly flawless that way. Too much so.
Instead of letting herself go into that too closely, she simply answered.
“He did do it to save the world. Plus, he’d even tricked himself into thinking he was just Troy the Human. I’m pretty sure that gets him off the hook that way. Anyway, I’ll talk to you soon? In no more than a week or so. If not, then make sure to call?” There was no reason for that. They weren’t that close. Then, you didn’t get close without making an effort.
Calley didn’t seem that put out by the words.
“Got it. Talk soon!” She hung up then. Probably glad to be going back to sleep for a while.
Karen was still working away, which meant she jumped when Keeley moved over to her and patted her on the back. That was just the right combination of firm and warm to be alluring. A thing that had been built into the girl. Perfectly. She was in a skirt, which wasn’t being managed perfectly as she bent over. The thing was short enough that panties were being shown off. That was a good sign that she wasn’t an Alede. They almost never wore things like that. Not in public, anyway. It made having sex a tiny bit less convenient, after all.
“Easy. I’m out for now. Make sure to arrange things with Kait. Also, if people come by and suggest you go off with them for training, you shou
ld just go. No need to be wary or suspect they have bad intentions or anything.” She was being a little sarcastic, even if she more or less meant it. Anyone being that clever with Karen, at that moment, would be too much for her to handle, if their intent wasn’t pure.
A thing that Kevin, even in his new form, really hadn’t worked out, yet. The thing there was that Karen was several things that Kevin had never been even close to pulling off. One of those was a high-profile target. Most Alede ended up being kidnapped as sex slaves at some point in their lives, for instance. They were normally able to survive it and eventually escape, using their powers. Things that Karen could match. The difference was that she hadn’t gone to school to learn how to do all of that.
Sighing, Keeley stood back.
“I need to get with…” She nearly said Kaitlyn, since they were old friends and Karen worked at the mall with her. Instead she dialed a different number.
This time the person on the other end didn’t sound tired at all. Of course, it was six in the morning, meaning the popular actress would be up for the day already.
“Hello, this is Judy.” She sounded cute about it, instead of loading the words down with sex, like most of her people did, most of the time.
“Hey, Jude. It’s Keeley. I have a question for you?”
There was a pause, but only a short one.
“Um, sure. What do you need to know?”
Glancing at Karen, who had half turned to listen in, actually hearing both sides of the conversation, Keeley made her voice friendly. She felt that way toward the succubus at the moment, so it wasn’t hard to pull off.
“I have a friend who’s recently learned to turn from a man into a woman and back. She was also granted a third form, by an assembled council of Wise Ones. We actually voted her into the position. That was acting for some Humans taken hostage, last night. As a reward for her, I was thinking that I’d get her hooked up with some training? The Shifters are sending her to battle camp, but she’s also basically an Alede. She doesn’t need to feed, but she has the rest of the package. The allure and the looks. Even the hearing and the thing where she can push her eyebrows forward. Only she started out as an average looking Human male, so…”