Decisions

by Mel Todd

  She tossed and turned that night and would have almost relished one of those strange dreams to distract her from her thoughts. Instead only nightmares about having her journal articles laughed at, trying to stop bulldozers beside some quiet lake, and Chuck throwing pieces of lichen at her occupied her night.

  When the alarm went off, she lay there panting and sweat soaked.

  "Stupid brain, next time give me spaceships and sci-fi, that at least was interesting."

  10

  Refuse to Give In

  Why do we shift? Not the mechanics of it, that is for scientists. But why as humans, when some of us found this ability, do we love being an animal? What is it about the animal state that we crave? Is it a weakness or a strength? No one knows the answers to anything about being an animal, but my question is - if we are ourselves animals, how can we justify eating animals? Are they not us? ~ Editorial Opinion

  Stress, due to wondering if she'd made the right choice about pushing whoever made the threat, followed Cass all the way to work. For the first time ever, pulling up to the lab as the first person there made her worried. She looked at the building with sharper eyes. Seeing the lack of escape routes, the two exits to the building, and the lights in the parking lot that in the winter barely gave you enough light to make your way.

  "Stop it. You're being silly. It was some idiot trying to scare you."

  And succeeded.

  That mental voice, small and sounding too much like her niece Laila made her huff in frustration. She shut her car door, maybe with a bit more force than it needed and headed towards the building, there were experiments waiting for her.

  The lab seemed big and empty with shadows in all the corners. In the locker room everything creaked and made sounds she'd never heard. Heading into the lab, her coat, goggles, and hair net on, she didn't put her headphones on wanting to hear when people came in. Cass felt the building slowly come to life. Simon came in and headed to his corner of the lab. Other creaks and sounds made it feel safe and welcoming, but she spent the day with half of her attention on her surroundings, and half on her experiments. It left her exhausted.

  At lunch she ordered delivery and sat down in the break room to eat, watching her coworkers. None were friends, but she'd never regarded them as enemies. Well except Chuck, but that was because he was an ass. The other people she knew to smile at but that about covered it. No one looked at her out of the corner of their eyes or seemed to be overly interested in anything except their own lunch. By nature they were a quiet group, living in their own heads as they struggled with whatever problem they were involved with currently.

  So why does anyone care about me? Or more accurately why does anyone care about this project badly enough to want me to pull journal submissions?

  The thought still had her furrowing her eyebrows when she went back into the lab and looked at what she had accomplished so far that day. Exactly nothing.

  Okay, obviously the lab is not where my mind is today. Let's go do the research that should have occurred to me yesterday.

  She cleaned up her space, put everything back, and checked on the lichen, adding a bit of moisture to the environment. Then, once in the locker area, she divested herself of the hairnet and goggles, muttering to herself as she tried to convince her hair to not stick up in every direction. Giving it up for a bad effort, she headed to her computer.

  First, she pulled up her application and a sigh escaped as she saw it had been accepted and the attachments checked in. Now they could still deny it, but here at least they admitted they had received her evidence. It might not change their minds, but she'd done what she could.

  She performed a quick double check on her journal write ups. The ones she had submitted to were small niche journals. No major researchers read Journal of Fungi or Journal of Plant Interactions but having the write ups added up to a good reputation over time.

  And what are you going to do with that reputation?

  That question she couldn't answer so she ignored it and looked up the location of the lichen. Finding it wasn't as easy as she thought it would be. She'd never bothered to look for it before and it took her three times reviewing the submission before she realized they'd only provided coordinates.

  With a bit of exasperation, she put the coordinates in a map and started searching. After an eternity of searching, a name popped up and she found a news article referencing that it was pending zoning with construction planned for a new Department of Defense research laboratory.

  Why does anyone want to build something there? I mean a lake in Pennsylvania? Hidden Valley? Sounds like someone is stealing from a food company. Give them a year or two to finish researching the lichen and no one would care anymore. Not like you can't build it someplace else.

  That was the only thing she could find, though a few articles mentioned some nasty behind closed door committee arguments about it. She didn't care.

  Sitting back in her chair, she bit her lip and stared sightlessly at the screen.

  I still don't get why this was worth threatening me or breaking into my apartment. Whatever. It's done. They can't do anything now. Go home and maybe see if you can still shift.

  The thought that she'd lost the ability had teased at her and she didn't know if that would be good or bad. That last few weeks trying to pull off a miracle had not even given her time to think about anything else. Signing out, she rose and headed to the door only to slow her steps as she saw Chuck looming there, his gaze intent on her.

  "Going somewhere?" he said, and she could hear the sneer that plastered across his face.

  "Yes, going home." She answered coolly, even as she hands tightened into fists.

  "Bit early isn't it?" His mocking tone made her hands clench even tighter.

  If you get fired, you can't follow up on the protection act and finish what few tests you have left. Besides, he's the lab manager not your boss. He can make your life hell, but he can't get you fired unless you DO something.

  "Yep. Joy of salary." she pasted a smile on her face. "Besides with the three patents I filed last week, I'm pretty sure no one has an issue with the hours I work. And last time I checked, you were the lab manager not HR." Cass had to bite her tongue not to mention how much he enjoyed that benefit.

  Chuck shrugged. "True. Enjoy the benefits while you can, they won't last forever." He pushed himself off the door jamb and turned to walk away. "Women like you always take what someone else earned and don't realize the chances they've been given."

  She blinked as he walked away.

  What in the world was he talking about?

  Confused and tired, she headed home. She let the news play for a few minutes but after hearing they still didn't know where the cop and the kids were, she shut it off. Right now she didn't want to think. Home safe, she stood in her apartment and inhaled. It smelled the way it had when she had finished cleaning last night, like hers.

  Her skin all but crawled and she needed to be something other than her. Dropping her clothes into a careless pile on the floor of her bedroom, she reached and found the wolverine all but leaping towards her. She found herself snarling at the cologne scent that reached her so much sharper in this form whereas in her human form it had been almost unnoticeable.

  Hiding from herself and confusion, she let the animal guide her. She ended curled up in a ball under her bed falling into a deep dreamless sleep.

  11

  Nature Calls

  Shifters seem to fall into two categories, there is the first group that grabs this ability with a passion and it becomes an active part of their life. Then the second group shifts once, might tell a trusted family member about it, then never shifts again. Concern is that the estimated numbers may be off seriously if there is a much larger subsection of people that never reported their changes. What if the actual amount is closer to ten or fifteen percent? Not everyone changed on the same day. Could there be latent shifters waiting to come out only if the human desires it? It does raise questions abo
ut reporting as at this point it is voluntary. Other countries such as North Korea or China have made it mandatory. ~ TNN Shifter Report

  Waking up human and naked under her bed, set the tone for her day. Starting with whacking her head on the bed frame, taking forever to wiggle out, and shut off her annoying alarm. Realizing she was starving as soon as she thought about it made for a bad start.

  She grabbed a bunch of food at a drive through.

  I do believe this is the first time I've ever been grateful for fast food. Golden arches for the win.

  The food disappeared at a rate that would have alarmed her but now she just ate as she drove, saving the extra-large latte for her office work.

  Heading for her computer she called up to see if there had been anything new that came in. As the primary botanist on staff she would get specimens to look at, see if there was anything she could see that struck her interest. Most of the time it was interesting plant extracts and a large amount of what she did went toward beauty products. Demeter had contracts with a few major cosmetics companies to pass on anything that looked interesting when it came to skin care. The lichen had been unusual in that it led to medical research which was one of the reasons she had enjoyed it so much.

  A new fungus had been found and would be delivered this afternoon for her to cultivate and set up to start seeing if it had any uses, edible being number one. She marked the lichen complete and set up an order to move it to a special green house that kept plant samples viable. This one got flagged with 'growth' and 'expansion' so the nursery would know to cultivate it until orders came to the contrary.

  Just because she needed to check, she followed up on the journal articles and wavier but they all looked fine. The articles could take weeks or months before they were accepted and who knew when they would get published.

  Chill, you did what you could.

  The bubbling frustration of finding something that might be really impressive but not being able to follow up on it ate at her. But she'd known when she'd signed the contract that all she got to do was the initial review and testing. If there was something worth more time, someone with more experience and time in the lab than her would get it.

  With a sigh as she tried not think of the sound of the digitized voice, that she'd still known was male, she headed back into her routine and ignored the world as best she could. The rest of the week, while not boring, didn't have the excitement of the lichen. The fungus seemed to be a standard basidiomycete type, edible, with no unusual characteristics. She was bored. Boredom let her mind drift to the wolverine and wanting to play a bit. At lunch one Friday she looked up what areas were open up in the Sierra Nevada's.

  At the height of summer people often escaped into the mountains but the Sierra's covered a huge amount of space. Since she didn't want a camp spot but a place isolated enough where she could play, it didn't take her long to find a spot she thought might work.

  Saturday morning, dressed in tennis shoes, shorts, a t-shirt, and with a backpack full of food and some necessities, she jumped in her car and headed on up. Cass didn't really do camping, preferring the comforts of civilization, but she just needed to get away from people. Surely where she was going, there were no camping areas so she figured she could find a quiet place.

  She spent the three hour drive up into the Sierra’s listening to music and just enjoying the drive, refusing to think. This was not an experiment. It was a chance to be herself. Well, her animal self, though that idea still struck her as odd.

  Oh, please who am I kidding, of course it is me experimenting. Maybe this is my wild side?

  She snorted at the unintentional pun. Doing drugs in high school or college had never attracted her and the years of schooling to get her doctorate hadn't left much extra money to do anything really wild. But her school loans were almost paid off and she didn't have any other debt. So, at twenty-eight that put her in a pretty good spot.

  Maybe I am going to have a bit of fun. Not like any animal is going to bug a hundred plus pound wolverine and the odds of me meeting another shifter are low. I mean, 2%. That means out of every hundred people I know 2 of them might be shifters.

  The pep talk made her feel a bit better as she approached Bowman Lake. Most people went to Lake Spaulding or the Emerald Ponds. But she just wanted something that would be less populated and something her hybrid car could get to, which meant no rough logging roads.

  Bowman Lake had a lot of camping and picnic areas, but if she drove up past the main area there were turn offs and areas where she could park that wouldn't have many people around. She passed one or two that had other vehicles, mostly looking like people going fishing, until she found a spot half way up the lake with no one in it.

  Parking and getting out of the car, the clear cool air felt like a benediction across her face. A deep breath and the scents she'd never been able to notice before swamped her senses. The wet fishy smell from the lake, the sharp cleansing smell of pine, the rustle of leaves surrounding her, and the lap of water from the lake all registered. It felt oddly right, and she shook her head.

  Don't go falling for the outdoors, it always takes it out on you.

  That comment had been proved a dozen times by the time she reached an area far enough away that she felt the odds of running into anyone were slim. Her legs were covered with scratches, two bug bites, a scratch across her face where a branch had caught her, and her hair tangled from other branches.

  "I hate nature and it hates me." She muttered. "Should have stayed home and read, drank wine, and enjoyed my day."

  Even with the scratches though she still wanted to try being an animal outside and see what her body could do. But in the future, she'd probably pass. Nature sucked.

  Sighing with a mixture of annoyance and anticipation, she hung her backpack on a broken branch about chest high and started pulling out things. First jerky, which she shoved in her mouth and chewed on it while she pulled out a silicone baking sheet and dropped it on the ground. She carefully stripped putting each item of clothing in the bag, the last thing she wanted was bugs in her clothes. One of her professors had horror stories about the ants in the jungle and she developed a healthy respect for anything with multiple legs from those stories.

  It took her a few minutes, and she kept flinching, jerking her head to look around at every sound, but soon enough she stood naked on her silicone baking tray.

  First thing is to see if there is another animal there that I can change into.

  She didn't risk speaking aloud, no sense in drawing attention, not that she could hear anyone. Instead she thought about one of the animals she'd seen on the video and went to see if there was a cat which had the most variety of shifters; cheetah, lions, jaguars, cougars, even extinct ones, though there were more people that turned into wolves.

  Trying to keep the idea of a cat in her head she reached and slammed into a wolverine that she swore growled at her. She almost lost her precarious balance on the small square. Shaking her head, she tried again and looked for a wolf, though a cat would have been cooler. Again, all she found was an annoyed wolverine, and how a wolverine could radiate annoyance when she was the animal in question made her pause and laugh at herself.

  Cass tried very hard to think through how she could change into any animal and why it was a wolverine as opposed to a cat or wolf or bear, but her mind just hit the wall of 'it isn't possible, so what is there to figure out'. That left her with the wolverine.

  Okay, so I get to change into a wolverine. Still pretty cool. But I wonder why this animal instead of others? Well why change at all, but whatever.

  With that she quit holding her animal at bay and let it flow into her feeling the soft burn as her body flowed into this new shape that didn't feel as strange as it once had. A vague feeling of annoyance washed through her and was gone, which felt even odder as if she was annoyed at herself for being herself. But before she could really figure out what it meant or analyze the dissonance, she couldn't feel even a whisper of i
t.

  Frustrated she turned her mind outwards and stopped, stunned at the information that her senses could take in. She'd expected the smells, though there were so many she wanted to start investigating to map them all to their sources, to learn what each smell represented. Hearing was way up there too, but what really grabbed her was her fur. Each breeze ruffled it and she realized she could sense things, plants, branches, the silicone mat, touching, behind her hair and it means something.

  This didn't happen in the house? Why not? Oh yeah, no breeze, no AC and when I ran into things I wasn't thinking about it, plus I focused on other things, but this. Oh, wow.

  Cass stood, her eyes closed, and absorbed the world around her. It was so much richer, more nuanced than she'd ever thought.

  After an eternity and yet too soon, she opened her eyes and waded into the underbrush. After all, she wasn't here to stand like a loon and she had no desire to still be up here once the sun started going down. That meant now.

  With abandon she learned her claws were wicked at digging and had more fun than she wanted to admit digging up huge holes in the soil and scaring at least three mice half to death. Blundering through the underbrush, making so much noise she winced, something else noticed too.

  The warning shake of rattles filled the air, and she froze, an instinctive reaction from a part of her mind she didn't access much.

  What is that?

  Inch by inch she moved her head until the still vibrating tip of the rattles caught her eye and she focused on the coiled snake watching her with deadly intensity.

  Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit.

  Cass hated snakes. Not just didn't like them, hated them. They creeped her out, how they moved with no legs and the very idea of swallowing prey whole and digesting it made her want to throw up.