by Paula Knight
“So, this could all be a mistake?” Diana asked.
“It’s possible,” Cat said, “but I don’t think so.”
“What makes you so sure?” Diana asked.
Cat looked at her sideways again and a strange expression came over his face.
“I can’t really explain it,” he said, “all I can say is that, when I saw you...I knew. I knew it was you. It was like I was being pulled towards you. Like…”
“...like you knew me all ready?” Dian asked.
“Yes,” Cat said.
Diana thought about telling Cat that she had felt that same thing. She had experienced that same, inexplicable tug towards him the first time she saw his picture on the front of that magazine. However when she even thought about the possibility of revealing that to him, she felt herself blush. Even after the kiss that they had shared, it still felt too intimate. She decided she wouldn’t dare and instead kept silent.
“Anyway,” Cat said after a moment’s silence, “we’ll know for sure either way when we get to the reservation.”
“That’s one hundred and fifty miles away,” Diana said. She had not brought a change of clothes or a charger for her phone or anything except her wallet and the clothes on her back. She certainly had not planned on traveling so far in such a small amount of time.
Then again, she had not planned on being attacked in her apartment, then at work, then being told that she had the blood of a deity running through her veins.
“I’m sorry you won’t have time to get your things,” Cat said, “We’ll have clothes for you at the reservation.”
“So there are people waiting for us?” Diana asked.
Cat let out a small cynical laugh.
“Oh,” he said, “there have been people waiting for you for a long, long time.”
Diana looked at him. She remembered the gentle eyes he had given her when he told her his secret, the kiss he had placed on her neck when he wrapped the necklace around her, and finally, the kiss in the breakroom and she realized she had one more burning question she had to ask.
“Have you been waiting for me?”
Cat looked at her. He wore the same expression he had had when he first met her. It was awe and reverence. As though he had never seen anything quite like her.
Finally, he gave her a gentle smile and said, “You have no idea how long I have waited for you.”
Chapter Three
Charlie did indeed meet them at the “Westward Crossing”, which turned out to be the Albuquerque city limit going west.
When Cat pulled the car over and Charlie slid into the back seat, he sported one black eye and his face had two long scars working down the right side.
“You should see the other guy,” he quipped wryly when Diana looked at him in shock.
“Did you see the other guy?” Cat asked turning back towards Charlie.
“Other girl you mean?” Charlie asked giving Diana another wink as she looked to him. “No I didn’t. She ran off as soon as you disappeared down the road.”
“Looks like she roughed you up pretty good beforehand,” Cat said, pulling once again out on to the open highway.
“I looked much worse right after, believe me,” Charlie said. “Amanda patched me up a bit and gave me a new shirt.”
He brought Diana’s attention to the green button down shirt that he now wore in place of his tight fitted blue one. Now that Diana looked at it closely, she could see that it was indeed, much larger on Charlie than the other had been.
“That’s mine,” Cat said. Diana was not surprised, “I’ll expect it back.”
“Relax,” Charlie said casually, putting both his feet up on the back seat, “it’s not like I’d want to keep one of your ugly ass shirts anyway.”
“Then at least get your ugly ass feet off my seat,” Cat quipped looking at Charlie lounging in the rearview mirror. Cat, though his words suggested irritation, wore an exasperated smile none the less.
“Dude,” Charlie said, “you know I can’t sleep if I’m not lying down.”
“Do you need to sleep?” Cat asked. “That black panther could be back with her friends at any moment.”
“Hey,” Charlie said, “I did just save your lives. Don’t you think I’m entitled to a nap?”
Cat rolled his eyes but the slight smile was still present.
“Fine,” he said. “Just take your shoes off.”
“Ok,” Charlie said sitting up and sliding his oxfords off his feet, “just remember, you asked for this.”
Diana did not know what he meant by that. It remained a mystery for about five minutes until a strange, ungodly smell filled her nostrils.
“What is that?” she asked.
Cat did not answer, merely rolled down a window.
“Sorry about that,” he said, “I always forget that his feet are even filthier than his shoes.”
“Should we wake him?” Diana asked. Even through her hand that still covered her nose, she could smell what had a definite rotten sewer odor wafting up from the back.
“No point,” Cat answered. “Once he starts snoring, Charlie can sleep through the coming apocalypse.”
As though on cue, Diana heard a loud snore rise up from the back seat. Cat smiled and shook his head.
“How long have you known him?” Diana asked.
“Well, that depends,” Cat said.
“On what?” Diana asked.
“Are you asking out of curiosity or are you wondering whether or not he’s trustworthy?”
“Can’t I be asking both questions at the same time?”
Cat was silent and seemed to consider that for a moment.
“If I recall correctly,” Diana pressed when she did not receive an answer, “you were the one who told me ‘don’t trust anyone’. And now, you’re asking me to trust an awful lot of people I’ve never met before.”
“Fair enough,” Cat said finally. “I’ve known Charlie most of my life. We grew up together.”
“On the reservation?” She asked.
“Yes,” he answered, “we lived next door to one another. We played together, went to school together, we even trained together. I trust him with my life.”
“Trained together?” Diana asked.
“You’ll see when we get there,” Cat responded.
Diana was too exhausted by that point to ask any more questions. Instead, she looked out the window and focused on the large canyons moving towards them in the distance.
“You know, I’ve always loved it out here,” Cat said, “the world seems...I don’t know...bigger somehow away from the cities.”
“Me too,” Diana said. “I remember taking trips to the four corner canyons with my parents when I was little. Everything was so big and bright. I could have stayed there for days and been completely happy.”
“I miss it,” Cat admitted.
“Why did you leave?” Diana asked. She had been to the Pueblo several times. And while the reservation itself was not most people’s idea of paradise, the land around it was so beautiful and rich, she knew if she had grown up in such a place, she would do everything she could to stay there.
“That’s a long story,” he said reluctantly, “the short version is, I got into a huge fight with my dad when I was eighteen. Went away to school and never went back.”
“But...you said you still had ties there,” Diana remembered, “you were allowed to do digs.”
“I’ve kept in touch with my Grandfather,” he said, “he’s still on the elected council. But I haven’t been back to the Pueblo in over twenty years.”
“Does it feel strange going back now?” Diana asked.
“I didn’t have time to think about it to be honest,” Cat answered. “You sort of came out of nowhere.”
“Trust me, it wasn’t intentional,” Diana answered wryly.
Cat looked over at her and smiled softly.
“You should get some rest,” he said gently, “it’ll be a while before we get there.”
/> Diana nodded, leaned her head against the window and closed her eyes.
It seemed to Diana that only a few minutes had passed before she awoke to the sound of raised and slightly panicky voices.
“We can’t go that way!” Charlie was saying, “I’m telling you it’s a trap!”
“Well, we can’t come in from the east either,” Cat answered him, “Amanda said, they’re waiting for us there.”
“They could have tricked her,” Charlie said.
“You know that’s not possible. If Amanda says they’re there, that’s where they are.”
Diana blinked wearily and looked out the window. The sun was moving low towards the canyons in front of them.
She knew those canyons. They were the ones near the Zuni Pueblo. They were almost there. She must have been asleep for at least an hour.
“Good morning,” Cat said smiling at her, “Well...afternoon, I should say. We’re going to have to take a little detour.”
“We don’t have to, Cat,” Charlie said, “I’m telling you. The pueblo’s just ahead. Even if they are waiting for us, we can take them. There won’t be that many.”
"Charlie," he said, "my leg is wounded, you're a mess and Diana can't do anything."
"That's not true," Diana said defensively, "you said yourself, I'm supposed to be an ultra-powerful...deity, aren't I?"
"Diana," Cat said, “all I said was you have her blood, what we call the Alpha blood inside you, but you haven't been trained yet. You can't do what we can."
“But…” Diana began.
“I’ve made the decision,” Cat said. With that he turned off the road leading towards the Pueblo to a smaller side street heading north.
“I’m telling you,” Charlie said, “we’re heading into a trap. Dude, you know this is Navajo territory.”
“And I’m telling you,” Cat said, “I trust my sister. If this is the way she tells us to go, this is the way we’re going.”
Diana looked in the rearview mirror and saw Charlie shake his head but he didn’t protest further.
Neither did Diana. Instead, she looked out the window at the desert brush that surrounded them and thought about what Cat had said.
‘Diana can’t do anything.’
She had put in a defense because she didn’t want it to be true. But the more she thought about it, the more she really considered her situation, the more she realized that Cat was right. She couldn’t do anything.
Not only could she not turn into a cougar the way Cat and Charlie could, she couldn’t even fight the smallest and weakest human possible, let alone a large animal.
She had taken a self-defense course once in college. To say that she was far behind the other women in the class was an understatement. The instructor had even had to get her special gloves to make up for her weak wrists.
The idea of taking on anyone or anything stronger than a plush pillow man was laughable to her.
Still, the idea of being completely helpless now, the idea of being entirely dependent on someone else, made her even more terrified.
Diana had always liked to be in control of things. That was why she had never experimented with drugs and rarely drank, even though her college peers had done both.
She simply did not enjoy the feeling that she had lost control of the world around her. Now the whole world it seemed, was spinning out of control and she could hardly stand the fact that there was nothing she could do to stop it.
They drove straight down one side street then turned down another then another. Each one seemed narrower and more dust filled than the last.
“It’ll take us another hour or so to go around this way,” Cat told her finally, “you might want to get some sleep.”
“Well, apparently I miss important tidbits when I fall asleep so, I’ll stay awake, thanks very much,” Diana quipped.
“You didn’t miss anything important,” Cat answered.
“Really, Cat?” Charlie chimed in from the back seat, “she’s a smart girl, you really think she’s not going to see through that lie?”
Diana looked in the rearview mirror and gave Charlie a grateful half smile. She couldn’t help but feel that, for some reason, Charlie gave her much more credit than Cat did. No matter what Cat had said about being drawn to her.
“Okay,” Cat said finally, “what do you want to know that you think you missed?”
“Who are these people who are supposed to be waiting for us on the road to the pueblo?” Diana asked.
“Even Amanda’s not sure,” Cat said.
“Exactly!” Charlie exclaimed from the back.
“But she knows they’re there. She also knows that they’re Navajo,” Cat added.
“You said she can’t be wrong,” Diana pressed, “how is that possible?”
“Because her charm is connected to mine too,” Cat said, “she can tell when I’m in danger even when I can’t.”
“So...it’s a sibling thing?” Diana asked.
“It’s a twin thing,” Charlie called from the back seat. Diana turned to look at him with wide eyes.
Charlie stared back at her confused for a moment before looking to Cat in the driver’s seat.
“You didn’t even tell her that?” Charlie asked, “Jesus, Cat. What have you told her?”
“I’ve told her what she needs to know,” Cat cut in throwing Charlie a warning glare in the rearview mirror.
"Really? Have you really told her everything?" Charlie called out skeptically.
“Charlie…” Cat growled threateningly.
“You can’t protect her from everything,” Charlie pressed on undeterred, “eventually, you’re going to have to tell her.”
Bam!
Diana gasped as she was suddenly jerked forward from what felt like a hit to the back bumper of the car.
She felt Charlie’s body hit against her back seat and she cried out in pain as he impacted her shoulder.
“What the fuck?!” Charlie called out.
“Are you ok?” Cat asked Diana. She reached over to her left shoulder and rubbed it gently. She winced realizing it was still extremely tender to the touch.
“I...I think so,” she said.
Cat looked back in the rear view mirror for the source of the impact.
“We’ve got company,” he said quickly before pressing down on the accelerator and speeding up considerably.
Diana wanted to turn around to see what sort of trouble Cat had seen in the rearview, but the moment she tried to look over her left shoulder, she gasped and nearly cried out as she tried to turn her head.
She gritted her teeth but Cat turned and looked at her with concern, none the less.
She knew that she should feel flattered that he was concerned for her. She should be thankful that someone was looking out for her in this strange new world.
But Diana had always been proud almost to a fault. She did not like having to be rescued. And she certainly didn’t like feeling helpless.
Bam!
She felt herself jerk forward once more. This time she did cry out as the strain in her shoulder stung her and she now felt a new twinge in her neck.
“You’ve got to speed up, Cat!” Charlie cried from the back, “he’s still right on top of us,”
“Get down, Diana,” Cat said as he pounded his foot on the gas and the Mercedes sped ahead at what felt like more than one hundred miles per hour.
Diana leaned down in her front seat cringing against the horrifying pain in both her shoulders.
“I don’t want to say I told you so…” Charlie called from the back.
“Then don’t!” Cat said pressing down on the accelerator once more.
The car was now going so fast that Diana was sure she was going to be sick or pass out or both. She buried her head between her knees and closed her eyes against the pain.
“More coming on your right,” Charlie called out.
She felt Cat swerve to the left side of the one lane road just as the sound of metal scraped c
losely against the passenger side door just inches from where Diana sat.
“What’s going on?” Diana asked.
“Now’s not the time for questions,” Cat called to her against the roaring accelerator, “just make sure you stay down.”
“Cat, look out!” Charlie shouted.
Diana, unable to stop herself, sat straight up in her seat to see what had caused the outcry.
She screamed as she say a large black truck speeding towards them on the road and Cat slammed on the breaks of their Mercedes.
Diana lifted her throbbing arms to protect herself from the coming impact. She turned her head and closed her eyes as she heard the glass of the windshield crash and break. She felt the stinging shards cut her already wounded arms just as the car jerked to a stop.
Diana kept her eyes closed for a few moments. Her bloody arms still covering her face protectively.
Eventually, she opened her eyes slowly and looked to Cat in the driver’s seat. His face was cut and bleeding. But his eyes were open. His body was tense as though he were a dog who had just sensed a predator. She could almost see the hairs on his neck standing to attention.
“Wait here,” he told her keeping his eyes focused on whatever was outside the window.
He took the talisman out of his shirt, ran his thumb across it and then turned back to Charlie.
“You stay here too, Charlie,” he said.
“Cat, come on,” Diana heard Charlie say, “You’re going to need me to…”
“I need you to get Diana to the reservation,” Cat said fiercely. “I’m leaving the keys in the car. If I give the signal, you know the one, drive straight there. Don’t stop for anything.”
There was silence for a moment then Charlie heaved a sigh.
“Ok,” he said.
Cat then unlocked the door and moved out.
Diana kept her head between her legs for about one minute before she peeked her head over the dashboard.
She had never been one to play the good little damsel in distress.
What she saw was, by now, so routine that it should not have shocked her. She gasped none the less.
When she looked up, she saw Cat surrounded by what looked like an army of multi colored cougars...