Animage Academy: The Shifter School Down Under Year One

by Qatarina Wanders

  She was looking through the notes she took in her previous class when a noise at the entrance distracted her. Too late, she looked up and caught his eyes. In the midst of the noise, and other boys slapping his back and shoulders, practically salivating for his attention, Tarun stared back at her.

  For a moment, Ava felt like he’d caught her in a web. She tried to break away, but she was lost staring back into those bewitching catlike eyes. Not even realizing she was doing it, as she was used to hiding lately, she tucked her hair behind her ears, exposing her smooth aquiline neck.

  Tarun's breath wedged in his dry throat.

  Good God, she was flawless. How is it she didn't have every boy in school fawning all over her? Or even the girls at that?

  As the class filled up, he could only see the top of her head from where she was hiding in the back, but that was enough. But when someone moved away, bringing her fully into his view, she revealed to him another layer of her exquisite beauty. That long beautiful neck.

  He shook his head. Okay, it's just a neck. He needed to get a hold of himself.

  He was shaking from his reverie when Colin called out to him from his chair, interrupting his thoughts. Colin was a vulture shifter and normally hung out with the birds of prey. But Tarun thought a rat would have suited him better—or maybe a weasel. He had known Colin from his time living in England, for they also lived near each other, and Colin used to torment James relentlessly when they were growing up.

  All the seats were filling up fast as students claimed them. And everyone sitting in the seats facing the entrance had straightened their spines and looked ahead with attentive eyes. Tarun knew that meant Professor Bills had arrived.

  Seeing as how there were now no other choices, he scurried over to sit next to Colin. He had been keeping up somewhat of a charade with these other "friends." Not exactly telling them he didn't want to be around them, or that he didn't really like them at all, but keeping it amicable as best as possible. Even though he didn't want them as friends, he certainly didn't want them as enemies either.

  As he settled in, he snuck another glance over at the pretty kitty. It pained him that Ava didn't seem to like him very much. But he supposed he couldn't entirely blame her because she probably concluded he was like all the other jerks that laughed at her. He did hang out with several of them, after all.

  And even though he hated the stupid segregation of the school, the segregation everyone tried to pretend didn't exist, he knew if he started associating with her, it would probably only cause her more problems at this point.

  As Professor Bills started speaking, Tarun poured all his energy into preventing his wayward neck from whipping back to stare at her. Instead, he ripped open his bag and got ready for training.

  "This won't do at all!" Professor Bills, a balding, rotund owl-shifter, bellowed from the podium. Tarun had missed whatever he just said, being so focused on the contents of his bag. Apparently, Colin and his other friends had, too, because they all went mute.

  A small white hand flitted to Tarun’s forearm. His eyes followed it all the way to the face of its owner, and he met with Elaine's bright blue eyes.

  He hadn't even seen her sitting behind him. She was everywhere! How did she do that? He smiled uncomfortably at her and patted her hand.

  Was that a sigh? Did she just sigh? No, he must've heard wrong. Why did he just touch her back? That was clearly a terrible idea. It was bad enough he’d kissed her hand the other day, and that was only because she’d shoved it in his face. It would have been rude not to. She acted like such a princess all the time, but the worst part was right after he did, she ran off squealing to her friends about how he'd kissed her!

  "Everyone, step out from your places, please!" Professor Bills bellowed again. It was unnecessary for him to be so loud because everyone in the class could hear him just fine, even if he spoke in his normal voice. He was just that loud of a man.

  As Tarun moved to his feet, he made eye contact with James several seats over. James looked nervous. Tarun briefly wondered why, seeing as how Winta wasn't anywhere nearby, but his thoughts were interrupted by Bills’s booming voice once again.

  "Everyone in a circle! Around the room!" Bills demanded.

  One by one, the entire class lined up, their backs toward the wall as they faced Bills in the center.

  The professor was wearing a velvety blue suit that did nothing to hide the wide expanse of his jiggling belly.

  Tarun had heard one of the younger students, Priya, he believed her name was, make a joke that that belly swallowed all the students who refused to listen.

  After an unnecessarily prolonged silence, which Bills spent walking from one trainee to the next, sniffing the air in their faces like a dog trying to remember a scent, he stopped in front of a short girl with long black hair.

  Tarun turned his head slightly to see the person Bills had chosen as his first victim. Her face had blanched. She was definitely small for her age, which Tarun assumed was sixteen because she was there with them, and she didn't look at all comfortable. She looked as if the faintest of winds could blow her away. Her uniform dress hung almost to her knees, probably because that was the smallest size the school had, but even then, she was practically swimming in it.

  She stared fixedly at her shoes, quivering noticeably, awaiting her instructions.

  "I want to show you the power behind your abilities," Bills bent down and said directly into her face, "and who better to reveal it than—" he turned and opened his arms dramatically as he said to the rest of the class, "a phoenix!"

  Everyone gasped, including Tarun. He had no idea there was a phoenix shifter at the school. How had he not known about her? Next to unicorns, and right alongside griffins, the mythical phoenix was as rare as could be and nearly extinct. There were only a few known left in existence.

  As the astonishment sank in, the stunned silence turned into gasps of wonder, words of amazement, and a few students near her even boldly reached out to touch her.

  She whimpered and folded in on herself, all the while keeping her gaze locked firmly on her fascinating Mary Jane's.

  “Miss Sharifi,” Bills asked in the softest voice Tarun had heard the booming man use, bending down his sizable hulk to her height with much difficulty. "Can you show us?" His voice wheezed a little at the end.

  "Yes, Sir."

  Tarun could barely hear her little voice.

  Even though he thought he had braced himself for it, nothing could have prepared Tarun for what happened next. He'd read the legends about these creatures, heard the stories, but discarded most of them as false. But now, raw proof stared back at him in the form of this tiny girl.

  She stepped away from the line, toward the center of the circle, directly into the light streaming in from the long windows. It was cataclysmic. First, little licks of flames erupted from every part of her body. She spread her arms wide and slowly turned in a circle for all to see.

  Tarun gulped and waited for Bills to tell her enough was enough, but the professor looked on, his eyes glued to the spectacle in front of him like every other shifter in the room.

  The suffocating smell of burning skin filled Tarun's nostrils. His eyes watered. Some of the others looked away uncomfortably, but no one attempted to get Bills to stop her.

  So they all watched the tiny girl, the smallest he'd seen in their year, burn alive.

  It was gruesome. The flames extended around her in the shape of an enormous bird, her arms deteriorating as her skin peeled off, and orange wings took shape around her. Her bones disintegrated, soiling the floor with the ashes, her hair shriveling up, eyes squeezed tightly shut until they burst inside her sockets, leaving a dark emptiness behind. He'd seen many shifters transform, but never had he seen something as gruesome as this. The only thing that prevented him from running forward and trying to stop this was the fact that she remained perfectly calm. In fact, she wasn't even shaky anymore.

  It was hard to believe this was the shy gi
rl from just a few moments earlier. And even though the entire scene was terrifying and disturbing, she wasn't screaming in pain, and Bills stood confidently by her side, occasionally nodding his approval or patting his monstrous belly. Yes, satisfaction oozed from him in droves. He looked at the girl like she was his pride and joy.

  "Magnificent, isn't she?" he called out to the classroom. Then, directed toward the flaming bird shape in front of him, "There is no fear in your power, no shame, no restraint, only acceptance!"

  When the last shreds of her body crackled and fell to the floor, the fire burned brighter, licking hungrily at the air. Enveloping. Encompassing. Tarun couldn't see any part of her body any longer. Only vicious flames.

  Professor Bills brought his palms together and waved them back and forth in satisfaction. "When you do this, once you fully accept it, you have access to your powers, both animal and human."

  Tarun had no idea what that meant, but the words were scarcely out of the professor’s mouth when the fire winked out completely, as suddenly as it appeared. In its place were the powdery ashes of the girl who'd stood there just before.

  Okay, now things were getting a little unnerving. What was Professor Bills really trying to prove here? That girl had just burned up! Had he fully expected her to commit suicide while they all watched? And everyone stood by and let it happen?

  His heart pounded as he processed the scenario. He knew phoenixes were known to resurrect from their ashes, but that girl couldn't have been older than sixteen, and the professor had made her kill herself! That was it. Her life snuffed out. So now she would come back and be reborn? And have to start life all over again for the teacher’s sideshow entertainment?

  "Sir? I don't understand. What just happened?"

  Out of the corner of his eye, Tarun saw Ava peeking out behind her curtain of brown hair. She didn't seem overly flustered. Good for her. He felt ready to tackle that fat man.

  Her question was the icebreaker, because after that, the entire class broke into mini pandemonium. Everyone broke the circle and started backing away from the pile of ashes. One question climbing over the other.

  "That's a brilliant question, Miss Carrington," Professor Bills responded without looking at her. Then he turned to Tarun. "Mr. Gulati, are you familiar with the legends of the phoenix?"

  Preparing to speak over all the noise, Tarun's shoulders jerked up and down. "I am, but I guess that's all they are: legends. I don't have any confirmation of their—" Tarun broke off, stunned, as he stared at the ashes.

  They were glowing, and not just the cinders, but the whole pile was actually glowing. Then they lifted up and started to swirl. Every particle moving and multiplying until they started to come back together. Bonding, attaching to each other.

  Tarun rubbed his eyes, literally, to make sure he wasn't dreaming. Smoke suffused and inundated from the powder, whining and squealing, twirling around, faster and faster. Next, thick clouds of cinder and embers rose, all-consuming, soft and fiery at once.

  It was taking the shape of… Really? It was forming into a human. Then a huge plume of powdery smoke exploded all around the shape, and when it collapsed and settled, in place of the human-shaped ashes, stood a bright red, yellow, and orange regal phoenix.

  She was alive! Tarun was astonished, sure, he went to school with dragons, and his headmistress was a griffin, and heck, even he was a walking legend—a white tiger. Yet that knowledge did nothing to defeat the wonder of what he had just witnessed. He had no idea watching one shift would be so…magical.

  "Bravo, Miss Sharifi, bravo!" Bills called out, beaming. The regal creature spread her wings—her squawk could be heard, likely all the way down the hall and perhaps even outside. It even drowned out the vigorous clapping of all her classmates as she then took off into the air proudly—thankfully, the ceiling was several stories high in that training room for this very reason—and zipped down close to the students in line so they could feel the heat coming from her. Then she careened off toward the ceiling again.

  "Now, each of you will do exactly the same." He ignored the looks of surprise from his students. "You will harness the power endowed to you as human and animal!"

  Murmurs of confusion filled the room.

  "Miss Anderson!"

  Michaela stepped out from her place in line, perhaps wondering if the teachers had had some sort of secret meeting to decide on making her into a spectacle in every single class. Tarun had certainly wondered that about her himself.

  "What are pandas known for?"

  She let out a little giggle before replying, "Food!"

  Professor Bills glared at her, pushing his mouth all the way to the side of his face.

  "I mean, um, strength?" she ventured, looking as if she expected Bills to discipline her again.

  But he said, "Good. What are cheetahs known for?"

  Her eyes shot from side to side, but her face remained angled at the professor. "Speed."

  "And wolves?"

  "Agility…" She trailed off in a whisper and then went on. "And tracking."

  "Yes, good. And you will demonstrate that now as a human."

  Michaela's shoulders slumped as she groaned.

  Tarun chuckled to himself. This was one of those things that made this academy so great. Every tiny little detail about any shifter could be picked apart and then harnessed into something the shifter could use in combat.

  And that Michaela girl was about to be the first to figure it out...in front of everybody.

  13

  When it was her turn, Ava hesitated longer than was appropriate.

  "Miss Carrington, I'm sure there is something house cats do that you can emulate." Bills watched her fidget nervously.

  When she'd signed up for this godforsaken school, for whatever reason she’d been so excited about, no one had told her she would have to transform in almost every class. What was the use of consistently making her feel small and pathetic? She had just watched a freaking phoenix burn to death and explode from the ashes, for crying out loud! Couldn't that have been enough for the day?

  Okay, think… What are tabby cats known for? Her brain went blank. She reached the recesses of her memory desperately. Searching for something cats were known for other than being lazy and sassy, and playing with balls of yarn. Anything cool. Anything even remotely not uncool! But she came up empty.

  While she fidgeted, shifting her weight back and forth between her pointy boots, the sound of snickering filtered its way to her.

  Great, here we go again.

  Soon, Professor Bills would lose patience with her and come for her head, she was certain.

  Okay, okay, something… Anything…

  Inhaling deeply, she thought of something. Sure, it wasn't stunning, but at least she had something to show that wouldn't make her look like a complete and total loser.

  "Sharp claws," she said finally, facing her instructor. Behind him, she could see Tarun. Relief printed clearly across his features. Weird. Stupid Tarun. Who did he think he was? Being nice to her one second and ignoring her the next?

  "Go on then," Bills pushed when she just stood there.

  Concentrating only on her fingernails, she isolated her shift to that area only, something she'd gotten moderately good at during her classes at Animage. She looked down and watched them lengthen into tiny-but-sharp glistening claws.

  Bills squinted, his practically nonexistent eyebrows lifting slightly. "Curious," he murmured.

  She returned his gaze with a questioning look.

  Saying nothing, Bills hurried over to his desk, opened the drawer, grabbed a large hand mirror, and returned to where Ava stood, her claws still extended.

  "Did you not mean to do that?" he asked her as he held the mirror up in front of her.

  Ava looked at her reflection and didn't see what he was referring to at first, but then she noticed her eyes had changed as well. Her eyes were usually catlike anyway, but now they were one hundred percent her cat eyes. Her pupils reduced to
small vertical slits. She let her tongue snake out, Yep, that too. She hadn't been trying to do it, hadn't even been aware of it actually, but now that she looked around, she realized she could see with her cat vision.

  "That's a very helpful skill to have, Miss Carrington, you realize that?"

  Night vision could certainly be useful, yes.

  Nodding, Ava swished her claws through the air, let out a small hissing noise, and then without backing up for momentum, she leaped straight off the floor, high and tall, flipping in a full somersault when she got about ten feet up and then struck back down, landing comfortably on both feet. Amazingly enough, she didn't even totter on her heels. Hooray for cat balance. Feeling a boost of confidence, she made herself twist again, but accidentally slashed her own arm with her razor-sharp claws.

  Blood, thick and unrelenting, seeped from the wound, eliciting gasps of horror from those closest to her. Ava's heart thudded sporadically, her vision swimming. She hated the sight of her own blood. And now that she looked at it, the pain was kicking in—and that cut went deep. She bit down hard on her lip and looked at the ceiling to avoid letting herself cry.

  Professor Bills didn't look too concerned and made his way over to his desk once again, setting the hand mirror down and replacing it with a roll of gauze. But, before he'd even made his way back halfway across the room, Ava noticed the pain was rapidly dissipating. She risked a glance back down at her wound, expecting to see sliced-open gore, but instead saw a purple glowing light coming from her arm and realized her skin had already begun to heal. The opening had latched back together, and it was no longer bleeding. There was still blood all over her arm, but there was no longer a blood flow. Just the dried mess from a few moments ago.

  "Professor, Sir, she's healing!" Someone—she didn't know who—called from nearby her.