Cayden Wilde in Calling the Shots - Episode 3

"Matthew Kingston was turned into a satyr after attending a bachelor party that he hardly remembers. It turns out that someone else came in late that some of the guys recognised. This guy had a magical cup, an artefact that could possibly be related to the Holy Grail. There's someone at the hospital that could possibly identify this guy but at the same time, Matt just went through hell.

"I'm a werewolf but I'm not heartless."

******

There was an unusual scent in the air. It was crisp, fresh and a little... lemony but not so sour that it made his lips curl. A little sweet. It took a second for Cayden Wilde to realise what it was.

It was the smell of a clean apartment.

He was stunned the moment he stepped through the front door. The tiles were so shiny that he was pretty sure they glistened. In the back of his mind, he could actually hear little chimes ringing and stars dancing over the polished surfaces. The walls had been cleaned to the point where he could actually see that they were painted a creamy blue. He always assumed they were a dull grey on purpose. Discarded clothes were no longer piled onto his couch like a colourful mountain range and the couch could actually be sat on. Old boxes of Thai food - which was Cayden's go-to fast food meal - were gone and the kitchen never looked so clean.

There was one downside however.

"Ms. Feine!" he cried, bolting straight for the kitchen. He grabbed the big, white mug there marked with a simple logo of a wolf's head against a full moon. Then he peered inside. His ears folded back in horror. "What's he done to you!?"

The clomp of footsteps echoed from the bedroom. Matt came striding in except... he wasn't quite the Matt that Cayden remembered. The Satyr he picked up at the police station was about two feet shorter than him, athletic in build and sort of looked like someone had shoved a prepubescent kid into a pair of goat's legs and stuck two horns on his head. The stud in front of him was about 7'2'', brimming with muscles and had a thick layer of reddish-brown fuzz that covered his chest and arms, outlining the hard edges of all his muscle groups. He also had a rather strapping chinstrap beard that defined his chiselled jaw. The collared shirt he was wearing couldn't close over his enormous chest so it was left to hang open like a light green vest. The bright red track shorts left nothing to the imagination. If it weren't for the same eyes and curly hair, Cayden would've mistaken him for a different person.

"Matt...?" Cayden began. "Is that you?" He was both glad and cursing the fact that it had been a long drive back to his apartment. Sitting in his sport car for a couple of hours had given his balls time to recuperate and 'fill up the tank' so to speak. Now they had no trouble telling the rest of his body that Matt was fucking hot and to get himself some goat meat.

But he had better sense than that... most of the time.

"What the hell did Katie do to you?" he demanded.

Matt absently scratched the back of his head, turning his eyes away from Cayden in shame. "They wanted to see how the curse worked on me. They had me drinking these potions. First I got turned into this..." He gestured at his admittedly glorious body. "Then I turned into an even bigger full-goat-man... and then after that... I can't quite remember but Katie said I turned into 'Satan'... I'm not sure what that means."

"You're probably better off not knowing." Cayden stepped around the isle in the kitchen. "So I assume they managed to partially turn you back?"

The massive Satyr blushed. The light pink of his cheeks patched well with his reddish-brown hair. "Sort of. They could turn me back all the way to being the Satyr I was before but..." His cheeks grew even brighter red. "I guess I kind of like looking like this."

Who wouldn't?

Cayden pushed aside the lewd thoughts swirling in his head. Though it was difficult with such a hunky stud standing right in front of him. Every time he tried to slam the mental doors on sex with super-Satyr-stud Matt, another would pop in bringing to mind their two, huge, muscular bodies, coiled around one another is sexual bliss, tongues rolling over chiselled abdominals and suckling on plump, strong pectorals.

He had to focus on something that_really_ pissed him off.

"What did you do to Ms. Feine?" he said, holding up the cup.

Matt gave him a bewildered look. "Your coffee cup? I cleaned it."

"But... why?" he whined, utterly crestfallen.

The Satyr still gave him a puzzled look. "Because it was filthy and disgusting. I mean, there was this layer of coffee stuck to the bottom of the cup. It was actually nearly entirely_black_. I had to soak that thing for hours and use this disinfectant spell that my mom taught me. If I wasn't so sure it was just coffee, I would've called a pastor on that thing because the bottom was as black as the Abyss!"

"But that's where all the flavour was!"

"The deepest depths of hell?"

Cayden growled at him, baring his fangs. "Okay Matt. I know you've been through a lot of shit and trust me, I know what that shit's like. I've been working with Katie for years now and you cannot imagine how psychotic she can be. She once threw a baby off a roof to prove a point!"

Matt pulled his head back in surprise. "What was the point?"

He waved away the question. "Something about how innocence should be preserved and if God really considered all babies innocent at birth, He would save the kid when she threw him off. We were dealing with this really_religious guy." He swung his mug through the air. "My point is, I put up with a_lot of bullshit in my life and the only thing that really gets me going through the day is some coffee just the way I like it from my favourite mug." He held up the cup. "This mug. Ms. Feine!"

The Satyr stud lifted a hairy hand. "I've got to ask. 'Ms. Feine'?"

"As in caf_feine!"_ he roared, rattling the windows. Cayden stomped back over to his kettle and started boiling some water. "Now I'm going to have to build it up all over again. Fuck! That's going to be at least a million cups. Gonna have to deal with watered down swill until it's back up..."

A thick, meaty hand fell on his shoulder, strong fingers gently gripping the muscle beneath his coat. "I'm sorry, Cayden," Matt said, genuinely apologetic. "I didn't know. It just got caught up in all the cleaning I was doing."

God what else did you clean...?

Curbing his frustration, Cayden turned towards the bulky Satyr. "Why were you cleaning anyway? Please don't tell me this was some sort of way to exert control over a situation that you had no control over."

Matt flinched away from him. "Huh?"

He crossed his arms, resting his back against the fridge. "Common behaviour I've seen in a lot of victims, kid. Especially those that have had some part of their identity stripped from them. Parents died, lost their jobs, lost a limb or even..." He nodded towards Matt. "Got turned into a Paranorm. Things have gotten out of their control so now they're desperately searching for a way to find something that they can control. Prove to themselves and others that they aren't utterly powerless." He fixed Matt with a piercing stare. "So what is it, Matt? Did you clean my apartment because you wanted to feel in control?"

The Satyr shrugged at him. "Maybe a little but mostly it was because after I came back from Mama Cherry Blossom's place, I realised this place stank like sex. Like... it's everywhere."

Oh... His senses must've been heightened by his transformation.

"I masturbate and have sex. A lot."

"I can tell." Matt laughed a little and leaned towards him, sniffing at him. "You just had some recently, right?" He sniffed a little more. "With quite a number of guys."

"Guys from the PUK fraternity at your college," Cayden chuckled, a little abashed. "Turns out one of the groomsmen were there. Ron."

"Ronald?" Matt exclaimed. "Is he...?"

"A Satyr and loving it, apparently."

"He..." Matt paused. "Huh... I guess I get it."

Wait... he does?

Matt turned around and strode towards the kitchen isle. The young Satyr parked himself on one of the stools, resting his weight on the marble tabletop, forearms bunching and veins popping up and down his biceps. "I mean, when I first got turned, I didn't want it. It looked like someone had taken half my body and sewn a goat there. I felt... out of place in my own body and disgusted at these hairy, hooved legs."

For emphasis he lifted one of his legs, setting his foot on a nearby stool. Cayden tried not to drool at the sight of those thick, muscular quads, oval-shaped calves and big, hooved feet. It didn't help that the fabric of his shorts were strained so tightly around those muscles.

"But then Mama Cherry Blossom had me drink those potions and I realised things could get a lot worse. At the very least, I'm still me."

Guilt shot through Cayden's chest. He had seen this in both Ted and Ron. With Ted, he seemed to just suddenly switch into 'Satyr-mode' when he got horny. Ron seemed to embrace the lifestyle but had been considering it for a while. That put into doubt what Matt was feeling and talking about right now.

Does he actually feel this way or is that just the spell at work?

Is this Matthew Kingston the human or Matt Kingston the Satyr?

Cayden took a deep breath and let it out just in time for the kettle to let out a soft 'click' and finish boiling. "Matt, when I first changed, I went through what we former humans like to call our 'honeymoon phase'. Everything is brighter, smells are sharper, you're stronger, faster and can fuck for longer. It comes as a shock and when you look back at who you were, you tell yourself you will never go back."

"That's exactly how I feel!" Matt exclaimed.

And that's what I was afraid of.

"And that's the thing," he warned. "Being a Paranorm is very different from being a human." He pressed a paw against his chest. "Now being able to shift freely between werewolf form and human form is neat and all but every full moon, I have no choice. I'm always in wolf form. Plus my claws are a lot_harder to trim than cutting nails." Cayden wiggled his fingers at Matt. "I actually have to file these bastards. Plus all this fur is a _bitch to wash. I spend at least half an hour in the shower every day just trying to shampoo and condition every inch of my body. And if a scent gets stuck, it gets stuck."

He shook his head. "My point is, you're only looking at the positives right now. Live with being a Satyr for a month and you'll have to deal with all the nuances of it."

"Like what?"

Poor kid. He doesn't believe there are any negatives...

"Apart from dealing with the stereotypes of being a Satyr?" Cayden said. "Remember you're the victim here. You got turned into a Satyr. Think about how you'll introduce yourself at parties. What your family will think of you. Someone will treat you with kiddie gloves and maybe even other Satyrs will stay clear away from you because they might think you're just this poser. Let's not forget that you were illegally turned into a Paranorm. The court fees alone are going to be a nightmare. On top of that, you were human. You never had more than a light coating of hair on your body. You've never had fur. You're going to have to get used to having horns. Hats are going to be fun and so is hair care. You've also got a digitigrade stance. You're going to need different footwear."

"Then I'll just go around barefoot like you." Matt gestured at Cayden's feet.

"Then you'll need to consider hoof rot and possible diseases you could get from getting gunk stuck up in there. Also, you got that body through magical means. You want to keep that? You're going to need to adjust your diet and work out. Did you ever go to the gym before?"

"Once a week."

"Now you'll probably need to go every day. Big bodies mean big appetites. Let's not forget that certain Paranorms can't eat certain things. I can't eat chocolate. Sure they have those stupid 'Doggie-Chocs' that they wave around but it's never the same. I'm not sure what Satyrs can't eat but if you want to stay like that, you'll need to visit a doctor. Speaking of, you'll need a full medical check-up."

Matt's pointed ears drooped. "That... sounds like a lot of work."

"This isn't just a costume you can put on when it suits you, Matt," Cayden said grimly. He poured some black coffee grounds into his cup and then siphoned some hot water right into it. "It's a lifestyle change. One that'll take a lot of time and effort to get used to." He took a sip from the cup and grimaced. It just didn't have that twang to it like before. "Ron adjusted quickly because he's studied it. You could say he's got the soul of a Satyr trapped in a human's body. But you..."

Matt scowled at him. "So you're saying I'm always meant to be human?"

"I'm saying you shouldn't be so quick to accept the hand you're dealt with. People have the choice these days to change their species and gender. Just because they were born a man or a woman doesn't mean they have to live as one. A human can become a Paranorm and Paranorms can be turned into humans if there's enough power used. So just because you were turned into a Satyr now, doesn't mean you should go ahead and just accept it and force yourself into embracing it."

The Satyr stomped his hoofed foot on the floor. "Who says I'm just 'accepting it'. I genuinely like being a Satyr!"

Cayden set his mug on the table. "Alright. Then how about this? For the rest of the day, we're going to push that body of yours to its limit. We're going to test you in all your Satyr-y goodness. If tomorrow you're still adamant about being a Satyr, then fine." He lifted his paws up. "I won't try convincing you otherwise. Deal?"

Matt lifted his head and grunted. "Yeah. Okay. Deal."

"Good." Cayden downed the rest of his coffee then he went to the top drawer just above the stove and pulled out a large, black tub. He set it on the counter with a whump. After grabbing two glasses, he opened the tub and began pouring a strange, grey and black power into the glasses.

"Uh... What's that?" Matt asked warily.

"Paranorm protein shake," he answered with a shrug. "Unlike humans, certain Paranorms need more than just creatine to build up muscle. We have magic inherently running through our veins and if you don't feed that magic and just keep pumping your muscles, you risk 'burning out'."

The Satyr inclined his head to the side as Cayden poured some cold water into the glasses. The liquid fizzed upon making contact with the black power and turned a strange, milky green. "I heard about burnt out wizards and witches. Isn't that where they use too much of their magic and they can't use it anymore."

"That's 'drying up'. Magical energy is finite but it reproduces naturally in people, norm or Paranorm, as long as some part of it is already present in the bloodstream. That's why avid magic users carry around magic potions with them. If they ever use every last drop of magic in their body, they can just drink that and they'll be able to recover their magic. If they don't, they won't be able to use magic anymore until they can get more magic in their blood."

Cayden shook his head and pushed one of the glasses towards the Satyr stud. "Burning out is when a magic user undergoes drastic physical alterations without flexing their 'magical muscle' so to speak. If a wizard or someone with inherent magical powers were to just hulk out and become Mr. Universe without proper nourishment and training with their magic, then they'll 'burn out'. In that case, it's like muscular atrophy. Your magical ability just shrivels up. It's still there and they might still be able to cast the odd spell or two but it's never as strong."

He tapped the drink. "So for our first exercise, we're going to workout every aspect of ourselves. You're not a human anymore, kid. You're a Paranorm and that comes with some natural elemental alignment, inherent magical abilities and some natural talents."

Matt beamed, his fluffy little tail wagging excitedly. "Oh boy! I've always wanted to use magic."

Cayden grinned at him, flashing his teeth in a very predatory manner. "I've always wanted someone to use magic on."

******

The office of Katherine was small, quaint and located smack dab in the middle of the city. It was a single storey building located in between a candy shop and a gun dealer. That matched her personality perfectly. Sweet... but deadly. Des was seriously wondering what he was doing coming to her when he remembered that out of all the lawyers in the town, she never lost a case. Not to mention that she was also using her incredible resources to figure out what had happened to the newly made Satyrs.

He sighed and pushed open the wooden door.

He was immediately met with the sight of a cannon and Katie standing right behind it.

Poof!

White feathers blasted right into his face and he actually took a step back in shock. It took him a moment to recover from being just hit by the contents of a pillow but not enough to formulate words. He just stared at Katie, wondering what she was thinking.

"Oh damnit..." said the silver-haired lawyer. "It's tar first _then_feathers. Can you help me clean this up? Then close the door and open it again in about fifteen minutes."

Des brushed off a few feathers from his shoulder. "I know you hate me but you're seriously going to tar and feather me?"

She shrugged and wandered over to her desk. The entire office really just consisted of her desk and a vast array of differently shaped mirrors displayed around all over her office. "No. That was how I was going to greet anyone who came through my door. You just so happen to conveniently be the first."

Right, like I believe that...

"As much as it pains me to say it," Des rumbled, following her inside, "I need your help."

"Oh really?" Katie reached behind her desk and pulled out a couple of coloured flags. "Alright but we can only communicate using flag signals."

He narrowed her gaze at her. "No."

Again, she ducked behind the desk and produced two wooden sticks. "Smoke signals?"

"No."

One more time and she picked up an old timey telegraph. Before she could even ask, Des just shook his head.

Then she disappeared fully behind her desk. Des lifted an eyebrow when he heard power tools being used. Wary as he was, he wandered closer. As he was just about to peer over the desk...

BAM!

Katie re-emerged with a fully decked out marionette theatre complete with marionette versions of themselves. Admittedly, his doll was rather flattering especially with the chest and crotch area.

"Then we communicate through puppets!" Katie shouted, waving a finger into the air.

"You're really into the puppet thing this week, aren't you?"

She didn't answer and she jerked her chin towards the 'Desmond Gordon Puppet'.

Sighing, Des grabbed the strings of his doll. "Fine." Speaking through the corner of his muzzle and in a slightly high-pitched voice, he said, "Katie, there's only one groomsman that's missing and we found him. He's in the hospital. Admitted himself for analysis." He wiggled his puppet around a bit to simulate speech.

She spoke in her own version of a cartoony voice. "Well Desmond, seems like you really don't need my help on this one unless it's a legal matter."

"It sort of is," he replied. "The doctors and nurses won't let me see him. Says he's mentally unstable because he believes he's cursed to become a Satyr. I tried pulling rank on them but they're adamant that only family and friends can see him."

"Ah, the Obama Care Act of 2075. Doctors have the right to refuse access to a patient to all levels of authority if it conflicts with their Hippocratic Oath. This eventually led to the Medical Neutrality Act of 2077 where all government-sanctioned sites of medical practice are effectively 'neutral ground' similar to foreign embassies. Authorities may not enter it without special permission."

"And our good Mayor Gardrum doesn't want this blowing up any more than it already has," Des answered. "Giving me officially permission to go into Jamison will be like putting his rubber stamp on this case, branding it as a shitstorm."

He watched Katie's marionette cross her arms thoughtfully.

"That is problematic. But those Acts are accepted all across the US. Pulling some legal mumbo jumbo to get in to talk to the groomsman will be difficult. Unless, of course, you go in not as an officer of the law but as a concerned friend."

Des lifted his eyebrows at her. "I can't lie, Katie."

"No but I can. I am a lawyer, after all. The Acts ensured that hospitals can allow even friends to visit the infirm. There's no way to actually tell if the person claiming to be John Doe's best friend really is their best friend except if the patient or the _real_friends claim otherwise."

"I guess..." Des rumbled. "What's your plan?"

"The hospital only has two floors. How high can you jump?"

******

Matt grunted and squeezed his abdominals into his hundredth crunch.

"One hundred!" cried the Satyr stud and immediately collapsed onto the bright blue yoga mat on the floor, panting for breath. Sweat covered his entire body, causing his body hair to glisten. The distinct smell of wet goat was in the air as well as crotch musk. He had discarded his shirt leaving him only with the shorts that left little to the imagination now that they were soaked with sweat.

"And?" Cayden prompted.

Groaning, Matt squeezed his eyes shut. Two fifty pound dumbbells lifted off the ground next to him, suspended by his sheer will and magical energy. He murmured the chant over and over again under his breath until they came up to about Cayden's chest. Then they immediately dropped with a loud _slam_on the ground.

"Good job," said the werewolf, dressed only in a black singlet and blue and grey shorts. "Now move over. My turn."

Matt rolled off the yoga mat with a moan. The poor guy couldn't get up. It sort of made Cayden chuckle but it was a common symptom with those who underwent spontaneous muscle growth as part of becoming a Paranorm. All those muscles needed maintenance. If you didn't build them from the ground up, maintaining and building them was a shock both physically and mentally. It was especially common amongst newly made Paranorms that gained new limbs. They would trip over their own tails, get wings caught in places, forget they have extra arms or legs and generally be awkward for a long while. Usually, that was what broke them out of the honeymoon phase.

He wiped down the yoga mat with a towel and rested himself down. Clasping his paws behind his head, he began to do his hundred crunches while murmuring a simple magical spell to lift a pair of hundred pound weights into the air in tandem with his movements.

"My stomach hurts..." Matt whined, managing to sit up.

Admittedly, his abdominals never looked more chiselled. They were like eight blocks of vanilla chocolate dusted lightly with paprika. Cayden shook those thoughts out of his mind. He was disgusted at himself. He wanted to taste the Satyr, to sink his fangs into that muscle flesh, have his meat into his muzzle.

God I'm such a dog...

He continued with the exercises, just offering a grunt in acknowledgement.

"Right, right. All focus on the exercise," muttered the Satyr. He grunted and rolled his shoulders. They had done some free weight exercises with their shoulders previously and his deltoids never looked so plump and defined. "Just... Do I really need all this exercise? I mean, I'm trying to maintain my look, right? Not bulk up?"

"This is maintenance," grunted Cayden as he finished his fiftieth rep. Between crunches, he said, "If you want to bulk, you start tacking on weights to your crunches. Doing them suspended in the air. Reverse crunches. You're working your muscles. Not just burning energy and fat."

Matt groaned softly. "Damn... Never thought getting ripped would be so hard..."

"Facts of life, kid. Just because magic can get you to your destination quicker, doesn't mean the world doesn't stop turning. You stay put too long and you'll be left behind. Magic is a tool not a shortcut."

He finished his hundredth rep and leapt to his feet. "Alright. Moving on. Get on the bench press."

Matt whine. "Come one. Can I at least have a bit of a rest?"

"No dice, kid. You didn't get any exercise yesterday. You just got your new body now. You've got to define your limits now or you'll just fall into your own routine. If you're willing to get cursed or have a spell cast on you again just to make your ripped again, then go right ahead and pig out but that sort of procedure is expensive. Not to mention it's the easy way out."

The Satyr grunted and got up, practically crawling over to the bench press. "Right, like you never took the easy way out."

Cayden flicked his ears forward. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Matt sat down on the bench, body slightly bent over due to the soreness in his abdominals. "Well, you always stay as a werewolf. You keep yourself buff, furry and strong all the time. You never go back to your weak human self."

"You think I shrink when I go back to being human?" Cayden replied. "Kid, law of conservation of mass. You can usually tell a wereperson in human guise because they're bigger than everyone else. The only real difference between me now and me as a human is that I'm fuzzier, have a muzzle, pointed ears, a tail, claws and sharper teeth. And my dick changes shape but everything else is basically the same. I didn't get this big because I became a were. I got this big because I trained myself to be."

Matt gave him a dubious stare. "Right. So you were always 7'10'."

"Well, no. But that was a very painful process." Cayden rubbed the back of his neck. "When I got turned, it was when I was eighteen. It was like a second puberty. During puberty, you have your growth spurt and shoot up about a foot. Imagine getting that in the span of a single night. Hurt like hell. And remember, during puberty, you're weirdly proportioned. I was skinny as fuck and kept banging my head on doorframes. I built this up..." He flexed a bicep. "... to get myself back into proportion. It just so happens that as a werewolf, my metabolism is way faster than a human's so I've got to train more than most humans. I just really got into it after a while."

"That's all well and good for you." Matt lay back and gripped the bar of the bench press. "But I'm not a bodybuilder."

"You want to keep that body?" Cayden replied, stacking on some weights. "Then you might have to be. You've got the physique of one."

Matt sighed and braced himself for the exercise. "Nothing is ever easy, is it?"

"There are easy things to do. Just that they're rarely worth doing."

He guided the Satyr into doing some steady reps with the bench press. They traded places once Matt's chest was nice and plump and continue to stack on weights until Matt was exhausted and could barely do a single rep. Cayden kept going though. While being a werewolf did give him supernatural strength, he was adamant about pushing himself with every session. He wasn't going to be complacent.

"How'd you get bitten, by the way?" Matt suddenly asked. "I mean, okay. You got bitten when you were eighteen. Why? Did some crazy werewolf bite you one full moon?"

Cayden rolled his eyes. "No. It was my then-girlfriend."

"Girlfriend?" Matt repeated surprised. "You had a girlfriend?"

"I'm bisexual kid. I don't care who I fuck so long as I get to fuck them. Well, I'm never going to fuck Katie. She's got... devices." He didn't say 'toys'. He said 'devices'. Both of them shuddered at that thought. "Anyway, she was a werewolf and I was a stupid kid just about to graduate from high school. We said we'd always be together and she kind of pressured me into becoming a werewolf. I kept putting it off until the month of finals. I finally relented, she bit me and I transformed. I felt awesome as a wolf but I didn't really have control over my own body. I couldn't attend the finals. I got to retake them later but I was so distracted with my new senses and sensations that I got a miserable grade. Just went straight to the police academy from there. Thought that the discipline they'd teach me there would reel me back in to place. I wasn't wrong."

"You never went to college?"

"I never went to college," he confirmed.

"Do you regret it?"

Cayden cocked his head to the side slightly. "Do I regret never going to college?" He let out a thoughtful hum. "Well, no offense kid but I honestly think college is just expensive way for people to charge you for teaching stuff you probably won't even use. The real world doesn't really need a lot of what they teach you in college. You're probably better off just learning on the job."

Matt grunted as he pushed the bar back into the rack. "_Summerdew_teaches you a lot of practical stuff, you know."

"But can you figure me going to Summerdew?" Cayden countered. "I learned everything I needed to know on the street and in the police academy. I guess you could say the academy_was_ my college." He shrugged and gave Matt's shoulder a light tap. "Move. My turn."

He stacked on more weights and then began pumping the bench press in rapid succession. Matt looked on with a bit of jealousy as Cayden managed to push out fifty powerful presses in a rhythmic fashion. They did five more sets, all with increasing weight. Matt didn't quite manage to keep up despite his increased bulk but Cayden kept pushing him. It really was more a matter of the Satyr being unused to such intense physical strain. His body told him to stop but if he wanted to maintain that physique, he needed to push through it.

They continued their workout with more chest exercises, eventually moving onto doing some dips and pull ups. Matt complained for the better half of the routine but after he was dripping with sweat and could barely stand, he stopped talking. Eventually, two hours after they began, Cayden handed Matt a recovery shake which the Satyr eagerly chugged.

"How do you do this once a week?" Matt groaned.

"Once? I do it six times a week. I take one day as a break and yesterday was it." He had to admit, he felt a little bit of pride swell in him at Matt's stunned look. It was a real stroke to his ego as he puffed out his chest and drank his shake. He even made sure to tilt his head and body a little to the side so that Matt could get the full view of his bulging bicep and that little trickle of the shake that he purposefully let drip out of the corner of his mouth and run down his chin.

Oh fuck! Am I actually flirting with a guy six years younger than me!?

Am I a sugar daddy!?

Cayden choked a bit on his shake and had to set it down as he cleared his airways with a few ragged coughs. Matt was halfway out of his seat but he waved the Satyr down.

"Anyway..." mumbled the werewolf. "Day's not over kid."

"Oh yeah?" Matt asked, appearing a little confident. "What do you have in mind?"

Cayden pounded his chest a little just to get the rest of the liquid out of his windpipe. "Clothes shopping."

Matt tilted his head to the side. "Huh?"

"You're covered in sweat, your clothes stink and I'm pretty sure whatever you were wearing before is not going to fit you now. So we're going to get you some new clothes. And you _aren't_borrowing any of mine.

Mostly because sharing clothes is like the quintessential couple thing to do...

Matt tugged at his shorts which really didn't have that much give considering how tightly they were wound around his thighs. "I guess the clothes that Katie gave me are kind of revealing. Not to mention my lower half is nice and warm but my upper will freeze if I step outside. I might poke someone's eye out with my nipples!"

Not for the first time, Cayden wondered if Katie had a vested interest in his love life and why. Maybe she took some sick pleasure in watching him bone other people. Perhaps his life was like the porn flick she was directing and even played a small role in.

"General rule you'll learn about being a Paranorm, kid. Just because ancient art depicts your species as walking around nude, it doesn't mean that you should. Getting bird shit on your fur or even standing out in the rain is a pain in the ass."

Cayden finished the rest of his shake and then gave the table a little pat. "Come on. Day's not over. Time to head out shopping."

"Whoa hold on!" Matt exclaimed. The Satyr picked up the shake glasses. "We should wash these. I mean, if you leave protein out to dry like this it'll get all gross."

I guess he has a point...

"Give me a few minutes," Matt said. "It won't take long."

After a quick five minutes of ensure the shake glasses were nice and clean and drying at just the right angle, Cayden and Matt headed off out of the apartment. A quick drive a couple of blocks down and they went to the local shopping complex, particularly the eastern side where most the Paranorm items were sold. Werepeople, Orcs, the occasional naga and even a few humans milled about the area. It didn't matter what age they were. There was something for everyone in the Wakefield Mall.

He led Matt into an Abercrombie and Uradash outlet.

"Uh... Cayden, I don't think I belong in here," Matt murmured softly. "I mean, don't the A&U people just sell to a certain type of person?"

"Have you seen yourself lately?" Cayden replied.

Wait... Does that sound like I'm coming onto him? It sounds like it, doesn't it?

Thankfully, tall, ripped woman with green skin approached and let out a soft whistle at the sight of the two, hulking males.

"My, aren't you two fine specimen of men?" the dryad cooed. "What can I do to help you two?"

Cayden hiked a thumb at Matt. "He just found out his clothes don't fit him this morning. Tore right through his clothes. He's going to need a new wardrobe."

The dryad batted her eyes at Matt. "Oh you poor dear." She gently clasped Matt's meaty forearms and led him towards the rows upon rows of clothes. "Come with me. I've got something that'll look amazing on you. Our new winter collection is out, you know."

When isn't it winter in Wake Delta, Cayden thought sarcastically. Then again, I guess it isn't snowing so that's something.

He watched from a distance with mild amusement as the dryad shamelessly flirted with Matt, gripping whatever firm muscle she could to 'take some measurements'. Poor Matt was blushing again, his cheeks turning that rosy kind of colour that Cayden found rather adorable especially since he knew that Matt blushed all over. Matt gave him a sort of 'help me' look as the dryad began piling on some clothes into his arms.

"Don't worry, kid!" he shouted. "This is on me!"

"See," said the green-skinned woman, setting a pair of digitigrade jeans into his arms. "Your dad is paying for everything."

Wait... dad?

"Ouch. That must hurt."

He was surprised to find a human standing beside him. The guy had jet-black hair but with blonde streaks running from his temples. He was fairly athletic in build and wearing a white and gold ensemble; a white sleeveless shirt with golden trimmings and a pair of white pants with golden lines running down the flanks. Oddly enough, he was wearing a pair of silver-wraparound sunglasses despite being indoors. There were a pair of jeans draped over his arm.

"Though admittedly, calling someone 'kid' does heavily imply you're his stepfather or at the very least, uncle." The man shrugged. "Basically male authority figure trying to buy the love of someone younger than him or that he at least sees as his charge."

Cayden gave the guy a shake of his head. "I'm sorry. Who are you?"

"An avid reader, the occasional writer and someone that's about to be kicked out of this store for being human."

On cue, a burly Orc dressed in the A&U brand clothing came striding over. "Excuse me sir. But I think you'll find better products that suit your taste across the way at the _H&M_store."

"You mean the Human and Mammalian store?" said the white-clad stranger. "I suppose you're right." He lifted the pants and examined them. "Though I really like these pants."

The Orc tried to hide a frown behind his large, lower tusks. "Sir, those are digitigrade pants. They wouldn't fit you."

"Oh they're not for me. I've got a good friend of mine that'd just can't find good quality pants for those with a digitigrade stance. She goes around everywhere just wearing shorts or a skirt. She's a nightmare when it snows. Just will not shut up about how cold she is." He gestured at the pants. "Do you have these in a size 25?"

The Orc, having realised that this stranger was buying for a friend, suddenly brightened his mood. "Of course sir. Just in the back. One moment while I get it for you."

The man watched the guy go and then turned back to where Matt was just slipping into a change room. The dryad addressing the satyr couldn't help but give the guy a little smack on the rump, making Matt let out a cute little yelp.

"It's amazing, isn't it?" the strange said with a soft chuckle. "A hundred years ago, that would've been grounds for sexual harassment. But ever since Abercrombie moved towards a Paranorm-only business model and managed to win that civil suit about how hitting on hot Paranorms is a form of flattery and not harassment, this sort of treatment is pretty normal."

"You know about it and yet here you are, a human, in an _A&U_store," rumbled Cayden. "You're not one of those guys that wants to be a Paranorm, are you?"

"Oh I could be a Paranorm if I wanted to. Everyone can. It just so happens that it's my choice to take on this form. Just as it is your choice, I'm sure, to take on that form." The man nodded towards the stall that Matt had disappeared into. "And I'm sure it's his choice to stay like that."

Cayden laughed soft. "You're very wrong there. Matt didn't choose that form."

"So he didn't choose to stay a big, strong Satyr?"

The automatic 'yes' was halfway through Cayden's muzzle when he realised that was not true. "He didn't choose to be a Satyr..." he mumbled.

"But did he choose to stay as one?"

This guy... There's something about him...

"The power of choice is an extremely fickle thing," continued the mysterious stranger. "It has the power to cast certainty and doubt at the same time. The lives of many can be changed with a single choice. But the greatest power of choice is the fact that it can only be owned by the person making it." The man turned his eyes to Cayden and dipped his sunglasses down just slightly. He caught sight of a pair of sapphire-blue eyes with oddly shaped pupils; pupils shaped like eight-pointed stars. "The choice to go back to being a norm or a Paranorm rests solely with the person making it. That means the consequences of that choice, all the good and the bad, rests with them.

"Don't be the dad that tries to shield his son from the harshness of the world, Cayden. The sun will continue blazing no matter how badly you want to block him from its harsh rays. You'll get burned if you try." The stranger turned around and started heading for the exit. "Just let him get some sunshine every now and then. Who knows? He might even work on a tan."

"Who -?"

Then the orc salesman came back. "Huh? Where'd the guy go?"

The moment when Cayden glanced at the green-skinned muscle man was all it took for the mysterious stranger to disappear entirely from sight. The werewolf scratched the back of his ear in confusion. "I... uh... Not really sure, man. I've... got to go."

He approached the stall where Matt was changing and knocked on the wooden door. "Hey Matt, you okay in there?"

"Cayden?" came the muffled reply. "I need help!"

Please don't tell me you're stuck...

"Open the door. I'll come in."

There was a little click and Cayden pushed open the door. He had to bite his lower lip to stop himself from laughing.

Still unused to having a pair of horns, poor Matt had pulled the shirt over his head at the wrong angle. Now, the kid's horns had jutted through the slate grey shirt while his face was pressed up against the fabric. The dryad poked her head in and the look on her face was a mix of amusement and displeasure.

"Don't worry, I'll pay for it," Cayden snickered. "Just do me a favour." He handed her his phone and draped an arm around Matt's broad shoulders. "Take a picture, would you?"

"Cayden..." Matt groaned.

"Ssssh," he said, pressing a finger against where Cayden thought Matt's lips were. "Daddy's talking to the nice lady."

The dryad grinned, glad she wouldn't have a torn garment against her name, and gladly took the picture for them. Cayden then helped Matt pull the shirt off his horns and taught him the proper way to slip on a shirt for a horned Paranorm.

"Dragons, Minotaurs and other Paranorms with horns tend to try wearing button up shirts instead, you know," Cayden offered. "Horns just get in the way. It's even more fun with multi-headed Paranorms."

"I always wondered about that," Matt admitted, tugging at the new, red shirt he had gotten. It fit his form rather well and matched with his fur and hair colour. "I know this hydra in middle school once. They grow heads as they progressively get older. When he hit puberty, he grew a new head. Apparently finding clothes for them isn't that hard. Getting them on is the difficult part."

Matt tried to slip on a pair of jeans but crashed into the wall. Cayden sat him down on the offered chair and helped him slip on the garment. Those with digitigrade stances tended to get a little unbalanced on a single foot.

"Those with multiple heads tend to cooperate with one another eventually as they grow into maturity," provided the werewolf. "As you hit puberty, yeah, you're fighting for dominance and trying to assert yourself as the bigger man. But as you get older, you'll eventually learn to cooperate and become fully functional person. Don't believe those stereotypes where you can get a Hydra's heads to argue with themselves or a Chimera to start trying to kill one of its extra body parts."

"There is so much about being a Paranorm that I don't know about..." Matt laughed bitterly at himself as he wiggled his cloved hooves lightly. "It's like I'm stepping into another world..."

"It's the same world you've been living in." Cayden helped Matt to his feet. "It just so happens that you've never had to concern yourself with other shit because you were a different species."

"Step a mile in a man's shoes, huh?" Matt regarded his feet again. "Or lack thereof..."

"Pretty much." He gestured at the counter. "Come on. Let's go pay for this then grab a bite to eat. There's somewhere I want to take you before dinner."

The food court was unusually packed being midweek but it was just a little after noon so that was to be expected. The broad open food court area was situated beneath a glass dome. There was a central garden build around a fountain depicting humans and Paranorms pouring water out of jugs back to back. The garden was dominated by tropical plants, particularly four palm trees that rose up to nearly touch the dome. It was unusual to see such foliage so far up north but apparently there was some magic involved there. Something about the four trees being like stalwart guardians that kept the mall safe.

Cayden let Matt pick out some food first so he could save their seat. The Satyr returned about fifteen minutes later with some Asian-inspired clear-broth soup. When it was the werewolf's turn, he grabbed a burrito meal from a Mexican stall and sat down opposite to Matt.

"Do you cook?" mumbled Matt through a mouthful of noodles.

"Not really," answered Cayden with a shrug. "Mostly takeaway and when Katie comes over, she cooks for me. We sort of trade. One weekend I go over to her place to eat and the following weekend she comes over to mine. The third weekend we go out together to some place we both decide on and then it starts again. Rest of the week, generally some of those pre-packaged bodybuilder meals."

"I saw those." Matt grimaced at the memory. "They looked... disgusting. Was that really 'banana rice'?"

"For breakfast, yeah. Good carbs. Good vitamins in bananas. Just heat it up a little and you're good."

"You heat up the bananas? In rice? Doesn't that taste... weird?"

"The taste is fine. It's sweet rice. It's the texture that gets you. Kind of mushy. Sort of like baby food."

Matt grimaced and regarded his meal with disgust. "God... I'm so hungry but thinking about that stuff just makes my stomach turn."

Cayden shrugged. "It's like I said. You want to keep that body, you've got to build up to it." He chewed on his burrito thoughtfully. "You're lucky. You got your body in an instant with a wave of magic want and some potions. Me? I had to earn my body through hard work, sweat and a lot of ass kicking."

"Why?"

The question stunned him in its simplicity. "Huh?"

"Why did you have to be big and buff?" clarified Matt. "Why did you choose that path? Couldn't you have been lean and athletic? I know some werewolves who prefer that build. Says that it helps them keep their speed and agility."

Cayden thought back to the day he chose to really start working out. "I guess it comes from the fact that I was a skinny, clumsy runt of a werewolf, fresh out of high school, my girlfriend having dumped me because I didn't look nearly as good as a werewolf as she thought I would and going to the police academy seemed my best option. That and the fact that I didn't have a penny to my name, came all the way here from Brooklyn and -"

Matt held up his hand. "Wait, you're from New York?"

"Didn't mention that?" Cayden shrugged. "Yeah. Born and raised in New York. I moved out here to get away from the bullshit of the city. I went to the police academy here. It's a small town so they were really willing to accept anyone. Just as long as you have a clean record and don't have a problem with drugs, they don't care who signs up." He ran a paw through his hair. "But let me tell you, the academy here is brutal."

"I've always lived here," Matt admitted. "And I know how the police academy can be. You hear stories about it. Cops sometimes come to the schools to tell everyone their horror stories. Is it true they get you to do crazy obstacle courses in the middle of the night?"

"In the middle of the night and in three-foot deep snow," Cayden grunted. "They even threw us out into the freezing waters of the ocean to _swim back_in the middle of winter." He thumped his chest lightly. "But it hardened my resolve. Hardened my body, mind and spirit. I put so much effort into graduating and I'll be damned if I don't earn that badge."

"And you ended up getting kicked out anyway..."

He sighed softly and bit into his burrito if only to buy himself more time to formulate his next words. "Despite the hell Katie and I give Des, I really didn't get kicked out as such..." Catching Matt's curious gaze, he said, "Yeah, the police force is predominantly weredogs. All field cops are weredogs. But there are cops that aren't weredogs that work there too. Desk jobs. Forensics. That sort of thing. Des kept pushing me to one of those jobs instead of doing what I liked doing. He wasn't so much as kicking me out as... putting a leash on me and telling me to stay away from all the action. We nearly tore each other apart when I confronted him about it and that's when he fired me."

"Still... doing all that just because you're a werewolf? Seems pretty low."

"Being a werewolf is just the stereotype that I have to deal with, kid." He nodded towards his young charge. "Just like you'll always have to deal the stereotype that you're an overbearing, drunken frat boy who just likes to party and has a pea-sized brain that's only capable of taking down the number of times he's fucked someone and been fucked."

"Hey!"

"That's the stereotype," said Cayden with a shrug. "Especially with your body now." He jammed a finger into the table. "But we can't let those stereotypes define us. I'm more than just a werewolf. You're more than just a Satyr."

And you've got to know that before you decide to stay a Satyr...

That mysterious stranger's words invaded his thoughts and he wondered if he was doing the right thing...

I'm just telling Matt all his options. He knows what it's like to be a human. Now he has to get used to the idea of being a Satyr.

"Come on." He finished the last of his burrito and got up. "Day isn't over. Let's get you some more clothes, some horn and hoof polish and your vaccinations."

Matt straightened in his seat. "Vaccinations? What?"

He gave Matt a devilish grin. "Every Paranorm has their own kind of diseases to worry about, kid. Now that you're a Satyr, you're going to have to get vaccinated against a whole tonne of shit. One of them is Satyr Syphilis."

"W -W - What!?"

******

Jamison Memorial Hospital was erected on the site that Doctor Methuselah Jamison erected the first ever clinic in all of Wake Delta when it began about three hundred years ago as a small fishing village. That clinic eventually evolved into the big, broad hospital that it was now. Though it only had two storeys, it was wide enough to see to the treatment of thousands of patients each year. Its broad, sky blue walls was always a welcome sight and often a visage of safety and comfort to those approaching it.

As a No One, Katie could sense the countless lives that began or ended within the hospital's calming, blue walls. Souls new and old were dispersed into the Shimmering Ether, the plane in this Post-Convergence world where the souls of the dead wandered until they either bumped into some planar realm of a deity or were called to one such plane. Sometimes gods would contest over a particular soul for whatever reason. Gods drew from the faith and belief of their followers, after all. Just like how artefacts were forged from the legends and superstitions of people, so too were deities empowered. The more souls a deity had believing in them, the more powerful they were.

Katie often considered them to be_really big_ emotional vampires and was rather vocal about it. Probably another reason why R3 sent her to serve some time within this realm. It was her calling the deities soul-sucking, egotistical sociopaths that made them mad. Their fury brought the attention of the Creator whom she again mouthed off to and convinced that these gods were spoiling his creation.

Thus... the Convergence.

It made her sick how the gods basically treated the people of the material realm like crop to be harvested. Religion was their fertilizer. Each soul a seed. Natural disasters, wars and plight were like harvests to feed their insatiable hunger and to fuel their own machinations. But as she passed a young couple being wheeled out on a wheelchair, the mother clutching her lovely twins in her arms and the father beaming brightly while praising one deity or another, she had to begrudgingly admit that there was one thing this world had in leaps and bounds; hope.

No matter how bad things got, no matter how many people died, the people of this world, norm or Paranorm, clung doggedly to life and maintained hope for a better future. Even if the gods came down and started Armageddon, she was fairly sure there would be a large number of people that just would not leave.

She chuckled softly to herself as she approached the front desk.

"Hi there," she said, greeting the nurse behind the desk. "I'm here to see Vance Yang."

The woman, judging from her red skin and fiery red hair with a light glow to it, was an Efreet. "Are you a family member or friend?"

"Family lawyer, actually," she lied. "I heard none other than the Chief of Police had come here trying to pin my client with the horrific illegal Parafication that occurred down town. Something about him attending the same bachelor party but because he's the only one left human, he must be the culprit."

Her ploy worked and the nurse's lips twisted into a scowl. "Honestly, the poor boy has gone through enough. The nerve of that Chief Gordon. Just because he has a shiny badge doesn't give him the right to go accusing anyone of a crime that he just can't solve. Doesn't he have detectives? Why can't find the _real_culprit?"

She laughed softly. "Sometimes I wonder the same thing. So may I speak to my client? I've been the family lawyer for years and I've helped the family with the legal debate or two. Van calls me 'Auntie Katie' when he doesn't think I'm listening. I told him to stop because it makes me feel old."

The Efreet laughed and swatted a hand in her direction. "Oh you look fine, dear." She gestured towards the right. "East wing. Second floor. Ward M14."

M14.

The 'M' stood for 'Magical'. Hospitals had a sort of coding system when it came to their patients. The hospitals had codes depending on what treatment their patients required. S for surgery, P for psychological, D for diagnosis, O for observation and M for magical. That Vance had already been moved to the M ward indicated that he had passed the diagnosis phase and was now being treated.

And that was bad.

If anyone started messing with the equilibrium of the spell put on the soon-to-be-satyr...

"Thanks for the help," Katie said, attempting to remain cool. She headed away from the counter and the moment she was out of earshot range of the nurse, she immediately pulled out her phone and called Des. "Please tell me you're in position."

"I am," growled the Old Bull. "But I don't see why I couldn't just have gotten a ladder..."

"Because that'd be very obvious," she answered sharply. She hurried up the stairs, mentally cursing her heels. "Listen, they've put Vance in the M Wards."

"That means they could've begun magical treatment!"

"I know. I'm heading up there now. M14. Pray to your gods that the doctors haven't decided to wave their hands or shake their wants at him yet."

"Hurry."

Katie tucked her phone away and sprinted down the hallway. Doors whizzed by her and her eyes scanned each little plate above the doors, looking for M14. When she found it, her heart sank. The air felt like it was filled with thousands of tiny, ethereal hands all wiggling through the air, fingers worming over each other and drawing across her skin with the lightest of touches. It was the tell-tale touch of magic.

"No..." she whispered and immediately barged through the door.

There was a circle of doctors dressed in their long, flowing white robes marked with runes surrounding a single young man, still human. Each of them were wearing face masks and hairnets. Some had stethoscopes around their necks but all wore gloves. They were all chanting softly while the young man lying on the bed started at Katie's sudden appearance.

"Stop!" she cried, waving her hands wildly. "You don't know what you're doing!?"

One of the doctors turned to her. "Who the hell are you?"

"Someone who knows a lot more about what's going on than you do," she snapped. "Stop casting whatever spell you're casting! You'll only make it worse!"

The patient, no doubt Vance, propped himself up slightly. "Worse? What do you mean?" The fellow was a little pudgy and possessed Asian features, his skin a soft brown with a golden tinge to it. His eyes were a deep black and his hair was roughly cut to look uneven but still stylish. Through the white robes he wore, Katie could make out the saggy man-breasts that he possessed and the rounded belly. Judging by the light stubble around his cheeks, he hadn't slept very well the past few days.

Katie stepped forward but two of the doctors blocker her. She tried to push them away but they tried to press her back. "There's been a spell cast on you, Vance! I know you've seen its effects on Ronald! If you try to break the spell, you'll turn into A Satyr or worse!"

Vance's eyes widened. "But... these doctors will cure me. They already know there's been a spell and they're going to break it."

"No!"

The doctors tried to shove her out of the room. "Listen here, little lady," grunted one of them. "We're professionals here. We know what we're doing."

"No you don't!" Katie cried.

The remaining doctors began chanting once more and that sensation of magic crawling through the air began once more. Katie was shoved right out of the ward and the door locked behind her. She cursed and banged on the door. Through the window, she could see the magical physicians were already channelling all their power to the leading medic who was waving his hands through the air in intricate patterns.

She thought fast.

Turning to the right, she barged right through ward M13.

A family carrying Mylar balloons and flowers jumped back in surprise. She barged past them, apologising profusely as she made her way to the window and yanked it open.

Two storeys down, Des was standing in the gardens just beside the hospital.

"Des!" she cried.

The Bulldog jerked in her direction and then back to the window which he was sure was M14. "What are you doing in there? The blueprints said -"

"I know what the blueprints said!" she snapped. "I need you up here now. They've begun some sort of ritual! They're going to turn Vance into a Satyr!"

Des' eyes widened and he took a few steps back. "Alright. I'm on my way up!"

CRASH!

Katie jerked her head to the left. The noise could be heard even through the normally sound-proof walls between the wards. The family and their ailing child stared at the shaking wall and then to Katie.

"Get out of here!" she exclaimed. "Go!"

They rapidly grabbed the sickly boy and hurried out into the hallway. Already, the rest of the hospital was starting to react. By the time the second _crash_hit, people were screaming. Des took a running jump and with a cry, uttered a few magical words. His leap was empowered by the spell and he slipped right through the open window and landed beside Katie.

BOOM!

"Oh that doesn't sound good..." grunted the weredog. "Call Mama Cherry Blossom. We need her here right now. If she can concoct a potion to turn Vance back -"

BOOM!

Suddenly, a big horned head crashed right through the wall, smashing through concrete. The goat's head let loose a terrifying roar and belched fire from its muzzle. Katie could see the doctors from the ward desperately scrambling away, screaming in terror. She immediately leapt to her feet and seized one of the vases sitting nearby. As the mutated Vance roared and flailed, she leapt up towards him and brought the vase crashing down.

SMASH!

The mutated demon-goat shook his head for a moment as if shaking off the disbelief that he had just been hit on the head with an actual vase. He gave Katie a ferocious stare, flames shooting out of his nostrils.

A bellowing roar came from Des. The Chief of Police came charging forward, shoulder down and arms clasped together. He ploughed his shoulder against the goat's head, sending him crashing back into ward M14 with a crushing shoulder check. Des gasped as his shoulder collided with the concrete wall. Katie immediately went to his side but he waved her away.

"I'll be fine!" Des barked. "Don't let him get away!"

Katie nodded and charged into ward M14. In the span of less than a minute, the clean, sanitised ward had become a warzone. There were scorch marks everywhere and the bed had been ripped to shreds and overturned. Thankfully, the mutated Vance hadn't torn any of his attending doctors to shreds with his enormous claws. They had fled before he could do any personal harm.

That didn't mean the towering behemoth was any less intimidating however.

Like Matt had been, Vance had transformed from the adorable, slightly babyish young man of Asian descent into a hulking goat-demon. The beast stood at a towering ten feet tall, hunched over in the confines of the hospital ward with his massive, webbed wings bent at an odd angle. His long, black horns scraped against the ceiling. Dense, black fur covered his entire body. Dagger-like claws tipped each of his fingers and his enormous cloven feet were big enough to crush a man's head in a single, diamond-hard stomp. Unlike Matt, however, Vance carried over his belly though his pectorals had evolved from man-boobs to thick, square frames of muscle. Just like Matt, he had an enormous throbbing member that was basically a third arm.

The demon snorted at her, flames pouring out of his muzzle in a wild rage.

"Vance..." she warned, holding up her hands. "I don't want to hurt you. So please. Stay calm. Don't do anything rash. I'm here to help."

The former-human roared and thrust his head forward. A torrent of flames launched from his muzzle straight at Katie. She ducked the torrent and dove behind the overturned bed. Without missing a beat, she threw her entire weight against the bed and used it as a battering ram. Metal screeched against the tiled floor. Vance caught the charging furniture in his massive claws, snorting derisively. Katie immediately scrambled over the mattress, leaping into the air towards the surprised goat. Her heeled shoes crashed right into the goat's forehead, digging deep into flesh and bone in three bone-crunching kicks.

Vance staggered back, clutching his forehead in agony and letting out a bellowing roar. Momentarily blinded by his own blood and pain, Katie scrambled up the demon's large muscular stature and swept up behind him. Using her powerful legs, she caught Vance's neck in a crushing scissor hold. With the beast's arms so long and so thick with muscle, he couldn't reach up behind himself to claw at her. He could only flail as he ran out of air and fell to his knees.

Within moments, Vance Yang collapsed to the ground, unconscious.

Katie sighed. Des staggered in to the room, his arm hanging limply by his side. The doctors were poking their heads in from the hallway alongside other curious staff and patients.

She got do her feet, dusted herself off theatrically and flicked her hair back.

"And that's why you listen to the crazy lady with silver hair!"

******

Matt's laughter, despite his significant increase in size and weight, was like a bright, cheerful ray of sunshine on a gloomy day. It was light, youthful and really, really drunk. Cayden, slightly tipsy himself, was rather amused at how his young charge had gotten wasted on two beers at the bar. Another two later, and Matt was absolutely sloshed.

"You know," slurred the Satyr as he stumbled into Cayden's apartment. "I would kill to be able to work and live in the same place."

"Oh really?" Cayden asked, following him inside and locking the door. "Where do you work, exactly?"

"Farm about a hour or so from where I live." Matt took his hulking frame towards the lounge, bumping into a couple of walls as he did so. He crashed into the sofa face down, giggling into the pillows. Cayden had to physically go up to him and roll him over. "Just get paid to basically do farm stuff. It's what I'm going to grow up being, anyway. A farmer."

Cayden tilted his head slightly to the side. "A farmer? I thought you lived in the suburbs."

Matt gave him an absent wave. "Yeah but look at me. I'm not cut out to be anything else. I go to freakin' Summerdew, man."

He hardly saw the correlation. "So? Going to Summerdew doesn't mean you'll be forced to be a farmer. You could be a mechanic or an engineer. Hell, I didn't go to college and look at me now."

The very drunk, burly Satyr suddenly sat up. "You're right! I should quit college!"

"Whoa, whoa," Cayden exclaimed, waving his paws through the air. "I did_not_ say that. College is important. If you have the chance to go, you should go."

Matt frowned at him. "Are you kidding me? You're the one that said they were just an 'expensive way for people to charge you for teaching stuff you probably won't even use'. I should quit right now before my mom pays too much and I end up disappointing her."

I'm surprise you can remember all that while still drunk.

He swatted Matt's shoulder, beckoning him to scoot aside so he could take a seat on the couch. It actually felt rather strange sitting down soft, leather cushions. Most of the time, he just used it pile on dirty clothes that he couldn't be bothered washing yet. To actually sit down on it... well, it was almost a new experience.

He instinctively draped an arm over Matt's shoulder. "Look kid, you shouldn't give up on the path you're on just because some other one looks better. My life isn't all that glamorous, you know."

"Are you kidding me?" Matt laughed, absently kicking his legs around. "You get to go around town, acting all badass and even sticking it to the Chief of Police. You're investigating shit like me turning into a Satyr. That makes local news, man! National news, even! On top of that, you like, workout all the time. You get to drink all night and that club was fucking awesome!"

Cayden suddenly regretted taking Matt to his favourite bar. "That wasn't a club. It was a bar."

"But people were dancing."

"You were dancing, kid. Just you."

Matt snarled at him and shrugged off his shoulder. "Quit calling me kid. I'm not that much younger than you."

"I'm calling you 'kid' because you're acting like one," Cayden said firmly. "You see something shiny and dive right in to grab it without thinking about the consequences. Have you even given thought to what will happen once this is over? You can't stay a Satyr, Matt. Not without a hell of a lot of procedure."

The Satyr crossed his arms and huffed at him. "Then I'll get through those goddamn procedures. I'll sign the papers, get my official species changed, whatever. I like being a Satyr and I'm going to stay as one."

"You're being immature. It's the Honeymoon Phase."

Matt gave him a fierce stare. "You think that I'm just deluding myself with what it means to be a Satyr, right? Well I'm not." He leaned forward, almost nose to nose with Cayden. "I know what you've been trying to do all day, Cayden. You've bene trying to dissuade me from staying a Satyr this whole day!"

"Uh... yeah. That was the whole plan, remember?" Cayden replied. "We made a deal. I'd try to show you what it means to be a Satyr and if you're still convinced you want to stay one by the end of the day, I'd stop?"

"No." Matt frowned at him and poked his chest. "You said you were going to push me to be the best Satyr I could be not try to convince me _not_to be a Satyr." He turned away, arms crossed. "Nice try asshole. Well it turns out, I know a lot more about being a Satyr than you think."

That was slightly insulting... and accurate. Cayden was hoping Matt would be drunk enough to let him slide on that last part but apparently not. "Oh really? And what insight could you possibly have over me on being a Satyr? Apart from the obvious last few days of actually physically being one?"

Matt's eyes became distant and his features softened. The tightness in his arms faded and he let out a soft, regretful sigh. "The eight of us... seven guys partying with Archie for Archie's bachelor party. We weren't always so close. I'm Archie's friends and I know Ted through him. But I don't actually know many of the others on a personal level. I chat with them every now and again and we talk whenever we meet up with Archie around but I've never actually been alone with any of them.

"Thing is, my only friend was a... a Satyr."

Cayden was suddenly very aware. He wished he could grab his notepad and pen but he didn't want to miss a second.

"My best friend's name... well, former best friend's name was Trevor. Trevor Stalks. We went to middle school together. Everyone thought as a Satyr he was this horny, slutty, drunken idiot even back then. But he was a really nice guy. He took up football to prove to everyone that even Satyrs could be star athletes. He made the team, he worked out and he became big and strong."

"Kind of like how you look now?" Cayden prompted.

Matt began wringing his hands again, a nervous habit. "Yeah... All through high school, he was this star athlete. Everyone forgot about his species and just saw him as Trevor or 'Stalker' as they liked to call him. But then... we went to college."

"And...?"

The red-headed Satyr sighed and shook his head, averting his gaze away from Cayden. "College is meant to be this open-minded place where you get a chance to experiment and find your place in life. But the moment Trevor came in... it was like middle school all over again. Everyone pigeonholed him into that partying Satyr guy. I guess access to alcohol actually helped that stereotype."

"Everyone... including you," Cayden realised.

Matt shut his eyes. "Yeah. Archie is the guy that's hard to say 'no' to. We met in English and we just became fast friend from there. But Archie has this whole niche around him. Ted, Ron, Vance and the others? They're all his friends. And so was I. I had fun being around them. But Trevor wasn't Archie's friend. They all saw Trevor as just another Satyr frat boy who belongs to PUK even though he never once set foot in that fraternity."

Ron said he always wanted to be a Satyr. Did he hide it from everyone else too?

It sounds like Archie was the heart and soul of the group and their leader. His ideals were sacred.

"I guess I sort of cut off contact with Trevor over the years," Matt concluded. He pressed a hand against his chest. "But he was still my friend and I still remember all those years I spent standing beside him, encouraging him to fight against the stereotypes and being who he was not what he is."

The mood in the room was extremely heavy and Cayden couldn't help but place a paw on Matt's shoulder, squeezing lightly. "Sounds like that's advice you need to take in for yourself."

Matt sighed heavily. "Yeah... Maybe." He lifted his gaze and fixed Cayden with a warm stare. "Thanks Cayden. I appreciate it." The young Satyr looked at his hands, turning them over. "I guess I got a little caught up in what I am now." He closed his fist tightly. "I don't think I'm ready to make a life-changing decision on whether or not I want to be a Satyr. Not tonight at least." Matt laughed bitterly and slouched forward. "I mean, there are a lot of bad decisions a guy can make while drunk."

"You sound pretty sober to me," Cayden said, slapping the young man's back. "But hey... tell me something. When was the last time you saw Trevor?"

"Trevor?" Matt frowned and scratched his chin absently. "Honestly? I can't remember. I mean, I see him from time to time on campus. He's on the team there. But I haven't seen him lately." He locked gazes with Cayden. "And he wasn't at the bachelor party. I'd remember."

He gave the young Satyr a pointed look. "Are you sure? You were _really_drunk."

There, Matt winced. "Yeah, okay. Maybe I would've remembered if I wasn't so drunk. Maybe some of the others saw him. I can't be sure."

The others were also pretty drunk. But Ron mentioned that the mystery Satyr was someone everyone else knew... Archie and Vance included.

"How well did Archie and Vance know Trevor?"

Matt shrugged absently. "Well enough, I suppose. Archie constantly joked about Trevor being a Satyr even to his face. Vance sort of just chuckled alongside him and chimed in every now and then. After a while, I guess Trevor just got tired of it and found his own clique."

Hmmm... Would Trevor be vindictive enough to crash the bachelor party and do all this?

Was it some sort of poetic justice? Make everyone into Satyrs in an attempt to show them what they put him through?

It's a thin lead... but a possible motive at the very least.

Matt grunted and leaned back into the sofa. "Okay. My head is starting to spin. I think I'm going to call it a night." He gave Cayden a lopsided smile. "You don't mind if I stay on your couch, do you?"

It was already fairly late in the night and Cayden had no intention of driving Matt an hour or so home. Not to mention Matt's mother had yet to realise that her son had hulked out and was seriously considering remaining a Satyr. Who know how she would react and what she would say to Matt?

"Bullshit." Cayden rose from the couch and gestured towards his bedroom. "You cleaned up the place. You deserve the bed. I'll sleep on the couch."

"You sure? It's your place."

Memories of sleeping in bus stops, under trees, in dank alleyways with nothing but the clothes on his back filled his mind. There were other memories too. Flashes of things he had to do just to survive. The kind soul that saved him.

He shrugged, both at Matt's statement and his miserable recollection of that horrible year. "I've slept in worse. Go ahead and take the bed. I'm going to sit here and see if Des blabbed the case more."

Matt thanked him and headed towards the bedroom. "Thanks Cayden. G'night."

"Night kid."

Cayden watched Matt slip into the bedroom, eyes focused on that cute bubble butt with the adorable tail just poking out of those skimpy shorts. He laughed quietly at himself and masked it by switching on the TV.

"Down boy," he told himself.

National news had nothing on some illegal Parafication case somewhere in the northwest so that was good. The MIB had yet to get involved though somehow he seriously doubted that they really would step in given how small Wake Delta was. Local news, however, was exploding about some Paranorm that went wild at the Jamison Memorial Hospital.

Huh... I wonder if that's somehow related to Vance...

He shook his head free of the thought. "Nah. It's just a coincidence."

After a bit of surfing through the channels, Cayden positioned himself a little more comfortably on the couch. One leg was draped across the entirety of the couch and an arm was perched over the backrest. Given that Matt was already sound asleep, he stripped off his shirt and pants, leaving him only in his blue underwear. His mind kept drifting over to Matt and the poor guy's situation. Then he thought back to that mysterious man that had met him at the mall.

"It was you, wasn't it?" he whispered softly, a gentle smile on his face. "Still watching after me after all these years."

He leaned his head back, ignoring the television entirely. Looking up at the ceiling, he imagined what his guardian angel would say in this situation right now. Those three months he had spent travelling across the entirety of the states from New York City all the way to Wake Delta had been the best of his life. Even if the month before that had begun with him getting kicked out of house and home for letting himself get lured in by a 'filthy howler' and bitten to become a werewolf. Compounded with the fact that he flunked his SATs, couldn't get into college and the girl dumped him, Cayden had been in a bad place.

He remembered finding a way to the edge of the Hudson and looking at the murky waters, seeing how welcoming they were.

Then... there was just this guy.

"I'm going on a trip across the country. Want to come with me?"

Those were his first words to him. Cayden wasn't sure why but the sheer boldness of the statement, the gentle smile on his face and indeed the calmness by which he made the offer just drew him in. And suddenly, they were travelling across the country. In some way, that encounter reminded him of when Katie had appeared in his life.

There was movement from the corner of his eye. Matt was standing in the bedroom doorway, completely naked and with a blanket draped over his shoulder.

"I thought you'd gone to bed."

"I remember you didn't have a blanket," answered the Satyr. "I thought I'd bring you one. But then..."

Cayden lifted an eyebrow and noticed the stirring in Matt's fuzzy sheath. "You okay there, kid?"

Matt's lips twisted slightly. "I could be better, daddy."

Despite just being six years Matt's senior, that one word stirred something primal in the werewolf's body, particularly his groin. His cock twitched and Matt must've sensed it because the Satyr strode over, more confident than he had ever been and knelt in front of Cayden. The red and grey werewolf watched quietly as Matt leaned down towards his crotch, pressing his face against the fabric. His warm nose pushing up against his sheath stirred the beast inside Cayden and he let out a soft moan. Matt's smooth hands glided up and down his legs, the warm touch filling him with heat and encouraging blood flow towards his groin.

Cayden had a yearning to have every inch of his body touching some part of Matt's taut, muscular form. He was barely controlling himself as it stood. The sexual need that had bubbled up from the entire day came rushing to the surface. His right foot tiptoed up Matt's leg, navigating the hills and mounds of the Satyr's furry leg before settling over Matt's crotch. His big toe curled around Matt's sheath. Droplets of precum came pouring out of the rising member, lubricating Cayden's toes as they glided up and down the emerging length.

Matt let out a hungry moan and hooked his fingers around the edge of Cayden's underwear. He grabbed the rest with his teeth and savagely tore the cloth away. His eyes hungrily worshiped the werewolf's rising cock. He lapped at the base of Cayden's dick, coaxing inch after inch to emerge from the werewolf's, grey sheath. At the same time, his own dick was stimulated as Cayden pushed the foot against the thick, pulsating meat, pressing it against Matt's solid, hairy abdominals.

The Satyr shuffled forward, his hot breath wafting over the red, hot meat in front of him. He was salivating like a hungry puppy. His lips closed in around Cayden's dick, causing the werewolf's toes to curl in ecstasy. Suddenly, all Cayden could hear was his own rushing heartbeat pounding in his ears. Bolts of pleasure were shooting through his entire body, originating from the lightning rod that was his dick. Matt couldn't take every inch of him but the Satyr gripped the still rising member in his hands, pulling and tugging, stimulating Cayden's balls to pump more precum into the Satyr's mouth.

But Cayden still had the desire to feel Satyr's body pressed against his own.

He growled, catching Matt's attention. Kicking off the rest of his underwear, Cayden lurched forward and gripped Matt's hips. There was a look of shock on Matt's face as the werewolf suddenly stood up and pulled him right off the ground. Matt let out a surprised cry as he hung upside down, his face pressed right up against Cayden's cock. Spreading his legs slightly, Cayden found a solid position to support both himself and Matt's weight. He pulled the Satyr's dick towards himself, crossing his arms against the small of Matt's strong back to keep them stable. His tongue lapped out, guiding the throbbing member towards his waiting muzzle.

Matt moaned and gripped Cayden's head with his strong legs. As the werewolf engulfed his dick, so too was he compelled to wrap his own lips around Cayden's member. Both men moaned in ecstasy as both gravity and their combined lust placed them in an inescapable standing sixty-nine. Cayden's eyelids fluttered at the sensation of Matt's rock hard abdominals brushing up and down his chest. The strong scent of Satyr musk filled his nostrils while precum dripped out from the corner of his lips. Matt squeezed his ass in delight and his tail wagged happily.

Cayden wanted more and more of Matt's hot cock inside of him and he eagerly let the throbbing member slide down the back of his throat. Supressing his gag reflex, he hungrily drunk the salty precum the Satyr fed him. His own member was partially down Matt's throat, the poor Satyr's cheeks bloated with precum and the sheer girth of the werewolf's dick. Both men thrust their hips, moaning as both their lust and muscles were put to the test.

Blood was rushing into Matt's head and the poor Satyr had to pull away and beg for a break. Cayden gently rested the Satyr back on the couch but remained on top of him. He rubbed his cheeks against Matt's strong, muscular legs, amazed at the sheer power in them.

"Let's take this to the bedroom," Matt mumbled.

Cayden was not going to complain. He leapt off the couch and scooped up Matt in his arms. Despite almost being as big as he was size-wise, Cayden was fully capable of carrying the Satyr all the way into the bedroom. Matt drew closer and closer with each step and just as they reached the foot of the bed, Matt's lips found Cayden's. Their tongues danced affectionately and Cayden set his partner down onto the bed gently, delicately.

As their lips parted, Cayden pulled his tongue down to Matt's neck. Goosebumps rose across the Satyr's supple flesh as he traced the cords and veins from Matt's strong jawline, across his shoulders and down the sloping 'V' of his chest. The light dusting of hair across the Satyr's chest carried his scent magnificently on the thick plateaus of his chest. It was a scent that Cayden would never forget for the rest of his life.

His lips gently closed around Matt's nipple. The Satyr sucked in a breath through clenched teeth, his back arching in delight. Taking that as a positive, Cayden bit down lightly on the fleshy nub. Matt's lips parted in a silent gasp, his fingers digging into the sheets. The Satyr's breathing grew rapid as Cayden drew laps with his tongue around the sensitive flesh. He could feel Matt's needy dick pressing up against his pectorals and he allowed the throbbing meat to slip between the valley of his chest, clenching the muscles there to squeeze more precum out of it. He gripped down on Matt's leg in the process, thrusting against the Satyr's thighs like a wild dog in heat.

His tongue drew him towards Matt's abdominals, his paws gliding down the Satyr's wide traps. Cayden nuzzled the healthy fuzz there, adoring the feeling of such muscle filled with life rising and falling. It was like feeling an entire hilly paddock completely with thick, reddish-brown grass moving and breathing beneath him. He followed the contours of Matt's abs, swirling his tongue around Matt's belly button.

He purposefully avoided the Satyr's dick, causing a whine from his charge. Instead, with a devious smile, he lifted Matt's legs up, hoisting the thick, muscular appendages onto his broad shoulders and exposing the kid's ass to him. He pressed his nose against the crack, taking in Matt's unfiltered scent. His wet nose bounced against the base of Matt's balls and the Satyr gasped. Cayden lapped at the hairy nut sacks, causing Matt to moan louder and louder. He could actually feel the Satyr's balls gurgling and hurrying to produce more and more precum. There was a steady stream of the stuff pouring out of Matt's dick, cascading down the crevasses of his abs.

Sufficiently stimulated, Cayden knew it was time to prime the boy for the main event. He bent lower and brushed his tongue against Matt's hole. The Satyr immediately flinched and clenched his ass. Their first time together had been... educational. Matt was much smaller then. There was no way he could've taken all of Cayden's meat but now... well, even Matt knew that he could take more. Still, Cayden went slowly and continued to gently lap at Matt's hole, loosening the muscles there until Matt was nice and relaxed. He gently pushed his strong, thick tongue into the offered opening. Matt moaned loudly, his back arching. Through the connection, he could feel the Satyr shaking with delight, eager for more. He pushed more of his tongue inside. All the strength left Matt's legs and the horny young Satyr was shaking violently like an earthquake had struck him.

Now he was ready.

Cayden gave Matt's ass one last flick of his tongue before pulling away and straightening up. Without even saying a word, the other male knew exactly what to do. Matt rolled onto his stomach and propped himself up on his hands and knees. Cayden cupped a paw beneath the Satyr's leaking member, collecting some of the precum there before rubbing it all up his length. Panting with need, Cayden guided his dick into the offered hole, the tip pushing into the young man.

Matt let out a loud cry of ecstasy.

"More!" he cried.

Cayden was all too happy to oblige. He pushed himself deeper and deeper into the horny, young Satyr, relishing the connection between them and the warmth of their bodies so close to one another. His own moan rose from his throat. Gripping Matt's waist, he thrust into the Satyr, pounding his cock deeper and deeper with increasing strength and ferocity. The bed shook with the increasing need from both men, the springs groaning and squeaking in harmony with their cries.

"More!" Matt pleaded. "Give me more, daddy!"

That primal beast with Cayden rose to the surface and with a ferocious snarl, the werewolf lunged forward and pushed his dick, knot and all, deep into the Satyr. Matt gave a cry of pure ecstasy. Cayden's strong, muscular arms wrapped around Matt's chest, pinning them together as the werewolf fiercely pounded the Satyr's furry ass with all his might. Matt's eyes rolled into the back of his head and he became blind to the world; all that he could feel was the immeasurable pleasure of being fucked by such a strong, virile male. It took all Matt's strength to keep them both upright. Every thrust from Cayden was like a meteorite striking him down. Precum was pouring out of the werewolf, filling up the Satyr.

Matt just could not hold on the mounting pleasure any longer. With an ear-splitting cry, his cock erupted like a volcano. Stream of Satyr spunk came shooting out of his dick hard and fast. It struck the base of his chin and painted the headboard white. Cayden's animal instincts took over and he bit down Matt's shoulder. The mix of pleasure and pain was too much for the young Satyr and his dick blasted out another torrent of seed that send shockwaves throughout his entire body. His arms collapsed from underneath him but his rump remained firmly in the air for Cayden to continue fucking wildly. His dick, now pointed down, pumped his cum over and over again into the sheets until his balls were completely dry. Even then, wave after wave of orgasm hit him as Cayden ploughed into him seemingly possessing endless stamina.

Cayden pulled away from Matt's shoulders, panting madly and with his drool running from his lips and tongue. Blind with pleasure, the werewolf gripped, Matt's furry hide with his claws, desperate to keep that firm, bubble butt still as his need mounted and mounted. Sweat rolled off his body, clinging to his fur and mingling with the scents in the air. The scents of need and lust drove the animal in him to one objection: to cum.

The werewolf tilted his head back, the moans rising from his throat evolving into a long, lusty tone. That tone grew and grew, louder and louder as he approached climax. Cayden shook his head from side to side and bent down, chin pressing against his huffing, puffing chest, fangs bared as a howl build deep within his lungs. He could feel the cum bubbling up from his balls, rushing up inch after inch of his dick. He could feel it just at the tip, just _teetering_on the end of orgasm.

"Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!" he cried.

Then he threw his head back, unleashing an ear splitting howl that shook the windows and very walls. His hot seed blasted into Matt's ass with the ferocity of a firehose. The Satyr rocked violently as wave after wave of cum flooded him like the ocean during a storm. The shocks were so powerful that he actually came a second time in the span of a few minutes. Cayden's duck pumped more and more cum into him, almost like the werewolf was feeding him seed that he, in turn, would pump out of his own member.

Cayden's body shuddered and all the muscles loosened all at once. The huffing, puffing werewolf collapsed onto Matt. The protective part of him easily avoided crushing the Satyr and curled his arms and legs around his partner. They lay in the classic spooning position, Cayden immediately drifting into loud snores. Matt leaned into Cayden's form, smiling softly and contently.

******

"Well this was a fucking waste of time."

Vance was being interviewed by more police at the station. Now a full blown Satyr, Vance could barely remember what happened in the past few hours let alone what happened a few nights ago at the bachelor party. All chances of possibly identifying the culprit were down the drain. The poor guy was stuck in his hospital bed while big, burly weredogs in blue uniforms interviewed him and doctors pored over him.

News was going to get out. Very quickly. The social media feeds were already barking about the demon attack at Jamison Memorial Hospital. A few conspiracy nuts were already tying the illegal Parafication of a human into a Satyr into this event. Someone noticed that Vance had become a Satyr and sent that news into the internet.

The reports were outside the hospital, cameras flashing and begging from a statement from the Chief of Police. Des remained quiet as he hovered outside of Vance's new ward, Katie by his side.

"At least Mama Cherry Blossom got to the hospital in time before he woke up and went rampaging again," offered Katie. "But now we're stuck again. We're no closer to figuring out who perpetrated this crime or why."

Des ran a paw down his face. "We can't find the person. So the only thing we can do is find the item. Or at least learn more about it."

"Good luck with that." Katie crossed her arms miserably. "From what I can gather, these transformations also come with some sort of short term memory loss or mental manipulation. Vance barely remembers anything and none of the other victims do either."

"I'm not talking about them." Des locked gazes with Katie. "I'm talking about the Artefact Vault."

The No One lifted her eyebrows. "Really? You want to go there?"

"It's our only shot. Maybe the Keeper knows something about the artefact that's causing all this."

She lifted a finger, wagged it a couple of times and then poked Des' nose with it. "Only one problem, chief. No one is allowed in the Artefact Vault save for a few. Even the mayor needs permission from the Keeper. If you want to get in there, you need to talk to the mayor and the paper work for that will take ages."

"I know." Des' face scrunched up in disgust. "And the media has people permanently stalking the Vault looking for anyone that goes in or out. If they see me going in..." He sighed and let out a soft grumble. "That's why we need Cayden to go in. He's the only one that we know that can come and go into the Vault without explicit permission from the mayor or anyone else."

Katie tapped her chin thoughtfully. "That's true. But even then, we've still got a pretty slim lead. All we know is that it's a cup and it turns people into Satyrs."

"It's more than that." The burly bulldog glance at Vance who was growing frustrated with the circular line of questioning. "All the guys that we met can't seem to remember this Satyr. Vance was supposed to be sober through it all and yet he transformed as well. Matthew was so drunk he was accosting people on the streets. Archie was found passed out at the Sleeping Beauty. Ronald was similarly inebriated and Vance took him to PUK. But Vance wasn't drunk. Yet he still transformed and now can't remember much of the night."

"Memory loss," Katie concluded. "The artefact isn't just designed to transform someone, is it?"

"Artefacts aren't inherently evil. They only do what they are designed. It's the person wielding them that twists their designs to their own needs." Des rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Listen Katie, I don't want to send out a manhunt for Satyrs here. Get Cayden to the Artefact Vault. Find out all you can about this cup. If we can't get anything else, the mayor is going to press me to find this guy."

The Chief of Police gestured down the hall. "You saw what happened. The media is pouncing all over this. If it gets out that there's someone out there with the ability to transform someone into a Satyr and there's no known way to reversing it without turning that someone into a rampaging demon, the shit is going to really hit the fan."

"Let's not forget that anyone could be infected and they won't know until they get aroused," murmured Katie. "Alright. I'm going to see if I can convince Cayden to head to the Artefact Vault. Probably in the morning. The Keeper doesn't like being woken up late at night."

Des snorted sarcastically. "What does the keeper like?"

"His privacy."

******

"Alright. I'll see you when you get here." Cayden sighed, shut his eyes and rubbed them through his eyelids lightly. "Thanks. Bye."

He hit the 'end call' button. His ears flicked backwards.

"What're you doing up?"

Matt leaned against the doorframe and gave him a weary smile. "I heard you talking to someone."

Cayden lifted his phone and gave it a little shake. "Katie. Apparently they found Vance at the Jamison Hospital. The doctors were already trying to remove the curse on him by the time they got to him."

The young Satyr's eyes widened in terror. "Oh no! Did he -"

"Yeah. Went bestial. Katie and Des subdued him and got Mama Cherry Blossom to revert the balance in his essence back to Satyr level but the damage is done. The media is pouncing all over this and pretty soon, the mayor is going to get involved." He took a deep breath and blew it out softly. "They want me to head down to the Artefact Vault in the morning."

Matt cocked his head to the side. "The what?"

Didn't expect a suburban kid to know about the Vault...

He turned completely around to face Matt, still fully naked but with his dick well within his sheath. "Wake Delta is what's known as a magical nexus. The magical ley lines that run throughout the world converge here giving this place a lot of magical potential. There are other places across the world. Hundreds, in fact. Wake Delta isn't the biggest by far that's why we don't get those crazy research facilities here or lots of wizards and witches convening here."

Cayden shrugged his broad shoulders and tossed his phone onto the couch. "As a nexus, it's a prime place to study artefacts. You can set up a lot of magical wards using the natural magical energies that flow around this place. The Artefact Vault is one such place. There are other facilities like it all over the world. In the US alone, there's Warehouse Zero in Washington DC the Conclave somewhere in Nebraska and also Area E somewhere in Nevada. There's more but I've never been told what they were."

The werewolf looked out the window thoughtfully. "Each facility has a purpose behind it. Warehouse Zero catalogues and deploys artefacts for the US Government's use. Area E experiments on them."

"And the Vault?"

"Massive storage space," Cayden answered. "Artefacts that are seen as having no practical use are thrown in there. There's this painting apparently done by Monet that follows you everywhere for a week."

"You mean its eyes follow you?"

"No. The painting follows you. Wherever you go, you'll just suddenly find it staring at you. It'll be on your wall at home, in your office, in the fucking toilet as you're taking a shit. Creepy stuff. But that's all it really does. Nothing useful. So it's kept in the Vault." Cayden ran a paw down his face. "Katie wants me to head over to the Vault in the morning to see if I can learn anything about this cup."

Matt beamed at him. "Great! I'd love to see it!"

He held up a paw. "Hold on there, kid. You can't go. The Vault has a lot of wards around it and security. Not just anyone is allowed inside. To get in, you need to get explicit permission from the mayor and the mayor himself has to vouch for you to the Secretary of State, maybe even the President. It takes a _lot_of paperwork to get in."

"So how are you meant to get in?"

"I have... special permission." Cayden gave Matt a lopsided grin. "The Keeper likes me. He lets me come and go as I see fit using the back entrance."

"And I can't go in?"

"Sorry. No. Best if you don't either. No telling how your body will react to other artefacts. There's some messed up shit in there."

Matt's ears drooped and his large chest deflated. "Damn..." Then he gave the werewolf a coy smile. "Can you at least keep me company until the sun rises?"

Cayden returned the smile. "Sorry kid. Day's not over."

The Satyr frowned at him at the familiar sentence.

Then a knock came to the door.

Cayden, his tail heavy and dragging behind him, headed towards the door, draping his coat over his shoulders. He pulled the door open. "Evening. Thanks for coming so late."

"Of course," Olivia Kingston replied with a pleasant smile. "I haven't seen my son in days and..." Her eyes drifted to the large Satyr standing in the doorway to the bedroom. "Matt? Is that you?" Those soft, green eyes watered and she pressed her hands to her lips. "Oh no... what's happened to you?"

Matt was frozen in place. "Mom!? What are you doing here!?"

"Cayden called me," she said, striding forward and appraising him. "He said something had happened to you and..." She began to weep. "... what happened?"

"I..." Matt shook his head and shot a confused and hurt look at Cayden. "Why did you call her?"

Cayden glanced at the clock on the wall. "It's only eleven. Remember our deal? I had the whole day to push you. If your big, half-man, half-goat heart can take confessing to your mother how you honestly feel, then I'll stop trying to convince you otherwise."

Olivia Kingston glanced from Cayden to her son. "Matt? What's he talking about? What do you have to confess?"

Matt grimaced, averting his gaze and scratching the back of his neck absently. There was no hiding the scent of sex in the air. It clung to Matt's fur and hairy chest. Plus there were still parts of his body covered in sticky seed. "Mom... I..." He shot Cayden one last fiery look before meeting his mother's gaze. "I had sex with Cayden."

Not exactly what I was anticipating but... I was ready for that.

Olivia spun around, regarding Cayden in shock. "You did what!? Mr. Wilde, that is highly unprofessional! How could you!?"

Cayden shrugged absently. "If you read my contract, it says that I'm allowed to have sex any time I want and with whomever I want. I don't charge you for the time, naturally."

"I did read that but I didn't think you'd be making love with my son!?"

"It wasn't love. It was just sex." He jerked his chin towards Matt. "Besides, he was the one calling me 'daddy'. This wasn't rape, Mrs. Kingston. This was sex. Your big, burly, _Satyr_son came onto me."

Olivia's eyes widened like saucers and she spun back towards her son. "Matthew... is this true?"

"Mom..."

"Just tell her, Matt," Cayden growled. "The whole purpose of this day was so you could be certain with your decision. If you can't be certain that you want to stay a Satyr now, you'll grow to regret it."

Olivia's lips quivered. "Matthew... Do you honestly want to stay... like this?" She gestured at him.

Something sparked in the young Satyr. "Like this? Like this?" He slapped a hand against his muscled chest. "This_is a Satyr, mom. A living being. A citizen of these United States! If God created everything, He created Satyrs too! And you know what? I _like being a Satyr. It's not matter how what I am but who I am and who I am is someone who had the rare opportunity to try out a different body, a different way of life and I like it! If you can't look past what I look like on the outside and remember that I'm still your son, well then..." He pursed his lips, fighting the words from coming out. But it was a losing battle. "... then fuck you!"

Cayden grimaced at that.

Ouch.

He felt Matt's fiery stare at him. "And you." The fuming Satyr stormed over to him, pressing a ginger against his chest. "You think you know what's best for me? You who is so_sick of humanity that you can't even bear to take on human form anymore? Yeah, that's right, Katie blabbed! It shouldn't matter _what form you take!" He snarled and glanced around the room, laser-like eyes burning into his mother's teary-eyed face and then to Cayden. "But I'm surrounded by bigots. Now I see why Trevor left the group."

He bumped past Cayden, heading for the door.

"Matt -" Cayden began.

"Leave me alone!"

Matt pulled open the door, revealing Katie just about to knock. She didn't get a word in before the very naked, very angry Satyr stormed past her and out the apartment complex.

The silver-haired No One stepped inside, glancing first at Cayden and then at Mrs. Kingston. Her eyes settled back on the barely clothed werewolf.

"What did you do?"

A sob came from Olivia Kingston but it came as a surprise when Cayden noticed that she was smiling. "He opened my eyes. My baby boy is growing up."

"You're not... mad?" Cayden asked.

"I'm proud," she answered. "Matthew has always been a timid boy. He was a bit of a follower. A supporter from the sidelines instead of standing his own ground. That boy he mentioned, Trevor. A Satyr who wanted to become a start athlete. Matthew supported him and really rode on his coattails all throughout middle and high school. Then when he went to college, he just merged into the group that was Archie Najima's posse, just another face in the crowd." Oliva pressed her hands against her chest, the tears on her face tears of pride and joy. "Now, seeing him make his own decisions, living his own life... I fills me with pride."

"So you don't care that he wants to stay a Satyr?"

Oliva shook her head. "Mr. Wilde, I may be a devout Christian but God teaches us to love everyone. Besides, would I have come to you, a werewolf private investigator, if I was against Paranorms?"

Huh... I suppose that's true.

Then he realised he had royally messed up.

Oh fuck... I've got to go get Matt.

He turned to leave but Katie seized his arm.

"No way, mister," she snapped. "Take it from someone who has had an _eternity's_worth of experience with situations like this. Matt needs to cool off. You go running to him now and he'll do something stupid."

"But -"

"I can see how this will play out, Cade," she said, silencing him with a finger. "You're going to chase after him, yelling that you're sorry. He's going to stop in the middle of the street, you're going to argue at one another from a distance. He's going to get run over by a passing eighteen wheeler."

Both Cayden and Olivia flinched.

"Yes, that happens," Katie snapped. "More often than I like to count. Leave him be. In fact, let me take care of him."

"But -"

"You messed up. I get that. You want to make it up to him. Fine. But now is not the time. Seeing you will just piss him off more and make him do something terrible." She waved a hand angrily through the air. "Hell, you just tried to use his own mother to convince him to go back to being human! Couldn't you just leave him alone to make his own mistakes!?"

The words from that mysterious man at the mall came back to haunt him.

"Don't be the dad that tries to shield his son from the harshness of the world, Cayden. The sun will continue blazing no matter how badly you want to block him from its harsh rays. You'll get burned if you try."

"Then what am I supposed to do?" he whimpered softly.

"Your job." Katie wrinkled her nose. "Take a shower. Get dressed. Got to the Artefact Vault and ask the Keeper what he knows about the cup. I'll take care of Matt."

"I..."

Cayden squeezed his eyes shut.

He had messed up with Matt. The burden of guilt was weighing down on him and every instinct told him to go off and chase after him. What was the point of solving this case if the person he was sent to investigate and care for was hurt and damaged? Knowing full well what it was like to be left alone in the world in a body that was not entirely his own, he felt for Matt and knew that he would need guidance.

But it was such thinking that hurt his young charge in the first place. Perhaps Katie was right. She was more experienced in such matters and he was the only one allowed into the Vault on such short notice. Given the disaster at the hospital, the culprit could be getting people drunk and turning them into Satyrs all over Wake Delta!

What do I do...?

******

Well, dear readers, it is time to choose Cayden's path!

What shall he do?

1) __Cayden hurt Matt. Badly. It should be his responsibility to apologise and make things right. Send Katie to the Artefact Vault. She is a No One after all. Perhaps she can find another way in.

2) The Artefact Vault and the Keeper will only speak to Cayden without all the paperwork. He is the only hope to learn exactly what this cup was and perhaps how to stop it. Let Katie take care of Matt while he goes to the Artefact Vault.