Chapter 11 - How Fast Can You Run?

"You've been listening Charlotte. I'm not stupid, I'm useful. I've been used to help your alternate version in my world a few times."

She just turns to the Naga. "Give me that file. The Ananasi require it."

I raise an eyebrow and my mouth opens, but a look from the naga makes me rethink that rather rapidly.

"Why do you want it?" he says.

"We need it. It is Ananasi business." she holds out her hand.

"So? We don't have a reason yet." he responds.

"We require the information on Project Chimera." she says.

I can feel the hair on my neck stick up again as I suddenly remember what a chimera was. The mythological beast that was a combination of many others. Eesh.

The naga's glance at each other then it slowly extends the file towards Charlotte.

"Wait!" I say.

Suddenly I feel like I've just been looked at by four medusa's. If looks could kill, dead a few times over would be an understatement.

"I'm sorry, I don't mean any disrespect, I just need the locations of project 5 and project reserves. I suspect there are other shifters imprisoned there. Please, I can't leave them." I plead.

The naga opens the file and looks through it until he finds something.

"Ready?" he asks.

A quick fumble around and luckily besides my bed there's a pen and paper. I grab it and nod at him as he reads out two addresses that I quickly scribble down. He then hands the file to Charlotte who just vanishes. Woman of many words that one.

"Thank you again. I'm sorry to be a pain." I sigh and place the pad down.

When I look up again, they're gone.

"Goodbye to you too... Oh bollocks, I never arranged getting the fucking ritual." I sigh again.

Sitting up in bed I rest my head in my hands. My head hurt and I was still a little tired. I hadn't been asleep long, in fact, let's be honest, I needed more sleep.

I roll onto my side and pull the covers back over myself. Closing my eyes and letting myself drift off into luckily, a dreamless sleep.

It must have been quite a few hours later when I woke, sitting up and yawning I realise that there was something on the covers. Rubbing my eyes clear of the sleep I look down the bed. At the foot of my bed was a silvery tube with a cap on it and a note. Warily I pick up the note and look at it.

'We're keeping an eye on you. This is repaying the favour.'

I'm not sure how long I re-read that note for, but it didn't reveal any more mystical hints, so curiosity finally got the better of me and I pick up the tube. It's about five inches long, an inch wide, with a pop cap on the side.

Scowling gently I turn the cap end away from me and pop it. Nothing happens. That's a good sign.

Peering into the tube I see something rolled up. Turning it up on its end, it slides out. Definitely a scroll or parchment of some description. Gently prodding it, I manage to unroll it and look at the surface.

Looks like a handful of diagrams, albeit looking a lot like cave paintings. There's a picture of five wolf heads. Wait, that's not just the heads, there's the skins as well!

My eyes widen in shock, this is the ritual! How the hell did they..? Urgh, actually, I don't want to know. They're like the elite of the shifters and supposedly able to get in anywhere. Last thing I need is to start questioning their methods. It's bad enough that I'm currently questioning my own existence without someone to love or love me.

Stupid I have to admit, but I wanted so badly to be loved that I went on this whole deal and right now, I'm having a difficult time trying to find some changing breed that I haven't pissed off in some way.

What was I doing here still? Why on earth did I decide this was a good idea? I mean, sure, I felt some vague sense of obligation to the khan, but in all honesty I have no idea where I was leading up to. I had a world of hopes, but one after the other, they were smashed to pieces.

Life was much simpler as a vampire. Well.. It was when I'd become an elder, the things I had to endure before that. Not fatal, but memories I would happily keep buried. Prostitutes had it easy compared to some of us. A web of intricate promises and lies we walked nightly and each night held the risk that we would not rise another.

Yet I had a position of power, of strength and most importantly of safety. I had given all of that up in a heartbeat for love. The irony being I never had a heartbeat and on top of that, I'd given it all up for an illusion of hope. I'd lied to myself and convinced myself that I could stand beside the brave warriors of gaia and be shoulder to shoulder with my beloved.

I get out of bed and slide my jeans back on, glancing in the mirror I see the tears rolling down my face. I hadn't even noticed I'd started crying. It was just so painful to keep going each day now. At the beginning I was full of fire to seek repentance for my mistakes. Though it seemed that my punishments were harsher for when I tried to repent than when I didn't care.

The prospect of being a vampire again was a possibility, yet it was one that was nigh on impossible for me in this condition. Even in my sheer despair, I knew that once I took that step as I am right now, I would become a creature of pure pain. I wanted the pain to stop. I wanted to stop being so un-appreciated by all around me.

It wasn't as simple as that either. All knew of what I am and what I was. My reasons for becoming what I am, were nothing but laughable excuses to them. Love actually conquering the darkness within? Especially the love between two men?! It had Greek tragedy stamped all over it. The one who I had felt the closest to becoming part of his strength. He was scarred by the man who's life I call friend. No matter where I go, the bonds formed, break with record speed. Understanding and acceptance were thrown aside because it's what you are that counts and never who you are.

I sit on the bed and look down at my hands. The slightly slender and soft pink hands. They had never seen the harsh work of a hammer or sword. The scars I bore were out of sight for all but those who could see into my heart. Once upon a time, my body was the only currency I could pay with.

For two hundred years, I avoided causing pain and hurting anyone, lest it be returned onto me. I had been the victim of such pains by the hands of those I was sold or traded to. Then I am my own master and do as I chose. Only to bind myself to the side of one I felt could lead me to a new life. He did indeed bring me into a new life, but it was one without him and one I wasn't prepared for.

My eyes drift along the floor and I see the bag that I had gathered the items from the police station in. A glint catches my eye and I reach into the bag. Slowly I withdraw what appears to be round piece of metal attached to a foot.

I grimace gently as I realise it appears to be attached to a wizened rat's foot. The hell is this thing? Guessing with the look and where I got it from, it's got some spiritual power, but I'm not sure what. Though I could always ask it. I frown and pick up the bag, emptying it of its contents.

Once I'd done I took a look over my small cache and wondered what the hell I had. There was something that looked like a shard of red crystal, the wizened rat's foot and a sheathed knife from the looks of it. Time for me to take a peek into the umbra and have a word, if they want to talk that is.

I concentrate and gaze across the gauntlet.

"SET ME FREE!!!" roars a voice and I tumble off the bed backwards. Landing with a thud and the air being shoved from my lungs.

"Ooof! The hell??" I groan and clamber back up onto the bed. That was fucking loud. I head back up onto the bed and grunt as I plonk my backside on the bed again, concentrating and slipping back into the umbra with my view.

"RELEASE ME!"

I look at the items and see what appears to be a red lizard of some description trapped inside the crystal. It looks to be the one screaming to be let out. I sigh softly, this ought to be interesting.

"Calm down. First off, what are you and secondly how do I actually release you?" I frown at him.

"Let me out! How dare you keep a fire spirit entrapped like this!" the red lizard snarls at me. It's got quite the sharp array of teeth sticking out of its little snout. It also appears to have flames licking around it's body and almost dribbling from its maw. It seems really pissed to say the least.

"Okay, focus that fire of yours for a moment please. I do certainly need you to tell me 'how' to let you out rather than just keep snarling at me."

It glares at me and the crystal looks like it's starting to smoulder somewhat. Urgh, if this fucker burns a hole through my bed I am going to get pissy.

"Seriously, tell me how." I scowl at the damn thing, it's really not getting anywhere with it's hot headed.... Oh.. Yeah, fire spirit, of course it's going to be hot headed.

It shakes around a little and looks annoyed. This is going well. How the fuck am I supposed to release something like this without knowing how. In fact, should I really be releasing a spirit like this?

"Look. I'll help you, as I don't want to leave you trapped if you don't want it. I just don't know how to release you as well as the fact that I don't know if you're going to burn the place down around me if I do."

It hisses at me "I want out of this place!!"

I sigh again and shake my head. What am I going to do with it? I'd better take a look at the other items first. Shifting my gaze to the rat's foot I'm surprised to see it's attached to a whole spirit rat.

"Oh, hello!" I say.

"You want the stuff now? I'm bored and want to get out of here." it snuffles and I blink.

"Erm. What stuff?"

"Whatever was stashed, you want a bit of it or all of it now?" it twitches its whiskers at me.

"Sorry, I'm not following." I blink.

I've never heard a rat sigh before, it sounds a tad exasperated.

"Give me the power, I'll get your stashed fetishes, then I'm off. Alright?"

I scratch my ear. A cockney rat asking me if I want my stash. This isn't the smartest of ideas to be doing on my own. But right now, I don't really feel like getting anyone else about my road to failure. Coyote's laws say think then act, I'm thinking that at least there's no one else here to blow up.

"Sure, why not." I reach my hand out and concentrate, in my hand forms a scrap of meat made from pure spiritual energy. Might want to show that little trick to Alex at some point. The rat snatches it up and devours it in an alarmingly fast speed. Then it nods and vanishes and I can see four more spirits appear.

Slipping back into the real world for a moment, I frown. The bed has four new items on it and I rub my neck as I study each one. The biggest of them appears to be a fucking trident of some description, about 4ft in length, seems to be covered in something akin to gold, but it's shinier. Not exactly sure what the hell that is, though it also has a thicker than normal part in the centre. Oooh, button.

ACK. I stop my hand from pressing it, only just though. Bloody temptation though. There also appears to be a black masquerade mask, a pendant with a wisp of fur attached and something that looks like a black stone. It then occurs to me that I didn't see a spirit in the small knife that's on the bed still in its sheath. I guess that thing isn't actually a fetish, oh well.

Rubbing my eyes I sigh softly again. Might as well try and talk to them. My eyes shift their perspective, this time looking through the gauntlet and into the umbra.

My gaze falls first on the pendant. The spirit in there is looking right at me attentively. It takes a moment or two for me to realise that I can't recognise the spirit's shape as it keeps changing. Taking one form, then another, then part of another form. Sheep, wolf, lizard, just watching it for a few seconds makes my head feel a little dizzy. Yet no matter what form it takes, it's looking at me.

"Hello?" I try.

"Hello." it replies in a rather perfectly plain voice.

"Hi. May I ask what spirit you are?"

"You may." it replies.

I resist the urge to slap my forehead for walking face first into that one.

"What spirit are you?" I ask.

"I'm not telling." it replies.

Well that worked well. I sigh softly, this is going swimmingly. So far I've got a bitching lizard and a smart arsed shifting thing. I'm not just too tired for this, I'm so out of my league that I should really just give up. Here I am trying to do things that the great sages of the shifters take caution in doing and I'm wandering around blindly out of mere curiosity.

Though it's hardly surprising. All I need to do is think about what my un-life and new life has been and all I can see is a string of things going wrong for me since the day I understood that the man I was, would have fallen in love with that damn tiger. Every time I try my hand at something it backfires and I end up feeling shit. Yeah, feeling that now as well. Didn't feel it so much as a vampire. Why did I change? Why on earth was any of this worth it? What the fuck do I keep fighting for? It's not like I'm gonna get rewarded for any of this. Even if I get Tyr back, then what? I get to wave goodbye to him as he fucks off to do his duty?

Oh dammit, I can feel the fucking tears yet again. Will I ever be able to stop crying over spilt milk at this rate? Probably not. I sit down on the bed and put my head in my hands. I just can't stop the tears at the moment. My head hurts. Why was it so unfair? Why had I been so stupid to believe that after two hundred years of seeing people make stupid mistakes over love that I had fallen so far as to be the same? Things were no different for me no matter what I did.

Each and every day was more than just a challenge for me, it was almost unbearable. I had so little to keep going for and many reasons to just die. I'd made mistake after mistake that were causing pain to anyone I was near and then I'd get a chunk of my confidence blown out. I'm pretty much out of it and this is a total repeat of the same thing, a circle I couldn't break.

God, why was this all my fault? I just wanted to be happy, why couldn't I have that? Why was it so painful to wake up every morning? Why the hell didn't I just jam this knife in my own chest and end it all?

Wait, knife?!

For the second time in the evening I'm sprawling off the bed as I drop the knife that has somehow appeared in my hand, sending it skittering across onto the floor at the other side like it was snake about to bite me. My heart is going ten to the dozen as sheer panic was barely averted. When the hell did I get that thing in my hand and where the hell did I get suicidal thoughts from? Surely I'm better than that?

There's a question I wish I hadn't asked myself. I knew that I couldn't answer it right now as it wouldn't be a good answer. But I knew that I'd never just stab myself, there were loads faster ways, even for a shifter.

I peer over the bed and look at the knife on the floor. It's just laid there, looking like a normal wooden handled knife. The damn thing looks so ordinary, no wonder I'd been fooled. That is assuming it was that thing that was fucking with my head.

The knock that resounds at my door just then is enough to make me launch myself clean across the room and straight up into my manabozoh form. My claws quickly yank open the door before I can even think that doing this is a good idea.

Standing at the other side of the door is a blond lass about 6ft tall and packing a pair of breasts that I have to wonder if they're real because they're huge! Besides her is another lady with short brown hair holding something which is glowing like a mobile phone screen, but it's a lot bigger. Actually, it looks like something that Tarquin uses back in my world.

They're both looking at me, the blonde has a grin on her face, the brunette is scowling. Well this is a lovely surprise... For some straight guy somewhere anyway. Right now I'm waiting for my adrenaline rush to calm down enough for me to actually think rationally.

"Hehe! Hi!" giggles the blonde. Her boobs actually bounce quite emphatically as she giggles. Damn, those things are distracting, even for me!

"Uh... hi?"