Alterations
A "Winds of Change" Story
Something had me trapped!
I was straining with every fiber of my being, trying desperately to break free. I screamed repeatedly, and tried to attack whatever it as that had me, but there was nothing to attack.
Worse, I was getting closer to the creature on the ground and there were other animals down there! I kept trying to fight it, struggled against whatever it was until I was only a few feet from the animal that was staring at me with intensity.
My mind snapped, and in my fear I changed direction. I focused all my anger and fear at the creature looking at me and flew straight at him, attacking. He started braying in surprise as I battered his head with wings, talons and beak.
Another pair of hands gripped me and I suddenly found myself landing roughly on the ground. I lay there on my back, stunned. My mind started to clear a little. I looked into the worried eyes above me. My thoughts started moving from concepts to words again. I looked at the faces around me and I started to put names to them again.
Kim knelt down next to me. "Brian?"
I looked at her a long time, my thoughts slowly coming back together. "Kim? What happened?"
Abruptly, Maxine burst into tears. She sagged and looked like she might have fallen over had Jon not supported her. As quickly as I lost it before, I suddenly felt back. At least, most of the way back. There was a nagging feeling in my head that there was something more I should be realizing...
Between sobs, Maxine tried to say something. I managed to make out "Sorry", repeated about four times, but the rest was a blur. I looked around at the other faces, my head still swimming a little. My wings felt a little twisted, probably from landing on them. I held out my hands, looking at the four taloned fingers for a second, even as someone I didn't know, but who was scratched from my earlier attack, helped me to my feet.
I looked over at Maxine., "It's okay, I'm all right."
Kim looked at me worried. "Are you? What do you remember?"
I thought a second. "Everything, I guess. It's a little hard to explain. I guess I know what I was doing, but not always why." I thought a minute longer. "But, now, I think I know why I've been doing some things since the Change."
I started looking at the people around me, making sure that I could put names to faces, but was completely stumped with the mule I saw. I started to get a little worried when he extended a hand. "Don't worry, we haven't been introduced, at least in person. Jack DeMule."
I shook his hand and said "Brian Coe" then I looked at his face a second. "Wait a minute, you're not..."
He smiled. "I am."
I sagged and hung my head. "Sorry about attacking you. I'm not sure why, but for some reason you looked like a threat to me."
He grinned, his face was very expressive, "I was. Who do you think dragged you out of the sky?" Then he ran his hand across some of the wounds. They were all luckily superficial. An eagle attacking was capable of a lot of damage, even to a far larger creature. "Don't worry about these. I'll heal."
Jon smiled, still comforting Maxine, "I'm glad to see that you're okay. It looks like we won't have too..." he stopped and looked around quickly. "Where did Bryan go?"
All of us started looking around. The sun was beginning to come up and my vision was rapidly becoming more powerful again, but I didn't see any sign of him. "Was he here with you?" I asked.
Jon nodded. "He was here just a few minutes ago." He sniffed. "I can still smell him. Bryan!" he yelled.
No answer.
Jon looked at Jack, who seemed to be concentrating a little. "He's around here somewhere, but he's not close. He must have run off when we were all busy with getting Brian down."
Jon suddenly looked angry, which shocked me. "Damn it! He knew that we might need him! Of all the irresponsible..."
His voice trailed off as he abruptly shifted to norm shape and barreled off in one direction. Maxine, who had been using him for support, twisted a little and fell on her rump. Jack helped her up.
"What the hell? What brought that on?" I looked at Kim. "We'd better go after him. His temper is short right now. He's libel to do something he regrets."
"Are you sure you're up to flying? I mean..."
I smiled and spread my wings. "Nothings broken or sprained. Besides, you're nearby if I lose it again." I glanced at Jack and Maxine. "You mind following on the ground?"
They nodded and took off in the direction that Jon had run. Kim and I took to the air. I had no idea what Jon was talking about, really. Why Bryan would have been needed to save me I had no idea. But whatever it was, something had happened after I...uh...left. Whatever uneasy truce had been called seemed to have fallen apart.
Jon was moving fast along the ground, but I had the advantage of not having to move around obstacles, as well as a slight morning tailwind. I dropped my altitude to be right over the treetops, pulled forward a little, and landed right in front of him as he broke through into a clearing. "Jon! Wait! Stop!"
He skidded to a stop, pawed the earth a couple times, then shifted back to morph. He was panting hard, but there was still a look of complete anger on his face. "That was a stupid thing to do, Brian." was all he managed to say through gritted teeth.
I tilted my head quizzically, "What do you mean?"
"What I mean is, I was libel to go through you. Now, what is it? I have some...matters to talk with Bryan about."
Unconsciously, I started fluffing my feathers, an anger response that made me look larger. My wings opened slightly and my face got more intense. "Jon. Sit. Down. And. Wait. Here."
Jon went from angry to stunned. I guess I looked rather frightening like this. His eyes got wide and he meekly sat down on a log. I bored into him more. "I don't know what's going on, but you aren't in any condition to finish whatever this is. Kim and I will find Bryan if we have too. He's bright white and it's September. Unless he's hiding, we shouldn't have a problem."
Jon started to say something and I held up a talon. "I don't want to hear anything. Jack and Maxine should be here any minute. Wait for them." Without another word, I bunched myself up and launched into the air. I tilted my head enough to see that Jon was still sitting and now was looking at the ground.
As long as he wasn't rushing headlong into the forest I guessed it was all right. If he was mad at me, I'd deal with it later.
While I'd been on the ground, Kim had been making wider and wider circles trying to spot Bryan. She was at nearly 1000 feet, and could scan a lot of ground. I joined in the search, both of us scanning the hills and forest around. I was sure that, by now, Jon and company had resumed their search. I hoped that he was in more control. Not having luck myself, I started to fly over to Kim. I had stupidly not asked Jon which direction he scented Bryan in.
As I approached, she tilted her wings and started making a very tight circle. I looked down and saw what she was looking at: A white bighorn sheep morph. It could only be Bryan. He had covered a lot of ground in a short period.
As we descended, I noted that he didn't move. He was laying on the ground, apparently asleep. His clothes were badly torn, and his fur was covered in dirt and leaves. It looked like he had managed to run himself into exhaustion fast and then just collapsed.
I looked at Kim. "Go back and get the others, but make sure that Jon is under control. He should be okay now. I'll see what's going on." She nodded her head and flew back to where I had left Jon. I quietly circled down and landed lightly a little distance from the sleeping sheep.
Even from here, I could tell that he was resting peacefully, but that peace had come at some price. His face was streaked with the dried remains of tears, his body covered in the nicks and scratches that come with a mad, uncoordinated dash through the woods. His breathing was regular, but there was a slight sobbing quality to it. I wondered if he was really asleep, or if he was just blocking out the world.
I quietly walked closer, and he didn't stir. With a little trepidation, I reached out a talon and gently shook him on the shoulder. "Bryan?"
He stopped breathing for a moment. He was holding it and his eyes never opened. In a quiet, very controlled voice he said, "Please, go away."
"I'm not going to leave you out here. What's wrong?"
He let out a deep breath. "I was so close." he whispered. "So close." His eyes slowly opened and he drew himself up into a crouch. He smiled a little, but I could tell it was forced. "Are you all right?"
I smoothed out some feathers on my chest. "I think so. At least, I seem to be back. I guess I'll know for sure in the next few days." I looked at him seriously. "Bryan, what happened? I mean, what did you tell Jon when the rest of us went down the beach? When he realized that you were missing, he flipped."
Bryan looked at me sadly, then averted his gaze. I'm sure that he didn't want to tell me anything, there was some reason why he was holding back. He picked up a stick and began to trace shapes in the dirt. Without looking at me, he said, "I have a Power, Brian. Jon knows about it, I told him last night. We thought...when we realized you were gone, we thought I might be able to help."
My curiosity was piqued. "What is it?"
"I...I can convince people to do things." He said quietly. "I hate it. I've seen what it can do, the evil it can do."
From his expression, I think he expected me to react badly, but I was really more curious. "You must be able to do some good, if you thought you could help me."
He sighed. "It didn't do any good. I tried, and it didn't work."
I thought a minute. When the eagle had seen the four of them on the ground, it had circled out of curiosity more than anything. It had been about to leave, though. Something kept it there...
"I think you did something, Bryan. I don't know for sure, but something kept me circling. Maybe it was you."
He took a deep breath, "I almost didn't come. I didn't want too."
It was probably the first time since the Change that I was glad my face had little expression. I think that a look of surprise would not have been helpful. "Why?" I asked quietly.
"Fear. Maybe terror is a better word."
He had stopped talking. "Bryan, what happened to you?"
He hesitated a long time, digging into the ground with that stick, then started to tell me everything. At first, I wasn't sure why, but as his story moved from the first days of the Change and into California, I think I knew why.
I had lived the greatest fear that he had. His first experience with the Change had been watching a young man get trapped as an animal. Then it nearly happened to him after he'd been drawn to Morrisville.. As he moved to the present day, with the events of the last 24 hours, he started talking about Maxine and the confrontation with Jon last night. She had, in a way, become a new focus of his fears. She could do what terrified him most: change him against his will.
What happened to me, of course, didn't help matters any. It had put him close to the breaking point. Somehow, the fact that he hadn't been the one to save me, that he hadn't had the chance to confront his fear head on, had broken him.
As his tale came to an end, I gave him a long, sad look. "Jon was right, you know. You have been running. But I think that you've run yourself out. I'm guessing that you didn't tell Jon all of this, did you?"
He shook his head.
"Are you feeling better?"
He nodded meekly. "I think so. I don't know how I'm going to be if I have to see Maxine again."
I looked at Bryan seriously as the events of the night before clicked into place. "I don't think this was her fault."
"She changed you. She did something."
I nodded. "Something, but I don't think that she knew it. I think all that power Jon was holding onto did something to the transfer. I was slipping before I became a full eagle. I knew it, but she didn't. I think that shifting only sped it up."
Bryan nodded a little. "That makes sense. Explains why you flash shifted."
"Huh?"
Bryan looked at me oddly. "You flash shifted. Maxine said that it had never happened before when she'd used her Power. Must be because of what happened before."
I looked at Bryan a moment, then started thinking about something. "Bryan, don't be alarmed, but I'm going to try something." I looked at my hand a second, started thinking about it not being there...
...and I was in norm shape again.
Bryan bunched himself to bolt away from me, but stopped, looking at me with terror in his eyes. "Brian? Are you okay?"
I stood on the ground a second, running thoughts through my head. I could feel the eagle in here, much stronger but this time not overpowering. I was in nearly complete control. I thought a second, and abruptly was back to my normal self. Bryan seemed to be panting hard, but had calmed considerably when I shifted back. "I don't think we can blame Maxine for what happened. Seems that I'm a shifter and didn't know it."
I'm not sure if that made Bryan feel better or worse, but he seemed to accept it easily enough. "Were you...okay like that?"
I nodded, somehow feeling better about the last day or so. "I was fine, I think. I might avoid it for a little while though."
"You never knew? Didn't you ever try?"
I shook my head. "I've been working in a lab most of the last few months. Shifting didn't seem that important." Then I had a strange thought. I looked at my hand again and thought about something else...
...and nothing happened. I grinned. "Well, so much for that."
"Huh?"
"I was just checking if I could manage other forms. I just tried a raccoon."
"Can't have everything." He said with a slight smile. "From what I've heard, not that many people can shift outside their species."
I started to make some comment, but what he said made me think a second. I held up a finger, then concentrated again on my hand. I formed a picture in my mind...
...and my hand went from orange to black. Bryan was staring at me, stunned, but not seemingly scared. I slowly looked myself over. I had managed to perfectly duplicate a flighted whitetail hawk morph. I spread the brilliant white and black striped tailfeathers and looked at them, then back at Bryan. "Looks like I can do other birds of prey..."
Just then, Jon and company broke through the forest into the clearing. Both Bryan and I had been so intent on my situation that we hadn't heard them coming. I looked over at Jon with a little worry. He still looked mad, but he was far more in control. His attention was first on Bryan, but then he looked at me. He opened his mouth to say something, then sniffed. A look a confusion crossed his face. "Who are you?"
I glanced at Bryan a second then back. "Jon, I think we had all better find a place to sit and talk for a while..."
Copyright 1997, Brian Eirik Coe
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