Chapter 10

Standing beside Jenna’s locker, Josh was finding it hard to keep still, he was agitated and nervous. Jenna was different to the other girls at school. She wasn’t into gossip, nor did she care about the latest fashion items. She lived in her own bubble. A place where she only let a select few in. Josh had been observing her for some time. He tried hard to peel his eyes from her whenever she was near. The way her eyes lit up and sparkled with laughter, how she flicked her red hair over her shoulders, each movement she made caused a flurry of admiration.
He ran his hands through his hair and paced a little. He heard her musical laugh and altered. Josh watched her turn the corner and head his way. He gulped. She had an innocent beauty about her. He watched her smile and laugh beside Donna and couldn’t help the smile that crept onto his face.
Even with all the worry and doubt he was feeling, the sight of her smile pushed them to one side. All he saw in that moment was her. He felt nothing else but a stir of excitement, no fear for his brother. No worry for his family. It was a relief.
Jenna paused, just for a second then moved slowly towards him.
“Hay,” she said.
“Hay,”
“Well, I gotta go,” Donna winked.
“Yeah yeah, winter formal duties,” Jenna laughed with a roll of her eyes.
“How are ya today?” He asked her. A stupid question. He just needed to ask her. All he had to do was ask that one question.
“Fine, you?” he nodded.
“So, a bunch of us are going to Dell’Oways for ice cream after school, you should tag along,” It wasn’t going as planned. Chelsea had asked him as he arrived at school if he was going. He had told her no. Having to put up with the idiot teenagers at school was more than he could handle. Now he had asked Jenna to go. What was wrong with him? Why couldn’t he just come out and say it? He was wasting time, but most of all he was putting his family at risk. The longer he stayed at school, the more the students would notice how different he was.
Humans are scared. They fear the unknown. Even when the obvious is standing right in front of them they can’t believe what they have seen. When they do, there fear takes control.
“Sure,” she smiled. Her eyes danced with a light he had seen often. A light that only one kind had. But it couldn’t be. They had checked her out. Her blood line was solely human. Not even an ancestral trace of his kind or any other.
“Great, I will meet you in the parking lot after school,” He winked at her as he walked away. Each step he took felt like he was walking through cerement, or like rocks were tied to his feet. It was hard. He wanted to turn around. Take another look at her. Memorize her features. However, they were already craved in his mind. She was the center of his dreams.
***
The clanging of metal and the screech of wheels pierced Jax’s skull. The one he had clawed a few days ago sat on a computer chair sliding backwards and forwards over the tiled floor.
He was tied to a hospital bed. More drugs and torture, they were breaking him down. He knew what was coming. The chemicals burned in his veins and set his insides on fire.
But he would survive. Death was not an option for him.
He had to stay alive. He had to figure it out. He was just an experiment. A lab rats. When humans don’t understand something then they will do anything they can to find out the knowledge they desperately seek. Everything to them could be explained by science.
“You know. You have been quite helpful,” The man tapped is fingers on the desk. His graying hair was disheveled.
Each time Jax saw him he looked worse for wear. Each day he looked dirtier and smelt it too. Jax guessed whatever he was doing or looking for was taking up too much of his time.
“We have learned so much from you, your genetics. How you change. But there is one thing missing. How does it work?” Jax thought the man was crazy. He was studying him. That was it. He wasn’t part of the government, not that Jax could tell, or was he? Who was he? What did he want?
“It’s a family thing,” Jax replied. Not the best response. A short answer that laced the truth.
“There are more like you?” the man asked.
Jax choose to ignore that question. He obviously knew that answer he had cages full of his kind.
“So, tell me. How do you do it? How do you change?”
“Why?” Jax asked.
“Ok I will make you a deal. I will answer your questions. If you answer mine,” Jax didn’t know what to think. So, he decided to test him.
“Okay, tell me why? Then I may consider the deal, it wouldn’t be fair if it was just one sided now, would it?” Jax gave him a toothy grin. If he could find out more, then it may give him an advantage.
“As you know, we are at war. The only way we are gonna win the war is by strengthening our army. Which is where you come in,” The war, Jax almost laughed. He had been around many years and had seen some of the most famous wars. What was going on he would not call a war but a battle for oil and other resources. The government of America were greedy, just like the government of all the other countries he had visited. They wanted control of the biggest oil resource in the world. America had gone in guns blazing claiming that the country was planning and carrying out terrorist attacks.
Jax knew that wasn’t the case, humans on the other hand were like puppets. They were gullible and followed their master without questioning the facts. Now the humans were questioning, beginning to see what was under their eyes all along.
“Yeah, that wasn’t the full story,” Jax tried to shrug but it was more of a roll of the shoulders.
“How do you shift? I may consider telling you more,”
“It is who we are. Apart of us. There is no way to shift. Our body does what needs to be done. If you are in danger your body tells you to run. For us, our body tells us to shift,”
“So, danger is the trigger, fear?”
“Why do you wanna know?” Jax asked. He had a bad feeling. His gut was telling him that he had already said too much. He had learned from an early age that there were three types of humans, the curious, the control freaks and then the scaredy cats. Revealing too much always ended badly.
The curious wanted to know the ins and outs of everything. Digging and digging until their fragile minds can’t take any more. Some go crazy, while others spend their entire lives looking for more answers and evidence. Knowing becomes the soul focus of their lives.
The scaredy cats, well knowing plays tricks on their mind. They jump from the slightest sound.
A little rustle or the howl of the wind.
They end up suffering from bouts of anxiety some end up with more mental health problems. It all depends on how strong the persons mind is. Control freaks, they want to use their ability for their own needs. They need to be in control and will use any measures that they deem necessary. Jax knew deep down that this man was not just one of the types but two, curious and a control freak. It was not going to end well.
The man grinned. “I have made my own army an army of shifters. Just like you,”
Jax’s veins ran cold. The man was more than insane. He didn’t know what he was doing.
He wasn’t creating an army. He was creating killers.
Wild animals that would take no sides. They would kill them all. Had he not ever heard of the saying, you can never tame the wild. The wild lives and dies by its own rules.
“Then you are crazy. The animal will take control. You will all die,” Something hard hit Jax in the face. That is when he noticed the men hiding in the shadows. If he was stronger, he would have heard the beating of their hearts. Smelt them. In their hands they held guns, not the typical gun that fired bullets but ones that held tranquilizers. Jax had been shot by them often. Each time it took him longer and longer to wake. His body couldn’t fight the toxin as good anymore. It was too beaten.