When patching Trevor back together....
"WHY DID YOU HAVE TO TELL THEM THAT-?!" Mary snarled at Serenity. She finished
patching up Trevor (she had been studying to be a vet after all) and changing his
bandages. She had overheard her parents of course, the ears weren't just for show.
Serenity was startled, "What?"
"Why did you have to tell them that? AFTER they made this -sacrifice- for -me-! They
didn't want to make me human because they thought they'd be stealing who I was! They
chose to adapt to me instead of the other way around-! How many parents do you know
that would have done that?! AND YOU had to go and throw it all in their faces!!! I could
have easily lied and told them that the blue wolf lady was mistaken and I was born a lion
girl like they think and the whole world thinks!! I could have come up with a decent lie for
what happened when I was cursed! But no! You! You had to!"
Serenity was stunned, "You -want- to remain a lion girl?!"
"I'd have to have all my clothes customized for my tail, wearing shoes is a joke! I'll stand
out like a sore thumb my entire life and look like those circus freaks in Russia who really
do look like animal people! But my parents made a bigger sacrifice for me than I could
have ever imagined! And I was more than willing to make a LITTLE sacrifice for them by
lying! I don't want to take grade school all over again but I can likely skip a few grades if I
try hard enough. I STILL don't know if my friends were altered by things or not or if I have
new friends that I made in this version of reality the curse made! And my favorite stuffed
animal whose been with me forever got his species changed too! But when I saw them
defending me from those monsters I realized- I wouldn't MIND being this way as long as
we were together! I've had friends who some people would call 'unique' and less polite
people would call 'freaks' but none of them gave up or gave in! I through! This is my big
middle claw to this stupid curse! Screw it! If Ulee' is stuck with wolf ears I might as well go
around with cat ears!"
"'Ulee'?"
"he was my best friend and I was tutoring him before his family moved away, or that was
what I thought happened to him! He was the one who told me they were permanently
wolves! Well! If he's stuck a wolf even if we get his head back ons straight then, then,
then, then THEN---!" The seven going on eight year old cat child shook, tears in her eyes
as her muzzle quivered, "THEN I WANNA STAY THIS WAY TOO!" She practical tore her shirt
and jeans off leaving her as naked as her parents. "You wanna see dis bad thing gone
forever and 'ever? LET'S DO IT! But I'm stayin' in da pettin' zoo!!!"
"I feel sick to my stomach admitting it," Said a male voice, "I mean, really feel sick,
anymore sick I'd puke... but I've realized I can appreciate that."
"TREVOR!" Serenity declared happily, "You're awake!"
"Technically yes, though I think the singing dancing plush toys in the corner would
disagree... " Trevor shook his head a couple more times, "There, they're gone."
The old woman and lion cup looked at each other.
"Trevor... thank you... you saved my parents... you saved me...you're the bravest cat I've
ever known! What you did was so cool! A lion couldn't have done better!!"
Trevor blushed, "Mary. If you were some years older I'd ask you out."
Mary decided not to remind Trevor how long house cat's lived given Trevor's condition.
"That's very sweet, but you're two legs two extra of being my type."
"Heard that one before." Trevor quipped back.
"I'm sure." Mary smirked.
"Madam Serenity... what were the words whoever used to get you stuff as you are?"
"NO!" Madam Serenity said in the hardest not precise voice in existence.
"It's okay kiddo," Trevor said, "I can tell you the wording the jackass used who cursed me
instead, I'm stuck this way too."
"TREVOR!"
"Sorry Serenity, it's not like we're friends, and cats aren't known for loyalty, well, most,
consider this my way of going against type and looking out for my fellow Felidae."
"Trevor this is escalation!"
"Sorry Serenity." Trevor shook his head, "But... I think ... for once, just this once... "
Trevor told Mary the wording of his curse. Mary memorized it. Serenity ended up praying.
Paul was keeping an eye out outside the house now that the mirrors were gone the
wolves, if they decided to come back for Ashley, would have to come from the outside, or
least that was what he hoped. He ignored his cracked ribs, he could get them set later
once they were relatively in the clear.
++++++
Felicity left to greet the police officer coming in so he didn't freak out and draw his pistol
first.
Guarding the blue she wolf, Brian and Felicity looked at each other.
"Getting around is going to be hard isn't it for us honey? We're so tall..." Felicity.
Brian nodded, "I didn't think we're end up so big... this could be trouble."
"Very much so... I'm going to have trouble not bumping my head in... well, any room
really..."
"At least I was right about one thing."
"Eh?"
"Your mane is the most sexy thing I've seen in a while."
Brain could take consolation in that.
"This is why wolves are better." Ashley said gleefully.
"You shut up." Felicity snapped.
"Pst! You're ugly, stupid, and impractical. We're still at least small enough to go around.
How did we lose to clumsy things like you?"
"To be fair, we ARE more agile than you, and we have quicker reflexes to boot." Brain said.
"So save it, you're a criminal in our home and you threatened our pride. If we can't remove
your brainwashing then you're going to jail."
"We're the pack! They'll look out for me! So save it!"
"Mommy! Daddy! I wanna talk ta ya about somethin'."
The two lions looked at see their cub with one arm around Lance standing in the door way.
"Dear you're naked." Felicity said.
"So are you mommy and daddy. And so is Lance." Said the lion cub stroking the plush
animal.
The two giant lions looked at each other, and nodded.
"You got BIG.." Mary said in a voice mimicking innocent wonder.
"Well, the Transform was for us to stand up to the wolves honey..." Felicity said, "It's to
help."
"Mommy... what Miss Serenity said..."
"Yes... is it true dear?"
Mary considering lying and acting like she didn't remember her past existence at all, but
knew what Madam Serenity had told her parents that was impossible.
"Yes... "
Both lions shuddered finding out their memories were lies.
"Honey... after this is over I promise, we'll turn back and everything can go back to the
way it was." Brian promised.
Mary thought of Ulee'. "I wanna stay dis' way."
"Dear-?!"
"I wanna you to stay dis' way too too!"
The two lions looked at each other, wonder if, what was said was true, if the game was
effecting her like it clearly effected the wolf Ashley.
"I was a grown woman before." Mary lied, knowing her parents had no way of knowing,
she hadn't mentioned her age to Serenity, and Judas wasn't one to be able to judge human
except by size. No one would ever know except her. "I know it's hard for you to accept
but... I WANT to be this way, I WANT TO STAY this way... and to be with you... " She
decided to leave out the part of Ulysses being a major factor in her choice. "And... if we're
gonna gonna be a pride, a family, then let's BE a pride and family! Let's be dis' way for
evah and evah!"
Felicity sighed, "Honey... your life before...but can... you don't really..." Being told all this
confusing information made Felicity insure in spades, as did it in Brian.
Ashley was blinking with wide eyed confusion. And a traitorous thought crept into her
brain, 'Their bound... it's as unbreakable as ours?'
"Trevor told me how he was stuck as a cat... and look around... our family pictures, the
height of the ceiling, haven't ya wondered why you haven't needed to crotch and not bump
da ceilin'? 'As we've always been.' That was part the transform I said... "
Indeed, their family pictures, their furniture, their doors... all of them, showed naked or
almost naked lion people (Brian and Serenity still had their wedding rings though they
were different sizes to fit their fingers).
"Let's be a pride and family forever and ever, let's show we're better than the big bad
wolves and aren't savages and CAN live with humans." Mary said with sparkles nearly in
her eyes that reflected then in the eyes of her parents who stared at her transfixed.
"Honey... if this what you want..."
"Please~ daddy? Lance wants it too... All da police-mans who want to help can go back to
the way they were before when we save everybody... "
Brian knelt down looking down at his child.
"Mary... are you sure that's you talking and not-"
Mary licked her father's muzzle, "Please~?"
Brain shuddered and went docile, looking almost entranced, "If that's what daddy's little
girl wants..."
Mary whispered the details of the part of Trevor's curse that locked him in his form. Brian
asked her daughter Transform or Dare, Mary answered without hesitation, and Brian told
her sealing her fate, and Mary then asked her parents the same question and they
obediently answered, and in a minute also, their fates too were sealed.
+++++++
The police officer when came into the house was a busty woman, blond, and had long
curly hair. She took one look at Serenity and said, "Hey Old Man Scotts. So old age finally
caught up with you again eh?"
"I'm Irish, ugh, WAS irish!"
"Same diff'."
"Not really!"
"Geeze sorry."
Paul came down from the roof grunting at his damaged ribs, looking decidedly tired after
his fight with the gray female with the ribbon, but he had rested only a short time, he
should have reseted longer but had proven stubborn.
"WHAO!" The she cop said, "This the nasty?!"
"Noh." Said the big orange ape.
"He isn't!" Serenity moved fast before the cop could grab her weapon.
"Geeze, don't scare me like that, this is Glendale, you don't know who you can trust..."
Trevor walked into the living room moving like a drunken sailor. Mary emerged with her
parents following behind and quickly scoped up Trevor.
"Good Mr. and Mrs. Hardy..." The blond she cop said in a perfectly calm and civilized voice
to who she saw as simply the rightful owners of the house.
Serenity looked at all of them. And sighed. Not wanting to bother to explain to the cop
that the Hardys weren't supposed to be lion people.
Of course Felicity dragged Ashley behind her.
"OFFICER SAVE ME!" Ashley tried.
The she cop looked, "This the nasty then?"
"Yes." The lions said together.
"We're going now." Serenity said simply.
"What?" Brian asked.
"You want us to abandon our home?" Felicity asked incredulous.
"I abandoned mine because Julie knew where it was... but somehow they found Julie after
she left with her daughters, that's who hired me to try and do something about her
vanishing husband whose apparently part of this pack too logically. Then Julie ended up
changed as well. Now they know where I was? Right after getting here? I don't believe in
random chance like that. We're going now. I already call Gill, the police chief to expect us
at the police station with the officer he sent."
"So ya know da curse is real?" Mary asked still holding Lance.
The buxom blond pointed at herself, "I used to be a effeminant man named Bob, joker
didn't think to make me harmlessly give the curse back to'em, but he didn't count on that I
still had my baton and police raining he tried to get down to business. And yeah, the joker
used the whole 'always this way and no way back' clause. Jerkass. But the prick wanted me
to appreciate everything that was gonna happen to me and left me that makes me me
intact."
Serenity asked, "Do you still have your turn?"
"Sorry no, I used it on a serial child kidnapper who had off early a while back (early cause
he wasn't in the ground yet), gave him a look that no would trust and sent him on his
way."
Serenity put two and two together. "And you let him KEEP THIS turn?"
"... I...didn't say I thought it out as well as I should have."
Mary however, had the monster who had changed at the back of her mind, her mind right
now was on her family and pride.
"Then let's get going." The she cop said, "I can call in the others maybe..."
Brain said, "We can take Trevor, Mary and the wolf in our car. You can fit Paul in yours
right?"
The cop replied rather agitated, "Now come on, she's a suspect and speaking of which."
She looked at Ashley, "You have the right to remain silent,-" The she cop began and told
the wolf her rights.
After hearing her right Ashley laughed, "Can you even try me in a human court? Ha ha!"
"You're a part of civilization like the Hardys, so save it. And now what's that nonsense
about me not taking the suspect in my squad car?"
"She's too big to fit, our car is build for people our size. And if she breaks lose, we're
better equipped to handle her."
"... fine... but if she escapes, you're facing jail time..."
"She won't."
++++++
The squad car drove with the Hardy's vehicle in front (if Ashley broke out it would likely be
from the rear), Brian driving, Mary sitting in Felicity's lab and Trevor in Mary's lab.
Ashley was mostly quite, though still throwing jabs about the lions being no match for the
superior brains of the wolves and The Master.
"There's got to be something we can do." Felicity sighed looking over at their prisoner.
"There's nothing you can do! My wolf self is complete! It's the only form I'll ever have!
Game over!"
Felicity thought. 'What's the point of all of this? Is it wrong I'm a lion, or is it wrong if I
thought 'I can just make more' if I lost Mary? Is it wrong these people are wolves... or is it
wrong they're slaves?'
"Ashley.... Transform or Dare?" Felicity said simply.
"HA! If I chose Dare you'll make me betray my family and pack! F'you! I chose transform!
I'd rather be a she wolf shaped bar of chocolate than stab my pack mates in the back
because of the game that brought us together to begin with! I CHOSE TRANSFORM! Suck
on that!"
Felicity face didn't change. "... Transform, into a person who can appreciate everything
you, and your Master, and all your pack mates: have done, are doing, and will do: with
perfect objectivity."
Ashley gasped. She shook her head and shook it again, she would have held her head i she
wasn't chained up. Instead she simply had to endure the feeling of her brain nearly being
split in two by the pain as she felt blood vessels pound and felt the cruel, vicious,
undeniable, ruthless, overwhelming, uncompromising, brighter than the sun sharper than
razors clarity of TRUTH! What Master and Alpha Female had done to each other. What
they had done to their parents. Marcine and Jack. Martha. Master's great grandfather. The
kitchen and ground staff who were now the gargoyles and shadows. The betas. Her pack
mates! The pups! Ashley screamed.
Her head leaned down as she patted heavily and bug-eyed. Her ears drooped flat against
her skull.
"Ashley?"
"I.... I remember... I remember all of it." What had Master, what had her pack, what SHE
done-?!
It also occurred to her now, objectively, if she hadn't been so hell bent on being the
heroine outright defying her captor heroically as her pack mate mounted as dramatic
rescue, she could have used her Transform or Dare on the lions. But that didn't really
matter anymore, what if's and could have's rarely did. What had she DONE, what she
DONE?!
Master should have never created the pack out of unwilling members, and fifty three. Fifty
three people not counting the six shadows, the six gargoyles, and Jack and Marcine, and
the five statues. Fifty three and twelves made sixty five, sixty five and seven made seventy
two. Seven two people, that was how many the game had altered, all of them against their
freedom of will... Well, Alexandra had said she would have willing been transformed
anyway, her loyalty to the Smiths trumped everything even before the transformation
Ashley thought logically. Alexandra had actually been agitated with Master that he hadn't
-trusted- her to accept the transformation willingly. But seventy one others... seventy
one. Including her. What choice had any of them been given?
"I remember it all." She repeated a third time. "All of it. .... I... I apologize for taking part in
invading your home and planning to assimilate your family and kidnapping your friends...
my loyalty is to Master and my pack but... that's no excuse for breaking the law and trying
to force our will on you... we could have -asked- Miss Serenity to leave us alone then and
there, and it should have been suggested, and with our numbers now at the level for short
term survival, -there's fifty-three of us total of the seventy-two transformed at the estate
by the way- we could have brought to the table that we would seek out no new victims
since we're immune to being revert anyway thanks to the choice of words of Alice, that's
our semantics master and the one who can pass through any reflective surface along with
her two cousins/half-sisters."
Of all the reactions the Transform would cause, none of the lions had expected this.
Felicity continued, "Ashley, what are you saying?"
"I love Master Jensen, I love my packmates, but we've doomed ourselves by using unwilling
people to transform into our pack... we'll be destroyed in one shape or another if we
continue this way. We were wrong to break and enter into your home, and to try and
kidnap Miss Serenity and Mr. Trevor just to have a chitchat." Ashley shivered, "What I did
was wrong and a crime... I was taught better than that." The she cop had been right
Ashley thought, they WERE part of civilization, and the pack couldn't survive if the Master
thought they were somehow ABOVE it.
The lions all looked at each other, again, they had expected the Transform to simply not
work, or for Ashley maybe to go crazy, or for her brainwashing to shatter. Only now, she
was the same as before, only now, as the Transform had specified, she could fully
appreciate everything she, her pack and Jensen had done from a perfectly fair and
impartial point of view.
"There are three of us who can pass through mirrors and take others with them, Alice,
Samantha and Abbey, all little girls, anyone whose not a wolf they bring in becomes made
out of living glass like them. Don't worry about being rough with them, they can't be so
much as scratched, it's part of their transform. There two other pups, Amy and Zelipe,
white and red fur, and pink fur, anyone they touch and call a Big Bad Wolf turns into one....
Oh, and Master is the big bad wolf... from the story book, it was part of the original
Transform that Alpha Female placed on him before she was Alpha Female."
Serenity needed to know, "... Who are they really? Jensen and Alpha Female?
"Jennifer Smith and Kyle Perkins."
Trevor heard the name, and fainted.
Ashley managed to catch this out of the corner of her eye, "Is he going to be okay?" She
asked, the fact that people who weren't part of her family and pack (which she still loved
and would still die for) were PEOPLE and not just 'potential wolves' awakening in her brain
again.
"... I think so..." Mary said innocently, "I think it's just time for his catnap."
++++
"Roger... your eye..." Megan looked horrified.
Where one eye had been was now only a bloody mess, Lawrence looked at her sadly with
his surviving one. "The cat that broke into the estate before did this... by the time we dealt
with it, those lion things attacked us next."
"Damn them." Megan snarled.
"Don't worry, you'll get to pay them back for me soon, Master is call in nearly everyone to
come with him to take care of them and capture Serenity one way or the other."
Megan gasped. "Master?! Is leaving the estate?!"
"He's left before to get his tooth made."
"But that wasn't into danger!"
"It's what Master wants, and it's for the greater good of the pack."
Megan merely nodded. 'Brother....' Megan thought dismayed.
"Did you have to take so long Alice?" Jensen said with her his army behind him.
Alice handed him the wording of doom, "Precision takes time father."
"I understand," Jensen said once again making the error of not trying to sense were
Serenity was now, assuming she'd still be at the house, "Let's go!"