Flying Blind Ch. 02

Heda's head bobbed around for a moment, then she admitted that she was. Sort of. "It's early in the relationship."

"You? In a relationship? After leaving a trail of broken hearts and warm beds across half of Europe?"

"Oh don't get all high and mighty on me," Heda grumbled. "It's not like you're a saint."

He smiled. "Never said I was. But a blind shifter?"

Heda stopped and got in Ed's face. "You had better be on your best manners," she said.

"Hmm, sounds serious. Don't worry, I don't go in for that 'DM' bullshit. You know that."

She sighed, then hugged him. "I know."

Joanna clapped her friend on the shoulder. "She's just our protective mother hen."

"Hen?" Heda said. "Listen here lizard lips --"

"Lizard? Oh, you are in so much shit for that!"

Ed sighed. His sister had not changed at all.

Ten minutes later, they were sitting in the radio station office, waiting for Madison to wrap up her between-song monologue.

"She's got a sexy voice," Ed whispered.

"You don't know the half of it," Heda replied.

Billy waved at her. "You can go in now. You've got about ten minutes 'til she's back on the air."

"Cool beans. C'mon," Heda said, pulling her brother by the arm. "Hey babe," she said when she was clear of the door.

"Hey!" Madison said, turning around and her eyes glowing . . . "Crap!" she shouted, noticing the strange man standing in the doorway. She turned off her Gift and reached for her glasses. "Sorry, but the light . . . in my eyes and --"

Heda pulled her friend's hand away and kissed her. Madison was trying to object despite the lip-lock for several seconds before she just gave up and melted. Heda reluctantly let go of that bottom lip and then, "It's okay. Madison, this is my brother Edgar. Edgar, this is the infamous Madison Sloan. Madison, Edgar is actually a paranormal private investigator that the university has called in to help with the kidnapping."

Madison extended her hand in a random direction, causing Heda to sigh.

"He won't tell anyone, and he already knows something is up."

"But what still escapes me," Ed interjected dryly. "Okay, you're Gifted. Got that part."

Madison thwacked Heda on the arm. "Don't ever just walk in with a stranger without warning me!"

"He's not a stranger! Strange, but not a stranger."

"Is one of the two of you going to explain her whole sight thing? Please?"

Madison shrugged. "I'm legally blind."

Ed slapped his face.

"Madison --" Heda whined pitifully.

"Okay, okay. I can use echolocation in human form. Bat sonar. So there."

"Was that so hard?!" Ed said throwing his hands up. "Nice to meet you by the way. When would be a good time to talk to you? In a straight-forward way where you just answer my questions rather than confuse me?"

"I'm free for lunch," Madison said a bit shyly. "Heda, did you want to join us?"

"I've got classes from ten-thirty until two, then I've got practice. Don't worry, Ed will be a gentleman. Because if he isn't, he knows I can kick his ass." She kissed Madison while glaring at Ed. "We're gonna split, but I'll talk to you tomorrow after practice. Okay?" Another kiss.

"Sure. Hey, how did the meeting the Fuhrer go?"

Heda stopped in her tracks. "Uh, it went well. We can get out of our housing contracts, so Peter's going to call his uncle in the morning. We'll keep a room open for you."

"So he wasn't a total ass?"

"No, he was --" She paused, wondering how Madison would take the idea of Heda consorting with the enemy. "He was professional," she said, and left it at that.

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The next afternoon . . .

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"Seriously, it was that bad?" Madison added, trying not to break down into another laughing fit.

"And don't even get me started on the scrabble competitions. Heda is a NUT for words. When most girls were getting their first Barbie Dreamhouse, my father actually had to build a Barbie Library for her."

Madison laughed so hard she almost cried. "I'm not sure what's scarier. That she would want the library or that she played with Barbies!"

"Oh, she won't want to admit it, but she was a girly girl, in an alternative kind of way. She has, and I kid you not, read the dictionary."

"No fucking way!"

"Yep. It was a junior dictionary, but it was still fuckin' huge. My mom bet her she couldn't do it as a way of shutting her up. It did for an entire summer. Then my sister walks into the kitchen one day, and keep in mind she was thirteen, and slammed the dictionary on the table. Mom says, 'You know if had just raked the leaves like I'd asked, you could have earned this in an a few hours.' Puts twenty bucks on the table and just looks so smug. Heda goes, 'Yeah, but then I wouldn't have had an excuse not to do chores all summer.' Mom just about shit herself." He reached out to keep Madison from falling out of her chair.

"I knew she was smart, but --"

"Oh, she's horrible at the sciences, I promise you that. Words and athletics make her happy. That and being one-up on Mom in their never-ending verbal maneuvering."

"And you've got two other brothers, right?"

He nodded. "The twins, Richard and Rob. Rob's in grad school and is gonna be a lawyer, and Richard's a fire fighter up in Denver."

"Are you all full shifters? I can't tell that, even with the sonar," she said dejectedly.

"Actually, it's just Heda, Mom, and me. Heda got the Progenitor Strain, obviously, but for me the Noah Strain was dominant. Probably Dad's genes. Richard and Rob also have the Noah Strain, but their totem animals haven't manifested. Dad's never did."

Madison nodded. There were two ways in the shifter world to gain lycanthropy, which was to contract either the Progenitor Strain or the Noah Strain of the disease. Both Strains existed in the same DNA sequence, but whichever activated first, it killed the other. Those with the Progenitor Strain inherited the totem animal of a parent with active lycanthrope, and those with this Strain always developed the ability to shift. This Strain was only transmitted in the mother's womb. The Noah Strain was a little different in that those who had it dominant might never shift. On the other hand, they might also develop the ability to shift into a totem animal of any species.

No one was sure why certain species were "chosen" and others were not, but it seemed to help keep some great planet-wide balance. Whenever one species began to die out for any reason, the Noah Strain seemed to start favoring that species. Philosophers and scientists in the shifter world were still debating the "whys" and "wherefores," but most people just accepted it and moved on. The Noah Strain could be transfered in the womb or by a savage transfusion of blood, such as in an attack. Such attacks were more often than not fatal and had been disallowed by the World Shifter Council. And the older one got, the less likely it would be that the Noah Strain would manifest, with Neil Reichert's late-bloomer status a rare exception.

"So what kind of bird are you?" she asked.

"Raven."

Madison let out a little gasp and leaned back. Ravens were the mystics of the bird world. Magic rarely if ever worked on them, and they could trace magic back to the source. But there was another "gift" that sometimes happened that was less welcome. "Have you ever had the visions?" she asked.

He shook his head. It was a common question, though it always made him a tad uneasy, as if answering the question would jinx his luck. Raven-shifters sometimes developed the ability to prophetize or see into the future, but it often came with a price in that the seer went mad. "Nope, and here's to hoping I never do." He raised a soda can and clinked it against Madison's, who reacted with a "Here here."

"Well well well," came an all too familiar voice that made Madison develop an unflattering snarl. "Seems like the Fuck-a-loser club got a new member. Listen buddy," Alvin said as he stepped up to the table, "you look like the kind of guy who can do better than to pity fuck a DM, so why don't you scram so the bitch and I can talk."

"Ed, this is Alvin Hannity. He's already made the DM joke and called me a bitch, so his use as a conversational partner is pretty well spent. Of course, that tirade went on longer than his dates usually do --"

"You fucking --"

Ed slowly stood up and turned to face Alvin Hannity and his three goons. Two of them just HAD to be from the football team, and the girl just seemed to have "For a good time call" tattooed onto her psyche. "Alvin Hannity? Any relation to William Hannity?"

"He's my father," Alvin said.

"Your father is a great man," Ed said. "I did some work with him hunting down an embezzler a while back. I liked him. So are you really his son, or did the local mailman get a little forward with the missus because YOU are nothing like him."

"Fuck you," Alvin said, hauling his hand back.

Before his opponent could punch, Ed had produced a shiny badge, which got Alvin's attention. "I'm a Paranormal Private Investigator here on official business of the FCU Council of Shifters and the North American Shifter Council."

"So what? So you're a private dick."

"But at least I'm not a public dick," Ed replied calmly. "But I can recommend to both Councils that someone be held for questioning, and displaying random bouts of sociopathic behavior certainly moves you up the suspect list."

Alvin looked perplexed. "Huh?"


"It means, guano for brains, that he can arrest you and parade you around like a suspect if he wants," she said acidly. "So get lost. My complaint against you isn't going away, though I wish to the Goddess that you would."

"I don't know who the hell you think you are," Alvin said, "but you obviously don't know who you're messing with."

"Actually, I do. I even identified you by lineage." Ed put his arm around Madison's shoulders. "Am I daft, or does he really have a problem with short-term memory?" He sighed. "And my name is Edgar Adler."

"As in Heda's brother," Madison chipped in.

Ed rolled his eyes. "Usually it's, 'Oh look, it's Jessica's boy.' Now, it's 'Heda's brother'? Why can't I just be known for me?"

Alvin was furious about being ignored when he was attempting to be threatening. "You wouldn't be so tough without your badge."

"Actually," Edgar replied, his voice so cold that it was almost brittle, "my badge is the only thing keeping me from beating you into mulch were you stand."

"C'mon Alvin, the bitch ain't worth this," Bill Baker said, trying to drag his illustrious leader away. Alvin put up a good show of pretending he still wanted to stay and fight, but something about Edgar's gaze and tone put his nerves on edge.

"Punk ass bitch," Ed muttered under his breath, then he turned a curious eye to Madison. "Okay, want to explain THAT?"

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That evening . . .

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'No one is listening,' the Cold thought, moving through its own lair like a harsh Arctic wind. 'Why would they? Fools! They did not listen the last time, but by all that is unholy I will make them understand.' He looked towards the Spanish Mantle and the One inside. The One's tongue had been ruined and it smelled of feces and urine and stank of a fear so tangible it could almost be touched. The Cold approached the One. "You will go now, and you will let them know. You will speak volumes without saying a word. You will continue the Message." It grabbed another special tool off of a nearby tray. "Prepare."

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Some time later . . .

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Heda stepped out of the gymnasium after the practice from hell. She was convinced that her coach was the devil herself come up from hell to make Heda run shuttle sprints until she sold her soul in order to escape. It was the only thing that made any sense. Her brother was perched on the short wall that was in front of the gym.

"Hey, how'd the talk with Madison go?"

"I've gotta tell ya, I like this one Heda. She's got a good head and a sharp tongue, as I discovered when one Alvin Hannity showed up. You could've warned my about the 90210 drama ya know."

"It just didn't occur to me. I take it you scared him off?"

"Yeah. Madison got a kick out of it. She told me she hasn't had a lot of 'backup' until you showed up."

"It bugs me that people make such a deal about the blindness, which a lot of them probably wouldn't do if she'd just come out about her Gift."

"People who have been wounded are cautious," Ed reminded her. "Be patient. So tomorrow --" He stopped talking when Heda's cell phone went off.

"That's not my ring tone," she muttered, then remembered her other phone and her heart skipped a beat. "It's the Neighborhood Watch phone," she said, quickly shifting through her bag to find it. She pulled it out, placed it to her ear, and immediately turned pale. "Yeah. Understood. Actually he's with me. Got it." She hung up. "They found the second victim."

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To be continued . . .