Xander vol.1 Transmutation (8 page)

“
Whatever,” he mumbled as
he sent another wave of tentacles streaming their way.

Xander readied himself,
ready to take another stance, when a compact wall of dirt and
concrete came shoving up through the floor in front of them,
blocking the attack. Xander took a step back, startled as he heard
a growl of anger come from Richard.

“
Stay out of this, Nora!”
he bellowed from the other side.

Xander blinked repeatedly
as he looked back at Nora, whose hands were slightly raised, and
covered in small vines. He stared at her in awe as she
pleaded.

“
Please,” she whispered.
“You have to get – ah!” she cried as a tentacle wrapped around her
waist.

Xander reached out to grab
her, his eyes widening before she was forcibly flung out from
behind the wall and into one of the cement pillars of the
mall.

Her body fell limp to the
floor as another tentacle crashed through the compact wall, ripping
it apart. Xander quickly ducked out of the way of the tentacle,
jogging a few paces towards Nora’s body before he was stopped by
another. Xander frowned as he turned to face Richard, who held a
smug grin across his face.

“
She never listens,”
Richard sighed.

“
That’s enough,” Xander
said firmly, stepping towards Richard again. “Leave her
alone.”

“
Can’t do that, lover boy.
But you can join Juliet in death, if you’d like,” Richard taunted
as he readied his assets.

At once, two metal arms
came charging at Xander. Holding his stance, he latched his hands
onto them, letting them coil tightly around his arms with a grunt.
Richard laughed.

“
Got you now,” he
breathed.

But it was Xander who had
Richard. He glared, his violent eyes narrowing as a spark was seen
within them. A spark that traveled through his body and into his
hands. Richard’s expression wavered just slightly as he noticed the
spark, and then dramatically as he felt it.

All at once he felt the
high voltage Xander shot through his from his own tentacles, the
water beneath them acting as a magnifier for its power. Richard’s
body spazzed for a few moments before falling limp with a splat
onto the damp floor. His tentacles slumped from their vice-like
grip and joined him on the floor beside Xander.

Xander let his arms fall
to his side as he watched Richard’s still body, waiting for any
movement or signs of striking back. When he found none, he turned
back to Nora, who still laid motionless on the floor behind him
where the water had yet to reach. He made his way to her, kneeling
down to scoop her up into his arms.

Chapter 8

At the old abandoned
house, Loni was beginning her job of analyzing each and every place
that Saphora, Hydra, or Arol had spent any significant amount of
time in. And with the house being the point of impact for Saphora,
it was no surprise that it was on the top of her list.

Most of the house had been
covered in yellow police tape. Not wanting to brush up against
anything, Loni had done most of her snooping as a lioness,
providing her with a much higher level of agile
movement.

Reaching the kitchen of
the house, she ducked under a couple of haphazardly placed lines of
tape before leaping up onto the dusty marble countertop. She
sniffed about its surface, her nostrils flaring periodically as she
exhaled.

She craned her neck up
towards the hole that ripped through the kitchen ceiling and
through the deteriorating roof. Again, she sniffed, but again she
did not catch the scent that she was hoping for.

At this point, she had
searched the entire area, along with its surrounding area, and
there was still no sign of the escape pod that Saphora had been
riding in. There was the possibility of course that they had landed
in separate areas. But Loni was skeptical, even though Saphora was
an Ekechi, that she would have survived such a fall from such a
distance if the escape pod was not nearby. Which left the other
option.

That it was
taken.

Her thoughts were
interrupted by the ringing of her communicator in the pouch she had
left by the front door. Or doorway, rather. The door had long been
kicked in. Loni leapt down from the countertop and stealthily made
her way over to the pouch before morphing, reaching in, and
answering.

“
Loni,” she answered
officially.

“
Loni,” Xander repeated,
always being one to call out the name he wished to speak to. Loni’s
head nodded exaggeratingly slowly, never understanding why he had
to repeat her name when she had just said it, in addition to the
fact that they could see one another.

“
Yes, Xander,” she
somewhat sighed in mild annoyance. “What is it? I’m
busy.”

“
We
may
have a problem,” he started,
dragging out his words. Loni pinched her brows together with a
slight groan. She’d left him alone for under 48 hours, and already
there was a problem.

“
What kind of
problem?”

“
I think I may have found
something.”

“
Something like
what?”

“
Well … Someone. Two of
them, actually. But where they’re two, I’m sure there are
more.”

“
What are you talking
about?”

Xander hesitated before
moving the communicator to the side, capturing the view of Nora,
who laid unconsciously on one of the sofas in Fran’s house. Loni’s
eyes squinted as she leaned forward, trying to get a better look of
the woman unknown to her.

“
Who is that?” asked
Loni.

“
I rescued her. I don’t
know who she is.”

“
Rescued her from
what?”

“
Who,” Xander corrected,
adjusting the communicator to face him. “He wasn’t human, and
neither is she. It looked like he was trying to kill her. I don’t
know why.”

“
Where was
this?”

Xander hesitated, not
wanting to give away where he had been visiting for the past two
days.

“
At … one of the human’s
local communing buildings.”

“
What were you doing
there?” Loni scolded. “We’re supposed to be –“

“
Don’t worry about why I
was there. Worry about what I found, and what’s laying on – urgh!”
Xander grunted as a thick vine suddenly latched around his
neck.

He dropped the
communicator and immediately reached his hands up to tug at the
thick plant. Loni’s eyes widened as she suddenly viewed Xander from
beneath him, where the communicator had fallen.

“
Xander?” Loni screamed,
waiting for him to break free from the ambush. “Xander!” she
screamed again when she was not answered.

Stuffing the communicator
back into the pouch, she zipped it back up before morphing, taking
the small bag into her mouth and taking off, using her exceptional
speed to hightail it to the house.

At said house, Xander had
been turned around to face the now awake, alert and disarrayed
Nora. She had her honey eyes locked on Xander, her body curled up
at the far end of the sofa in what almost looked like paranoia. The
vine that was wrapped around Xander’s neck was coming from her
wrist, as he could now see. He patted it, almost lovingly as he
coughed.

“
It’s okay. You’re okay,”
he wheezed. “It’s me – the one that came to help you.”

It took a few seconds for
his words to sink through the jumbled mess that was Nora’s mind.
But once they did, her eyes widened, and the vine retreated,
letting Xander fall to the floor. Nora rushed off the sofa to his
side as he rubbed his red neck with his hand. Her hands hovered
apologetically over his body.

“
I – I’m so sorry,” she
whimpered. “Are you okay?”

“
Move,” Xander coughed in
response. Nora’s brows furrowed in confusion as he moved onto his
knees.

“
What?”

“
Move!” he shouted as he
pushed her back onto the carpeted floor.

She looked up at him in
disbelief as he hurriedly got to his feet and spun around. Almost
on cue, his body collided with the overgrown lioness that came
charging into the room. Loni snarled as she attempted to claw
around Xander’s body at Nora, who squealed and promptly crawled
back. Xander’s heels dug into the floor as he was pushed back from
Loni’s force. His arms tightened around her torso as he fought
against it.

“
Loni, stop!” Xander
ordered. “She didn’t mean it!” Loni roared again as she tried to
move Xander out of the way. But Xander was persistent. “Loni!”
Xander bellowed.

Loni morphed, swooping
down to take her gun from her pouch and aim it at Nora, who was
cowering against the far wall of the living room.

“
What are you?” Loni
demanded.

Xander still stood
partially between them, though didn’t stop her, for he was curious
of the answer as well. Nora, eyes wide, almost scoffed at the
question as she looked over the woman’s body which had just moments
ago been the body of a lioness.

“
What are
you
?” Nora
countered.

Loni hesitated against the
comeback as the grip on her weapon tightened. Xander placed his
hand on the gun, eyeing Loni warningly.

“
Ladies …” he started,
glancing between the two fair-haired women.
Mother help me
, he thought to
himself. “We all have some explaining to do, okay? Why don’t we
just … put the gun down? Loni? And introduce ourselves,” Xander
suggested as he successfully lowered his guardian’s hand, taking
the gun from her.

Loni and Nora stared each
other down as Xander slowly placed the weapon back in the pouch
that sat on the floor. He carefully placed himself between them,
keeping more of an eye on Loni than Nora.

“
Right then … I’m Xander.
And this …” he gestured to Loni with one hand. “… is my guardian,
Loni. She can get a little protective when she sees someone trying
to kill me. So excuse her hospitality, or lack thereof.” There was
a short moment of silence before Xander continued, this time
gesturing his hand to Nora. “And you are?”

“
Nora,” she answered
flatly, her eyes still glued on Loni’s tense body.

Xander nodded, giving an
encouraging smile as he sighed.

“
Okay. See? That wasn’t
–“

“
What are you?” Loni asked
again, cutting Xander off. “You aren’t human,” Loni pointed out,
having heard it from Xander.

This time, Nora hesitated,
anything but trusting of Loni. She glanced at Xander, seeing his
expression of admitted curiosity. Her lips fell into a hard line as
she averted her eyes. This wasn’t how she imagined exposing herself
and the operation that the doctor was running. But at this point,
she was in need of any help that she could get. And if Xander had
helped her once, maybe he as willing to do it again.

“
He calls us
Chimera.”

“
Chimera?” Loni
repeated.

“
He?” Xander asked, more
interested in the man behind the curtain.

Nora gave a hesitant nod
as she adjusted her back against the wall she sat against. Xander’s
eyes instinctively roamed her body, driven by curiosity. He
wondered how a mutation could be so subtle. He’d seen the humans –
plenty of them. And Nora, she didn’t look anything out of the
ordinary when he compared their appearances in his head. His eyes
narrowed as he analyzed again. She looked just like any other
human. Heck, she could pass as an Athenian whether or not she kept
her vines to herself.

“
Chimera or not,” Loni
glowered, pushing Xander’s hovering arm away from her as she bent
down to pick up her pouch.

They both watched her
carefully as she turned around and began stepping towards the front
door that had been carelessly left open.

“
I want it out of
here.”

“
Hey,” Nora complained in
response to being called out of her name. Loni spun on her heel to
pierce her eyes once again.

“
It won’t be so easy to
stop me next time.”

“
Loni –“ Xander
pressed.

“
We don’t have time for
this, Xander,” Loni scolded. “You know this. Bring her back to
wherever you got her from, and get your work done. We didn’t come
here for this.”

Xander kept quiet during
the foreseen scolding. He expected as much from Loni in regards to
anything other than research he mentioned. And admittedly, Nora was
a big anything.

“
And keep this door
closed!” Loni shouted before slamming the door behind her. Nora
flinched at the abrupt volume, her brows furrowing as her eyes rose
to Xander’s face.

Back at Clemming’s City
Mall, there were officers crawling all over the area of the broken
fountain, tagging and bagging anything they thought they’d need.
There was yellow tape all over what was left of the fountain, which
was crackled and crushed against its raised edges.

The rubble was scattered
about the scratched and dusty floor. There were little triangular
tags around various pieces of rubble, as well the wall that Nora
had put up, for Richard to tear down. The mall had been closed
since the incident a couple of days ago.