Sumer (Working Title)

Prologue



I was twelve years old when my mom died. Her death was not sudden, or something that came as a surprise. She'd been dying for a long time. Most of the last year of her life was spent too weak to leave her bed. The curtains were never open, always drawn against the light too painful for her lackluster eyes. She was always sleeping. Her ashen face was paler than the starkness of the pillow. Her brown hair, once full of curls and bounce, was dull and limp with her illness. On the occasion that she was awake, we would talk in hushed whispers to one another. I imagined we were like sisters telling each other secrets in the darkness of our nighttime room.

Then, her bed was empty. The curtains were opened, letting sudden bright light spill in onto the bare bed and the quiet room. The nurse took Mom's life-sustaining equipment. I became a shadow in the house, sulking from room to room with my music player shutting the world out.

Maybe that's why I felt the connection with the most wild thing on the planet. A spark. Some sort of understanding.

A few days after Mom died, Dad dragged me with him to the warehouse. I didn't want to go. But that didn't matter. He'd been informed that someone had trapped a couple kats, the wildest of all the wild creatures on this alien planet. He had to take me along. Mom was dead. The nurse was gone. There wasn't a choice.

I was still reeling from Mom's death. She'd only been gone a short while. Her absence, though I'd been prepared months for it, was still a shock. Knowing it was going to happen hadn't made me any less pissed at the universe for taking her away from me.

While Dad spoke with the mayor, policemen, and veterinarian about possible euthanasia, I curled my upper lip in disdain and wandered away. The building was dark and creepy, but I was not afraid. My music pounded in my ears, muffling the effect of the world on my senses. I shoved forward through odds and ends of equipment until I came to a large iron cage.

My breath caught in my throat. Green, glowing eyes. Three sets. They were looking straight at me like multiple stabs to my body. Piercing. My legs trembled. Caught in their collective gazes, I couldn't move.

When I remembered to breathe, and that they were behind bars, I thumbed my music off and tugged the buds from my ears. The world was strangely quiet. I let the buds dangle around my neck as I stared back into the eyes of the wildest creature I would supposedly ever see on planet Sumer. But, they didn't seem all that wild to me. Unlike tales I had heard adults recount over and over at the breakfast table, on the porch, or in the garage, these eyes did not watch me with hunger and ferocity. Rather, I felt my own sorrow and helplessness reflected back to me.

I breathed.

The kats moved, and so did I. Like some silent query had bid me, “Come closer,” I answered and stepped to the cage. Placing my hands on the cool bars, I peered in. I was not afraid of the wild creatures on the other side. They shifted, their eyes moving in the dark. Their giant, shadowy forms ducked away from me. One in particular met my gaze with an intelligence that I was not aware existed in the species. He stood, towering above me in the cage, and stepped closer to me. I could feel his heat on my hands he was so close.

I didn't move. I craned my head up to look into his feline-like face. Small, rounded ears pricked towards me, waiting like a patient man with palms outspread. The short, gray fur around his face was smoothed back. His lips quivered around his small, rounded muzzle. The nose was pale, pink velvet. There were no whiskers.

I met his green, pleading eyes.

These were not wild creatures.

The lights flashed on. I squinted in the sudden brightness. The group in the cage huddled together, casting worried gazes upon each other. The one standing shifted away as his eyes looked behind me.

“Rae,” Dad yelled, starting me. I had not really heard his voice in several days, had resorted to lip reading rather than listen to him trying to console me. I jerked away from the cage. “What the hell are you doing? Those animals are dangerous.” He grabbed me around my shoulders with his large, work roughened hands and pulled me close to him. His brown eyes were fearful under his bushy brows.

The kats behind the thick iron bars watched us. Frightened and staying near each other, they pressed against the backside of their cage. Unable to get any further away. Unable to escape.

“C'mon, honey,” Dad said as the police, the mayor, and the vet carrying a rifle, all gathered around. They were big men. I knew their faces. Little did I know they would forever be etched with contempt in my memory from this moment on.

“You don't need to see this.” He spoke softly while he nodded to the men. The vet raised the rifle to his shoulder and waited. He looked at me, and then at Dad.

My heart seized. Realization dawned.

“You're going to kill them?” I cried. Euthanasia. Death.

“Rae.” Dad leaned down next to me. “They are very dangerous animals. We can't risk turning them loose and having them come back. People's lives are at stake, and our livestock.”

I gasped, shocked and heart pumping. I stared at the Kats. They shuddered in fear, skin covered in velvet smooth fur twitched. They knew. There was nothing I could do to save them. There was nothing they could do to save themselves. They were looking at the last few moments of life. Mewing like whimpers met my ears. I cried.

Dad dragged me away. My eyes were caught on the solemn gaze of the kat that had approached me. He wanted to communicate. Around him, his companions huddled close. His intelligent stare held mine, trying to convey some silent message to me. Our locked eyes was severed as Dad forced me through the side door into the cold, winter world outside.

Pop, pop, pop.

The gun cracked and echoed in the building. Were they bullets? “Humane” darts filled with deadly poison?

My breath hitched and caught, and I gasped. Dad led me away to our car. I shoved the buds back into my ears with shaking fingers and turned my music back on, trying to drown out the cruel world that stole my mom, and killed the innocent.



Chapter One



The town meeting was underway when I slid in through the back doors. My friend Izzie dragged her feet behind me. I'd planned my visit home from college to coincide with this worried and anxious get together. Kats were the topic of discussion, as always.

“Those wild vermin are becoming a real problem,” A rancher declared loudly. Billy. He lived the farthest out of town. His wide brimmed hat was set far back on his head, revealing his concerned steel gray eyes to the audience.

Wild. The adjective wasn't really necessary. All kats are wild. Once, they were like shadows that no one ever saw in the expansive forest very near our town. Like an invisible ghost to the superstitious, we knew they existed, but never caught sight of one. In recent years, attacks on livestock started occurring. Ranchers were concerned, and they blamed the kat.

“I call to put a bounty on their heads,” Billy continued. “We need to take care of them, before they take care of us. It's gotten so bad that I won't let my kids out of sight, and if I keep the animals any closer to the homestead, they'll be eating off our table.”

There were several nods and murmurs of approval as Izzie and I shuffled further into the meeting room. We took the chairs at the back.

“How much of a bounty?” Dad asked Billy. Of course Dad would be here. He saw me and nodded in my direction with a small smile. I hadn't seen him since my birthday two months ago. He sat next to the mayor as an assistant to mediate the meeting. Sometimes I wondered why he wasn't, or ever had been, mayor of Abbey. He was the role without the title. Had been for years.

Izzie leaned over and whispered, “The Spot would be so more interesting. We haven't seen each other in months and the first place you drag me is here. I better get an A on this test.”

She glared at me and flicked her light brown hair over her thin shoulder. I had always been envious of her thin, straight hair and model perfect body. I returned her glare. In exchange for accompanying me, I was to help her study for a chemistry exam.

Rather than say anything, I simply hushed her and leaned forward. They wanted to put a bounty on the kats? My brow furrowed as I imagined people slinking through the forest with rifles and shooting at anything that moved. People would come from all over, dispersing into the forest, to get in on it.

“500 dollars?” Billy replied, shrugging his shoulders. “I hadn't put much thought into it. I just figured it was a good, simple solution. We need help to get rid of these kats before we all lose our source of income. I know I speak for all of us here when I say that without our livestock, we're broke.”

My heart quickened. I clenched my fists tightly on my knees. Everything within me wanted to jump up and shout out that it was a mistake. Surely, they must be wrong about the kats killing livestock. And we certainly couldn't shoot them. There was something horribly wrong in doing so. Kats weren't what everyone thought they were. What I saw when I was twelve years old clearly proved to me that there was something more to them, something no one else understood. It was something I still wasn't sure that I understood. Didn't anyone know anything about them?

Aside from my own feelings on it, a decision to kill them couldn't be made without understanding the importance they may have to the balance of Sumer's ecosystems. Such a widespread species, found on all continents, in all terrains, must have value to the planet.

The thought of shooting them made me cringe. I still had nightmares about what the veterinarian did to those kats in the warehouse. To this day, I couldn't face him without recalling the rifle to his shoulder, his finger on the trigger. Blue eyes focused on the target.

I knew one thing. Kats had feelings. That made them much, much more than a wild animal like a Sumerian lion, or a Terran grizzly, long extinct now.

“That's okay. 500 dollars is a start,” Dad replied, kicking back in his chair.

“We'll have to set up a perimeter around the town so folks don't get too trigger happy near city limits,” Zane Matson, Abbey's mayor, said. He leaned forward in his rickety chair and ran a hand through his shaggy, blond hair. He was a fit man. Tall and wiry, he was a runner by appearance and spent his free time training for marathons.

“Would there be a market for kat pelts?” My gaze shot to the owner of the voice. Barbara. Front row. She and her family lived near Billy. They owned a flock of sheep. “If people could not only get a reward, but also sell the pelts, there might be more success in managing kat numbers.” Her curly hair stuck out from her hardened face.

“That's barbaric!” I cried out, lurching forward in my seat. My voice echoed in the meeting room. Over a dozen pairs of eyes swiveled onto me and I clamped a hand over my mouth. I was usually invisible.

“There's not much barbaric about it,” Dad explained calmly. “It's an old practice, that's all.”

“It's cruel,” I stuttered. “It's wrong. Killing animals for their pelts, or other parts, ended a long time ago.”

Izzie put a hand on my forearm. “Take it easy, girl. You'll draw blood.”

I didn't realize that my hands had become so clenched into fists that they were white. I could feel a slight stinging in my palm where my pink painted nails bit through the skin. My heart fluttered wildly in my chest, like a bird's frantic wings. I should have known that the meeting wouldn't have good things to say about kats. I should have stuck to my dorm room and studied for Monday's calculus exam. But, when Dad told me about the meeting concerning the kats, I had to come home to be present for it. I had to hear what would be said. Even if I didn't like it.

Shooting the kats was poor management. What if it was discovered years down the road that like the Terran wolf, kats had a place and role in the ecosystem? An important one. What if we nearly wiped them out and Sumer fell apart? Who were we, only generations old on the surface of a billion year old rock – the equivalent of a blink in time – to make such alterations to the environment? We were the ones destroying their native homelands, their forest and territory. We logged extensively, and we introduced Terran livestock to Sumer's distinctly different ecosystem, and we shoved the Sumerian wildlife aside.

“But.” My eyes swept the room. Everyone watched me expectantly. Some were annoyed. Most were indifferent. I was John Grays awkward, introverted daughter. The one who liked kats like some girls liked Terran horses. I heard rumors that most of the town figured I'd gone crazy after Mom died, leaving me to darker tendencies. Not many had been sad to watch me go off to the university, versus staying with Izzie, and a lot of other teens from my graduating class, at the junior college.

“Rae,” Dad said. “You've been gone a while. You don't know. The kats' attacks have increased. One a night now, sometimes two. Our town is on the verge of not being safe anymore. We have to make important decisions to protect each other. If hunting and killing a few of these kats lessons those attacks, then...” he trailed off, his point made. Then, it would be good to kill them.

I disagreed. Wholly, and completely.

“It's murder,” I said.

“It's hunting,” Dad corrected. “A popular past-time for hundreds of years.”

I shook my head and squinted my eyes at Dad. “Sport hunting. That hasn't been done for a long time. Hunting is to eat, for nourishment. Is there a market for kat flesh?”

“You sound like a hippie,” the mayor said.

“If I had to decide between my family and my livestock, or a damn kat, I'd shoot the kat,” Billy said. “No hesitation. I might eat him, but probably I'd hang his carcass on my fence to warn other kats away.”

I was repulsed, and was sure my expression belied just that revulsion.

Izzie glanced at me.

I gritted my teeth. “Maybe we shouldn't be here. The only reason they are attacking – scratch that, the only reason they might attack...I mean there's no proof its kats anyway...is because we are cutting down their forests and encroaching upon their territory.”

“John,” TJ, the sheriff stated sharply, his eagle piercing eyes glaring at me over his sharp nose. He was there that night in the warehouse. Younger then. I remembered those who were there that night darkly, with almost hatred. Including myself sometimes.

Sheriff TJ continued, “Why don't you send that damn fool girl of yours back to the city with all the other hippies like her. Don't know why she comes home anyhow.” He mumbled the last part, flicking the table with his forefinger. He was one who hadn't been sorry to see me leave. He was always looking for some excuse to take me to Dad when I was in high school. Whenever I turned around he was watching me. He wanted to catch me drinking underage, speeding in my pickup, or even littering.

“Careful, Sheriff,” Dad warned. “Rae is my daughter.”

“Well, keep her quiet, then. Children should be seen and not heard.”

“I'm not a child, anymore,” I said defensively. “I have a right to be here and voice my opinion.”

“Not really, girly. You haven't lived here in years. So technically, you're not a member of the town -”

“Sheriff,” Dad said sharply. “Really?”

Mayor Zane cleared his throat while Dad, Sheriff TJ, and I glowered at each other.

“Sheriff, you're being out of line. Rae grew up here. She will always be a part of this community.”

“She wants to let these kats run wild and free,” Billy said in the sheriff's defense. “Don't we have a right? These kats are killing our livelihood.”

“Yes,” Mayor Zane agreed. “So let's do this civil. Rather than hash it out in a never-ending debate, let's take a vote.”

There were mumbles of agreement and eager faces. They wanted to do something. To take action.

“All in favor of the bounty?”

“Yes,” an almost unanimous chorus of voices rose in the room, followed by everyone's hand greeting the air. Even Dad's.

“Opposed?” Mayor Zane looked at me.

“I oppose it,” I said defiantly. I jerked on Izzie's hand, but she remained still.

“I am not voting,” she hissed in my ear. “I just want a freaking A so I can get my apprenticeship.”

“All right, then,” Mayor Zane concluded. “I'll run this through the ranks, but I don't see why our request won't be approved. We should have a legal bounty set within a few weeks.”

I jumped to my feet, glowering at Dad. His expression was impassive, the same one he used on me all through my childhood when I disagreed with him. The look he gave me often since Mom died. Like he didn't know what to do with me.

Shaking my head, I dragged Izzie outside with me as I had dragged her in, wishing childishly that I could slam the door behind me.

~*~

I awoke with a start, my heart fluttering in my chest. The world was shaking, or maybe it was just me. I was tangled in my bed sheets and as I thrashed free of them, I tried to remember where I was. My surroundings were familiar, but not right. Oh, yes. I was surrounded by my childhood bedroom, not my apartment bedroom to which I had become accustomed to seeing every morning for the last couple years.

My vision was fuzzy and my eyes burned. I felt sobs close to bursting from my chest. What had I dreamed that left me feeling so lost and helpless? I blinked and the tears ran hot down my cold cheeks. I slowly rolled up and braced myself on the edge of my bed where I hung on like the world was spinning out of control. My hair clumped in tangles around my face and tickled my cheeks, but I didn't bother to tuck the strands away.

I hated it when I woke up from a nightmare and couldn't remember what it was. Flashes of desolation, darkness, and green eyes. Kats. That was all I knew. It was a recurring theme. And every time I woke up, that was all I remembered.

“Rae,” Dad knocked sharply on my door. I jumped. “Get up. It's festival day. I told Zane we'd help set up.”

“Seriously,” I croaked. “You volunteered me?”

“Yes, so get up.” I started to protest, but heard his footsteps retreat down the hall.

Swiping the back of my hand across my cheeks, I threw the blankets from my lap, and stood. As I fumbled through my mostly empty drawers looking for clothes suitable to work in, I tried to mentally shake the last vestiges of irrational fear. Rather than dig into my subconscious, I distracted myself by pondering what Izzie might have in store for me tonight. If it was like any other Harvest Festival evening in the past, it was bound to be interesting, in the least. I just hoped that I kept all my clothes on this time. Was there a full moon tonight? I worried on that.

Izzie and I were as opposite as the faces on either side of the Jefferson coin. One side was rolling landscape and sunrise, the other side was an eagle flying wild and free. I was the landscape. Izzie was flying. I was grounded in reality. She was a free-spirit in her own perfect world. And had dragged me all sorts of crazy places since high school.

The phone rang downstairs as I was pulling my t-shirt over my head. It was silenced on the second ring. “Rae,” Dad called up the stairwell. “It's Izzie. Get up!”

Sighing, I grabbed my sweatshirt that was draped across the back of my desk chair and pulled it on over my fresh shirt. Still in my sleep pants, I opened my door tentatively. Maybe I could call her back later. Whatever she had in store for me, I knew I was not going to enjoy it. She was the social butterfly since the start of high school, and had made it her mission to drag me to every party she could. I wasn't sure what she enjoyed more – torturing me, or making the other teenagers uncomfortable with my own awkward presence.

I wound my long, dark red hair up into a bun and wrapped a rubber band that was on my wrist around the knot a few times. I stepped onto the landing and closed the door behind me. I took the steps slowly, weighing my options of avoiding Izzie for the Festival and saving myself any embarrassment tonight. My options were limited to none. Even if I hid in my bedroom for the rest of the day, Izzie would find me and somehow blackmail me with horrifying secrets I'd long forgotten about. No, I was doomed to whatever plans she had in store for me. In any case, I still had to help her study.

But, I doubted her reason for calling had anything to do with studying.

When we had both, terrified, entered into the much-anticipated high school ranks, we completed a rapid role reversal. In grade school, I had been the friendly, popular little girl, while Izzie was the awkward one with the glasses and braces. As it often happens, other kids picked on her for looking so different because her parents couldn't afford to fix her eyes and teeth. Seven years old, and I took her under my wing. We'd been inseparable ever since.

The summer before high school, her parents finally were able to afford to pay for the surgeries Izzie needed to lose the glasses and the braces. What followed was a complete surprise, for Izzie stepped out of her shell, flipped her light brown hair, and was suddenly popular. Meanwhile, I became the shy, reclusive one – the dark, moody girl who was fascinated by kats. The hippie. The outcast.

Anyway, since I'd been her protector in grade school, she apparently saw it as her mission to do me a favor in return by getting me out into the social scene. She hated that I spent most of my time skulking around campus with my sweatshirt hood up and buds lodged tightly in my ears. Needless to say, she spent a lot of energy trying to make me over. It never worked of course. As much as I envied her appearance, I would never wear the clothes she wore. I couldn't even imagine myself in short shorts and flamboyant tanktops, skin tight leggings or knee high boots. Forget the low-cut, here's some cleavage t-shirts, or the don't bend over skirts. Give me plain old tank tops and jeans, boots, and a side of sweatshirts when the weather calls for it. I love my chunky necklaces and odd, nothing else like them, earrings. Izzie loved the dazzle. Anything that sparkled she adorned herself with.

“Rae,” Dad hollered.

I jumped. “I'm coming,” I shouted as I thudded down the stairs without missing a beat. I snatched the phone from Dad with a glare. He grumped at my disheveled appearance and muttered, “Girls.” He promptly left the room, prepared for Izzie and I to commence “girl talk.” He'd overheard one conversation too many and had made it habit to make himself scarce whenever Izzie was on the phone.

“Hey,” I said into the receiver, plopping onto a bar stool.

“Oh my goodness.” Izzie's chipper voice rang in my head. I pulled the phone away slightly. “It's Festival time!” She sang. “Are you ready? We're going to party under a full moon tonight so cancel any plans that you might have, because you're going. And don't try to fool me, I know you don't have plans.”

I tried to cut in, but Izzie knew me all too well.

“Don't you dare say you're not going, because I will hog tie you and have Brandon throw you in the back of his truck. You will be dragged there against your will one way or another so you might as well do it the easy way. Don't forget, I still remember what happened when we went camping.”

Oh, yes. She had a knack for remembering the most embarrassing instances that I had forced from memory. That particular camping trip had involved me, too much whiskey, no outhouse, and peeing on the side of a public road. Would I ever live that one down? With Izzie as my friend, I highly doubted it.

I sighed and mumbled, “Whatever.” As for Brandon, who was Izzie's older brother, he often helped her in her endeavors. I still hadn't figured out if he did it out of love for his sister because she asked, or if she blackmailed him, or if he enjoyed torturing his little sister's friends. Whichever it was, if I got passed the rumor Izzie would let fly, I wouldn't get passed him once she had given her command.

Recently, Brandon was on my list of people I didn't want to talk to because he'd been all too excited to get his hunting license and a gun. Or so I'd heard.

“Dad volunteered me to help set up for the festival.”

“That's okay. The party isn't until tonight, anyway. Long after the festival.” A child screamed in the background. “Mary Anne drop that!” There was a clatter. The sound of pots falling to the floor. “Sorry, she's been getting into everything.”

“Should I let you get back to baby-sitting?”

“Oh, no,” she replied. Even if I wasn't there, I knew she was twirling her long, flawless hair around her pointer finger. She always did that when she was talking on the phone. “It's fine.”

“Okay,” I replied, propping my elbows on the counter. “When do you want me to help you study?” I reached for the coffeepot on the bar. “Damn, Dad drank it all.”

“What?”

“Nothing. Dad just drank all the coffee and didn't make more.”

“Shame,” Izzie said, a smile in her tone. “Well, Mary Ann's mom will be home in ten minutes. Do you want to meet at the Spot for coffee? You can help me study there.”

“Hang on,” I said, setting the phone down.

In the next room, Dad was reading his newspaper, his feet propped on the ottoman. His reading glasses were low on his nose. I was caught off guard for a brief moment at how much older he looked. It seemed like he'd aged ten years since I went away to school.

“Hey, Dad. I'm going to help Izzie study for a while at the Spot. Do you want to get me from there when you and Mayor Zane are ready?”

He put his paper down, and looked at me over his glasses incredulously. “You're going to help Izzie study?”

In the past, “study” had been Izzie's code word for something much more troublesome, and much less studious. No wonder Sheriff TJ had watched me like a hawk. “Yeah. I told her if she came with me to the meeting yesterday I would help her study for her Chemistry exam. Believe it or not, I'm actually helping her study this time.”

He chuckled. “Yeah. That's fine. You'll be at the Spot?”

I nodded. “Thanks, Dad.”

Back at the phone, I said, “He'll meet me there, Izzie. See you in fifteen?”

“Okay,” She said loudly. “Bye!”

“Later.” I hung up the phone.

“Okay, Dad,” I called out. “I'll be at the Spot.”

“Right,” I heard him mumble to himself as I dashed back up the stairs. “They go to college and on visits home can't hardly stay to visit...” The rest of what he was saying was lost on me as I moved out of earshot. Serves him right for volunteering me when he didn't what know my weekend plans were. Though I did feel the slightest bit of guilt when I thought that he probably volunteered me so I would actually spend time with him.

I pushed that thought aside as I exchanged my pajama bottoms for my favorite pair of baggy cargo jeans. In the mirror, I applied a hint of eye liner and lipstick before topping the look off with my high school baseball cap. Izzie just loved it when I hid behind the bill of my hat. I yanked it down low, giving me just enough vision to see what was at my feet immediately in front of me.

I was stumbling down the stairs only minute's later, eager to get my morning cup of coffee. “Bye, Dad,” I said hastily, not even looking at him as pushed my feet into my boots, threw open the door, dodged the hanging basket, and grabbed my bicycle. Remarkably, it was still in the same place on the porch that it had been for years.

~*~

The curiosity of trying to remember what my nightmare had been about, all but forgotten in the excitement of the festival's wonderful food, dancing, and games, came back to pick at me as I stood before the bonfire late that evening. I stared at the flames and tried to ignore my mind's determination to remember. Tried to ignore the burning questions. Why did it bother me so much?

All around me, familiar faces from high school laughed and hollered. I hadn't seen a lot of them since graduation, though they'd been around on my visits home. I was only one of a handful that left Abbey to attend Merle University. They danced, some silhouetted by the fire behind them, some made orange by the fire in front of them. Music blasted loudly out of Brandon's overly large pickup truck. A few dancers were actually managing a good rhythm and I watched them in awe, unable to ever dance well myself. Others, either like me, could not dance, or had already hit the cooler too hard. Their twists and dips were largely exaggerated. I hoped no one fell into the fire.

I sipped at my punch, which was less than punch and more than its fair share of alcohol. Though I was fairly close to the flames, I appreciated the warmth of the intoxicating drink as it traveled down my throat and hit my belly like a swallow of hot liquid.

The darkness behind the reach of the fire light reminded me of the sense of desolation that I experienced in my nightmare. The green, haunted eyes. What else? What wasn't I remembering? Had there been communication?

Brandon came up behind me and threw his arm around my shoulders. “Hey, baby. You having a good time?”

I resisted the urge to grab him and push him to the ground. He was my best friends older brother, after all. I'd spent since junior year of high school trying my best to oppose the idea of punching him. It hadn't been easy, but over the years I had developed a knack for ignoring him. Not that he'd caught on.

I fiddled with my cup. “Not really. I was dragged here against my will.”

“You should be used to that by now.”

“Doesn't mean I don't want to be here. I intend on making it plainly obvious. Maybe someday soon she'll take a hint.”

Brandon laughed, looked over at his sister topping off her cup from the cooler by his truck. “Unlikely.”

“Girl can hope,” I said, drowning myself in the last few swallows of my cup.

“You aren't afraid of the kats are you? I seen you staring into the dark earlier.”

“I'm not scared of kats,” I practically spit as anger from the town meeting entered me. I imagined a raindrop falling onto the earth and making its predictable path downhill toward a bubbling stream. “On the contrary, as you very well know, along with the whole town, I find kats fascinating. We don't know enough about them.”

“We know they attack.” Brandon puffed up his chest and pointed his cup at me. “Don't worry though. I got my rifle in the truck.”

I jerked away from his arm and gave him the best, meanest glare that I was capable of. It even worked on Dad.

“Rae,” Izzie called, bounding excitedly to my side. Whether Brandon knew it or not, he'd just been saved by his little sister. “Isn't this awesome? The night isn't too cold. Cups are overflowin'. The fire is burnin'. The guys are smokin'.” She really enunciated the last sentence.

“You're already drunk,” I finished her list.

“So what? It's Harvest Festival. C'mon,” She took my empty cup. “Live a little. Loosen up. You need a refill.” She took me over to the cooler. Well, dragged, really. After she handed me the cup, not without spilling and sloshing the contents all over me as she did so, she gushed, “Isn't Johnny hot? I've been crushing on him this whole quarter. He's in my English class.”

Her eyes trailed from mine to the group of young men knee deep in scrap metal and wires. The scrap metal was once a car, I believe, and the wires were its exposed circulatory system. From what I could discern with my eyes, and what I had learned while eavesdropping, they were attempting to engage all four tires. If they could accomplish that, the car would be further destroyed by seeing what damage could be done to it wheeling at the pit by the lake's edge. I had a feeling that even if they weren't able to make it all wheel drive, they'd take it to the pit anyway and drive it until it got stuck, or was so bashed it wouldn't run anymore.

“Which one is Johnny?”

“The hot one.”

I arched an eyebrow. First, none of the four working on the car looked 'hot' to me, and second, they were mostly in shadow anyway. “That doesn't help.”

“He's the blond.” She pointed to the young man who half sat, half crouched on the driver's side of the car. His face was buried in a mesh of wires. A flashlight held in his mouth shed light onto what he was working on.

I recognized him as one of the boys who'd taunted me in high school. They pulled my hood off when they walked by, took my baseball caps, pushed me, tripped me, humiliated me any chance they could. They called me a freak. Because I was quiet. Dark. Because I liked kats. Because I'd rather hide behind my music and hair rather than face the world they lived in.

I curled my lip, but made no comment on her interest.

“Come on, Rae,” Brandon said, shuffling over to Izzie and I in what I could only guess was some kind of dance move. If I thought that I was no good at the art, he didn't fare much better. Maybe he was even worse than me. Then again, who knows how much he'd had to drink so far tonight. He nearly tripped as he lightly shoved his little sister, and winked at me.

“Izzie is right,” he continued. “You're always so serious – a real wet blanket. You're smothering our raging fire!”

“I'm not your fire's problem.” I gestured to what I would consider a campfire. The small flames were no where near bonfire category. They had been earlier in the evening, but drinking and socializing had starved the fire from the fuel it needed. “It needs more wood.”

“There's no lack of wood here.” Izzie giggled and gave a flirtatious smile across the golden flames that sparkled in her highly intoxicated gaze.

I rolled my eyes.

Brandon smiled, and raised his finger to me in a “don't go anywhere” move– like I had anywhere else to go at the moment. He disappeared into the direction of his truck. He returned moments later, an armful of wood in the crook of his left arm, while in his right he dragged a good-sized pallet. I contemplated helping him, but didn't.

“Wood,” he announced proudly, grinning from ear to ear. “Want to do the honors,” he asked, dropping the contents of his left arm at my feet before waiting for my answer.

I shrugged, tossed a few good-sized logs into the flames. Too bad there wasn't a feasible accelerant nearby, besides the alcohol. It would work, and it would be highly entertaining to throw it onto the fire, to see and feel the sudden whoosh. The kind that required a person to check for singe marks. Though it would have entertained me greatly, I didn't want to die for it. These people hated me enough as it was. I would not cross the line and use their booze to accelerate the fire.

But without any, the fire merely waved in gratification as it engulfed the newly added fuel. The coals crackled and popped. I kept feeding, watching the flames lick higher and grow hotter. When my pile was gone, I eyed the pallet.

“That one next?” I indicated with my head.

Brandon chuckled. “Are we a bit of a pyro?”

“No,” I responded quickly. “I just want something to do.”

“Oh, no,” Izzie corrected. She finally turned her moon-eyed gaze off Johnny. It was then that he noticed her staring and gave her a shy little wave. It of course caused Izzie to lapse into a fit of girlish giggles. She was hardly able to control herself enough to say, “She's a total pyromaniac. She really shouldn't be anywhere near a fire. Remember a few years ago?”

How could I not? Me, naked. Well, nearly. And everyone pointing, laughing. Speaking of which, Brandon broke out into a series of loud guffaws as he remembered. “Don't stand too close, Rae. You probably wouldn't want a repeat performance, although myself and any other guys wouldn't mind...”

I groaned, shot Izzie a glare. “You,” I accused. There was a reason my drinking was much more modest the last few years, and why I really, really had not wanted to come tonight. “I thought everyone was too drunk to remember that.”

Brandon laughed.

Izzie shrugged, her attention already turned elsewhere.

I sighed, sipped my drink. “Might as well maintain my reputation. Pallet next?”

Brandon grinned. “Why not? Let's make this bonfire wickedly phenomenal. Stick with me sister. It'll be wicked.”

I resisted the urge to comment on his repetitions.

“Well,” Izzie uncrossed her arms and stepped away from our little group. “I'll leave you to that. I'm going to see if Johnny needs any help with...whatever they're doing.”

“Right.” I chuckled, aware of her present grasp of automobile knowledge, or lack thereof. Understanding boys though and how much they enjoyed explaining how much they knew, that might work to her advantage.

Izzie skirted the fire, and Brandon and I were left alone with the wood and the hungry flames.

He bent down and pulled up one end of the wooden pallet. “Grab the other side.” He gestured. Together, we heaved it on top of the growing flames. They split left and right, curling ravenously around the new fuel we'd supplied.

I admired the deep orange and yellow colors as they waved in the night sky. It made me think of Mom. Before she was ill. When we would go off into the forest with sling shots, hunting game birds. Sometimes, very occasionally, we caught one. While the forest grew dim and cold, Mom made a small fire and we cooked our feast over the hot flames. The fire would catch her frizzy hair, the lighter strands of brown, and make a halo around her head. We cooked it in a traditional way, as old as human time, nearly. We watched it spin round and round until it was a perfect golden brown and the juices ran off, sizzling in the fire. Mouthwatering greatness. My mom new the secrets to a good meal. Cooking over the fire was a perfect, natural way to dine outdoors.

Brandon stomped the pallet down into the coals. Sparks flew into the night sky, some lazy, some violent. They showered nearby people, made them shout in alarm and slap at their clothing.

I heard Izzie giggle. Johnny had pressed her against the car, using his body to shield her from the errant sparks, and to gain a moment of physical closeness. The sparks gathered on the ground around them, some still glowing.

Shaking my head at my friend in wonderment, I said, “Well, that's a better bonfire.” It blazed and crackled in a hissing of delight as it devoured what we fed it.

“Sure is.” Brandon wrapped his arms around me in a crushing hug that nearly had me gasping for my next breath. He was more than a little tipsy. I could smell it.

With a sudden impulse, I jerked from Izzie's brother and jumped onto the center of the fire, onto the pallet, and then through to the other side.

“Rae,” Brandon shouted. “Are you crazy?”

I grinned at him over the flames. They flickered wildly after my quick disruption, which provided them with their favorite substance other than wood – oxygen. They waved hungrily, beckoned me to stir the air once more.

“Probably.” I jumped back through, using the pallet as a stepping stone to sweep through and and above the flames. They flickered close, caressed my fingertips and my feet. Breathless, I stumbled into Brandon. He caught me around my arms and I laughed blissfully. He watched me with a mix of concern and wariness.

“Come on,” I urged, straightening. “It's awesome.”

He shook his head, his previous enthusiasm gone. His eyes sought the surroundings, seeking. “No. That's dangerous.”

He made a grab at me as I leaped back onto the burning pallet. It still provided a platform surrounded by flames. I shuffled my feet to the rock and roll song. If this was to go down in my history, I hoped it was more popular than my last escapade.

“Brandon, you've jumped off the cliff. This is not more dangerous than that. See? I'm perfectly safe.” The fire curled around me, nearly brushed my skin. The clothes I wore felt the heat and it burned on my skin. I kicked the air and played my imaginary guitar. It was one of my favorite songs blasting out Brandon's speakers, after all.

“Rae,” Izzie yelped when her eyes caught mine. “You're going to get burned!”

“No way,” I said confidently. Though, feeling the heat on the soles of my boots, I quickly vacated the pallet. It began to crumble as my weight pushed off it.

No sooner had my foot toed the earth then chaos ensued. Sudden, frightened screams pierced the air, jolted all of us. I fumbled and barely avoided colliding with the ground as I jerked my eyes left and right. Everyone was still, confused, seeking.

What was going on? My show hadn't been that frightening, had it?

“Kats!” A breathless, high-pitched voice echoed, followed by two pale, terror filled faces as they appeared into the light of the fire. They came from the direction of the cliffs.

My chest tightened. My whole body tensed, frozen. But not in fear. Anticipation.

I saw Izzie grab Johnny's hand. He wrapped his arms protectively around her, pushed her into the gutted car.

“I'll get my gun,” Brandon said, springing into action. He ran to his truck, where the music still beat unawares of the extreme tension that had settled over the bonfire party.

Gun. I snapped awake and sprinted after him. Catching him by the arm, swiveling his frightened eyes on mine, I caught him by surprise. He spun so hard that he nearly fell on top of me. Holding my arms, he steadied himself. I felt his fear shaking in his taut arms. Saw it in his wide brown eyes and terse lips.

Around us, everyone scrambled for their vehicles. Tires spit dirt and gravel.

“You can't shoot them,” I shouted. I sounded hysterical, my voice pitched, broken.

“Rae,” Brandon tried to free himself from my grip. “You don't know what you're talking about. Kats are dangerous.” He succeeded in pulling away from me, shoved my flailing hands aside as he raced back to his truck.

I stood in the darkness outside the light of the fire, waiting for him to return. The silence of the surrounding forest was deafening, not even my fellow people made a peep, nor a rustle. Something, or someone, was out there watching us. And I was the only person not cowering in terrible fright. I did not, would not, run for the shelter of my vehicle. I would never grab up a weapon to kill a kat. There was something that needed to be learned from them. If we killed them, the answer would be lost.

Brandon returned. Out of the darkness, his iron fist clasped my upper arm painfully. In his other hand, he gripped his rifle like a talisman to ward off evil spirits. “Get in my truck, Rae. You'll be safe there.”

I shook my head and jerked free of his grasp. “No.” I shook my head, backed quickly away from him. I couldn't let him shoot them. If I could help it, I would not let another kat die because of our ignorance. Not this time.

“Rae.” Brandon's voice was sharp, but I didn't listen.

Turning quickly, I stumbled, caught myself, and ran towards the cliffs. Towards whatever caused the girls to scream. I'd show them. If it was kats out there, they wouldn't hurt me. Without a doubt, I knew that. I wasn't sure how I was so completely certain, but I was. Those eyes, those intelligent eyes haunted my dreams. Green eyes.

My name was said with concern by several people. Izzie's voice begged, called me back. I heard Brandon, furious, that I was between him and the kats. He could not use his rifle now, not in this darkness, not knowing exactly where I was. I had successfully put myself between him and the kats, if they were out there. I was protecting them.

The cold air embraced me as I pushed beyond the warmth of our bonfire. Wind from over the lake waters bit at my cheeks, leaving a sheen of moisture on my skin. The sounds of my footsteps on gravel and hard-packed earth were all that I could hear. Beyond that was a silence so very still that it was as though nothing else existed.

My breath puffed. I stumbled forward until I could not even discern the ground at my feet. The dark was so impenetrable that it hit me like a giant, invisible wall. The glamorous pale moon had disappeared behind thick clouds. If I wasn't careful in how I proceeded forward, I could topple straight over the cliff. I would not even know it until the ground disappeared beneath my feet. A glance behind me revealed that the darkness was only before me. I could still make out the fire, and the shadows of frightened peers. Whatever lay in front of me remained stealthily silent, almost as if they weren't even there. But, I felt their presence. Yes. The kats were out there. They were close.

I desperately wanted to see one.

My heart pounded. If they were near, surely they heard it. Thump-thump. Thump-thump. I blinked, attempted to force my eyes to adjust, to see anything in the dark.

A sound to my left. Breathing. Soft, padded footsteps.

A kat was very close. Their presence tickled a portion of my mind into awareness and a placid, serene atmosphere enfolded me. It calmed me. I felt at peace.

“Please,” I said, seeking blindly. “I want to help.”

Shuffling, the sound of loose dirt shifting. I had the vaguest of sensations that they could have been only a few feet in front of me. Like, if I outstretched my hand, I might touch their fur. Their presence was that palpable.

I took a step forward.

And the presence was gone.