CAUTION: This story contains implied sexual activity between minors, violence, and profanity. Reader discretion is advised.

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Unless otherwise indicated, all the names, characters, events and incidents in this book are either the product of the author's imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Assam Chai
by IndigoNeko

Chapter 2

Tuesday, May 31st, 2016

Kayson sat with his sisters around the kitchen island, prodding at the bowl of macaroni with his spoon and listening to the squelch it made. He wasn’t hungry at all, and neither were his sisters. They’d barely touched their breakfast, leaving half of their scrambled eggs sitting cold on their plates that morning. They hadn’t even asked for lunch, and by two in the afternoon, his mom had fixed them Kraft Mac & Cheese. She probably figured that it was the only thing they were guaranteed to eat, and was worried enough to fix it in spite of the fact that it was terrible for strict carnivores like themselves. 

Maddy took the first bite, followed by Emmy. Kayson hesitated, knowing that it was loaded with carbohydrates, preservatives, and other nasty junk that could give them diabetes and cancer. Still, one bowl of mac and cheese wouldn’t hurt them in the long run. So he took a bite of it anyway, chewed for a moment and swallowed. It was delicious, and he hadn’t eaten it for months. He tried to remember the last time they’d had mac n’ cheese, suspecting it had probably been either Thanksgiving or Christmas.

The home phone rang, interrupting Kayson’s train of thought, and his mom darted across the kitchen to answer it. She picked the handset up and frantically pressed the talk button before holding it to the side of her head and listening for a moment. A second later a look of anger flashed across her face. She cut the call and stuck the phone back on the charging station, hissing in irritation. 

“Telemarketer?” Kayson asked, already knowing the answer. His hearing wasn’t good enough to have heard the other caller, but their mom regularly ended calls like that without saying a word, then complained about how they wasted her time. 

Isabel nodded, turning away and rested her hands against the counter for a moment, clicking her claws against the polished white marble before turning back to face her children. “Is it any good?” she asked, smiling slightly as she saw them swallowing spoonfuls of the bright yellow pasta.

Both Emmy and Maddy nodded, still taking bites of the mac and cheese, making inroads through their bowls already. “Yeah, it’s delicious,” Kayson replied after swallowing what was in his mouth. The cheesy flavor permeated his entire muzzle and he was sure his mouth was stained yellow. They were going to have to brush thoroughly afterwards to get bits of gooey pasta from between their sharp teeth. Not that cavities were a huge concern; all the members of his family had polyphyodonty. Accidentally swallowing their own teeth when they fell out was a far bigger concern.

“Good,” Isabel said, giving a slight smile, clearly relieved that her children were at least eating something, whether it was good for them or not. 

“Mommy, when is Daddy coming home?” Emily asked after swallowing.

“I don’t know, sweetie,” Isabel replied, the smile fading from her muzzle. “Hopefully soon, but... I don’t know...”

__________________________________________________

By the time lunch had rolled around, Alex had gotten familiar enough with skateboarding to have collected a dozen or so new bruises. Skateboarding was close enough to snowboarding to inspire confidence, but different enough to cause problems. And when those problems happened at high speeds, the young tigress went rolling across the pavement, sliding into sidewalk curbs, and even crashing into a parked car. Jason, of course, had been laughing hysterically while filming Alex’s crashes and sharing them with the rest of the Bus Stop Gang.

When hir phone’s alarm went off at a quarter to noon, Alex sighed and handed over Jason’s freeride board, then peeled off the knee and elbow pads that now looked like someone had taken a cheese grater to them. “That... was awesome. But I gotta be heading home now,” shi said, handing the pads over.

“Okay, tigger. I’ll catch you later. Come over any time you wanna go skateboarding,” Jason said, watching as the younger tigress picked up the yellow mountain bike and swung hir legs over it.

“Sounds good, later!” Alex said, wrapping hir tail around hir waist before pushing down on the pedals and riding out of the beaver family’s driveway.

Two minutes later, the tigress was pulling into hir own driveway and dropped the bike on the lawn just before the stairs that led up to their house’s side door. After nearly a year it still felt strange to have a three story house with the first floor being just a garage and basement. Shi didn’t even think of the garage as being a ‘first’ floor, per se, though technically it was. The second floor was the main level, and there was a set of stairs to the left of the garage that led up to a side patio and door... the one that shi still thought of as the ‘main’ entrance. The side patio continued about forty feet along the side of the house, only to go down a few steps to the back yard. 

Alex pulled out hir phone as she went up the stairs, opened the Vivint app that hir dad had installed on hir phone and used it to disarm the house alarm system and unlock the side door. By the time shi reached the door, the deadbolt was retracting back into the door with the whine of the electric motor. Shi pressed the latch above the curved handle and pushed the door open.

“Hey kiddo,” Raenne called out from the kitchen as Alex stepped into the house. “Chicken and cheese burritos okay?”

“Yeah,” Alex replied, unfastening hir helmet and peeling it off, hanging it by the straps on one of the coat hooks next to the door. “So what’d you want me home by lunch for?” shi asked, being careful not to shut the door on hir tail before walking across the great room to the dining table and taking a seat.

Raenne took a skillet down from the rack over the kitchen island and set it on the range. “So that I can teach you how to shoot.”

A chill went up the young tiger’s spine. “You mean, like, use a gun?” Alex asked. For a split second shi remembered crouching on a dark street, covering hir ears and eyes as deafening gunfire echoed all around hir. Grandmother Dina was singing quietly in Russian.

__________________________________________________

“Exactly,” Raenne confirmed. “Some threats require more than hands and fists. I’d like you to learn how to use firearms, just in case,” the tigress explained, in answer to her daughter’s question before turning to get the tortillas and cheese out of the refrigerator. Raenne stopped as she saw her daughter’s ears go flat against hir skull and turned to look at hir, wondering what was wrong. 

Alex was staring at her with eyes wide open, pupils narrowed, hunched over, ears flat, hackles raised... Raenne instantly recognized the signs of extreme fear; her daughter was absolutely terrified, and Raenne had no idea why. ‘Shit’, she mentally cursed, wondering what the hell she’d done.

The tigress quickly walked around the table, squatting next to her daughter’s chair. “What’s wrong, love?” she asked as Alex started to hyperventilate. Then she mentally slapped herself, having totally forgotten about the incident in January, which had required months of therapy. “Shhh, it’s okay, love,” she said, reaching out and wrapping her arms around the frightened cub. “I’m here for you, kiddo. You’re safe.”

Alex tried to speak as she held hir tightly, but nothing came out except whimpers, and then shi started to shake. Raenne was starting to worry that she’d just triggered some kind of PTSD episode, and held her daughter tightly, praying that Alex wouldn’t have a blackout and slip into a catatonic state. 

“You’re safe, kiddo. Don’t speak; Just wait. Try to relax. I’m here for you,” Raenne said, murmuring calming phrases and gently rubbing her daughter’s back while holding hir tightly. It took a solid minute before Alex stopped shivering. Eventually Alex took a deep breath, and Raenne loosened her grip, pulling back a bit. “You okay now?”

After a moment, Alex nodded. “I’m s-sorry. I don’t... I don’t know wh-what happened.”

“It’s okay, love. You didn’t do anything wrong. It was an involuntary fear response,” Raenne explained. “Probably PTSD. I’m guessing you remembered what happened when you were with your grandparents.”

Alex shivered again, just for a second. “I don’t know... I just got scared. I mean, I’ve seen guns on TV and stuff and watched you cleaning yours. I dunno; I just... froze up.”

“Huh...” Raenne murmured, thinking quickly. The tigress tapped her claws on the top of the wooden dining room table. “I’d like to test something,” she said, coming to a conclusion. She knew this might be a bad idea, but had to know for sure, because her plans to train Alex in combat marksmanship were an absolute no-go if the sight of a gun triggered any kind of traumatic episode. 

Raenne stood up and reached behind hir back, drawing the P320 she’d purchased last week from the holster along her back waist under the flannel shirt. The tigress carefully faced away from her daughter, ejected the magazine and pocketed it before pulling the slide back to check that the chamber was empty. Then she turned and set the pistol on the table where Alex could see it.

__________________________________________________

The pistol sat on the table in front of Alex, matte black metal practically oozing danger. The fur on the back of hir neck stood on end again and it felt like tendrils of ice were crawling under hir skin. Alex knew, all too well, how lethal a firearm could be.

Somewhere deep in hir psyche was a terrified child, crouching in stygian darkness intermittently lit by muzzle flashes, shaken by the thunder of gunfire, sprinkled by tiny droplets of blood that fell like rain. The room darkened around hir and Alex became that child once again, reliving the memory.

It seemed like an eternity before the sounds of gunfire stopped. Alex opened hir eyes and stared at the mangled corpses of hir grandparents and their bodyguards. Shi watched as rain shimmered under the flickering streetlight, falling on the cracked and oil-stained asphalt, slowly washing away the blood. Only this time, shi knew that it was just a memory of the not-so-distant past. 

Alex heard Grandmother Dina singing the Cossack Lullaby so clearly it was like she was still alive, before the shooting. The old tigress was holding Alex in her arms while they waited in a dimly lit hospital waiting room. Grandfather Viktor held hir hand while shi cried, sitting next to them while grandmother sang to hir. Everything faded around hir as shi felt a blackout coming on. The void beckoned with the promise of safety.

But Alex knew now that it was a lie; that the void wasn’t safe. That anyone could do anything they wanted to hir when shi was catatonic. Shi never wanted to be helpless again. 

Alex struggled to stay conscious, fighting against the seductive lure of the void. The tigress clenched hir jaw, fangs scraping, and the dining room snapped back into focus. Now shi just had to deal with that memory; to ensure that shi never fell under its sway again.

With a flash of insight, Alex realized that shi could quiet that frightened fragment of hir mind. Not by forgetting it, since it was unforgettable, but by separating that part of hir psyche and allowing it to fall under the spell of hir grandmother’s song.

The terrified child’s silent screams went ignored as Alex desperately tried to lock that memory away in the furthest, darkest recesses of hir mind... chaining it within a prison of darkness and music. Finally it slept, comforted by the false safety of the void, calmed by the lullaby sung by hir dead grandmother.

As the terror that had gripped hir slowly faded, Alex took a deep breath. Shi looked at the gun sitting on the dining room table once again, half-singing the words “Сам узнаешь, будет время, Бранное житье.” Shi turned hir head to look up at hir mom. 

Raenne stared down at hir, taking a moment to parse the unexpected fragment of Russian; they didn’t speak it very often. “Who told you that?”

“Бабушка.”

The older tigress swallowed and visibly shook herself. “You’re not scared?”

“No,” Alex lied. The part of hir that was scared would always be scared. But it was locked away now. Shi would never let fear control hir ever again.

“So... are you okay with going shooting?” Raenne asked, raising an eyebrow.

Alex nodded. “After lunch. I’m hungry.”

The older tigress let out a sigh of relief. “Give me a couple of minutes,” Raenne said, picking up the handgun off the table and holstering it just above her tail before heading back into the kitchen.

__________________________________________________

Hank pulled his SUV into the garage, singing along with ‘Ride of the Valkyries’, and then tapped the button on the remote hanging from his sun visor. The garage door slowly closed, casting the garage interior into gloom. The bird turned off the ignition and removed the keys, causing the car’s radio to go silent, then undid his seatbelt. A second later he pushed the car door open and stepped out, closed the door and walked over to the wall to hit the light switch.

With the overhead lights on, it was much easier to see. Hank walked up the two steps to the interior house door and turned the door knob, pushing the door open. The sounds of pop music echoed from the living room. “Ginnie, can you help me take in the groceries?” he hollered, then promptly turned back around and strode to the back of the SUV, popping the handle. The back window slowly rose with a hiss from the pneumatic pistons, and he pulled the gate down. 

Hank scooped two of the paper bags up, holding them to his chest and headed back inside, walking over to the kitchen and setting them on the counter next to the sink. The music that had been playing in the living room was gone, the house silent other than the rustle of paper grocery bags.

“Uhhh... Dad? I don’t think I can,” Ginnie said, trying to push herself up off the couch to help take in the groceries. 

“What do you mean?” Hank said, stopping on his way towards the garage and poking his beak around the corner into the living room.

“I mean my legs aren’t working. It’s like they’re made of jello,” Ginnie said, trying to stand up. After a third try, she managed to get upright, but her legs were visibly shaking. 

Hank watched his chick’s legs quiver as she stood in front of the sofa. He blinked, unsure what to think. Was this a medical emergency? Did he need to call for an ambulance or would driving to urgent care be sufficient? “When did this start?” he asked.

“Uhh... they were kinda weak this morning when I woke up,” Ginnie said.

Hank walked over and looked her over, then ran through the emergency checklist: “Do you have a headache? Pain in your chest or arm? Problems breathing? Anything else?”

“No, no, no, and no.” 

“Hmm. Well, sit down again. I’ll finish taking the groceries in and then call the medical hotline,” Hank said, turning around to go do exactly that. It took two more trips to get all the groceries in and another two minutes to stick the cold goods in the refrigerator. Then he pulled out his medical insurance card and used the house phone to call the hotline number listed on the back.

After going through the robot answering system and waiting five minutes on hold, Hank finally reached the medical advice hotline, and quickly explained the problem to the person on the other end of the line, going through a checklist and asking Ginnie for information as needed. Eventually the person on the other line asked him if Ginnie had done any unusual and strenuous exercise lately.

“Uh... Yes,” he replied. “She went to karate for the first time last night. She was utterly exhausted and fell asleep in the car on the way home.”

“It sounds like it’s an overuse injury. Overuse of muscles that aren’t acclimated to a given exercise can cause weakness, especially within the first twenty-four hours, followed by delayed onset muscle soreness from twenty-four to seventy-two hours,” the help-line tech said. “Tylenol can help with muscle soreness. You can also use NSAIDs like Advil or Aleve, but they can slow the healing process. Remember to only use the formulas approved for your species, as other formulae can be toxic and even fatal. If she has any other symptoms, call us immediately, or if you think it’s an emergency call nine-one-one.”

“Thank you,” Hank said, waiting as the technician gave their closing spiel and then disconnected the call. The bird sighed. “Well, chiclet, it sounds like you overdid it at karate class. According to them, you’ve got an overuse injury. Muscle weakness for a day followed by soreness for another two or three.”

Ginnie let out a sigh and lay back down on the couch. “Great.”

__________________________________________________

After making sure the twins were safe in their play pen down in the dojo’s basement, Raenne walked out into the courtyard. The older tigress was carrying a backpack and a pair of plastic cases, one long and one short. Alex followed hir mother out across the smooth flagstones and down the steps to the parking lot before they turned to the side, heading back along the outside of the courtyard wall.

“We can’t fire guns within the city limits, or within a hundred and fifty yards of any occupied building. So... we’re going out into the woods behind the dojo,” the tigress explained, leading the way towards the forested area behind the dojo, ignoring the tall grass and weeds that were growing back in after the construction earlier that year. “Remind me to go over both of us for ticks when we get there... and when we get back as well; I’d prefer not to get lime disease.”

Alex nodded, then added “Okay” when shi realized hir mom wouldn’t see the gesture. Shi didn’t want to get lime disease either, whatever that was. The two tigers made their way over the rocky hillside and further upwards, reaching the trees that were set back a ways from the dojo. Alex hadn’t realized just how loud the rustle of wind through the grass had been until they entered the forest and everything grew quiet. The quiet crunch of dry pine needles and leaves underfoot was the only noise, other than the occasional bird call. They went another two hundred feet before Raenne stopped and set the cases down on the ground, followed by the backpack.

After going over both of their legs to make sure they didn’t have any unwanted passengers, Raenne squatted and undid a pair of locks on each of the gun cases. After setting the locks aside, she undid a pair of latches and pulled the cases open. 

The smaller one had a handgun in it, and the larger one had a gun that Alex instantly recognized from the movie ‘Die Hard’. The bad guys had carried them. Alex felt a frisson of fear and heard hir grandmother’s voice whispering in the back of hir mind, but easily pushed them away; Shi wasn’t a child anymore.

Raenne picked up the smaller one and ejected the magazine from the handle, catching it in her other paw, then pulled the slide to verify that the chamber was empty. She set the gun down and used her thumb to push one of the cartridges out of the magazine and held it up.

“This is a cartridge, one of the many types of ammunition used in firearms. The tip of it is the bullet, usually made of copper-coated lead. The rest of it is a brass casing which holds propellant, commonly called gunpowder, and a primer.” The tigress rotated it, pointing at the bottom. “This small circle on the bottom is the primer. When something hits it hard enough and fast enough, it creates a tiny explosion... which ignites the propellant. When the propellant explodes, it forces the bullet out the end of the casing.”

Alex blinked; apparently ‘bullets’ were actually cartridges, and cartridges were way more complicated than shi had thought. “Okay.”

“There are many kinds of cartridges, but this one is called the 9mm parabellum. That’s because the bullet is 9mm in diameter. There are many other cartridges, like the .38 Special, .45 ACP, or .357 Magnum. Most guns can only fire one type of cartridge. If you put the wrong cartridge in a gun and try firing it, bad things happen. At best, it won’t fire. At worst, the gun can explode in your hands if the bullet is too small and gets stuck in the barrel.”

Alex nodded, making a mental note to always make sure to use the right ammo.

Raenne pushed the cartridge back into the magazine and held it up. “This is a magazine. It holds the cartridges. This particular magazine can hold fifteen cartridges, or as most people say, fifteen ‘rounds’ of ammunition. There are holes in it to show you how many cartridges are currently in it. See the hole here? You can see a cartridge through the hole, and the number fifteen next to the hole tells you there’s fifteen cartridges in the magazine.”

Alex leaned forward and saw the gleam of brass through the hole in the black magazine. Shi nodded, wondering if ‘magazine’ was just another word for ‘clip’, like they said in the movies.

“This is a handgun,” the older tigress said, holding up the gun. “Specifically a pistol. There are other kinds of handguns, like revolvers, but we’ll talk about those later. When you pull the trigger...” Raenne explained, pointing out each part, “the spring-loaded hammer will be forced backwards. If you pull it far enough it will release the hammer, which jerks forward, hitting the firing pin.” She then did exactly that, demonstrating the double-action trigger mechanism and showing the hammer strike the firing pin.

At this point Alex was starting to feel a bit overwhelmed. There were a frighteningly large number of words that Mom was using that were unfamiliar. Even though Mom was pointing out each part, it was becoming far too much to keep track of.

“Just above the magazine and in front of the firing pin is the firing chamber,” she said, pulling the slide back to show the empty space. “If there’s a live cartridge inside the firing chamber and the safety is off, when the hammer hits the firing pin, it will strike the primer and detonate the propellant inside the casing, forcing the bullet out through the barrel at extremely high speeds,” Raenne continued to explain, pointing at the front of the gun.

“Uhh... Mom?” Alex interrupted, hir ears going flat against hir head from embarrassment. “I hate to say this but you went way too fast for me to keep up. Can you explain all of this again... just a little bit slower?” shi asked plaintively.

__________________________________________________

Both Ivan and Dillon watched impassively as Liam carried the lizard into the filthy warehouse bathroom. None of them wanted the smell of lizard shit and piss permeating the air; the smell of diesel and rust was bad enough. Dillon grunted and Ivan turned his head towards the lynx and raised his eyebrow, wondering what the lynx wanted.

“You really did a number on him, Ivan,” the lynx muttered with a thick Boston accent, straightening his dress shirt. “Did you really have to break his elbow?”

“He spit on me,” Ivan replied, covering his shame over losing his temper with a pragmatic shrug. “Only a stupid, arrogant asshole would spit on someone who’s bigger than them while tied up in a car trunk. He’s had a lifetime to learn such arrogance. It will take a while for him to learn humility. A bruise will only be painful for days, but a broken bone will be painful for months,” the tiger explained, shifting slightly on the crate he was sitting on. He didn’t think a few months of pain would be enough to teach the lawyer humility, but it would be a start.

Dillon frowned, but nodded. The lynx brushed his slacks off and leaned against the lizard’s Maserati. They waited for a couple of minutes before the rhinoceros brought the lizard back out of the restroom. The lizard was cradling his broken arm and let out a hiss when Liam set him down on a short stack of wooden pallets. 

“Thanks,” Ivan said, nodding to Liam before glancing over at Dillon. “Go check on Noah; he isn’t answering his phone. See if he’s managed to move any of that product,” he ordered, then waved the lynx away, waiting until he’d left the warehouse.

“Are you feeling a bit more talkative now, or do I need to put you back in the trunk?” Ivan asked, standing up and walking over to the lizard. There wasn’t anything particularly imposing about his outfit; a pair of blue jeans, work boots, and a black leather jacket over a white tank-top... but the tiger stood a bit over six and a half foot tall and weighed close to three hundred pounds, less than ten percent of which was fat. Ivan was proud of his physique, built over thousands of hours at the gym.

The lizard looked up at the tiger and let out a quiet hiss... or as close as he could manage through shattered teeth. “Wha’ ‘o you wan’?”

“The same thing I wanted yesterday, Mr. Pullman,” Ivan said quietly, hoping that the lizard wouldn’t be stupid this time and tick him off again. “For you to tell me everything you know about my parents’ deaths, their wills, their estate, and how I can get access to it.”

Heinrich panted for a moment, clearly in pain, then started speaking as best he could. “All I know about ‘eir deat’ was wha’ wa’ in da new’paper: Eight people dead in nor’ borough, wit’ one lef’ alive... a kid. Allan Pra’ wa’ da Kamin-kis’ ‘amily and e-tate planning lawyer. I wadn’t e’en aware o’ dem until af-er Allan wa’ murdered lat mont’ and had to take over hi’ account’.”

“So you didn’t know about it until last month,” Ivan confirmed, waiting for a nod. “What about their will? What did they plan for the estate?”

The lizard paused for a moment, gasping for breath, then slowly continued. “Deir lat’ will and te-tament wa’ written year’ ago... If eider ‘iktor or Dina died, all of da e-tate wa’ to go to the udder one. If bot’ o’ dem died, the e-tate wa’ to be liquida’ed and di-tributed accor’ing to da will. Par’ was to be gi’en to charity. The udder wa’ to be... pu’ in a tru’t and gi’ven to one of deir choo’ing... or charity...”

“So their will specified part of the estate was to go to charity and the rest placed in a trust... if they chose someone. Got it.” Ivan reached out and grasped the lawyer’s shoulder and held him upright as he swayed on the wooden pallets. He turned and looked at Liam. “Get a cup of coffee and a pair of Tylenol from the medkit upstairs. And make sure it’s the lizard formula. I don’t want him dying of liver failure.”

The tiger looked back down at the lawyer and shook him slightly, waiting until the lizard looked up at him before asking “So did they choose someone?”

Heinrich hissed again as the shaking jostled his arm, then continued. “Yeah. On da... day dey died.”

“So where is the estate now?” Ivan asked, glancing up at the rusty metal staircase that was creaking dangerously under the weight of the rhinoceros going up to the manager’s office. As Liam stepped out of sight, he looked back down at the lizard.

“It wa’ liquida’ed by the en’ of January... da donation were in chari’y by de en’ o’ March. Da remain’er... in a tru’t with... The Fila-delfa Tru’t Com’any,” Heinrich said, swaying again as the pain grew too much for him to continue talking.

“The Philadelphia Trust Company? In whose name?” Ivan asked, reaching out and pinching the lizard’s shoulder, knowing the pain would keep him awake.

“Alekan’rea... I don’t know her la-t name... Need to look it up at da off... da off-it. Name i’ Rut-tin. Andy... I-unno...”

“I’m their son,” Ivan growled, growing angry and squeezing the lizard’s shoulder harder as he started to lose his temper. “They left me nothing?”

“I’ you or your... Rain... made a claim again’t de e-tate, dey were to gif you one... one dollar,” Heinrich closed his eyes, clearly on the verge of passing out.

Being lumped in with the same category as his straight-laced bitch of a sister made Ivan see red. “That BITCH!” the tiger roared, angrily backhanding the lizard off the stack of pallets. The lawyer hit the cement floor with a crack of breaking bone and a meaty thud. 

The tiger froze, realizing he’d let his rage get the better of him yet again. “Fuck, not again,” he whispered as he bent to pick up the lawyer, hoping that the lizard wasn’t dead. “I need to find a therapist,” Ivan told himself. If he didn’t, he was going to accidentally kill someone... again.

__________________________________________________

After nearly fifteen minutes of lessons on nearly every aspect of firearms, Alex nodded and recited the four primary rules of gun safety. “Treat every firearm as if it’s loaded. Keep the muzzle pointed in a safe direction. Keep your finger off the trigger. Be sure of your target and what’s beyond it.”

“That’s it, kiddo. Ear and eye protection on,” Raenne said, tightening the suppressor on the end of the threaded barrel and waiting before Alex put hir glasses down before handing the pistol over.

Alex gingerly accepted the Beretta 92FS, careful to make sure hir trigger finger was straight along the frame just beneath the slide. It was surprisingly heavy, exactly as Mom had said it would be. 

“Range is hot!” Raenne yelled, loud enough that it echoed through the forest, then stepped to the side and handed her daughter a magazine, loaded with a single 9mm cartridge.

Alex accepted the magazine, waiting for the next instruction.

“Load,” Raenne ordered.

The younger tigress positioned the magazine under the handgrip and then slammed it upwards. Shi checked to make sure the magazine was seated fully, using a claw to pry at the metal flange in the front, all while keeping it pointed at the paper target taped to a wooden post twenty feet away, the spot Mom had designated ‘down range’.

“Ready on the left?” Raenne called out.

Alex obediently checked the left. There was nothing but trees for hundreds of feet.

“Ready on the right?” Raenne called out again.

This time Alex looked right. Again, nothing but trees.

“Commence firing.”

Alex raised the muzzle slightly and gripped the grooved sides of the slide, pulling it back. It was just as difficult as Mom said it would be, taking a surprising amount of strength. Shi let the slide go and it slammed forward, making the muzzle jerk down. The weight of the suppressor on the end made the muzzle bounce slightly.

The young tigress used hir thumb to push the safety up. It clicked, revealing the small red dot indicating the gun was no longer ‘safe’. Alex pointed the gun at the small target, looking between the two sights and making sure the dot was right between the two black squares. Shi focused on the target, trying to do as Mom had said, trying to keep the dot between the two squares while still looking at the target, then squeezed the trigger.

The hammer slowly moved back, barely visible since shi was looking at the target and simultaneously keeping the little dot centered in the sights and covering the center of the target.

POP!

The gun jerked unexpectedly in Alex’s paws. Shi blinked, then took a breath, realizing shi had been holding it in.

“Range is cold!” Raenne bellowed.

Alex lowered the handgun, glancing down at it and seeing the slide had locked backwards just as Mom had said it would. Shi stared at the target. A tiny hole sat just inside the red circle, slightly to the left of center.

“Good job, kiddo.”

__________________________________________________

Wednesday, June 1st, 2016

Isabel opened the front door. Her mother, Patricia, rushed forward and gave her a hug while her father Walter continued up the front walk, arriving a moment later. They both squeezed her tightly, saying nothing. Having a husband gone for over twenty-four hours might be the norm for some people, but it certainly wasn’t the norm for Isabel, and she’d been barely holding it together. 

Knowing she was still loved broke the dam of pent up emotion, and Isabel suddenly choked and started wailing, slowly growing quieter over the next minute or so, until she was just shaking in her parents’ arms. After a few moments of silence, Walter suggested they go inside. Isabel nodded and let go of her parents, then the three of them headed inside, with Patricia closing the door behind them.

It took Isabel another minute before she felt composed enough to call the children down. “Kayson, Madison, Emily? Your grandparents are here,” Isabel called, her voice still unsteady.

A few moments later the three Pullman children came down the stairs, Emily holding the stairway railing followed by her older sister Madison and finally Kayson. All three of the children looked hesitant until they caught sight of their grandparents.

“Oh my Gosh,” Patricia gushed, playing the doting grandmother. “You’re all growing up so fast. You’ve each grown at least two inches since we saw you at Christmas,” the older lizard exclaimed, waiting as the three children made their way downstairs.

Several hugs later, the adults were sitting on the sofa while the two youngest, Madison and Emily sat on the floor and watched a children’s show on the television. Kayson had retreated back upstairs to play video games while the adults talked.

“Henry didn’t leave any kind of voicemail or text message saying where he might have gone?” Walter asked. 

Isabel shook her head, wondering when her parents had finally given up the name Heinrich and started calling her husband Henry. “He called me at lunch saying that he was excited he’d found a top-notch lawyer to take over Allan’s position at the firm and that he was going to try to make it to Kayson’s little league game.”

Patricia frowned. “What happened to Mr. Pratt?”

“There was a break-in at the office a month ago,” Isabel explained, her throat tightening at the memory. She’d liked the Addax; he’d been kind and witty. “Allan was working late. He confronted the burglar and he... He was killed.”

Both Walter and Patricia took deep breaths at that. “Do you think Henry’s disappearance could be related?” Walter asked.

“Maybe?” Isabel said with a noncommittal shrug. She didn’t know for sure, but had known roughly what was going on at the office thanks to her nightly talks with her husband. “Allan was trying to cut back on the dispute and litigation side of his corporate legal work to focus on contracts and finance. Said there was enough on his plate as it was. Allan also dabbled with some of the estate planning side of the practice that was Henry’s primary focus. Henry also did some cases related to marital agreements like pre- and post-nuptial contracts, and some adoption works. Henry tried to avoid divorce and custody cases; he said they made him feel sleazy.”

“So both of them were handling financial legal work... one for business and one for families,” Walter clarified. “I assume they had access to a large number of bank accounts. Some of them probably had quite a bit of money in them...” he surmised.

“I’m sure some of them were very large accounts, but Allan and Henry didn’t have direct access to them,” Isabel explained, remembering some of what Henry had explained about trusts. “The banks themselves limit access to those accounts; they only allow access by a trust’s beneficiaries when they meet specific conditions. They also freeze the accounts if there’s any unusual activity, usually requiring court orders before funds are released. Just having the account information is useless.”

“Right, but... if someone didn’t know that... and they did know that the accounts had a lot of money in them, they might be willing to commit theft, or even murder...” Walter theorized.

Isabel’s lower lip began to quiver, and her eyes teared up, realizing there could very well be some sinister reason for Henry’s disappearance. Walter held his daughter’s scaled hand while Patricia wrapped her in a tight hug.

__________________________________________________

Ginnie stared at the clock on her nightstand, wondering why she was awake; she hadn’t had a nightmare... but it was barely nine in the morning. She tried to move, and immediately regretted it as her arm immediately throbbed with pain. That made her aware of the fact that the rest of her body hurt just as much, or more. Her legs, abs, chest, arms... everything hurt. That was why she’d woken up.

She tried to throw back the comforter, but could barely lift it... and the attempt left her in so much pain that she immediately gave up on the idea of leaving the bed. “Dad?” she called, not really expecting a response. The young bird drew in a lungful of air, opened her beak, and screamed: “DAAAD!”

The house was silent. Ginnie sighed through her nares, air whistling faintly. Her phone was sitting on the computer desk on the other side of her room, too far to reach. Even the digital audio player and headphones sitting on her nightstand might as well have been a million miles away. She closed her eyes and relaxed against the pillow, her entire body throbbing in pain in time with her heartbeat and waited.

Half an hour later, Hank walked into the kitchen, dropping a small plastic bag with a handful of hinges, screws, strike plates, and doorknobs on the kitchen table; all the supplies he’d need for today’s home repair task. The small hardware store downtown had been unbelievably busy.

A second later, a scream from the back of the house had him sprinting towards his daughter’s room. The bird stopped at the doorframe. “What’s wrong?”

Ginnie’s beak was parted, panting for breath. “I can’t move; it hurts too much.”

“What hurts too much?” Hank asked.

“Everything!” Ginnie wailed. “My arms, my legs, my chest... and it hurts worse if I move,” the young thrush complained. “...and I’ve got to pee.”

__________________________________________________

Raenne pulled her black Murano into the only available parking spot in front of the small bike shop next to Ratchet’s Hardware. Apparently the beginning of summer was a very popular time to do home renovation projects, the hardware store was doing brisk business, despite it being just after nine in the morning.

The tigress hopped out of the SUV, followed a moment later by her daughter, and went around behind the back of the car to open the trunk. They’d had to fold down the back seat to get the Cannondale mountain bike into the car. It was much easier to get the thing back out though, and after Raenne set down on the pavement, Alex wheeled it around to the front of the shop.

Raenne closed the trunk up and followed, double-timing it to the glass front door and pulling it open so that Alex could wheel the well-used bike inside. A fit looking rooster wearing a lycra cycling outfit stood up from one of the workbenches at the back of the store. “Hey there!” he crowed.

“Hey Tom,” Alex said. “We brought your bike back.”

“Great!” the rooster said, picking up a clipboard and walking to the front of the store. “Did your dad teach you how to ride? How’d that go?”

“Yeah... It could have gone better, I guess,” the tiger cub replied. “I fell a half-dozen times, banged up my knee and wrist.”

“Well, it looks like you didn’t break anything, so... it could have been worse,” the rooster said philosophically, his face drooping. Raenne suspected that he’d come to the conclusion that he probably wouldn’t make a sale today.

“Yeah, for sure,” Alex agreed. “I already broke my leg last year, snowboarding up on Mt. Hood. I took a jump on Kruser Run and got like twenty feet of air, but I biffed the landing and cartwheeled into a tree.”

“Oh sh...oot,” Tom said, catching himself at the last moment and glancing up at the older tigress. “That must have sucked.” 

Raenne smiled to herself, appreciating his linguistic restraint. This chicken was amusing; he wore his emotions upon his sleeve for everyone to see.

“Yeah,” Alex agreed. “Learning how to bike wasn’t bad, actually. I fell a lot more when I was learning to skateboard this morning. I had pads when I was skateboarding though.”

The older tigress watched the rooster’s face perked up again, knowing that was probably from the realization that the cub was an extreme sports enthusiast and that he might still make a sale today. 

“Guess it can’t have been that bad if you went skateboarding earlier today, huh?” Tom mused. “You know... when we’re doing serious enduro racing, we actually wear body armor, including chest and back plates, shoulder pads, elbow pads, knee pads... the works. If I’d known you were gonna be doing anything that extreme, I’d have suggested you get some armor.”

Alex nodded, then looked up. “Mom, can I use the armor at the dojo-”

“Absolutely not,” Raenne immediately retorted. “Those cost almost as much as my car. If you want pads for biking or skating, we’ll get some... the kind that don’t cost an arm and a leg.”

“Oh,” the tiger cub said, glancing down. “Okay. Can I get a mountain bike then?”

Raenne watched the rooster’s expression out of the corner of her eye and frowned, just to get a rise out of him. She couldn’t help but grin to herself as his face fell again, then took pity on him. “Of course. That’s why we’re here, aren’t we? To return this and get a new one?”

Alex smiled, hir tail twitching in excitement behind hir, and Tom’s expression lit up again, a smile showing at the corners of his beak. “Here, let me show you what I’ve got for someone your size,” the rooster said, turning and walking back into the store.

Ten minutes later, Alex rolled a brand new mountain bike out of the store, one that fit hir height perfectly, and was in black and orange, hir favorite colors. Raenne paid cash for it, after applying the security deposit from the one they’d borrowed. Tom had also said he wouldn’t charge for labor on any repairs or tuneups for the first year. 

Raenne helped her daughter load the new mountain bike into the back of their SUV and shut the trunk, then walked around to the driver’s side front door. The tigress looked up at the sign above the store and smiled again at the store name, ‘Chicken Legs Cyclery & Bike Shop’.