Peck! Peck! "Grrrrr!" I snapped viciously at the annoying crow pecking my fur to see if I was dead meat. It fluttered in the air and I jumped after it. I caught it in my jaw and quickly snapped its neck. I landed lightly on the ground and gulped down my breakfast. I gave myself a quick wash before shape-shifting back to a human. I ran out of the woods and slipped quietly into the house so I wouldn't wake any.....

Dammit! I thought. I had completely forgotten that my family wasn't home. I couldn't get a whiff of any fresh scents of my mother in the kitchen. Everything was exactly how I left it before I left for my hunt. I growled in frustration and packed up my things for school and head out as usual. I needed to tell Mary about this. She would help me.

Later in second period, the gym teachers made us run a mile. Mary is a distance runner so a mile is nothing to her. Me. Well, I'm more of a sprinter but I can still jog a mile. I mean I can run up to ten miles and still keep sprinting but I wasn't in the mood today. Plus, I'm sore from sleeping in an odd position on that branch.

" My family is missing," I whispered under my breath.

"What! They're missing!" She exclaimed. She stopped while I jogged a few feet ahead. She quickly caught up to me.

" Jeez! Please don't be loud about it. You're still the only one that knows!" I murmured.

"Sorry!" This time it was a whisper. I sighed. Mary is my best friend who embarrasses me 24/7 and is very loud. She's a very social person unlike me. I'm kind of emo because most if my clothes are black and I have black hair. I managed to disguise my eye color to appear black so people assume I have very dark brown eyes. If you look close enough, you'll see streaks of purple.

" Yes, they've gone missing. It's not like them to disappear like that without telling me first." Mary started to analyze and her eyes lit up as she found a solution, but it was a sad glint in her eyes.

"Do you think he's back?" She asked gently. I stopped in my tracks. Anger started to bubble up inside of me. One of the students bumped into me and I sped off towards Mary.

"Why would you think he's back? He hasn't attacked me for what? Nine years! Do you know how powerful he is? He should've figured out teleporting to different dimensions a long time ago!" I quickly turned bright pink with embarrassment and kept my head low. " Sorry for taking it out on you. Its just...ugh you know how much I hate that guy! But still, tell me why you think it's him?" I already figured out solutions before she could tell me. I was right with all of them.

"First off, you're the last one of your kind. You're also the only surviving member of your blood family. It's only natural for him to go after you next," she explained. I sighed.

"I know I know. But there's a flaw. Knowing how powerful he is, he should've figured out how to teleport to different dimensions years ago. Why is he coming after me now? Was he waiting for me to settle in comfortably so that I would forget about him?" I looked at her in her misty blue eyes. She shrugged.

"Probably." We continued our jog in silence. Both of us were thinking about the possibilities and chances that could be the reason behind all this. I feel like that he was just waiting for me. Waiting for me to lose my skills that I had at back in my old home. He was waiting for me to loosen up and forget. If that was the case, he thought wrong. I may have gotten accustomed to the humans, but I did not lose my skills. Besides, I've only been with them for two years. There's no way I'd get lazy that easily. It wasn't long before Mary and I saw the teachers standing by the door waiting for the students to finish their mile. Despite doing an extra lap by accident, Mary and I finished first. We walked around to cool down and continued to think about what was happening while waiting for everyone else to finish.

"Okay! Let's go inside everyone!" shouted Mrs. Berlet. Everyone walked back into the gym chatting away with gossip. I kept my ears open to listen for some juicy gossip. I found one that perked my interest and giggled to myself. Mary heard me laugh and cocked her head to one side like I would normally do when I'm confused or curious.

"Ryan just got dumped for the what? The sixth time now?"I laughed softly. Mary just bent over dying of laughter. She quickly recovered from her outburst and we jogged inside.

"I mean you've got to expect it. He's the bachelor of the school," she giggled. I grinned in agreement.

"Okay! For the rest of the period, we're going to play ball tag!" shouted the gym teachers. Most of the boys roared with excitement. The girls just groaned. I don't really care about it. I don't try. If I tried, I'd get everyone out in an instant or knock the pins at the start of the game. The teachers like to include pins to make the game faster and more exciting. The girls normally defend the pins while the boys throw the balls. I normally just wander around, collecting balls, and giving them to players. I'm always the last one out.

We all lined up against our side of the wall and waited for the whistle to blow. Mary isn't good at sports besides long distance running. As soon as the whistle blew, she ran off constantly towards one of the pins and got in front of it. I just walked up to the line that marked the court and waited for the foam balls to start flying towards and away from us.

"Someone! Catch the ball!" someone screamed. I heard the ball whizzing towards me. It wasn't a fast ball so I caught it with ease. They cheered for no apparently good reason. I tossed it to one of the boys for them to throw. I sighed and joined Mary beside the pin. I caught a couple balls afterwards and used the ball to deflect the other balls. Being the clumsy people they are, one of the boys knocked down the pin we were guarding so well. He tried to pin it on us of course but I could care less and fired back at him. I won the argument because I'm a "good-to-honest- student" to everyone. I'm quite mischievous honestly but no one knows except for friends who I love (to annoy but I still love them).

After class ended and we went in to change, I made up my mind and decided the he took my family from me. It was the only logical explanation of their disappearance. I quickly changed out of gym clothes and waited fir Mary to finish. Once we were alone in the hallways I told her my plan.

"WHAT!!! That's so risky though! Your gonna get hurt!"exclaimed Mary.

"I've already been hurt physically and emotionally. I'll be fine. Its not the first time either. He took my family's lives and almost took mine! You know the wound I always hide by wearing a tank top? It's never gonna go away!" I closed my mouth and my head hung low. "Sorry" I whispered.

Mary gently wrapped her arm around me and we walked to my locker. "It's okay. You lost family once. You don't wanna lose your second one. I understand." I just stared at her.

Thank you. I said through telepathy.