Chasing Stories

[Nico Ellison]

Lots of weird stuff going on out here, up in the outskirts. Into the woods. Nico also maybe sort of just wanted to take a peek. It had been a while since that strange burst of killings took place, taking out a lot of the smaller shifters that lived in the area.

Nico's job wasn't to poke into this stuff, of course. He worked for the newspaper, which was a boring old newspaper with boring news about what shitty movies were playing in the tiny old theater, weather reports, traffic, local politics. That sort of thing. Boring, boring, boring.

That was kind of Nico's MO, though. Best to be boring than to be too interesting in this town.

But Nico was snooping into things that he could never write about, like the shifter deaths. His heart dropped as he walked through the woods, barely breathing. He took out his phone to video record what he saw but there were only the barest traces of the tragedy that had happened here. Cracked branches on bushes, a trail through the thick undergrowth. Nothing tangible though. If there had been blood or fur, it had all been long picked apart or washed away in the summer rain storms.

Hearing a shuffling sound further up the trail, Nico turned that way, automatically focusing his phone's camera on whatever it was.

[Red]

Today was one of the days that Skylar—or Red, as he liked to call himself—needed to go into town. Some places were just impossible to get into without looking like a human, like the store or the pharmacy. With the little money he scavenged—mostly coins, and one five dollar bill—weighing down his pocket, he cautiously emerged from the camp. Red made sure to wipe his prints as much as possible, knowing that there could be hunters about.

It was a bit of a walk into town so he wore shoes and mismatched socks. A faded windbreaker he picked out from the community clothes chest wasn't quite enough to shield him from the winter cold but it had to do. He already wished he could have his warm fur back but sadly he couldn't bring clothes with him if he wanted to dart about as a fox!

Stepping lightly down a well-worn trail leading into town, he kept his ears and eyes open. The recent spate of attacks against smaller shifters had him worried; he hugged himself loosely, uncomfortable being out here alone. Usually Alex came with him but today was one of his 'working' days. Red still didn't like him being so close to the humans but Alex was one of the few in their group who could speak fluent human and had a good chance of blending in with them. On the other hand, Red only knew a few words and spoke even less, preferring to communicate through gestures and—in fox form—yips and barks.

Just as he rounded a bend in the trail, he heard something up ahead. It was already too late to hide, though, as the trail straightened and the trees thinned slightly. Red stopped suddenly. There was a human. And he was pointing something at Red. Terror flooded through him as he gasped. Was... was it a hunter? Red's eyes were wide, terrified; he backed up a small step and held up his hands.

[Nico Ellison]

Shit. For two seconds, he thought he was going to catch a hunter out here. Not good news for him, being a shifter and all. But it didn't appear to be a hunter. Just a kid with wide eyes, putting his hands up like he thought Nico's phone was a shotgun. Nico lowered the phone, raising a brow slightly.

Despite having come out into the woods to find out what was really going on, Nico didn't actually expect to find any other people out on the trail. Maybe animals, maybe shifters. Not really, though. If this was really where a massacre took place, he couldn't imagine them staying around. This kid wasn't anybody he remembered from class or anything, though.

"You live out here?"

[Red]

This was it.

This was the end. Of life.

Red wouldn't have claimed that he'd led a blameless life but he had lived so little of it... There was still so much he had yet to see, like... the other side of town. Like that lake everybody kept talking about, or the sunrise from the top of Pine Bluff. And he'd never even tasted a fresh hamburger. What did hamburgers taste like hot off the grill? Red wouldn't know, and in his mind he never would.

The hunter looked maybe as startled as he was. It was a hunter, wasn't it? He was human, he had a device in his hand aimed at Red's violently beating heart. But weirdly he lowered it and he spoke—asked a question. Red's eyes darted left and right even though his head stayed still. He was frozen, stupidly with his hands held up.

"...no." Was there anywhere he could run to and hide? A bolt hole maybe, left behind by other foxes or dug by rabbits? Red shifted back another step, his dirty shoes scraping the pebbles. "Don't... kill... please?"

[Nico Ellison]

No? Was he just looking around for something like Nico was? He didn't seem to be looking for trouble. To be fair, neither was Nico. He wanted to know the truth but he was half afraid of finding it. If there was a massacre out here, it meant hunters. Hunters had been here and they might come back. But the kid in front of him was no hunter. Not that Nico had, like, experience with hunters, not firsthand. He was so boring and ordinary that nobody would ever suspect  him of being a super.

Huh...?

Did he just ask him not to kill him? Nico blinked and stared for a long moment, speechless. Nobody ever asked him not to kill them. He was just so... unassuming that he was hardly any threat to anybody. Feeling somewhat self conscious, he wondered what about him seemed so dangerous and aggressive that this kid thought he was about to kill him.

"I'm not going to kill anybody," he said. "I was just..."

He didn't know how much to say so he shrugged and looked down at his phone before turning it off and slipping it into his pocket.

"...hiking," he finished. "And taking pictures."

[Red]

In fairness the hunter didn't look like a hunter. He was pretty... bland was the word that came to mind. Not stand-out. Red had seen humans with all kinds of distinguishing features but this one, not so much. Brown hair, white skin, not too tall and not too short. His clothing was normal, too. It was the device that Red feared; he remembered other humans with similar devices, ones who had cornered him and put a net over him.

They took him to a place called an 'animal sanctuary' but sanctuary was hardly the word for it!

Although the fight or flight response was strong...ly tilted towards flight, Red made himself stay still. Until he secured a definite route of escape, he was making no sudden moves. No sir, not even with the device in the hunter's pocket.

"Hiking...?" He didn't know that word. It sounded suspicious. But pictures he did understand! Where was the camera though? Red thought pictures were taken with cameras—big black things with a bumpy round bit at the front that flashed a lot. He eyed the hunter. "Camra? Ca—camera? Where?"

[Nico Ellison]

"Yeah. Hiking."

He didn't understand the confusion. Hiking was pretty straightforward. And sure, Nico wasn't dressed in flannel and cargo shorts with hiking boots but he could still be hiking through the forest! And taking pictures! Which... well, that part was honest. He was taking videos and photos of the area to look at more closely when he was alone and not feeling all creepy crawly. Like something was watching him. Like there were hunters nearby.

"Where?" Nico furrowed his brow slightly. "What do you mean?"

Pulling his phone back out of his pocket, he held it out.

"I mean, it's not a camera, but I take photos with this. My phone."

[Red]

"Ca-mer-a?" He said it slowly in case the hunter didn't understand. Red even put his hands up to his face—slowly!—to mimic taking a picture with a camera, depressing an invisible button with his forefinger. Hiking. Hmm. Hiking. He'd have to ask Alex what that word meant, in case another hunter came along and decided to use it on him.

"Huh!" Red didn't know what that noise he made was, but he made it when the hunter took the device out again and then held it out towards him. "NO!" He shouted, cringing as he put both hands over his head to protect himself.

[Nico Ellison]

"I know what a camera is."

Why was this guy talking like he didn't understand english fully? Oh. Maybe he was an out of towner. Maybe he was from somewhere else and English wasn't his first language. Nico only knew English; he didn't know where to begin with trying to figure out what this guy's native language might be. He had some kind of accent, but it was like... nothing Nico heard before.

The violent reaction to his phone, again, like Nico had pulled a shotgun on him. Nico looked down at his unoffensive phone curiously. Then back up at the kid.

"It's just a phone," he said. "You can use it like a camera...."

He turned it toward himself and clicked to take a photo of himself and then turned the phone so that the kid could see he had just taken a photo of himself.

"See?"

[Red]

Camera. That thing was a camera??

Red slowly uncurled, watching like a hawk as the hunter pointed the device at himself! "Nooo!" He shouted again, this time—um. He wasn't sure why his visceral reaction was to be worried for the hunter but nothing happened except his spastic responses. Feeling his cheeks heating up, he finally realized that it was a camera of sorts when he saw the picture.

That thing was a... flat camera, apparently. And Red was a fool.

"Oh." He said, laughing out of sheer relief. It was a quiet laugh, but a laugh was better than him yelling for no reason. "Camera." Red finally relaxed. He stepped towards the other boy, looking sheepish. "S-sorry. Um. What... what is hiking?"

[Nico Ellison]

Weird kid. What did he think the phone was going to do to him? Maybe he was one of those super home-schooled kids that heard about how phones caused brain cancer. Did he think just pointing it at somebody caused it? Nico had no idea; he had never seen anybody react so violently over something as innocent as a cell phone before.

"..yeah. It's a camera."

Maybe he just never saw a phone with a camera. There were some smaller groups in the rural parts of Oregon that kept to themselves. Some people called them a cult. Was... the kid from that cult? Looked like he could be. The few of them that Nico saw around dressed the same, like they basically just went dumpster diving for their mismatched outfits and threadbare clothes.

But this was too much. Now he was asking what hiking was? Nico stared at him for a moment, incredulous and half thinking he was being trolled.

"Hiking. You know... walking around the outdoors to be with nature." Honestly, now that he was trying to put the hobby of hiking into words, it did sound a little weird. "It's good to get away from all the people and technology sometimes."

Not that he was huge proponent of hiking or anything but he still didn't want to give away his true reason for being up here.

[Red]

Being stared at weirdly was not a foreign experience for Red but he shrank a little under the scrutiny nonetheless. There was an awkward silence, during which Red scrambled to remember what normal humans did in situations like these. For foxes, it was easy. They studied one another—check—and then they moved on, pretty much, unless one was intruding into another's marked territory.

Something told him this boy wouldn't have marked his territory in the same way...

His pants were too dry for that, for one thing.

A lot of words came his way, about half of which he understood. Red smiled tentatively. That was what Alex told him to do; smile and play dumb. Pretend to not be from the area. That wasn't hard given his accent and his way of bumbling with simple words. It was his turn to stare at the other person as he tried to piece together what he meant. "Walk... with nature," he said slowly, nodding. Yes, walking. In nature. In the woods. Humans did that a lot; Red usually hid from them and waited until they were gone to snag scraps they left behind. Pieces of sandwiches, wrappers to line his burrow, things like that.

"Walk." Red pointed to himself. "Sky—Red. Red." He jabbed his own chest again. "Walk to town." Sooooo... now he was going to ease forward... and try to get past the other guy... "To town," he repeated.

[Nico Ellison]

"Okay..."

He didn't get the Sky part but he was supposing by the way the kid was jabbing himself in the chest that Red was his name. Okay. And he was walking to town. Why... was he telling Nico any of this...? Conversation? Or... the way he was edging forward, it was like he thought he had been taken hostage. Nico stepped aside to give the kid a wide berth.

"Sure. Go to town. Good luck, Red."

Nico just got here so he had no intention of going back into town at this point. But if the kid calling himself Red wanted to go to town, that was his prerogative. It wasn't like Nico was holding him up. Giving the kid one last look, he went in the opposite direction, away from town and further into the forest.

[Red]

"Thanks. Good... hiking."

A way past! Red darted off down the path, just barely avoiding a headalong sprint. Not to look suspicious or anything, he went off at a speedy half-jog instead, helped by the downward slope of the trail. But before he hit the next bend, he looked over his shoulder at the human boy headed away from him, up into the thicker part of the woods. Idly he wondered what the boy's name was—he never said.

But then he disappeared from view and Red remembered that he had errands to run before he could go see Alex at his new workplace. Red didn't understand much of what Alex described to him, but he knew that Alex helped write in something called a newspaper, and that he worked at a building called the office. The errands took some time while he was in town; he avoided looking at the people he saw and tried to stay out of sight as much as possible. Even though he didn't blend in quite as well as the others, no one bothered him if he kept to himself. It was still almost two hours of being intensely nervous though! Red didn't think he could ever be completely at ease in town.

Afterwards he made his way down to the single-storey building that Alex worked in. Red had been shown the way there once before and knew that he could pretty much walk in. A few people looked up as he entered but Alex saw him from his desk and grinned. Red smiled slightly as Alex bounced over and grabbed his hand and pulled him over to the little cubicle that he worked at.

"Hey! Didn't expect to see you here today, Red," he beamed as he pushed Red into an empty chair beside his own. It looked like the person who shared the space with Alex wasn't there.

"Who?" He asked, gesturing to the space. What if the person who worked here came back?

Alex shook his head. "Oh don't worry. That's Nico's desk. He's out right now. Out—uh, away. Not here." Alex patted his hand gently and reassuringly.

Red smiled, nodded and glanced over the pile of papers littering the desk in front of him. He couldn't read much of what he saw and lost interest eventually. Nico was a funny name, though. Was it short for something? But he and Alex also had short names so it wasn't that uncommon. It was just that humans tended to have two names for some reason, while the animals preferred just one. Easier to remember one name.

While Alex got back to writing, Red contentedly sat beside him and doodled on a notepad, waiting for him to finish working before they went home together. Home was the woods, and their comfortable burrow nestled into the side of a hill. He drew little foxes chasing each other around, some trees, hills, anything that came to mind. Red was pretty good at drawing things; sometimes he used that skill to communicate too. His mind wandered as he drew, however, and when he looked down he was surprised to find that he had drawn the boy from earlier!

Red half-smiled, bemused, and put some finishing touches on the boy's hair. Earlier he thought the boy looked somewhat plain but he started remembering things now like the swoop of his bangs and the shape of his eyes and even the pointiness of his nose.

[Nico Ellison]

Good... hiking?

Awkward.

The whole thing was cringe-worthy, he realized as he continued into the woods. He didn't dare look back a second time, pretty sure that the kid thought he was every bit as weird as Nico thought he was. Yeah, well... He looked down at his phone. Right. He was here to look for more evidence.

There really wasn't much to see and he wasn't sure whether to be relieved or disappointed. Mostly relieved, he found. He didn't want to see his kind, bloody and mutilated. But he heard all about what happened, the whispers rippling throughout the community. Nico's dad said they should leave but Nico was quite attached to the place where he'd grown up, his friends, his family. Besides, they couldn't leave. Nico's grandma would be so devastated.

After a while of walking through the dead wintry forest, Nico took a few more photos and recorded a few more videos before sighing and putting his phone away. It was nearly dead and he had to get back to work. Actual work, not his excuse for work out here in the woods. So far, his work didn't require much venturing into the woods. This week he was supposed to list out the movies playing at their dinky theater and give short summaries of each. Most of it was already written up.

Picking up lunch on the way in, Nico made his way over to his desk. He paused when he saw somebody else there, only expecting one other person in his corner. But he shook it off and continued over, rustling his paper bag of fries and a burger from the local Happy Burger. He looked down at whatever the stranger was working on and a little shock hit him when he realized he was looking at himself.

"Uh..." He looked over at Alex in question.