Broken Nightmare

Chapter 10

  After all the introductions were through, Stephan continued on to explain the 'plan of action', as he put it. He was going to send Claire and I back to school, along with the rest of the other Shape Shifters who needed to complete their education. In the meanwhile, he said we would both be put to the test, maximizing and exercising our abilities. Because I have used my ability for a while, I pretty much know how it works. However, they all insisted I learn more and try to do more to bring out all of my possible abilities.

Claire, however, will be gone for about a week before I get to see her. The full moon is tomorrow night, and that would be her first shift. The hardest, apparently. That, and she will be only animal. She can change into whatever she wants, but she won't be herself. After this transformation, she will become herself the more and more she shifts, which will be whenever she wants after tomorrow. So now, they are teaching her to control her fire. How to reign it in, push it out, what amount to give, not go give, etc.

Now, however, they want me to start practicing me to fight. Just in case none of them are there to help me. "I have experience, trust me. My older brother was even more paranoid than you guys. I know I can defend myself in the need comes," I warned the Shape Shifters as soon as they mentioned it.

"And that's good," Nathan butted in. "But Supernatural people are not the same to fight with. You will need to be stronger, faster, and more clever than you are now to be able to beat one of them."

I scoffed. "You guys are acting like I am about to go into battle."

The room fell silent as I spoke those words. "Wait, I'm not going to actually be fighting anybody, will I?" I pushed, now more worried I will have to exercise these techniques I swore to myself I would never use.

"Spencer, will you please train Elana and give her all the . . . routines . . ." Stephan chose his words carefully.

The man to my right nodded and stood, heading to a door I never saw at the end of the family room.

"Wait, now?" I asked, still cold from my run earlier.

Spencer turned with the door open for me. "After you," he said while gesturing to the door.

I stood and walked over to the door, seeing some stairs leading down to another level. Looking back, I caught Hyene's eye. She had an unsure look, but then nodded when she noticed I was looking at her. I'm not quite sure why that comforted me enough to head down those stairs, but my feet descended one by one.

Once downstairs, I heard Spencer coming behind me. The basement opens up to another family room, but this one is smaller, a somewhat normal size. And this time, there are doors all around the room, two on the right, two in the middle, and one on the left. Moving me aside, Spencer goes to the left of the room and pulls open another door, but this time, I don't hesitate to follow him.

Looking inside, the room is a little larger than the first family room I saw; the room inside covered with mats. Like a mental asylum, only they are blue. Along the back wall was a bookcase filled with boxing gloves, mouth guards, sparring gear, various dart guns, and some bandages. On the right side, there was a line of punching bags, awaiting their next use.

I realized Spencer was still holding the door for me and scurried inside. He followed me and stepped off to the side, taking off his jacket as he crossed the room. Under his jacket was a black short sleeve tanktop, exposing all the tattoos on his arms. He headed over to the far corner, kicking off his shoes then peeling off his black socks after.

"I don't know what your brother has or hasn't taught you, so I want to start with a test to see how much experience you have.

I turned around and pulled off my socks as well and threw them against the outside wall. "What do you mean?" I asked as I turned around.