Werecat Circus

Prologue

15th May 2009

"Shift into your tiger form. Now! Both of you! Don't hesitate, do it this instant! I have to go try and save your father. Run and hide. You may need to leave the boat. Flame, don't let Damien out of your sight. I love you both."

That was the last thing that my mother ever said to me. Her and my father; my brother and I, we never saw each other again after that moment. I remained with my brother, and she with father. In her haste to save our dad, she left us both to fend for ourselves. Two young shifters alone against the world that wants to kill them. It is the way of the jungle that only the strongest survive, and all cubs must hide while their parents fight an enemy. Many families are torn apart that way, but we never expected it to happen to us. We figured if anything happened we could all escape together. I guess the instincts run deeper in our veins than any of us imagined. These preservation instincts revealed themselves to us when my dad's employers discovered our previously well hidden secret. We were not human. Are not. Never had been and never will be...

By now I guess you've realised that we aren't human. I shouldn't have had to explain that part, unless you are stupid. I mean come on, 'shift into your tiger form' isn't something a normal mother would say. But thats for another day. I guess you would prefer to hear why we had to hide? Why we were separated? It has everything to do with our family, and the world we live in. Especially the government. Dad worked for them you see, so we lived on a military base out at sea. Risky, hiding such a large secret here, but it was dads dream job. Sometimes we have to take risks in life. This base is a ship, able to travel the world to wherever assistance is needed. Fully inclusive, an entire town is on the ship, with all the necessities people could need. Entire families moved to compensate for one members job, so that nobody would have to be isolated from their family. Of course, interaction with land does happen but this is mostly just for refuelling and stocking up on supplies. Not for socialisation. No expense had been spared on creating the boat, so it was frowned upon to miss life on land.

Being shifters, our family missed the freedom of the forests we once knew. This set us apart from the humans, those happy to live in a grey concrete world, away from the wilderness. They felt safer. We didn't. But we coped. For dad. For us. For our people. The ship held precious cargo that we couldn't allow to fall into the wrong hands, or to be turned against us. The defence missiles for the entire Kingdom. While the Supreme King was supposedly the only one with the clearance to order an attack, none of us trusted it. So here we were. My dad was enlisted to work on the boat disguised as a human, to protect our people if we were ever revealed. Us four were the first line of defence for shifters everywhere. Look how that went. Badly. We failed. Taken by surprise, they outwitted us all. We should have realised that only the very best in the field would enlist for a job to do with the countries defence missiles. Men who were not afraid to shoot children.

They found out. I still don't know how. I think it had something to do with some shifters taking over a town, making their own community, and the humans found out. Living together comes with risks, but sometimes those risks are worth it. All they seem to have created is trouble, for our family at least. That is a story for another day though. Not now. Maybe someone betrayed us, told them we were spying. Who knows. I will find the answer one day. I will find the one responsible for our troubles. They will pay for what happened. But back to the story.

Once mum had left to help dad, panic set in. We were alone, and all in danger. What if something happened to mum? What if she couldn't reach dad in time? Or what if the humans won? The enemy had guns on their side, and we just had claws and teeth. Claws may be effective, but only at short range. Not ideal when facing guns. We arent human, but is that any excuse to hunt us down and kill us? We haven't done anything to hurt them. The only reason we were here was to protect, not cause trouble. Especially not my brother and I. We were just children. What kind of a race blames children for things out of their control? What kind of person will willingly shoot a child after living with them for most of the childs life? Just because some details have been revealed. Fear is a strong motivator, and fear of the unknown turns neighbour on neighbour.