“Hi Charlene,” Nate said to the woman sitting at the desk. “Is he in?”
I waited to see if my head would feel any pounding, but there wasn’t even a little extra pressure. Evidently when Nadine said ground, it didn’t have to be dirt, which was great for me. I could cast spells all over the house without any issues. Not that I planned on doing that, it was just good to know I could.
“Nate, what a pleasant surprise. Yes, he’s in and has about thirty minutes before his next meeting. Do you think you can have your business taken care of by then?” she asked.
She acted like it was an everyday occurrence to have people just appear in the office. It worried me a little when I thought about who exactly had the director’s ear. I’d been under the assumption that not a lot of people could teleport, but then again, she could’ve heard of me. Most of the people I lived with had big mouths.
“Maybe, he might decide to cancel the rest of the day’s appointments when we’re done speaking to him. It’s one of those conversations when things are likely to hit the fan. I’d be ready to come in and assist if we call you.”
Without waiting for a reply, he led us to a closed door and knocked. After a couple seconds, Director Milton opened the door. I figured he’d be more likely to bark out an order to enter than open the door himself, but he was already surprising me, so I took it as a good start.
“Agent Barnes, what a pleasant surprise, come on in,” he said, opening the door wide.
I wasn’t aware the director was going to know Nate on sight. If they were buddies, things were going to be easier than I thought. I realized Director Milton hadn’t used Nate’s first name, but I figured he didn’t have any idea who I was, so some formality needed to stay in place.
“Thanks, Director. I don’t believe you’ve had the honor of meeting my partner, Avery Clavens.”
“No, I can’t say that I’ve had the pleasure,” he said, giving me the once over and smiling to reveal his pearly whites. “Won’t you guys both sit down?”
“For the conversation we’re about to have, I think we prefer to stand, but I highly recommend you take a seat,” Nate said.
“Now you have me worried,” the director replied. “I don’t believe in sitting while a lady is standing in the room, so I’ll join you two on my feet.”
“It’s your choice. Sweetheart, would you like to do the honors?” he asked.
I could see he was ready to go all out immediately. I’d thought we’d have a discussion first, and use the reveal to solidify our claims.
“Sure,” I said, starting my ring of fire.
“Holy crap, what are you doing?” the director yelled. “Hurry, get the fire out.” He ran to try to find something to extinguish the fire, not realizing nothing was burning.
During his frantic running, I found my phoenix, who didn’t seem to be caged anymore. That was a little odd. I’d have to look into that later, because right then it was phoenix time. I changed into my phoenix and spread my wings out to stretch. It felt good to have my feathers.
The director, having only coming up with a glass of water, turned to try to throw it at me and saw I was no longer standing there. His eyes went wide just before he fainted to the ground.
“I warned him about using a chair. Charlene, you need to cancel those appointments,” Nate hollered.
She rushed into the room and took stock of the scene before her. “Oh my, I’ll make sure you aren’t disturbed,” she said before shutting the door.
I changed back into my human form. No use staying phoenix if there wasn’t anyone to see it, at least not that time.
“How long do you think he’ll be out?” I asked.
“Probably not long. He was just a little startled, and who wouldn’t be seeing your sexy phoenix body,” he responded.
“Time and place, Nate, and this isn’t the time nor place. Do you still think this is a good idea? I could pop back home and get some of Vinnie’s memory loss spray, and we can come up with another plan,” I suggested.
“He’ll work fine. I didn’t see him make any moves to call for assistance. He just needs a few seconds to come to grips,” he replied, just as the director started to stir. “See, he’s already moving.”
After another minute, the director sat up and shook his head. He looked up and started darting his eyes back and forth between the two of us.
“Did you guys pump some kind of hallucinogen into the room before you got here?” he asked. We both shook our heads. “I didn’t think so. Does someone want to explain to me what just happened?”
“Sorry about that, Sir,” I said. “I thought we were going to do the explanations first, but Nate, the lemonhead, thought trial by fire was the way to go, literally.”
“Sir, we understand that you may not be as big a stick in the mud as most of the politician types in this city,” Nate said. “We’d really like to have your help in a matter that greatly affects people like us.”
“People like you, so you’re both fiery birds?” I could tell Director Milton was trying to piece together what he saw, and he was still having trouble with it.
“We’re both phoenixes, yes. There are many other types of beings who can change form out there in the world today,” Nate informed him.
“Like werewolves, are they out there howling at the full moon like in the movies?” the director asked. Apart from the fainting, he seemed to be taking it pretty well, even if he still wasn’t sure he could believe it.
“There are beings who can change from human form to wolf form. We don’t really call them werewolves, though. Nothing about their ability has to do with the full moon. Humans can’t even become one of them. We’re all born the way we are and have lived among humans from the very beginning. Us phoenixes were actually the first species born on this planet,” Nate continued educating.
“It’s kind of hard not to believe when you change right in front of me, but I’ll need a lot more information before I do anything to help whatever cause you have. I’m really tempted to take you to a lab and have you studied,” the director said, and I wondered how much trouble I’d get in for kicking him.
“That would be a very bad idea. Avery here has kind of taken the role as a leader to all of the uniques and I’m pretty sure they’d break her out, and me along with her since I’m her soulmate. Why don’t you come with us to our home? You can meet some of the other uniques and see that there’s nothing to fear from us. We have books you can read through that will help explain things to you better than either of us could,” Nate suggested.
“And what would make me think it’s a good idea to just go off with two people who have admitted they aren’t human?” he asked.
“Because, Sir, you have a very inquisitive mind, and you want to know if it’s really all true. I can promise you right now that nothing in our home will hurt you. We’ve never harmed someone who could be classified as human and don’t plan on starting.” I didn’t count the human criminals we’d had to deal with in the line of work.
“What about other things in the movies, are they real?” he asked.
“If you’re speaking of vampires, no they’re not real. I won’t confirm or deny any other species until you’ve read the material we want to provide you. I really think it would be better to do it in our home, though. We don’t want it being leaked to the public until we’re ready,” Nate said.
“Do I really have any choice in this matter?” the director asked. “It isn’t like you can just let me go.”
“If you decide this is too big for you, we’ll do something similar to what they do in the movies and erase your mind,” I told him.
“I know I don’t want to go back to not knowing there’s something else out there. I’ve always had a strong feeling that there was magic in the air. Let’s go. If I find it’s something I don’t want to be involved in, you can just wipe my mind later,” he announced. “Wait just a second, I’ll have to get Charlene to cancel my afternoon meetings.”
“Don’t worry; we’ve a
lready taken care of that. Sweetie, you think you can transport all three of us?” Nate asked.
“That shouldn’t be an issue,” I said, and started the process of my spell. The director watched me cut my hand with great interest.
“What’s she doing?” he asked Nate.
“You’ll find there’s a lot more to my girl than meets the eye,” he replied, being a little cryptic. “We’re leaving now, Charlene. I imagine your leader will be giving you a call anytime now to inform you of today’s events.”
As he finished talking, I completed my spell and we were zipped away to our house. We ended up right back in the dining room, where a few groups of people were still mingling.
“Hi guys, this is Director Milton, and he’s going to be our guest for the next couple of days. After he’s done a little studying, he’ll probably have a lot of questions, so please try to be as helpful as possible in answering them,” Nate informed everyone whose eyes had focused in on us.
“Yes, Sir,” the group replied.
“I think it’d be best if we find Charles and put the director in his care. He’s the one who wrote the books and probably the best bet to answer any questions,” Nate said.
“Good idea,” I said out loud. Mentally, I called to Charles. “Where you at, Charlie? We have a visitor for you.”
“I’m in the living room watching TV, but can meet you wherever you need me,” he replied.
“Stay put, we’re on our way,” I responded. “It looks like Charlie is in the living room, let’s head that way,” I said out loud.
“How do you know where he is?” the director asked.
“You’ll find different uniques have different powers. A common one among phoenixes is telepathy of some sort,” I said.
“So you can read my mind?” he asked. It sounded like the idea intrigued him more than anything else.
“Sure, if I wanted to, but it isn’t something we use very often. Me and Nate don’t really have an option because we’re soulmates and can always hear what the other is thinking, but other than that, I’ve rarely used it on humans,” I told him. Of course it helped that my memory only covered a very small portion of my life.
We led him to the living room, where I found Charlie, as I decided to call him, sitting with Jimmy, Rick and the berserkers.
“Director Milton, I’d like to introduce you to our son, Charles. Charles, this is the man who is hopefully going to help us pave the way into revealing ourselves to the human population,” I said.
Director Milton looked back and forth between us with a questioning look on his face.
“Oh we may have forgotten to mention that once a unique hits thirty, they stop aging. No one in this room is younger than, Jimmy how old are you?” I asked.
“Two hundred and fifty,” he replied.
“Two hundred and fifty,” I repeated. “You may also be interested in learning we can’t be killed, just in case you had any ideas leaning that way floating around in your head.”
“I didn’t really, and am sort of glad I didn’t. So, where are these books you want me to read?” he asked.
“Charles, can you show him to the library and help him understand what we need from him?” Nate asked.
“Sure, Dad. Right this way, Sir,” Charlie said, moving towards the door.
“Before we go, can you tell me exactly what you hope to get out of this?” the director asked.
“Well, we want to reveal ourselves to the world. We don’t want to live in hiding anymore and we have a bit of a supernatural issue we’re dealing with that we want you humans to be aware of. I’ve kind of been appointed the liaison on the unique side of things, and I think we’re hoping you can be the human version of that,” I explained.
“I won’t make any promises, but I’ll listen to any information you can give me,” he replied, and followed Charlie out the door.
I supposed all we had to do at that moment was wait to see what happened. It has been noted that I wasn’t great with the whole patience thing, right?