Ice Wolf and Ink Panther

Daughter

Ivy

"Ivy, wake up now!" Ink's voice yells in my mind, her growling harsh while my brain scrambles to make sense of what's happening.

Groaning I look around, instinctively jerking against the cuffs that bind my arms and legs.

"Good to see you're awake, we were starting to wonder if you'd ever come around." I turn my head to see Silver strapped to a chair with Cobalt strapped to another chair over.

"Does either of you two know what's happening?" I ask, my eyes sliding around the room. I've never been in this part of the compound before. Looks like Fletch and his hunters were still hiding things from me, not that I blame them.

Cobalt replies "No, I was the first awake and no one's come in. Though by the looks of these chairs I don't think we really want anyone to walk through those doors."

Silver struggles against his cuffs for a moment before looking over to me "Ivy, you've been here for a while, any idea what they'll do?"

I shake my head in reply "No, I've never been in here before."

"They're not going to torture us are they?" Cobalt's question sounds like he already knows the answer.

I want to say no, but the truth is that I really don't know these hunters as well as I thought. If they can hide entire rooms from me I'm sure they can also hide their motives.

"No we're not." Fletch says as he, Quinn and a few other hunters all stride through the door.

He stands in front of us, so he can see all three of us at once "In fact we're going to free you all."

Not one hunter moves to undo our straps and I have a feeling Fletch's idea of freeing us isn't the same as what we're thinking.

"Free us how?" I ask "Free us by death?"

Fletch gives half a smile "Ivy if I'd ever planned on killing you I would have done it as soon as we caught you. Killing is always a last resort here."

He nods at Quinn "No, it's never been my intention to kill your kind, in fact while we have had to hunt your kind our goal is not to exterminate you, but to cure you."

Silver growls, his eyes flashing, "We aren't a disease, we don't need to be cured."

Fletch stares at him "Really? You mean to say that you'd rather be controlled by animal instincts, to lash out because anger blinds you, to be a danger to people? We've been working to fix you, to give you control."

I look at Quinn "You want us to be like Quinn to join you?"

Fletch shrugs "You're welcome to join us but once you've undergone the procedure you'll be free to leave."

"What's the procedure?" I ask my tone wary.

Quinn hesitates a moment and Fletch answers "To strip you of your animal of course."

Silver and Cobalt both snarl, their eyes glowing as they lunge against their restraints. "You want to rip away our animals? That's impossible!" Silver growls his words coming out half as a hiss.

"You'd kill us before you'd managed to succeed!" Cobalt growls out.

I shake my head slowly "No you've already done it haven't you? You did it to Quinn."

It makes sense. I've never seen Quinn shift, never seen her eyes glow and never seen anything that could make me guess she was anything but a human. In fact if it hadn't been for the fact that everyone had told me Quinn was a shifter I'd have never known she was any different to the rest of the Grayson hunters.

Both Ivory and Ink are clamouring around in my head howling and snarling as they panic but I force my voice to remain calm "So you're trying to turn us back into humans."

Fletch motions to Quinn "No, you're still shifters, after all Quinn is still much faster and stronger than the average human but the animal inside you would be gone, and your shifting would be severely limited."

"And how much is severely limited?" Silver demands, his eyes burning as he glares at Fletch.

Fletch answers "The Grayson Hunters have been around for centuries. From the beginning our goal had been to stop shifters once and for all though we never planned on genocide. The initial trials performed by our ancestors had shifters only partially being cut off from their animal. They could shift but only on the full moon. Having fragments of their animal inside them turned them insane and so unfortunately these particular shifters were put down."

He looks over at Quinn "But in recent years with more advanced technology we finally found the solution. Quinn is now the first successful shifter to undergo the procedure and her animal has been completely cut out. For Quinn her shifting abilities are virtually gone. Apart from developing glowing eyes on the full moon, Quinn cannot shift at all."

Silver and Cobalt are staring wide eyed at Quinn who seems perfectly at ease with the attention. There is silence for a moment before Cobalt springs to life, his chair rattling beneath him as he yells "You! You would stand by as these hunters torn out our animals? They've already killed part of your soul and you would let them do it to others? To our entire species?"

Quinn blinks slowly, her voice lowering "Yes, in fact when they cut out the monster inside me I was the one to kill it." Her voice is cold the only sign of her hatred.

We all hold identical looks of shock on our faces and Fletch takes a step forward " I am sorry for all of you and I wish there was another way but to keep peace between humans and shifters steps must be taken."

Silver lurches forward "The only threat here is your lunatic ideas!"

Fletch smiles, a teak of his lip "I am sorry you feel that way, hopefully once the bond between you and your animal is gone you will see the logic behind our ways and agree that it is in the best interests for everyone that you sacrifice your animal."

Fletch gives us each a nod "To show you I do this out of duty to both humans and Shifters and not malice or cruelty I will give you one hour in which you can say goodbye to your animals."

He turns on his heel, the other hunters and Quinn falling in behind as they leave us.

Seeing Quinn walk away has a fury building in my chest "You would really leave us here? Let this happen to us?"

Quinn turns her eyes hard "I know this is the right thing for Shifters, otherwise I wouldn't have let them operate on my daughter."

let me know what you think