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That makes a little lost sleep worthwhile. I guess I live a pretty narrow life most of the time." He glanced back at Zyl, who had stopped in the doorway between the main room and the closet-sized kitchen. "I really liked your buddies. They're funny but cool guys, all of them."
    "I'll tell them," Zyl replied. "I think they liked you, too. They don't open up and act natural with just everyone. We're all different, you know."
    Carl went ahead and poured two mugs of coffee and stuck them in the microwave to reheat. That gave him a minute to absorb Zyl's remark. Different. Did that mean the strangeness he'd sensed was real?

 

Chapter 4
     
    He carried the two mugs to the narrow table and put one in front of Zyl, now settled on one of the two stools. "Different? How do you mean? What do you mean?"
    "They're all like me. Shapeshifters, beast kin, Were-kind. You sensed it. I could tell, but you were afraid or unwilling to believe. They recognized you as kin. I told you there's a cat inside you. Not sure what kind, but definitely a feline."
    Carl sat down before he collapsed. It made perfect sense, even though it went against everything he'd always believed. All he'd told himself and clung to for some tie to reality, to sanity. "I-I-I don't know what to say, what to think. I want to deny it as I always have, but it's getting harder."
    He clenched his hands around the mug, letting the heat leach into his flesh and drive out part of the sudden icy chill that threatened to absorb him. It was too much to take in, yet Zyl spoke in such a calm, matter-of-fact way that it started to sound like truth.
    Zyl reached across the table and covered Carl's clenched hands with his. "I know. It's a lot to take in, forces you to make a sharp and sudden turn in your beliefs. I understand, even though I've always known who and what I am. Somehow, you've suppressed it or it's been suppressed by some outside force. You should've shifted by puberty, but I realize you never did. That trapped cat is fighting to get out. The allergies are its revenge. Maybe I can help you through it."
    Carl looked up and met Zyl's green gaze, sharp but also somehow gentle, almost tender. "Can you? Will you? Help me, I mean? It's going to be hard, going to be scary and I bet it'll hurt like crazy, too. Tell me, how does it happen? How does someone become Were-kind or are they all born that way?"
    Zyl hesitated, as if marshalling his thoughts or trying to simplify his explanation. "There are three ways, really. Some are born that way. It's carried on a recessive gene so requires one have it from both parents to manifest. Neither of them may ever display it if they only carry one. There's a separate gene also, one that's dominant, that can suppress the shifter genes. We're still trying to understand and unravel all this. Anyway, trueborn Were-kind are not too common. Then there's a virus that a regular human can be infected with. Most often it's through a bite, but sometimes an exchange of bodily fluids is enough, especially if the human carries one of the recessives already."
    Almost scientific, Carl thought. Okay, maybe he could accept it as at least something possible. Not exactly pertinent to him yet but ... "That's kind of two-and-a-half ways," he said, recovering a bit of humor. "So then what?"
    "We need to work on getting you through the first shift."
    * * * *
    Zyl saw the shock on Carl's face as the impact of his calm statement soaked in.
    "You mentioned exchange of bodily fluids as a possible trigger. Does that imply what I think it does? I mean do you think we should..." The other man stumbled to a halt, a wash of color sweeping over his face.
    Restraining a laugh because he knew Carl did not find anything about this situation humorous, Zyl nodded. "That's not the only way, but we could. I mean a blood transfusion is one method...things like that, as well as sex. I won't insist and certainly not force anything on you that doesn't feel good to you, seem right