When All Else Fails

Page 1

I was really going to have to find a new job. This moving every year was getting annoying. I liked my job as an engineer but I followed the projects and most only lasted a year or so. I'd finished another and had to move again. Each time I moved I had to find a new Hyena pack. I was only half Hyena the other half wasn't something I liked to tell people. It had caused me to lose more than one boyfriend. No one wanted to claim a Hyena that was half swan. Those who liked me as a Hyena, since that was my shape, weren't so interested in having pups that might actually be Cygnets instead. I always told Alpha's my second half because I didn't want it found out later and have trouble because of it. My new Alpha had given me a room here in the rather large pack house. We'd gone all over and then she'd turned me over to the guy who roomed next to me. Jeff.

"I don't mind if he wants to tag along after me for a time."

Had been his answer to the alpha when asked if he'd show me around. I'd spent a couple days now just learning the lay of everything with the new pack. I started the new project I was on tomorrow. It would keep me busy. I was over seeing a renovation of an old office building. It needed a lot of updating. It dated back to the thirties and it showed. We'd keep to the historical but bring it all up to code.

I saw Jeff check his watch for what had to be the tenth time in the last hour.

"Am I keeping you from something?" I ask. He chuckles.

"No. I have to oversee a Session tonight and need to go meet them soon."

"Session?" I ask.

"What used to be a called a Mating Hunt." I stared wide eyed.

"I thought those were outlawed." I said, very surprised.

"In their old context they were. We do a small different version with lots of rules and oversight." I wasn't so sure it was a good idea. I knew he probably saw the concern on my face. He chuckled.

"Want to come. Be an observer, you can see we aren't a crazy pack."

"Really?"

"Yeah. Come on I'll explain as it goes." I followed him from the living room through the house. "So, there are a limit of six Chosen, and the one Breeder. Unlike in times past where four or five breeders had at any unattached regardless of if they want it or not, we limit one at a time and all Chosen are interviewed, screened mentally and physically as well as tested for health troubles. The Breeder is allowed to choose from a selection of files and people. He can choose up to six."

"Are they screened as well?"

"Yes. They also go through a series of tests for fertility. No point to them as a Breeder if they can't actually get anyone pregnant. So it works the same was as the old if one of the ones they breed gets pregnant they are mates and can do the claim after that."

"Most don't do this preferring to wait for a goddess blessed mate or fall in love."

"We do as well but there are a few who want a mate and family and are tired of the dating and disappointment so they go through this. It's up to them whether they want to be a Breeder or one of the Chosen. Some try one way then the other. The Breeder tonight, this is his fifth try. Breeders are allowed three tries in a six month period then they have to wait six months before trying again."

"Why's he still trying?" I had to ask.

"Honestly I think he's desperate. He turned forty last year. He checked out for fertility but for some reason he's had no luck. We offered to let him be a Chosen but he's not interested in that. He wants to be a Father not a mother." I laughed.