Chronicles of the Unknowns: Genesis

Excerpt from the Sequel

Meet Celeste.

She's a shape shifter who's been living in the wild for several years. Which means that she's missed a lot of what's happened since their secret was exposed and has no idea that there's a war going on. That is until she finds herself in shackles as the humans herd Unknowns into a large compound and has to fight her way out of it before they kill them all. Or worse.

But she's made acquaintances with a character who didn't get a lot of attention in the first book: Jake. So you'll get to know him a little better in this book. For this one I'm gonna put it right in the middle of the action.

"What are they going to do to us?" I asked.

"Best case scenario: kill us all. Worst case scenario: perform a wide variety of tests in an attempt to harbor our power and use it for themselves. They don't know it's useless though. Even if they could duplicate our powers it would kill them if they ever tried to implement it into their own DNA," Jake said.

"We need to get out of here," I said as we walked closer to the compound they were leading us to. We were all in shackles.

"If we make a move now they'll shoot us and kill us. Unless you're impervious to bullets then go ahead," he said.

"If we don't do something now, we might never escape," I responded.

Jake tilted his head at me.

"What can you do?"

"I'm a shape shifter. I can morph into any animal."

"Cool," he said, smiling widely.

"What about you?"

"I have an immense amount of strength. I think if we do this right we might be able to get out of here alive."

"How often do people escape?"

He shrugged.

"Often enough."

We walked through the threshold. They were about to move us all into a large cell. I stuck by Jake's side.

"So you can break these handcuffs?" I asked.

"Like a twig."

The handcuffs snapped just a moment later and clattered to the ground.

I watched as one of the guards came over to investigate.

"Now would be a damn good time to morph," Jake said in a hurry.

The guard shouted when he noticed the commotion that Jake and I were causing. I needed to change into something that I could be both stealthy with and protect myself and others if need be.

I'd spent a lot of time as a wolf, but that's not what I needed. Wolves were great predators and extremely intelligent, but they worked in packs. I needed a solitary animal. Something that was a risk taker. A creature that could climb well if I needed to, but was big enough to scare these guys senseless.

I focused my mind on a leopard. Over the last few years I was becoming faster at morphing, but it wasn't instantaneous. It took a few seconds, sometimes up to a minute depending on how well I knew the animals. In this case, I was on all fours in about 15 seconds. The handcuffs fell from my paws.

I crouched to the ground as the guard reached for his gun as he looked at Jake. He hadn't seen me.

The leopard's senses and instincts flooded my mind. It saw the guard as prey, which was just what I needed. Our tail switched as we calculated our move. We watched the guard cock his gun and the leopard wiggled in preparation to leap.

There was a tense silence. I was aware that all of the other Unknowns were watching this unfold, but the leopard wasn't as concerned. It was time to eat.

The safety clicked off.

Without hesitation the leopard leaped, claws extended and a feral snarl ripped through the air. The guard's throat was within my teeth before he knew what hit him. There wasn't even a struggle.

The leopard wanted to drag its kill up a tree to protect it from nearby predators, but I knew better. I pushed the leopard's mind back and used its body as my own. Although I'd been living in the wild I still relied on each animal's instincts to get me through. It was two minds within one body: the leopard could hunt, Celeste couldn't.

I growled at the Unknown's behind me. It startled them enough that they got out of their stupor and started moving. We needed to get out of here before more guards came.

Some of them struggled to get out of their handcuffs. I could smell the fear in the air. They knew that if they couldn't break free they'd be killed. I watched as Jake helped those who weren't strong enough or didn't have a power that could break the handcuffs.

My ear twitched to the left. I could hear a hoard of footsteps coming. We needed to move now.