The Skin Changers [slow updates]

Chapter Nine: The Sparrow

The hard part wouldn't be getting in the building, no, that was the easy part now thanks to Jasper.

The hard part was not looking suspicious as she walked around the building looking for her little window opening. She supposed she could change into an animal and search but the change was exhausting enough, and even more so the longer she held the form. She was going to need that energy when searching for the files.

Gracelyn only hoped there weren't a bunch of cameras outside of the building and if there were, she could only hope the people watching the screens in the security room would think of her as a dumb, lost teenager and not someone looking to steal from the building - even though that's exactly what she was doing.

After a once around of the building she found her tiny window. She ran through a list of potential animals to turn into and their respective, helpful traits; first she thought she could turn into a bird but not only would she have to do that but she'd also have to give herself a mini flight lesson and she wasn't so sure how that would turn out.

Second, she thought of maybe a rat, obviously a rat would be small enough to crawl through the window but it wouldn't be able to get up to the window and that was a whole other problem itself. Her last options were a lizard or a spider since both could climb up walls and both would be small enough to fit.

As fun as it sounded to be an eight legged and thousand eyed spider, the thought creeped her out more plus she wasn't so sure how the whole reading part would work with that many sets of eyes on her head. Not to mention spiders scared the crap out of her and she was one hundred percent sure she did not want to become the thing she feared.

Lizard it was.

Gracelyn walked away from the building, in fear of a camera catching her body switch and exposing her to the rest of the world. She decided on a little wooded area behind the county courthouse.

"Here goes nothing." She muttered to herself, getting into a nice little stance to commence the changing. Gracelyn laughed at herself at the ridiculousness of it all. Even adding a little knuckle and neck popping before closing her eyes and concentrating.

Her ritual started, top to bottom. Imagining her skin changing into a reptile's, her body shrinking, and then the limbs. When she opened her eyes, instead of seeing the building in front of her, all she saw was grass for what seemed like miles.

So maybe she didn't think this fully through. Now having given herself a very long journey for a lizard body. Gracelyn was now about a hundredth of her size and had made herself have to walk a hundred times further. Nice going.

Being a lizard wasn't all that great, she discovered as she skittered quite awkwardly across the lawn of grass and towards her destination. Gracelyn felt gross, her skin wasn't quite slimy but the skin still felt weird to her. The feeling of it dragging across the ground made an uncomfortable noise and gave her a disgusting sensation.

Maybe the spider would have been a better option. But it was too late to think about that now.

The soft grass continued to brush against her rough skin until she reached the wall with the barred and open window. She didn't quite know how the whole walking up walls thing worked but she was hoping it would just come natural like the balance of her cat transformation.

Luckily it did come quite naturally, her toes curling and uncurling as they latched onto the wall and propelled her upwards towards the metal bars. She still didn't quite understand why buildings had little vents like that but she was glad it did. Otherwise finding her parent's records would prove ten times more difficult.

She finally reached the opening, her eyes adjusting to the lack of light in the room. There was just enough low lights that let her see what she was doing but it was much darker than the bright sunlight of the outdoors.

The room was old and dusty and packed practically from floor to ceiling with boxes upon boxes of files. This was going to take so much longer than she had expected. It would take hours, even looking through just the boxes labeled 'C' -- assuming they would be alphabetized -- would take entirely way too long.

But if she wanted answers she would have to start looking. It couldn't be that bad.

Gracelyn was oh so wrong. Hours. It had been hours and she was still crawling in and out of boxes searching vigorously for anything that said Chaplin on it. She found numerous boxes where it should have been, but if this file had existed it didn't any longer. It was wiped away just like the rest of her parents records.

She let out a frustrated yell, that sounded more like a squeak in her lizard form. That only frustrated her further. Having this secret that nobody else understood and having parents that abandoned her.

If they weren't already dead, Gracelyn could only hope they were living just as miserable of a life as her. Having to bury and hide who they were. Searching their entire life for something that no longer existed. Feeling a pain that ran so deep that it nearly destroyed them at two a.m. when they found they couldn't sleep because their nightmares kept them awake.

But just when she was about to give up a bird flew in through the window, it's body slamming into a box that had seemed empty. Though papers floated out from it, as the box tumbled to the floor. The sudden noise caused Gracelyn to jump back and look around, only hoping that no one would come to investigate.

The bird chirped at her, looking at the papers and back to her numerous times. But Gracelyn stood her ground, didn't birds... eat lizards? The bird cocked its small head at her, as if it was confused as to why she hadn't gone to look at the fallen papers. It chirped once more, hopping a little closer to her.

Gracelyn started to skitter backwards but the sparrow had stepped into the light, causing it to light up the small birds features. But the only thing that interested her was the bird's eyes, they almost looked.. Human.

She started to walk forward, trying to get a better look at the eyes. She had to know for certain if it wasn't just a figment of her tired brain from searching so many boxes. But as soon as the sparrow figured out what she was doing, it quickly tried to fly off. Resulting to hopping up different shelves until it reached the barred opening. It seemed to have injured its right wing from ramming into the box.

It took one last look at her before disappearing into the afternoon sky. Gracelyn scrambled up the wall to get one last look, but it was already long gone.