Moonshifter High

Chapter 11: Let's play detective!

Since everyone knows I completely suck at fashion, Eva and Jules decided to go shopping with me Saturday, hoping I’d learn something. I don’t think I will, but I think it’ll be fun.
So Jules, Eva and I went to the center of our city, and we went from shop to shop. It was fun, but soon, we had to part ways again.
‘See you Monday!’ I called after Eva.
‘Good luck Lexi!’
‘And good luck me.’ Jules said grinning at me and poked my side. I’m not ticklish, so I didn’t mind. Jules on the contrary… She’s véry ticklish.
Eva turned back around, looking forward, and made her way to the bus that would take her home. When she disappeared from sight, I turned back to Jules as she turned back to me, sighing.
‘Hey Lexi?’
‘I don’t want to go into another store…’
‘No no no! Those guys…’ I turned to see what she was pointing at, and saw Jayden and Chris, walking away from us. ‘I know them.’
‘Golden Path Pack.’ I looked back at Jules, who grinned back at me. Her eyes sparkled with something I knew all too well, and I’m sure I looked the same as we had another twinsie-moment: ‘Let’s play detective!’

~

And so, Jules and I followed them, using our ninja-detective-tricks. Whenever they appeared to –almost– look at us, we’d hide behind our jackets or turn around so we’d look like we were just another part of the crowd. We managed to follow them quite some time, moving further away from the city again. Where are you going…? We crossed a few more roads and then I heard Jules in my head.
‘Where are they going? Back to their pots of gold?’ Still not good at joking I see.
‘I really don’t know Jules. And that was a very bad joke.’ I wanted to roll my eyes at her, but then I’d probably lose balance, trip and alert the guys that we were here and that would be very non-ninja.
We slowly got closer to the trees, until we were walking in the forest. I hoped the leaves crackling as we stepped on them wouldn’t make too much noise. We were at a distance that we weren’t close enough so they could smell us, and by looking at the trees –and my hair– I could see the wind was coming from them, towards us, so they couldn’t smell us. But there wasn’t much wind here anyway.  I could see Jules wasn’t comfortable, and I was confused: why didn’t they just shift now? We’re in a forest and humans never come here. Besides, it’s a faster way to travel. Our school is located somewhere in this forest too, hidden so no human could find it.
‘What are we going to do when they enter their territory?’ I knew we’d have to come up with something soon, because we almost reached the border of their territory. They would know if we entered it, like they had before. ‘We can’t go there anymore!’ That made my attention snap back to Jules’s voice.
‘Anymore? How many times were you in there?’
‘Less than you were!’ She had a point there.
‘Focus!’
‘Right right, focus.’ And with Jules’s last comment, we stopped our conversation and focused on the guys again. I had to bite my lip to keep me from laughing, since the guys were acting really goofy and childish – they were walking on a muddy path and tried to push each other in a puddle.
‘Lexi, Juliet, we know you are following us.’ I froze as Chris said that, turning around to look at us with raised eyebrows. Uh-oh…
‘Oh! I-it’s y-you guys!’ Jules stuttered. Smooth… ‘W-we really did-didn’t know…’
‘You followed us all the way from the shopping district.’ Why did they remain silent and got us all the way back here if they knew? They’re not going to kill us are they? No, probably not. But they might get pissed…
‘N-no!’ I tried to convince them otherwise, crossing my arms, but I was never really good at lying.
‘You’re such a burden…’ Jayden sighed and scratched the back of his head. Well that’s a nice thing to say! Seriously, what’s wrong with this boy? Is he bipolar or something? One time he’s all happy and nice, and the other time he’s like this. ‘Why did you follow us in the first place?’
‘Wé’re not the one who have to explain! And you know what I’m talking about.’
‘You saw us train, didn’t you?’
‘We know everything!’ Jules interfered again, but then bit her lip, looking down. ‘Almost.’ Once again: smooth. But it’s true though – we don’t know everything.
‘You annoy me.’
‘At least we’re not going to hurt anyone with being annoying!’ Jules pointed out, and opened her mouth to say something again, but was cut off by Chris. He rolled his eyes and lifted his hand slowly. At first, I didn’t get why, but when I looked to Jules, I saw she was taller than she normally was. I looked down and saw why: her feet were lifted off the ground. What the hell?!
‘Help!’
‘Jules!’ I wanted to take a step towards Jules, but was stopped in the middle of my movement when a cold feeling spread up to a little under my knee.
My feet were frozen onto the ground.
There was ice coming from the ground and went around my legs, making me stay in place.
My feet. Wrapped in ice. I was starting to freak out a little.
The ice spread over the ground, moving to the first few trees surrounding us, covering them in ice as well. I could see my own breath as I looked around mesmerized, and Jayden’s breath too when he talked.
‘Stick around a little longer Lexi,’ My head snapped up to Jayden, who was standing there with a pissed off look. His stare matched the reason I couldn’t walk – they were both ice-cold. ‘your friend is not going anywhere and neither are you.’ My heart beat frantically in my chest. Jules was floating a few feet above the ground, only being held up by the hand of a guy, and I couldn’t do anything since I was frozen to the spot. Literally.
Why did we follow the guys with super powers again?
I looked back up at Jules, and saw her panicked expression.
‘Hang in there Jules.’
‘Very funny Lexi.’
‘What?’ I didn’t get why she sounded so angry, but then remembered she was floating. Hanging? ‘Oh wait!’
Jules tried to move, and her eyes widened as she yelped since Chris dropped her a little.
‘Don’t move.’ I wanted to hit him for doing that to her, but if I hit him he would probably drop her all the way. And I still couldn’t move. I struggled against the ice, but it didn’t budge. ‘If you don’t stop distracting us from our work, there will be consequences.’
The ice crept a little further into the forest when Jayden moved his hand. He cursed when he noticed it too.
‘We just… Those powers…’ My eyes widened when they found Jayden’s right hand. ‘Your tattoo!’ It indicates his power. His tattoo is a snowflake, and his power is controlling ice. How did I not see that before?
‘Stop being such a pain in the ass and leave us alone. You know too much already. Percy has been stressed out because of you two pups.’ Jayden snapped at us.
‘But why are you doing this? And why do you have those… awesome powers.’ Although Jules tried to hide the last bit with a cough, everyone heard it. I don’t know if I imagined it, but I think I saw the corner of Jayden’s mouth tug up slightly before he returned to scowling.
‘None of your business!’ Chris snapped and he dropped her a bit once again. I struggled against the ice once again, but Jayden made sure the ice was so thick it wouldn’t break easily. I wonder if Chris also has a tattoo to indicate that his power is telekinesis.
‘But it’s not fair what you’re doing!’ Stop Jules, don’t you know he might actually drop you? I thought, but didn’t actually send it to her.
‘We just follow the orders.’
‘Then, if I order you to put me down, would you do it?’ Jules made her smartass comment. I bit my lip as I tried to rub the goosebumps off of my arm. Remember ice is still really cold, and we were surrounded by it. And, on top of that, my legs were wrapped in it.
But then I saw Chris had this evil smirk, and my worry for Jules intensified. I think Jules’s last comment had pushed him over some invisible line.
‘If that’s what you want.’ Suddenly, Jules dropped from the air. I covered my mouth with my hands and my eyes widened. I almost cheered from relief when she didn’t hit the ground, but was caught by Trace. He carried her bridal style, before he put her feet on the ground again. He rested one hand on her shoulder as he looked back up to the two boys in front of him.
‘From here on, these two are my responsibility. They were not trespassing, nor insulting you so you have no right to do this.’ Oh yeah, he’s pissed. Only now did Jules open her eyes again.
‘Be an alpha and take care of this. Or at least try to.’ Chris growled, also angry, before he turned around and walked away. Jayden glared at the newly arrived group and Jules before turning around too. I was standing a little away from them, but my feet were still covered in ice. He wouldn’t leave me like this right?
‘Uhm… Jayden?’ I started carefully. ‘Jay-Jay? Aren’t you uhm, you know, forgetting something?’ Jayden turned around and locked eyes with me and I looked at him pleadingly. He dropped his eyes to the ice as I bit my lip and his mouth dropped open slightly, forming an “o” shape. He stomped onto the ground, which made the ice all around us crack. It shattered and fell down from the trees in a million tiny pieces that glistened in the sunlight, and the ice around my legs shattered too. I looked around, still amazed by its beauty, before I pulled my legs out of the ice, welcoming the warmth as Jayden disappeared. I turned back to the group and saw who Alpha brought with him: Jim, Hunter, Mick, Mia and Rose.
‘We have to get out of here…’
‘I agree. Let’s go.’ Jules joined me so we stood side by side, and carefully started to walk backwards, eyes focused upon the group. They were all discussing stuff with each other, and didn’t look at Jules and me, so it was the perfect time to ninja out of here. We slowly turned to look at each other and Jules nodded. Run! We were just about to run, but Trace noticed. He caught us by the collars of Jules’s coat and my jacket.
‘Alexia Avery Freeman and Juliet Penelope Hunt. Whátdo you think you were doing?!’ I cringed as he yelled at us. Ninja-ing out of here… Oh, you mean before?
‘Not following them.’
‘No…’ Jules added, stretching the o.
‘You guys are  producing so much trouble for me I could swim in it.’ Oh don’t exaggerate. Wait… He’s not. Darn. ‘Explain nów.’ We were turned around so he could look at our faces, his clouded with anger. I looked at Jules, but she looked at me and nodded.
‘We were playing detective.’ I finally decided on saying as I looked back at Trace.
‘On our own.’ Jules added.
‘Again.’ I finished.
‘The good news is that we discovered what those tattoo’s meant!’ Jules exclaimed excitedly.
‘And we found out they’re réálly strong!’
‘Yeah!’ We both put our thumbs up and smiled, trying to get him to lose his ‘Me. Angry Alpha.’-act.
‘I’m disappointed in you. Both of you.’ Immediately, our hands and smiles dropped. ‘Juliet, you promised you’d contact me if you were done shopping, and I thought Lexi was the clever one keeping both of you from doing stupid things.’ I looked down, huffing, and kicked a random stone. Now, I realized it wás a stupid thing to follow them. I had this uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach, and to be honest, I was slightly disappointed in myself too. I put Jules in danger, and myself too. But we did discover something new, and that was and still is a good thing.
I was snapped out of my thinking when Trace continued: ‘Come on, let’s go back. Really, why do you always cause so much problems!’
‘It’s mostly Eva and Kim doing stupid stuff and Chess and Robin saying stupid stuff and the others throwing stupid stuff so I don’t think wé are the ones in the wrong.’ I agreed with Jules. Why do wé always have to be the grown-up-ones, and why does he make it look like we’re álways doing something wrong?
‘I’m not talking about Eva, Robin, Mia, Jim or Sienna or whoever! I’m talking about yóú two.’ We continued making our way back after that, and I looked at my shoes the whole time. Left, right. Left, right.
‘What do you mean “Jim”? I never threw with… Oh never mind.’ I smiled at that, but couldn’t muster anything else. Oh look! There’s left again!
‘Alpha, wouldn’t you just let them get away with this one? They’re right about the others doing stupid stuff too.’ Thank you Rose! I could walk up to her and hug her right there, but then I’d have to let her into my personal bubble, and that’s mý personal bubble. ‘Just this time.’
‘Where did my leadership go?’ Did this mean he was cracking?
‘It went on vacation together with your common sense.’ There were a few “oh”-sounds from the rest of the group and I stared wide eyed at Mick.
‘Fine!’ Trace huffed. ‘Then this was the last time.’  A grin made its way onto my face and Jules and I high-fived.

~

‘I’m gonna go to the toilet!’ My mom said as she got off of the couch. We had been watching some TV-show, which just went to the commercial-break.
‘I’m going upstairs!’ Mason said since he knew my mom always went downstairs. And indeed…
‘I’m going downstairs!’ She said as she made her way to the hallway, to the toilet. Mace stood up too as Joey said: ‘I’m not going at all!’
I raised an eyebrow at him. ‘Good to know, everyone, very interesting.’
‘We know,’ Mace said, stopping around the corner of the doorpost. Only his head and hands were visible. ‘you can’t live without that little piece of information.’
I scrunched up my nose, ‘I’d probably be better off without it. You know, not getting scarred for life?’
‘I’d like to continue this conversation, but I really have to go now!’ And with that, Mace disappeared and I heard his footsteps on the stairs.
Django walked to me, wagging his tail, and then put his head on my lap. I smiled at him and pet his head. He’s adorable, isn’t he?

~

The next day, Sunday, was the day we went to Lindenhoff. Also known as the Hunting Grounds. We’re still wolves, so every once in a while we go to the Hunting Grounds to… take care of our ‘bloodlust’. I had asked if Jules wanted to come, but she said she couldn’t, so it was just my mom, stepdad, brothers and me.
When I closed the fence behind us, we all shifted. With my mom and Sean leading, we made our way further down the field. Trees were scattered over the field, enough for us to hide in, but not enough to really form a real forest. We first just ran around a little before walking more towards the middle of the field. It wasn’t long before we saw a deer grazing.
‘Okay, Kate, Lexi, you and I will make sure it doesn’t get away. Mason, Joey, you take it down.’
We all split up, surrounding the deer. I watched it look up, but it hadn’t heard us. It continued grazing warily. I looked around and saw everyone in position.
‘Ready?’ Sean asked. He got affirmative answers from all of us. ‘Go!’
Mace and Joey charged for the deer, who looked up at the sudden noise in fright. The deer darted towards a side it thought was free, but I jumped in the way and growled at it. The deer ran towards another side, but this time Sean stopped it before Joey and Mason took it down.
Somewhere I felt really bad for this deer, especially since I might want to study veterinary medicine. But we were wolves, and if we didn’t do this, we might look for another way to deal with our bloodlust.

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Hey guys! As promised: another chapter :) So Lindenhoff actually exists, although it's a firm that provides resaurants of their meat, vegetables, fruits, potatoes and dairy products, in the Netherlands.
SO~! Thank you for sticking with this story out of all the amazing stories out there on Wattpad (anywhere, actually) especially since it took a long while to update.
-XXX- RainbowRose8