A/N: Okay, so this little story has been floating around my head for a while after I re watched The Shaggy Dog. I was thinking, what if something happened like that to Skylar. I was somewhat interested to explore Dick's reaction to that; I assume he would be in total denial of it, and this was born. It will be a six-part story, and takes place six months after Skylar moves in with Dick. She's now fifteen, while Dick is still twenty-three.
So, hope you guys like it!
Part 1
There's just something about Huskies that's always fascinated her.
Seriously, their soft fur, striking eyes, strong personalities; what's not to love? She's always admired that breed since their trip to Alaska almost a year ago. She still sometimes dreads that trip as it reminds her of the time she nearly killed her brother. Sure, she didn't know he was her brother back then, but the thought still haunts her.
At the moment, she's fixed on this awesome documentary about sled dogs on the TV. There's only so much you can do on a Saturday afternoon when your brother is at some meeting. So, she had made herself a cup of hot cocoa and sat in front of the TV, watching the first thing it showed when she switched it on. She's probably been here for about an hour when she sees Shiloh's head snap up. That's when the door opens and she turns to see Dick closing the door, his tie loose around his neck and his blazer on his arm.
"Back so soon?" she asks, knowing that when he left for the meeting, he said it would be at least three hours long.
He shrugs. "I couldn't take it anymore, so I left." He says, placing the blazer on the sofa and removing the tie.
"Can you do that?" she asks.
"Well, my father is everyone's boss, so that gives me the privilege of leaving whenever I want to." He grins, unbuttoning the collar button of his shirt. When she goes back to watching the TV, he leans over her shoulder. "What're you watching?" he asks.
She shrugs. "Just something about sled dogs." She answers.
He knowingly smiles at her. As Shiloh trots over to him, he bends down to stroke her head. Just as he does it, a loud beeping noise starts, making Shiloh freak. It also makes Skylar almost drop her hot cocoa. She turns around as he calms the dog down.
"What was that?" she asks.
He walks over to his briefcase and opens it, taking out a small communicator. "Trouble." He answers, starting towards the bedroom where he kept his suit. "We need to go, now."
"What's it this time?" she asks, making Shiloh sit and slowly calm down.
"Theft at a local museum in Gotham." He says, closing the door.
"What about?" she asks, moving to her own room. Well, the room which had all of her clothes and stuff. Ever since she moved, she's sort of been sleeping in his room. She herself doesn't know what happened. But she remembers having a nightmare the night she moved and went over to Dick's room for some reassurance and ended up sleeping beside him. Somehow, she thinks that he feels that if she sleeps alone she would be a victim of nightmares again. She'd normally try to shoot it down, but after the first couple of times, she just gave up.
"I'll tell you when we get there." He says, coming out dressed in his Nightwing suit.
"Have you heard about the Gem of Bahari?" he asks as he jumps from rooftop to rooftop.
She shakes her head, flying alongside him. "No, I don't think you ever told me about that one."
"Well, the Gem of Bahari is a priceless gem, as you could have got from the name, from its origins traced to tribes in Africa. It was a gift from the chief of the Bahari tribe, now long disbanded, to the chief of another tribe as a wedding gift. The wedding was arranged between the Bahari tribe's chief's son and the neighboring tribe chieftain's daughter to secure good relations between the two tribes. But, the son fell in love with another girl, which was frowned upon. He broke off the engagement to pursue this girl and caused a situation which almost sent the two tribes to war." He explains.
"And that would be bad because…?" she asks.
"Well, even though the neighboring tribe, called the Nyasi tribe, was more in number, the Bahari tribe worked with Nature. They spent so much time in the company of wild animals that the animals listened to them and followed them. They also practiced a special form of magic that made you one with your primal roots." He finishes.
"Wow…" she says. He nods.
"Anyway, a war on the tribes would result in unnecessary bloodshed. So, hoping to avert the war, the Bahari king was forced to give his tribe's most prized possession, a Gem that was of immense value. He warned the Nyasi tribe chief of the power the Gem radiated. But greed overcame the tribal chief and he tried to use its power to wreck havoc on the natural balance of the area. The Gem's power became too much for him to bear and he succumbed to it. The Bahari tribe chief stole the Gem back and buried it far, where it was excavated years later and has been going around the world for almost three hundred years." He whips out his grappling hook and swings to the nearest building, where he puts it away and continues running.
"So, what does this Gem look like?" she asks.
"Imagine a rock, somewhere between three to five pounds yet can still fit in your hand, but made of pure sapphire." She unconsciously fingers the sapphire bracelet on her wrist, the last connection to her mother. "It's this blue stone that seems to change colors when exposed to different light conditions. You can pretty much see the power it holds. It took mankind over ten years to find it, and despite being old, it hasn't even showed an ounce of change."
"But it's here now, isn't it?" she asks. He nods.
"We think Morgaine le Fey's gonna try and use its power to bring her son to power." He says.
"Wait, Morgaine le fey?" she asks. "That's who we're dealing with?"
"Which is why Robin and Batgirl called for both of us." He finishes. "You up for it?"
She grins at him. "When have you known me to back down from a challenge?" she asks.
"At least thirty times so far." He nonchalantly answers.
"Okay, guilty." She says. "But this is definitely my style."
"I wouldn't call this your style of a mission." He interjects, constantly keeping that annoying smirk on his face.
"What would you know? She asks. "You've barely known me a year."
"Oh, that just proves you don't know me enough." He counters.
"And Tim says we don't fight." She laughs along with him as the museum comes up.
They find Tim and Barbara waiting outside as they arrive.
"What took you so long?" Tim asks when they finally land next to Barbara.
"The zeta tube near the museum broke down." Dick explains. "So we had to take the beam to our house and then run all this way."
"Anyway," Barbara cuts in, giving Skylar a nod, "Morgaine le Fey's stealing the Gem right now. We go in and we might stop her from getting her hands on that kind of power."
Dick looks to Skylar. "Let's do this." She says.
They burst in and see that le Fey with a huge blue rock in her hands. Skylar guesses that that's the Bahari Gem. Dick was right. In this condition, with the lights hitting it just right, it seemed more like a kaleidoscope than a blue stone. She can see why the GCPD wanted to desperately keep this particular stone. It was the definition of simple yet pure beauty. If she looked closer, she could also swear she could hear a lion roar or an elephant trumpet, although it was simply a figment of her imagination.
"Let the Gem go, le fey." Dick calls. "There's no escape."
The witch stops in her tracks. "Oh, the Big Bad Bat sent his three pups to capture me, did he, and oh, someone new." Skylar suddenly feels very self-conscious as le Fey sizes her up, looking up and down her body.
Protectively, Dick steps forward. "I'll repeat: let the Gem go!"
Morgaine le Fey looks at the Gem in her hand and then at them and then back to the Gem. Suddenly, her face breaks out into a cruel smile. "Not a chance, Nightwing." Saying so, she mutters a few words that make the Gem glow bright blue.
"Look out!" the last thing she hears is Dick's voice before she loses consciousness.
When she wakes up, all she can think of is how much her head hurts. She opens her eyes, wondering why she felt, furry. She sees Dick, Barbara and Tim, with the Gem safely in its case and Morgaine le Fey all wrapped up in chains for the police to find. So, why was everyone staring at her like that? Why wasn't anybody telling her what to do? Did she have to take over? Did she have to become the leader? Did she have to correct these people who were showing so much instability?
Wait…what on earth was she thinking? Why did she have this strong desire to exercise?
And first of all, what was this weird itching feeling in her mouth?
She stands up when she notices that she's still on all fours, and all three Bats look so large. She opens her mouth to ask what happened, but that comes out is weird whine. She tries to form words, but simply can't. All she accomplishes is more whines and finally, a bark. She looks up at them, mentally asking Dick what's going on, hoping that he'd answer.
"How did this happen, Dick?" Tim asks.
"I'm…I'm not sure." Dick says, looking extremely stunned. She tries to ignore the nagging feeling that she needed to bite somebody and secure balance.
"Was it the Gem?" Barbara asks.
"Could be…" Dick says as he, Tim and Barbara get drawn into a conversation. Slightly irritated with the confusion, Skylar barks once to let them know that she's still here. She needed an explanation to why there was a tail behind her!
"Oh, I forgot you still don't know." Dick says, going down on one knee to her level as he removes a mirror from his utility belt. She still doesn't know why he has a mirror in there, but has a feeling she's about to find out. He holds up the mirror to her face, and she's met with the shock of the life.
The face she sees in the mirror is hardly even close to human. It's sort of more wolfish yet not a true wolf and she has a nagging feeling she knows that face anywhere. Black fur covers her face and her upright, alert ears. White fur covers her muzzle and neck. Blue eyes, her eyes, stare back at her. It takes her a few more seconds to put it all together. That's when she realizes that she's a dog!
No, not a dog. A Siberian Husky!
She scrambles, looking around for her mother's bracelet as she panics. But Dick puts a hand on the back of her neck and she feels calm at once. Almost like he knows what she was looking for, he fingers something around her neck, where she finds that the bracelet has found its way around her neck, like a very expensive collar.
She heaves a sigh of relief and tries to talk before she forgets that she's a dog. Thinking about that fills her with panic as all these new instincts and emotions are extremely frightening to her. But luckily, Dick was right beside her the whole time, calming her down whenever she started slipping into these new instincts.
"You get Zatanna yet?" Dick asks Tim, who is on the phone.
"I think I have." Tim says. "It's ringing, wait…Oh hey Zatanna. Tim here. Listen, we have a slight problem over here…huh? Okay, I'll give it to him." He covers the mouthpiece. "She wants to hear it from you, Dick."
Dick gets up, eliciting a small whimper from Skylar. He takes the phone from Tim as Tim takes Dick's place beside Skylar, stroking her black fur to calm her. Dick quickly has a hushed conversation with Zatanna and then puts the phone down a full agonizing minute later.
"So?" Barbara asks, still in shock.
"She says she has to come and see for herself." Dick says.
Skylar suddenly feels a lot of jealous, negative feeling coming off Barbara in waves. She can feel the energy increasing whenever Tim says Zatanna's name. Unable to take so much toxic emotion, she whimpers, which results in all three of them soothing her and taking the topic off the magician.
"Let's get her back to the house." Dick says, pulling out his cell phone and dialing a number that was pretty much on his speed dial.
"Who are you calling?" Barbara asks, and Skylar feels more negative energy coming.
"Alex." Dick answers. "I'm gonna get him to take Shiloh for a few days while we figure out what to do."
Hearing that, Skylar barks, trying to get him to remember what happened the last time Alex took Shiloh for a few days. They had found the golden retriever at the local shelter. After that, Skylar wouldn't trust her best friend with her dog for a long time. Luckily, Dick gets the message.
"Or no." he says, earning a small gruff. "I'll get him to put Shiloh in the kennel for a few days."
"I have absolutely no idea what caused this." Zatanna admits, stepping back from Skylar.
"You don't?" Dick asks, one hand still in her fur as he sits next to her.
Zatanna shakes her head. "It's a force more powerful than I've ever known. All I know that it took up her most powerful primal nature and transformed her into the corresponding animal."
"So that's a husky?" Dick asks.
"It makes perfect sense." She says. "Her strong yet silent nature, her ability to take on almost anything, her love for adventure and exercise; it's makes perfect sense that she would be turned into a husky."
"But it is reversible, isn't it?" he asks, trying to avoid all the similarities she just pointed out.
She nods. "It is, but there's a catch."
"What catch?"
"I don't know the counter spell yet. She has to stay in a human mindset till I find it, and I don't know how long it will take. If she gives in to the dog nature, she could be stuck as a dog forever, and even I won't be able to do anything about it."
A/N: So, that's part one. Hope you guys liked all the twists and turns that will be coming up. I have a whole store of surprises planned for this, if you guys like it enough, that is.
Please review.