Chapter 12

Maddy was ready early the next morning. She'd spent time trying to clear her head about the whole situation but she couldn't stop her mind from racing. Her heart was hammering in her chest even when she went to step out of the door and run to the school. That was why she jumped a mile at the grinning faces of Rhydian, Tom and Shannon when she saw them on the other side. None of them had been able to stay a second night, and she'd told them that she'd likely have gone by the time they turned up in the morning, yet here they stood now.

"What are you doing here?" she asked. That was when she was startled yet again by her dad grabbing the car keys behind her.

"You think we'd let you do this on your own?" He moved past her and headed to the car as Emma took her coat off the rack. Maddy felt a flush of relief as she headed to the car, Rhydian taking her by the hand as she did. She'd been worried about how she'd prove to the Segolia Wolfbloods that she wasn't actually the shapeshifter, but them all arriving together solved that. There was no way they wouldn't notice something was up on the drive. They all knew each other too well.

With that in mind, they all got in and Dan pulled onto the road. Maddy tried to hide her nerves. She knew everyone could see right through her. Rhydian reached over and rested a hand on her right leg. That was when she realised her legs had been twitching. His touch served to relax her and she leaned over and rested her head on him. They stayed like that until they pulled up to the school.

As they got out of the car, Sweeney and two of her elite team walked over as the other Segolia operatives filed into the school behind them.

"It's good to see you made it." Sweeney said as she approached. "Smart move all showing up together. Now, let's get you all inside." They all got out of the car and began walking in as Sweeney explained the plan. "We'll start off by getting our network of thermal technology set up as well as issuing tracking pins to anyone who's part of the mission. They clip to your clothes and mark your position so that we know who's who." Everyone nodded as the two elites flanking her handed them out. Everyone clipped them on as they followed, heading towards the gym. Maddy decided now was as good of a time as any, pulling out her phone and going on the internet. She went to the school's student page and used her account to log in. Less than ten seconds later, her phone pinged with a text message.

'Online and ready.' It was Sarah. She knew she was standing by. Her phone started to buzz with an incoming call, Sarah's name on the caller ID bar. She answered it but didn't say anything, putting it on speaker and sliding the phone into her hoodie's zip-up pocket but keeping it mostly unzipped so that Sarah could hear.

"Man, this school's security is weak!" They looked over at one of the technicians who was busy typing away. "I'm shredding through it like nothing. It's almost like someone's doing it for me. I've got access to the cameras and the records of basically all the staff just in case this thing tries to impersonate a caretaker or anything."

"Well done." Sweeney clapped him on the back proudly with enough force that he had to stifle a choke. Tom and Shannon watched in amusement. Even Rhydian had a grin on his face. It made Maddy feel like she was somehow the only one who was scared. She tried to cover it up when Shannon turned her way, but to no avail.

"Don't worry, Mads. Nothing's going to go wrong here. I count thirteen Segolia agents plus Sweeney's elite five and then Sweeney herself. That's more than enough muscle for one Wolfblood!"

"What did you say?" Robyn, one of the elite five, had heard Shannon and was now walking over. "Did you say thirteen?" Shannon nodded.

"Count them for yourself." Shannon gestured to the line of Wolfbloods waiting for orders from either Sweeney or one of the elite operatives. Sure enough, there were thirteen.

"Ma'am, we have a problem." Robyn beckoned Sweeney over, making it clear she didn't trust this to the earpieces. Maddy instantly worked it out even without Robyn saying it. There was only one reason she'd have issue with there being thirteen unless she just really hated odd numbers. Only twelve must have been assigned. There was an unknown Wolfblood in the room.

"I'm on it." Maddy heard Sarah's voice from her pocket as Sweeney walked over to hear what Robyn had to say. Suddenly, their ears were assaulted by feedback blasting out of Robyn's earpiece. The ear ache hit Maddy, Rhydian, Emma and Dan instantly as Robyn's face contorted in pain. The same was happening to Sweeney. The other four elite were also hit, wrenching their earpieces out and scanning around as the high-pitched frequency moved on to the lower-ranking security members. One-by-one they all cried out and began trying to rip their earpieces out. The fake one joined in on the performance, but it just wasn't fast enough.

"That one!" Tom called out, pointing to one near the middle. "He reacted later than everyone else!" Sweeney and her elite team instantly pulled themselves together, converging on the fake security Wolfblood that Tom was pointing to. He instantly knew he'd been found out and went to make a move just as two of the lower-ranking operatives threw themselves bodily at him to try and pin him down. He moved back just in time and the two others butted heads in the middle. They hit the floor in a heap and the imposter bolted for the door.

"Did it have a tracking pin?" Maurice demanded, turning to face the technician. He started typing and pulled up a map of the school. The series of dots appeared on the map and he stared at it for a second, working out the movements.

"I have a rogue signal moving towards the staircase just around the corner on the right."

"Isolating..." Maddy heard Sarah's voice just as the dots on the map changed colour. Everyone in the hall turned blue while the rogue marker stayed red.

"Hey, the dots all just changed colour! What's going on here?" The technician started tapping frantically.

"Don't change it, you fool!" Sweeney snapped. "It's just highlighted the shapeshifter!" With that, she turned to the lower ranking Wolfbloods. "Nine years of training! Nine! And you didn't even think to count the bodies in the room?" She glared down at the two that were still in a heap on the floor. "At least you two tried, I suppose. Get patched up and I'll discuss this failure with all of you later. There's still a chance for redemption. Get out there and find it!" The ten who were still on their feet nodded and headed in the direction the technician had last indicated.

"I've got a clear lock on its tracking pin. If you head the other way to the left set of stairs you can head it off and reach the darkroom first." Maddy nodded, but this time Emma looked around at her. Her glare locked onto Maddy's pocket where the voice was coming from.

"Who are you talking to, Maddy?" But Maddy was already running. She knew her mum was going to be angry, but there were bigger things to be dealing with right now.

She sprinted towards the stairs that Sarah had mentioned channelled her wolf into a jump that carried her up to the first landing. From there she sprinted up the rest of them and turned left towards the darkroom. She began a mad charge down the hall, but faltered at a noise behind her. She turned to see Rhydian on the flight of stairs below her. He jumped up onto the banister and used it as a springboard to propel himself over the safety rails by the stairs and land cleanly on the floor. In that instant, she decided that if she ever had kids then he would be the one who taught them how to use their wolf. He was so much more in touch with his abilities that it put her to utter shame.

"What are you doing here?" she demanded. Her question was only met with a sharp glare.

"You think I'd let you do this on your own?" It was the same response her dad had given as they were leaving. He could only have known that if he was there too. It was him. But she had to play it safe.

"Sarah, where is the shapeshifter now?"

"It's stopped some distance away. Probably lying low." Maddy breathed a sigh of relief. That sealed it. Proof positive.

"Come on, then." She turned to go, but stopped as Rhydian called out behind her.

"Maddy, don't trust it!" She looked back to see Rhydian vaulting over the railings exactly as he had before. But Rhydian was also standing right behind her. Surely if the first Rhydian was the imposter he would have attacked by now. But what if the shapeshifter was trying to play the long game. And how was it even here? Sarah had said it was far away!

"Sarah, we've got a problem!" Maddy's voice raised slightly out of annoyance. "I've got two Rhydians here!"

"Crap! It must have ditched its tracking pin!" Sarah's growl of annoyance was undisguisable. "Okay, I have a lock on you and Rhydian. I'll try and isolate which is which through the security cameras but it'll take a second. Buy me some time!" Maddy's brain whirred, trying desperately to come up with literally any stalling tactic at all.

"Try this one then, boys: What's my best feature?" It was a crappy choice and she knew it. She literally had nothing else. But the result surprised her.

"It's the glow you have to you." The Rhydian closest to her was the first to speak. You just have something to you that I've never been able to draw or even really single out. You care about everyone even if they go out of their way to make it impossible to like them. You have dreams for yourself, but I know you'd sacrifice that in an instant for the sake of someone else. You don't care what other people think. You just get on with being you. It's something I could never manage to do because I've had to keep myself hidden for so long." With that, he turned around and faced the other Rhydian, his eyes blazing with golden fire. "And it's something this thing will never have or understand." In that moment, Maddy could have thrown her arms around him. Instead, she tensed up and turned to glare down the other Rhydian standing by the stairs with a stunned look on his face. Sarah's laughter filtering through her pocket burst in on the moment.

"Well I don't even think I need to say anything now. That one that was just talking? That one's the real one." Maddy let out a ferocious growl and moved to properly stand next to the real Rhydian, facing down the imposter.

"So, who are you really?" she demanded. "What does your true form look like? And what the hell do you want?"

"I want my true body back!" the shapeshifter snapped. "I want my true form to be restored! But I shifted so many times that I lost my residual self-image. I forgot what I was supposed to look like! I haven't known properly since I was a child!" Maddy had to admit, it was pretty disconcerting seeing a mirror image of Rhydian standing there in front of her when the original was right next to her.

"So how does hunting my family help?" She couldn't hide her confusion. None of this was making sense.

"I wasn't!" the mirror image protested. "I was trying to search for the last photo of how I used to look. The darkroom was a longshot. Then I came to your house because I thought that it might be somewhere there, assuming they kept it. I couldn't find it. But if I can see it, I can use that image to craft a new form for myself. Something that's much closer to my age now. I can actually be myself again! I won't have to keep stealing other peoples' identities!

"Well why don't you change back to the last form you remember having and we'll go from there?" Rhydian's tone suggested his guard hadn't budged an inch. Maddy mentally checked herself and tried to remember that she had to be ready for anything.

"If I try and go that young again, there's a risk I'll get stuck." Fake Rhydian sighed and gave a defeated shrug. "I'd end up growing old and dying while still looking like I'm in my late twenties at best."

"I think that sounds better than getting old and decrepit." Maddy muttered before meeting the shapeshifter's gaze again. "Okay then. Try and get as close as you can. Don't risk getting stuck, but try and remember what you used to look like. Whatever you end up with might help us." The shapeshifter faltered, clearly unsure. Eventually, it nodded.

"Okay." It closed its eyes and focused hard. "Let's see... I was a girl, blonde hair, green eyes, freckles..." It started morphing in front of them. This was very different. Whereas before the transitions they'd seen had always been smooth and quick, this filled the air with the sound of bones crunching and twisting. It was slow and looked disturbing to them as the shapeshifter forced itself to assume a form with no visual reference. This wasn't it copying someone it had seen, this was it building a new form entirely from scratch. But when it finished, Maddy drew in a hushed breath. The girl that stood in front of them was older, true enough. But there was no doubting who it was. It was very clear what the shapeshifter had been trying to go for.

"That's impossible." Maddy didn't trust her own voice not to crack as hot tears sprang to her eyes. "You're dead!"

"No, Maddy." The woman in front of them moved a bit closer. Maddy felt Rhydian tense but didn't take her eyes from the woman who extended her hand to her. "It's really me."

"Who are you?" Rhydian asked, visibly confused. He still hadn't taken his guard down, but at that moment Maddy didn't care. Her eyes were squarely fixed on the woman in front of her.

"Maya."