Written in collaboration with Gabriel
A car crash. Darkness. The hospital. He was taken away, the Doctor explaining to his parents that they needed to perform an 'experimental surgery'. They agreed; he was as good as dead anyways.
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"LET ME GO!" Tom screamed, thrashing with all of his will and power. None of it helped. The Doctors sedated him, and he was knocked out in a mstter of seconds.
When he woke up, he felt werid. "What?" He tried to say. Nothing came out. Only a strangled "Mew?" He jumped, and tried to scream. It didn't work, but an awful wailing of a cat filled the air.
A Doctor came into Tom's view, and he shrunk away, falling in his new form. "Don't worry, kittykitty, you're okay." The Doctor's voice was horrible, dripping with hate and malice.
Tom hissed, finding his voice. He was strapped to a table. As soon as he hissed, he was knocked out again. When he awoke, he was a boy again. A normal, regular boy! "Good evening, Tom." It was the Doctor. Tom yelled, and stumbled back; he was free. "Now, now. You'll find you've been changed, boy." The hate and loathing was back. "You can turn into a cat, Tom! Isn't that wonderful!"
Tom yelled, and cast about for an object or weapon. None was there. "What have you done to me!" He screamed, blood and tears coursing down his face. An image of Patches flashed before his eyes; a cat he had known that had gotten hit by a four-wheeler.
Tom screamed, and pain racked his body. His ribs cracked and reformed, his bones broke and reconfigured themselves. His jaw elongated, and then snapped back to his face, forming a muzzle. His ears grew, and he felt his spine elongate. His screams had turned to meows, and he bolted, still only half changed.
He made it out the door before the Doctor realized what was happening. By the time the guards arrived, Tom was gone.
Taken from the diary of Sunshine Banks-Jones
Tom's dad and my mom are married. I guess that makes us stepbrother and stepsister. Never really thought of it that way. Usually I just thought of aus as friends whose parents were married. I guess I'm just weird like that, though.
They'd been friends since... well, a long time. I'm not really sure how long. Since my dad left, and we moved here. I think they worked together. Yeah, that was how they met. They just hung out for the longest time. Then, when we were older, they started to date. It was odd at first, but me and Tom had always figured they'd get together eventually. You could just see it. You can usually see things like that.
When Tom was little he used to tell people he could talk to animals. They told him stuff, he told them stuff. No one really believed him. His dad, my mom, anybody. Well... I did. He proved it to me. If I was older it wouldn't have been much proof to see him walking around making cat noises to my pet, Patches. But then it was all the proof in the world. I knew it was the truth. I just knew. But he realized people wouldn't believed him, and defensively, he stopped telling people, kept it a secret. We were the only ones who knew, the only ones who remembered. Then.
He kept a lot of secrets, probably, some of which I guess I still don't know and maybe I never will. Usually it was little stuff. I suppose Tom was just a defensive sort of a guy, at least that's what I saw. But I knew his biggest secret. He'd never tell his dad he liked guys, or my mom, of course. They'd totally freak. But I guess we just trust each other like that. I'd tell him if I liked girls (Which I totally don't. Ew. Gross.). He knows that.
Anyway, I guess someone else must have known his secrets. Both of them, maybe even. Because one day Tom just disappeared. There was that perfectly innocent car crash; probably actually was an accident. It was like, that morning he was in the hospital, almost ready for a discharge, and that afternoon he didn't come home like he was supposed to. Everyone thought Tom ran away. Somebody ended up coming out and telling his dad he was gay. That made them think it even more, and the police found a note in his room. For some reason I knew it wasn't Tom. If Tom ran away he'd tell me. Wouldn't he? I mean, we teased each other, sure, but we were buds! He'd never even talked about it. He liked it here. No problems.
But Tom didn't come back. A year passed. He still wasn't back. We all waited and waited. But still no Tom.
Last night I was in the backyard. Watching the stars. I guess I was remembering him. Something stupid. It was this stupid thing, this time when we were out four-wheeling. But my cat, Patches, she ended up getting in front of one of them. No more cat. Yeah, I was sad, but I think Tom was worse than I was. I mean, he'd had conversations with her, so to him it was more like running over a person. But it's those wierd little things about people you remember.
And then I thought I saw her. Patches, that is. Must've just been a stray, I thought. There are a few around there. But it came into our yard, and walked up to me. And then it wasn't a cat anymore. This is the hard to explain part, because the cat was just gone, and there was Tom. But he was different. His ears were wierd... shaped like a cats'. And he had a tail, like a cat, too. I knew it was Tom, though. The rest still looked like him. And Tom's always had this weird patch of dark skin over his right eye. Like a cat. Yeah, it was definitely him.
Tom's never been a modest fellow, but he was totally naked. Later he explained that he loses his clothes turning into a cat. I guess that makes sense.
Somebody's really messed with him. And maybe someday we'll find out exactly who.
