Chapter 9: Full Moon Rising
"Is this everything?" I asked Uncle Ducky as I put the last of our camping gear in in my bike's half-full, detachable trailer. "Yes, dearie," he said as he locked the door to the house. "Well come on then," I replied as I started my bike, "we're gonna be late." I put on my helmet and mounted my bike before I handed Uncle Ducky a spare helmet once he was situated behind me. "Hold on!" I yelled through the com-link, as I revved the engine and sped off towards NCIS headquarters.
We finally pulled to a stop in front of Ziva and Abby. I cut the engine and took off my helmet. "Um, Uncle Ducky? You can let go now," I coaxed, as I pried myself from his vise grip. He took off his helmet and dismounted. "I'm sorry, Madison," Uncle Ducky said, "but motor-biking is definitely not my forte." "Wanna switch?" Abby offered, as she motioned to Gibb's car behind them. Uncle Ducky responded with a nod and passed the helmet off to Abby, looking relieved as ever. "Hey, you guys want to put your stuff in my trailer?" I asked as I set down my helmet, dismounted, and set the kickstand. Everyone nodded and took their stuff from the backs of Gibb's car and Ziva's car. Then, Tony and Tim puled into the lot. "What took you so long?" I asked, once they had parked and exited Tony's car. "Ask Mc-Cub-Scout over hear," Tony growled as he threw an enormous camping pack at Tim. He stumbled back a couple feet before Tim put the pack in the trailer. "Better safe than sorry," he said, adjusting the baseball cap on his head. "Meh-meh-meh-meh-meh-meh," Tony mocked as he scrunched up his face in a truly horrendous effort to imitate Tim. "Geeze, do you always do this?" I asked as I took Tony's duffle bag and tossed it in the trailer along with everyone else's stuff. "Do what?" asked Tony asked, seemingly perplexed. "Fight like an old married couple, I mean, seriously, when was the wedding?" Ziva and Abby took one look at Tim and Tony's faces and burst into laughter. "We do not!" exclaimed Tony, since he was the first to come out of his mental lapse. I simply raised an eyebrow at the two, than looked around for where Uncle Ducky had wandered off.
I spotted him sitting in the car with Gibbs, as they had a conversation and sipped coffee. I shut and locked the trailer and mounted my bike. "Come on people, we're burning daylight!" I said in a failed attempt to imitate Wil Anderson from the 1972 film The Cowboys. Tony shook his head disapprovingly before he followed Tim and Ziva into the back seat of Gibbs' car. I started the engine, and put down the visor on my helmet as Abby hopped on behind me. "Do you need directions?" Abby asked through the com-link. "Nope," I replied, as I pressed a few buttons on the bike's LCD screen, "Already have it programmed on my GPS." "Alright then, lets go!" she yell as I shot out of the parking lot with Gibbs trailing not far behind.
we arrived at Dead Man's Creek twenty minutes before sun down. We set up our tents in ten minutes, than I got to work on slipping into my harness, teaching Gibbs how to operate it (for when I would be in control of myself fifteen minutes after the transformation's settled), and securing the chain part around a thick oak tree. My harness consisted of a fifteen-foot, alloy chain two industrial strength carabineers, and an army strong climbing harness – pre-adjusted to my panther form. A five minutes till sundown, I drew a circle around the tree, which my harness was attached to, with a twenty-foot diameter. Then, I gave everyone one last warning and stepped into the harness, as I waited for the moon's light to take effect. Once the moonlight touched my skin, my bone started to shift. I let out an excruciating howl of pain as I crumpled to the ground.
After twenty minutes of unbearable pain, my transformation was complete. My violet eyes glowed gold in the moonlight as I surveyed my surroundings. Tony was the first to move towards my boundary line. I lunged at him, only to be caught by the chain, and yanked back; my claws only grazed the arm of his sweatshirt. "Tony, you stupid donkey!" Ziva yelled, as she pulled him back towards the rest of the group. "I think you mean 'dumb ass,' Ziva," Tim corrected as he stifled a laugh. For fifteen minutes, I paced back and forth through my little circle; never once did I take my eyes off of the prey that I called my team. Then, finally, the red that had clouded my vision before began to seep from my eyes as I regained the small amount of humanity that I still had.
Gibbs gave me another five minutes to fully calm down before he entered the circle to undo my harness. Once I was out of the harness I walked over to Tony and nuzzled the side of his leg; my way of apologizing for attacking him like I did. "Ha, you think you're so cute, don't you?" Tony replied sarcastically, as he continued to nurse his invisible wounds. That's when I started purring, which made Tony jump a few feet in the air. I snickered as I walked to the trailer and pressed the lever to unlock and open the door. I jumped in the trailer and emerged a few seconds later with a dark red duffle bag clutched in my jaws. I dropped the bag at Gibbs' feet. He opened it to reveal a surplus of modified dog toys. Then, took out a large glow-in-the-dark Frisbee and threw it. I chased after the glowing disk before jumping up and catching it in my mouth.
The night went on that way until around three in the morning, when everyone retreated to their tent to sleep. I, on the other hand, took to the tree for a well-deserved catnap – no pun intended – before dawn. At around five thirty, I retired to the trailer to await my final transformation. I probably woke everyone up with my howls of pain, but, as they say: it's never easy going back. By six, I was fully dressed in a clean set of clothes – the ones I had been wearing previously were shredded in the transformation process, hence the need for my trailer – and I was ready to go home. I exited my trailer to see everyone had already woken up and cleaned up the campsite. I walked over to Gibbs, "what's going on?" I asked. "We got a dead marine in the woods a couple miles south of here," he said. "Apparently you're not the only one who believes in the full moon theory," Abby added in as she threw her stuff in the trailer. Everyone followed suit and soon we were on out way to the location of our dead marine: Fox Hollow Woods.