AN: Hey, it's me, idkaname! I know you guys haven't heard from me in a long time, but I'm back, kinda.

Remember the whole 3rd story business, well, I have news about that. It's not done, but it's getting there. I have been given the first chapter of "The Long Road" and an author's note from Random Reviewer, the one who is writing the third one. This is just to satisfy your appetite for a little and to show that there is progress, but why don't you hear it from her instead:

Hey, hello, greetings and how are you. Random Reviewer here. Yes it is I who have tested your patients so...and I'm sorry to say I will be testing it more. Sorry:(
I had my lovely muse idkname post this because I suddenly realized just how long I've been keeping you readers waiting, and as a reader myself I know what a struggle that can be and decided to throw you a bone. That said the long hiatus is NOT over, and I feel you deserve a reason.
As I said before, I am first and foremost a reader, up until this crazy plot bunny Hi-jacked my brain I didn't have to many plans to change that. But change it did, and one thing a swore to myself when I decided to write something with the intent to post was that I wouldn't post until I had finished the story. The reason for this is so 1) I can keep a regular posting scheduled, instead of posting at random intervals whenever I write, and 2) so that I actually have a finished product instead of being one of those people who start a good story and then lose the muse and give up half way through (not that I'm saying my stories particularly good, that for you guys to decide)
sadly, I'm suffering from a classic rookie mistake, I've got to many idea's in my head, that are leading in a million different directions and a million different dead ends, and I'm tempted to run with them all. But I know, as a reader, that writers who do that produce over the top, mary sue crap, and I'm seeing myself spiral around that tempting abyss. But hey, at least I'm aware of the problem. I'm taking my time, chasing the muse, and cutting the chafe from the wheat, so to speak. In the mean time, all I can do is warn you. Warn you that this is going to take time (Uhg I know) , Warn you that I have decided that not everything has to be well researched and its ok if I make up techno babble for some stuff, and warn you that I may go off and do something crazy like post a different story (Night at The Museum seems to have sparked something, no promises) or maybe it would be a good idea to pop out a quick one-shot to get bad writing out of my system. I don't know what I'll do, but I do promise that you WILL get this story damn-it! One way or another you good people will get a story (Maybe not a particularly good story, but a story)

New York city, icon of American cities, and a place with a voice all its own. It inspires pride in the vast majority of its residence, whether they would admit it or not. Catalina Ortega was not one of these people. Being a late life transplant into the vast metropolis, she didn't harbor any ill will towards her new home, but all the same couldn't find a sense of comfort anywhere in it. When she had first arrived in the city, the persistent metallic quality to the air had burnt her nose with each breath, and each car horn had sent a shock through her, which for a while gave her the disposition of a spooked deer. Now, a year later, Catalina had acclimated to the hustle and bustle, but still wouldn't call herself in anyway completely comfortable with it. Even as she found things, and even people, to like in the city, she had yet to gain any real attachment to it. The obvious solution to this would be to move, but the problem with that was, while she wasn't attached to the city, she was attached to her job. Small as it is, the Noah's Ark Animal Clinic was the first place to give her a chance after she had gotten her D.V.M, so she felt it her responsibility to at least see out a two year residency, just long enough to get her feet wet in the field, after which she would move on to her ultimate goals. In the mean time she could admit that she had at least grown quite found of the clinic, and all that came with it for better or worse. Her father had imparted on her that "people who can appreciate the animals in their lives can't be all that bad to be around", and that wisdom had proved some measure of salvation in what otherwise would have been her personal hell, being able to focus on her patients and their people providing some familiar ground in a foreign land. It was also helped that she hardly had time to focus on anything else while she was there. Even a small clinic in a place like New York saw more than its fair share of business, so she spent her days elbows deep in vaccinations, de-wormings, expressing anal glands, listening to borborygmus, performing spays and neuters, antibody titer's, BUN's and fluoroscopy's, and so many various procedures it made her head hurt to try and count them. It could all be overwhelming, but despite the stress of the job, and the surprising frequency of aggressive patients, the clinic quickly became the only place in the city she actually felt safe. While she may have gotten over the smells and the sounds of the city, the one big issue that she had with it that refused to resolve itself was a persistent paranoia over the cities darker side. From a practical stand point Catalina knew that it could be considered unhealthy to give so much thought to the worst possibilities, but as many of that mindset did she would say she was just being realistic, which sadly enough she was. As a woman right out of college, living alone, small of stature and relatively attractive, not only was she a walking sitcom cliche, she was a well known target demographic. Theft, Murder, and Rape; the three major threats that hung over any mindful citizens heads, and what drove Catalina to take such precautions as making sure to hide her wallet from sight unless it was absolutely necessary, keep a can of pepper spray and a pocket knife in reach at all times, keep thick curtains over her windows so no one from an adjacent building could look in, accepted the most random schedule the clinic had (Which was easy, vet's could always look forward to unpredictable schedules) so that no one could be sure of where she would be when. Most importantly she had searched far and wide for a landlord she could trust, and what she found was Mrs. Kieslowski, an amicable woman who kept a roof garden, had a pet friendly policy (Which despite Catalina having no pets of her own, was still important in light of her job) and was more than sympathetic to Catalina's worries. All in all, while she wasn't particularly fond of the city, she had successfully made a nice little niche for herself in it. After a year of hard work and careful planning on her part, she had built up a sense of normal in what for her was an alien world. But of course the universe loves irony, so it was the very job on which she had built this normalcy that had led to her life becoming irrevocably strange. In retrospect it was amazing how easily none of what happened after that day would have happened if she had just decided to call in sick, but as Benjamin Franklin had put it, "for want of a nail".