This is tosh - pure, unadulterated silliness. But I enjoyed writing it, so 
there. All standard disclaimers apply, set in ATF universe.


ANIMAL MAGIC

Ezra flinched and squinted, pain shooting through his skull. His eyes watered 
against the bright fluorescent tube light above as he blearily managed to 
open them. Memory returned with cruel clarity – exiting his Jaguar outside 
his elegant Denver townhouse home, Ezra had suddenly found himself face 
to face with a man in a balaclava who'd sprayed him full in the face with 
what had obviously been a powerful sedative.

Finally shrugging off the effects of his artificial nap, Ezra felt a chill run 
down his spine. He was fully dressed still, but strapped down onto some sort 
of medical table that was titled slightly downward reminiscent of the 
"beds" used by the Minbari in one of his favourite sci-fi shows, Babylon 5. 
(Not that anyone knew sci-fi was one of his hobbies, the one time he'd 
carefully skirted the issue while at Atlanta, the whole genre and aficionados 
of it had been sneeringly excoriated by the gathered FBI agents).

Directly in front of the bed was a very large, complicated looking machine, 
which ominously had a large "nozzle" like protuberance aimed directly at 
Ezra's favourite stomach. Indeed, the entire room had that clinical 
atmosphere of an operating theatre. Oh, dear. 

A high-pitched, snickering laugh made his tense stomach muscles tighten up 
altogether, and a second later, Dr Alphonse Holbachstein crossed his field of 
vision. Ezra kept his face bland, acutely aware that his situation had just 
gone from very bad to utterly abysmal. Holbachstein was a brilliant 
scientist. He was also an utterly mad one. For the past three months, Ezra 
had been deep undercover as ATF Team 7 had gone after drug lord Leon 
Gonzalo; Gonzalo, previously a small-time player, had suddenly gone major-
league after abruptly starting to supply good quality heroin at much lower 
prices than normal, making a fortune in weeks. Ezra discovered the secret 
of his success – Holbachstein, who was quite happily synthesising the stuff 
by the kilo for a cut of the proceeds with which to finance his inventions – 
vicious weapons of mass destruction that Holbachstein routinely sold to any 
person, organisation or nation that could – or would - afford his particularly 
nasty inventions. 

Totally devoted to his science, Holbachstein viewed the rest of humanity as 
nothing more than very large lab rats. He had gone totally off his head at 
the takedown (because the fire fight had bullets damaging/destroying his 
special inventions and research), which saw Gonzalo die - and it had 
primarily been Ezra's heartfelt, riveting testimony that got the scientist 
detained for life at an asylum for the criminally insane.

Now Ezra saw the bruises and minor cuts indicating that Holbachstein had 
managed to effect escape from his prison. Holbachstein was very tall, but 
stooped over, and had a thin, narrow face with a pointy chin, long, red-
tipped nose and watery, pale blue eyes, the combination of these making 
him resemble a rabbit. A very rabid rabbit.

"Dr Holbachstein. How very unpleasant tah see yah again." Ezra drawled.

The scientist glared at him furiously and nodded at the two muscular goons 
who had accompanied him. "Make sure Standish is secure." Once again he 
gave that hitching, breathless giggle that was his trademark. "Time to die, 
Agent Standish. Time to die sooooo sloooowly…the pain will be unbearable, 
excruciating, agonising…"

Quite sure it would be, Ezra fought back with the only weapon he had left 
to him – words. Even in the unlikely event that his team mates were right 
this moment discovering that Holbachstein had escaped and were dashing to 
Ezra's house, they would be hours too late to save him. But Ezra knew he 
could take satisfaction in the knowledge that Team 7 would make sure 
Holbachstein paid for murdering him. He was part of a family. It had been a 
long, hard road before Ezra accepted it, but now he knew it as surely as the 
sun rose in the East. Taking a deep breath and ignoring the grinning goons, 
Ezra gave a derisive snort and cut across the vituperative words, "Oh 
please, with that? It looks like a giant cake icer!"

Holbachstein stopped and blinked at this temerity. Then he scowled and 
patted the large contraption. "This? This is my crowning glory! My great 
achievement, my ultimate triumph…Pah, you are too stupid to understand 
the genius that led me to it!" 

Ezra managed to look singularly unimpressed, which wasn't hard since he a) 
genuinely had no idea what the machine was, and b) when he looked at it, 
the big "nozzle" and white plastic computer machinery behind it did make 
it superficially resemble nothing so much as a large cake-icing machine. 
Rubbing his hands together gleefully, Dr Holbachstein leaned close. "This 
machine collapses the structure of human DNA. In short, Agent Standish, it 
disintegrates those it strikes. Your DNA will unravel like a ball of twine, 
every atom in your body will drift apart and you will collapse into less than 
dust," Holbachstein's face twisted into a maniacal sneer, "but the process is 
slow, Agent Standish. It will take ten minutes for you to die, and for every 
single millisecond you will feel the agony as your body is ripped apart, 
molecule by molecule!"

Even the goons jumped nervously as Holbachstein loosed another bout of 
manic laughter. Ezra could do nothing as the scientist turned on the 
machine and it began to hum ominously, Holbachstein turning dials and 
setting readings. Abruptly the scientist's pocket shrilled. Irately whipping 
out the cell phone, the madman embarked on an agitated, one-sided 
conversation. "What?…No! I'm…yes, yes. Now? Alright!" Snapping the phone 
closed, the scientist ordered the goons to set up a video camera so he 
wouldn't miss the demise of his first "test subject". Hitting a final button, 
Holbachstein and his two cronies had left, shutting the door.

Ezra twisted futilely against the restraints, to see if he could ease his body 
to one side far enough so the nozzle's whatever missed him – if he could just 
inch –

With a click, something like a wide laser beam shot out from the nozzle, 
and unspeakable agony tore through his every fibre.

* * *
Ezra opened one eye. His vision was clear and not painful. Opening the 
other eye, he blinked at the expanse of white above him. He was somewhat 
surprised. He had never thought deeply on the possibility of the afterlife, 
other than to simply assume that he would never be good enough to end up 
anywhere else other than the hot place. The vast expanse of white was far 
more heaven-oriented than –

Oh. 

Ezra blinked again as a slight turn of his head brought the DNA Disintegrator 
into his line of vision. He was still in the room. But I'm on the floor. Ezra 
saw the table he had been strapped to, the restraints torn apart. For a 
moment, he contemplated his situation. Other than being on the floor he 
felt fine. For someone who should have been in excruciating agony as his 
body was slowly shredded from the inside out, Ezra felt remarkably perky. 
In fact, he felt fine. 

Holbachstein's departing words suddenly came back to him. If Ezra was the 
mad scientist's "first test subject", then Holbachstein had really had no 
idea if the machine actually worked. Obviously, it didn't! 

Ezra allowed himself a momentary grin, then realised that if he was to 
escape alive, he needed to get his ass of the floor. Suddenly something 
moved in front of him and he froze at the sight of a thick bar a few inches in 
front of his face. It was white, with black spots, and had just twitched. Ezra 
remained motionless, but the bar – possibly some sort of snake? – did not 
move.

Taking a deep breath, Ezra suddenly threw himself backwards and away, 
rolling over till he hit the wall and frantically scrabbled to his feet.

Or tried to.

He crashed down again, flailing helplessly as he heard high-pitched snarls, 
but he was unable to get up. Finally he was able to get onto his hands and 
knees and brought up one arm to ward off any attaaaaaaaaa…

He stared at his arm. It was long, it was white, it had black spots, and it was 
made of fur. Blinking at this, Ezra tried to waggle his fingers. The big paw 
twitched and long, sharp claws suddenly protruded from it. Ezra was 
suddenly aware that the low growling sound was coming from his own chest.

Just what in hell is going on here?

Cautiously, he tried to shuffle forward and found that he could 
move…effortlessly. 

Easing right up to the machine, Ezra edged around until he found a spot 
where the fluorescent lighting reflected well off the plastic casing of the big 
computers, the closest thing the place had to a mirror. Reflected back at 
him was an image. 

He was a snow leopard. 

A large snow leopard. 

A green-eyed snow leopard. 

But still a snow leopard.  

For a several minutes, easily five or six, Ezra merely stared at himself, too 
stupefied to even think, before gradually the whirring of the video camera 
brought him back to himself. Taking a firm hold on his gibbering panic, Ezra 
threw it into a little room at the back of his brain and slammed the door 
shut. Holbachstein was brilliant and an egomaniac, but he wasn't infallible. 
The lunatic had screwed up before – that was how he had ended up being 
ostracised and then outlawed by the scientific community in the first place. 
Holbachstein decided to invent a DNA Disintegrator, but he never tested it, 
so he didn't know that it actually…he looked down at his paw…transforms 
DNA into something else. Ezra suddenly remembered about the only 
scientific maxim he'd ever retained from his many high schools apart from E 
= mc2, namely: matter can never be created or destroyed, only changed into 
something else. Holbachstein had been trying to destroy a considerable 
amount of matter – an adult human body – and had obviously come up flush 
against basic laws of physics.

A large portion of Ezra's mind was still running around in circles screaming 
over the image reflected in the machine, but long-ingrained survival 
instincts had kicked in. He could collapse in a whimpering heap once he was 
a long, long way from Dr Moreau. If Holbachstein discovered him here in this 
state, he would kill him to dissect him – or more likely dissect him to kill 
him – and then enthusiastically go about trying his "matter transformer" on 
any poor soul who crossed his path. Part of the reason Holbachstein was 
deemed "never safe" to release was the evidence Ezra had uncovered about 
his experimenting on people vehemently against their will or who had no 
idea they were guinea pigs at all. Holbachstein had kidnapped people at 
random from shopping malls and highways in various countries when he 
needed a test subject, and there were entire towns, three in the United 
States alone, which had unwittingly been guinea pigs for some new 
invention. Holbachstein would have no qualms about zapping anyone he 
could with the thing to see what they turned into.    

Carefully moving, Ezra found that his new body seemed to know exactly 
what it was doing and he could move with fluidity. After taking half a 
minute amusing himself by seeing how fast he could retract and shoot out 
his claws, Ezra winced as he heard a distant, harsh booming. For a moment 
he cringed, then realised the echoing boom-boom was a twin duet, the 
heartbeats and footfalls of someone approaching – though still a good ten 
minutes away. 

One swat of his paw had the camera and tripod crashing to the floor, and 
the few occasions Buck Wilmington had bullied him into eating BBQ ribs with 
his fingers came in handy as he used his new sharp teeth to rip the spooled 
tape into confetti, some of which he ate just for good measure. One thing 
that humans had in superiority to big cats were taste buds – the film didn't 
even register with his saliva glands. 

The boom came closer, the heavy tread of feet drowning out the heartbeats 
as they did so. Two people, walking side by side. Ezra tilted his head on one 
side. He was surprised by his own olfactory ability, especially through a 
closed door with them many yards away, but realised that a real snow 
leopard – indeed, most carnivorous species – had to have a pretty mean nose 
for food. Humans didn't need nostrils that could scent deer at half-a-mile, 
all they needed to do was look out for the golden arches.

Ezra found he could wrinkle his nose, something the rational – i.e., still 
numb - bit of his brain made a mental note not to do in public, as he had no 
doubt it would make him look as "cute" as 150lbs of fanged, clawed killing 
machine can look. He knew it was the two goons coming, doubtless sent by 
Holbachstein to fetch the videotape of Ezra's gory demise. Even as a 
human, Ezra had noted a certain fragrance coming from one of the two 
thugs that clearly indicated personal hygiene was not a priority. That 
distasteful whiff was now cranked up to the level of rank odour. 

The two literally never saw what hit them. Shoving open the door, the 
largest goon just had chance to spot the destroyed video camera before 
something large and white collided with them; by then, sharp claws had 
neatly sliced across their throats, severing jugular, trachea and vocal 
chords. They were both dead within ten seconds, by which time Ezra was 
halfway across the complex.

He loped along corridors and up flights of stairs. Ezra had no idea if "real" 
feral felines had colour vision, but was grateful he did. His exit was also 
made easier by the fact that his sharper aural and olfactory senses meant he 
knew people were coming a good five minutes before they were anywhere 
near him. Thus he was able to cautiously wend his way through the 
complex, ducking into corridors and empty rooms – courtesy of his human 
ability to understand and open doors – whenever he was approached. 

Finally he bounded up a narrow flight of steps, went up on his haunches and 
brought his weight down on a metal door, surging through to the outside 
world and freedom –

He collapsed in a heap, agonised yips wracking his frame.

Like a deaf man who suddenly regains his hearing while standing in the 
middle of a rock concert, Ezra was swamped by complete sensory overload. 
A hundred different sounds and a thousand separate scents simultaneously 
battered at him, each shrieking for his attention. His eyes clamped shut as 
the incipient twilight became searing, painfully bright.

The soft whirr of a video camera had stalled his incipient mental 
breakdown. This time it was the din of alarm klaxons. Abruptly coming to 
life, they swat away the other sensory assaults like a giant swatting a fly. 
Ezra lifted his head up, focussing on the sound as he had focussed on the 
video camera. Flight was important now, sorting himself out could wait until 
later, much later.

Easily outstripping any human sprinter, Ezra made the secure shadows of the 
tree line a good three minutes before the first guards-for-hire came 
barrelling out of the compound, waving their guns around agitatedly and 
generally getting in each other's way. To his astonishment, Ezra realised he 
could understand the glowing band of colour around each individual. He had 
always considered "auras" to be metaphysical charlatanism, but his new 
perspective enabled him to see in a wider spectrum. He had colour vision, 
for which he was grateful though he wondered if all snow leopards had it or 
if it was a holdover from his transformation from humanity. Maybe some 
humans who claimed to read auras were simply able to see in a wider 
spectrum band than normal? 

Whatever the physics, Ezra watched what was going off. He could see 
everything clearly like he was sat on his couch watching a DVD, but 
everything was amplified – shapes were much more sharply defined and 
clear, colours were more intensely vivid, and overlaying everything he 
looked at were colour patches, as if he were watching the DVD through a 
heat-sensitive camera. Each person had "splashes" of bright red "hotspots" 
- as if someone had paintballed them - on their bodies. The head was the 
largest and brightest red splash, and Ezra remembered reading in some 
magazine that humans lost most of their body heat through their scalp. 
Another hot spot was the heart. After twenty minutes of careful 
observation, Ezra realised he could discern mood from watching the faint 
glow that surrounded the scurrying men's bodies. Most of the guards had a 
sort of pinkish-hue, and then Holbachstein came out. The man's entire body 
was glowing a deep, dark red – almost a claret or burgundy shade, edging 
towards purple – which combined with his extremely agitated expression 
and gestures told Ezra all he needed to know.

Slowly the men began to fan out from the complex and Ezra retreated 
further and further back into the dense undergrowth, easily undetected. He 
had realised that the "complex" was probably the abandoned coking plant 
situated to the west of Denver City, which put him in Colorado National 
Park, about fifty miles from Denver proper. From the confused, slipshod 
search pattern, that any competently trained agent – or even reasonably 
bright civilian – could have slipped through, Ezra rapidly saw that most of 
the guards were hired idlers, bought for beer and bucks at some bar and 
with no idea of what they were really doing. 

Holbachstein was another matter entirely, however. Clearly shaken from the 
deaths of his goons, Holbachstein marched haphazardly through the 
undergrowth, barely aware of the other searchers, muttering agitatedly to 
himself as he obviously tried to work out what on earth had happened. Ezra, 
who had taken refuge atop a rocky, ivy and shrub-smothered crag that none 
of the men had even glanced at, watched with ever growing rage as 
Holbachstein wandered ever closer.

Suddenly very, very aware of the offensive capabilities of his new body, 
Ezra slowly eased his prone body upright as Holbachstein came closer. All 
Ezra had to do was jump – even assuming the impact of the collision didn't 
kill Holbachstein outright, one flashing claw or his powerful jaws could slash 
Holbachstein's throat/crush his skull in a second…

It was his tail that saved Holbachstein's life. Crouched ready to spring, Ezra 
saw a flicker out of his peripheral vision, and the realisation that he was 
lashing his tail back and forth brought him back to himself. Killing 
Holbachstein was his heart's desire, but what if even JD Dunne, techno-
genius extraordinaire, couldn't figure out what Holbachstein had done to 
that machine, or how to make it work? Much as he wanted Holbachstein 
dead, Ezra couldn't kill the man – yet - if it turned out he was the only one 
who could reverse this process.                      

Unaware of how close he had come to being slaughtered, Holbachstein 
continued on his agitated meandering. The search was fruitless. After 
realising that killing Holbachstein wasn't currently an option, Ezra had 
slipped silently away in what he "knew" to be an easterly direction, heading 
back towards Denver city. The denizens of the wild night showed little 
inclination to be hostile towards a snow leopard in the prime of strength, 
and Ezra was constantly testing the range of his senses as he made his way 
through the mountainous forest, scenting a bear, two wolf packs and several 
other predatory felines when they were still a long way off. These creatures 
were content when the intruder did not remain in their territory, but 
continued on its way. 

* * *
    
Ezra watched the forensics police officers going over the ground from his 
vantage point, hidden in a high treetop a good hundred yards away. One of 
the officers suddenly called another and he saw her point to his own foot – 
rather paw – print, clearly delineated in the soft earth. The presence of 
these doubtless efficient officers was providing Ezra with no answer to his 
problem – how to get back to his family.

It had taken Ezra three days to reach a suburb of Denver, where, secreted in 
the back garden of a residential home, he had caught the news of how an 
ATF team had raided the abandoned Brandanbeck coking plant in a search 
for a kidnapped agent. The search had come up blank – neither the agent 
nor his abductors were found. Though the announcer stated that the search 
was ongoing, his attitude was clearly that the "unidentified agent" must be 
occupying a shallow grave somewhere in the Denver Mountains. AN attitude 
clearly felt by ATF Team 7 – Ezra's heart had clenched in anguish as the 
cameraman caught a glimpse six figures who stood together with bowed 
heads and slumped shoulders, clearly distressed. 

Unfortunately Ezra knew his situation was very dangerous. Locating Team 7, 
bounding up to one of them and expecting that person to take one look at 
him and "know" he was really Ezra P. Standish was utterly ridiculous, even 
someone as intuitive as Vin. Humans had very sensible reactions to being 
faced with creatures that had a fangs and claws. Ezra knew he would need 
all his wits about him not to end up being shot. It was now six days since 
Holbachstein had abducted him and Ezra was painfully aware of the need 
for progress. Holbachstein wanted revenge against all Team 7, he had just 
hated Ezra the most. After a while of Ezra not being discovered, 
Holbachstein would go after the others, and that was something that 
couldn't be tolerated. What if Ezra's situation had been a freak result? 
Something caused by a shorted out wire? What if the next time, the 
machine did exactly what Holbachstein had designed it to do? What if it 
turned one of the others into some sort of mammal to? Holbachstein 
couldn't be allowed to know what he had done.

The one positive slant to the situation was that Ezra found he had no 
trouble retaining that which made him "Ezra". He had dined well on his 
journey from purloined milk bottles, roasted joints left on kitchen tables 
and other foodstuffs impossible to access to something lacking human 
intelligence, but Ezra found he had no trouble remembering that he was a 
man, albeit in a very unusual body. He had experienced no compulsions to 
chase down and rend apart the fawns and lambs he had come across in his 
journey, nor any sexual urgings towards the two in-heat female pumas he 
had passed. The attitude of the local wildlife was also atypical. The female 
pumas had regarded him warily but with no interest, likewise cows and 
other herbivores would look up when he came near, but showed none of the 
aggression or fear one would expect them to show towards something that 
routinely had them for lunch. It was as if Nature's creatures accepted that 
they were seeing a snow leopard, but nevertheless somehow just "knew" 
that Ezra was no threat to them.

He knew that human beings would not be as intuitive. The scene played out 
below was acute evidence of that. It had been late afternoon the day before 
when Ezra's ears were assaulted by the piercing shriek of someone in 
extreme anguish. Reacting instinctively, Ezra had set off at a dead run and 
burst into a small glade near a children's playground. A large, burly man had 
managed to knock a violently struggling woman to the ground and was 
tearing at her clothes while she thrashed and screamed in an attempt to get 
away. 

Ezra didn't even slow down – he hit the rapist full on in the back and sent 
him bowling over. The perpetrator's head hit the base of a tree with a 
definite crush and he did not rise. Ezra stood over the man's form, 
trembling from shock and adrenaline, with no idea what to do next. A slight 
sound from behind him made him turn his head and the woman froze rigid. 
Her clothing virtually destroyed, she was an attractive brunette in her 
thirties despite a face mottled with bruises, streaked with tears and swollen 
red with distress. However when she looked at Ezra, she showed just as 
much fear as when she was being attacked. 

Lowering his head to check that the perp' really was out cold, Ezra slowly 
walked away, not looking back, able to discern what she was doing out of 
the corner of her eye. Easing towards her dropped purse, the woman eased 
out a cell phone and dialled 911, whispering desperately into it with a voice 
that cracked. Even after Ezra disappeared from sight she didn't move until 
the paramedics came. From his vantage point, Ezra watched as she shakily 
explained what had happened. Any scepticism on the part of the paramedics 
disappeared at the sight of the large paw prints all around the unconscious 
man.         

The police had appeared on the scene in short order and had been an escort 
for the woman and still unconscious attacker. Their scepticism had 
disappeared the instant they laid eyes on the paw tracks and their hands 
had dropped to their sidearms. As he lay on the branch watching the 
forensics crew, Ezra knew he faced a similar problem. Getting anywhere 
remotely Denver City – never mind ATF Team 7 - without being shot was 
going to take a plan so cunning you could stick a tail on it and call it a 
weasel. Even assuming he made contact, how could he relate to his team 
mates what had happened when all he could was growl and roar?

Once the forensics crew had gone, Ezra jumped down from the branch. He 
had no choice but to venture into Denver. His biggest fear, that the "snow 
leopard" would subsume his humanity, had proved groundless, but Ezra still 
had a lot of anxiety. Holbachstein had created the machine by accident, 
which meant that he might not even be able to reverse the process even if 
he wanted to. Also, what if it was – or became – permanent? A sort of, 
"you've got 72 hours to regain your humanity or get used to Whiskas 
Supreme for the next 50 years"? Assuming of course that his lifespan 
remained that of a human and not of a feline. Cats, even predatory big cats, 
had a lifespan of only about one third to a half of that of humans; in cat 
years, Ezra was a nonagenarian at least. Well squatting under the branches 
wasn't going to get him anywhere.

* * *

The angry roaring of a big cat startled the rescuers; heads bent over bushes 
and shrubbery lifted up and people looked at each other. 

The park rangers had no explanation, nor did mountain rescue. A scout 
troupe had gone camping in the hills just to the West of Denver, and 
everything had been fine until a very young bear, not much more than a cub 
had blundered into camp. The bear had been more frightened than the 
children and took off at a flat run, but the boys had panicked, and when the 
scoutmasters regained control, four were missing, all under the age of ten. 
The local police force was here, as was Mountain Rescue and the Park 
Ranger Service, plus ATF Team 8 who had been passing en route back into 
Denver. None of the law enforcement officers made any comment on the 
grim attitude of Team 8 – they were known to be close friends of ATF Team 
7, whose undercover agent Ezra Standish had been kidnapped and murdered 
a few days ago.

"That's no puma?" Ryan Kelly, leader of Team 8, stated categorically.

One of the park rangers shook his head. "No it isn't. I have no idea what it 
is, I've never heard –"

The scream of a child chopped his sentence off.

Everyone – the four boys missing parents, rescuers, cops – set off at dead 
run towards the sound like iron filings flying towards a magnet, crashing 
through underbrush as though it wasn't there. Ryan Kelly and his team, 
weapons ready, burst out onto the edge of a wide, ravine caused by the 
river surging through it. On the other side, on a large flat rock, were the 
four boys. Three were standing side by side, clutching each other, 
defensively in front of the fourth, who was sitting down, clutching his blood-
covered arm. They had their backs to the river and the 30 plus adults who 
could only stand helplessly on the wrong side of the unbridgeable gap. 
Facing the boys on it's hind paws was a bear, but this was not the 
adolescent black bear of their camp, it was a full grown flathead grizzly, 
the most feared beast in the South West. 

Between the bear and it's snack of four boys was crouched a snow leopard. 
Ryan Kelly dimly heard one of the ranger's exclaim that such a creature 
couldn't possibly be here, unless it was an escaped pet. As the adults 
watched in astonishment, again the cat forced back the bear. 

Ellie Mathis' son Joey was the smallest boy of the four, yet he was the one 
in the middle of the trio, holding together and up his friends. Ellie was a 
single parent and had been ever since her husband decided he needed to 
"find himself". Ellie discovered she wasn't really bothered about him 
coming back when he'd located himself and threw herself into making her 
son's life as unruffled as possible. It was Ellie Mathis who rummaged 
frantically in her purse and coming up with her cell phone, hauled back like 
a true Little League mom. The phone hurtled through the air and smacked 
the grizzly right on the nose. It jerked back at this new threat, but within 
moments it was confronted by a cacophony of yells, screams and missiles as 
the adults picked up rocks, raided their purses or grabbed whatever else 
seemed handy enough to throw. Faced by this unnerving development on 
top of a large, angry fellow predator, the grizzly turned and lumbered away 
in search of easier, quieter prey.

Ellie Mathis felt no relief at the departure of the huge bear; the adults were 
still on the wrong side of a chasm with a leopard not three feet from her 
bleeding child. To the collective astonishment of the grown ups, 
momentarily flummoxed by their sudden victory, the snow leopard did not 
turn on the children it had hitherto been protecting. Instead, it turned and 
faced them and sat on it's haunches, seeming to look at them with what one 
of the park rangers swore was an attitude of "get on with this rescue, you 
idiots".           

A couple of rangers remained in the same position with the local police, who 
drew their guns and aimed them at the big cat, though the adults knew 
their police Berettas were of little use – the river gorge was too wide for 
total accuracy with a handgun even in optimum conditions, never mind the 
prevailing breeze and the constant spray of mist as the river surged over the 
rapids; they would only have been sure of a hit with a rifle, but if the cat 
did attack the children, at least the discharges of the guns might frighten it 
off.

Team 8, the rest of the Search & Rescue and the parents hurried north for a 
quarter of mile, relentlessly forging through bracken and bush to a place 
where the river was wide but shallow, one of the waterway's rare natural 
fords. Splashing heedlessly through the water with Ellie Mathis in the lead, 
they began to trek back downstream on the right side of the river.

Ezra stood up, keeping an eye on the police on the opposite bank in case 
one of them, like that adolescent deputy who was obviously nurturing those 
three hairs over his top lip, got nervous and fired. An expert marksman 
himself, he had no fear of them hitting him, but there was a good chance a 
stray might catch one of the children, and Ezra hadn't just fought off a 
grizzly bear – for heaven's sake – for a child to be killed by his own rescuer!

He heard the approaching parents long before anyone else. Walking slowly 
away from the huddled boys he was quickly lost in the trees for a good ten 
minutes before Team 8 and the parents burst into the clearing to be greeted 
with hysterical joy by their sons, a din Ezra could clearly hear as he loped 
away with an easy glide. Despite hearing the Search & Rescue and Team 8 
heading slowly towards him, he ran on uncaring, he would out distance 
them by miles easily. However, a new determination was his focus, and had 
been ever since Ezra laid eyes on Ryan Kelly. The haunted, sad expression 
on the face of Team 8's leader was but a shadow of the more profound grief 
Ezra knew his six team mates would be feeling. Getting back to his family 
was his priority…

* * *

In the event it took Ezra another five days to work his way unseen into the 
heart of Denver. They were a revelation as he made his way with delicate 
caution through back alleys, over rooftops, through sewers and drainage 
ditches, across empty lots, through deserted warehouse districts. He saw 
innumerable drug deals, his sensitive nose logged the hiding places of over 
five different illegal narcotics that he made sure to "fix" in his memory for 
Team 7 to deal with when – Ezra refused to contemplate "if" – he regained 
human form; and his sharp ears prevented over a dozen rapes and nearly as 
many murders as various bad guys ended up getting badly lacerated by 
something big and nasty with fangs and claws that disappeared into the 
night as soon as it rendered them too badly injured to proceed with their 
crime.

By sleeping on ledges a couple stories up he avoided police patrols and the 
human predators and gradually made his way to Purgatorio where Vin lived, 
but Ezra discarded his initial strategy of simply making his way inside the 
apartment of the man he regarded as his closest friend. Vin was too good a 
shot and too used to life in the wild to be frozen with fear when faced with 
what appeared to be a snow leopard – there was too much a risk of ending 
up as Vin's hearthrug. Besides, what Ezra really needed was the chance to 
"prove" his humanity. If he could get near one of JD's computers, he could 
communicate via type and then they would get somewhere, whereas Vin's 
dyslexia meant he avoided computers unless he really needed them.

To this end, Ezra carefully snuck to Vin's jeep, buried himself on the floor in 
the rear and waited with absolute stillness, only the top of his head visible 
as he watched the entrance to the block. As dawn began to get established, 
Vin exited the building, though Ezra's senses of smell and hearing had 
already logged "Vin" as approaching. What he saw made Ezra instinctively 
lower his head in sadness as the Texan came towards the jeep. Vin had 
always been a little on the scrawny side, but now the weight had melted off 
him. His face was putty grey and gaunt, dark circles under dull, faded eyes 
and lifeless, straggly hair. He walked with a weary disinterest in the world 
around him – a dangerous apathy to have in Purgatorio. Ezra remained 
totally motionless, hardly daring to breathe, but Vin merely trudged up to 
the jeep and got in the driver's seat.

Listlessly Vin pulled on his seatbelt, then inserted the key and turned on the 
ignition – and froze when a large furry animal suddenly flowed between the 
front seat gaps to sit on the passenger side of the jeep!

Ezra blinked in distress when Vin's heart rate shot up, hating to unnerve the 
other man, but he remained still knowing any gesture of affection was likely 
to be misconstrued. The sharpshooter remained frozen for a good half-
minute as he assimilated that yes, a snow leopard really was sat not six 
inches away from him on the front passenger seat of his jeep. Very carefully 
Vin inched his hand towards the ignition key, only to freeze again when the 
cat snarled. 

"Okay, easy." Vin murmured softly, racking his brains frantically. He 
couldn't just still here – Purgatorio wasn't like nice middle-class suburbs 
where kids stayed in bed till 8:30am and then remained safely indoors till 
the school bus came. It wouldn't be long before the street kids began to 
emerge and there was no telling what the predatory cat would do. Moving 
with precise slowness, Vin set the jeep in motion with not so much as a jolt 
and trundled down the road at a full five kilometres per hour. The leopard 
didn't so much as twitch.

Continuing on and thankful the for mostly deserted road at this hour, Vin 
gradually increased his speed to 10kph, then 15, then 20, then 25, his 
wonder increasing likewise as the cat showed no dislike or aggression. Hell, 
had he not witnessed the thing move from the back of his jeep to the front, 
Vin would have thought it was a statue as it sat there on it's haunches with 
it's tail wrapped around it's paws and it's eyes narrowed to mere slits. 

Vin moved his finger towards the indicator for left, "Gotta get y'all to the 
zoo –"

SNAAARL.

Vin instantly retracted his hand from the indicator and ignored the left-hand 
lane, continuing straight on as he consciously forced his heart rate down. 
Maintaining speed, Vin twice more tried to go left to pick up the highway for 
Denver Zoo, each time his intention was aborted as the cat snarled and 
showed truly impressive fangs. Vin gnawed on his lower lip anxiously – they 
were getting into the center of Denver City, and traffic was ever increasing. 
"Dammit, ah almost think yah wants me t' tek yah inta work." He muttered 
aloud to himself.

YOOOWEL.

Vin turned to stare at the cat with astonishment; it regarded him intently. 
Vin blinked unaware he was muttering "no" to himself – the cat hadn't 
responded to his words…? He glanced up – directly ahead was Vin's final 
intersection. If he went straight over, he'd eventually leave the city behind, 
if he went left, he could make his way in a big circle back to the zoo – if he 
went right, it would take him to the Denver Federal Building. "Ahm goin' 
left - !" Vin got no further as instantly the cat snarled and bared it's teeth. 
"Okay I'll keep on going!" Another snarl. "Then I'll go right!"

YOWL.

"No way!" Whispered Vin but he went into the right hand lane and turned 
right and the cat began to purr.

Vin wasn't a man who scared easily or for long. Still moving slowly, he 
attempted to repeatedly take a direction other than that which would lead 
to work, only for the snow leopard to immediately react with aggression; by 
the time he eased the jeep into the underground parking garage, Vin's face 
was alight with confusion and wonder, though he couldn't bring himself to 
directly address the animal and see if it responded.

Knowing speed was of the essence, Ezra launched himself out of the jeep 
with a great bound and was across the garage even as Vin scrambled to 
unclip his belt and grab for his rifle in the back. As Ezra had anticipated, 
Ronald the handyman had just exited the service elevator, and Ezra 
bounded in as the doors re-closed, ignoring Vin's yell. Ronald was over fifty-
five and had been deafened in a gas explosion years before, he never even 
noticed the feline that went past him and didn't look up as Vin ran towards 
him. The doors slid shut and Ezra reared up on his hind legs, hitting the 
button for Team 7's floor. By the time Vin got to the elevator and jabbed 
the call button, the elevator was too far up to go straight back down – it 
would go up to all floors that called, then back down again. Of course Vin 
would use the stairs, but Ezra still had a big enough lead.      

The service elevator opened and Ezra bounded out onto a deserted floor; 
knowing that Vin was even now racing up the stairs to this level, Ezra 
hurried to Team 7's office at the end of the corridor, again rearing up and 
batting down the door handle to get in. Once inside he spotted instantly 
what he needed – JD Dunne, bless him, always left his computer on Standby 
instead of switching it off completely…

Vin Tanner arrived breathlessly on Team 7's floor and gave a soft gasp of 
relief to see it's deserted state. Instead of searching every room, his 
instincts told him to head for Team 7's own office. Drawing his gun, he 
eased his way inside, closing the frosted-glass main door behind him to 
prevent the leopard escaping. Moving cautiously, Vin eased himself into the 
bullpen. The leopard was sat in JD's chair, it's attention fixed on the screen 
as if fascinated. Vin hesitated – to destroy such a beautiful creature was a 
crime, yet he couldn't allow it to hurt anyone if it decided to atta……..

Automatically Vin's eyes swept the area and now they suddenly actually 
registered the words floating, in very large print, on JD's monitor: PUT GUN 
DOWN VIN.

Vin was dimly aware of a strange, muted "yik, yik" sound and vaguely 
realised he himself was making it. Sinking down into a chair – Josiah's he 
finally managed to understand, Vin stared at the message on the screen, 
then at the snow leopard who was staring at him with unmistakeable 
urgency. Finally he fumbled for his cell phone and hit a single button. Each 
of the seven had this button on their cell phones and pagers – this button 
paged six other beepers that the sender was in need of immediate 
assistance, that all activities must be dropped and to come to the sender 
right damn now. On Ezra Standish's desk, it's top neatly piled with the 
workload of a dead agent, pager and a cell phone both trilled. Almost 
instantly after, Vin's cell rang; not taking his eyes of the snow leopard, Vin 
simply picked up the cell phone and rasped, "I'm in the office, git here 
now!" before ending the connection. Four more times he delivered the same 
instruction.
* * *

It took less than ten minutes before Ronald the handyman was scared out of 
his wits by the arrival of five fast-driven vehicles that didn't park but simply 
screeched to a halt before they hit the walls. Five men tumbled out and 
raced up the stairs as Ronald gaped. 

Their entry into their office was textbook law enforcement, but they all 
halted as they saw Vin sitting, apparently unharmed, at Josiah's desk, while 
a large snow leopard sat in JD's chair.

"Huh?" JD blinked as his brain confirmed his eyes' message.

"Vin?!" Chris hissed softly, keeping his handgun rock steady on the big cat. 
"What the hell is that?"

"It's a snow leopard." Vin answered.

"Vin, why did you type a message to yourself to put your gun down?" JD 
asked as Chris seemed lost for words.

"I didn't – it did."

Nathan said carefully, "The snow leopard?"

"Yup."

"Um, Vin…" Josiah began in a very gentle tone.

The cat moved and five handguns snapped up – ignoring them utterly, the 
cat extended a paw and one gleaming claw popped out of it's pad. Carefully 
it depressed the keyboard. 

JD made a soft sound as four letters appeared on screen.

KRIS.

Had he not still been too freaked out to appreciate it, Vin would have 
relished the five utterly stupefied expressions on their faces. Everyone was 
frozen.

But it was JD who – perhaps more trusting and open to the wonders of the 
universe than the rest – suddenly swallowed and before any of the others 
could stop him, moved to the leopard in a way that blocked their line of 
fire. To shoot it, their bullets would have to pass through him. "Ezra?"

The snow leopard leaned forward and rubbed its glossy head against JD's 
chest like an overgrown house cat. 

JD Dunne was a young man, and he had never seen the point of hiding your 
emotions behind a mask of stoicism. Flinging his arms around the snow 
leopard's neck he burst into sobs, burying his face in fur and feeling the 
vibrating purrs shiver through his body.

The other five men were still stupefied. After several minutes of ferocious 
whispered arguments between them about the impossibility of the cat being 
Ezra, he'd had enough. Gently disengaging himself from JD's grip, Ezra gave 
a loud snarl that immediately transfixed everyone's attention, as hostile 
noises from a large predator with long fangs and sharp claws inevitably 
tends to do. Flexing his claws, Ezra turned and began to type laboriously – 
H, O, L, 

"Holbachstein!" Buck barked aloud. "Damn it, it's Ezra!" He glared around 
at the others, "Unless any of you got a better explanation."

Their faces were still disbelieving, but Ezra didn't blame them; if it were 
Buck or Nathan trapped in this feline body, he'd be having some trauma 
over it too. However, they were crowding around him without any of the 
fear they'd initially shown; Team 7 was comprised of men who knew from 
experience to trust what their own senses were telling them, and right now 
they were faced with a snow leopard who could type, and who knew the 
name "Holbachstein".

Turning back to the keyboard, Ezra typed: HOL KDNP ME KILL ME FRST TST 
FR HIS MCHN HOL LEFT THRT IT KILL NOT KILL MAKE ME THIS

Chris read the words. "Holbachstein escaped and kidnapped you intending 
to kill you with some new nasty he'd invented?"

YES, Ezra typed.

"First test for his machine." Buck muttered. "Ezra was going to be victim 
number one, but something went wrong?"

HAD ME TIED MCHNE DISNTGRT ME HAD 2 GO ROOM LEFT ME SO MCHNE CUD 
KILL DID THIS NSTED

There was silence as they digested these words, then Josiah exclaimed, "Of 
course! Matter cannot be destroyed, only transformed from one form of 
energy into another."

"What?" Chris snapped.

"Basic physics – and philosophy." Josiah replied. "Some people believe that 
matter – the physical universe – was created when God took some of His own 
energy and transformed it into matter. You cannot destroy matter, only 
change it from one form of energy to another; the ability to destroy matter 
would make you able to kill a small part of the Divine, which is impossible 
as the Creation is always inferior to the Creator. Holbachstein was trying to 
break one of the basic universal laws of physics, so of course this "machine" 
of his didn't work, it transformed Ezra's matter into something else, rather 
than destroying it."

Nathan suddenly looked ill. "Good grief, how many other people do you 
think he's done this to?"

NONE. By means of slow typing Ezra was able to convey the videotape's 
destruction and his own escape. Holbachstein had no notion of what the 
machine could do and was probably still fixated on locating and killing Ezra. 
He watched with relief as the other six men lost their haunted, grey 
expressions and came to life again as they had a purpose – find 
Holbachstein, fast, and get Ezra back. Though nobody uttered a word, the 
real possibility that Ezra was stuck in feline form hung heavily in the air.

Abruptly Ezra jumped down from JD's chair and loped into Chris's office out 
of sight. Before anyone could challenge this behaviour, there was a knock on 
the outer office door and Ryan Kelly from Team 8 came in with some files, 
looking mildly surprised to find them huddled around JD's desk. It took five 
long minutes to get rid of him and only then did Ezra reappear.

"Ez' yah'll have to stay with Chris till we find that scum." Vin suddenly 
announced. "He's the only one with a home that's out of town enough for a 
snow leopard not ta be noticed. Yah can't stay in the city, some jackass'll 
shoot yah."

The others nodded in unison, remembering their own response to Ezra when 
they thought he was a snow leopard – no way could he remain around a lot 
of people! For the remainder of the day, Ezra remained in Team 7's office, 
slipping into Chris's office whenever anyone entered, as his teammates bent 
their every effort to locating Holbachstein. Chris deliberately remained late 
in the building, he and Ezra making their way down the stairs to the parking 
garage without incident. Chris opened the passenger side and Ezra bounded 
easily up onto the seat as Chris shut the door and went round to the driver's 
side. Conversation en route to Chris's ranch was nil – though completely 
relieved to be back with his friends, Ezra was deeply embarrassed to be able 
to respond only with snarls, yowls, and other undignified noises and his 
team mates had quickly figured this out.

Ezra entered the ranch house cautiously, but there was no need for panic as 
neither of Chris's dogs reacted. Old Diablo and young Sam regarded him 
quizzically for some time and would not come near him, but showed no 
other hostility. To Ezra's gratitude, Chris simply opened the door of the 
small guest room next to the kitchen that Ezra habitually slept in and left it 
open. Feeling better than he had for days, Ezra made himself comfortable 
on the bed and went to sleep.

* * *
Team 7 explained away their grim looks and their constant attendance at 
Chris's ranch by way of a "huge" case, nor was this a lie. JD was able to 
locate Holbachstein with amazing ease since the man had bought highly 
specialised computer equipment; the good news was the mad scientist was 
still near Denver; the bad news was that he was holed up with one of the 
myriad anti-government/racist mini-militias that infested the USA. Their 
"stockade" – a glorified group of shacks – was in the Denver Mountains and 
had the disadvantage of being difficult to sneak up on. Buck and Josiah went 
personally to the small town nearest and by liaising with the local PD and 
sheriff's department, were able to ascertain that the militia were allowing 
Holbachstein to run some "repairs" on a mysterious "contraption" in return 
for a lot of cash that they intended to use to by serious arms – ground to air 
missiles and such. 

"Holbachstein obviously hasn't used the machine on anyone else." Josiah 
proposed upon his and Buck's return to the ranch. "If he had, there would 
be uproar in that stockade, yet they all treat Holbachstein like he's nothing 
more than a weird, barely tolerated cash cow."

Ezra jumped down from the couch and began to pace agitatedly; despite 
JD's best efforts and managing to obtain an outsize keyboard, Ezra was still 
able to communicate only via typing, which was tremendously slow. 
 
"We'll get him, Ezra." Vin tried to reassure the pacing cat.

"It's not that." JD surprisingly was the one who could most quickly interpret 
Ezra-the-leopard's moods. He slid off his chair so he knelt in Ezra's path and 
began to soothingly stroke Ezra's fur. "Holbachstein invented a matter 
transformation machine entirely by accident. He still thinks it's a 
disintegrator. Ezra's worried that if Holbachstein messes about with the 
machine too much, he may make some irreversible changes to it."

And Ezra will be stuck like this forever…

There was no need for JD to finish the sentence that hung in the air 
between them. 

* * *

Chris began to roll up the map they'd spread on the floor while Buck and JD 
began the important task of gathering beer and nuts. The militia group's 
"security" was about as useful a block as a sieve; apart from a few middle-
aged overweight die-hard originals, most of the group's membership were 
large, local lummoxes with little between their ears other than their skulls, 
twentysomething loafers who swaggered around impressing women and 
other local layabouts. Due to their constant inebriated bragging, Team 7 
soon learned that on Friday virtually the entire group was going on a trip to 
harass newly-opened Southern Black Baptist church, which would leave the 
stockade with only a "skeleton crew" – plus Holbachstein. They would take 
the surveillance van out into the wilds, then circle back through the forest 
on foot and come at the stockade through the forest proper to the North, 
instead of the previously used FBI tactic of approaching from the South 
West. AD Orrin Travis, still under the impression that Ezra was dead, had 
given Chris carte blanche for Team 7 to undertake the mission and to do so 
alone, since more personnel meant a greater likelihood of being spotted. 
Once they had Holbachstein, they would get him to reverse the process and 
they would then miraculously "discover" Ezra dishevelled but alive in the 
stockade. 

"We'll get him, Ezra." JD encouraged as he came back into the room with 
bowls of popcorn, potato chips and savoury nuts clutched precariously in his 
arms.

Ezra inclined his head but made no other response. He refused to yowl and 
growl, and typing was not only slow, but quickly became painful to curved 
claws designed to slice and dice not pound a keyboard. That first weekend 
at Chris's ranch, after they'd talked everything to death (and Nathan had 
insisted on giving Ezra a physical examination), Ezra had used the keyboard 
to relay as much information as he could recall, including the locations of 
the drugs he'd smelled en route into Denver. He'd also conveyed his fears of 
self-loss, and his relief that though his physical form changed, he remained 
quintessentially Ezra. That had started off Josiah on one of his long 
explanations about the immutability of the Soul versus the 
transubstantiation of the flesh, which had left them all glassy eyed, but that 
marathon type-athon had been enough for feline muscles and claws.

Ezra considered his current options; his normal response when Team 7 
gathered at Chris's ranch of a weekend to watch the game was to retreat to 
Chris's cosy, book-lined den that was separated from the larger room by an 
arch and lose himself in something edifying or entertaining. Unfortunately, 
while he could read as a snow leopard, he found it became quickly painful 
after ten minutes, his long-range cat eyes straining to focus consistently on 
small, black print.

Josiah settled himself in the huge, stuffed armchair that was moulding itself 
to his impressive frame, Nathan took the other armchair and JD sprawled 
out on the small two-seat couch; JD often forgot himself as he got wrapped 
up in the game and after several incidents of having beer and butter-soaked 
popcorn upended in their laps, the others had insisted he be the sole 
occupant of the couch. Ezra alone had spotted a gleam of triumph in the 
youth's eyes – Mr Dunne was indeed growing up nicely.

The huge, antique four seater couch had been passed down through 
generations of Larabees, hand-carved by a Welsh craftsman from a single 
massive English Oak, and it didn't even flinch under the combined weight of 
the sprawled Chris, Vin and Buck. Ezra narrowed his eyes; he wasn't going 
to curl up on the floor like some damned house pet, and since he couldn't 
read –

"HEY!"

"EZRA!"

Only Vin was fast enough to jerk up his beer and bowl of snacks as a large 
snow leopard suddenly jumped up and sprawled full length across all their 
knees, settling his head comfortably on his paws that rested on Chris's legs 
while his long tail whacked Buck in the face before settling down with Vin in 
the middle. Realising that to push the big cat off would be both foolish and 
painful, the three disgruntled men settled back down, firmly placing their 
bowls of goodies on Ezra's back and ignoring the sniggers of Josiah, JD and 
Nathan. 

Their irritation didn't last; as the game went on first Vin, then Chris then 
Buck absently stroked the soft silky fur of the large, warm, living comforter 
and gradually a serene quiet fell over the room. The TV played to itself on 
low as Nathan and JD snored softly in duet. Aware that the three men he 
was sat on were also dozing, Ezra remained still. Looking up, his eyes met 
those of Josiah; the big ex-priest smiled gently at the tableau, especially as 
Chris had both hands resting on Ezra, like a little boy cuddling a pet.

* * *

Chris watched Vin ahead of him slip through bush and bracken like it wasn't 
even there with a tinge of envy – the Texan sharpshooter was the 
personification of "silent but deadly". The surveillance van was covered 
with camouflage two miles back and slowly the six men and the leopard had 
made their way to the back of the stockade. Brambles and trees crowded in 
– it was clear that the militia group had never anticipated an attack from 
the North –

Abruptly Ezra moved, cutting off Vin's forward movement. For a moment 
they all froze as still as statues while Ezra padded forward slowly and began 
to paw viciously at small tussock. Worried that it might be an explosive 
device, Chris moved forward but then saw the glint of a metal turning 
wheel, like you got on the doors in submarines. 

"Hellloooo, what do we have here?" Murmured Buck rhetorically as the six 
men gathered around and helped Ezra remove the flora, displaying a rusted 
metal escape hatch that looked like it hadn't been used in a decade.

"This is too good to be true, surely?" Nathan questioned.

"No." Josiah contradicted, examining the hatch cover. "This particular 
group of malcontents was founded by Bradford Whitlock – known to sensible 
locals as Whitlock the Witless – who was paranoid on top of being a 
megalomaniac; I'm willing to bet there are several escape tunnels in this 
place that he didn't tell even his inner circle about."

"Whitlock was killed trying to escape from prison ten years ago, all his 
original recruitees are either dead, in prison, on the run or frying their 
brains with booze and drugs every week." Chris mused. "Given the average 
IQ of the guys in that place, I'm willing to bet these tunnels haven't been 
discovered since Whitlock originally had them built. Let's try it."

It took the combined strength of Josiah and Buck – the two largest, 
strongest men in the group – to open the hatch so they could look down into 
impenetrable gloom, giving credence to the idea that nobody knew about 
the tunnel. Chris eyed the darkness askance – "I…"

With a bound, Ezra disappeared down the hole.

"Ezra!" It's hard to yell in a whisper, but somehow Chris managed it.

A low growl of defiance answered him.

Chris descended next down the metal rungs, warning Ezra that they would 
discuss this when Ezra was human again. Ezra rumbled softly towards 
something in the corner, a small rectangular metal object that Chris rapidly 
discovered was an industrial junction box. Once again it took Josiah's 
strength to move the handle, but then the tunnel was filled with dim light. 
Small miner's lamps had been strung along the ceiling, and most of them 
were not working, but enough shed pale light on the tunnel. It was dead 
straight ahead apart from this bit, which bulged out in a circle directly 
below the escape hatch. 

"Where is the power coming from?" Buck questioned as dirt and dust 
covered everything. 

"It must be attached to the stockade's main power supply." JD responded. 
"A portable generator would have run out of power long before now and 
batteries would be long dead. I can't believe that these militia guys are so 
stupid they haven't ever wondered, "hey, what are all these extra fuses 
for" when they look at the stockade junction box."

"Apparently they are." Chris growled. "Let's move."
  
The tunnel was tall enough for even Josiah to stand upright in, but so 
narrow they had to proceed in single file with Chris determinedly in front, 
Ezra on his heels. The walls and ceiling were packed earth with wooden 
boards and beams as supports and a single thick cable running the length of 
the ceiling in the middle. 

Ezra snarled suddenly and everyone froze at the snow leopard's display of 
temper. Ezra sniffed the air cautiously, he could smell Death – but it was old 
Death, long gone. He gave a soft rumble and Chris moved forward 
cautiously, only for the man in black to stop dead and swear viciously.

They came out of the narrow tunnel in another small circular space with a 
hatch directly above them. This space however had other occupants – 
skeletons. Nathan came to the fore as they examined the scene. Dressed in 
the ragged remnants of what appeared to be heavy-duty digging or mining 
overalls, some of the skeletons still had shovels and helmets with miner's 
lamps on them. JD swallowed as saw how some of the remains had patches 
of skin and hair on them. All the skeletons were damaged – bullets lay on 
the dirt inside rib cages, showing they had once penetrated flesh. 

Lots of bullets.

"Machine pistol," Vin growled softly, "with something that fires so many 
rounds per second and them all in a confined space…"

"From above." Nathan gave his verdict, straightening from his examination 
of the skeletons. "Look how nearly every skull has bullet damage. They 
were gathered at the bottom, looking up, and whoever was up there simply 
pointed a machine pistol down here and cut them down. Probably Whitlock – 
it's just the sort of thing a homicidal paranoid would do to protect the 
secret of the tunnels."

Josiah had made his way cautiously up the ladder and turned the hatch 
wheel, but no matter how he strained, could not lift the hatch. "I can hear 
something creaking above me," he said finally, "I think they've put some 
furniture on the hatch cover."

In grim silence they retraced their steps, not commenting as Ezra painfully 
scrabbled up the metal steps to the outside. Spreading out, they began to 
search the undergrowth intently, and it was Vin's sharp eyes fifteen minutes 
later that found another overgrown tussock with an equally rusted escape 
hatch. Going down again, they found that this tunnel was also hooked up to 
the main power, though the lights were even more feeble than the first 
tunnel. Moving forward in silence, they were unsurprised to find another 
group of skeletons around the base of the entrance hatch. Once again Josiah 
climbed up and this time the hatch cover rose.

Josiah quickly lowered it as he felt things slide away then peeked through. 
"It's pitch black." He whispered.

Slowly he eased his way up, followed by Chris, then Buck who realised – "It's 
a broom closet!" 

"Built in – very clever." Josiah muttered.

The closet was a very large, walk-in cleaning cupboard that Whitlock had 
obviously chosen because it was built-in to the house and not mobile. A few 
mops, brushes and buckets adorned the floor but all were coated in thick 
cobwebs. Helping Ezra up, the six men found themselves crammed into the 
confined space –

"Like something out of a B movie comedy." Grunted Buck in irritation. 
"Let's get out of here and get 'em!" Suiting action to words, he grasped the 
handle and slowly eased back the door of the closet as the others crushed 
back to give it room. "Huh?"
Someone had taken the handle off the outside of the door, and now the 
doorway was blocked. JD gave a nervous laugh. "They sawed off the handle 
and wallpapered over the door."

Nathan gave a disapproving sniff. "Fortunately for us they did a pathetic job 
of it – the wallpaper's come away from the door, that's why it didn't rip 
when Buck opened it."

There was a snick as Ezra extended one claw, stuck it in the wallpaper at 
about chest height, and dragged it down smoothly; then the leopard stuck 
his head through the gap and surged out into the room. Quickly demolishing 
the wallpaper, Team 7 found themselves standing in small, deserted storage 
room on the ground floor, which must be the small utility room near the 
kitchen. They were quite alone.

"Let's rock and roll." Ordered Chris. 

It was laughably easy. Bellies already beginning to hang from day after day 
of junk food, beer and cigarettes, even the youngest of the militia group 
remaining behind were woefully unprepared for an attack that came from 
within the main house in the compound; unfortunately their appetite for 
violence was unmatched by a high IQ – en masse they lunged for their guns, 
a fatal error to make against angry, armed men who were instantly ready to 
fire.

Holbachstein let out a high-pitched shriek and took to his heels, but the big 
cats are amongst the fastest land-based predators; the snow leopard took 
off from a standing start next to Chris and hit Holbachstein in the back as 
the man reached the top of a flight of stairs, hearing the deeply satisfying 
crunch of cartilage as Holbachstein's impact with the floor broke his nose. 
For a long second Ezra battled the desire to rend Holbachstein into bloody 
gobbets of flesh, but sanity prevailed, especially as he heard the gunfire 
falter and die as Team 7 cleaned house.

Ensuring all the militia members were dead or handcuffed, and disabling all 
the guns anyway as a precaution, the other six men made their way to 
where Ezra was placed foursquare on the moaning scientist's back. Once all 
their guns covered him, Ezra stepped off Holbachstein and Josiah hauled 
him upright. An angry Josiah was an impressive sight, especially when 
holding Holbachstein as if he weighed little more than a feather.

"W-W-hat…?" Holbachstein's eyes were glassy and his face sheened with 
sweat.

Buck as ever got straight to the point. "Yah gonna change Ezra back, then 
your ass is going to jail for – ever!" 

Holbachstein continued to dangle and Buck growled, "Bite him, Ezra – wake 
him up."           

Ezra growled and this caused Holbachstein to look at the snow leopard 
properly for the first time; under any other circumstance his expression of 
utter shock would have been highly amusing. "Transmogrification?" 

"Whatever. You'd better be able to reverse it." Chris's tone was quiet but 
icily lethal.

They made their way towards the room where Holbachstein's machine was, 
but the lunatic made no resistance; what little sanity he possessed was in 
full scientist mode as he stared at Ezra enraptured. "Standish retains his 
sense of self?" 

"Yep." Buck growled in a tone that did not invite further questions, but 
Holbachstein persisted; in clipped sentences the six men explained Ezra's 
human sentience remained and that he had communicated his state to them 
by typing, but Holbachstein had stopped listening and was muttering 
complicated formulae to himself interspersed with rhetorical exclamations 
of "Impossible!" and "Fantastic!"

Pushing open the door of what was clearly a converted bedroom, Team 7 
paused on the threshold as they saw the machine for the first time, standing 
diagonally in one corner, the nozzle aimed at the far wall, against which 
were propped an array of bottles and other household items that 
Holbachstein had clearly been trying to obliterate without success – 
presumably the device only worked on the animate, not the inanimate.

The momentarily spell was broken by Buck, irrepressible as ever, "Damn if 
Ezra weren't right – the thing looks like a giant cake icing machine."

Holbachstein, completely lost in the wonder of discovery, had forgotten his 
desire to see Ezra die in agony and twitched forward, muttering about 
precise calibrations and ratio of absorbance. Distracted by his own 
eagerness to be bipedal once more, Ezra did not catch the scent till it was 
too late. Incredibly, it was Holbachstein who screamed "NO!!" as the 
situation went straight to hell.

The young militiaman had taken refuge in the one place he thought the Feds 
would not be interested in looking, behind the crazy man's machine. Right-
thinking folk knew nothing good ever came of Jewry, and Holbachstein's 
weird "Destructor" contraption would never work. If it did – or as soon as his 
money ran out - he would be disposed off as was proper for all inferior 
races. Faced with every member of the attacking Feds surging into the 
room, the man panicked and popped up from behind the machine like a 
jack-in-the-box, his gun cocked and ready to fire.

Holbachstein's shriek startled all them for a second, but the way he twisted 
out of Josiah's grasp and sent the big man staggering back into Buck as he 
dove for the doorway saved the ex-priest's life as the militia idiot's first 
bullets whizzed through the empty space where their bodies had been 
moments before. 
He wasn't given another chance – six weapons discharged simultaneously 
and the man was hit fatally in the head and heart several times. 
Unfortunately one death spasm sent three bullets drilling into the machine's 
operational console followed by the full weight of his body crashing onto it. 
Ezra yelled a warning but all that issued from his mouth was the piercing 
scream of a feral cat before he was enveloped in utter agony – every fibre of 
his being felt like it was being scoured in acid – then he mercifully lost 
consciousness.

* * *

Ezra blinked at the expanse of brown as he blearily opened his eyes. The 
whole horizon was dark, oak brown – and rising up and down slightly. His 
head felt like the aftermath of a Rolling Stones concert and his hand was 
twitching like –

Whoa. His hand? 

Yes. Present and correct, one human hand, protruding from the sleeve of a 
familiar red coat. Memory came rushing back and Ezra sat upright, clamping 
his lips together as the room spun sickeningly. Opening his eyes he caught 
sight of Holbachstein and his stomach rebelled violently – snapping them 
shut again, Ezra turned his head away from the sight and re-opened them. 

The machine stood innocuously in the corner, the dead militiaman still 
draped over it. Behind it in the corner was a coat rack with a couple of 
shabby white "lab" coats hanging from it – presumably Holbachstein had 
tried to insist on a level of scientific decorum and had probably been 
ignored. Resolutely ignoring the rest of the room, Ezra focussed on the 
coats, walked shakily to them, removed them, walked more steadily back, 
and dropped them over Holbachstein's remains, carefully not to look at 
what he was doing. From scalp to shoulders, Holbachstein was Holbachstein; 
from there down was a nightmarish mish-mash of feathers, fur, scales and 
raw pink substance that Ezra knew would haunt him forever. 

Taking a deep breath, Ezra looked about him. The "brown horizon", which 
did indeed take up a goodly proportion of the ex-bedroom, was a bear. Ezra 
crouched down beside it, relieved to see that it was fully formed and apart 
from apparent unconsciousness, appeared fine. He studied it for several 
minutes before he realised what it was. Much larger than even a grizzly, 
with dapple-grey "spots" on it's snout, Ezra realised with a thrill of shock 
that the creature was a Cave Bear. Memory came clearly back to him – a 
school outing from one of his many exclusive boarding schools to a zoo. The 
most interesting feature of the playground for rich kids had been the 
"interactive" Extinct Zoo, which displayed creatures such as T-Rex and 
others. Amongst the many exhibits had been all seven species of elephant – 
of which only two now remained – that Ezra had been genuinely interested 
in, but next to that was the North America section – Cave Bears, Cave Lions, 
giant horses and camels had once roamed the Midwest. Ezra laid a hand on 
the thick, warm pelt. The Cave Bear was unique amongst all the ursine 
species. Unlike all currently existing species of bear, who would attack man 
– even actively hunt man in the case of the Polar Bear – Cave Bears were 
almost completely herbivorous and consistently easy for humans to 
domesticate due to a placid nature. Evidence of Cave Bears as pets 
abounded in many North American archaeological sites. Ezra knew that the 
bear had to be Josiah.

"Oh mah lord." Ezra looked around him.

Crumpled near the bear was a panther whose ebony fur was as black as 
midnight. A large, full grown timber wolf with an impressive ruff lay prone 
on it's side against the wall, next to it was a dog-fox whose fur was a deep, 
rich russet that many a redhead would die for. 

"Mr Tanner? Mr Larabee?" Ezra looked around with a hint of panic, then 
blinked in amazement and despite the surreal nature of the situation, 
smiled. "How apropos."

Also crumpled on the floor were two birds. The smaller was a medium sized 
hawk whose feathers were a rich bronze, and next to it was the symbol of 
America, the Bald Eagle. This one's feathers were much blacker than usual 
for the species and even comatose it exuded viciousness. Ezra looked around 
him, his keen intellect fitting the pieces together. The machine's field of 
fire was a narrow diagonal beam – the militia man's collapse must have sent 
the beam to "broad disperse", but it wasn't wide enough to blast the whole 
room. Everything within the beam had been…"transmogrified"…

"Holbachstein was partly out of the field of the beam, and it killed him 
trying to change him."

Hearing the words from his own mouth brought Ezra back to the present and 
the need to act quickly. Orrin Travis had arranged for back up to arrive 
thirty minutes after Team 7 began their assault, which meant in six minutes 
seven seconds the cavalry were going to charge the front gate.

"Josiah! Nathan!"

It took four precious minutes to revive his six teammates and calm down the 
growling, yipping, squawking sextet. "QUIET!" Ezra was perversely pleased 
when total silence instantly descended. "In two minutes the rest of the good 
guys are going to be here. Now, Holbachstein is dead and this machine is 
clearly on life support. All I can do is set it to go one more time and hope it 
reverses the process – I could kill you all, or you could all end up staying like 
that for eternity. Are you sure you want me to proceed?" He winced at the 
cacophony of growls and screeches.

Ezra went behind the machine and carefully lifted off the stiffening corpse, 
licking his lips as he saw the damage wrought. The two birds, bear, panther, 
wolf and fox huddled together in the centre of the room, all wobbly and 
ungainly. The wolf's ears twitched back and forth and Ezra realised that the 
ATF and FBI must be approaching in the distance. It was now or never. 

Perhaps because of his failing mind, Holbachstein's creation was easy to 
use. You pressed the large green button to start, the red one to stop. 
Hoping it still had enough juice for one more blast, Ezra slapped his hand 
down on green – then ducked reflexively as the machine's circuits blew in a 
shower of sparks.

* * *

"It's a miracle!" Orrin Travis repeated for presumably the millionth time as 
Ezra sat in the back of an ambulance with a blanket around him. The 
remainder of Team 7, similarly singed around the edges, were close by. Ezra 
had had no time for relief when he threw himself out from behind the 
machine to see his six colleagues back in human form. The machine was 
fizzing and popping and burning and for all Ezra knew was programmed to 
turn into one big bomb if messed about with. Helping each other out of the 
room, the seven men stumbled out of the main house into daylight and a 
barrage of drawn guns. 

Ezra's nimble mind concocted a believable story of kidnap and being forced 
to listen to Holbachstein's insane ramblings for days on end by the time ten 
minutes and passed. 

Now he felt a surge of satisfaction as he saw the Feds begin to bring out 
something else other than bodies – pieces of the Transmogrifying Machine, 
all of which were blackened and charred. It was clear little if anything 
would be salvaged from the device, for which Ezra was grateful. He was 
going to put this nightmare behind him.

* * *
Six months later…

Ezra cursed and ducked as bullets whizzed overhead. Why oh why did the 
bad guys insist on trying draw their weapons and shoot men who already had 
their guns drawn and who were wearing body armour? Now here he was 
ruining his new pants in this godforsaken dirt-hole warehouse trying to take 
down a drug lord who was more slippery than an oiled rat. He was dimly 
aware of Team 7 taking care of business around him and darted forward 
between crates. 

It was the flash of light that saved him – ducking reflexively against the 
bright flash, he felt the heat of the passing heavy calibre bullet that 
smashed into crates behind him and Ezra hissed into his lip mike, "Vin, 
sniper, two o'clock high!"

Vin's own rifle barked an answer and Ezra was able to move again. Five 
minutes later, the entire drug cartel was deceased, but the six men of Team 
7 were anxiously crouched behind crates as their sniper and the former drug 
lord's battled it out; then it happened – a sharp cry and a rifle spun into the 
air to hurtle and smash on the concrete. 

"Go, Vin!" Cheered JD, standing up.

Chris raised his hand in salute to the tiny figure they could see balancing 
high up on the water tower. "Get yer ass down here, Tanner." He growled 
into the lip mike.

"Patience is a virtue, cowboy –"

The sniper had lost his rifle and his handgun was useless, only the fact that 
he was seconds from death galvanised his dazed brain into confused action. 
His shot, fired from a Beretta, came nowhere close to the Texan.

But Vin flinched and ducked reflexively at the sound, and his foot twisted on 
the edge of the tower platform. He had nothing to grab hold of and as the 
six men watched in horror, Vin Tanner fell from the tower.

Ezra was frozen with agony as the figure spun over in the air like a toy 
thrown by a spoilt child, twisting and spinning and shimmering –

What? 

A momentary haze obscured Vin and instead of a plummeting body, a golden 
hawk spread out wings and beat them frantically to achieve lift. The fall 
turned into a swoop, and the hawk soared back up into the sky with a 
triumphal scream.

Nobody moved, nobody even breathed until Ezra gasped and realised he 
hadn't been drawing oxygen into his lungs. The hawk came back now, 
heading straight for them, it's flight path wobbly but intent. Flapping 
harder as it got lower to the ground, the hawk hovered about six feet away 
and was once again enveloped in a sort of opaque haze that solidified into 
Vin Tanner.

Five men erupted into exclamations, demands, questions. Vin shook his 
head and raised an objecting hand. "Ah don't know! I jus'…did it."

"Stand clear." Turning to look at Ezra, who had not questioned Vin, they 
found he had drawn away from the group. "I am about to experiment."

Closing his eyes, Ezra concentrated on remembering the experience of being 
a snow leopard, the smells of the forest, the heady scent of leaves and 
flowers, the rich aroma of soil, the myriad heartbeats of rabbit and the vast 
distance his eyes could see…slowly Ezra opened his eyes and found himself 
staring straight at Chris's knees. Either he had crouched down or…Ezra 
stretched out an arm that had now become a foreleg of white fur with black 
spots.

"Good God." Nathan muttered

"Amen, brother." Josiah responded as they all stared at Ezra.

* * *
One Year after that…

Chris twitched the laces of his stretched out, booted feet away from the 
sneakily encroaching claw. "Damn it Ezra, I'll kick you if you don't stop 
trying to untie my laces."

The snow leopard stretched out on the ranch's front porch gave a derisive 
sniff but closed it's eyes and raised it's head towards the sun, basking.
Despite his present irritation, Chris couldn't cling to any genuine 
grumpiness, so raised the bottle of beer to his lips again to disguise his 
smile. Ezra in human form was as coolly aloof and impenetrable as always, 
but Ezra the snow leopard was a much more playful – dare Chris think it, 
affectionate – entity. 
Absently Chris flexed the fingers of the arm that was currently in a sling – 
the source of his irritation. The joint operation between ATF Teams 7 and 8, 
the DEA and FBI to take down a major drugs cartel had gone down almost 
perfectly – bar one lucky goon who managed to "wing" Chris's left arm. The 
crooks and law enforcement officials had been treated to a spectacular 
Larabee temper tantrum that substantially increased the infamous legend of 
the man in black and which had the unfortunate shooter singing like a 
canary to any cop who would listen in a desperate attempt to appease the 
ranting Larabee. However, only a select few knew the reason for Chris's ire 
– even eagles need both wings to fly, and Nathan had firmly vetoed any 
avian adventures for two weeks. 
Chris sipped his beer again and pretended he wasn't watching the skies for 
sight of a golden speck. Since Vin's inadvertent transformation, they 
discovered that they could "transmogrify" at will. Chris knew that it had 
brought the team even closer together – even Ezra who even on good days 
previously had still held a part of himself back. Chris was certain there was 
no human being on Earth more deserving of the gift of flight than Vin 
Tanner; the Texan loved to soar high above the land in company with a 
certain black eagle, and it filled in Vin that need for privacy, that need for 
personal space which used to see him pull back from his team mates like a 
tortoise in it's shell. Chris had withdrawn his savings to purchase several 
more acres of land around his ranch, and the others had contributed once 
they found out about it – now the seven had a wide range of unspoilt 
mountain and forest range in which to be their non-human selves.   
Philosophising about why the machine had deigned to transform him into a 
creature extinct for over five millennia made Josiah happy, if no more 
comprehensible; Nathan had admitted his favourite storybook character had 
always been Bagheera, panther companion of Mowgli in Rudyard Kipling's 
The Jungle Book, freed from slavery by a broken cage lock. Buck and JD 
would often go loping off into the woods together exploring and JD seemed 
less excitable now. 
The biggest surprise had been Buck, who several times had let slip some 
perceptive – even wise - comment that contradicted his perpetual attitude 
of jovial, boisterous bonhomie and truth to tell, made Chris wonder just 
how well he knew his oldest friend. A classic example had occurred several 
days after Vin's transformation as they discussed the ramifications of their 
abilities. 
* * *
JD had spent hours researching everything he could find about the species of 
animals they were, and the discussion had started off with them wondering 
how their lifespan as humans would be affected, if at all.  
Nathan, medically astute as ever, had had an epiphany during this, and 
pointed out his own romantic involvement with Raine, plus the romantic – 
and sexual – relationship between JD and Casey and Chris and Mary Travis. 
What if their "new" abilities were not tetragenic – affecting only the 
individual – but hereditary? Nathan had been hoping to start a family with 
Raine in the near future, but as he pointed out, there was no medical way 
to test whether he would walk in and find panther cubs in the nursery one 
morning.
Ezra had pointed out how useful his snow leopard form was in literally 
sniffing out crime in Denver, for example places used to store illegal drugs. 
Flying high above the Denver forest, Vin and Chris had spotted some illegal 
trappers on Chris's land and had flown straight back to the ranch to call in 
the park rangers. When questioned by the delighted rangers they had 
quickly concocted a tale about hiking in the forest and being lucky enough 
to spot the poachers before they themselves were seen, but as Ezra pointed 
out, they couldn't keep using the same excuses for obtaining information 
and solving crimes. Defence lawyers were tricky operators – what if one 
demanded in court to cross-examine an "informant" that one of the team 
had made up to disguise the fact he'd been in animal form at the time? 
They needed to construct watertight cover stories if they were going to 
utilise their animal sensory abilities in doing their jobs. There was also the 
imperative to prevent nasty people like the FBI and other shadowy 
government agencies discovering their talents.
"You're all forgetting the important bit." 
They had looked in surprise at Buck, who generally kept quiet during hot 
and heavy "learned debates".
"However we use our abilities as animals, the one definite thing we do know 
is that we're stuck with them." Buck had stated flatly. "Remember one 
thing – Holbachstein did not invent a Transmogrification Machine – it was an 
accidental creation while he was trying to make something else. Even if the 
mad doc' had lived, or if there is somebody out there with the same IQ as 
him, there's no guarantee that he or they could re-create what he did. The 
machine was reduced to scrap metal and the FBI aren't going to be able to 
rebuild it if they try for a thousand years, so from now on until the day we 
die, being able to transform into an animal is going to be part of our 
existence. What I'm trying to say is that if we're gonna go on with our lives, 
we need to let the people we care about the most know what's going on, 
because if I was Raine and found a baby panther in my little one's cradle, 
I'd be a mite freaked."
     
It had been sound advice. Orrin and Evie Travis, Mary, Casey and Nettie, 
Raine and Inez had all been informed of the situation and the probable 
ramifications. Raine was still determined to start a family in the next 
eighteen months, and the possibility of bearing children with the ability to 
transmogrify was a bridge she intended to cross when or if she came to it, 
and Mary had said much the same to Chris in a more private conversation. 
Both had deeply loved their respective dead spouses, and though they were 
sure of their feelings for each other, neither Mary nor Chris was individually 
comfortable with the thought of a child that didn't have Stephen Travis as a 
father or Sarah Larabee as a mother.   

* * *

Chris came out of his reverie as Ezra tilted his head on one side in a 
listening attitude. A few minutes later, a large wolf and a dog fox came 
bounding out of the tree line neck and neck in what was clearly a race that 
the dog fox won by a clear tail-length. Already resuming humanity as he 
bounded up the porch steps, JD collapsed grinning in one of the rocking 
chairs and snagged an open beer from the cooler, while Buck also changed 
back and leaned against a lintel, sipping a chilled brew. A sleek black 
panther padded delicately out of the undergrowth shortly after that, 
followed in short order by an absolutely colossal bear whose stately pace 
was measured. At this point Ezra also returned to human form, and the six 
men sat drinking beer, five of them watching Chris scowl and trying not to 
smirk.

Finally a golden dot grew into a lazily coasting hawk making its way back to 
the ranch house. The bird swooped down as if to land on the porch rail, but 
became Vin to stand effortlessly upright on the ground. The Texan ignored 
Chris's glare as Ezra handed him a beer; Chris's tendency to be over 
protective – particularly of Vin – was the source of much deeply hidden 
amusement. 

"Have fun?" Growled Chris.

"Yep." Vin replied blandly.

Pressing his lips together, Buck stood up, "The game's starting fellas, lets 
get inside."

Together seven extraordinary men who had been made unique turned and 
walked inside the ranch house, bickering affectionately like little boys.

©2003 Catherine D. Stewart