The cold came for the kill.

  When the Rakshasa came for the same in the dark waters, he prevailed. By way of luck.

  Luck did nothing against an unforgiving beast like the weather.

  Cold winds cut deeper than claws. He couldn’t heal fast enough. His hunger and exhaustion wouldn’t let him.

  He didn’t have any fight left. He didn’t have the willpower to let go of his mothers voice in his mind and face the hollow hum of reality. She said she’d find him. He let her words paralyze him as the first snowfall of the year took over and he nearly froze to death midslumber.

  In his dreams there were no beasts with stripes or cars like caskets under cold water. There was warmth, spreading slowly but surely. There was light, glowing dimly but steadily—

  “The fuck are you doing in my tent?! HEY!”

  A boot hit his leg, hard on the shin.

  The warmth disappeared, the glow faded. He opened his eyes.

  “You motherf— oh don’t worry. I’ll wake you up. Think you can steal my place huh? You must be off that good sh-” He stomped off mumbling before picking up something.

  Andre could hear the metal drag on the concrete.

  “I don’t mind jail. Three meals and a bed ain’t never hurt me..” The man groaned before returning to stand over Andre. “Wake up, asshole!”

  The man swung the pipe.

  Andre reacted, arm shooting out of the torn up tent he laid in. He rolled over and caught the metal pipe.

  An older grey bearded man with weathered pale skin and a dirty beanie on his head met his eyes. First angry, then surprised and quickly terrified as Andre’s eyes turned green and slitted.

  In a flash, Andre was up and grabbing the man by the neck. With ease, he lifted the man off his feet and slammed him into the brick wall of the alley opposite him.

  The man’s feet dangled.

  Andre snarled. The skin around his eyes and the sides of his face darkened and spots formed.

  The man fought to breathe, “Pl—please! I’m sorry…. I-I didn’t know! I didn’t mean to…. I….are you with Tariq? I meant no disrespe—AH!!”

  Andre gripped his throat tighter and growled. He could hear his heartbeat. He could smell the meat of him. He could feel the blood rushing under his palm and fingers.

  “Aht aht….”

  Andre and the man turned to the entrance into the alley to find an older dark-skinned man standing there with a cane. He wore a beat up coat with a colorful scarf and knitted brown hat that carried his dreads like a tote bag full of ropes. Andre couldn’t see his eyes due to his circle glasses. He had a blunt between his lips as he spoke, “Noooo no no. Don’ do that ting’ there mi boy. Leave him. Life hard nuff’, ya know?”

  Andre could barely understand him. His heart was pounding too loudly. The cars whizzing down the cold street behind him echoed metallic screams. The smell of the terrified man was too inviting.

  The man stamped his cane. “Now, bwoy.”

  Andre didn’t move right away.

  “Mi ah see you no badman. You scared. Thas’ good. I bet you’ hungry too. Reeeeal’ hungry.” The man pulled a bagged up slab of meat out of his coat pocket.

  Andre suddenly couldn’t hear much of the city or smell much past the blood beginning to infect the air.

  He dropped the man.

  “Beat it.” The man said to the homeless man.

  He wasted no time and slowly began backing away.

  Andre pounced on the meat, eating the bag as well as he began tearing into the flesh.

  “Bomboclaat…..” The man whispered between puffs of his blunt as he watched.

  Andre looked up at the man— who was now inside the alley with him. He snarled.

  “Easy now, play-boy. Mi nuh wan’ no raw slab. And cut all dyat’ fang flexin’ there bwoy. Y’know where ya ar’?”

  Reason crept back into Andre as he swallowed the meat. He looked around. The snowed in alley was made by the walls of two large buildings. Dumpsters ate up the space deeper inside. Manhole covers into the sewers spewed foul mist. The city was screaming. He could feel how massive it was even in his small crevace.

  “You’re in da city of lions, bwoy….. and you’re jus’ a cub. Eh…..Even worse, you’re a different-cub. The lions don’ like different bwoy. Dey scare of it. Real scare. You gotta hide dat’, ya hear?”

  Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  Andre shivered, looking down to find his clothes frozen and covered in snow.

  “Come on, kitty-bwoy….. come inside before ya die standin’….” The man turned around and began walking out of the alley.

  Andre followed.

  He slowed his step as he exited the alley and faced the city.

  Everything loomed over him. Everything was built over something and slathered with graffiti in wild booming colors and designs of roaring lionheaded men and police officers with cat eyes or beautiful women with stripes. Cars littered the streets, playing loud music while others honked and cussed at people from open windows.

  The apartments were all connected by string where clothes and sheets hung frozen in the cold winds—

  “Aye bwoy’? Get inside ‘fore somebody see ya’!” The man said from the doorway of the building he entered.

  Andre continued walking. Heading into a store called Fine-Herb Jamaican Jerkhouse.

  Before he could even enter, the smell started to make his eyes water and his nose burn.

  “You ah’ be ok, kitty-bwoy’. Jus give dem’ senses a moment to adjust, hm?.” The man said as Andre entered the store.

  Quickly, he closed the door behind Andre and flipped the sign hanging on the glass door from open to closed.

  The store was split into two halves.

  The left side was a grocery store of sorts with all kinds of strong smelling herbs and even clothes pinned to the glass wall of the front desk. The right side was a sit down restauraunt of sorts with the back being a kitchen. He could smell the grease and meats.

  “You wan’ some more?” The man asked, “Of course ya’ do. Come, small up yuself’.” The man pushed past Andre and headed towards the back.

  Andre followed until the man turned and pushed him back with his cane.

  “Aht aht! You don’ touch mi’ kitchen, hearin’ me clear?”

  Andre snarled at the cane with closed lips.

  “Mi nuh see no more fang flexin’.” He wagged his finger at Andre, “Smart kitty-bwoy.” The older man smiled and dipped into the kitchen.

  Pots and pans clattered. The man cursed and cursed some more before stepping out with a massive steak. “Don’ take mi hand, bwoy.”

  Quickly, the man tossed him the steak.

  Andre caught it and backed away before squatting and tearing into the meat. Between each bite he snarled like the lions on national geographic. He felt outside himself. Not as much as before. But still too much. He felt scared to move. Every smell and sound pushed him out again. Slowly the guilt came from wanting to eat the man as he ate more of the food.

  The man must’ve noticed.

  “There ya’ are…..” He turned his head to look down at him.

  Andre didn’t reply.

  “Come. Hot shower an’ clothes.” The man walked off with his cane, turning left from the kitchen to move a large poster and reveal a door. He opened it, showing a set of stairs that led down to a dark cooridor.

  Andre followed hesitantly until he was taken to a bunker of sorts.

  He could smell one of the rooms housed frozen meats. It was cold everywhere. But further in, a room awaited with a fresh bed and bathroom.

  Well, moderately fresh. Old blood died the brown sheets and the pillows were beaten to near flatness. There was also no windows. Only a dangling lamp that flickered when he flipped the switch by the doorway.

  “Da’ clothes in da’ washroom ah’ fit ya fine. Go on, get warm an’ clean.”

  Andre swallowed in the awkward silence. “…..”

  “What bwoy?” The man asked.

  “……who are you?”

  “Call mi Jamar, bwoy, don’ call mi no ting’ else, ya’ get me? Now go.”

  Andre stumbled off for the bathroom.

  “An wash ya teef’! Don’ come from that washroom wit dat’ bloodclat blood-breaf, ya-hear?” Jamar yelled after him.

  Andre didn’t even try to decipher what he said there.

  Showering was hard for Andre. Impossibly hard. Almost. Every sound forced him out of it and left him standing in the water— in a sort of predatory trance where he listened and waited. He couldn’t move. Every smell needed precise dissection. Every memory was crippling. The adrenaline of the new environment masked the cries he wanted to let out. He couldn’t say her name. Not now.

  After an hour long shower, he was clean and unthawed. His wounds weren’t as healed as he thought they’d be. In fact, one ripped open under the hot harsh shower stream. Otherwise he was alright. The clothes waiting for him were a bit too big, but he made it work. He now wore a pair of baggy grey sweats and a hoodie with a leather jacket to go over it. It smelled faintly like the herbs and spices of the shop. Like it had been sitting in the shop for a while. Probably pulled from the front desk where it was on sale.

  When the fog faded, he used the damp towel to wipe the mirror clean and see himself.

  His stomach sank.

  He looked terrible. His cheeks were sunken, his eyes seemed to have a permanent faint glow. His left eye was bruised. His lip was cut. His hair was longer, now hanging down to his chest in dark full curls.

  A bell rung, telling him the door into the shop upstairs opened.

  But he remembered it being switched to closed for the public.

  Andre’s stomach tightened. He was out of the bathroom and padding through the room in a semi-crouched jog. He approached the stairs and listened to the man arguing with a woman.

  He headed up the stairs, the only way out.

  Quickly, he opened the door.

  They were at the front desk which was right in front of him, giving them no option but to see him.

  And the same for him.

  “Wa’ yuh starin’ at, gyal?” Jamar asked from the front desk.

  The “gyal” in question was a girl about Andre’s age. Maybe a little older. She was tall with incredibly dark brown skin that seemed to have a sort of red undertone. Her hair was in thick shiny braids running down her back. She wore hooped earrings and had glossed lips. She smelled like apples and cinnamon and something else that made his hair stand on end.

  She smelled like his mom.

  “Wa’ yuh’ doin’ up here, bwoy?! Get!” Jamar hissed at him as he poked his head over the counter.

  Andre growled.

  The girl growled in reply. Her eyes lit up like gold-glass jewels under sunlight. Portions of her braids lit up the same and she bared her teeth, revealing large fangs.

  Andre did the same as his skin changed.

  The girl recoiled and dropped her eyes before fighting to raise them again, “…..What the hell are you?”

  “Bomboclaaaaat….” Jamar stomped out from behind the desk and threw a steak at him, “He’s a Hybrid. A worse…. but dat’ ain’ da point now.”

  Jamar looked over at Andre, “You no’ hungry now?”

  Andre looked at the meat on the floor, “I’m not an animal.”

  “Oh’ da’ human mind is back. Good.” Jamar said, “So ya’ don’ want dat’ slab der’ bwoy?”

  Andre didn’t answer as the girl stepped out from behind Jamar.

  “A Hybrid? He must not be from round’ here. That’s not a good thing is it? If Tariq and the gangs find o—”

  “Not sure…..he kinda’ look familiar… but mi nuh know. Don’ worry bout da’gangs, gyal. He hidin fa now.” Jamar said.

  “Hiding? For how long?”

  “As long as it takes.”

  The girl looked at Jamar with a raised eyebrow, “Aye, J. There’s been all types of outsider Strays coming to Empire City. You never tried to hide one until now, what’s up? You don’t know him. He could be a test from Tariq. You know he likes them mind games….”

  Jamar shook his head, “He’s different.”

  “Yea…. Hybrid. Since those exist somehow….” She replied.

  Andre stood watching them.

  Jamar shook his head again, “Dat bwoy’ a Feral. He no like the others.”

  “What— like Tariq?” She asked.

  Jamar nodded.

  The girl’s eyes went wide and her feline form faded, “…..awe shit.”