-----

Author's Note: Here's five. Thanks to everyone for their feedback on my floundering support for this story...I've decided to follow it to the end, whenever that may come about :) I'd like to thank djkauf for the devilish good editing and DC Comics for their characters.

-----

Chapter Five:

I’m not even sure where I was, not even when I got there. I spent the night in the truck, it was rather uncomfortable. I felt bad about stealing the truck but I was good with my promises. As soon as I got to California, I would definitely make sure the two of them were compensated for it. Did I want to steal the truck? Not really, but it was the only way. Or else I would have been walking to the damn bus station.

As soon as I pulled into the parking garage across the street, I left the truck there. It was almost out of gas anyway. I locked the doors, leaving a note telling Marvin where he could find his keys. Then I walked across the street to the bus depot. The first thing I did was buy a ticket---I still had a few hours. So the second thing I did was rent a storage locker. I put the truck key and another hundred dollars inside. Then I took the key and gave it to the girl behind the counter, telling her that a guy named Marvin White would definitely come looking for it. She didn’t ask any questions.

After that, I left the station, heading down the street toward a little shopping district I saw. After all, I had a few hours to kill. I was never much of a shopper as a guy. I used to go with Mom on occasion but it always used to bore the hell out of me. In the end, I always ended up in the Arcade or in some sporting goods store. I trusted her to do all my clothes shopping; after all, it was mainly jeans and t-shirts. I’m not a trendy guy, not like the other guys on the team. Mom didn’t make a lot of money either so I couldn’t afford to be in style even if I wanted too. Connor was the same way, what with living with his cousin and all. Of course, his Dad and mega rich model Mom sent him cash every week, he put most of it away for college.

Me, money burned holes in my pockets.

So as I browsed the racks, trying to decide if I should buy something, I couldn’t help but think that something had changed in me. I’m not sure what it was but it was definitely something. I wanted to spend the money but not on this stuff. Yet here I was in some clothing boutique, browsing girls clothes, wondering if that would fit me right. Frustrating, isn’t it? I haven’t been a girl for more than a day and already I was clothes shopping. It should have annoyed the hell out of me but it didn’t. That was the scary part, I was kinda enjoying it. I wonder if this is what happened to Cassie too. I never really knew her from before. I knew Connor had a really good friend named Charlie---he talked about him a lot---but I never met the kid. I guess he was kinda a loner dweeb, at least according to the other guys on the team. But if Connor liked him that was enough for me. Connor was a good guy and a good judge of character.

I pulled a pink top from a rack and held up to my chest. I didn’t even realize what I was doing until I did it. As soon as I did, I groaned. I shoved it back real quick. What the hell is wrong with me? I moved on quickly but found myself in a similar predicament a few seconds later. Now it was jeans and I was holding a pair up to my waist. I groaned, forcing them back on the rack. I gave up after that---realizing there was no way I could do this with a level head. So I decided just to bail. I made my way toward the door as quick as possible, not watching where I was going.

I ran into a girl as she was coming in. I bumped into her lightly, shoulder to shoulder. We looked each other in the eye for a moment. She was pretty, long blonde hair, sharp features. She had these eyes that were bright blue and mesmerizing. Looking at her made my heart skip a beat.

“Sorry” we both said at the same time then laughed.

I stepped to the side to allow her to pass and as she did so she wobbled, falling. I caught her, her hands falling on my chest. Both of them cupped my breasts for a second and we both blushed. She apologized with a string of curses then pushed away, disappearing into the store. I turned to see if she was all right but I lost her in the stacks. I thought about following but I couldn’t bring myself to go back into this dreaded place. I shrugged it off and went out the door. I wandered the streets a bit after that, doing a little window shopping. I finally came upon a little diner and went inside. I ordered a cup of hot chocolate, sitting at the counter. When I finished it, I reached into my hoodie front pouch to get my wallet and found it gone.

I panicked, wondering what must have happened to it. My mind flashed back to the boutique, I must have dropped it when the girl ran into me. Luckily, I still had enough of Wendy’s change to pay for the drink. After I left the diner, I ran back to the boutique and asked the girl behind the counter if she saw it. She didn’t. I looked around the shop a bit but came up empty. I would have looked more but my bus was coming. I bit my lip and cursed, all my money was in there. Thankfully, I kept my bus ticket in my pocket or else I would have been screwed.

I made my bus on time though. I did a lot of bus traveling and not just to school either. We were always getting on buses, going to away games and things like that. But this was the first time that I’d ever been on a bus like this. Earlier I bought a one way ticket, meant to take me from Iowa all the way to California. It was a Greyhound, the ticket cost about two hundred and fifty bucks and to get there it meant I had to switch buses three times but it was worth it. Anything to get as far away from Illinois and the troubles I left behind. When I got on the bus, I found a seat by the window, anxious to get things going. I stared out the window, looking at the station. It pained me to be going so far away but it wasn’t like I had a choice. The only life I had was in Chicago and now it was all gone. I might upset a few people---Cassie and Connor and maybe Cissie---but they probably thought I was an evil murderer anyway.
I wanted to get away from all that; I needed to get away from all that. Then why was I crying?

“You ok?” asked a voice from behind me.

I turned; ready to tell whomever it was to mind their own business when I gasped. It was the girl from the boutique. She smiled and slipped into the seat next to me, not even bothering to ask if she could. It didn’t matter. A girl that pretty, I’d let her sit on my lap.

“I’m fine,” I said softly, wiping tears.

She laughed. “You’re not crying because you dropped this are you?”

She reached into her pocket and pulled out my wallet, waving it front of my face. I was elated. I quickly took it from her. Then I did something stupid and opened it, making sure everything was still there. I’m glad I did, there was some cash missing. I looked at her, frowning. “You take some of this?” I asked, anger in my voice.

She frowned and lowered her voice. “I’m real sorry but I was desperate. Look I’ll pay you back but I need to get out of here.”

I got angry. “What the hell kind of person finds a wallet, steals money from it and returns it to its owner?”

She shrugged. “Look, I’m real sorry. I told you I was. I’m good for it; I’ll pay you back as soon as we get to where we’re going.”

“And where are you going?”

She smiled. “California, just like you.”

I was about to say ok but then something dawned on me. “How do you know where I’m going?”

She opened her mouth and closed it real quick, like a fish gasping for water. Then she bit her lip. She cursed under her breath. “This is going to sound crazy but that’s where I saw us going together.”

It did sound crazy. “What the hell are you talking about?”

She opened her mouth to say something but then her eyes widened. She gripped the arms of her seat and cursed. “Shit, I thought it was going to take longer than that.”

I turned to where she was looking, which was clearly out the window. What I saw drained the color out of my face. It was two guys in suits, talking to a man in uniform. The guys flashed their badges, looking all official. It didn’t take a genius to figure out who they were. I cursed, it was the fucking DEO. They were after me. I turned to tell the girl it was me they were after but her face was pretty pale. She looked like she was going to throw up.

“Are you ok?” I asked, reaching over and touching her arm.
She shook her head, her hand reaching forward and grabbing mine. I had to admit, it was kinda nice. “Look I don’t have time to explain but we have to go now.”

“What go?” I asked, “We can’t go, this bus will be leaving in a few minutes.”

She shook her head. “They’re going to stop it or try to anyway. They’re bad people, real bad people.”

I shook my head. “They’re government morons but they’re not bad. Besides what makes you think they’re after you.”

That gave her some pause. Then she reached into her purse, taking out a bottle of pills. She popped one and closed her eyes. She gripped my hand tightly, digging her nails into my flesh. I winced under her tight grip then it relaxed. She let out a big sigh and opened her eyes, tears running down her cheeks.

“You’re right,” she said, letting go my hand. “They’re not here for me. They’re looking for you I think.”

That made me pause. Then I pushed myself up in the seat, ready to bolt. She grabbed my arm, pulling me back down. She was a lot stronger than she looked.

“They’re not going to find you. The bus is going to start and the two of them will still be standing there when it does. They’ll shout and give chase but they won’t catch us.”

I looked at her like she was crazy. “How do you know that?”

“Trust me, I just do.”

I frowned. “This coming from the girl who stole my wallet.”

She smiled sheepishly. “I’ll pay you back, I promise.”

I huffed and turned away from her. I looked out the window again, trying to ignore the crazy girl sitting next to me. Instead, I watched the two Agents continue to talk to the uniformed man. I watched and waited but whatever they were talking about seemed to take longer than they thought. Then the bus engine roared loudly and the bus started to move. Soon it was moving at a good pace. I watched in shock as the two agents shouted and gave chase, trying to catch us as we slowly pulled away from the station. They gave up when it was clear they weren’t going to catch us. I smiled widely then turned back to the not-so-crazy girl sitting next to me.

She smiled. “Told ya.”

“How did you do that?”

She smiled and stuck out her hand. “I’m Rose by the way, Rose Wilson.”

I numbly shook her hand.

_________________________

Rose liked to talk---a lot---and mostly about herself.

I didn’t mind though, it was kinda refreshing actually. She didn’t get into too many specifics but now I knew why she was in such a rush to get away. She was running from someone. She didn’t exactly say from who but from what I could gather, it might have been her father. He sounded like a real ass, the complete opposite of mine. Though both had a military background, her’s apparently worked for the Department of Defense. He was a Colonel of some kind, strict and overbearing. She didn’t say why she ran but I think it had something to do with a massive argument they had. It was all she said about it. The rest of her talking was about her days on the run---she’d been gone from home for two months now. What amazed the hell out of me was that she’d actually started in Washington, DC.

“DC?” I said, flabbergasted.

She nodded. “I slipped out of my bedroom late one night two months ago after…” She sighed and shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is that I’m finally on my way to California.”

I nodded. “What’s there?”

“My Mom” she said with a smile then quickly added. “I think.”

“You don’t know?”

She sighed heavily. “The Colonel” she said, that’s how she referred to her father, never as Dad. “He said she abandoned me when I was just a baby but I don’t believe him. I got a post card from her about a year ago; her address listed her in California. I tried to talk him into letting me go and see her but he wouldn’t allow it. But after recent events there’s no way I’m going to stay there with him.”

“Recent events?”

She laughed. “Water under the bridge” She sighed again. “I never thought I was going to make it this far, especially on my own. If I didn’t find companionship soon I was going to go crazy. But that’s all settled now because I have you.”

She wrapped her arms around mine and rested her head on my shoulder, smiling. Not that I didn’t enjoy it but it was a little awkward.

“You don’t even know me; in fact we’ve just met.”

She nodded. “I know but I have a feeling you and I are going to become great friends.”

We got on the bus at six in the morning and didn’t make our first transfer until five hours later when we reached Omaha. We barely got time to stretch our legs before the bus started moving again. I was a little nervous the whole time we were at the bus depot there. I had the strangest feeling that the DEO were going to jump out of the shadows and grab me. But Rose did her thing again---whatever that was---and told me that they hadn’t caught up with us yet. It made me happy when she included “us” in her bit. I’m not sure why she cared so much but she did. Another thing I didn’t understand was how she was doing whatever it was that she did. But she didn’t want to talk about it. Shortly after we left Iowa, I tried to ask her about it but she changed the subject. But if we were going to continue this journey together, we needed to be honest with one another.

I took a deep breath. “I think you and I should talk.”

We were now twenty minutes out from Omaha, having just left the depot there a little while ago. Rose was lying with her head against my shoulder, pretending to sleep. She opened her eyes and looked up at me, frowning.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” she said sternly.

“Then don’t talk,” I said, “listen.”

That got her attention. She moved her head from my shoulder and sat up. I took a deep breath. It felt strange to be so close to someone, even someone I’d just met a few hours ago. But the last day or so was all about the unknown. First, it was everything that happened back at home, then waking up as a girl, meeting Wendy and Marvin and now this. I never in a million years thought I’d be so open with strangers before, but Wendy and Marvin were good people. I’m not sure if Rose was the same, ---she did rob me after all---but I felt I could be open with her, too. Even though she probably wouldn’t admit it, I think the two of us had a lot in common.

“I think you and I are a lot alike” She opened her mouth to protest but I held up hand. “You’re different aren’t you, different than other kids our age. Something happened to you, something that you can’t explain and don’t want to talk about. Your father knows, I think, and that’s why you’re running from him. How am I doing so far?” She nodded, I smiled. Then I took a deep breath. “Can I ask you something?”

She sighed. “You’re going to whether I want you to or not.”

I smiled. “What’s your name, your real one?”

She sighed heavily. It took her a minute or two to respond. “Wade.”

She tried to explain but I cut her off. This time I held my hand out to shake hers. “Hi Wade, nice to meet you. My name is Eddie.”
Her eyes bugged out of her head after that. She numbly shook my hand.

I told her my story. It didn’t take long. She didn’t interrupt me at all, listening like a captive audience. When I got to the end, she looked a little pale though.

“And that’s who the guys in the suits were?”She asked, referring to the ones back in Iowa. I nodded, she shuddered. She leaned over and gave me a big hug, it felt nice. When she pulled away, she was crying. “I’m sorry about your Mom.”

“Thanks “I said, sadly, crying a bit myself.

We didn’t say anything for a few minutes then she said: “We can’t go to your aunt anymore.”

That took me by surprise. “Why not?”

She sighed heavily. “Trust me, I’ve been a Colonel’s daughter all my life and if I know one thing then I know how these people work. They’ll be waiting for you at your aunt’s house, the conversation you had with her on the phone was being monitored. That’s how they knew to get you at the bus station.”

I groaned, I hadn’t even thought of that. But it made sense I suppose. But I still had no choice. “I have nowhere else to go.”

Rose smiled. “Yes we do.”

She reached into her purse, rummaging about a bit. Then she pulled out a folded piece of paper. She opened it slowly and handed it over. It was computer printout showing a roughly drawn map, an address and a name in big block letters: TERROR TITANS. I was a bit confused. “What the hell is this?”

“One of the real reasons I’m going to California.”

“I thought you were looking for your Mom?”

She nodded. “I am but these people are a bonus.”

Ok “I said, looking at the sheet of paper in my hand. “Who are the Terror Titans?”

She smiled. “They’re like us” she lowered her voice to a whisper. “They’re Metas.”

My eyes bulged out of my head. “You’re kidding?”

She shook her head. “I read about them in an underground forum. They’re a group of kids like us---runaways---they went through the change and for one reason or another, they left their homes. They’re local but according to the ClockKing42, they accept members from all over.”

“Who’s ClockKing42?”

“He’s the guy in charge or the group. I’m not sure what his real name is but that’s his handle. Sounds pretty cool right?”

I shrugged. “I’m not so sure.”

She frowned. “But they’re like us.”

I bit my lip. I knew I was prying but I couldn’t help it. “You still haven’t explained that.”

She sighed, folding the piece of paper. She stuck it back into her purse and looked around; making sure no one was eavesdropping. “Ok, remember how I said my real name was Wade?” I nodded. “Well it is but I’m the only one who ever called myself that. You see, I’m a girl, I have been since birth. But inside I was a guy, a guy called Wade.”

“You’re one of those transgendered people?”

She nodded. “My father always knew I was different but he wasn’t willing to except that. You see he doesn’t just work for the DOD, he works for a scientific branch of it, one that until recently was working on mind control. But when the Meta human outbreak---his words, not mine---occurred, Dad switched gears. He ordered the scientists under him to figure out what makes a Meta tick so they set about finding the perfect test subject.” She sighed heavily.

“Was it you?”

She shook her head. “When they couldn’t find one, that’s when he turned to me. He was only trying to help, I think. My Dad knew what the Meta change did to some people, how it changed their genders. So he told me all about it, asked if I wanted to be his son for real. You have no idea how fast I jumped at the chance.”

“He doesn’t sound like such a bad guy.”

She frowned. “Something went wrong” She took a deep breath, tears running down her cheeks. “You see the US Government ran this experiment where they took some of their soldiers and tested them for the metagene. When they found viable candidates they got them to agree to allow them to activate the gene inside of them.”

I nodded. “I’ve met one of them.”

She smiled then continued. “My father got his hands on the same drug they used---don’t ask me how---and he injected me with it. Like you said, he might have been doing it to help me but it was mainly to help himself. He’s never been happy to have a daughter and if he could get a soldier and a son out of the deal, he was willing to risk it all. Well, suffice to say things didn’t work out as he planned.” She waved her hands up and down her body. “You see, what my father didn’t know was that in order for the drug to work properly, the recipient of said drug has to have the metagene in them to begin with. Well it turns out that I didn’t.”

“So you remained a girl?”

She nodded, crying. She tried to tell me more but it was incoherent through her tears. I reached over and pulled her into my arms, holding her tight. She cried like that for a while. Someone sitting across from us asked if she was all right and I told him it was her “time”. He turned a little white and learned not to butt his head into other people’s businesses. I felt pretty good after that. I let Rose cry herself out on me. After that, she slowly drifted to sleep, her head on my lap. It appalled the hell out of me that a father could do such a horrible thing to do his daughter. What the hell kind of government agency funded an operation like his? I thought maybe it was DEO but it was even too sinister for them. Whatever group it was, I could see why she ran from it.

I let her sleep. We reached our next transfer stop, which was Denver, that was around ten at night or so. I reluctantly woke her up. She was a bit groggy and apologetic for sleeping on me. I told her everything was fine. I helped her off the bus and onto the next one. We sat quietly after that. I knew there was more to her story that she wanted to tell but I could see it hurt her to do so. After about an hour, she rested her head on my lap and fell back to sleep. I had to wonder how much sleep she’d actually had in the last few months. It must have been rough, always on the run like that. It made me wonder if that’s what my life was going to be like, too. I know she was really excited about these people in California but they sounded kinda fishy to me.

I’m not sure when I drifted off to sleep but I dreamed again. There was more fire and laughing. Wendy and Marvin were in it again, this time they were in submissive roles. Neron was sitting in that big chair of his and my new friends were at his feet. They were dressed in bondage outfits; the black leather looked particularly unwelcome on Marvin. Neron kept laughing. He looked at me again, those horrible black eyes burning into me again.

“Join Me,” he said in that echoing voice of his. “Join me or your friends will be mine for the rest of eternity.”

There was a lot of flame and screaming after that.

___________________________

I snapped awake, drenched in sweat, my heart pounding a minute.

I looked around, confused as all hell. I blinked a few times, wondering where I was. Then I looked down and smiled. Rose was still sleeping, her head on my lap. I reached down and stroked her hair. It felt good to have someone that close again. I’m not saying anything was going to happen between the two of us but it’d been so long since I’d even been able to let someone touch me. It made me feel all gooey inside. It also helped me forgot about my horrible nightmare. I tried to force it from my head. I looked out the window at the dim morning lights. I blinked again, wondering where we were now. I reached into my pocket and took out the bus schedule, comparing it to my watch. According to both, we were somewhere in Utah.

Six in the morning. I groaned, which meant I’d been on this bus for a whole day. We still had another sixteen hours or so before we got to California. The prospect of spending another sixteen hours on a bus was not very comforting at all. I tried to busy myself any way I could but it definitely wasn’t easy. Thankfully, it wasn’t long before Rose woke up. She was as bleary eyed and as confused as I was, at first anyway. She looked up at me though and smiled.

“I’m sorry,” she said, moving stiffly from my lap.

“Its fine” I said with a smile. “You looked like you needed it.”

She stretched. “You bet your ass I did.”

She excused herself after that and ran to the bathroom. She came back a few minutes later, dropping back into her seat with a sigh. We didn’t say anything for a while but then she got talking again, mainly about this group she wanted to meet. As I said before, she was really excited about them. I think it impressed the hell out of her that there were people out there who would actually take in people like us. When she said “us” though it was with sadness.

“Do you want to finish your story?” I asked after a minute or two of more silence.

She shook her head but said. “Yes” She took a deep breath. She collected her thoughts. “After injecting me with the drug, the Colonel was pretty confident that both of our wishes would come true. But when nothing happened right away, he grew kinda agitated. I think it annoyed him that the changes didn’t happen right away like in the other subjects. His annoyance and agitation grew into frustration. Then he locked me in my hospital room. I think he was afraid I was going to tell someone what he did. After all, he performed an unsuccessful experiment on me and nothing had come of it, which was real bad. I didn’t find out until later that it was an unsanctioned, illegal experiment. The Colonel thought it was a failure but it wasn’t.”

“Did you tell him?”

She shook her head. “Not at first. But he discovered something was up when I accidentally touched him and blurted out that he was going to drop his coffee mug on his lap in the next five minutes. He thought I was messing with him until he came back into the room five minutes later with coffee all over his pants. After that, things got bad. He started forcing me to touch people, trying to get readings off them. But it angered him that my “visions” only went a few minutes into the future. He said they were useless but he didn’t know how much wrong he was. After that he tried to come up with ways to make me have longer and better visions.”

She reached into her purse again and pulled out the bottle. She turned it so I saw the label. She sighed heavily. “It turns out that I can’t control when my visions come unless I pop one of these. They’re adrenaline pills, something inside of them acts like an accelerant to my ability. Once I put one in my mouth, it forces the vision to come whether I want it to or not.”

“That’s horrible” I said, appalled and then remembered she did it when she first met me. I shuddered at the thought.

She nodded, teary eyed again. “He started using other drugs too, trying to make my visions longer. That’s when I decided to run.”

I nodded. “How did you get out of there?”

She smiled. “You remember how he thought my visions were useless?” I nodded. “Well, being Daddy’s little girl---the daughter of a military man---he made sure I had self defense. Well Daddy took it one-step too far and made sure I had the best possible training. I’m currently skilled in several forms of martial arts; I’ve been a student since the age of four. I take to it like a fish to water. All the kids in my group used to call me the Ravager because I’m so vicious on the mat.”

I shuddered at that too. “Is that how you escaped?”

She nodded. “Being able to see a few minutes into the future helps when you’re fighting someone.”

“I’ll bet.”

She smiled. “I’ve been on the run ever since. You know the rest.”

We laughed and talked after that. She told me about the struggles of growing up as a boy stuck in a girl’s body. I felt kinda bad for her, even more so knowing that even after having a Meta change forced on her she didn’t get her wish. But she said she was content now. I found that hard to believe but according to her if she was meant to be a boy, it would have happened. She said that with sadness. I tried to tell her maybe Jade could give her a ring and make her appear like one, it worked for me except I didn’t want it of course. But she didn’t want to be a bother. So we changed the subject and I’m not sure how but we got talking about sexual orientation.

“Its really hard being in the locker room and seeing all these naked girls around me” She said with a shudder. “You have no idea how hard it was to keep myself restrained.”

“So you’re a lesbian?”

She shook her head. “Everyone else saw it that way of course. But to me, I was a healthy teenage guy getting a metaphysical hard-on for the girls around me.”

“That must have sucked”

She nodded and looked at me. “What about you?” I gave her a confused look, she sighed. “Girls or guys?”

I laughed. “Girls definitely.”

We both blushed and shared a smile. Time passed quickly talking to her. It was different being with her too, not at all like Cissie. I still cared a great deal about her but with Rose, it was like I wasn’t hiding myself. With Cissie, I was afraid I was going to hurt her. But with Rose, I didn’t have that problem. I suppose that’s not a fair assessment because Cissie didn’t stick around, so I wouldn’t hurt her. In the end, she hurt me. I tried not to think about it. Instead, I looked at my watch, shocked that so much time had passed. It was three hours from the time we woke up. Rose was in the middle of telling me about little league baseball, begging the Coach to let her play on the boy’s team. She was in the middle of her story when she stopped suddenly just after our hands briefly touched.

“We have to get off this bus at the next stop.”

She shocked the hell out of me. “What? Why?”

“They’ve got a road block up ahead. There’s a bunch of cars and everything. Someone on here recognized you from the news and called it in. The police are going to stop the bus right outside the next city.”

I groaned. “Are you sure?"

She nodded. “If we stay on, they’ll get you.”

I cursed. She grabbed my hand and squeezed gently. We got to the next town ten minutes later. We were just inside Nevada now, far from where I wanted to be. We filed off the bus with some of the other passengers. Rose talked to the bus driver, making him get our bags. I don’t think he was too happy about it but she took some of my money to grease his palms. That shut him up. I wasn’t really sure why she so anxious to get her things, they were just clothes, right. I could buy us some more. But I saw as soon as he got her stuff: she had a guitar too. She slung it on her shoulder, making sure if was secure. She carried both our bags too: my backpack and her duffle.

I reached for my pack but she shook her head. “A gentleman should carry the ladies bag,” she said with a laugh.

I laughed too, looking at the guitar case. “I didn’t know you played the guitar?”

She smiled. “I don’t”

We left the little bus depot in a rush after that. I’m not sure where we were going to but it was a lot better than being caught. I just hoped Rose knew what she was doing because I sure as hell didn’t.