Chapter 6

This situation will not be settled by bold speeches and majority decisions but by sweat and blood, specifically Valkyrie's blood.

Valkyrie Anna Kemper speaking in front of Joint Congress

"I hate both of you," I grumbled, turning away from my mother and dropping down on a chair next to her while the traitors laughed at my predicament.

OK, maybe the two of them didn’t actually laugh, and I guess I wasn’t angry with them, as it really wasn’t their fault. I mean, the tests were probably necessary. However, add to that what just happened to the rest of the day's shenanigans, I think I was entitled to be more than a little grumpy.

"No, you don’t sweetheart," she said, reaching over and kissing my temple.

Audrey at least kept her professional demeanor as she cleaned up the gynecological torture devices. I didn’t hear what the two of them were talking about until I returned from the bathroom after cleaning myself up, but mom did not look happy.

"Hopefully, I'll switch back to Henry, and I'll never have to do that again."

Neither of them replied, which didn’t make me feel any better.

For women to do this every year or so, I have no words. Yes, it's exactly what you think happened. Both my Mom and Aunt insisted on it wanting to make sure that all my new parts at least appeared to be healthy. Hopefully, this would be the last of the tests for the day. I knew with the oddness of my anatomy, however, that I would eventually be subjected to more of them.

"So, what's the prognosis, doc?"

Audrey opened her mouth and closed it. She then knelt and held my hand. "You’re a very healthy young woman."

"Huh, so, walks like a duck." I looked towards my mom, who gave me a sympathetic smile.
"Well, Fuck." Not that I thought my Aunt would say anything different.

With a sniffle, my mom wrapped her arms around me. "I'm so sorry, Henry."

"Still not your fault, and you might as well call me Kára. It's going to get confusing otherwise."

"Are you sure?" she fretted.

"Yea." Rubbing my eyes, I tried hard to hold back my own sniffles. "God, this sucks. So now what?"

My mom looked at her watch. Mine was well somewhere.

"Sleep," she insisted, "We're all going to have a long day tomorrow."

"Sleep sounds fine." I shrugged, although I wasn’t tired. "But tomorrow."

"Yes, tomorrow. I know I haven’t been the best mother lately," my mom remarked, frowning slightly.

"That’s not true." I could see that, like me, she was concerned with what was going to happen in the morning.

"You're sweet," she replied then said, "But we both know better, Kára. Now as much as I would like to wrap you up and hide you away, I am going to guess you don't want that."

Looking down, I whispered, "No."

This situation might be totally unbelievable and impossible, but my responsibilities like so many before me, were clear. Truthfully, I always had fantasies about fighting as a Valkyrie. However, it was more than that. My dad, mom, Maddie even Audrey faced the Wraiths with their heads held high, how could I do any less.

"You're so much like your father," she said, pushing the hair out of my face. "We will face this together."

"And I will help, of course." Aunt Audrey insisted grabbing my hand.

Her help started with finding me something else to wear. Right now, I sat unhappily in some sort of generic flowered hospital gown. What's funny now, not so much at the time, was that when we started the tests, I hadn’t figured out how to remove my clothes. Not being able to vanish, my outfit would have been messy.

Unfortunately, although I could manifest two outfits, it did not include a magical closet full of clothes. I had my Valkyrie armor and the green dress that was it.

Before the three of us left the examining room, I was wearing a US Army t-shirt, sweatpants, and white sneakers. Somehow, Audrey managed to scrounge up official undergarments as well.

Weird, I never had an issue wearing them before, but now. OK, I was under no illusion I could leave the room without some sort of bra. As much as I was trying to ignore the two perky things sitting on my chest, I remembered Mille Hanson, who in 8th grade came to school without one. I already had enough attention looking like an elf.

Spinning around, I smiled at my mother, "US Army fashionable."

"Yes, you look ready for PT." Rolling her eyes, she then said. "I'm going to try and stop by the house. I'll grab an outfit or two from Maddie's closet for you."

"Thanks." I then frowned as the three of us left the examining room. "Mom, do you think they will let me go home after the meeting tomorrow?"

"I think they are going to ask you to remain on base, sweetie, at least for now. So, I should pick up a few of your things. Just make a shortlist of what you think you might need."

"Probably for the best," I sighed, fingering my visitor badge, "I mean, I don’t even have a real ID."

"Don’t worry about that," Mom said, pointing at Audrey, "After we get you settled, we're going to be making a few calls. Between the two of us, we should be able to sort things out for you."

Well, I knew my appearance was going to cause some problems, OK, quite a few. Among other things, even with me being both excited and horrified at the media attention, I had no desire to return to my old High School as Kára.

Knowing the people in my grade, the majority of them would lose their shit if they discovered I now batted for the other team. With everything going on, at least the schools would be closed for the week, putting off dealing with that issue.

"I mean no one, but us knows what really happened, right?" I whispered to the two of them.

Audrey was the one who replied. "Only a few people and most of them will be here in the morning. Your mom also spoke to Directory Henley while you were getting an MRI. She's going to get some things rolling that will help you going forward."

Directory Carole Henley of the DPA was also a former Valkyrie. I met her a few times.

"Valkyries take care of their own," I grinned.

"Damn straight." My mom laughed.

--0—

It took a while as I had a million things running around in my head, but I eventually managed to fall asleep. Even my dreams were tumultuous, filled with weird stuff, half of which I couldn’t remember.

As I went through my now much longer morning ritual, I decided that this whole girl thing was starting to get old fast. Besides the whole using the bathroom differences, taking a shower was now going to be a chore. Oh, I sucked it up, as there wasn’t much I could do about it, but it didn’t make me less annoyed about it.

At least my mom acquired some toiletries, probably got them from the PX. Included in the bag were numerous bottles for my shower. I probably should have asked what I needed to do with them.

Remembering to put the towel around my body correctly, even wrapped one around my head like I had seen Maddie do many times, I left the bathroom only to find my mother setting a suitcase on my bed.

"Good thing I didn’t come out naked." I gave her a look, which she promptly ignored.

"You have nothing I haven’t seen before, Kára." She commented while opening it up and laying out some clothing.

"This is all just too weird." I sighed. I don't think I have been undressed in front of my mother since I was little.

"Did you use the conditioner?"

"I'm going to just wear the green dress," I ignored her question while looking over the outfits she managed to bring back from the house. "I'm not sure if any of these will fit anymore."

"You need to use it, sweetie, plus the body wash. I'm not sure, but you will probably find your skin is a little more delicate. So no more just using shampoo to wash yourself."

"What, I also use soap."

"Right." Mom shook her head. Taking the towel off my head, she ran her hand through my hair. "Come sit down. Let me do something with this."

"You brought a blow-dryer from home?"

As I said, this whole girl thing was more trouble than its worth.

"Hush you, take a seat."

Grumbling, I sat down on a desk chair so he could get behind me and use the mirror behind the closet door. Wow, she brought a whole bunch of stuff.

"Your hair is beautiful," Mom commented as she picked up a hairbrush. "You're going to need to learn how to take care of it properly."

"I guess, but I might switch back to Henry tomorrow," I said, hopefully.

"True." She then hesitated for a moment and then said. "What if you don’t?"

"Mom."

"I know." Leaning over, she kissed my head. "But you need to keep that in mind."

I didn’t want to think about that even if it might be true. "Well, shit."

"Language, young lady."

I turned around. I could see a frown, but her eyes told me otherwise. "Mom, you, and Aunt Audrey are the worst offenders."

"Yes, well, we're not the best role models in that regard," she laughed.

I couldn’t help but snort, but the blow dryer kept me from replying. I will admit it felt nice, and in the end, it looked similar to how it was styled yesterday.

"Wow, looks great. Pretty sure even Maddie couldn't have done something like this," I said as I turned my head. "We should have hired you to be our hairstylist for the Cons."

Laughing, she started to put her things away. "So, you were saying something about wearing the green dress?"

I frowned at Maddie's old clothes that only a day before would have fit me. I had, hmm, gained quite a bit on top, and well, I now had hips. Maybe some of the newer clothes, but I would have to go through them later and told my mom so.

"Do you need to..." she started to say then stepped back as suddenly I wore the outfit from yesterday.

"Sweetie, where's the towel?"

--0—

"It's OK, not that the Army is short on towels, but you need to be aware if you're going to change and not to lose anything important, Kára," my mom said, grinning ear to ear as we walked out of the dorms to find something to eat.

"Whatever," I grumbled. "My wallet, phone, and keys are still missing, and worst of all, I really liked the outfit I wore yesterday."

"Well, unless all of it is really gone, maybe you can find them?" I looked at her, and she just shrugged. "It wouldn’t hurt to try. I mean, this whole thing is rather odd, to begin with."

"Hmm, maybe I can summon them like I do my other weapons."

She almost tripped as she looked around and whispered, "What do you mean other weapons?"

"Oh, sorry, something I discovered last night. Apparently, I have a few that I can manifest. While sitting on my bed zoning, I was summoning and unsummoning my spear. Suddenly, I felt something else, and next thing I knew, I had a rather wicked looking sword in my hand."

Sword, spear, war-hammer, and if I closed my eyes, I think there might be more. So, no magical clothing closet, but it seemed I picked up an armory.

"I see," Mom said, looking thoughtful. "And do you think you have the same skill with the sword as your spear?"

Good question, but I was sure the answer was yes, which, of course, should have freaked me out. Valkyries don’t ordinarily manifest with weapons. However, they tend to be drawn to a type. Maddie mentioned that they had a long line of weapons at the testing center, and she ended up selecting a large two-handed war-hammer.

So newly manifested Valkyries all knew how to use their chosen weapons up to a point. The rest was where training comes in. We were also blessed with a considerable boost to our physical abilities, manifested or not. So pretty much none of us, well I was one of them now wasn’t I, could play competitive sports in school; however, it did help us train.

However, upon manifesting, I gained more than just rudimentary knowledge. That weapon proficiency was one of the reasons why Emma kept insisting that I was her senior.

"I see," Mom frowned. "I can't say I am upset about that. Many times my skill with my halberd was all that stood in the way of injury or death."

"I have a question, Mom. Once the DPA discovers that I know how to use my weapons, I can't be thought of as a junior, can I?"

Not including the other skills I seem to have acquired, one of them I was about to use right now. Grabbing my mom's hand, I took her down another corridor, then towards another, then outside.

"What?" she started to ask.

"Better outcome," I explained, and then looked at the smokey haze that still covered most of the city. According to the morning news, almost all of the fires had been put out, although there were still a few persistent ones down by the docks.

"How many?"

Mom knew exactly what I was asking. "Looks to be so far a little over a hundred dead; we were so incredibly lucky."

I knew that number would probably rise with all the wounded that had flooded the hospitals, but I had to agree. If the Incursion had occurred in the middle of the week as opposed to the relatively empty business district, it would have been much worse. Not that was much consolation to those who had lost loved ones.

"Sally," I called out as two people stepped out of a car.

"Oh, Kára," the young girl squealed and then ran towards me. I could see she was ready to glomp me, but she held off at the last movement.

"Good morning." My mother greeted her with a smile, then her father as he approached.

"So the two of you are here early," I said.

"Too early, I was still asleep when the hospital called," Sally grumbled. "Kimberly is being let go this morning. Mom spent the night, but they kicked us out."

"The doctors thought it would be better for her to rest at home," Sally's dad said. "Oh, Sarah, we made sure to mention how much we appreciated that your daughter was in the city yesterday."

"Yea! That’s right, daddy." Sally raised her fist. "We Valkyries have to stick together."

"Thanks." I couldn’t help but laugh at her exuberance.

"Well, just in case we thought it might help get you out of trouble."

"My daughter's not going to be punished, but we do appreciate it, Jack."

We spoke a little while longer. Sally said they would call later to make sure everything turned out OK with my meeting.

"Did you know Kimberly was being released early?" Mom asked as we watched the two make their way towards the hospital's entrance.

I shook my hand back and forth. "I thought something good would happen if we went this way but wasn’t sure."

Nodding, she led away to find some breakfast.

--0--

Breakfast wasn’t too terrible, and soon we were off to the other side of the base for the debriefing. We decided to walk since it was going to be such a beautiful day. About halfway there, I decided it might not have been the best of ideas with all the looks I was getting, especially from the young soldiers. Being a young man myself, I recognized those looks very well.

"Nervous?" Mom asked.

"I guess but more from well," I faltered.

"Go on, sweetie," she smiled.

I sighed, not really sure what I was trying to say. "I mean, look at me."

"I know you don’t want to hear that all I see is a very pretty young woman."

"You're right, I don’t, but it's more than just turning into a girl, Mom," I sighed. "What happens when people find out that I used to be a guy? I'm already all over the news."

Mom leaned over and whispered, "So why does anyone else need to know?"

I stopped and looked at her. "Really."

"We Valkyries are very good at keeping secrets." She shrugged. "So is the DPA."

"But everyone's going to know something's up when Henry doesn’t come to class next week."

"Also, something easily fixed. If anyone asks, we could say he moved to California to live with his grandmother."

"Huh, oh, sounds like you and Aunt Audrey have already made plans."

Grinning, she slipped her arm into mine, leading me off towards where we would be having the meeting.

--0—

"Morning Emma," I said as I entered the room. "I'm surprised you’re here. Thought you had already been debriefed."

Waving happily, as she approached, she greeted my mom before turning to me. "Hey, yea, I was, but it seems they have some more questions."

"More the merrier."

Slipping her arm into mine, she dragged me off as my mom went to talk to Aunt Audrey, who arrived by another door.

"Guess what? Quicksilver is going to be here too," she said excitedly as we found ourselves standing in front of a table with coffee and donuts.

"Alice is here?"

Reaching for an apple fritter, she asked, "Oh, you know her?"

"Of course she does," a voice called out from behind me. "Kára pretty much knows everyone."

"I wouldn’t go that far." I gave her a warm but confused smile. "Not that I mind, Alice, but why are you here?"

"Part of my new job as a liaison between the DPA and the Army," she replied, stepped forward, then leaning closer and whispered, "Don’t worry, Kára, we have your back."