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With the sound of our wings flapping and the wind in our faces we couldn't talk while flying. I let Melissa take the lead, so I could see how strong a flyer she is. She kept up a decent pace. Not as fast as I could, but faster than I expected.

We stopped the first night in a state park. "How are you holding up?" I asked Melissa, who was breathing hard but looked okay.

"Tired! I've never flown that much in a single day before, especially while carrying so much stuff." Melissa replied. I helped Melissa put a fire together so she could cook up something to eat, then went hunting. We both fell asleep quickly after eating.

In the morning we ate again and set off. By the end of the third day we were nearing Boston. After eating in the morning we flew on. Once Boston was in sight I motioned for Melissa to land and followed her down. "What's up?" she asked curiously.

"I think whoever's after me may have set a trap for me at my parents' house. I'm not too worried about fighting off whoever may be there, but I don't want my parents getting hurt. I've been thinking about how to handle that the last few days and I think I've got a solution, thanks to you." I replied.

"Me? What do you mean?" Melissa asked.

"If they're there, they're expecting me, not you. Once I come in they'll be totally focused on me. I can let them take me. While their attention is focused on getting me wherever they want me, you can go in and get my parents away from them. Once you've got them I can break out and we can meet back here." I explained.

"How will I know where they are?" she asked.

"I'm sure they'll let me see them, so that I know they have them. I can make a fuss to make sure you know where they are." I said.

"Are you sure you can get away once they've got you?" Melissa asked worriedly.

"Yes, I'm sure." I said more confidently than I felt.

"Well, if you're sure, then I'll be glad to help. I guess if I fly in a little after you, and at a higher altitude, it shouldn't be too hard to get close enough to see what's going on." She replied.

"Thanks." I said with a smile. "Are you ready to go, then?"

Melissa checked to make sure all her swords and other gear were secured and then nodded. I nodded back and flew off into Boston. I glanced back to make sure Melissa was staying far enough back and saw that she was still climbing. I faced forward again and started trying to find landmarks that would help me find my parents' house. Everything looks so different from the air… I mused.

After a few minutes of flying around haphazardly I spotted my old high school. From it's layout I was able to discern the direction to my parents' house. A couple minutes later I was touching down on the lawn. I kept my eyes open, but I didn't see anything out of the ordinary. I walked up to the door and knocked. I listened and heard someone moving towards the door. I heard a few other sounds that indicated there were probably four or five other people in the house, maybe more.

The door opened suddenly and something shot out and struck me in the chest. I felt something flowing into me. It felt delicious! I felt a part of me I was never even aware of before suddenly wake up, and it thirsted for more! My eyes had closed at some point and I opened them to find I was lying on the ground. Several men were standing over me with tasers and cattle prods. Seeing my eyes were open one of them jabbed me with a cattle prod. Even more of that delicious something flowed into me. I shuddered in pleasure. I finally realized it was electricity I was feeling. Somehow I was absorbing it without injury, to say the least!

My eyes opened again and I was hit again with a cattle prod. This time I rolled with it and back on my feet. "Stop!" a man shouted. The men around me moved aside so I could see into the house. My parents were bound hand and foot on the couch. The man who spoke gave me a moment to see them and then stepped into my line of sight. "If you keep struggling we'll kill your parents!" he snarled.

Satisfied that I'd seen where my parents were at, I nodded and let them pull and push me to my feet. They half led, half dragged me towards the street. A semi truck pulled up with a van trailer. They dragged me around to the doors of the trailer, which were opened from the inside. A ramp was lowered and they shoved me up it. In moments I found myself pushed down to the floor in the center of the trailer, surrounded by a couple of dozen men in body armor. They were all armed with cattle prods, which were pointed at me. There were strip lights on the ceiling illuminating the bare metal walls of the trailer. The doors clanged shut and were locked from the outside. In moments we were moving.

I looked back towards the doors, I was facing the other way, and suddenly they were jabbing me with cattle prods from every direction. It was a real struggle to appear to be in pain as the delicious energy flooded my system. I felt stronger and more alive than I ever had before!

Writhing around on the floor was easy enough, as I was being hit rather hard and the electricity just felt soo good! How had I ever survived without it these last couple of years?

They finally stopped hitting me and I lay still. I felt something change inside, and I knew I could let this energy back out if I wanted to. I relaxed every muscle in my body and listened carefully for any word on my parents.

A few minutes later the man who had spoken before received a cell phone call. He moved to the far end of the trailer and answered it. Despite his precautions I clearly heard someone tell him that another winged mutant had killed the men at the house and taken my parents away. That was all I needed to hear!

I was originally going to fight my way out, but I decided I had a better option, now. I felt the energy inside me and released it, nearly all of it. Arcs of electricity shot out of my body to strike the walls of the trailer and the men inside. They screamed and tried to get away, but in moments they were all lying on the floor, twitching and unable to control their own movements. I cut a hole in the side of the trailer and jumped out.

I looked around myself, trying to get my bearings, when I heard the brakes on the truck screeching. I didn't see any reason to stick around and fight with the driver, so I took off and started flying in circles until I got my bearings. Once I had I turned towards the place we'd agreed to meet at. I had only flown a short ways before I heard the sound of helicopters approaching. I dived and took cover in an alley.

The helicopters flew almost straight overhead. I thought I'd evaded detection, but they turned around and came directly towards me. Running down the alley I looked back at the helicopters. These weren't ordinary helicopters, they were gunships!

I didn't think it likely they'd shoot at me on the ground, but I was wrong. I was running across a street towards another alley when bullets started tearing up the ground right behind me!

Not seeing any point in hiding anymore, I took to the air. They continued shooting at me, shattering windows as their fire tracked me. These guys are reckless! I thought.

Dodging their fire I tried to get at them, but they covered each other. Every time I got close to one of them the other would drive me away with a rain of bullets. Then I remembered how I disabled the men in the truck. When I got close to one of the helicopters again I released all the power I could into it.

The arc of energy that shot out of my hand was much smaller than before and didn't seem to have any effect. I felt drained and weak and realized I was out of power! I nearly crashed into a building I was feeling so weak. I dropped to the ground, trying to find something I could use against the gunships. That's when I saw the breaker box on the side of a small restaurant. I ran towards it, still dodging machine gun fire. When I reached it I didn't bother opening it, I just sliced right through it. Several wires were cut and exposed, so I grabbed them and felt the sweet energy flowing into me once more.

The energy was flowing much faster than what I got from the cattle prods earlier, but it still wasn't painful. I soaked it up eagerly, aware of the bullets tearing into the building only a few feet away. The helicopters couldn't stop as quickly as me, so they over flew me. That gave me all the time I needed to drink in many times more power than I'd had before. The gunships announced their presence with a missile. The wall next to me exploded, throwing me clear of the breaker box.

I felt no pain from the explosion. In fact, I felt wonderful! I jumped straight up, flapping my wings strongly, and was soon higher than either helicopter. They began to climb but I didn't give them a chance to fire any more missiles. I could somehow feel a path from me to each helicopter. I released a large bolt of energy at each through my hands. The arc of electricity was much stronger this time.

Sparks and smoke erupted from both helicopters. Their rotors stopped spinning and they dropped like stones. I noticed one of them was on fire as it dropped past me, but I didn't stick around to see what happened. I heard explosions behind me as I flew away.

I headed towards the edge of town. I'd used nearly all the energy I absorbed through the breaker box, so I was feeling rather drained. I was tempted to stop and charge up somewhere, but I didn't want to delay anymore than I already had.

Finally I arrived and saw Melissa and my parents waiting for me. Landing heavily, I stumbled towards them.

"Cat? Are you alright?" Melissa asked worriedly.

I shook my head to clear it. "I'm okay, just a little drained. Did everything go okay for you?" I answered.

We were standing in an empty field and there was no one in sight, so I sat down and got more comfortable. Strange, that fight wouldn't have taken this much out of me before, but now that I've discovered this new ability I seem to need the energy just to feel normal! I thought.

Melissa still looked worried, but sat down with me. "Yeah, everything went fine. When they drove off with you I waited a few minutes to make sure they were gone then I flew in through a window…" she began, but Dad cut her off.

"She did a lot more than fly through the window! She came in swords first, decapitating two of those guys on the way. Then she knocked another guy's gun aside with one sword and cut off the hand holding it with the other. The fourth guy got a shot off and hit her in the shoulder, but she just ignored it and cut him in half! And that wasn't the end of it! She led us downstairs and there were four more down there. She told us to stay in the stairwell and then she ran down and jumped over the nearest two, stabbing one in the throat and the other in the eye. Then she spun around and cut into the last two down before they could even draw their weapons!" Dad said excitedly.

I looked wide eyed at Melissa at the end of that explanation. "Really?" was all I could manage.

Melissa blushed and looked down, but nodded. "That sounds about right, I guess." She admitted.

"Wow, you must have gotten some substantial strength and reflex enhancements out of your mutation!" I exclaimed.

"I guess, I haven't really tested it before. I knew I healed fast, because I survived injuries that should have killed me, but I didn't know about the rest." Melissa said. She looked sad when she mentioned the injuries she'd had before. I would have asked her about them, but then Mom derailed me.

"Not that I don't appreciate getting away from all those guns, but why did you two come for us?" she asked.

Melissa looked to me and I sighed. "I had reason to believe you might be in danger. They wanted to use you to capture me."

"Why would they choose us for that? We've never met before! I've never even seen a mutant in person before today!" Mom replied.

"It's because of David." I said softly.

"David?! You know where he is?" Dad exclaimed.

"Is he alright?" Mom demanded worriedly.

"Yes, I know where he is, and he's fine." I replied wearily. I really didn't want to get into this, especially with how drained I was feeling.

Dad surprised me by grabbing me by the shoulders and yelling in my face. "Where is he?!"

I gently pushed him back. He released my shoulders as if he hadn't even realized he had grabbed me. "He's right…here." I replied, pointing at myself.

"I don't understand." Mom said.

"I mutated over two years ago, Mom. I used to be David, now I'm Catherine." I explained.

"You expect us to believe that you are our son David." Dad asked incredulously.

"Thomas said he would tell you that I was okay. He did, didn't he?" I asked.

Dad looked startled at my use of Thomas' name. "Yes, he did. But he didn't say anything about you, I mean David, being changed into a girl!" he replied.

I started telling them everything I could remember of my childhood. By the time I reached the age of eight Mom stopped me by wrapping her arms around me. "David! It really is you!" she sobbed, clutching me to her like I might disappear any moment.

Dad joined us, tears streaming down his face. "We thought we'd never see you again!" he said.

Melissa sat back and smiled as we hugged and cried all over each other. "I didn't think I'd ever see you again, either." I said once we'd separated. "Especially once I knew the government wanted me, I didn't want to attract attention to you."

"Obviously that didn't work out too well." Dad noted dryly.

"Yeah. They tried to kidnap one of the other mutants on the island where I live, and that's when I realized you were in danger. I'm afraid the only solution I've come up with is for you both to come to the island." I said apologetically.

"It would have been nice if we could have packed first." Mom said wistfully.

"I'd go back, but they probably have another team there by now." I said apologetically.

"Don't worry about it." Dad said. "I'm just glad to know you're okay. How far away is this island of yours, anyway?"

"Um, it's several hundred miles northeast of Australia." I replied.

Dad started at that. "How did you get here then?" he asked.

I shrugged. "I flew."

"Uh, Da…Catherine, that must be several thousand miles away." Dad pointed out.

"I know. I can fly very fast and far." I replied.

"So how are we going to get there?" Mom asked.

I gestured towards Melissa and said, "We'll carry you."

She looked back and forth between us skeptically. "You can carry us and fly that far?"

"Not in one day, but we can do it." I replied. Melissa nodded.

"Maybe we'd better get going then, before they send someone looking for us." Dad said, looking regretfully back at Boston.

"I think we'd better take a little detour, though." I said, still feeling weak and drained without the energy I'd so recently discovered the use of.

"Where to?" Melissa asked curiously.

"Over there should do." I said, spotting some power lines and pointing at them.

"Do for what?" Dad asked as we began walking in that direction.

"I discovered something new about myself when I was attacked at the house. I can absorb electricity. Now I feel weak without it, and I used up pretty much all I'd absorbed taking down the gunships they sent after me." I replied.

"Gunships? Are you alright?" Dad asked worriedly.

"I'm fine. And I'll be a whole lot better in a moment!" I said and jumped up onto the power lines. I could feel the power flowing through the lines, even though I wasn't absorbing it yet. I knelt down on all fours, still balancing on one wire. Once I was settled I reached over for the next wire. Electricity slammed into me, a heady rush of power unlike anything I'd experienced so far. There was a bit of pain at first, but it was quickly overridden by the pleasure of filling that empty place inside. For the first time I began to feel like I'd had enough, so I hopped down from the power lines.

"Cat, are you alright?" Melissa asked worriedly. I looked down at myself and realized my clothes were smoking a bit.

"Yes, I'm great!" I replied happily. I felt like I'd just had a large meal, only I wasn't lethargic, I was energized!

Mom and Dad looked at me worriedly, as did Melissa. "Really, I'm fine. We'd better get going now. Melissa, why don't you take Mom and I'll take Dad." I said.

Before he could protest I picked Dad up in my arms and lifted off into the air. I felt light as a feather, even while carrying my father. Melissa rose up beside me with Mom in her arms. She didn't seem uncomfortable with the weight. We headed west.

The hardest part of the flight was holding myself back so I didn't leave Melissa behind! I'd had to do so before, but now it was so much harder. About four hours out of Boston she began to fall behind. I spotted a secluded area to land and headed down with Melissa following. I landed carefully and put Dad down, turning to assist Melissa if she needed it.

She was obviously tired, but she landed easily enough. I took off the backpack with the food in it and handed it to Dad. "Why don't you guys put together something for your dinner while I go hunting?" I suggested. Of course I had to explain my dietary needs, again, to Mom and Dad. They both looked a little green, but they didn't say anything.

Flying low I quickly spotted a deer but found I wasn't hungry enough for something so large. Spotting a rabbit I quickly ran it down. Strange that I'm not hungrier. I mused as I ate.

Dad had a good sized fire going by the time I returned. "Are you going to tell us about the gunships, now?" he said, or rather demanded, as I sat by the fire.

I sighed. "Alright, but I should start with what happened when I arrived at the house."

"We saw them hit you with that taser and drag you away." Dad interrupted.

"Yes, but what you couldn't see was that the taser energized me, instead of hurting or disorienting me. Well, I guess it was a little disorienting, too. I didn't know what was happening, and it felt very good! I let them lead me away so we could get plenty of distance between them and you, and Melissa could get you out. They put me in a semi truck's trailer and started hammering at me with cattle prods once the truck was moving. I let them until I heard someone tell them over their radio that Melissa had gotten you out. Then I released most of the energy I'd absorbed into them." I explained.

"You electrocuted them?" Mom asked in shock.

"More like tasered them, really. I wasn't as efficient as I probably could have been, so a lot of the energy was released into the trailer itself." I replied.

"So they're okay?" Mom asked.

"Yeah, most of them weren't even unconscious when I cut my way out of the trailer." I said.

"How did you cut your way out?" Dad asked. I extended my claws in answer. "Oh. Those can cut through metal?"

I nodded. "Yes. After that I started flying to the place where Melissa and I agreed to meet. Then two gunships attacked me. They were too well coordinated for me to get to either one, so I found a breaker box and charged up. They interrupted me by blowing up the wall the breaker box was on, but I had enough energy to fry both helicopters. They both crashed and one of them caught on fire. Something blew up as I flew away, but I wasn't sticking around to watch." I said.

Dad shook his head in wonder. "You destroyed two gunships, after incapacitating a couple of dozen people! How strong are you?"

I shrugged. "I don't know for sure. I know that I lifted a life boat filled with rock and sand without any trouble back on the island once. I feel even stronger now that I've got a good charge going, but I don't know if I just feel that way, or if I actually am."

"Why are these people after you again?" Mom asked in wonder.

"They want to make their own mutants that are as strong as or stronger than me. Weapons." I replied angrily.

Dad laughed, "They're fools to keep coming after you. You've only gotten stronger as a result. I wouldn't be surprised if they gave up the chase after this encounter."

I shrugged and the conversation moved on to catching up on the last couple of years. Mostly me telling everything that'd happened since the pirate attack. Melissa listened as raptly as Mom and Dad did. I was only halfway through the first year when we decided to call it a night. Since we didn't have any sleeping bags or camping gear, Melissa and I used our wings to cover all four of us.

We ate again in the morning and I continued to tell my parents and Melissa about everything that had happened on the island while they ate. Then we were flying again. I encouraged Melissa to glide as much as she needed to prolong our flying time. That pattern continued for three days. By then we'd reached California.

We stopped that night not far from San Francisco. "Can we make it to the island in one day from here?" Melissa asked as we gathered wood for the fire.

"I could on my own, but I don't think we can while carrying my parents. We can go to Hawaii first, though." I replied. She nodded and we took the wood we'd gathered back to where Dad had cleared a space for the fire.

"Catherine, why don't we make a stop for some clothes for your mother and I before we go on to the island?" Dad suggested.

"You have money with you?" I asked, surprised.

"I have my ATM card, my credit cards, and a little cash." He replied, holding up his wallet.

"Okay, but you should probably go in on your own. Melissa and I would draw too much attention." I said.

"I wouldn't be too sure of that." Mom said. "San Francisco has a lot of mutants; you'd probably blend in fine."

"Melissa might, but not me. I'm the only mutant so far who has characteristics of more than one animal. I'll stick out like a sore thumb." I replied. "But I will keep an eye on you from the air, just in case."

Mom was satisfied with that.

In the morning we carried them into Golden Gate Park. Mom, Dad, and Melissa went on to shop while I flew overhead carrying the bags and Melissa's swords. She'd been somewhat reluctant to part with them knowing the kind of trouble I've often found myself in, but she didn't want to leave them lying around in Golden Gate Park, either.

I followed them from shop to shop for hours. They stopped for lunch, then shopped some more. I hadn't expected it to take this long!

Eventually they returned to Golden Gate Park and I landed to meet them. "How much did you buy?" I asked in shock at the pile of bags they were carrying.

Mom shrugged. "You know how your father is, always wants to be prepared. You'd think he had been a boy scout!" she said with a chuckle.

We went through the bags and removed tags and packaging and threw that away. They'd bought two larger backpacks to put everything in. I convinced Dad to wear the old backpacks, one in front and one in back. "Are you sure I won't be too heavy with all that?" he asked.

"I'm sure. If it were only a matter of weight, I could carry all three of you and the bags." I assured him.

"Hmm, maybe in the future we should just all climb in a basket and you can carry that." Dad mused.

"That's not a bad idea. Maybe Jill and Vincent can cobble something together." I replied thoughtfully.

We had a lot of time to kill before any of us would be ready to sleep, and it was too late to be flying on to Hawaii. We'd already covered everything that happened to me on the island in the last couple of years, and everything that had happened at home. So this time the focus was on Melissa.

"You haven't told us much about yourself yet, Melissa." Mom said.

"Oh, well, there's not much to tell, really." She said self-consciously. "I mutated, my parents were murdered, and then I met Cat and agreed to help her get you and then go to the island with her."

"Your parents were murdered?" Mom gasped.

"Yeah, they were the only ones besides my friend George who accepted me when I mutated. The college I was going to at the time kicked me out, so I moved back with my parents. They were great, but one day four men came into our house and shot my mother. Before my Dad or I could do anything, he finished her off. I tried to protect Dad, but they killed him, too." Melissa said sadly. Tears began streaming down her face and Mom grabbed her up in a hug and held her until she stopped crying.

"Are you alright?" she asked worriedly.

"Yeah, I'm okay. Anyway, after my parents died George got threats against his life, but he didn't stop talking to me then. When they started threatening his family, though, he called one last time to explain why he couldn't have anything to do with me anymore." Melissa said.

There was silence for a few minutes after that, and then I thought of something. "You never did say how you mutated. Kansas is pretty far from the ocean." I said curiously.

Melissa looked uncomfortably at my parents before replying. "There was this clinic. They claimed to be able to control how a person mutated, at least to some extent. I volunteered."

"Claimed?" Dad asked.

"It was a lie. They had no more control over it than Cat did. They were just using us as guinea pigs while they tried to figure out how the mutation works and why. They tried to keep their clients in the dark about that, but if they found out they wouldn't let them leave. One of the mutants went berserk and tore the place up. I barely escaped with my life." Melissa explained.

"I heard about that, but all they said in the news was that a mutant went berserk, not what was going on there. Why did you volunteer, anyway?" Mom asked.

Melissa looked to me and I nodded encouragingly. They already knew I'd changed genders, so I couldn't see it being a problem. "I was transsexual. They were appealing specifically to transsexuals with promises of making us women. That's why the mutant went berserk, she became more male, not less, and they gave up on helping her." Melissa said without looking at either of my parents.

Mom looked thoughtful at that, while Dad looked angry. "Tell me they didn't get away with that!" Dad exclaimed.

"If any of them survived, they did, but Felicia killed most if not all the doctors and nurses that worked there." Melissa replied.

Mom turned towards me and said, "You're not…" she trailed off, but I knew what she meant as she glanced over at Melissa.

"No Mom, I wasn't transsexual, I was just gay." I replied, and then slapped my hand over my mouth, but it was too late. That cat was out of the bag!

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 To Be Continued…