Valentine's Day Is Looming

Tuesday howls, yowls, and growls, shapeshifter lovers.

Yes, it is now the Chinese Year of the Snake, so get your slithery sexy on. And, of course, Valentine's Day is looming on the near horizon. This Thursday, in fact.

We here at SHAPESHIFTER SEDUCTIONS, are putting together Valentine's Day flash scenes for your shapeshifting pleasure.

That said, I must apologize for the following flash scene. It's not very Valentiney. However, my energies remain low, and getting the Muse to cooperate was not easy. 

Still, I'm planning to write a romantic follow-up for Valentine's Day.
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What Would Be My Dream Valentine's Day?

TV STATION HACKER WARNS OF ZOMBIES IN MONTANA: KRTV says on its website the hackers broadcast that 'dead bodies are rising from their graves' in several Montana counties. GOTTA LOVE MONTANA!

"Now there's a headline. And, hell, here I am in the freeze-your-butt-off state of Montana."

Szarelle stared at Steve Quayle's website on the tiny screen of the handheld computer her captors allowed her. Not a smartphone, of course, and she had no way to text or communicate with anyone.

Fascinated by the news headlines Mr. Quayle updated regularly, and by the breakthrough books he wrote -- two of them being "Giants and Ancient History" and "Genetic Armegeddon" -- Szarelle checked in several times a day.

Yeah, what the 'f' else did she have to do? That is, when her scientist captors finally left her alone.

So far, she refused to shapeshift, despite the various forms of persuasion and torture she'd endured. From promises of wealth ... to gawd knows how many methods of hypnosis ... to the cocktail of drugs they pumped inside her ... to waterboarding, and what Szarelle euphemistically called 'shock therapy'.

Only the amount of electrical current they'd hit her with would have killed a herd of elephants. Of course, the 'pain compliance' had begun after discovering she was somehow immune to their various, highly advanced mind control technologies.

Even their micro implants failed. Her body simply ejected them.

"Six months and counting in this dungeon out in the middle of snowy nowhere." With a sigh of disgust verging on hopelessness, Szarelle placed the palm-sized device on the one tiny table, then leapt up from her primitive bunk.

She moved the few feet to the small, ground level opening that served as a window, then stood on tiptoe. A heavy blanket of snow as far as the eye could see. Yeah, not that far.

Being depressed should have killed her by now. Even if nothing else did. So far, anyway.

Out of habit, Szarelle strained to see as much as she could. Even though, she faced east, the gentle glisten of light and the long indigo shadows told her that sundown was near.

Szarelle hugged herself tight, and shivered. The thin shift she wore didn't do a damn thing to keep her warm. But that was the point.

They wanted her to shift into her furry warm animal self. No, the mad effing scientists didn't want to kill her and dissect her.

That is, if she could be killed. Szarelle didn't own a clue.

She shuddered at the thought of being dissected while still alive. Returning to her bunk, she sat on the edge. Her shoulders slumped forward, every ounce of her feeling dispirited.

Yeah, nearly defeated, Szarelle admitted to herself.

What the freaking hell, she didn't even know what breed of feline-canine she was supposed to be. Her years of fanatical research had provided nothing but a scholar's knowledge about the ancestors of every discovered species of canine and feline on Earth.

Szarelle lived in the hope that the latest archeological discovery would give her the answers ... anything, anything at all.

Before being weaned, she'd been orphaned. A kindly, wolf shapeshifter couple had taken her in as one of their cubs. They'd had a litter, and she'd grown up with four siblings, two sisters, two brothers.

Howls of agony, she missed them. Most likely, her family still believed she was happily hanging out on the beaches of Jamaica -- living the good life, mon.

Szarelle mewed a sound of pure despair. The only thing identifying her had been a makeshift paper collar, with what her adopting mother had assumed was her name written on it.

Her chin dropped to her chest, and Szarelle didn't move. Misery owned her.

On top of her dire circumstances, how cruel was it that Valentine's Day loomed? Her very favorite holiday of the year.

Okay, it was damn stupid to be fretting over such romantic, hearts and flowers silliness when captured by the nerd ghouls from the ninth ring of shadow-government hell. At least, she assumed it was some secret, military industrial complex thing.

Clenching her eyelids, Szarelle slowly raised her head, and let it fall backward. With the pain of desperation ripping through her, she fisted the thin pad that served as her mattress, and rocked back until her head thumped against the cement wall.

If there'd been a ghost of a chance that chewing her way out with her large, razor-sharp fangs, then digging to the surface using her fearsome claws, would work ... but from what Szarelle could tell, the pod like structure had to be four feet thick.

Escape. She willed herself to escape. She daydreamed constantly, vividly of escaping.

That is, when they weren't prodding and poking her, and figuring out some new way to torture her. Then doing it day in and day out.

Szarelle had created so many movie escape scenarios, even written the scripts in her mind ... that if she ever did ... well, she had to escape. Somehow.

But, maybe a career as a screenwriter was real possibility.

After forcing herself to change positions, to lay as comfortably as possible on the bunk, Szarelle stopped herself from shivering. With her hands behind her head, she ignored the cold.

"If I could ... what would be my dream Valentine's Day?" Closing her eyes, she focused, and let her imagination take over.

****

Daejh paused on his way back to the lean-to, and the fire his brother carefully tended. He lifted his nose to the wind, in the same way he'd do, if in his lynx form.

"Female perfume," he announced to Dryce. "What the scat would a woman cat shifter be doing out here? By herself, and in her human shape?"

Quickly rising from his haunches, Dryce stepped away from the campfire. He sniffed for several long moments, his nose flaring noticeably.

"Cat?" he asked. "She smells more like a dog shifter to me. But the aroma is downright enticin'."

"Think she's lost? In trouble?" Daejh grabbed his parka, slipping into it fast.

"We better find out." Dryce zipped up his parka. "This ain't a fit night out for cat or dog, and especially not a human."

TO BE CONTINUED FOR VALENTINE'S DAY...

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~ Have a Magickal New Year of the Snake ~ 

Savanna

Savanna Kougar ~ Run on the Wild Side of Romance ~