Tiffany stared icily at the strange figure on the other side of the desk. She remembered the last time she was in here, after she'd pranked Sarah by unhooking her bra and leaving her topless in the lunchroom, mostly because she'd had that awful dream later that night. She didn't feel quite so intimidated as she had then, though, not now that she knew what to expect. Her teacher...her teacher still frightened her, but the principal? He was just some guy.
"Miss Saunders," Principal Erin said, a few grains of sand trickling down into the bowl on his desk, "I must say...I'm disappointed. So soon after...the last time...and you know how we...feel about violence."
She scowled. "So what was I supposed to do, just let her talk about me like that? Let them all do that? Some of that stuff was borderline sexual harassment!"
"If that's true," he said, "you know perfectly well...you ought to take it...to your teacher. We will be quite...happy to deal with...such matters. In any case...verbal abuse does not...merit physical attack."
"Yeah, and then I'm the girl who hides behind the teachers, not to mention I have to deal with...with her."
"I will leave the...personal problems between...you and your teacher...to yourselves. But if you do not...wish to take it up with her...any of the other teachers..."
She frowned. Of course, he wasn't going to get involved. Never mind what the woman had done to her, he would just sit there in tacit approval... "Can I go now?"
"That depends. Can I trust you...to refrain from further attacks?"
She sighed. "Sure. Whatever."
"You may, then."
Sarah was standing in the main office when she left. Of course, she had come to gloat, to crow like a little exhibitionist rooster at the fact that Tiffany had finally got hers, had finally been brought down to their level. "Cram it, cuckoo," she snapped.
The harpy frowned. "I didn't say anything."
"Yeah, you were going to. I've heard enough taunts already; you'd just be a voice in the crowd." She huffed, irritated.
Sarah shrugged. "Actually, I was going to say, if you ever want to talk about it..."
Tiffany's jaw dropped. Was she kidding? "What do you know!?" she snarled. "You can't even begin to comprehend what I lost! I had everything within my grasp, Sarah! And now it's gone...I lost...I lost..." She stopped, trying to keep her emotions under control.
Sarah stared at her. "What? Tiffany, you looked like a..." She caught herself. "You certainly didn't lose anything going back to looking like a real human being again. Besides, that's a pretty interesting look you've got now."
"I'm a freak!" Tiffany said. "You're just saying that because you like being a freak! You've sold out and joined them!" A broad sweep of her arm indicated the rest of the school. "I was...I wasn't like that, I was the perfect human...I could have...I could have..."
Sarah only partly choked back a laugh, and Tiffany glared at her. "You could've what?" she asked. "You were kind of strong, and you had that scary-ass aura thing, and what, that makes you a god? Did you have some kind of super delusion powers? There are dragons now, Tiff. Those two kids from Friday, some other girl I've seen out flying...they can fly, they can breathe fire! I can fly! Hell, half the people walking around this school have more advantages than you did!"
"You don't understand," Tiffany said, wishing she knew how to make Sarah grasp her statement - or at least stop sounding like she was making sense. "I was on top - I was leagues ahead of everyone..."
The harpy shrugged. "Hey, I was on top too, once. Tiff, you're right, it's hard to lose something like that, but now...so many of us have the potential to be something really cool. I don't even think I got the most interesting change out there, but it's just me, it really is. As a human...I never could have even imagined what flying is like. There's got to be things like that about you, if you just look for them..."
"And now you flounce around naked and need somebody to bathe you like a freaking animal!" Tiffany snapped. "Don't you get it? You've lost your humanity! I don't care, you do whatever, but I never wanted that! I was going to have it all and keep my humanity!"
Sarah thought for a moment, then shrugged. "So?" she said. "I like humans fine, I liked being a human...but I'm not a human anymore, and pretending to be one is just a bunch of pain and denial. I know how it feels, I went through this myself, but...it's just not worth it. If you ever do want to talk about it, give me a call." She turned and left, and Tiffany turned away in disgust, both at her wannabe-feral talk and at the fact that she had her tail flipped upwards and fanned out in a sort of "hmph!" gesture, giving an unimpeded view of her feathered ass.
Stupid bird! Stupid bird saying stupid things that she couldn't get out of her stupid head...argh! Why couldn't they understand? Why didn't they get what a loss this was? It was like...like this was no big deal to them. Like they all expected her just get over it and move on...
Eric huddled in the den with Nikki as she listened to the man outside, her mind racing. She shouldn't go out - she should stay in here until he lost his patience and went away. After all, how in the world would someone from a world in which nothing like her even exister react to the sight of an anthropomorphic skunk? And he probably had a gun, too. On the other hand, there was a dog. Granted, it sounded like it was more afraid of her than she was of it, but what if she was wrong? What if it came after her? Or worse yet, Nikki? She didn't know anything about fighting, and maybe Nikki did, but she was only a little girl...
And then there was the name...she remembered back to the letter: "Samuel will help you." But that was crazy! Just because some letter from some unknown party that Nikki thought was her mom said it...how would she know!? And how did she know this was even the Samuel the letter referred to? This was all so crazy! If only it would go away, if only she could be faced with a sane, normal environment in which to deal with sane, normal problems like being transformed into a skunk-girl and having some kid show up claiming to be...okay, not the best examples. Still, though!
She could hear the man urging his dog to go investigate. The dog didn't seem to like the idea, but if he was that determined...oh, there was no good way out of this, was there? Either she'd get discovered or she could give herself up...just...please let that letter be right...
"Stay here," she whispered to Nikki. "Don't come out unless I call." The little girl nodded, trembling. Eric crawled out of the den, brushed herself off, and stood up.
