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Chapter 1. Gabriel An unusual cold snap in late November was proving tricky not only for those unfortunate enough to be travelling by road; it also had the annoying side-effect of making stealth far too difficult for Tom to feel at all confident that he could follow his mark without being compromised. Normally, he would have considered snow to be a big help, because it would have deadened the sound of footfall, but not tonight: the slight frosting of white covering the pavement had very quickly hardened, and now even the lightest tread threatened to betray him with a give-away crunch. The man he was following turned a corner and began to walk across open, rough ground towards a disused factory; there was no cover, so Tom was forced to fall back even further, as he had now lost the benefit of shadows to hide in. When the man approached a large open gap in the front of the building, formerly the entrance to a loading bay, Tom quickened his pace, but very quickly had to turn aside. Two large, unpleasant-looking, immaculately-dressed men stood either side of the opening; they closed together as the man drew near, but then seemed to recognise him and impassively returned to their former posts, allowing the newcomer to enter. Tom edged around to one side of the old building and, to his encouragement, came across a broken section of wall leading into the same large space as did the main entrance, but by the time he was peering around the crumbling brickwork into the interior of the ruin, there was no-one to be seen. Opposite the main entrance, though, a large dark coloured vehicle was sitting, its lights off and the engine not running: he peered through the gloom for several seconds before he was satisfied that the driver's cockpit was unoccupied. Then he stepped over the fallen masonry and crept through the gap. At least, once inside, there were few hazards to give him away; although there was a little ice that had dripped through the floors from damaged parts of the roof, it was few and far between, as were the twisted, discarded pieces of metal that always seemed to collect in such buildings. There was enough moonlight to be able to avoid them, but also a very fine balance between being able to see where he was putting his feet, and keeping to places that minimised the chance of being spotted. A few hushed voices put him back on the trail of the man who had led him here. Against the back wall was a raised platform, presumably the loading dock, that was accessed from the other side by a row of arched openings, which themselves would lead to storage rooms; there was a faint light emerging from one of those archways. However, the mysterious vehicle, which he now recognised as a Transit van, was backed up to the platform opposite the same doorway that he wanted to explore, and was sitting with its rear doors open. A quick, careful clamber brought him close enough to confirm the inside of the van was empty, and to be able to observe the source of the voices: he then realised he had struck gold. The man he had tailed was in the process of opening a large wooden box, and Tom arrived just in time to see the lid fall to the ground. His mark, as he knew, was Stefan Goldberg, an expert in arms of all types, but he was not the real prize. The object he lifted from the box was clearly an automatic weapon; from his limited experience, its shape suggested a submachine gun, perhaps a Russian PP-2000, but neither the light nor his knowledge were good enough for Tom to be at all sure. Whatever it was, there were several, as the man's companions began lifting and examining the contents of the crate: illegally imported arms, he realised, but although it was exactly the type of evidence he had been hoping to discover, even this was not the real prize. The real prize was the furthest-away member of the group, the one who stood facing him; the best dressed by far. Salvatore Gabriel. **** Tom's phone was on silent; he took a few rapid-fire shots, to establish the association between Gabriel and Goldberg, a known arms dealer. That would do for a start, but he wanted to be able to prove what was in that wooden crate. His eyes searched the room; perhaps there was a window overlooking it, that would give him a better angle. He might have been too keen to scan the area and had leant too far into the doorway; he might have given himself away through too much rapid movement; but in any case he became aware that one of the heads had turned towards him. Time to back off. He leapt as quietly as he could onto the floor of the loading bay and ran on his toes towards the broken wall; there was no need to give himself away with the noise of running at full tilt: the men behind him would still be in a state of surprise, and would be suspiciously and quietly approaching the opening to investigate. Then disaster struck. One of the scraps of twisted metal managed to find its way to his foot, and he kicked it, sending it somersaulting noisily across the concrete floor. Immediately there was a shout, then several raised voices behind him. Having now lost the advantage of stealth, he broke into a sprint, leapt over the rubble, and allowed himself only a fraction of a second to glance one way before setting off in the other; there was no-one in sight, not yet, but he was not free, not yet. Correct. Several sets of heavy footsteps were now in pursuit. He decided not to make for his car. When tailing Goldberg, who had parked close to the old factory, Tom had pulled in a hundred yards or more behind him, then followed at a discreet distance; even if he managed to get that far, he would then run the risk of being hemmed in by larger, faster vehicles, and would probably find himself caught in a steel trap. Instead, he crossed the waste ground, ran down a side street and into the nearest tube station: not many minutes later, he was walking quickly, but unobtrusively, out of High Street Kensington Underground, then round to the newspaper office on Derry Street. The security guard nodded and acknowledged him by name; he ran up the stairs, not wanting to wait for a lift, then threw himself around his desk and into his chair, where he sank back and gulped in deep breaths of air. The car could stay where it was: he would take the tube home tonight and collect it tomorrow; in the bottom drawer of his desk was an almost-full bottle of whisky. He poured a generous measure into the mug sitting beside his keyboard, not caring about the dried coffee at the bottom: in his current emotional state, the alcohol was far more important than the taste. Setting the empty cup back down again, he began uploading the photos from his phone onto the file server, and quickly writing up everything he had witnessed, though in as much detail as was reasonable, citing the images as corroboration. He poured himself another drink, which he sipped at more slowly this time, enjoying the taste a little better: the first helping of whisky had made a very good job of washing the mug completely clean. Before he left, Tom made sure the draft report was generally accessible by by all his colleagues; if anything happened to him, he wanted it to be possible for his work to be discovered, and hopefully used as evidence against that man: that man he hated with all his soul: Salvatore Gabriel. **** There was no sign of anything suspicious in the vicinity of Kensington High Street, nor did there appear to be on the train, so Tom allowed himself to relax a bit on the journey home. By the time he was pushing open the little wooden gate, it was well after seven o'clock and he was looking forward to helping prepare dinner before sitting down to eat with his wife, followed by an early-evening pastime that was his favourite of all, any day, any week, any year, and one which only became more intense and more beautiful as evening gradually progressed to night: something that began by relaxing on the sofa with a drink in one hand and Ruth curled up cosily under his other arm. Ruth was a beautiful woman with terrible dress sense: she almost made it seem as if she wanted to disguise her beauty, and she had a great deal to hide. Her raven-coloured hair she wore short enough to be able to keep it out of her eyes by tucking it behind her ears, something that endeared her to Tom every time he saw her do it, and had become a mark of affection from him: gently tucking away her hair in the same way when he saw it drop in front of her, always earning him either a pleasant smile or a humorous frown; either of which he considered to be a great reward. Her face was almost round and completely perfect; she hardly ever wore make-up, being one of those fortunate women who looked wonderful without it. Her lovely body, though, was virtually impossible to discern: she rarely wore dresses; in fact, the last time Tom remembered her in a dress or skirt was around the time she had last experimented with make-up; but that was a time so painful he would prefer to forget, and sorely did he wish he could. Since then, her usual form of attire had been oversized, baggy, shapeless clothing that undid most of the good done by her face. Tonight she was dressed in comfortable jeans and a T-shirt far too big for her: loose enough for its folds to disguise the shape of her chest, but unable to hide her slender build or how little there was inside it where it hung around her waist. As usual, things developed slowly. Ruth poured both of them a drink: brandy this time, being her favourite, with Tom asking for the same. As usual, once she had handed him his glass, Ruth took up position at the opposite end of the sofa from him, and they exchanged a few stories of how each had spent their time that day, leaving out various irrelevant details (and various more serious details on Tom's part). As usual, Ruth became more talkative, and more affectionate, as time went on, moving closer, until she was snuggled up against him, his arm around her. Finally, as usual, by half past ten they were in the bedroom, undressing each other. It was always a delight to unclothe Ruth, exciting and strange, and Tom never tired of the pleasure: always refreshing, always as exhilarating as the first time had been. She began stiffly, as ever, letting him peel off each garment, one by one, her hands at her sides, but offering no assistance at all. Her almost boyish figure he slowly unwrapped to reveal a gorgeous soft centre: the beautiful woman who had been concealed inside her nondescript outer layers, like a fallen jewel concealed in rough ground. He gently caressed her hips, slender waist, her back, and finally her breasts; whereupon, as abruptly as always, the ice maiden doth melt; a fire kindled in her eyes and, as if a statue had suddenly come to life, her arms were around him and she was kissing him passionately and hungrily. After a while she stepped away slightly and began to remove his clothes, urgently and relentlessly, the kiss being resumed as she pulled each item from him: not much more than a minute later a naked woman had procured for herself a naked man, whom she pushed backwards onto the bed, falling on top of him. She spun around, now pulling him on top of her, and drew the covers over them. Their lovemaking was intense; Ruth was almost insatiable; half an hour later they lay, exhausted; still close to each other, Tom on his back and she curled up at his side, holding on to him as if trying to hold on to the emotions that bound them together. Tom could tell when she dropped off to sleep, but he remained awake, unable to shake off the morose feeling that all too often followed their all too brief moments of bliss; unable to stop himself reliving the heartbreaking tragedy that, against all the odds, had come to define such a loving, supportive relationship. **** About eighteen months ago, Tom had been working on a story for his newspaper: he was investigating claims that residents, including in particular a large number of elderly and vulnerable people, were being unfairly evicted from their homes, and that most had been persuaded to sell far below the market value of their property. He was slowly uncovering evidence that a little-known businessman going by the name Gabriel, was using underhand tactics barely within the law, to buy up land with the intention of selling it at a premium to property developers. The first article was published, accredited to Tom Carter, investigative journalist. It detailed the thinly veiled trickery and intimidation that Gabriel's company employed to achieve their objectives, spotlighting the misery of the victims who had been cheated, and promising much more to follow as further information came to light. The circulation of the paper almost doubled overnight. Two days after the story ran, on a bright Saturday afternoon, Tom and Ruth were driving home from a shopping centre while they talked about his mother's upcoming 60th birthday; Ruth was complaining that she supposed all the arrangements were going to be left to her, just as had happened with Tom's father's 60th, almost two years earlier. "And of course, you were so busy working that I had to do everything myself. You'd disappear off the face of the earth, and who was it who ended up having to run everywhere? Me! Trying to do everything at the last minute as usual. Running to the supermarket, running to the function room, running home, running ..." "Why? Would the car not start?" That silenced Ruth for several seconds as she turned to stare out of the side window, struggling against the smile, unable to stop it spreading over her face, no matter how hard she tried to fight back against the typically ludicrous joke from the adorable idiot she called her husband. Not that his quip was particularly funny; it was his timing, his dead- pan delivery and innocent tone of voice that, as usual, cracked her up. She began to say, "You think you're hilarious, don't you? Why don't you try taking some respon..." but broke off into a scream as something slammed hard into her side of the car, making it spin out of control. The object that had struck them was a large, black Transit van; it had been waiting in a lane between two buildings until the driver had received a message that his target vehicle was approaching; it then, with immaculate timing, shot out from the lane, straight into the front passenger door. The van was driven so skilfully that to it, the impact was merely a glancing blow, and the driver made off at speed before the results of his handiwork came to fruition. Tom's and Ruth's car entered a four-wheel skid; Tom immediately lost all command of the vehicle's course or behaviour: it hit a parked car, side-on between its own wheels and mounted the other car's bonnet; it then slid down before slowly, ever so slowly, toppling over onto its roof, leaving two unconscious, injured occupants helplessly trapped inside. The next thing Tom was aware of was an annoying, persistent beeping noise; that was followed by unbearably bright light and then, very shortly afterwards, by pain all over his body. There seemed to be someone near him, perhaps two people: he could not tell. Everything was blurred and beginning to fade, then, after what seemed like a few seconds more, he realised the beeping had stopped, the light was tolerable and the pain almost gone. A man in a white coat was standing at the side of his bed. "Mr. Carter," he said, looking at the chart he had lifted from the foot, "Good morning. I'm Dr. Caulfield. How are you feeling?" "Groggy," was Tom's reply. "Where am I?" "King George Hospital. You'll still be a little drowsy from your medication, so I'd advise ..." Tom gasped as he began to come to. "Ruth!" he interrupted. "My wife! Where is she?" "Your wife is not in any danger, and she's recov ..." "The baby! Ruth's pregnant. Is the baby all right?" Dr. Caulfield turned and walked back to the bedside, taking a seat in the chair beside it. "I'm sorry," he said, but did not need to continue any more than he felt able to: those two words conveyed everything. "God," Tom exclaimed, his voice cracking, "I want to see her." Dr. Caulfield explained what had happened when Tom and Ruth had been admitted to the Emergency Department, three days ago. Both had concussion and severe bruising, but neither had sustained any fractures. Ruth, though, was suffering vaginal bleeding, and was then discovered to be pregnant, but with no foetal heartbeat. Emergency surgery revealed a uterine rupture, and the surgical team had been forced to perform an abdominal partial hysterectomy. The central part of her womb had been removed, but leaving the cervix and ovaries in place. "Does she know?" "She's awake now, but she hasn't been told anything yet." "I'll tell her." Early that afternoon, Tom was fully discharged as a patient, and he was shown to the room where Ruth was recovering. She smiled weakly as he entered and turned her hand, inviting him to take it by moving her fingers a little, but she did not manage to raise it from the bed. He sat beside her, then she turned, took one look at his face and tears began to collect in her eyes. Dr. Caulfield regarded the scene through the small window in the door for a few moments. By the time he turned away, Tom was holding Ruth's hand in both of his and he was bent almost double over the bed, his head nearly touching the pillow as he rested it against hers. Ruth's eyes were screwed together in despair as she listened, but her face was turned towards him. Three weeks later, once Ruth was strong enough, the couple held a small ceremony for their unborn child, a girl, in the cemetery near their home. Every few weeks after that, Tom visited, taking flowers - "children's flowers," as he called them - buttercups, daisies, snowdrops or daffodils when they were in season. Ruth never went with him, but she always listened tearfully to her husband as he described the little handful of blooms he had laid on the grave where their tiny daughter, too small and helpless even to be a bump in her mother's tummy, had been laid to rest. **** Tom woke the next morning to find Ruth had moved and was lying near the edge of the bed with her back turned. He slid over and put his hand on her waist, running it along the smooth curve from her hip to the side of her breast: she woke, sighed, and spun to face him. There was still a slight coolness on her face, but when he explored her hip and waist again, then began to rub the small of her back, her passion once more burst into flame and she pulled them together. Both still being naked, it was the most natural thing in the world that they should make love again. Ruth then slipped out of bed, saying she was definitely going to be late for work, and she was going to blame him (although she would most decidedly not be telling the truth about the reason why). When she leant over the bed, still nude, to drop the cover back into place, Tom ran his fingertips from her wrist to her shoulder and she playfully slapped his arm away. "Not now," she said, "Time's up." He watched her receding figure, admiring her body until she had pulled the dressing gown fully around herself. Then she spoke over her shoulder, pretending to be exasperated. "You should get moving too. Get there on time for once." "You know we don't stick to office hours. Just deadlines." Tom got out of bed and found his own gown; he left for the kitchen, allowing Ruth to have the run of the bedroom and the bathroom while she was readying herself. He made her some coffee and a slice of toast in the hope she would have a few seconds to throw something into her mouth; she accepted his offering gratefully, then, with a loving, but still rather disappointingly platonic, kiss on the cheek, rushed off. Tom poured himself a second cup of coffee, which he drank slowly; he showered, had another coffee, then left. While he walked to the underground, he sent a text message to one of his colleagues, saying he was going to collect his car and would be in soon, traffic permitting. The car he drove to the underground car park where his paper had leased a few dozen parking spaces; being late morning, and the main pool of spaces being provided on a first-come-first-served basis, there were only two left, of which he gratefully accepted one. He then had a walk of a few blocks before he would reach Derry Street. While he strolled, he laid his plans for the day. There were no other deadlines that were particularly pressing, so today was free for him to dedicate to his own pet project: engineering the downfall of Salvatore Gabriel. Tom was fully convinced that the accident causing Ruth's miscarriage had been nothing of the sort; that in fact it had been a deliberate attempt to stop the articles he had begun to publish; and that it had been ordered by Gabriel himself. Ever since that day, he had been single-minded in his determination to destroy that evil man; embarrassing him in the press and undermining one of his many operations was no longer good enough: he was now hell-bent on proving him guilty of a crime sufficiently serious to send him away for a very long time. Trading in illegal arms would be ideal, and once he had gathered enough evidence, it would be delivered to the police first, then, if and only if the police agreed, the newspaper second. The last thing Tom would want to do would be to compromise the trial, so if his work never saw the light of day, never saw the the ink of a printing press, never earned him a penny in commission or even an iota of credit, so be it. Such was the extent of his hatred towards Salvatore Gabriel. Half way along the last side street before reaching the main thoroughfare, he passed a man walking in the opposite direction; both smiled and nodded politely as they moved out of each other's way, with Tom passing close to the line of parked cars. Before he could veer back towards the centre of the pavement, several things happened, in such rapid succession that he was taken completely by surprise. The nearside rear door of the closest vehicle, a large black Mercedes, opened without warning, blocking his path. He was about to give the occupant an exasperated grimace, while nimbly side-stepping the obstruction, when two hands seized him roughly from behind. Caught off his guard, he was unbalanced and was therefore easily toppled over, turned, and pushed onto his back, where he landed on something hard: someone's knee. Again from behind, one hand grabbed him under his chin while another clamped a cloth over his mouth and nose. The cloth was repulsive, giving off a sharp, acrid smell, and Tom struggled as best he could, but something or someone was holding his legs down, stopping him from kicking out, and his arms were having difficulty finding anything they could get purchase on. In any case, it was becoming more and more of an effort to move any of his limbs, and very quickly it became too difficult to move at all. Everything slowed down, became quiet, became more and more dim, then grey, then black. **** Tom woke slowly and painfully: not physical pain; his head ached and felt fuzzy; it was difficult to think. Then he suddenly snapped into full consciousness as he realised where he was. He was sitting, slumped face-first against a metal pillar, on the floor of a large room in an old, deserted building. He was sitting, arms and legs around the pillar, his wrists and ankles bound by handcuffs. He was sitting, naked, on a large sheet of plastic. He became aware of a few others in the room. One of them stepped into view. "Nice of you to join us," he said gruffly, with an edge of contempt in his voice. Salvatore Gabriel. **** Chapter 2. Missy "You know why you're here?" "You're going to kill me. You tried once before." "You shoulda taken the warning. Backed off." "You're going to pay for that. For what you did to my wife." "It's you shoulda watched who you took for a ride, if you care about 'em. Folks ain't safe around you." "You bastard! My wife was pregnant! She lost the baby, and now she ca..." but the rest of Tom's condemnation was wiped out by the savage blow struck across his face by one of Gabriel's henchmen. "None of my business who's in the car with you." Tom was spluttering; he spat out a tooth, but Gabriel's reaction was only an evil grin. "Don't worry about that," he said, "Soon you'll have a full set again." He nodded to the man closest to Tom, who picked the tooth up from the ground and, with his other hand, roughly grabbed Tom's jaw, squeezing it until he involuntarily gasped; as soon as his mouth opened, the man pushed the tooth into it and then pressed the heel of his hand under Tom's chin, clamping his mouth shut until he gagged and was forced to swallow. He then left Tom to retch at the feeling of the solid object passing down his gullet. "No evidence, " Gabriel said. "And that's what the plastic's for." "Why did you strip me?" "Burnt your clothes. No evidence. Don't worry, you won't be needin' 'em where you're goin'." He and all the other men standing around Tom chuckled ominously. "So the police find a naked body. So what? I don't care. If my murder leads to you going down, it's worth it." Gabriel only repeated his evil grin. "Ain't gonna be no body," he said. He put his hand in his pocket; Tom flinched instinctively, expecting he would shortly find himself staring down the barrel of a gun, but it was a phone that Gabriel produced: Tom's phone. "Unlock this. I want to see what you got," Gabriel demanded. "Go to hell." "I'll ask nicely one more time. Unlock the phone. Please." "Go to hell. Please." Gabriel nodded again to the man standing beside Tom, the one who had forced him to swallow his tooth, and who now took hold of his right hand, bending the fingers back. The index finger he held in both hands, then twisted it brutally: there was a snap and Tom screamed in agony as his finger broke. "That wasn't nice," Gabriel explained, "I said please." He held the phone close to Tom's hand and the other man, who was now able to bend the finger in any direction he liked, turned it onto the home button. Tom cried out again in agony and the phone unlocked. "Something else you shouldn't worry about," Gabriel said, "Before long, you 'll be wishing you had a broken finger," then he shrugged. "Even just one broken one." He swiped across the screen for several seconds. "You been busy," he said. Then he held the phone out to another of the men in the room. "Take this to Zaf," he commanded; the man nodded, took it from Gabriel's hand and walked out. "We launder phones, too," Gabriel told him, "Strip it down for spares, the rest gets melted down. No evidence." Tom's eyes followed his hand back to his pocket once more; this time he withdrew a black cloth bag, closed by a drawstring. From the bag, Gabriel drew a chain, followed by a round medallion that hung from it. The medallion swivelled slightly as it swung from the chain: one side was smooth, although with a few scratches on it; the other had the image of some figure, that Tom could not properly make out, in the centre, and some symbols inscribed around the border. The thing was dull and unattractive, like a piece of cheap costume jewellery, ideal for someone who was very much challenged in the taste department. "So are you planning on beating me to death with that?" "No, but you're gonna wish I had." Gabriel held the medallion at arm's length towards one of the other men, who took it from him and began working at something. Tom could not quite see what he was doing. "Now we need to dispose of you. You're una persona non gradita. You shoulda kept your nose out from stuff that don't concern you." "Damn you," Tom spat. He tugged at the handcuffs in frustration and immediately his face twisted up as he grunted with pain. Gabriel scoffed. "Don't worry about the cuffs neither," he said, "A few minutes from now, they're gonna fall off. Won't be no pair of cuffs in the world can hold you. Ready with that thing yet?" He was addressing the man to whom he had given the medallion, and who Tom could now see was busy threading a plastic cable-tie through the links of the chain. "Done," the man replied absent-mindedly, holding it up to check his handiwork. "Here, Frank ... boss." Gabriel, dead-pan, accepted the medallion held out to him, but immediately struck the man, hard and without warning: the back of his hand, followed by the palm, then the back again, all in quick succession. "What'd I say?" he growled; the man swallowed: first saliva, possibly some blood, then his pride. "Sorry, Mr. Gabriel," he said meekly. Gabriel then turned and addressed Tom. "Don't like no-one knowin' who I am," he said, "But I guess it don't matter now, 'cause you're not gonna be tellin' nobody. Figured it out yet? Frank? Salvatore? Gabriel?" Tom's mind was working furiously: there was something about those names; something familiar he could not quite grasp; they were definitely related in some way. He stared blankly at Gabriel, who smirked. "No?" he said. "Real name: Salvatore. Father's name: Gabriele. Nickname: Frank." Still Tom stared into space. "I shoulda just let you go. You don't know nothin'. Father's name: Gabriele Capone. Real name: Salvatore Capone. Nickname: Fr..." "Salvatore?" Tom interrupted derisively. "Salvatore Cap... Frank Capone? That's ridiculous. Frank Capone's dead. He was gunned down on a street corner in Chicago, in nineteen-twenty-something." "Nineteen-twenty-four," Gabriel corrected him smugly, "April first. Or that's what they all think. Best April Fool's day joke ever." He held up the medallion and let it swing. "Payin' a visit on a guy called Sancho Rodriguez. Drugstore not doin' too good. Couldn't pay his protection. Guy was tryin' to escape. Only thing he was takin'? Not money, just this. I figured, must be worth somethin', so I puts the heat on. Made him tell me. Said it changes you into somebody else." "You should shop swinging that thing. You've hypnotised yourself." Gabriel stared hard at him. "I didn't believe him neither. So he showed me. Put it round his neck, borrowed a glove. Touched it here," he pointed at the medallion. "And whaddya know? Turned right into me! An exact copy of me! So then I figured, this is good. The heat was on me, see. Cops breathin' down my neck, word on the street ain't good neither. So I sets this guy up as a patsy for me. Cops walk right up to him, open fire. Said we fired first. Don't matter none. They shot Sancho Rodriguez, not Frank Capone." Tom looked at Gabriel doubtfully, but he was starting to feel very uneasy. "There was a fire at the flophouse we was hidin' in. After it was put out, no sign of that medallion. Nineteen-fifty-somethin', caught up with the schmuck that had it. Tricked me. I was dyin', see? Needed to change quick. So I took somethin', used it right there. The shirt I used was a trap. Guy'd made some b... somebody else wear it. After I changed, no way was I gonna take him. That guy was smart." Gabriel did not say what the medallion had done to him, but clearly it was something that he personally considered to be humiliating. "Fifty, sixty years it took me, but I tracked it down. Ten years ago got a tip-off, came over here. Didn't make no mistake this time. Took care of the guy who had it first. Two reasons he didn't expect me to be a killer. One was my age. Then I set up in London. Fresh blood. You limeys're easy pickin'. Now I'm a successful businessman. I got a reputation to uphold, and I don't like no punk gettin' in my way. "Brings us round to you. In the old days, we'd buy you a new pair of shoes, maybe teach you to fly. But these days the cops trace stuff they don't used to. Blood, hair, DNA. They gettin' too smart. So we gotta be smarter. No evidence." He hung the medallion around Tom's neck and loosely fastened the cable tie. "Don't want you shakin' it off," he said. Tom looked up at him, puzzled, but now rather disconcerted. Gabriel sensed the way defiance was crumbling into fear, and savoured the moment before continuing. "So we don't kill you, 'cause we don't want no body, but we don't want you talkin' neither. So that's what we do. Stop you talkin'. We just need something you can wear, see. Touch it to that thing and it changes you into the last guy who wore it. Guy ... or broad ... or ..." (he put his hand into his coat pocket again, this time producing a leather strap with a buckle on one end, and which Tom recognised as a dog's collar) "... bitch." **** Tom felt himself instinctively tense up as Gabriel approached. "Belonged to ... someone I knew," he explained cryptically, "Broad who owned her called her Missy. Black Labrador Retriever bitch, but you'll find that out soon enough." He touched the collar against the medallion and Tom immediately felt a tingling sensation course throughout his body. He initially tried to tell himself he was imagining things, but then the pain in both his mouth and his right hand began to lessen and he in turn began to panic. He pulled frantically at the handcuffs, but to no avail. "Wait a few minutes," Gabriel laughed. "They won't give you no more trouble." He backed off and Tom stopped struggling; all of a sudden he had become aware that something was seriously wrong: although his body felt completely normal, sitting the way he was, fully vertical, arms raised, legs together at the ankles, began to seem unnatural, as if his joints were supposed to flex differently. He looked down at himself and gasped in shock: there were unexplainable differences to his body that he had been unaware of until he saw them, but even that was pushed out of his mind by the realisation that his genitals were no longer there. Only then did his peripheral vision tell him his skin was becoming darker, less well defined, and he realised that he seemed to be sprouting black hair. Something was pushing painfully at the base of his spine, making him lean forward to allow himself the relief of feeling it escape behind him; his arms, having been dropped in order to lean forward, became difficult to lift again; his elbows and knees both straightened themselves against his will and refused to bend in the direction he expected. He looked up at Gabriel in confusion, only to discover his vision had changed: he could not discern colours properly: everything was fading into muted green; then he realised he could see his nose. The thing was, it did not look like a nose; it looked more like a dog's snout. Then Gabriel's prediction came true: without warning, the handcuffs fell from his wrists and ankles: he was free. "Told you they'd come off, Missy. Good girl." Tom immediately tried to stand up with the intention of fleeing towards the nearest exit, but was completely unprepared for the way a canine body was coordinated and how it worked. When she tried to use her lower limbs, as she still thought of them, to push herself into a standing position, the direction they moved in was nothing like the one she intended, and only resulted in her being thrown backwards at a completely unexpected angle: she had to twist round to stop herself sprawling completely on to her back; she rolled over and righted herself on all fours. At that point she realised that not only did this stance seem to be natural, but her arms and legs were the same length. Then it dawned upon her that she no longer had arms and legs, hands and feet: she had four legs, and four paws. Tom froze, realising in despair that the medallion had done exactly what Gabriel had said it would: turned her into a black Labrador Retriever. "Gabriel!" she tried to shout, but all that came out was. "Grrrr!" "You bastard!" she tried to shout, but all she managed to do was bark three times. Several curses she tried to level at Gabriel, but all that happened was that she became more and more frustrated, as it became more and more clear that, under no circumstances, was she capable of enunciating any sounds that could be used to form words. Tom did her determined best to stand upright: she threw herself upwards and backwards; for a few seconds, she managed to balance on her hind legs; she teetered precariously for an instant, then a second instant, as she stared angrily at Gabriel, then the inevitable happened: she lost her balance and fell sprawling onto her side, rolled over onto all fours once again and launched into a whole string of expletives that came out as a series of angry barks, of which only she knew the intended meaning. "Save your breath. You can't talk." Tom then began to growl menacingly as frustration turned to anger, but she found herself restrained by someone who had taken hold of the cable tie around her neck, lifting it and pulling her head back painfully, and almost lifting her front paws from the ground. Gabriel walked over to her and buckled the collar around her, then clipped a lead to it. She heard the sound of the cable tie being snipped; the man behind her lifted the chain from around her neck, pulled the tie free and handed the medallion to Gabriel, who held it up tantalisingly. "Want this?" he scoffed. "Have it." He threw it to the ground in front of Tom. She immediately tried to lift it, but was unable to do so: all she could do was paw at it as it lay on the ground, pushing the chain around like a toy. Then she had the idea of lifting it with her mouth , which she eventually succeeded in doing, only to find herself unable to put it around her neck; she tried to throw back her head and release it, but it just fell onto the floor in front of her. She whined. "Let me help," Gabriel said and, to Tom's amazement, he lifted the medallion and placed it over her head. "Glove," Gabriel then ordered to one of the other men; he immediately removed a black leather glove from his hand and threw it to Gabriel, who caught it deftly, then dropped it onto the floor directly in front of Tom. "Be my guest," he said, and Tom, in complete disbelief, stood over the glove and crouched, bringing the medallion to the floor on top of the glove, expecting to change into a duplicate of its owner. She was cruelly disappointed, though, because nothing at all happened: not even a repeat of the tingle that had introduced her first transformation. She tried again. Nothing. Gabriel laughed dismissively and bent down to retrieve the glove, which he threw back to its owner. "Ain't gonna work no more," he then said mockingly to Tom, who was, by now, breathing rapidly and whining in deepest despair: if the medallion would only work once, that would mean she could never, ever become human again. "Not for twelve hours," Gabriel concluded and Tom almost collapsed with relief when she heard his words: there was hope after all, but the feeling of dread returned almost immediately as she realised how tenuous that hope was going to be, because Gabriel then bent down, removed the medallion and held it up while she stared longingly at it. "Take a good look," he grinned, "last time you're gonna see it." He dropped it into the black bag, pulled the drawstring shut and deposited it into the pocket of his coat. "Do yourself a favour, forget the twelve hours. You're gonna be nowhere by then." Gabriel handed the lead to one of the other men, who by now had all congregated behind Tom. "Now I can shoot you," he threatened, withdrawing a revolver from the same pocket, and cocking it as he aimed it at Tom's head. She quailed, but saw no point in trying to run: she would never be able to pull free of the man holding her lead. "But I'd rather see you suffer," Gabriel concluded, releasing the hammer and returning the gun to his coat. "Lose the bitch," he growled and turned, walking off without taking so much as another look at her. She was not given long to watch his receding back, though, because almost immediately, she felt a harsh tug on her collar, and a voice commanding, "Move yourself, mutt!" The obvious thing to do would have been to put her hands behind her head and either unfasten the lead or unbuckle the collar, but Tom found she was incapable of putting the thought into action: she was unable to rotate what she thought should have been her shoulders, or raise what she thought should have been her arms; instead she managed only to lift one front paw until her foreleg was roughly horizontal. Two or three seconds, though, was all the time she was allowed to contemplate her failure, because the man holding her lead then tugged on it so powerfully that it hurt her neck and pulled her across the floor with her paws scrabbling futilely in resistance. What little defiance she was showing obviously irritated her captors, because one of them swore in frustration and grabbed her collar, violently enough almost to choke her; her front paws were lifted from the ground and she was half dragged, half carried towards something she only became aware of at that point: an enclosure, made out of metal bars, with an open door; the sight made her struggle harder, but to no avail. The hold on her collar was released only when she was immediately in front of the door; the man dropped her to the floor and then kicked her hard on the rump, sending her tumbling with a yelp into the interior of the cage; she heard the metallic ring of the door slamming shut before she had the chance to right herself. Tom dragged herself around, as quickly as her unfamiliar body could; she found herself looking at the face of a man, hunkered down, sneering through the bars. "Just there," he said, pointing at something on the other side of the door, "That's the bolt. Just put your hand through the bars and pull it back ... oh, sorry, you can't can you?" he laughed, and Tom had to make a massive effort not to give him the satisfaction of making her whine. "Like this," the man continued and slid back the bolt. Tom, suddenly realising she had been presented with a route to freedom, lurched forward against the door, but the bolt had been shot back into place before she was able to throw herself against the bars, which she did both uselessly and painfully, drawing howls of laughter from the men encircling her cage. "Come on, let's go," a voice said, "I want to get home." Tom felt a sharp pang of regret at the thought, but was unable to dwell on it because straight away she was thrown off balance by the cage being lifted, making her feel giddy and disoriented; she was forced to lie down with all four legs flat on the floor, and her head resting on her paws. It was a position she deplored, but was the only way to cope with the way the floor beneath her was swaying so alarmingly. The cage was dropped clumsily onto the floor of a van, jolting Tom enough to make her whimper in discomfort. "Shut it," a voice growled threateningly, "or I'll kick you in the nuts." "You'll be lucky!" another voice guffawed and the rear door slammed shut to the accompaniment of derisive laughter. Further metallic clanging of doors was immediately followed by the sound of an engine starting, then by a horrible lurching sensation: the van was in motion, but Tom's cage had not been tied down, leaving it free to pitch and slide with every forward or lateral movement. She began to feel nauseous; obviously she was suffering, as many animals do, motion sickness resulting from being transported by human beings who pay little or no attention to the comfort of their cargo, or give any consideration to their inability to prevent themselves being thrown around by the unpredictable movement of the vehicle. Tom was forced to remain down, but with her head upright, unable to relax enough to flop onto her side, even once the van was travelling at a more consistent speed, with less cornering. The journey took less than an hour, but it was the most terrible, most nightmarish hour of her life: to begin with she had been overwhelmed by feelings of pain, confusion and outrage, and it was her anger at Gabriel that had kept her going; but now she had time to think, and she did not like what was passing through her mind. She was completely helpless and at the mercy of the men who had caged her, and who could do whatever they liked to her: the only way she could possibly defend herself would be to fall back on trying to use her teeth, but even then it would only need two or three fingers inserted under her collar and she would be powerless to resist: the useless paws she had in place of her hands would be unable to do anything to help her out of her plight. They could tie her in a sack and throw her into the river, but having lost all of her dexterity, she would be unable to take hold of the sides to pull it open: if her body were ever found, the police would pass the case to the RSPCA and then think no more of it. They could surrender her to a dog pound, where she would be caged for a few weeks before being put down, and the only thought spared for her might be a vet whispering, "Sorry, old girl," as he withdrew the needle, before stroking her prone form gently, while he waited for her to die. She could be murdered openly and legally: she and Ruth would never see each other again, and no-one would ever know what had happened to Tom Carter. **** The van slowed without warning, making the cage slide over the wooden floor, and sending Tom backwards into the bars behind her, unable to find any way of holding on to something. The ride became bumpy and uncomfortable; obviously the driver had turned off the road onto a rough track, and Tom was now thrown about helplessly. When they jolted to a halt, she was pressed uncomfortably against the bars again, but this time with much greater force: she instinctively tried to brace herself against the back of the cage using her feet, but found that her paws simply slipped on the smooth metal and slid through the gaps, hurting the backs of her hind legs; she had fallen onto her side and pawed desperately at the bars, longing to be able to wrap fingers around them to hold herself steady. Moments after the van was stationary, Tom heard the sound of doors opening and closing, and at the same time she scrambled back onto her feet, glowering at the two men who opened the rear doors, outraged at the way they had treated her with such contempt. One of the men put a knee onto the floor and reached for the cage, pulling it to the edge and making Tom stumble with the sudden movement. He opened the door and took hold of her by the collar, tugging her so violently that she had no option but to yield and allow herself to be pulled from the cage; the man took hold of her lead and she leapt obligingly onto the ground to find they were in the middle of woodland. "Good girl," the man said sarcastically and unpleasantly, "that's more like it." He walked a few steps away from the van and Tom was forced to follow; while she trotted at his heel she heard the cage door close, followed by the rear doors. A voice called out impatiently, and Tom realised to her consternation that, apart from the first one or two words, she had understood nothing; the man holding her lead replied, but the sounds coming from his mouth were, despite Tom being sure they were English, unintelligible babbling. The man then bent down and unclipped her lead, but still held her by the collar; she heard the driver's door opening and closing. Tom growled suspiciously and the man released her, but immediately kicked her hard in the ribs, sending her tumbling over with a pained yelp. By the time she had recovered, the man was closing the passenger door and the van was tearing off, spraying dirt behind it. Tom ran after it for a few bounds, then gave up and stopped; she angrily barked what was supposed to be, "You bastards! You can't leave me here like this!" Less than a minute later, she was surrounded by silence, surrounded by trees, surrounded by nothing she knew or recognised; she was lost and alone: a Labrador; a bitch; a dumb animal, unable to communicate, unable to tell anyone what had been done to her, unable to ask for help. She had no idea how to survive in this body, no idea how to find her way home, no idea how to reunite herself with Ruth. She threw back her head and howled in despair. **** Chapter 3. Against All Odds The men who had brought here here did not come back; not that Tom had realistically expected they would, recognising as she did that the way she was standing and staring expectantly after them was merely one of the early stages of grief: denial. She was alone: abandoned, stranded, unwanted; there was no-one who could (or would) do anything for her, and the only person upon whom she could rely was herself. Then she sadly revised her last thought: the only dog upon whom she could rely was herself. She no longer had the right to think of herself as a person. What she would have liked would be to make a positive decision on what to do from then on, but she was also forced to recognise that her options were so few that she had no more ability to decide her future than she had to make herself human again. The easiest thing to do would be to accept her fate and try to make whatever home she could for herself as a wild animal living a feral existence, doing whatever she had to do to find food and shelter; but, realistically, that would mean seeking out like beasts, as close to her own species as possible, and joining the pack. That, however, would bring new horrors: they would be ruled by an alpha male, a position from which she was physically excluded; her role would be to watch as the two strongest dogs fought for the prize of being the father of her litter. No, she resolved, she would remain alone, fend for herself, and wait out her time: but how many years were going to be left for her to suffer the life this body would force her to lead? She had no idea how old she was; that is, how old the collar's original owner, Missy, had been when it had last been buckled around her neck. A dog could live to ... what? ... ten years? twelve? fifteen? For all she knew, she could be dead in a few days, a few weeks, or she could linger on for a decade of hell, and she honestly did not know which she would like the least. However, even in this loathsome body, the instinct for survival was still strong: already she knew in her heart that, no matter how terrible her life became, she would very probably fight to live, but for what? For year upon year of hardship, misery, hopeless longing for her old self, and if she could manage to keep herself alive, what would be the reward of her endurance? Would not each year she battled through her torment only earn her another year of subjecting herself to the same unendurable burden: struggling to remain on this earth as a four-legged creature that she hated being? She was becoming hungry, but it was also growing dark, so she decided not to look for anything to eat just yet; instead she would find somewhere to sleep: after that day's traumatic experience, she felt exhausted and, the more she thought about it, the more attractive the prospect became: every second she spent in unconsciousness would be one second during which she would be unaware of her canine form. A nearby tree promised somewhere to rest: the roots were large and exposed, with a valley between them where leaves had collected in the wind. She found the ground at the base of the tree to be slightly hollowed out, making the layer of dead foliage deep and soft; she found a spot to lie in, but could not fight her natural instinct to flatten a bed for herself by turning in a circle. Fortunately the space was deep enough that, when she lay down in it, it settled and many leaves fell around her. They were slightly damp, but still warm and she dropped off to sleep almost immediately. **** The next morning Tom came to slowly, subconsciously struggling to stay where she thought she was: lying, warm and comfortable, at home in bed, with Ruth at her side. In putting her arm around her wife, she stretched out a foreleg and found one of the roots of the tree, which she then tried to caress in order to make Ruth turn towards her. It was the effort of trying in vain to bend her elbow upwards and her inability to cup her hand around her wife's breast that made her begin to realise that it was not only Ruth's body that was disturbingly abnormal: suddenly harsh reality bit painfully and she jumped out of bed to find herself, instead of landing on bare feet on the bedroom carpet, standing on all fours in the middle of a forest, whining dolefully. The nightmare of her situation came flooding back as she remembered her transformation, and being left alone in the wild. Fear gripped hard at her she began to recall the conversation between the two men who had abandoned her here: the meaning of which she had understood not at all. She had already lost the ability to talk: what if she had also lost the power to understand human speech? She could be in the company of a hundred, or a thousand human beings, and not be able to exchange a single concept with any of them; no-one would ever tell her their thoughts or feelings, nor would anyone ever hear hers. She was goodness knows how many miles from Ruth, with no idea how to find her way back to her, and even if she managed, what then? What would be the point of going back to her wife in this body? The worst part was not the loss of her humanity, nor was it the loss of her hands, nor the power of speech. The worst part was the unredeemable loss of the woman she loved. She was suffering an unrelenting, crushing sense of loneliness, one that could not ever be cured even if the two were reunited; and that made loneliness the worst feeling of all. It was from that despair, however, that the resolve came to make up her mind. Tom Carter was not going to spend the rest of her life learning how to catch rabbits or field mice, or scrabbling in the remains of a picnic for a few scraps. She was going to take hold of life with both hands and shape her own destiny. It felt good to tell herself that, but all the time she was painfully aware that paws would not be able to take hold of anywhere near as much life as hands would, and her oppressive limitations would mean that any destiny she could shape would be pitifully bleak. She was not far, she knew, from the clearing where she had been abandoned, but looking around, she began to resent another disability that had been forced upon her: intolerably poor eyesight. Everything beyond a few dozen yards was a blur, and the whole scene was washed out by the same muted green, making a lot of things difficult to discern from each other. The clearing, though, she found, mainly because it was such a large space among the trees, and then it took her a few minutes to find the spot where the van had been, as she was so frustratingly short-sighted, and even up close, the ability to see subtle differences of shade was yet another thing that she had lost. The tyre tracks only became visible once she was almost standing over them, but once she had them, she found she could follow fairly easily as they led her towards a familiar sound: motor vehicles. The trail passed through a small car park where one of the wooden posts bordering it had been broken, and from there onto the road, where it turned left. Tom stuck to the trail, as closely as she could, making sure she was following the correct track. Without warning, one of the ambient noises seemed to come on her quickly, and as it did, it was joined by the sound of a car horn: Tom leapt aside with a startled yelp just in time to hear the sound drop in pitch as a car flashed past. Shaken, she barked once, half-heartedly: her anger consisted mainly of a mixture of fright, and a sudden thought that all her problems might have been over a few moments ago. Had he struck her, the driver would probably not have bothered to stop: he would merely have cursed her later, while cleaning blood and hair from the front corner of his car. However, now there was another, much stronger idea in her head: the van had brought her from London, and it had almost certainly returned there afterwards; that meant she now knew which way led home. **** Tom walked, ran, leapt as the terrain dictated, following the line of the road just within the trees. She was still hungry, but not intolerably so, and decided to make as much progress as she could before being forced to look for food. A little later - she was unsure how far, as she was finding it difficult to judge distance from her vastly altered perspective - she came to a roundabout, but was forced to wait, in ever-growing trepidation, until she had almost reached the direction sign before she found out whether she could still read. She returned to the grass verge at the side of the road to see a signpost with a circle and four lines, with meaningless symbols around it: she whimpered again in despair, unable to understand the place names on the sign, and by that losing the only hope she had ever had of finding out where she was. She sat on the grass immediately in front, staring forlornly at her latest exclusion from humanity, only to become aware that, after a second or two, the symbols had taken on a recognisable pattern. It took time, she then reasoned, and that also explained (she hoped) why she had been unable to understand most of the conversation between the two men the previous day: they had been speaking too quickly, and she had only been able to follow what they were saying when they spoke slowly and used simple phrases without long words. That realisation only set her mind partly at rest, because although she had not completely lost all of her human capabilities, she was going to have to accept that her capacity for understanding was greatly reduced by the way her eyes and ears processed information, and by her brain's sluggishness in presenting concepts to its reluctant occupant. Finally she managed to make out the words on the sign: "Woodford A104," "Loughton," and, "High Beach." There was also a panel on the bottom right, that she guessed was brown with white lettering, but just looked like a dull green smudge. No matter; that would probably just have told her what she had already worked out from the town names, all of which she recognised: she was in Epping Forest, about twenty miles from central London, but even better than that: she was only seven or eight miles from home. Now, her plight seemed a little less dark: like Dick Whittington, she was going to turn back towards London. Unfortunately, unlike Dick Whittington, even if she found what she was going to seek, it would not bring fortune, nor would it be likely to bring much happiness. Her journey took almost three full days. To avoid both the hazard of traffic, and the risk of being taken as a stray, she travelled by night whenever possible; her vision in darkness did not deteriorate anything like it had as a human; the daytime she spent either sleeping or searching for food. Only once did she manage to find a sizeable meal, when the chef of a roadside cafe spotted her gazing longingly at the bins and took pity on her, throwing her a few small pieces of raw meat; she managed to catch that he said they were going off, but Tom did not care, being so hungry, and also knowing a dog's digestive system to be much tougher and resilient than a human's. The only other thing she managed to understand was, "Here, boy!" (if only!) The rest of the man's words, although she could tell they were intended kindly, only served to distress her, being unintelligible. At least he had been good to her, she thought, remembering her first two attempts to beg some scraps; both times she had been driven off with a string of words she had not been able to interpret, but whose tone had made their meaning quite clear. On the third day, she found herself in familiar territory, but not without fresh hazards: she was negotiating the streets of outer London, and she was now in very great danger of being impounded. Fortunately, the suburb she lived in had a great many green areas, so Tom laid low in one of them until she could proceed in relative safety, under cover of darkness. She waited impatiently till dusk, then, her heart in her mouth, she began her fourth night as a Labrador creeping through the streets towards home. Opposite her house, there was another small landscaped area, with a row of bushes along the edge: she crept under cover there and tried to sleep while she waited for a glimpse of Ruth. She was on tenterhooks the entire night: the house, of course, was in darkness; she should expect that, but suppose Ruth no longer lived there? Suppose she had moved away in grief at losing her husband? If she had gone, Tom would never be able to find her again, being incapable of asking even such a simple question. Hours later, to her relief, Tom saw a light go on upstairs; spreading throughout the house as time went on. After a frustratingly long wait, perhaps another hour she guessed, having no accurate means of telling the time, the lights went out quickly, one by one, and although it was still early morning, and the sun was only just on the point of rising, the front door opened and a woman emerged; even if it had been pitch dark, Tom would instantly have recognised her beautiful wife. By the time Ruth had opened the gate and stepped onto the pavement, Tom had shuffled herself from her hiding place and was bounding happily over the (deserted) street towards her; with a single, gentle, bark, Ruth turned in surprise and Tom felt her heart leap at a proper sight of her: so beautiful, so lovely; but even that was tinged with sadness: how on earth could Tom possibly manage to tell her who she was? She approached and Ruth began to back away; Tom slowed and did not advance any further, but she was still wuffling a loving greeting, wishing the sounds she was making were able to convey the meaning behind them. "Hey, there," Ruth said uncertainly, with a nervous smile, and Tom became aware she was wagging her tail profusely. "Are you lost?" "No, I'm home," came the intended reply, but what actually came out of her mouth broke Tom's heart. "I don't remember seeing you before. Wonder where you live?" "I live here! Ruth, darling, it's me, Tom! I love you!" she barked in despair. "My goodness, it's almost as if you're trying to talk to me isn't it?" came the light-hearted response and Ruth smiled to herself at the ridiculousness of the idea. "You'd better run off home, now," she ordered, ducking her head a little, to let herself see behind Tom's forelegs along the underside of her body, "Good girl!" With that, she turned and walked around the corner without a backward glance, leaving Tom to whimper miserably as she watched her disappear. The gate was shut and the hedge that grew above the wall was too high to jump, but Tom remembered it was sparse and misshapen at the corner; sure enough, there was enough room for her to be able to slither over the wall, then between it and the hedge, finally manoeuvring herself through into the small garden at the front of the house; it would have been so much easier if she had been human, she told herself sadly, then groaned inwardly at the thought; no, had she been human, she would simply have put her arm over the gate and flicked the catch with her finger. Lying down in the corner, she settled herself to wait for Ruth to come home. **** Hours later, with twilight already giving way to night, Tom was finally roused when something familiar made her prick up her ears. She was hungry and thirsty, having waited faithfully all day, unwilling to desert her post, even if she could have, in case she missed the moment that had now arrived: the sharpness of her hearing (which still never failed to surprise her) picked up Ruth's light, even footsteps long before she had reached the corner. Shortly, the gate opened and Tom greeted her wife with a loving woof. Ruth, startled at being unexpectedly ambushed by a barking dog, jumped in surprise. "Oh," she squeaked, sounding alarmed, "You again! How on earth did you manage to get in here?" She reopened the gate and stood aside. "Poor old thing," she said sympathetically, "You couldn't get out again, could you?" She waved her arm towards the exit. "Come on, girl, off you go!" Being so readily dismissed was not what Tom had in mind at all. Not knowing how to react, she sat down in protest, then tried to express friendliness in the only way open to her: wagging her tail. She whined through her nose, as she had heard dogs do before, in order to plead with their master, and she lifted her front paws in the way they did when told to beg. Ruth laughed. "You're beautiful," she said, holding the back of her hand to Tom's nose for a second or two, then taking hold of her collar to look at it more closely, "Missy. But I'm sorry, you can't stay here." Still holding her collar, she led Tom to the gate; Tom, desperate to please Ruth, trotted obediently beside her; then, when her collar was let go, turned to face her wife, sat, and looked up sadly at her. Ruth was no longer smiling. "No," she said sternly, "Go away. Good girl, Missy, get lost." "Please, Ruth, don't send me away, I'm begging you! This is horrible! I just want to be with you! Please don't you reject me too!" Tom implored her wife, but becoming more and more despondent with every word that was lost by its involuntarily translation into a meaningless bark. Ruth took a step backward, taken-aback by what to her sounded like aggression, and she turned and let herself into the house. When she saw her open the door, Tom felt her hopes rise, but they were very quickly dashed when Ruth closed the door behind her. When it opened again a few seconds later, Tom was overjoyed, but then she saw her wife emerge holding a brush in front of her like a weapon. "Shoo!" Ruth told her and advanced with the head of the brush, pushing it against Tom's chest. The touch was gentle, but Tom expected the second would not be, so she turned and took a single bound onto the pavement. At the same time that she turned to plead her case, the gate was slammed in her face. "Go home, Missy," Ruth said emphatically and walked into the house. Tom whined with no-one to hear, then, her tail between her legs, returned to the shrub she used as a hiding-place and sadly watched her house as light after light went on and off, then finally all were extinguished. It began to snow, making her think that perhaps she would freeze to death, which would at least bring her misery to an end; but then an idea struck her. She searched under the trees until she found a piece of stick she thought would be suitable and, with her front paws on top of the wall, dropped it over. She then struggled into the garden: what she would prefer to have done would be to sit on the wall, lower herself using her hands, then push herself out feet first; but instead she had to make do with crawling over, hind legs in the air, then scrabbling and dragging herself under the hedge using completely unsuitable limbs. Finally, scratched and sore, and with Ruth's words, "You couldn't get out again, could you?" ringing in her ears, she was turning round to retrieve the stick. That found, she dropped it in front of her and settled down to wait. During the night, the snow stopped, but not before it had provided a good covering, ideal for Tom's purpose; she waited until she saw the first light go on, then she set to work. After a struggle to position the stick in her mouth properly (how much easier it would have been, she rued, to perform the simple task of lifting it with thumb and forefinger) she eventually managed to press one end down with her paw and grip the other with her teeth, then began trying to write in the snow. This only became another source of frustration: her vastly reduced motor skills forced her to form letters by walking backwards while dragging the stick along the ground, making it difficult to avoid trampling on what she had already written; she found it impossibly difficult to draw a curve, so her best attempt at a letter O came out more like two vertical, parallel lines: she found herself wishing, momentarily, that her name had been Tim instead of Tom. After three or four frustratingly long minutes, she had managed to produce three shaky but legible letters. Shaky but legible was going to have to do, though: how she longed for the days when she could simply pick up a pen and let the words flow onto the page! Tom dropped her pen to the ground and sat, giving two or three barks, softly, but hoping they would be enough for Ruth to hear. Sure enough, a few seconds later the curtain twitched, then drew back to reveal a beautiful woman, clad in her dressing-down, and making Tom whine at the memory of all those wonderful mornings, waking in bed beside her. Ruth stared out of the window, first in exasperation at finding Missy back in her front garden, then in shock once she had noticed the patterns in the snow beside her. There, neatly framed by a border of paw-prints, were four, no, three letters, that seemed to spell a name she had longed to hear for almost a week: T II M **** Chapter 4. Word of Mouth The curtain immediately dropped back into place and Tom could see it billow slightly as Ruth leant her back against the window. Then it was drawn once more and a much whiter version of her wife's face appeared again. Tom pressed her paw on the end of the stick again and lifted it; she then began to write while her wife looked on. Being defeated by the curved parts of the letters R and U, they came out more like K and V, but there was no doubt whatsoever in Ruth's mind that she was watching her own name being inscribed: K V T H The curtain fell again and this time was not reopened; instead the front door unclosed to reveal Ruth's slender figure: she looked on the point of tears. "Go ... go away," she demanded, but Tom's response was to write more: F L E A X E It took Ruth a few seconds to realise the F was supposed to be a P and the approximation of an X was the result of Tom's inability to cope with the complexity of the letter S. She began to cry. "Whoever put you in here, and trained you to do this is playing a damn cruel joke," she sobbed, "I'm not letting you out this time. I'm waiting till your owner has to come and get you, then I'm phoning the police." I A M T II M "Stop it! Just stop it!" Ruth exclaimed and turned back towards the house. She herself then stopped, just before the door and looked round at Tom. "This is impossible," she said, "Completely impossible." Her hand was on her forehead and she looked as if she were beginning to doubt her own sanity. "You can't do this. Dogs can't use tools. You can't pick something up and write with it. How are you able to do this?" K V T H I L II V E Y II V Ruth sank to her knees; she seemed either unaware or unconcerned that she was kneeling, barefoot, in the snow. Tom trotted over to her and dropped the stick from her mouth; she then sat in front of her and whimpered sadly. Ruth had her hands on her lap: Tom laid one paw on the back of one, then raised it, touching her wife's upper arm, but struggling to keep her foreleg in that position for long, then being forced to drop it. "Oh, my, God," Ruth stuttered. A dog showing affection would have nuzzled her and licked her face, but Missy had not behaved typically at all: she had first tried to hold her hand, and had then lifted her foreleg the way a human would have done when putting an arm around her. A dog could also not have written, "Ruth I love you." "Who are you?" she said. Tom looked at the first thing she had written, her own name, and whined sadly. "Am I dreaming?" Ruth asked, firstly to herself, "Is Tom dead? Are you him, reborn as ..." she broke down and sobbed; Tom sat in front of her, feeling helpless; then Ruth leant forward and put her arms around her, squeezing her gently, then she suddenly jumped up, walked a few steps away, turned, and shouted, "What the hell am I doing?" then marched over to the gate, opened it and stood aside. "Get out," she said, but Tom did not move. She sat and whined pleadingly. Ruth stared at her for a while, then seemed to make a resolution. "I'll ask you to do one thing," she said, "One thing you couldn't possibly have been trained to do." She lifted the stick as Tom watched enviously, easily picking it up just as she had earlier wished she could, between her forefinger and thumb. Ruth held it out to Tom, who took it in her mouth. "Tell me how old your mother is. In Roman numerals." L X I Ruth, who by that time was standing near the door, felt her knees buckle and she involuntarily sat down on the step. She buried her face in her hands and began to sob once more. Tom trotted over, sat helplessly at her feet, and whined quietly but plaintively. Ruth extended a hand and stroked the top of her head, then stood, walked into the house, and held the door open for Tom, who leapt gratefully up the steps; at last: she might still be a Labrador, but at least she was finally home. Ruth sat on the sofa and stared at Tom in disbelief as she watched her walk into the living room and sit at her feet, looking sadly back at her; while Ruth knew little about dogs, she did know their inability to communicate via facial expressions was substituted by other mannerisms, such as subconsciously flattening their ears down on their head, exactly as Tom was doing now. Ruth responded by shaking hers. "I ... I don't ..." she stammered, "What the hell is going on here? Why are you trying to tell me you're my husband, and how are you managing to tell me anything at all? What's happening to me?" She rested he forehead on her hand, with her elbow on her knee; Tom whined, prompting her to look up. "But you can't tell me anything, can you?" They regarded each other in frustration for a few moments before Ruth suggested, "Tell you what, one bark for yes, two for no, okay?" Tom barked once. "Good girl," Ruth encouraged her, then, wincing at the distressed whine she received in reply, added, "Sorry." "Your name is John Smith." Tom barked twice. "Tom Carter." Tom barked once. "I'm Joan of Arc." Two barks. "Florence Nightingale." Two barks. "Ruth Carter." One bark. "Give me a minute. I'm going to phone in sick." One bark. **** Tom was able to follow parts of the conversation; she caught the beginning, when Ruth was complaining about a headache and sick feeling (which was technically true, just not in the way she would allow her employee to assume), but as the call progressed the language became more sophisticated and flowed more quickly, forcing Tom to accept it was beyond her comprehension. The same creeping dread returned once more, this time subtly mutated into a new form: humans were making the decisions, while she waited obediently to find out what was to be done with her. And what would that be? Most likely to be kept as a pet, since Ruth no more had the ability to turn a dog into a man than she had: the suffering and hardship she had put herself through to reunite herself with the woman she loved had earned her the right to expect only the tiniest improvement in quality of life. The reality of her situation now bore fully down upon her, and its crushing weight brought back one of her earliest fears and made her realise there was nothing that could prevent it from coming true: she was going to be forced to live for the rest of her days in this body, until finally, old and arthritic, she would indeed hear a vet whisper, "Sorry old girl," as he withdrew the needle; the only change now was that it would be Ruth who would lovingly stroke her prone form while waiting for her to die. "Right," a human voice said, pulling Tom out of her thoughts and prompting her to look up at the woman she once thought of as her wife; if this were going to work, she would have to resign herself to her fate, let go of all pretensions of being more than a four-legged creature, try to forget who she used to be, and try her best to rebuild her relationship with Ruth, not as equals, but as a domestic animal and its mistress. Ruth, though, did not seem quite so despondent as Tom did, but that was easy for her, she thought, as Ruth had the luxury of a human body; when she spoke, she sounded as if there were actually some point to a conversation between the two, but such things were always going to be one-sided and unsatisfactory: far better to let things go, try to forget human language; then she might be relieved of the torment of remembering what it was like to be able to speak and to understand, and perhaps stupidity and ignorance would close in on her until at last she was unable to recall the things she used to do and enjoy, or think of anything more rewarding than walks, smells or her next meal. Canine, stupid and ignorant she might become: but at least she might become canine, stupid, ignorant and happy. "How are we going to talk? I could ask you to bark once for A, twice for B, and so on, but that would take forev... Oh! I know! I've got it!" Ruth jumped up and launched into an excited description of exactly what she had got, far too quickly to be within Tom's capabilities of getting what she had got; Ruth then rushed off, presumably to get whatever it was that she had got, while Tom waited patiently for her to get it. Presently, she returned and Tom then saw that what she had got was a pencil and a sheet of blank A4 paper, which she laid in the coffee table in front of the sofa. "Get this," she said, and proceeded to draw rows of boxes on the paper, filling in each row with the letters A-G, then H-N, O-U and V-Z. For good measure, she added the numbers 0-9 at the top, then, as an afterthought, drew two more on the short row beside the Z, marked YES and NO. She then placed the paper on the floor in front of Tom and offered the pencil for her to take in her mouth, which she did. "Point to the letters," Ruth instructed her. Tom immediately bent over the paper to write. I L O V E Y O U She then looked up at Ruth to see tears running down her face. "Why ... how ..." she sobbed. G A B R I E L "Gabriel? That gangster? The man who ..." Yes "He killed you? And you came back as ... as a ..." she broke off, unable to complete the question. No H E C H A N G E D M E "Changed? How?" H E H A S S O M E T H I N G T H A T D O E S T H I S Ruth and Tom spent hours poring over a sheet of paper on the floor, with Ruth making a new one every so often once too many holes had appeared in the one they were using. They broke off once or twice so that Ruth could fill a bowl with water, or find some raw chicken, after an internet search for food suitable for dogs. Tom, having eaten by lifting food directly with her mouth, and washed that down by lapping from the bowl with her tongue, then watched enviously as Ruth sat on the sofa holding a plate, from which she ate with a fork, or sipped at a cup of coffee. By evening, though, Tom had managed to tell the whole story, from her abduction, right through to the present moment, including everything: being tortured, transformed, abandoned in the middle of Epping Forest, and her epic journey home. She left nothing out; Ruth found herself in tears through much of it as she was told of the emotional turmoil her husband had suffered, not least at her own hand, when her repeated rejections had so much worsened Tom's heartbreak at being reunited with her in such unbearable circumstances. "I can't imagine what it was like," she mused, partly to herself, "What this must be like for you." I T S H O R R I B L E I T S H U M I L I A T I N G Ruth sobbed audibly and shuffled closer; Tom dropped the pencil when she realised what Ruth was about to do. She turned to face her wife and now made a gargantuan effort to do something she had tried many times, only to be tortured by failure: the sounds she made were a muted, restrained growling, followed by a soft howl, which was the closest she could get to a vowel sound. To any other observer, it would merely have been a normal, meaningless canine noise, but Ruth immediately recognised the pathetic attempt to speak; to her, the word was quite clear: "Rrrroooo..." "Oh, my God, you're trying to talk to me, aren't you? You're trying to say my name! You poor thing. Come here." Tom allowed her to throw her arms around the part of her body where her shoulders should have been; Ruth squeezed her, but although the hug was supposed to be loving, it was uncomfortable; her body was not built the way it used to be and was no longer suitable for hugging a person, but she tolerated it, because she was so relieved at finally achieving the bliss of having a woman put her arms around her, even if that woman was only crying into her fur. **** By the time Tom's story had been told in full, it was nearly bedtime. Ruth apologised before pouring herself a large brandy; Tom used the paper to tell her to go ahead, and to bemoan the fact the the most upsetting thing was not that she felt deprived, but that she seemed to have lost the taste for such things: she did not feel the need for anything stronger than water. There was more upset to come, though. Ruth could not bring herself to make Tom sleep in the kitchen, or even in a chair; she could sleep on top of the bed beside her. Much as Tom would have loved, it was completely impractical to try to crawl under the covers: with her fur, she would have been too warm in any case; but the worst thing of all was when Ruth undressed. Tom found herself looking forlornly at her wife's lovely body: her perfect figure and soft, rounded breasts; long before Ruth had covered herself by dropping her night-dress over her head, Tom had lain on her side, closed her eyes, and was doing her best to suppress the quiet, sad whining that was somehow managing to escape through her nostrils. Ruth not only sensed her pain, but almost shared it; while the body stretched out on her bed offered no physical attraction whatsoever, she did retain an affinity for the tiny remnants of a man she knew was trapped and muted by its disabilities; as she climbed into bed she gave Tom an empathetic stroke on the head: but there were no words she could find that would make either of them feel any happier. The days and weeks that stretched out before them turned into a constant battle to rebuild what little of their lives remained. Ruth explained that she had decided to take leave of absence from the shop she owned, after the disappearance of her husband, but had decided she would rather have something to occupy her mind, so with the approval of most of her friends, she had returned: the very same day Tom had found her way home, in fact. Ruth's friends turned out to be supportive; she regularly received phone calls and visits, and Tom's presence was universally approved: everyone thought it a great idea for her to have company while she was waiting for news. One of her friends wondered what Tom would think of Missy, then naughtily added that her husband was just going to have to accept the fact that she was the mistress of a black Lab. Having voluntarily ended her leave, Ruth felt unable to prolong her second absence, so she returned to work after two days. That, however, meant she was forced to lock Tom in the house while she was out: although she could be trusted with an entire day's supply of food and water, being intellectually capable of regulating her intake, she was unable to open the back door for herself, and so was forced to suffer the humiliation of being let out into the garden before her wife left in the morning, and again (occasionally in desperation) upon her return at lunch time and in the evening. Ruth left all the internal doors ajar for her and the television on, with Active Standby disabled, as Tom was no more capable of stopping it switching itself off than she was able to turn it back on again: using the remote control was, of course, out of the question, but much worse was her inability to cope with the complexity of the vast number of buttons and their tiny lettering (even without the frustrating clumsiness of paws that could not have pressed the correct button, had she been able to work out which was which). She was therefore stuck with the same channel all day, like it or not. Evenings were better than daytime (at least for Tom); while their social life was now almost non-existent, with no more visits to bars or restaurants (at least for Tom), they did walk together more than they used to. Most of their time at home was a bitter-sweet experience (though mainly bitter) as Tom was forced to watch helplessly while Ruth performed all of the household tasks, including struggling with heavy objects that she would once have willingly, and easily, lifted for her. She would, she mused sadly, be willing to give her right arm to be able to help, if only she had a right arm to give. To begin with, both had expected that sitting down together in front of the television would be the one thing they could still share as before, since even a dog was able to watch and listen; but that also turned out to be a severe disappointment: in almost every case, the dialogue was too fast and too sophisticated for Tom to be able to keep up with the story, so she was forced to content herself with lying with her head on Ruth's lap, being petted, while her mistress enjoyed something that was far beyond her capacity to understand. Christmas and the new year came and went, with Ruth visiting her family and attending a few parties; to all of them she went alone, with Tom assuring her she would be fine if left to herself (she was not). Spring came and went, with more time spent outdoors. Summer came and went, with the garden furniture seeing more use (at least by Ruth) than the living- room sofa, and Ruth sunbathing in a bikini, which was a sight that (even by that time) still tortured her former husband. Another Christmas, and another spring, came and went, with Tom and Ruth slowly settling into their new lives; the day-to-day activities of a woman and her pet Labrador became second nature, and no-one observing them would ever dream that Tom had been born as anything other than a puppy. It became less painful, for both, to try to forget that she had once been a human male, and once they had succeeded in letting go of any forlorn hope that she might one day be a man again, and accepted that she would always be as she was now, both felt happier, if only a little. Tom, to her surprise, began to realise there were some things she enjoyed, and that more and more things ceased to be blighted by her canine form. The only anomaly that remained in their relationship was that they still talked to each other, even though one side of the conversation involved silently pointing at boxes on a sheet of paper. Ruth, to Tom's mind, was no longer her wife: she was her owner. **** Ruth was sitting on the floor, leaning her back against the sofa, in her usual pose; Tom was lying beside her, with her head in her lap, dozing as Ruth watched the latest episode of a detective series on the television: it was over a year since Tom had, in frustration, given up trying to watch programmes made for human beings. As time passed, she was finding it more and more difficult to think of herself as a man: trying to remember what it had been like to be human was becoming an effort; although she was vaguely aware that she was not completely satisfied or happy to be a dumb animal, and she knew she envied humans and the things they were able to do, she could not truly imagine herself being anything other than the Labrador she had come to regard as her identity. The past and future were abstractions that were beyond the intellect of such creatures as she, and not only was Tom finding it a struggle to hold on to these concepts, she also had to face the creeping dread that a day may dawn when she had no knowledge or understanding of anything other than what simply was, and she would then be prevented even from remembering that she had once been human. The episode came to an end and was followed by the news. Tom pricked up her ears slightly; unlike most actors, newsreaders tended to speak more slowly and clearly, and it was usually possible for her to listen successfully, although, ironically, that meant the programmes she was able to understand were about things which were far beyond her limited sphere of existence: travel, to be enjoyed by humans; tax, to be paid by humans; employment, affecting only humans; sometimes there was talk of elections in which she would have no vote, or politics about which she was fully justified in being completely apathetic. She half- listened: tonight was one of those increasingly rare occasions when she found herself wishing she still had a reason to take an interest in current affairs. Towards the end she suddenly sat up, fully alert, listening attentively, and making Ruth turn her head to look at her in surprise; it had been a long time since Tom had acted out the fantasy of according relevance to what was going on in the world. "Grrrr!" Tom growled; unbeknown to Ruth, she was exactly reliving her first failure to speak upon becoming a Labrador. "What?" was Ruth's reaction, but when Tom only repeated the same growl, Ruth sensed she might want to talk, so she fetched one of the sheets, laying it on the floor in front of her, then offering the pencil. Tom immediately bent her head over the paper and wrote a single word. G A B R I E L "You're joking!" Ruth exclaimed. "Where?" Tom again began to write, but Ruth ignored her. They had been watching BBC news, so she immediately switched to iPlayer and found the report that had just finished; Tom gave up trying to talk for the moment, and they now watched together; this time both were fully attentive. The report told the story of a shooting in the Brixton area of London: six men had been found dead in what was initially suspected to be a terrorist incident; although it was not officially confirmed, the security service MI5 were believed to be engaged; the authorities had now discounted terrorism, believing the killings to be an execution carried out by organised crime; however MI5 had retained an interest after declassification of the incident, primarily because of the type of weapon believed to have been used; according to witness reports and some low quality CCTV footage, the weapons used by the killers were suspected to be Russian PP-2000 submachine guns. The officer in charge, DCI Danny North, made a brief statement that said very little about what had happened, and even less about how the authorities intended to proceed; but if any member of the public would like to volunteer any information relating to the aforesaid incident, the police would be very happy to receive it. The moment the report ended Ruth listened in confusion as Tom began making a succession of uncharacteristic growling noises, completely unlike the sounds she usually made when trying to communicate; she suspected she had been trying to speak. That was exactly the case: in her excitement, Tom had momentarily overlooked her lack of a human voice, and was well into her explanation before breaking off into a pained whimper as she became aware of the sounds she was actually making, and the vast gulf between reality and the words in her head. "Here," Ruth said kindly, offering Tom the pencil with all the sympathy she could. She then watched as, letter by letter, Tom's thoughts were revealed to her. G A B R I E L B O U G H T P P 2 0 0 0 S F R O M S T E P H A N G O L D B E R G "Okay, but who's Stephan Goldberg?" A R M S D E A L E R "I doubt if anyone could prove it. These guys are too careful." I H A V E P H O T O S "Where?" A T T H E P A P E R "How can we get them?" W E H A V E T O G O T O T H E P O L I C E "And say what?" T E L L T H E M E V E R Y T H I N G I K N O W T H E Y A S K E D T H E P U B L I C "Unfortunately, in the eyes of the police, you won't qualify as a member of the public." S O Y O U G O "Me? What do I know?" I L L T E L L Y O U Neither slept that night: Tom and Ruth sat for hours pouring over several sheets of paper as, frustratingly slowly, they worked through the painstaking task of committing everything Tom knew to paper. Ruth sat and wrote everything down as she watched it spelt out on the floor. By ten o'clock the following morning, a Sunday, fortunately, Ruth was reading her transcript aloud while Tom listened carefully; she then began to struggle to lift the pencil again: once Ruth had presented it to her she pointed at one box: "Yes." Ruth stared at the papers in awe; she had already heard (or rather, read) much of the story, but it had been told from Tom's own perspective, concentrating mainly on her transformation and struggle to reunite herself with her former wife, and had left out a lot of the detail concerning her investigation of Gabriel and his activities. The information Ruth now held in her hand was of extreme importance, and she realised that, together with the report and images on the computer at the newspaper office, they would form what her journalist husband would have described as, "Dynamite." "Why haven't you told me all this before?" I S O R T O F L O S T I N T E R E S T I N A L O T O F S T U F F "Yeah, I suppose you would, wouldn't you? Sorry," Ruth apologised; she sounded close to tears, then suddenly pulled herself together. "I'm exhausted," she said, "And you must be too. Lie down for a bit. I'm going to have a nap here." She stretched out on the sofa and took up her phone. "I'll set my alarm for two hours. Then we'll grab a bite to eat and this afternoon we're going to see DCI Danny North. I just hope he's working today." **** Chapter 5. From the Jaws of Victory Ruth drove to the nearest car park she could find to the police station where DCI North was based. Tom was glad to be out of the car: not being able to use the seats, she had been forced to curl up in the front passenger foot well, and the motion of the vehicle, combined with her inability to hold on to anything, brought back painful memories of the day she had been driven into Epping Forest to be abandoned there. Her first time in a car for more than a year and a half: her beloved Audi, that she desperately wished she could drive once again, and all it did was make her feel nauseous. The walk to their destination took about fifteen minutes, and was pleasant from one point of view, being a warm, sunny afternoon in late June; however it was extremely unpleasant from another: due to by-laws, Tom had to be kept on a lead. Ruth apologised profusely as she clipped it on, exactly as she always did: she believed she hated having to restrain Tom as much as Tom did in suffering it, however in reality Tom had little objection: as man and wife they had always walked side-by- side; and apart from the fact that Tom would have much preferred her head to be slightly above Ruth's, as it used to be, instead of at knee level as it was now, the ex-couple were walking as they always had: the hypothetical constraints imposed by a lead were nothing compared to the physical constraints imposed by her body, so why should the lead matter? It mattered because Tom knew it was there. She walked obediently at heel until they reached the entrance; Ruth then led her into the reception area and towards the desk sergeant, who looked up and immediately scowled. "I'm sorry, madam," he said loudly, "You can't bring an animal in here. You'll have to leave it outside." "Please, we need to see DCI North. Is he in today?" "If you would return without your animal, I'll attend to you then." "Tom, I'm so sorry," Ruth said as she secured the lead to a railing, "I won't leave you here for a moment longer than I possibly can." She received a soft woof in acknowledgement and turned to leave, while Tom made herself as comfortable as she could on the hard pavement, sitting upright. It was at times like these that she felt at her worst: watching people walk past, free to make their own decisions, able to do things she could only dream of, while she had no option but to wait until her mistress returned for her. Tom felt insulted that the law required her to be tethered, as if she were an ignorant beast who would wander off unbidden, but neither her sense of responsibility nor her trustworthiness counted for anything, because her reliability was irrelevant; "Would not," was completely outweighed by, "Could not," since Tom, willing or unwilling, was in reality unable to do anything until Ruth's human fingers released her from captivity. Her wait was long and tedious; tedium was something that did not usually bother Tom so much these days, being a normal day to day experience for the prisoner of Missy's body, but yesterday and today, she had been given a fleeting glimpse of something she had thought herself incapable of ever achieving: finally she was back on the trail of Salvatore Gabriel. Suddenly, life had meaning again, and to have come so close, only to be left out just as things started to become exciting was making her regress to the point where her physical shape was an intolerable frustration. Had she known it, though, her wife was experiencing a frustration that was no more tolerable than her former husband's. **** "Just give me five more minutes of your time. Please," Ruth implored, but DCI North stared dispassionately back at her. "Five minutes?" he growled, "I'm within five seconds of charging you with wasting police time." Ruth sighed; both her inhalation and exhalation stuttered with emotion; they stared at each other for a few moments, each trying to weight the other up: he looks like a reasonable man, level headed, Ruth thought as she considered him. His dark hair had tiny patches of grey, and he looked very slightly overweight, as if he had found himself faced with a progressive shift from active duty to extra desk work and meetings, and was struggling to adapt. His face was open and honest, his features well formed and handsome, with deep-set dark eyes and a firm mouth and chin; he must have been something to behold twenty years ago, she mused. She almost saw him as a fictional, idealised police officer; one who would risk his life to save you, then chew you up for being in danger in the first place, before gently putting his jacket around your shoulders and giving you all the time and attention you needed. "I would trust this man," Ruth thought to herself, "If only I could get him to trust - no, even just listen to me." "Look, please," she said, "If I'd been some crackpot, or trying to play a stupid joke ..." "My money's on the first one right now," he interrupted, but there was a softness to his voice that was not quite in keeping with the harshness of his words. She laughed half-heartedly in embarrassment. "Then my attitude would be that what I'm saying is perfectly reasonable, and that you were in the wrong not to believe me." "True, but what's your point?" "I agree that what I'm saying is ludicrous, impossible, and there's no way you should ever believe me ..." "So we agree it's the second one after all. Would you like me to read you a charge now, or perhaps a night in the cells first?" Ruth looked at him in trepidation, but his eyes were showing something that seemed like mild amusement. "Please, just five minutes. Then you can charge me." North sighed. "If I see this on YouTube, you will be spending a night in the cells." Tom involuntarily let out a happy whine and tried in vain not to wag her tail when she finally saw Ruth emerge from the police station in the company of a man she recognised from the television as Detective Chief Inspector Danny North. "Chief Inspector, this is Tom," Ruth said, "Tom, DCI North." Tom did her best to acknowledge North with a friendly bark. "Very polite," North observed, sounding sarcastic and impatient. "Tom," Ruth said immediately, "What's two plus three?" Tom barked five times. North looked impassive. "Seven minus five?" Tom barked twice. "You ask her something." "Seriously?" "Please?" North sighed again, now sounding as if he were reaching the end of his tether. "Six plus two minus four plus one?" Tom barked five times. "Congratulations," North said, turning his back on Tom to speak to Ruth, "I've no idea how you do it. Shall I arrest you now, or would you like to enjoy your last ..." (he looked at his watch) "two and a half minutes of freedom first?" "Please," Ruth said, now sounding near tears. She put her hand in her bag and pulled out one of the sheets of paper with the alphabet, plus the pencil, covered in tooth marks. "This is how we talk. I put the pencil in Tom's mouth and she points at the letters." "That's just going to be another trick." "Please. You've gone this far." "Come on. I can't believe I'm doing this." North led Ruth and Tom around the block into a side-street, and thence through the vehicle entrance to the police station. From there, they entered a small, dirty room near the door to the car park. Ruth laid the paper in front of Tom and gave her the pencil. "One minute left," North said without looking at his watch; the original five minutes had long since expired. "Thank you," Ruth breathed in reply and turned to look at Tom, smiling encouragingly. "What's your name?" she asked. T O M C A R T E R "What's my name?" R U T H C A R T E R What's this man's name?" D C I D A N N Y N O R T H "I'm willing to accept your dog is exceptionally intelligent and very well trained," North said, "It must be worth a fortune. You should insure it. Thanks for the show. I'll let you off with the charges. You can go home now." Ruth put her hand into her bag and held up the transcript of everything Tom had told her. "Ask yourself, where do you think I got this?" she implored North. "I'm betting that's your own handwriting. That's where." "You ask her a question. I'll go outside if you like." North looked at her in exasperation and shook his head. "First president of the United States of America?" G E O R G E W A S H I N G T O N "I didn't expect that, I'll be honest with you. When did the Titanic sink?" A P R I L 1 9 1 2 "Shit." "Not as shit as it is for us." **** Hours later, North, along with two of his colleagues, was sitting in stunned silence after witnessing Tom's corroboration of everything that had been in the transcript. She then gave a full account of the meeting she had witnessed in the disused factory two Novembers ago, and a description of the men present, especially Gabriel and Goldberg. One of the detectives, a woman, left to contact the newspaper and, shortly afterwards, returned with an iPad that she and her two male colleagues used to study a copy of Tom's report and photographs. "We had Goldberg down as a small-time dealer," North revealed, "This is the first evidence to come to light that he's been involved in anything as serious as this. I wish we'd known about this earlier. Why didn't you come to us before now?" G A B R I E L S T O P P E D M E T A L K I N G "We never covered that part of your ... em, claim ... properly. What's the story?" Tom began to explain, but Ruth, who knew the whole tale, interrupted and took over, being able to tell it more quickly. She described everything, from her husband's capture, transformation and journey home right through to their reunion, where she had been every bit as sceptical to begin with as had the detectives who were listening, still with a large measure of disbelief. "How long ago was this?" "A year and seven months," she squeaked, with tears in her eyes. The female detective looked from Tom to Ruth in abject sympathy, looking devastated on their behalf, while the two men shifted uncomfortably in their seats, discreetly trying to adjust their clothing. "I think we should have a look at the factory you followed Goldberg to," North said, grateful for a way to change the subject, if only slightly. To expedite the investigation, they travelled in police vehicles, since Ruth's car (only Tom entertained any serious notion that it belonged to her) was some distance away. That meant Tom being forced to comply with regulations by allowing herself to be caged in the back of a police dog handler's van. However Ruth, to Tom's undying gratitude, declined the comfort of the police car she was offered, instead opting to travel in the same vehicle as her husband, albeit with the advantage of being seated. Tom again had to suffer a lead when they arrived, but by then her enthusiasm was so great that she refused to be upset by anything; she strained at it as she led DCI North (who had elected to be her handler) towards the main entrance, then the broken wall she had used. Returning to the front of the building, Ruth was distressed to notice the unexpected change in her husband's manner: in her eagerness, Tom was pulling at her lead, wagging her tail and snuffling at the ground just like any other dog would; her excitement was making her seem less, rather than more, human. When they reached the platform, Tom found she was unable to scale it: "Put your front paws up," North suggested pragmatically, without the smallest thought for her feelings, "And I'll help you." Tom did as instructed and, to her surprise, North used one hand to take hold of her collar, for balance, and his other arm he placed on her rump, lifting her by the hind legs, before depositing her on the platform. She scrabbled a little to regain her footing, then whined at the indignation at being manhandled like that, or perhaps at being unable to climb for herself, or, more likely, both. She led North to the room where she had witnessed the meeting between Gabriel and Goldberg. North stopped at the door, and held her lead firmly, preventing Tom from entering. Another officer caught up and appeared at North's shoulder. "Best not go in, sir," he advised and North nodded in agreement. "I'll get forensics to set up here. Best not let the animal in, either, sir. It would only destroy evidence." When they made their way back and reached the edge of the platform, Ruth elected to help Tom down this time, which she did by lifting her from beneath, with her arms around all four legs, an experience Tom found only slightly less humiliating than the way she had made her ascent. North then addressed both of them. "I think that's all," he concluded, "We'll take it from here. Once we have something concrete, we'll be in touch. I promise, no matter how things turn out, I will contact you as soon as I have something to tell you. Now, if you don't mind, one of the officers will drop you off at your car." "Thank you," Ruth replied, "Just do me one favour, would you? When you arrest Gabriel, please, please, find that medallion." **** "So now, all we can do is wait," Ruth said gently, reclining in her usual position of late, on the floor with her back against the sofa, allowing Tom to lie beside her and put her head on her lap. She played affectionately with her ears. "Hopefully it won't be too long." Tom lifted her head and barked twice, which Ruth understood to be an agreement of, "No." Unfortunately, their hopes turned out to be ill-founded. Weeks passed without any word from the police, and as time went on, Tom found herself drifting back into her old state of hopeless endurance. For a while, she had greeted each morning with an excited anticipation that today might be the last where she would awaken to find paws on the ends of her limbs; but by the time November had come around, she was back in a state of sorry resignation that each morning's self-discovery was becoming less and less hopeful than the last. Tom was fully anticipating a third Christmas where the only way she was able to say, "Merry Christmas, darling, I love you," was a way that would make it impossible to maintain eye contact with Ruth while she said it. A Christmas greeting delivered with a pencil in her mouth was three days from becoming a reality when Tom had an idea completely out of the blue. Ruth had left some blank paper on the dining table so Tom, while Ruth was not in the room, stood up at the table with her paws on the surface. Cursing the way her limbs worked and the inconvenient way her joints flexed, she struggled until she managed to press a front paw and part of her foreleg on top of the pile of paper. She then twisted around and, after recovering from the fall, looked up to see the top sheet had done exactly what she hoped it would: it was partly overhanging the edge. She put her paws on a chair this time and gripped the paper in her mouth, then scampered off to the utility room, where the back door was usually open. Ruth was nowhere to be seen. Folding a sheet of paper was one of the most difficult tasks she had ever experienced, but with one paw on a short edge, she managed to scrape the other end off the tiled floor and push it with her snout, until she was able to press her nose down at (she hoped) the half way point. She then went out to the garden, where she succeeded in dirtying just one front paw, then limped back to the house on three legs. Her dirty paw she used to stand on the paper a few times, then, once her feet were clean, began pressing them on the fold she had begun earlier. Finally, she pushed the paper under the fridge. The twenty-fifth of December arrived, and Ruth and Tom exchanged their now customary Merry Christmases with each other, before Tom ran out unexpectedly. Ruth, puzzled, followed to find her whining in frustration and scrabbling at the bottom of the fridge with her paws: she had naively forgotten that, having pushed the paper under the fridge, her body possessed nothing that she could use to retrieve it. "What is it, Tom?" Ruth asked, "Is there something under there?" Ruth knelt down and ducked her head. "Looks like a bit of paper," she said, "How did it get under there?" She wiggled her finger underneath until she managed to pull out a corner, then carefully withdrew a roughly folded sheet of paper and examined it. Tears immediately began to run down her cheeks as she stared in disbelief. It took almost fifteen seconds to sob and stutter her way through the next thing she said, but she eventually managed to force the question out. "Th... this ... is ... a ... a ... Chr... Christ...mas c... card ... isn't ... it?" The paper was not so much folded as creased and crumpled; it looked more like it had been caught in something and scrunched up by accident; it was slightly grubby, but on what Ruth recognised to be intended as the front, there were two muddy paw prints, presumably in place of the words Merry Christmas. Then she pulled the paper flat, as if opening a card, to find three paw marks, which immediately leapt out as a heartbreaking substitute for the three little words Tom so badly desired to be able to speak. "How on earth did you manage to do this?" she sobbed, after taking several minutes to recover enough to be able to say it, "The effort this must have taken ... you were determined you were going to give me this, and you wouldn't give up, would you? This is beautiful. This is worth more than ..." she broke down into tears again and put her arms gently around Tom, her knees either side of her as the Labrador sat upright, allowing herself to be held. "You really are still in there, aren't you?" **** The raw emotion of that third Christmas Day of their new life together was a happy, but three-month-old, memory by the time DCI North finally telephoned. "Mrs. Carter?" he said, making Ruth gasp; she immediately recognised his voice. "Mrs. Ruth Carter?" "Yes!" she said in excitement, "Chief Inspector! How are you? Any news?" She could hear Tom whimpering in excitement at the mention of North's title. "I hope to have some soon. The reason I'm calling is really to apologise, because it's been so long since you've heard from me. I want you to know I haven't forgotten about you, although I admit that after all this time, you'd be justified in thinking I had. It's just that, until now, there has been nothing to tell. "I can't reveal anything about the case yet, but I do want you to know that we've made some good progress over the past few weeks, and I hope to see things move a bit quicker than they have been up till now. I sincerely hope that, in a few days time, I'll be in a position to bring you some good news. Unfortunately I can't promise anything, but I assure you that attempting to locate the artefact you described will be one of my priorities." Ruth returned to the living room to find Tom on the other side of the door, trying to prise it open with her nose, then with her paw, but failing on both counts; she apologised for pulling the door behind her, which she had done unthinkingly. Then she described the phone call and watched sadly as her husband's enthusiasm evaporated more and more with every word. "That's all he said, I'm afraid," she concluded sadly. "But I think we're in a better place now. Once we said all we could do was wait. Now we can hope, too." It was another three weeks before Ruth spoke to North again. This time, though, he had good news. After following a convoluted investigation, Gabriel had been arrested an hour earlier, and was expected to be remanded in custody pending trial. If they watched the evening news, he expected they would hear all about it from the media. However, the really positive news was that an exhaustive search, both of Gabriel's home and of any properties he was associated with, was now under way. The final stage, he hoped, of her and her husband's misfortune had begun in earnest. Ruth and Tom waited impatiently until the evening news was due to start; the television had been switched on within a few seconds and both spent most of their time in front of it, eagerly awaiting the news bulletin. Tom sat, glued to the screen, avidly watching whatever happened to be on, not caring how little she understood, and more than willing to forgive her canine aural system for failing to present her with much sense. Finally, the news arrived and Ruth sat on the floor in her customary position, but this time Tom sat upright beside her, her ears raised automatically, fully alert; Ruth put her arm around her. She had to bear the weight of her own arm, of course, since Tom did not have a shoulder for her to rest on, but it was a comforting feeling nevertheless, for both participants. They listened attentively to the main headline, about the arrest of several prominent, but as yet unnamed, businessmen: how the police had identified an arms dealer by the name of Stephan Goldberg and uncovered a store of illegal arms at a facility owned by a London holding company, also unidentified and known only as Company X; the directors had been arrested immediately; with painstaking research spanning several months, one payment from Company X to Goldberg had been traced back to another, wealthy but less-well-known, London businessman, who had been arrested that afternoon. DCI Danny North then spent almost five minutes in front of the camera being mercilessly bombarded by questions from the press, to which he refused to reveal any information at all; even the direct question, "It is rumoured that the businessman you arrested this afternoon is Salvatore Gabriel. Can you confirm this to be the case?" was stonewalled. Ruth switched off the television; she rubbed Tom's side and slid down lower against the sofa to bring their heads together. "It shouldn't be long now. I just wish this was all over and I had you back!" Tom made a positive-sounding whine in reply. "I know!" Ruth exclaimed happily, "Let's celebrate with a drink!" and when Tom whined unhappily, added, "Of water." She leapt up and made off to the kitchen, returning with Tom's drinking bowl, and a glass filled with clear liquid. "It's water, I promise," she laughed. The bowl she laid down in front of Tom and the glass she raised. "To us," she said, and Tom replied with a happy woof; Ruth then tapped the base of her glass against the rim of the bowl and they both drank. **** One week passed. Two. Three. Still there was no word from North. By the time May was drawing to a close, Tom was fed up, once again, with the peaks and troughs of her life: it seemed that every time something happened to raise her hopes, they were left hanging until they fizzled out into the most depressing kind of disappointment. The last day or two of May finally brought the news they had been waiting for. The phone rang and, when Ruth answered, Tom clearly heard her greet Chief Inspector North enthusiastically. She followed into the kitchen, where Ruth had left her mobile, and listened attentively, her tail wagging for the first time in weeks. However, as the conversation advanced, she became aware of her wife's voice becoming gradually more quiet, until she rang off with a, "Thank you, I'll see you shortly," that sounded disappointed in the extreme. Ruth almost threw her phone onto the table and walked straight past Tom into the living room, where she sat on the sofa with her head in her hands. Tom followed in a state of dread; she sat beside her wife and whined quietly. Finally Ruth spoke. "That was DCI North," she said; Tom barked gently in acknowledgement. "He's coming over to see us." Tom replied in the same way. Ruth had spoken with her head still bowed and resting on her hands; now she raised her face to look Tom in the eye. She was crying. "Tom?" "Rrrr?" "He said it's not good news." **** Chapter 6. An Inspector Calls The doorbell rang; Tom whined miserably: she felt as if she were in court, waiting for the entry of the judge, certain that she was about to be sentenced to life imprisonment. Ruth left the room, quickly returning with DCI North in her wake. "Would you like a coffee? Tea?" Ruth asked. As he took a seat, North glanced at Tom and shook his head. "No, thanks," he replied, "I'm good." "So," Ruth pressed, "You wanted to see us. I hope you have some good news at last?" she did not sound anywhere near as hopeful as her words. "I'd better get straight to the point," North replied, "I'm sorry, but we've now completed an exhaustive search of every property owned by Gabriel and, I regret to inform you, we have been unable to recover anything resembling the medallion you described." "Then surely there must be somewhere you haven't looked yet," Ruth countered; despite the directness of her words, she sounded desperate and not aggressive. North shook his head. We've engaged forensics, security services - experts in uncovering concealed storage, but even with the most sophisticated equipment, there is not a trace of it." "It can't just disappear in to thin air. It has to be somewhere!" "If it exists. I'm not ..." (he held his hand up, palm outwards, when he saw that Ruth was about to argue) "... going to offend you by saying I don't believe you, but ... I think we're going to have to accept that whatever has happened to it, we're not going to find out. It's lost." Tom seemed to have stopped listening by this point, and when Chief Inspector North made his excuses, along the lines of, "Well, I'd better not take up any more of your time," and left, she remained down, her head on her front paws, looking disinterested. However, when Ruth showed North out, she was a long time in returning and Tom went to look for her, discovering her with her head resting against the inside of the front door, weeping profusely. Tom whined and Ruth turned to look down at her, then walked past her and into the living room, where she threw herself onto the sofa and wept into a pillow. Tom rested her paws on Ruth's thigh and tried to push her snout under her wife's arm. Presently Ruth sat up and stroked Tom's head. "Oh, God," she blubbered, "What are we going to do now?" Tom pulled away, ducking her hear towards the floor once or twice, giving Ruth the agreed signal that she wanted to talk. Ruth sighed and fetched one of Tom's alphabet grids. I L L B E O K "But will you? Until now, we've always had hope. Not much, maybe, but it's always been there. Now even that's gone. We've lost everything." E X C E P T E A C H O T H E R Ruth laughed, but even that quickly deteriorated into a sob. "So that's it, then? This is what we are now? A widow and her pet Labrador?" N O T H I N G W E C A N D O A B O U T I T "So we just make the most of it?" I H A T E T H I S B U T Yes "Tom, I am so, so, sorry. I'd do anything to ..." (she sighed) "This certainly puts things in perspective for me." Tom did not understand, and Ruth did not explain her mysterious remark. Had Tom been able, she would have asked Ruth what she meant, but decided that it would be too tiresome to pose the question via her slow, limited means of communication. Instead, she changed the subject to something she had been slowly resigning herself to: she was no longer Tom Carter, and never would be again. Y O U S H O U L D C A L L M E M I S S Y "No. I'll always call you by your real name. You've lost ... we've lost so much, I couldn't bear to take that away from you too." **** That December Ruth did not receive a repeat of her messy, badly folded, almost unrecognisable, beautiful Christmas card, but she had been aware for some time that she ought not to expect anything like that again. The only present she gave within her own household was a toy: a bone that squeaked when it was pressed. One Saturday evening in the middle of January, the bell rang unexpectedly and Ruth arrived at the front door to find she had been beaten to it as usual. She pulled the door ajar, which was as far as she could, to see DCI North standing on the step. The impediment to the inspector's entrance was now trying to push between Ruth's leg and the door; Ruth pushed gently back and looked down with a mixture of indulgence and exasperation. "Get out of the way, Missy, for goodness sake," Ruth said with a laugh, "Let the poor man in the door! Come on, shoo! Good girl!" Finally the door opened to let North see a black Labrador loping happily through the entrance to the living room. He looked up in surprise, but before he was able to say anything, Ruth spoke first. "Sorry about that," she apologised with a mildly embarrassed laugh, "Come in. Can I make you a tea or a coffee?" "Coffee would be great, thanks," he replied, following on the trail of Ruth's former husband, while Ruth herself went straight to the kitchen, where she quickly made two instant coffees; the kettle had boiled only moments before the bell had rung. She loaded the drinks onto a tray along with sugar, milk and a few assorted biscuits. While she worked, she could hear North's voice drifting through the adjoining door between the rooms. "Good to see you again, Tom," he said, them, after a pause, "Tom? Tom Carter?" He then fell silent. When Ruth entered, she could sense him staring at her as she walked around the coffee table to lay down the tray. Eventually looking up at him, she saw he was frowning and looked concerned. She sat down beside him and smiled faintly. "It's nice of you to drop in," she opened, "But I'm guessing you're here for a reason." "I am, actually. I came to see you and ... you called her Missy." Ruth nodded. "She asked me to. A few months ago." "She ask... why?" "Why do you think? Look at her!" Missy was lying in front of the fireplace, with a toy trapped between her front paws, busying herself with the important task of chewing the part that protruded upwards. She was completely absorbed, and seemed completely unaware of the two human beings watching her, or of the conversation taking place between them. "She's like that all the time now, and chewing that thing is one of her favourite pastimes. It's supposed to squeak, but she's worried at it so much the squeaker's stopped working, thank goodness! It was driving me crazy before she broke it." Ruth broke down into tears at her own words. North pulled out a packet of paper hankies and offered one to her. She accepted it gratefully. "The day you told us the medallion was lost," she continued with a struggle, "We had a tough time of it after you left." "Yeah, I can imagine. I felt pretty shit myself." "That was when she asked me to start calling her Missy. I refused, but then, in August or September, she asked again, and I knew how unhappy she was. It was tearing me up inside so see her sometimes, so this time I agreed. I started calling her Missy, more and more as time went on, and then she stopped answering to her old name, so I gave up using it, and I haven't tried calling her Tom for two or three months now. "We also haven't used the paper with letters on it for ... God, must be nearly six months. I don't think she understands what I'm saying any more. I'll show you. "Tom!" she called, "Tom! Over here! We need to talk to you!" Missy carried on with her occupation as if nothing had happened. "See? Now watch this. Missy!" Missy stopped chewing the toy bone and looked up. "Missy! Here, Missy! Good girl!" Missy obediently trotted over and stood, expecting to be petted, which she was. Ruth turned to look at North, with a distraught expression. Missy, seemingly disappointed at not being given a reward, returned to the hearth and began the process of manoeuvring her toy back into position. She seemed not in the least upset by the difficulty of manipulating it with only paws to work with: the challenges presented by her inherent clumsiness seemed a normal part of her day to day life. "I think she's finally ... assimilated, if that's the right word, into being ..." (she shrugged reluctantly) "a ... a ... I've been forced to accept that my husband's dead. Effectiv..." Her face twisted and she broke down into tears before she was able to finish what she was trying to say. North put his hand on her shoulder in an attempt to comfort her. Missy carried on with her attempt to destroy her toy as if nothing had happened. North sighed. "I came here," he said uncertainly, "Because I thought I had some good news for you, but it looks like I'm too late. I'm sorry." "Why? What did you have in mind? Because I could really do with some good news right now." North lifted his jacket, which he had earlier laid on the sofa beside him and slid his hand into the inside pocket, from which he produced a bag marked, "Police," and "Evidence." Inside, through the window, Ruth could see another bag, but this one was made of black cloth. Ruth gasped, but it was a long, slowly drawn gasp, as she watched North, without removing it from the evidence bag, draw open the inner one and slowly remove a chain, followed by a shabby, gold or bronze coloured medallion. "Is ... that ..." she stammered after a pause, "Is that it? The medallion that changed Tom?" "I believe it is. The question is, is it of any use now?" Ruth extended her arm, lifting the chain from North's open hand, and raised the medallion in front of her face, gazing at it in wonder. "You've no idea how badly I've wanted this," she said vacantly. "I think I can guess," came the reply. Ruth's eyes met his; she looked deadly serious. "Tom," Ruth said to the figure lying on the carpet a few feet from her, "Look!" There was no reaction so she persevered, "Missy!" The Labrador looked up upon recognising her own name, but only for a second or two, before busying herself as before. Ruth, though, was not willing to give up so easily. She walked over and stood directly in front of her, dangling the medallion where she could not possibly fail to see it if she raised her head again. "Missy!" she commanded, "Missy, look, good girl!" Missy raised her head again, but her only thought seemed to be puzzlement at why her mistress was disturbing her without producing anything edible to give her. As a last resort, Ruth walked over to the sideboard, laying the medallion on the coffee table as she passed; she rummaged in one of the drawers for a few seconds, before removing a sheet of paper, which she laid down in front of Missy, offering her a pencil. "Remember these?" she said, sounding as if she were pleading, "Point to the letters, Missy. Tom." Missy took the pencil in her mouth; there was the sound of a snap, and she dropped two pieces of broken wood on the floor in disgust. Ruth looked up at North: she was devastated. "Let me try," North said in reply to the look on Ruth's face. He walked over and stood exactly where Ruth had been. "Missy!" he said sharply, "Tom!" then he paused before continuing, "Gabriel! Remember, Tom? Gabriel!" Missy lifted her head, growled briefly, then resumed chewing the toy as if she had immediately forgotten. "Salvatore Gabriel!" Missy now lifted her head in earnest, growling angrily as if she thought North to be a threat. North lifted the medallion from the table and held it up like a lawyer in court, producing damning evidence to secure a conviction. "Do you remember this?" he accused Missy, who only growled one more before returning her teeth to their original purpose, which was still held between her paws. "Come on, Tom, you know what this is, don't you?" Missy showed no further interest in North, or in anything he was saying or doing. "Do you not remember what this did to you?" "Grrrr!" was the only response, but it was unclear whether the growl was aimed at North, or at the toy bone. North discarded the medallion on the coffee table and sat beside Ruth, who had herself sunk onto the sofa in despair. "I'm sorry," he said, "I think you're right. Tom isn't in there any more." "How did you find it?" Ruth asked, "I thought it was lost?" "We all did, though I think most of us found it easier to believe it never existed in the first place. Then, this morning, one of my officers pointed out that when we were arresting Gabriel, he tried to escape by fleeing towards one of the outhouses of his property. At the time, we assumed he was simply acting in desperation, but she questioned that assumption. What if, she said, there was more to that outhouse than meets the eye? Suppose there had been another way out? So we revisited the site straight away, but this time we concentrated our efforts there. We found a concealed drain, and inside it was a recess with a safe. Forensics opened it and there was the medallion, in the same bag Tom ... you had described. We have Detective Sergeant Tessa Reynolds to thank, but it's just a shame that she didn't have her flash of inspiration last summer." "So what will happen to it now?" "I'm not here. Not officially. At the moment, I'm returning from the site to the police station, where I will register this as evidence. Once I have, I don't expect to see it again. If this does what you say it does," (he shrugged in response to Ruth's vigorous nodding) "it will very quickly become the property of some government department and it'll be completely deniable. The reason I stopped here on my way was because this is your one chance to restore your husband. The people who would end up in charge of it are ruthless, take it from me. They'd sooner let someone live out the rest of their life as an animal than admit to the existence if this thing." "I'm grateful to you for trying." "We're not beaten yet." North took out his phone, tapped on he screen, then stood in front of Missy. "Tom," he said assertively, "Tom Carter." He held his phone up to show Missy the image on it: it was a picture of Salvatore Gabriel from a news app. "Salvatore Gabriel," North said loudly and slowly. Missy looked up and when she saw what North was holding out to her, she began growling again, then stood and barked angrily. Ruth retrieved her own phone from the table and found a picture of Tom and herself. When Missy saw the photograph Ruth was showing her, she stopped barking and began to whine plaintively. Ruth gave her another pencil; Missy immediately returned to the paper with the alphabet and bent over it. I L U V Y O Ruth knelt beside Missy and hugged her. "I love you too," she said half- laughing and half-crying, "You're forgetting how to spell, aren't you? But you haven't forgotten how we feel about each other." No N E V R "We've brought you back, Tom. Thanks goodness. To begin with, I thought we'd lost you for ever." Y O V J U S T M A D M E S A D A G E N "No, I've no intention of making you sad again. We're going make you human again. Remember this?" Ruth lifted the medallion from the coffee table and held it up where Missy could see it. She immediately barked happily and her tail began to wag instinctively. Ruth listened for a few seconds before she laughed and interrupted. "You know something? For the first time, we don't need that bit of paper. I understood every word you said! You just told me you love me, you're sick and tired of being a Labrador, and you don't want to waste another second before we go upstairs and use this thing right now." Missy replied with a single bark, remembering the old convention of one bark for yes and two for no. Ruth turned to face North. "Can we take this upstairs?" she said, "We need something Tom wore, apparently. I still have things of his in the wardrobe. I couldn't ..." (she stopped and bit her lip) "Anyway, nudity ... you know ... she won't be wearing anything when she turns back into ..." "Sure. How long do you need?" "Tom said the transformation can take, oh ... an hour and a half, I think." That was completely untrue, and Missy had told her the transformation would only take about half an hour, but she was unable to argue, and could only emit a puzzled whine, which neither of the humans understood. "Okay. I'm happy to wait." "Thank you. Make yourself comfortable, please. Feel free to make yourself tea or coffee. You'll find everything you need in the kitchen." "One more thing. Handle it by the chain. It would be good if you could avoid getting any of your fingerprints on the medallion itself." **** "Come on," Ruth said encouragingly, "I know you find it a bit hard now, but at least this is your last time on four legs." Missy, who was estimated by the vet to be over ten years old by now, was beginning to find stairs difficult; this was one of the few things so far that made her look her age. She leapt carefully up, thankful this was the last time she would experience such a struggle with steps, for a few decades at least, and that she was not going to have to descend on all fours. To her relief, the bedroom door was ajar; sometimes the draught from the open window would push it shut, and she was glad she would not have to suffer one final taste of the frustration she had been forced to tolerate all these years, staring forlornly at the door knob while she waited for her mistress to curl her fingers around it. Ruth followed her in and closed the door behind her. Missy had no objection, only a wish that she were able to make it clear that she expected Ruth to let her turn the door knob after they were finished. "So, let's see," Ruth began, as she opened a few drawers and doors and started lifting various items of clothing and examining them. "This will do, I think." She laid a shirt on the bed. "You wore that to Harry and Zoe's wedding about five years ago." Opening the main wardrobe, she began pushing hangers along the rail until she found what she was looking for: a deep maroon dress, which she held up in front of her and stared at with a curious, blank expression, as if unsure whether it would be suitable, but then she said, "And I wore this on the same day." Suddenly everything became clear; Missy looked at Ruth with a new-found respect, and her biggest regret was being unable to tell her wife what a genius she was; Ruth's mysterious lie about the hour and a half now made perfect sense. When she, Missy, became Tom once more, she would become a man almost five years younger than she would now have been, had her life followed its natural course; Ruth was going to reduce her own age by the same amount, and keep herself fifteen months younger than her husband. That was what the extra time was for; however Missy's admiration only increased her unbearable frustration at being able to congratulate her with nothing more than a few unintelligible growls and whimpers. Then came the second surprise. "I'll go first," Ruth said and threw the chain over her own head. Missy let out a puzzled, "Rrrr?" but was incapable of otherwise questioning her, and could only suffer the renewed frustration of being forced to wait at the beck and call of a human, no more able to act for herself, than she was able to understand why Ruth would make her wait one second longer than necessary before releasing her from her torment. Then came the third surprise. Ruth walked over to the bed, where she had earlier placed their clothes; she looked down at the two garments, seeming nervous and unsure; she stretched out her hand, which was trembling; Missy whined in shock and distress when she saw what her wife did next. Ruth hesitated for a few seconds, then lifted Tom's shirt and held it against the medallion. **** Chapter 7. Different for Girls Ruth gasped slightly and threw back her head when she felt a tingle wash over her; Missy whined in despair: in her sudden panic, she had begun to imagine that Ruth was going to take over as Tom and keep her trapped in her canine form permanently; should that be the case, there would be nothing she could do about it. Missy could only watch as her wife's features gradually changed: her face becoming more angular and stronger; she reached behind her back, inside the T-shirt, and unhooked her bra; after a few minutes she pulled down her jogging bottoms and removed her underwear: she now possessed small but easily recognisable male genitals; she opened a drawer, took out and donned a pair of boxer shorts belonging to Tom. Eventually, she pulled the T-shirt and bra over her head, first dropping the medallion inside the clothing she was taking off, to make sure it stayed around her neck. By the time half an hour had passed, Tom Carter was dressing himself; he removed the medallion and lifted the dress from the bed. "All right," he said, obviously pleased with the deep, rich sound he could make, "Your turn now." As he advanced, though, Missy backed away and began to growl menacingly, her hackles rising and her teeth bared. The new Tom hesitated, then began to walk towards her again, but she only growled more threateningly and began to crouch, as if preparing to pounce on him. He stopped and retreated. "We don't have to do this," he said, "If you want, you're welcome to stay as Missy for the rest of your life. Obviously, I don't want to do that to you, but I can't force you to become Ruth, and if you keep threatening me, I'll have no option but to give up." Missy did not pounce, but neither did she show any sign of relenting. "All we need to do is go back downstairs and give this to the Chief Inspector, and that'll be it. I'll tell him we couldn't get it to work, so in desperation we tried it on me, and now I'm stuck as Tom. Is that what you want?" He then paused, watching Missy carefully, trying to gauge her mood. "Look, I'm going to make you human again. I'm just not offering to change your sex." Missy broke off into a defeated whine, but there was still the trace of an angry growl lurking somewhere in her throat. Tom, though, decided to seize the moment. "You'd better lie down," he suggested, "You don't have much by the way of shoulders, and we don't want it to fall off before you've become fully human again." He had chosen the phrase, "Become fully human," carefully, and had wisely avoided any reference to gender. It took Missy only a moment or two to realise she had no option but to cooperate, so with a whimper that sounded suspiciously like a gulp of alarm, lay obediently on her side, twitching nervously. Tom laid the dress beside her. "Better take off your collar first," he explained, then put the chain over her head, laying it out on the floor in front of her. He took up the dress and lowered it until it touched the medallion, and Missy immediately felt the same tingle she had over three years previously. The sensation made her whine again, as she realised her future was now being irrevocably shaped, and it was not the future she had expected, nor was it one she would have chosen voluntarily. Although she was unable to feel the changes happening to her, she was easily able to see them; slowly her dark fur lightened into Ruth's skin; she became aware that her knees and elbows were flexing the way a human's do; the pads on her feet were taking on the manoeuvrability of fingers and toes; her groin, to her annoyance, was not developing anything masculine, and she slid one knee in front of the other, shielding that part of her body from view; eventually she was able to use her arms to cover the developments taking place on her chest. Several times she tried to voice her anger, but was unable to make anything more than a hoarse, guttural noise that sounded like she was clearing her throat, so, unable to articulate her feelings, she had to content herself with expressing her wrath using her increasingly human face. Finally, Ruth Carter lay naked on the floor. Realising her transformation had completed, she swept the chain from her neck and leapt to her feet, too angry to care about her nudity, and spoke with a human voice for the first time in almost forty months: for all that time she had dreamt of this moment, and imagined the first thing she would say, but all her beautiful speeches were now forgotten, and the reality of those first words were very, very different from her original intentions. "What the hell have you done? You total bitch!" The new Tom stared guiltily back at her, unable to think of any way to explain. The new Ruth's knees were beginning to feel weak; she staggered towards the bed and sat down, burying her face in her hands. "What have you done? What have you done, you stupid ..." Any more words were lost in the sobs of despair that began racking her body. Tom paced the room, trying in vain to think of something he could say to alleviate the situation he had created, less and less sure of the wisdom of his actions. He was forced to resign himself to waiting until he discovered how Ruth would decide to act, once her initial trauma had begun to abate. Finally she looked up and almost snarled at her new husband, "You realise there's no way out of this now? By the time we'll be able to use that thing again, it'll be God knows where, and we'll never, ever get it back! What were you thinking?" "I'm sorry ... I ... I just ... had ..." For God's sake! I hate you! Do you know that? I absolutely hate you! What the hell are we going to do? What the hell am I going to do now?" "R... To... Ruth, we ..." "Don't say anything! Don't even speak to me!" She put her hand over her mouth and stared wildly around the room, then looked down at herself. "Shit, I need to put something on. I can't deal with seeing this." She lifted the old Ruth's underwear from where it had been discarded and stared at it. Tom rummaged in the chest of drawers and meekly handed her a clean pair, which she snatched from his grasp. She picked up the T- shirt and began to put it over her head when she stopped and threw it onto the bed in annoyance, before picking up the bra and looking at it in distaste; she then threw it angrily at his face, where it hit him and came to rest sitting on his shoulder. She retrieved the T-shirt, then added the jogging bottoms and training shoes. Fully clothed, she looked round and glared angrily at the medallion on the floor. Tom lifted it and said, "Chief Inspector North ... we'd ... em, we'd better ..." "We'd better what?" she responded belligerently. Although Ruth was unable to think clearly, being half in shock, seeing Tom lift the medallion with the intention of returning it to North, and with the prospect of never seeing it again, a very real and all too familiar feeling of dread pulled her back to reality. Here she was, trapped again, but this time by someone she loved and thought she could trust; someone who was now taking away her only means of salvation: in her eyes, the man holding the medallion had earned all the contempt with which she had regarded Gabriel. "No!" she snapped, in sudden panic at losing her only means of escape from a woman's body, "Don't you dare!" She made a grab for it, catching the chain and trying to tug it from him, but he was too strong for her and she ended up simply holding on to something she could not pull free. "Damn you, give me that!" Tom put his hand on her wrist and held it firmly. She let go of the chain in exasperation and sat down on the bed, on the point of tears. "We're not going to get out of this, are we?" she began to sob again, "He ... North ... or someone else ... is going to take that medallion away from us before we can use it again. We're not going to be allowed to keep it long enough. Damn you, what were you thinking?" Tom put his hand onto the door knob, giving Ruth another surge of desperation. "Wait!" she pleaded, "If we're honest with him, and explain what happened, maybe he'd agree to wait until we can swap back." "He won't." "We have to try!" Tom, however, walked out, leaving her sitting on the bed, staring at the empty doorway in disbelief. She ran to the top of the stairs in time to see her husband greeted at the living room door by the Chief Inspector. "Tom!" he exclaimed, grinning broadly, and offering his hand. "Hey, welcome back," he gushed, "Great to meet you at last!" Ruth descended the stairs and caught up with them in time to see North lowering the chain into the evidence bag. He took one look at her and smiled faintly, but obviously with a great deal of pleasure. "Nice for me to see those kind of tears," he said softly, "In my line of work it's usually the other kind. I think I'd better make myself scarce. You two'll be wanting some time alone." Tom emitted a gruff, "Yeah," and helped North on with his jacket, then showed him to the door; all Ruth could do was watch as her life disappeared before her eyes; after the promise of being restored to her former self, suddenly everything was being taken away all over again. She stood helplessly as the two men, one knowingly, the other unknowingly, arranged to strip her of her identity for the second and final time. North shook hands again, this time with both of them, awarded her a charming smile, managed to avoid glancing at her chest (not that her baggy clothes presented much for his eyes to be drawn to) and left. Then, with a shocking finality, Tom closed the door on her life as a man. Ruth felt herself almost collapse and her back came to rest against the wall; her body was shaking, her mouth trembling and she stared hard at Tom, wondering if she had ever really known the person she had been married to all these years. At that moment, she hated the man looking back at her. "To think I was in love with you, and I was so looking forward to being with you again. After all the suffering, and the effort of finding my way home to you ... and I thought I knew you? To think I trusted you all this time! And now you betray me like this?" "Ruth, please," Tom implored her, laying one hand gently on her shoulder, but she punched his arm away with all her strength, then slapped his face as hard as she could. "Fuck off!" she shouted, "You lay one finger on me and I swear you'll wake up with as many testicles as I have." She pushed him with the heel of both hands, putting her entire weight into it; she was not particularly heavy, nor was she particularly strong, but a mixture of several things: anger, aggression, knowing how a man would do it, Tom's surprise: all combined to throw him back against the opposite wall with a pained, "Oof!" She stalked past him and into the living room, where she sat on the sofa, buried her face in her hands, and finally gave up trying to hold herself together; her tattered emotions got the better of her and she dissolved into a blubbering wreck. **** Tom sat in the kitchen, discreetly staying out of Ruth's way, while he thought. First of all, he had made himself a coffee, but poured most of it out and switched to brandy, then whisky; as a woman, the former had been more to his liking, but now found he had inherited the original Tom's taste in spirits. He was on his third (third whisky, not third drink) when a shadow appeared at the doorway, making him look up blearily. The figure was slight, but had a confrontational bearing that made it seem bigger than it really was. The bottle of whisky, almost half full, was still sitting on the kitchen table in front of Tom, and Ruth fetched a large tumbler, laying it down beside the bottle with a loud thump. She then poured more than a quarter of the remains of the bottle into her glass and took a large mouthful, swallowed, and twisted her face in disgust. "Ugh!" she exclaimed and held up the glass, looking at it in surprise. "You've never liked whisky," Tom said, by way of explanation. "Oh, yeah, I forgot. This is a man's drink, isn't it? You'd better have it." Without further warning, she threw the contents of her glass fully in his face, catching him completely unaware; he coughed and gasped; too slow to close his eyes, they stung painfully. Without giving him so much as a second glance, Ruth walked through to the drinks cabinet and returned with a new, unopened bottle of brandy, from which she more than half filled her glass. It took only five or six gulps to empty it. She then replenished it to the same level and glared at her husband. He drained his own, but did not pour himself any more. "You have until I finish this," Ruth said in the closest her voice could get to a growl, "To collect your things and bring them down to the sofa. After I go upstairs, you will not put so much as one toe on the bottom step." Tom nodded very slightly, but enough for Ruth to see. He left and made his way to the bedroom, where he collected a few things: a duvet, pillow, a few clothes to put on the following morning; these he deposited at the top of the stairs. "I'll be in the bathroom," he called, without waiting for an answer. Before brushing his teeth, he removed his whisky-soaked shirt and dropped it into the shower cubicle; as a result, standing in front of the mirror, he got the first proper look at himself, particularly the muscles of his arm as it held and moved the brush. He spat out, then stood, admiring his flat chest; while it was by no means muscular, it was broader and had a more powerful appearance than he was accustomed to seeing in the mirror. He felt a pang of regret for his impulsive action earlier that evening. "Oh, God, I'm so sorry," he whispered with a rush of sympathy for the woman below in the kitchen, "I hope I haven't screwed up here. I just hope this doesn't destroy both our lives." His hair was lank and smelt strongly of alcohol, so he decided to rinse it quickly, hoping he would have enough time before Ruth came upstairs. He knelt at the open door of the shower cubicle, with the spray in his hand, soaking his hair, his discarded shirt, and as much of the stickiness on his upper body as he could without drenching the bathroom. He then returned to the handbasin and towelled himself off. That done, he stared at himself again and wondered; on a sudden impulse, he quickly locked the door and, returning to the mirror, unfastened the waistband of his jeans, pushed everything to the floor, and gasped in amazement at what he saw. He had been aware of the erection that had formed as soon as he had become a man, but it was still a surprise to see it reflected in the mirror. He put his hand on it and marvelled both at it and the bulk of the scrotum beneath, before exploring the hardness that passed all the way back between his legs; he was accustomed to his body simply coming to an end at the base of his torso, with nothing other than a small, soft groove that seemed to fold in on itself. He felt an occasional spasm, pleasant and seductive; he squeezed a few more times, when suddenly a wave of debilitating pleasure overcame him, making him lose the ability to stand; he sank to his knees and narrowly missed hitting his head on the edge of the handbasin, so little was he able to control himself. It took several deep breaths, crouched involuntarily with his hands on the floor to support him, before he was able to struggle to his feet again. He removed all the evidence - fortunately the bathroom floor was tiled and not carpeted; he was convinced there should have been more, but as he could find nothing, he was forced to conclude he had cleaned up properly. He reassembled his clothing and made his way down to the living room. At the same time as he threw his things onto the sofa, he heard Ruth leave the kitchen and make her way upstairs. With her out of the way, Tom decided to have another small drink; on the kitchen table was her glass, with most of its contents still there, and nothing more having been poured. He replaced both bottles in the drinks cabinet, finished Ruth's brandy, and washed both glasses before making up his bed on the sofa. He lay awake for a while; the drowsy effect of the alcohol was being offset by the unbelievable events of the past hour or two, and by the mild afterglow of his first male orgasm, still making his cheeks feel slightly reddened. His erection was returning, but he decided to leave things alone for now. Instead, lay and tried to sleep, trying in vain to expel from his mind, all his feelings of guilt at what the new Ruth's hand might be exploring at that very moment. **** Ruth mounted the stairs wishing she could do so without moving a muscle; every motion of her body resulted in an unrelenting bombardment of unwelcome sensations; this was particularly true of her chest while brushing her teeth, and she eventually decided that the lesser of two evils was to hold her other arm across her front. Next came the painful process of relieving herself: the jogging bottoms came down easily, but the T-shirt was so baggy it had to be lifted and held around her waist all the time. "Damn you," she seethed as she tried in vain to take her mind off what she was doing and how she was doing it, by attempting to solve the problem of tearing off a few sheets of toilet paper with only one free hand to do it; unfortunately, it was the very fact she needed the paper in the first place, that kept her mind firmly and uncomfortably on what she was doing, and how. She turned on the tap to wash her hands, absent-mindedly lifted the soap and immediately dropped it into the basin with a gasp of indignation. Putting the plug into the outlet, she filled the sink and waited for almost a minute before draining the water and tentatively holding the soap under the running tap, with a look on her face as if she had been stabbed in the back: "Damn you, how could you?" she asked thin air. After doing her hands, she hesitated for a moment, then decided she would leave her face unwashed that night. In the bedroom, the jogging bottoms were discarded over the dressing table chair; her trainers kicked off beneath it. Fortunately, her T- shirt was large enough to sleep in, so there was no need to undress herself, and all she needed to do was crawl into bed and hope to lapse into unconsciousness as soon as possible. There was no position she could find that was psychologically comfortable: on her back, the weight of her breasts, small as they were, still pressed down on her chest; on her side, one of her breasts rested on one of her arms, and her upper thigh compressed the softness between it and the thigh opposite; she eventually settled for lying on her back, because that way she found she could position her legs so that the softness between them was not so brutally obvious. As it turned out, there was no position that she would have been able to describe as best, or least bad, because her hands refused to leave her body alone. Time and again, they strayed in disbelief to her chest, her hips, her groin; every time they made the same unwanted discovery. Returning to the bed at her side in disappointment, it was only seconds before one of them would be back again, desperately hoping to prove that she had been wrong and the impossible had not happened after all. But every single time, her hand would find a woman's body, and her stomach would respond with an unpleasant lurch of trepidation. **** Tom woke early the following morning and gasped in surprise to find himself waking up as a man; the shock was not lessened by the sudden realisation what the unexpected, cumbersome hardness between his legs was. It took a conscious effort, but he lay for a while, forcing himself to think how he was going to spend the day: how best to talk to Ruth and what best to say; whether he should try to approach the newspaper where Ruth had worked when she had been Tom; whether he should try to manage the craft shop he had owned when he had been Ruth; whether he should look for a completely new job. His planning was interrupted by a shout from upstairs, as he heard Ruth's voice from the bedroom. "Get up here," she called angrily, as if Tom should have known all along that she would need something. Tentative footsteps she heard on the stairs, and shortly afterwards, her husband looked nervously around the door. "Can I come in?" he said, then jumped back in shock when he saw her standing, topless, in front of the dressing table. "Yes, get in here. Help me, for God's sake!" Only then did Tom notice she was holding a bra in her hand. She held it up and considered it for a moment, before turning it around and fiddling with it for a few seconds, then (at the second attempt) putting her arms through the straps in the correct way. She pulled the cups around her breasts and started fumbling with the straps behind her back. "Help me, damn you," she said again and Tom, rather than fasten it for her, instead guided her hands into putting the ends together. "Catch the hooks into the eyes," he said softly and contritely, "You don't need to get all of them, just enough for it to feel secure." "It's pinching me," Ruth complained. "Your breasts will be caught underneath," Tom replied by way of explanation, but only receiving an angry glance for stating something so obvious, "Pull the bottom of the bra down, then lift your breasts slightly, to make sure you get everything inside the cups." Ruth did exactly that. "Damn you," she repeated after lowering her hands and turning to glower at him. "By the way, did you have a nice time in the bathroom last night?" she said without warning, like a lawyer pouncing on an evasive witness, and adding, when she saw his puzzled expression, "Were you just experimenting, or were you leaving me a reminder that you have the balls now?" His face quickly turned to mortification as she explained, "I had to clean up after you before I was able to use the soap. I guess you were wondering where it went." "I ... oh, God, I ... it just ... "Just get out." Tom escaped downstairs, where he made coffee, toast, and poured out a little muesli for Ruth, hoping that some consideration and perhaps even some affection might begin to appease her angst at his actions of the previous evening; then he waited until Ruth eventually appeared. He had hoped, as he had realistically expected, in vain, but still he thought it important to lay the groundwork now, and subsequently hope to rebuild at least some semblance of a relationship. She ignored everything he had done for her and instead made herself an instant coffee, which she slowly sipped as she stared contemptuously at him. "I don't feel like pretending to be you," she said aggressively, "but I don't expect there's a job waiting for me at the paper, so I'm going round to your shop. I'd just close it, and to hell with you, except I don't want poor Beth to lose her job just like that. I'm going to tell her I need a few days off. Do you think she can handle things on her own?" "Yes, she'll be fine. She's good." "So, now you're going to get out. I'll be back once I've spoken to Beth and I don't want you here." "Em ..." Tom sounded unsure. "The answer to the question in your mind is, go wherever the hell you like. Go back to my job. That would be the easiest option, if you can hack it." "You think I can't?" Tom responded, initially irked. Then, just as suddenly, he seemed to deflate. "You're probably right," he admitted. "You used to be so good at everything you tried to do. Why did you screw up so badly yesterday?" "I don't know," Tom lied, "I don't know what I was thinking." Ruth shook her head in contempt. "It would be pretty stupid of me to expect much from you any more, but let's see if you can maybe do one useful thing." "Which is?" "Get the hell out of this house." Tom's face, already unhappy, fell even further. "Go to my job if you like, get a job of your own doing whatever, sit on a park bench all day. See if I care." **** Tom decided that to go to the newspaper was exactly what he would do. He spent most of the morning in the editor's office, and at the end was taken back on again, with the proviso he would write a series of articles on imprisonment, which was the cover story he had decided to adopt for his extended absence. The afternoon was dedicated to an agreement between himself and Chief Inspector North that Tom Carter had been held against his will for over three years, but the police would not pursue the matter; Tom would use his memories of his transformation as an allegory for the stories he would write. The fact that he had, in fact, no experience of an animal transformation, and up to a few dozen hours ago had been a woman, was completely unknown to North. All Tom needed to do now was learn to write. "Jesus," he muttered to himself at the thought. It certainly sounded simple enough. What could be easier than making a few marks on paper, or tapping on a keyboard? Ruth's morning was not so straightforward. She arrived at the craft shop to find Beth was already there, humming happily to herself as she rearranged one of the displays. "Hi, Ruth," she chirped, "Lovely morning, isn't it?" she was almost singing. Ruth forced herself to laugh. "Yes, it is," she said in spite of her feelings, "Good morning to you, too." Beth came over to the counter, which was where Ruth was, and fussed unnecessarily with a pile of leaflets; she spent far too long pushing them into a tidy bundle, and when Ruth turned her head, wondering what on earth she was doing, Beth laid her left hand flat on the top to press them down. At that point, Ruth finally noticed the engagement ring on her finger. "Oh!" she said in surprise, as her mind started to whirl in panic: she had no idea what Beth's boyfriend's name was; how would a woman expect another woman to react? she was going to have to hug Beth; how should a woman touch another woman? she was going to have to fuss over the ring, of course; she was going to have to hold a woman in her arms; what was it women always did? she was a woman, but she was going to have to suffer the frustration of feeling another woman's body pressed against hers ... "Beth, congratulations! That's such a beautiful ring. Let me see." She walked around the counter to where Beth was standing and took her hand, holding it up to admire the cluster of diamonds gracing it. "I'm so happy for you." "I've been bursting to tell everyone. I didn't think you were going to notice!" "Yeah, sorry I was so thick. I'm not really with-it today." "I know, it's not like you at all! It's usually just men who're that slow!" She joked, laughing, and Ruth, with some considerable effort, joined her. It seemed unavoidable they should put their arms around each other, which Ruth did with trepidation and Beth with gusto. Ruth forced herself into the embrace, all the while deploring the absence of the masculine thrill that she would normally have expected to arise from the excitement of holding such a beautiful woman. "Damn you!" she silently screamed at Tom. **** Chapter 8. Question and Answer By the time her husband arrived home, Ruth had been in for hours: Beth was in such a good mood that day that she had had not the slightest objection to managing the shop single-handedly for the next week or two. Tom entered the living room to find her back in loose jogging bottoms and a baggy T-shirt; she was slouched on the sofa, staring angrily into space. "Hi," he said uncertainly and she turned to give him a hard stare. "Go upstairs to my bedroom," she replied, making his heart leap, but then just as quickly dashing his hopes when she continued, "There's a case on the bed. Fill it." "Ruth," Tom pleaded, "Can't we ..." but she interrupted without giving him the chance to say anything. "Get whatever the hell you need. Get clothes for tomorrow or however many more days it is that you're planning on living for. Take whatever you want, but make sure you don't forget anything, because you're not getting a second chance. You and I are never setting foot in the same bedroom again, and after today, never in the same house. "Whatever it is you decide to do, you'll keep paying your money into the same joint account. I'll take what I like and you will do nothing to stop me. Leave your keys at the front door before you go." Ruth could hear Tom moving around in the bedroom and the bathroom; he took less than fifteen minutes before she heard him descending the stairs. He hesitated at the living room door and looked at her, but she did not turn her head towards him. She heard a set of keys being dropped onto the telephone table, then the sound of the front door closing. **** Tom found himself a bedsit in a run-down area of London, and the rent he was charged for it reflected its quality. It was all he could afford; almost as soon as any money was deposited into the bank, it was withdrawn by Ruth, except for a small pittance that was all he had to live on, and had to provide him with lodgings, food and travel. He settled back into his former husband's old job very easily, working long hours (since his office chair was vastly more comfortable than his home) and became a successful journalist (from his own point of view), or pretty much carried on where he had left off (from everyone else's). What should have been a welcome gift was, in fact, a great worry: words seemed to flow naturally from pen to paper, and while that was wonderful from a selfish point of view, it also implied that he had greatly betrayed the person he had effectively forced to become Ruth, and the fact he had hoped for a different result did nothing to appease his guilt. The more he realised he had all the skills that the old Tom had possessed, the more he realised how tenuous his hopes had been; he now feared he had condemned the person he loved more than anyone else in this world, his lifelong partner, whom he adored above any person or object in existence, to a future filled with torment and self-loathing. He could only hope that that would not come to be, and that, in time, the new Ruth would pass through her initial shock, eventually finding herself to be a contented woman, and that finally, all would be well; but the more he discovered about himself, the more slender his hopes became. This was a cruel discovery, and it hurt all the more because he was still deeply in love, and every day he bitterly rued the way he had destroyed his marriage, and all he could do was suffer alone. It was late August before he saw his wife again. **** Ruth negotiated her journey into the future with courage in the face of adversity: looking in the mirror to see a face of the wrong gender; looking down in the shower, or, worse, the bath, to see a body of the wrong gender; her distress at having to wear a bra she tried to appease by not wearing one at all, but that proved to be counter-productive: with the absence of straps, also came the absence of support, so the free movement of her breasts made her more, not less, aware of them. Moving her arms made her feel unwelcome additions to her person; moving her legs made her feel unwelcome absences. Where there should have been a muscular body, were soft curves; where there should have been strong arms and powerful hands, were slender arms and delicately tapering fingers; where there should have been a flat chest, were rounded breasts; where should have been her manhood, there was nothing. "Damn you," was on her lips very often during those first few weeks, but as time went on, unpleasant surprises gradually lessened: going to sleep as a woman no longer drew her hands into exploring herself in a vain attempt to disprove the impossible; waking up as a woman was no longer accompanied by the shock of self-awareness and the distress that followed; negotiating the twin hazards of reflective glass and cold, hard porcelain simply became facts of life; even female underwear slowly followed female outerwear into a banal normality that no longer, in itself, upset her. That gradual transition , however, only brought a slow, creeping realisation; Ruth was becoming quite accustomed to her new body: both the the subtle and the not-so-subtle differences between her life before and after her existence as Missy were now normal routine; the problems of dressing and behaving like a woman were trivial and inconsequential; even her periods no longer presented any fear. That gradual realisation, however, was what caused the feeling of dread to come over her: she began to believe she had discovered something that she would never, ever have suspected, but, on thinking back, the clues had been there all the time. Ruth was standing naked in the bathroom; she had, moments earlier, emerged from the shower, and she dropped her hands to her sides, let the towel fall to the floor, and stared at herself in the mirror. She had a perfect figure: beautiful, slender, admirable in every way. She looked deeply into her own eyes. "Oh, God," she sobbed, "I never knew!" **** It was around seven o'clock one evening that Tom was taken by surprise when he heard a knock on his door. Quickly, he lifted the wrapping of the sandwich he had saved from lunch time and deposited it in the bin at the foot of the bed, then turned the latch to find out who was so unexpectedly disturbing him. His mouth dropped open in surprise. "Hi," Ruth said, "Mind if I come in?" "If you can get in," Tom replied, referring not to any resistance on his part, but to the lack of floor space. What little there was, was cluttered with his possessions, there being no storage other than under the bed. The bed, of course, occupied about fifty percent of the room, leaving only a tiny L-shaped living area, with not even enough space for a chair. The bed was the only seating available. Ruth stepped through the doorway, over a small pile of books, and almost tripped over Tom's briefcase. Her face, which had been melancholy at first, now drooped into a horrified sorrow. She stared around the room at the faded, peeling wallpaper, the discoloured paint and the worn carpet, its pattern no longer clear. "This is awful," she said, almost crying, "How could I make you live like this?" "It's not that bad," he replied, bravely, "I only sleep here. I spend most of my time working." "Where's your case?" "Under the bed. Why?" "Pack it?" "Pack it? Why?" "You're coming home." "Coming home? Why?" "Because I forgive you." **** Ruth unlocked the front door, pushed it open, then instinctively stood aside to let Tom go first. He hesitated and she laughed. "Sorry," she giggled, "Old habits die hard." As she walked past him he put his hand on the small of her back, causing a feeling that was, unexpectedly, not entirely unpleasant, making her wonder at it. "Put that on the bed," she ordered, "I'll unpack it for you. You go and have a shower." "That sounds fantastic. There isn't much at that place for bathing." Ruth looked as if she had been about to hug him, but instead she said, "On second thoughts, leave the case here. I'll empty it into the washing machine." "Do I smell that bad?" "Leave your clothes on the bathroom floor. I'll get them after I've dealt with this lot." "I get it." Ruth collected some underwear and a dressing gown from the bedroom and took them into the bathroom for her husband to put on afterwards. The steam from the shower had only partially misted the door of the cubicle, giving Ruth her first experience of being a woman admiring a man's naked body: it caused a slight stir that took her by surprise and made her think about her feelings all over again; she grimaced and collected Tom's dirty clothes. She was in the kitchen when she heard Tom coming downstairs. "I'll get you something to eat," she called, "You look like you haven't eaten properly in months." "What's this?" Tom said; when Ruth entered, she was he was holding up a large, clear bag, filled with banknotes of all denominations. "Oh, yes, you can pay that back into the bank tomorrow. It's your money. I didn't need everything I withdrew, and I only took it to stop you getting it." She laid a tray with a pile of sandwiches and a few cakes on the coffee table. "I'm so sorry," she said. "No need to apologise. I love ham sandwiches." "Don't, please. You know what I meant." "Why did you ask me back?" Tom said, the first sandwich an inch from his mouth. "Eat first, then we can talk." Only once Tom had taken his first bite, did he fully realise just how hungry he had been, so Ruth looked on sadly as he wolfed down the entire plateful. While he ate, she had been perched at the far end of the sofa, just like the original Ruth had been wont to position herself; she rose and fetched two glasses and two bottles, pouring Tom a very generous whisky and herself a more moderate brandy. "Here," she said as she offered Tom his glass, "A man's drink, but I promise to let you drink this one." "Thanks," Tom replied, obviously trying to laugh, but looking too concerned to be able to make a very good job of putting up a front. "You were going to tell me why you've forgiven me." Ruth nodded. "The reason," she began, sounding uncertain, "Is because I understand why you did it." Tom closed his eyes and his head began to droop. "In fact," Ruth continued, "I'd have done exactly the same in your position." "Oh, God ..." "You'd think that becoming human again would have been so good that I wouldn't have cared what sex I am, wouldn't you? The thing is, even after becoming completely accustomed to being a woman, I still don't like it. It took me a while to figure out, but eventually I realised what had happened. The medallion made me into an identical copy of you. I became Ruth in every way." Tom looked close to tears. "Same for me. I've gained your ability to write, for example." "That figures, and it's pretty much in line with what I've experienced. It's not just given me your body, your mannerisms, the way you moved. It's also given me your emotions, the way you felt, your innermost desires ... Tom, it's given me everything. Absolutely everything." "Oh, God," Tom half sobbed, "I'm so, so sorry. I didn't think it would be like this. I thought you'd be pissed off with me for a while, perhaps a long time, perhaps for ever, but I really thought that you'd eventually become comfortable with yourself, even if you hated me. "I thought I could take those feelings with me, and doing that would resolve them, once and for all. I thought I could make them go away. That's what I've wanted all my life. I never thought I'd be leaving them behind to torture you the same way. I'm sorry. I've totally screwed up both our lives, and I'd undo it and be Ruth again if I possibly could." "So tell me, what am I? And there's no need to lie, or try to soften the blow, because I've pretty much worked it out for myself. I just want you to confirm I'm right." "You're a borderline transsexual." Ruth sighed. "Bingo," she said, almost under her breath. "And what does that actually mean? Borderline?" "You're kind of on a knife-edge. Your moods will change, and your ... desires ... for your ... identity ... will shift. Sometimes you'll be happy with yourself. Sometimes you'll be completely miserable. Sometimes you'll love being a woman, sometimes you'll detest it. "Emotionally, no-one is a hundred percent one gender or the other. Inside you, though, the boy and the girl are about equal. How you feel about yourself depends on which one of them is in charge at the time." "I'm a boy at the moment." Tom nodded. "And when you are, he'll make you scream in agony at being trapped in a woman's body." "But it's not like this all the time." "You're close enough to half-and-half for the girl to be able to fight back sometimes, and she has another advantage: part of you has a natural desire to try to fit in and be like everyone else. There'll be times when she manages to come to the surface, and then you'll succeed in convincing yourself that you really are 'normal'. For a short while you'll feel like everything's fine, and you'll tell yourself you can't understand what all the fuss was about." "What makes the girl take over?" "Day to day differences in your hormonal balance. Sometimes minute by minute. It's pretty much random. Except ..." Tom now hesitated and bit his lip. "Except what?" "You'll probably think I'm just saying this because I've got an ulterior motive ..." "Just tell me." "Sex." "Sex? You're kidding! Would that not make me feel worse?" Tom shook his head. "Hormonal balance, remember? Knife-edge? If you let the girl get turned on, she can feed you enough oestrogen for you to lose yourself in the moment and function as a woman. Doesn't last, though. By the morning the boy will probably be back, and he'll make you hate yourself for what you did last night, because he thinks it was humiliating. Not always, though. Sometimes the afterglow is still there, sometimes not." "So basically, I'll be happy as long as I'm on my back ... with my ..." Ruth faltered, unable to finish the sentence. "I wouldn't have put it quite like that, but ..." "Which means I have a lifetime of mood swings to look forward to. Is that it? No lasting happiness?" "There was one thing." "What?" "There was one time ... the hormonal changes that took place while I was pregnant ..." "Pregnant?" Ruth interrupted, aghast. "I felt great, all the time." "That was when you used to wear dresses, make-up too, sometimes." "Which reflected the way I felt inside." "But that ain't gonna happen, anyway. We can't have children. You had a hysterectomy." "I did, but you didn't." "What does that matter? The medallion turned me into you." "But me, from before the accident. You're fertile." "What ... I ..." "You must have had ... seven or eight periods by now. A woman who's had a hysterectomy doesn't." "Jeez ..." Ruth went white as a sheet, "But like I said, that ain't gonna happen. No way am I ready for that." **** They lay awake that night for some time, both staring at the darkened ceiling, both positioned at opposite sides of the bed, hardly able to feel each other's body heat. "You can't sleep either?" "I was thinking about my feelings. Now and ... over the past few months, since I became Ruth." She lay in silence for a few seconds before resuming. "It's not actually penis envy," she said, laughing half-heartedly, "Although God knows ... I really do wish I still had mine. But that's not it. Not really. It goes much deeper than that." She was lying on her back, staring at the ceiling, but she could sense Tom nodding his head slowly and sympathetically. "I want to be," she resumed slowly, "The clumsy oaf making a fool of himself in front of a bunch of girls, who sit there laughing at him, before they turn round and giggle to each other, 'He's gorgeous.' I want to make a woman feel like a million dollars, be dashing and romantic and make her swoon. I want her to feel safe and secure when I put strong arms round her. I want her to run her hands over my shoulders and my back and luxuriate in the way they feel to her. "But I can't have that. It's been taken away from me. Look at how small my shoulders are, and how thin and strengthless my arms are, how slender and soft my body is. There isn't a woman in the world who would want me to put my arms around her." Tom shifted uncomfortably. Ruth almost snapped at him. "And don't tell me there are some women who would. I'm not interested." "I know. You're not a lesbian, you're a transsexual, which in a lot of ways is more painful. Homosexuals are denied true and open love by society's prejudices. Transsexuals are denied it by physical reality. That's the most cruel cut of all." "Good night." Ruth turned onto her side with her back to Tom. He turned towards her, but without moving any closer. After a few minutes, Ruth rolled over towards him and gently held his upper arm with both hands. "Just hold me," she said; he wormed his arm between her shoulder and the pillow, putting it fully around her; very shortly he sensed her falling asleep with her head resting on him. He soon followed. In the morning, they woke up to find themselves at opposite sides of the bed, facing outwards. The following evening, Ruth poured them both a brandy, and took up her traditional position at the opposite end of the sofa as they talked. They were both, at least, grateful still to have a companion they loved, despite everything else, and Ruth soon found herself at the same end of the sofa as Tom, leaning against him by the time their glasses had been drained and they were ready to go upstairs. Ruth, thinking back to their sex life a few years ago, came to a resolution that had been forming in her head most of the day. When Tom closed the bedroom door, before he reached the bed, she stood in his way and waited for him to take the initiative, which, after only a moment's hesitation, he did. Slowly, but surely, he slid his hands inside her T- shirt and pulled it over her head; she raised her arms to help, then lowered them slowly to give him time to put his arms around her and unfasten her bra. By the time her arms were back at her sides again, the straps were off her shoulders and his hands were on her front, pushing the cups downwards to reveal bare skin. The bra dropped to the floor between them, leaving his hands in its place. To Ruth, it was like someone turning up a dimmer switch in a darkened room: a luxurious warmth seemed to be spreading all through her as Tom pushed her waistband over her soft hips and to the floor. Her feet were already bare, so she only had to lift her feet free. She began to undress her husband: the boy had already decided to stop complaining and simply allow himself to drift along in the pleasure his female counterpart was anticipating. Shirt, belt, waistband, underwear, all of Tom's clothes joined hers around their feet, and finally she pushed him onto the bed, exactly as he used to do to her, rolling over to pull him onto her in the same way. Sex as a man was exhilarating and sweet; Ruth was soft and gentle, receptive and hungry; her slender frame felt wonderful in his arms, her body pliable and yielding, every touch a shock wave of delight. Time and again she would fall into ecstasy, which only built up his own feelings, until the same almost unbearable rapture took him, his strength left him and she became, for a short while, the stronger of the two. Sex as a woman was exciting and dangerous; it was a thrill to be held in Tom's arms, to feel his hand enveloping her shoulder with his arm behind her head, to feel his hand on her breast, to feel her breasts pressed against her by his chest; she felt at once both safe and captive; yet with every moment she wished she could pull him closer and closer, and never be free of his embrace. The mild sense of intrusion was not objectionable but audacious: time and again she soared into bliss; finally he joined her in her paradise. They floated back to earth together and for how long they lay wordlessly in each other's arms, neither was aware. Eventually, Tom rolled onto his back with his arm still around Ruth and she settled naturally into his side, her head, one arm and one knee on top of him. She lay still with her eyes closed, trying to hold on to the warmth she was still enjoying, trying to stop her feelings changing. **** Ruth awoke the following morning on her own side of the bed, a man in a woman's body. It was as Tom had warned her: the boy was voicing his objections to being invaded by a man's seed; the fact that it had been removed along with the condom, when Tom had withdrawn, mattered very little: the twin problem was that, not only had she lost the ability to produce semen, she was now designed to receive it, and the boy was unable to decide which of the two he detested the most. The pleasure of last night had completely evaporated: almost as if she had borrowing something, and was now being charged interest. The touch of Tom's hand was initially irritating, and made her sigh in mild exasperation. She spun to face him, intending to tell him to leave her alone, but in doing so, his hand naturally slipped around her waist onto the small of her back, bringing with it a warm, comforting feeling, and the girl began to fight for her right to be heard. Seconds later, she pulled Tom towards her and very shortly, still being naked, it was only natural they should make love again. "Enough," she said, laughing, as Tom tried to kiss her hand; she had backed out of bed, but he had caught hold of her arm. "Time's up." She pulled her dressing gown around herself. "You need to get up too, you know." "Like you told me once, we don't stick to office hours, just deadlines." "Well now I'm giving you a deadline to get breakfast ready." **** A few months later, Tom arrived home to find Ruth pottering about in the living room. She looked up at him and smiled sweetly and happily. "Hi, darling," she gushed and immediately floated over to throw her arms around him, but not before he had had a chance to stare at her in delighted amazement. "Wow, you look ..." he breathed, momentarily struggling to draw air against the tightness of her grip, "... Amazing." Ruth was a complete contrast to the appearance she had presented at most other times: gone were the baggy T-shirt and jogging bottoms, and in their place was a short, less than mid-thigh length dress; she was wearing a small amount of make-up, and the expression on her face was almost as if she wanted to eat him up, right there and then. "It's reflecting the way I feel inside." "That's ... you're beautiful, you know." Ruth sighed in exasperation. "If I took my shoes off and stood in the kitchen, would you get it then?" "What? Oh, my God! That's ... that's wonderful! Rest. Sit down. Let me look after you. Can I get you anything? You need to make sure you don't exert yourself too ..." "Tom?" "What?" "I love you," Ruth was laughing, but also deadly serious. "I love you too. I can't believe I forgot to tell you! Relax. Can I get you a cup of tea or something?" "No, I'm fine. Stop fussing. You're like a mother hen." "How do you feel?" he said, beginning to recover his composure. "Pretty darn good. In fact, you know what I want to do right now?" she leant against him and rubbed the small of his back, gradually lowering her hand as she did so. "Surely you don't mean, em ..." "Yes, 'Em,'" she giggled, "But it starts with S, not M." "Should we be doing that in your condition?" "Tom, I'm pregnant, not made of glass." **** A little over two years later, Tom and Ruth stood with an arm round each other in the little cemetery where their unborn child had been laid to rest. Ellie, their daughter, who was almost two, laid a small bunch of "Children's flowers" on the ground that was marked by a tiny headstone. "Sister," Ellie slurred as she stood up; Ruth, with tears in her eyes, lifted her and gave her a loving squeeze. Ellie, when set down again, immediately ran off and started out on an adventure negotiating the paths that separated the sections of the cemetery. Ruth turned towards Tom and put her arms around his waist at the same time as he enveloped her in his. "How are you feeling?" he asked. "I feel great," she replied, "Really wonderful." She melted into his embrace, enjoying the feeling of a man's body pressed against hers, and of a man's arms around her. They drew back far enough to be able to look into each other's eyes. This was the first time they had stood together at their daughter's graveside since the day she had been laid to rest; until now Ruth, alone, had come: first as a man, then as a woman, now with her husband. It felt good finally to share their sorrow: the pain had never left either, but was made more bearable when they were together. Ruth, particularly, was comforted by leaning against Tom, and she was enjoying her second spell of uninterrupted contentment. "Glad you came," she joked, her eyes dancing wickedly, and they both sniggered at the double entendre. Ruth was wearing a short skirt, and a little make-up. The skirt she would only be able to get away with for another week or two, as her second bump was beginning to push it too much out of shape for even a woman of her slim build to be able to get away with. "Mmm," Tom said, through a kiss, "I love you." "I love you too," she replied, then, her eyes dancing, "I can tell you one thing." "What's that?" "I think we're going to have a large family."