Blurb: Pooka helps the massage parlour restock ingredients for their custom products.
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I usually come to work on a Monday with everything restocked. On my previous Mondays I came in in the afternoon, changed into my work robe and could just get to work. Not today though.

I officially got on board with the company just a week ago, but due to the point on the schedule I showed up on, I was still on my two-week trial schedule for my first week in, and so now that we’ve gotten back to Week 1 and the schedule has refreshed, my Monday work is starting in the still slightly dark early morning and all the shelves of the products we use had gaps in them as I walked past them to get here, to my room. All the products I still had in my room have been taken back to storage. It’s a restock day; the first half of each Monday is dedicated to getting more ingredients to restock on our products and then creating those products in the kitchen.

I enter my backroom and drop off my backpack by the table, bending down to pull out my water bottle. I place the bottle on the table after a quick swig and shrug off my new leather jacket as I walk to my door and hook it up on the back before trailing off to the changing room, lightly hesitating through unpreparedness trying out a new element of the job.

On my way there is Buzwe, holding a big box with a handle in one hand while the other arm is close to his side with a stack of clipboards held between his elbow and torso. He appears to struggle holding them up. “Ah, hello Pooka. How was waking up at this time?”

“Uff, not too great honestly,” I respond with a light giggle.

“Ahh haha, not an early worker then?” Buzwe shrinks as a clipboard slips slightly, his voice now coming out with a slight struggle. “Did you at least get a good stretch in before coming to work?”

Am I supposed to be doing that? “Uhhh, not really…” I try to hide my questioning tone, but Buzwe’s face subtly scrunches at my tone.

“Ah, uh, not a lot of people do, ah-!” As Buzwe responds the clipboard slips further, causing the rest of them to start sliding with it, prompting me to move forward and help him to contain the way they fall. As they hit the floor and we begin picking them up he speaks again “hey, why don’t you go get changed, get acquainted with this time of day and then meet me at storage with the other two, I really have to drop these things off.”

“Sure thing, Buze,” I chuckle.

Once he has secured the stack tightly to his side with a hand underneath to keep them steady this time, I walk into the changing room to see Cheryl leaning against her locker in a new turquoise robe, and the back of a tall, slim guy I’ve never met before, pulling a white coat out of one of the big lockers near the front entrance to the lockerroom. He is wearing a red band tee and black basketball shorts over his golden fur, topping off the look with a backwards baseball cap with a shield emblem on the front, as well as a red, white, black and chartreuse striped lanyard just barely visible through the fluff on his neck.

I get to my locker and open it up to see a second robe next to my main blue one. It matches Cheryl's. I begin unbuckling my belt and unzipping to let my jeans fall to my ankles before I hear a light footstep approach followed by a medium-toned voice with a lick crackle. “Hey, you the new guy on restocking today?” The golden furred fellow closes my locker to rest his green-ish eyes on my eye-ish yellows as he speaks. I already begin to feel the urge to harden my exterior.

I close my eyes for a tad longer than a blink before meeting his eye contact. “Um, yes? You are?”

He removes his hand from my locker to extend it to me, “Trevor; Trevor Aurum,” I take his hand as he closes his eyes and points at the name tag on the bottom of his lanyard to punctuate his name with. “Or Trevor Gold, if you wanna translate it from the ol’ timey lingo, ha ha… ha…” His laugh trails off as I slowly open my locker back up between our heads and put both hands in to set my robe onto the locker bench. He closes my locker again. “I’m studying chemistry over at Nixon University, and uh, between you and me…” he leans down, putting a hand at the side of his mouth as if to block the flow of his voice from reaching Cheryl, who he briefly glances to before continuing at the same volume. “I’m top of the class…” he wiggles his eyebrows up twice as he briefly glances at Cheryl again.

I take my own glance back at Cheryl's grim expression before opening my locker back up behind him, digging back into it and looking over my shoulder to respond to him with a lightly teasing energy. “Good job. Do you usually like talking to guys with their trousers down?”

“What? No, what gave you that?” he utters with a faint giggle while stepping away slightly and raising his hand to the side of his head which produces a thunking sound as he hits the locker door. “I just thought I’d introduce myself since I’m here on restock every now and then. I’m experimenting with lotions myself as part of my…” he comes closer and tilts his head towards Cheryl, keeping eye contact with me and raising the volume “Master’s Degree in Chemistry”.

I pull out my undershirt and long johns and set them on the bench atop my robe as I start shuffling to get my trousers off the bottom of my legs. “You mean the acid mixing stuff yeah? That type of chemistry?” I bend down to pick my jeans up as I hear the locker close above my head again.

“Yeah, and the combination of matter and how to dissolve and stuff, what other kind would I study?” He responds, with a shrug, arms flailing at his sides.

“Oh, any kind of chemistry, really; inorganic, neuro… supernatural if you’re rebellious…” I stand back up straight and lift my shirt over my head. “Or conversational chemistry, perhaps…” A light chuffing comes from behind me as I drop my shirt on the floor.

“You can study that?” He speaks with genuine curiosity. He continues with a chuckle “not that I’d need to, of course, you can see it all comes naturally to me,” he phrases with his eyes closed, putting his arm out to lean into the locker next to mine.

“Oh I’m sure it does,” I respond as I start gliding my bottoms up my legs and tightening the drawstrings.

“Yeah, you get it!” he responds, pushing off the wall and slouching on a bench in the middle of the room with his feet far apart.

I slip on my undershirt and open my locker again to shove my clothes inside. “And how are you Cheryl?”

“I’m tired, but glad I got here before even Buzwe arrived today,” she speaks, looking down at her claws as Trevor turns his head 90 degrees to listen to her over his shoulder.

“Yeah, she even told me she broke her earliness record today! Which is, like, awesome, I totally support her!” He speaks with his head still turned, shrugging over a few of the words. “She broke that record the last few times I showed up too! Isn’t that cool?”

“Wow, that’s impressive Cheryl,” I speak with an unserious raise of my brow and a light smirk.

She returns a chuckle “yeah, I get a nice amount of quiet to myself when I show up earlier on restock day.”

“She likes to get a bit of preparation done before meeting me,” Trevor turns his head back to me, raising his arms behind his head and speaking with his seemingly signature arrogantly closed eyelid, “she’s done it since my first trip here, she tells me.”

“Sure, you could call it pre-Trevor prep,” Cheryl affirms while giving me a sarcastic smirk and prolonged shrug.

Throughout their brief exchange I’ve worked my robe on, now tying it around my stomach and fiddling with the back to get my tail out of the rear. I turn to Cheryl, “say, do we usually just wait around in here or-”

“Yeah, the big boss guy I’ll duck his head in whenever they’re ready to get us in storage,” Trevor interrupts.

Cheryl’s pupils take a stroll around her eyelids as she pipes up after his comment, “by ‘big boss guy’ he means Cardo. It’s the only time we ever see him so don’t get too attached.”

As if on cue, there’s a knock on the changing room door with a small voice, “are you all decent?” He waits for us all to affirm before entering; he’s tiny even compared to my own height. At at most 5”1, he works his way around the centre bench, handing out two clipboards each to Cheryl and Trevor, before making his way to me and extending a hand. “Hello Pooka! A belated welcome to the company from your CEO.”

I shake his hands, “hello sir.”

He presents the first clipboard to me, splaying his hand over the sheet attached to the board and waving it over the page as he placed it into my hand. “This is your sheet, we’re starting you off small today so you can get the jist of it, but you’ll be paired off with Cheryl today to meet with Dr. Mot of Megascops University who you’re going to hand this second clip-”

“Boooooo! Megascops!” Trevor mockingly cups his hands about his mouth to interject.

Cardo gestures his palm towards Trevor without turning to look at him “Quiet a minute Trev’,” he brings his hand back to the second clipboard, “you’re gonna hand Dr. Mot this which is basically the same as yours, and she’s going to show you around the field and basically train you in figuring out how to identify the right plants, measuring the amount of each ingredient you need and she’ll be coming back with you to the kitchen here where she’ll teach you how to concoct our special stuff only this establishment has.” He punctuates this introduction with a wink.

I take both clipboards and nod “got it.”

“Cheryl volunteered to be a familiar face with you today. She’s got a few more sheets on her clipboard as she does this every restock day and a lot of her front page stuff is earlier on in the field, so you’ll get to see how it’s done before you’ll be thrown in to help her and then get a few done on your own once you’ve got the gist of it.” He walks around the bench to hand Cheryl her clipboard.

I nod along, following his hands as they assist his explanations. “That’s awesome, thanks sir!” I give a quick nod to Cheryl, “and thank you too! This is easing my nerves a bit”.

She nods back at my compliments. “No problem.”

“Oh, and Trevor?” Cardo turns to look at Trevor, who gives him a nod. “You’re with Buzwe today. Your Head of Science informed us how you took more of the greens than you were permitted last time, so that’s all on his list.”

“Tsk, man! First you tell me Cheryl is getting involved with Megascops and now you tell me I can’t get my hands on the lettuce?” Trevor leans forward, elbows on his knees and pout-lipped as he widens his eyes at Cardo.

“You can try hard to make it look innocent, but we have no choice. ‘He’s done it once and it reflects on him, if he manages it a second time it’s partly on you’, to paraphrase what they told us,” Cardo is speaking in a lightly threatening tone.

“Alright, fine…” Trevor slouched back.

“Alright, off with the three of you,” Cardo waves his hands towards the back exit of the room, “Buzwe is in storage, he should have the stuff ready by now and I’ve got a big day ahead. See you lot next restock.”

We all give him a nod goodbye and walk single-file to storage, a well organised room with shelves lining the walls and towering from the floors connecting directly to a lab, and a big table just ahead of the entrance against which Buzwe leans arms folded. Trevor taking the lead with Cheryl going ahead of me. Entering the room, Trevor and Cheryl walk straight to the desk, picking up cases of vials, bottles, jars, tubs and various other containers along with a vest-like set of straps with tools attached which they hand over their torsos.

Buzwe gestured towards me, “here, Pooks; the tools should be on your front. To give you a quick rundown, we’re off to the garden today, which I’m sure you’re aware is property of Tillywood.”

“Uhhh yes,” I nod along as if I’ve ever seen a forest.

“Right, well that means we have to treat the field with care and precision, which I was previously sure I didn’t have to explain” Buzwe comments, slowly turning his head to Trevor, who is helping fasten the back of Cheryl’s tool vest.

“Whaaaaat!?” Trevor looks back, feigning shock as he turns to get help back from Cheryl.

Buzwe looks back at me with a half smile, “the way his teachers talked about it was as if they gave him a face full of talons.” There’s a light chuckle in his tone, though the word ‘talons’ is catching much more of my attention. “I had a light panic when they told me what he’d done.”

“Oh, come on, you act like I was the first to do that,” I hear Trevor’s voice get slightly louder as he reaches behind me to help fasten my tool vest.

“What is even so special about this lettuce?” I ask.

“Ah, is that what they’re calling it these days?” Buzwe pipes up, pushing off the table and turning to pull pencils from the organisers. “Here, you three. We’ll be taking the trailer today. You know how to cycle, right Pooka?”

“I never got the hang of it…” I scratch the back of my head, not even sure what cycling is.

“Ah… well, I’m sure we can teach you…” Buzwe speaks like he’s never met someone who doesn’t know how to cycle before.

“Yeah, don’t worry about contributing to the cycling little man!” Trevor pats my head, “my legs are strong enough to handle the four of us and the trailer alone” Trevor cocks his legs slightly to show off his calf.

I forcefully bat his hand away from my head and give him a glare.

“I think we’ll be able to test that theory once we get started,” Cheryl snidely claps back.

“Alright, come on, let’s not stall…”

...

Loading the trailer with our equipment, the vehicle wasn’t quite what I expected it’d be and appeared quite old - it’s like it’s trying to be a convertible car, but inside there are 4 seats in a line connected to a network of metal bars, and sticks at the front of which is a set of levers to rest feet on, and there is a frame extending above the seats which holds a roof on top, covered in a fabric that looks like a circus tent.

Buzwe sits on the right-most seat, followed by Cheryl, myself and then Trevor, going to the left. It took him just under 2 minutes to give up on doing all the legwork before Buzwe and Cheryl agreed to continue it on, with Buzwe instructing me on how to position my feet on the pedals and telling me to just try and follow the rhythm of the pedals turning to figure out when to push forward, and to watch my legs for the motion of turning corners.

Trevor is leaning back, pedalling in a leisurely fashion with his hands in his labcoat pockets, while Cheryl leans far forward to hold onto the handle bars and pushes hard to contribute to the motion. Buzwe sits up with perfect sitting posture, which I attempt to mimic.

It’s a relatively quiet journey inside the cart while the outside is a lot more full of noise. It’s my first time out of the cave during daytime and it’s fascinating to see just how much city there is out of here as compared to inside of the cave, where inside of the cave it’s more like a town square with a street of housing on either side with the establishments lining the walls and entrance to the depths. Outside of the mouth of the cave, there's a quaint line of housing, bars and small businesses around the mountain, with the infrastructure building up more densely the further down the mountain we travel, with a lot of old-fashioned wood architecture to the houses. It takes a while for us to get out of the roads surrounded by crowded pavements before we start seeing the path quieten as we approach the edge of the settlement.

The further out we get, the more diverse the population becomes too, especially as I see the buildings separate approaching an opening at the end of the next street. Approaching s a school left of the T-junction, the back of which faces a long wall, and a laboratory besides a car pack on the right with the end of the junction meeting an opening in the wall blocked by a fence.

It was fascinating going past all the different varieties of people around, not just through how many differences there are between types of canid alone, but also how many different species live around in general, most of which are mammals, though a few families of other land species are around. My training in shapeshifting sets me into a mind that this area is ripe with opportunities to gain more species, but looking around at how busy the region is I know well there wouldn’t be a good moment and I’m certainly not interested in following conventional methods regardless, especially since I already got my first species so early on and I can now get around safely.

“Alright, here we are,” Buzwe hops out of the cart and moves around to the back to open the trailer.

Cheryl follows after, while as I try to move back from my seat, Trevor places a hand on the middle of my back and stops me, “Hey, Pooka, just a second please…”

I resist the urge to roll my eyes and look at him, “what’s up?”

“So, I know, like, you like Cheryl, but I want her to like me more bro,” Trevor puts a hand on my shoulder.

I wince and bring my head back out of shock. “I- excuse me?”

“Yeah, from bro to bro, I’ve kinda been single my whole life and I can tell you’ve gotten a chance before and I would just appreciate it if you could give me a shot on this one” Trevor pats my shoulder.

“But, hang on-” I interject, raising a hand at him, attempting to correct his view before he interrupts again.

“Please, man, you do this for me and you’ll have a bro for life,” He closes a fist at level with my hand, prompting a fistbump.

“But Trevor, I think you should know some things befo-”

Trevor puts his hand back down, “oh, fine then… I see how it is man,” he rolls up his sleeves, giving me a friendly smirk and rocking in his seat as he hops out of it, “it’s on bro.” I remain seated and confused as he stands up, “I’m not opposed to a little friendly competition, bro, it’s okay.”

I can at least be assured Trevor is not gonna find out what I’m hiding beneath the faux fur. I’m almost envious of his lack of awareness of everything going on around him. “Trevor, we’re-”

“No, no, let’s play, man, we’ll see who she ends up with soon, I’m sure,” he steps out of the cart completely and walks around to the trailer.

I can’t help but laugh through the frustrating encounter for a few moments before I decide to follow him to the back of trailer. The walls of the trailer are lined with shelves with borders fastening the contents; a series of empty spare containers, securely tightened in place. Buzwe has lined all of our equipment boxes and extra clothes to wear, namely boots and gloves, at the edge of the van for us to pick up and take with us, each of us taking our boxes out for Buzwe to close the door behind us and lead us towards the laboratory building.

On the short way I take a moment to take in my surroundings. What once felt like a cramped and enclosed settlement now shows itself to be a broad well spread out place, and what initially felt like such a tiny cliffside cavern I was living in showed itself to be a way more gigantic mountain than I had anticipated, not even half of which is occupied by canid buildings that approach the cave before eventually reaching a wooden platform just above the cave which connects to a path of ladders leading down to the ground outside of the cave. I look up to get my first ever glance at the daytime sky, an almost clear, pristine blue field in which I see a first in my lifetime; a portion of a group of young birds flying towards that wooden platform. I trail my eyes to the direction they came from to find above the school building there is a large perch on which stands a bigger group of the birds which show themselves to be a group of young owls wearing a different uniform from the canid students of the school that are filing into the building.

The way I was taught about Naturals would have you believe Naturals are so keen on segregation that they even have to sort themselves out by species and location, but it’s seeming here like while it’s true there are predominances of species in certain regions which largely reflects the living preferences of each species (like how this region is very canid heavy), there isn’t directly any sentiment that other natural species are “supposed to be elsewhere” like my old teachers would have you believe. They function just the same as Supernaturals. It makes me wonder briefly why they don’t treat the Supernaturals that way… I miss the Supernatural a lot…

As I turn back around to look in the direction we’re walking, we approach the outside of the laboratory, the front door of which opens to allow three owls to come out, two wearing specially made boots and gloves over overalls and the third wearing more of a labcoat, each of which extend their hands.

Buzwe walks back to me, grabbing my lower arm and pulling me with him to meet them. “Pooka, these are our partners from Atkin, partners, this is Pooka, the new employee who's here for some training today.”

They recite an introduction each as I shake their hands.

The first to shake my hand is a markedly tall, dark feathered Little Owl wearing a gaudy, clashing yellow flat cap topping off a largely mustard green farming outfit “Hi! My name is Amir, I’m one of the farmers here,” they place their other hand on top of mine “always nice to see new faces,” they wave their fingers at me as they’re treat, “I’ll be with Buzwe and Trevor today, but I can’t wait to work with you in the future.” As Amir says this I notice Trevor pump his fist as if to celebrate who he is working with. Amir moves away to stand with him, giving him a judgemental look.

The second to shake my hand is a short light grey owl in a similar farming outfit, this time in a navy blue colour to match the dyed tips of her wing feathers and majestic hair extensions. She is soft spoken, “I’m Nicula; you can call me Nic. I’ll be going with you whenever Dr. Mot arrives. I’m going to teach you to harvest the crops today.” As she steps aside, she walks off to greet Cheryl, the two clasping each other's hands and giving a mutual side hug to each other.

The third to shake my hand is a bright white owl with much of her body covered up presumably to stop the sun reflexing off her bright feathers. She wears black labcoat over the top. “My name is Sandy, I‘m a plant doctor. I’m just hear to patch up any errors you might end up making,” she shakes my hand for a moment before gasping quietly, “no no wait, I don’t mean that we think you’ll fuck it- I mean, mess it up, it’s just cause you’re…” she scratches the back of her head, “I’m a plant medic, that’s… all I needed to say isn’t it…”

I give her a reassuring giggle back, “nice to meet you. Don’t worry about it, I wasn’t taking it personally.”

She responds with a nod before stepping aside.

Buzwe comes up to me, “right, well, there's no time to waste.” He pulls a sleeve up to look at his watch, “Dr. Mot should be here any minute, I’m gonna leave you here for now. We’ll be out here for two hours I think?”

Nicula looks over at Cheryl’s list of items, scanning over the page. “Yeah, I’d say so. We’ll take a break at the hour mark, probably, if you wanna meet with us back here for that, Buzwe?”

Buzwe nods. “Sounds nice to me. See you then!” Buzwe starts walking away as he points towards an approaching pickup truck. “That’ll be her. Introduce yourself!” He makes his way through the gate to the fields.

Dr. Mot stops out of the car. She wears a big deep blue labcoat with a shield emblem over the chest pocket over a clean white shirt and black pencil skirt. She wears around her neck a blue, white, black and yellow lanyard with “STAFF” repetitively written along its length, on the end of which there is a name tag and a heavy set of keys and keychains which she fiddles with in her right hand. Around her arm is a basic silver watch. She wears black tights and high heels which make a powerful contact with the floor for each step.

She notices we’re all waiting for her, checks her watch and straightens up as she awkwardly runs around to the back of her car, “Oop! Be right with ya!”. She opens the back of her vehicle and pulls out a pair of boots, kicking her feet back to pull off each heel before dipping them straight into the boots. Once done, she pulls out a pair of thick gardening gloves and hastily makes her way back to the front of the car to pull out her papers before coming over, slotting her pen sideways in her beak and extending a hand to take my second clipboard. She says “ta!” ah she signs the top of the paper and then extends her hand to me, “I’m Dr. Mot.”

I shake her hand, “Hi, I’m Pooka!”

“Hiya.” She is out of breath as she scans over the paper I handed her. “Right, I promise I’m usually more organised and not so overdressed on a day like this, but I was just teaching a class and only had 10 minutes to get here. Either way, I’m the Head of Science at the Megascops side of the Universities; I specialise in botany, so I’m mostly just gonna give you a crash course in what all this means and, uh, maybe give you more resources if you come out of this interested in the study and think it’ll benefit your position at work.” She presents two thumbs up to me. “Sound good?”

I look around to the others with me with a broad nod. “Yeah, I think that sounds good! Thank you for coming”.

“No problem!” She nods to me and begins extending hands to the other members of the team. “Sandy, and Nicula. You are?” She extends a hand to Cheryl.

“Cheryl, ma’am,” Cheryl takes her hand for a shake.

“Right. I vaguely remember a canid Cheryl who went to the school. I didn’t happen to teach you, did I?”

“Oh, no no. I was taught by Mr. Storfy at Nixon. I do think I remember you though,” Cheryl clarifies.

“Was the Head of Science called Miss Strix?” Dr. Mot has an upward inflection.

“Yes she was,” Cheryl nods.

Dr. Mot points at herself and mouths “that was me”.

“Oh, no way!” Cheryl clasps Dr. Mot’s hand and Dr. Mot side hugs back.

“I’ve achieved a lot in the last 3 years, it’s nice to see you again,” Dr. Mot steps away and waves her hand for us to follow her towards the gate. “Alright, let’s get on with it.”

We all make our way to the field, the five of us approaching the fence with Dr. Mot bringing me to her side to give me a tour of the place. Looking through the gate across the field I see it spans far into the distance, a huge flatland full of flattened pathways and rows upon rows of neatly organised flowers, vegetables, herbs and other plants with groups of farmers, students, and customers of all kinds of species scattered sparsely across the field gathering the things they need. Around the far edges of the field is the edge of a woodland, the base of some trees showing at the edges of the field at the horizon, while peaking just above the horizon is the top of the trees, where I’m able make out that there is an abundance of buildings hung high into the trees and the vague silhouettes of owls walking across or flying over a bridge that connects some of them.

“Is that the university right there?” I point off to the distance.

“Kind of. It’s a rehabilitative flight school for people who need to retrain after, say, they get an injury or get some kind of prosthetic or maybe they never learned it as a child. The universities see over them alongside the hospital.” Dr. Mot answers.

“Oh, interesting…” I take a mental note of the fact that there is a civilisation full of owls sitting right there and already begin considering taking Dr. Mot up on her offer of resources. Having an owl form would be incredibly useful.

I’m brought out of my thoughts by a pat on the back. “Let’s not get distracted now, come on,” Dr. Mot brings us all forward and guides us down the first row to the left.

...

“Alright, I think I see them coming,” Sandy points.

We’re sat around a park bench outside of the lab. As we had finished collecting a batch we brought them back to the park bench to get them properly organised, some of them needing to be taken back to the lab for cleaning or to extract the ingredients using tools we don’t have at the parlour. I had managed to collect the things I needed without destroying any plants, so beyond a few plants that Sandy repotted for us, her expertise hasn’t come to use yet and she’s awkwardly leant over the edge of the table fidgeting waiting for more plants to check up. Nicula and I are sitting next to each other organising flowers while Cheryl and Dr. Mot prune and pluck at petals and leaves, organising them into jars or tying bunches of stems together with string.

Buzwe is leading the other group. Amir is behind him to the left and looking identical to the way he left while Trevor is behind and further to the right, his coat now brown in a lot of places and his knees now decorated with a stale green veneer as he wipes his brow with his forearm, his gloves in hand.

Buzwe snaps a finger to create a sharp clicking sound, then points with the same hand at a park bench right next to ours, “Trev, sit there.”

Sandy straightens up, “what on Earth happened to him?”

Cheryl pipes up, “did he perhaps fall face first into a hole he dug again?” Trevor hits the seat with a big thump.

Nicula speaks up next, “did he chase after Amir and fall over trying to catch him out of the air?” Amir sits across from Trevor gently, folding one leg over the other and clasping their hands together after adjusting their flatcap with a light giggle.

“No,” Trevor looks over at her with a cross expression.

Amir looks over at her demurely nodding.

“You cannot be serious,” Dr. Mot lets out a disappointed sigh.

“He wasn’t even chasing after any ingredients he uprooted,” Buzwe adds.

“I, for one, am impressed she got it right,” Amir waves his right hand around as if sitting on a high horse over Trevor.

Trevor is leant over the table propped onto his elbows looking down at the wood grain with shame. “It was supposed to be a silly little prank, how was I supposed to know he’d fly away?”

“We’re birds? It’s kind of our whole thing?” Dr. Mot extends a wing as if to show it off.

“Pooka!” Buzwe changes the topic, “how did you do so far?”

“I think it’s gone pretty well,” I get my hands back on the flowers in front of me, “I didn’t ruin anything I don’t think.”

“The plants survived, hehe,” Sandy raises her hands up as if to cheer, but quickly lowers them uncommittedly. “Sorry.”

I giggle slightly, “I’ve had an overabundance of help, which I’m thankful for.”

“Have you taken an interest in botany at all?” Dr. Mot passes off a wink.

“Somewhat?” I scratch my neck, “I’m always interested in categorising species, so it’s been interesting to see how the plants differ.”

“I’m sensing a ‘but’.” Dr. Mot is delicately pruning a very flimsy looking silver flower.

I was hoping I’d hidden my lesser interest better, but I’ve been realising lately that nobody seems to be as suspicious as each others words as I’ve been led to believe. “I think I’d be more interested if the plants had a bit more control over the way they use each of their traits,” I admit.

“Ahh, I see.” Dr. Mot clips the plant and lets out a tut as she lifts the head of the flower off the table. “It’s less about the uses of plants to us but more to them, would you say?”

“Yeah, like I think since plants rely on the environment around them to feed and continue their species and can’t really move or have a say in the matter, I find it a little harder to keep my interest on just them,” I bunch together a few grassy looking plants and pass them to Nicula who has collected more of them. “But I think it’s really interesting whenever it was brought up, say, that it’s thanks to insects that they were able to reproduce in their natural habitat, and then finding out that this also assists those insects.”

Cheryl pipes up now, “that’s an interesting thought pattern. A lot of people I’ve known have preferred the usefulness that knowing about plants has on us in our day to day lives and that’s part of why they pick up botany on the side. It’s sounding more like you’re perhaps interested in the diversity of animalia.”

They’ve got me spot on. “Yeah, exactly.” Right, time to make up some bullshit about why I got into massaging… “Like, I’ve always liked how different some of our clients are and how differently they respond to techniques on different body parts. I don’t think I could get that out of a plant or fungus.” I pick up a mushroom and a herb in my hand, Nicula quickly gets a glove on and takes the mushroom off of me, passing me a wipe.

“Do you think then, Pooka,” Dr. Mot speaks, taking petals off of a flower's head, “that maybe you’d be more interested in zoology?”

“Maybe, yeah”.

I hear Trevor speak up now. “I took zoology for a month in my first year, but I always found it really difficult.” He’s copying the way Amir removes a leaf from a chamomile steam. Trevor is trimming a gooseberry branch. “Our professor said that Golden Retrievers have a soft bite and I felt the audacity to say it in front of me was too offensive for me to keep showing up.”

Amir leans over to show Trevor the berries he’s supposed to be removing from the branch. “Is it true though?”

“He was exposing my secrets, dude!”

“I know a professor who will be delighted to talk to you Pooka,” Dr. Mot presents her hand, asking for me to pass over a flower.

“Is it Mr. Gall,” Trevor rolls his eyes as he snaps a branch of the berry branch.

“No, it’s Professor Dion,” Dr. Mot bottles the parts of the plant she was working on.

“Seriously? Professor Pushover?” Trevor leans back, confused.

“Don’t call him that, first of all,” Dr. Mot points at Trevor, “but yes, he is the most passionate person we have on the subject.”

“I overheard the staff talking about him one time. I’m surprised he’s still working there,” Cheryl has finished her work, leaning her elbows on the table.

“Is he a white-ish horned owl fella?” Buzwe’s ears are pointed straight up, listening for an ‘mhm’. “I was his classmate when I took up a basic medicine class. He was always a very shy man when you caught hmi off of the topic of the classes he took.”

“Sounds like he hasn’t changed one bit,” Dr. Mot arranges her bottles in a handheld case.

“I don’t think I had ever seen him in person,” Cheryl pulls a bottle of water from her bag.

“That makes sense if you went to Nixon,” Dr. Mot points in agreement, “you’re not wrong to point it out though. He only works afternoons and does an after hours class. He’s quite reclusive in his office or classroom, so he can be a rare sight to see if you’re not on the Megascops side of the science building.”

“That makes sense,” Trevor pipes up, “I make fun of the guy, but I feel sorry about it sometimes.”

“Well stop doing it then?” Dr. Mot propositions.

“But everyone does it!” Trevor argues.

“More the reason to stop then, isn’t it?” Dr. Mot reasons. “Either way, Pooka, teachers at the institute are able to open smaller classes or tutoring sessions for smaller fees or free sometimes, and with it being such a credible institute people are allowed to reference back with our professionals. It’s required that all our teaching staff make themselves available for peer reviews and such. Professor Dion’s got free classes and 1-on-1s and probably would appreciate having someone like you interested in what he has to say if you’re up for it.”

“I’ll think about it,” I’m definitely taking that offer. “What are the requirements for it?”

“I think Dion uses a test to gauge interest because he doesn't like having to over-explain the basics, but it’s free otherwise.”

I feel a twinge of panic in my chest, “doesn’t like overexplaining the basics? How does he teach then?”

Dr. Mot chuckles. “He only teaches students in their second year of the subject. If he’s going to teach someone who is not a second-year zoology student, he’ll have the university give you an entrance test that he’ll mark personally. Nothing too far because he likes having students to teach,” she puts a hand to the side of her mouth and hushes her voice, “and the extra pay,” her posture returns to normal, “but the main point is he’s trying to gauge how easily you’ll accept basic concepts rather than how much you already know, if you get what I mean. These classes are more like a test drive than a formal curriculum.”

“I see,” I consider the explanation. “I think I’d like to know more on what it’s about though.”

“I believe it’s more focussed on the differences across wild animals and their anthropomorphic counterparts,” Dr. Mot brings up, "with some stuff on the diversity of traits and such. The sort of stuff I’ve brought up today with plants, except it won’t be specific to the plants you need for these lotions and whatever else you’re gonna use this for”.

This is striking a chord; I already studied a lot of that at home to hone my shapeshifting traits. Depending on the questions I get here, I might be able to ace this test. I think I can be honest about at least my interest. “Oh easy work. Is the test hard at all?”

“Take it this way,” Cheryl interjects. “If you’re calling it “easy work” after a brief glossing over of the curriculum I think you’ll do just fine.”

“We’ll see how that confidence holds up when you get the test,” Buzwe warns, “the boy was a nutter”.

“The most intelligent of them are,” Dr. Mot compliments the man distantly. “The man is a gift to the performance reviews. The students that stick with Wid are the highest performing students I see over.”

Buzwe speaks up, “our break is almost over, so if this is happening, I’d recommend you exchange your info now in case you forget before we split off.”

“Yep, I’ll go and get a page from my notepad and write some stuff out for you,” Dr. Mot stands and jogs off to her car as if in a rush.

...

On my way home after my last client of the day I walk towards the back wall of the cave where I sit on a bench at the end of the alley in the small street located inside. Before leaving today, Dr. Mot was able to come back to the parlour to hand me a borrowed zoology book picked out by Professor Dion himself as well as a small booklet covering Dion’s credentials and information about his expertise.

He’s a cuddly looking small fellow, with a blondish colour to his feathers and dainty square half-rim glasses perched on his beak. There’s a darkness to the feathers beneath his eyes, and his fashion sense is prim and proper, with smart, cool and dark colours and a tie in each image I see. His credentials are impressive; apparently his biggest achievement was in the medical field for wild owls, which would later then prove important for real owls when his discoveries were then cited by other prodigies in the field. There’s a notable drop-off in events around 5 years ago, but most of his discoveries both before and after the drop off are related to finding differences between species both through behavioural observations in wild animals and through DNA analysis in all animals and contributing to studies that furthered the medical field for lots of branches of species.

This guy knows his stuff, and his knowledge of DNA means the information I could get from him is valuable. I feel visiting him can even inspire me to write more of that precept. Or any of it at al… I’ve barely even got past the first sentence…

The back of the booklet gives details on how the course works. Each session will have microphones present and I can take the vocal recordings home with me, as well some form of experimental autotranscripting technology that they’ve been developing, which I can also keep at home. Sessions may not necessarily be on campus if booking doesn’t pan out, the teacher usually opting to use an external office or perhaps even their own home.

I take a look about the street around me. It’s dark and nobody is around. The curtains about me are closed with lights on and off in an inconsistent pattern down the street. I thank the world every day that the naturals’ resistance to technology keeps civilians from planting cameras around the streets as I stand and get my bag over my shoulders.

I walk back behind the bench and look around to my sides to be totally sure nobody is around and slip towards the wall at the back of the cave blocking civilians from crossing into the stalagmite forest. I soften up my body and squeeze myself between the mouth of the forest and the blocking wall, popping out at the other side and walking the long way through the cavern down to the inlet I call home as I shrug off my bag and jacket along the way, leaning them against the rock I call a table and letting my clothes sink through my body as I slowly soften back into my fluid form. I put my new book and Dion's booklet on the table and decide to skip the shower and just get into bed; quite an exhausting day after the restock, all things considered.