Bath frowned, though Lisa couldn’t see his face. “Is that how you knew I was outside your house?” he asked pointedly.

“When we first met, I saw your emotions as a nebulous shell of darkness. An absence of light, of emotion—at least emotion that I could detect. That’s how your shell has always been.”

“What do most people’s emotions look like?”

“If people were like magnets, with a North and South pole, their emotions would look like electric field lines. They change color and intensity to reflect emotional states. When two people come together, their field lines overlap and swell. When a giant crowd gathers, their field lines all amalgamate into a giant sphere of emotion. When I join my own emotional field with that sphere, I can influence the emotions of the crowd, though I can do this with individual people as well.”

“Have you met others like yourself? Would you know if you did?”

Lisa shuddered. “That’s why I'm finally telling you about all this. I was going to tell you anyways, ever since you told me about yourself, but...later. I guess I’ve been pushing it off.”

Bath’s eyes narrowed. ‘Don’t tell me,” he said, “you've detected someone—someone who came into this neighborhood—who’s special?”

“I thought I would be excited to meet someone else who can see and manipulate people’s shells. And then look what happens: after I see one for the first time, I can’t even think straight.”

“Why?” Bath pressed.

“This person had a shell around them that I had only seen a few times in my whole life. It looked like...dried blood, with an almost crusty texture. Just one look was enough to tell me this person was without doubt up to no good. But more than that, I saw them consciously manipulating their own shell. The only person I've ever seen do that is myself."

Bath considered her words. First, he wanted to know: How did Lisa have this ability? If he devoured Lisa, would he, too, have the ability, or was there something more at work here? The fact that he, of all entities, had met Lisa right after becoming a human was an almost astronomical coincidence.

This is ridiculous, Bath marveled, letting all the strange events and revelations of the night sink in. Absurd.

But Bath was a predator, and Lisa had suddenly become an important tool in his arsenal. While his abilities were almost comically unsuited for subtlety, Lisa’s revolved around influencing people without them ever knowing. In that sense, she was his foil.

“Lisa,” he rumbled, “as my friend, and as a someone who’s special, would you like to help me push back the next mass extinction?”

Lisa cocked her head back, eyes closed as she grinned. “Bath, I'll do whatever you ask.”

Bath smiled darkly. “I lived through an entire epoch where practically the only creature on land was a porcine rodent. The biodiversity in the era previous had been magnificent, and after a mass extinction, this little pig-like prey creature was almost all that was left,” Bath spat. “Whether the humans of this age understand what a mass extinction means is of no consequence. They already know about history...ancient, geological history. They know about the mass extinctions of the past!” Bath growled; to Lisa’s credit, she didn’t so much as flinch and continued to stroke Bath’s fur in rhythmic, circular motions. “They simply choose to ignore this information, just as they choose to ignore blatant data that proves that humans are responsible for the premature warming of this planet.” He paused.

“Bath,” Lisa interjected, “another mass extinction is inevitable. Why do you care if humans speed it up? I mean, I care, because I am a human and a mass extinction will mean lots of people will die...but you really have no stake in the survival of humanity.” She looked up at him with wide eyes. She had never seen him so furious, his pupils thin slits. Even his shell, black as it was, seemed to swell around him like a massive black hole.

“If a mass extinction were to happen prematurely,” he began, “I fear that precious little life will be left.” His voice quivered with intensity. “Humans underestimate the fragility of ecosystems and living things. Given more time to adapt to changing conditions, many of Earth’s creatures would evolve and prosper in a new age. Many would die, but the next epoch wouldn’t be devoid of biodiversity. A premature, man-made mass extinction belays catastrophe on the level of an asteroid crash or mass volcanic eruption. The main reason why those kinds of natural disasters are so terrible is that they happen over a short span of time.”

Lisa fixed her eyes on him. “I still don’t understand. Why do you care?" she asked, emphasizing each syllable. “In a few million years, this period of time will be but a little inconsequential blip.”

Bath shook his head.

“The effects of this time will ripple millions of years down the road. Before humanity, I was the only one with the power to influence the Earth as a whole. A fair responsibility for me to hold, considering that I would be forced to live with the repercussions of my actions. But now, humans possess this destructive potential.

“Bath, why do you—”

“Lisa,” he interrupted, silencing her. His tone had a sense of terrible gravity, a finality that left no room for further questions.

“I will stop humanity from initiating its own destruction.”

“What do you have planned?”

He told her what he had been doing so far with the highway attacks, and how he planned to make humanity fear the use of gasoline cars and, eventually, all fossil fuels.

“No offense, Bath,” she cringed, “but this all sounds like a terrible idea. You're just as smart as I am; why couldn’t you think of anything better?”

Bath moved his head back in an expression of coyness that Lisa recognized even through the wolf’s guise.

“I—well, humans are inherently selfish. I sought to direct their self-preservation towards a productive end: not using fossil fuels."

“What you said kind of makes sense.”

“Kind of?”

She swatted him.

“But—it seems silly! I haven’t actually seen you get serious, but from what I can gather, you could probably single-handedly wipe a human city like New York off the map. Why don’t you just threaten the countries of the world? Tell them that if they don’t forsake fossil fuels for green energy, you'll destroy them?”

Bath twitched. “I considered that, but in the end, I felt like the best method was to make people think that they were deciding to save the environment themselves. Even if they initially began to heavily invest in green technology because of terrorist attacks, they would still blame those attacks on fellow humans. I don’t want to create a situation where, if humans exist hundreds of thousands of years, maybe even millions of years down the road, they would seek to destroy me.”

“But...they can’t, right?”

Bath’s tail brushed against her. “I'm not sure. I’ve never exactly been hit by an antimatter bomb.”

Lisa rolled her eyes.

“I don’t fully understand how I can manipulate my mass and shape. But until humanity were to develop the capacity to defeat me—a day which might or might not come—I don’t think they would leave me alone.”

“Wow, that’s kind of lame,” Lisa burst out. “You talk about being the supreme ruler of the Earth for half a billion years, and then you tell me you're afraid to rule the Earth now? When an actual challenge has presented itself?”

“I grew tired of ruling the Earth a long time ago,” Bath sighed. “After you have everything, you realize how little everything matters.” His voice dripped bitterness.

“Then fine. Do it for me, Bath. I want to rule the world. Let’s make it happen.”

“Lisa,’ Bath cautioned, caught off guard by her request. “You don’t know what you’re asking for. You'd be allied with me against all of humanity, perceived as possibly the greatest traitor to humankind. And that’s if we go through with your reckless suggestion instead of my original plan.”

“Bath, I'm not afraid of a war. Especially if the situation is as you say and we'd be fighting for the future of Earth millions of years from now.” She took a deep breath. “I have no illusions of my capabilities. I'm going to die within the next 80 or so year. But,” she said pointedly, “if I can do something worthwhile with my time, something that will echo and resonate for a million years, I think...that will be...” she struggled for words.

“You're talking about war, though you haven’t killed a single creature in your life save insects, which barely count.” Bath licked her cheek. “Are you really prepared for the consequences of killing millions of people? People like Hitler and Stalin killed millions. What we do may be worse than both.”

Bath saw her blanch

“Really?”

Bath inclined his head. “Yes. It isn’t certain, but not beyond the realm of possibility.”

Lisa smashed shut her eyes and gritted her teeth. She hugged bath as tight as she could, which was actually quite tight.

“If I end up ruling the world, I'll make sure history remembers us as humanity’s greatest saviors. None of this betrayer nonsense. That’s the talk of someone resigned to failure.”

So I’m just a pessimist, now? Bath sighed and shut his eyes, curling his body around her.

They lay there until they fell asleep.