I blinked as the nurse put in the last stitch. I had gotten eight of them under my eye. She was doing a fine job not asking what happened. She even told me to watch my step on the stairs next time.

"So tell me, how old are you?" she asked, while she was cleaning the rest of the blood off my face.

"Eighteen."

"You guys keep getting smaller and smaller." She wiped one final time and made a little bounce. "Or maybe I get older or older. Or maybe both. What do you think?"

I shrugged, and she did as well.

I jumped down from the chair I was sitting on and went out in the hall to a waiting Birdie instead of the guard who brought me here.

"Another miscommunication?" he asked and nodded towards my face. I didn't answer but just waited for him to lead the way back to the cell block. "I can't help you if you refuse to talk to me."

"I'm not interested in talking to you," I growled. "Take me back to my cell."

"You took on two very large canines, and you walked away with one cut. You're going to have to talk to me whether you want it or not." He grabbed my arm and led me into a new room. It looked like another infirmary, though smaller than the one I had just been in.

"Why? Why do you care?"

"Because it's my job."

"Why? You're a soldier! I am no one."

"You're not no one."

"Why does it matter?" I was getting angry again, and I was having a hard time keeping a lid on it.

"That is classified."

"What is?" I could feel a tingling in my fingertips. I clenched my fists. This was so not the time to get riled up.

"You do not ask me questions, understand? You're an inmate."

"And this inmate wants some fucking answers!"

"What is wrong with you? Do you know who're you talking to?"

"Yeah, master soldier of the States! Who apparently is interested in some kid from Ireland. Why?"

"I am not going to answer that." He crossed his arms, flexing his pretty impressive biceps.

"Who sent you?"

"I am not going to answer that either." His calm demeanour was pissing me off.

Tingling turned to pain faster than expected. I doubled over, holding my hands out from my body. Oh shit. Why now?

"I am going to shift," I groaned and started backing away from Birdie. He grabbed both of my shoulders and pushed me against the wall.

"Listen to me," he said with a soft voice.

"I can't..." And then it started. Pain shot down in my arms and claws started growing out of my fingers. "Get out!"

"Not going anywhere. Listen to me breathe." The minute he said that my senses went berserk. I could hear everything within the building. So much noise. An explosion of hundred's heartbeats, pulses, people speaking or dropping something. Birds chirping, wind rustling the trees. Everything went from being barely there to almost making me deaf.

I tried to free myself from Birdie's grasp, but it was no good. He was a lot stronger than me. I narrowed down on his breathing and tried to match my own with his. It didn't help, and my legs buckled. I didn't drop to the floor, only held up by him.

"C41, listen to me. You're not going to shift, relax your heart rate, I know you can."

But I couldn't. My heart was almost ripping its way out of my chest, and my skin was starting to grow several shades darker. This was embarrassing, and I just wanted him to leave me alone with the monster inside of me. He kept asking me to listen to him, but everything was too loud and too close.

"Nathan." Everything stilled, and I heard only his voice. "Nathan, you can do this. Just calm down."

And I calmed down. I didn't understand why. Never in my 18 years on this earth had I been able to stop myself from shifting, and this guy said some male name, and suddenly I was calm? I could still feel a slight tingle in my fingertips, but it was nothing.

My name. My name was Nathan. I remembered that much.

Birdie let go of me and took a step back. I looked frightened up at him.

"What the fuck did you just do to me?" I whispered.

"Averting your attention to something more important than being riled up," he replied calmly.

"I want to go back to my cell." I was so done with this guy. Fuck the plan, I wanted out.

"And I still want to know what is going on with you and the miscommunications."

"I have a big mouth, okay? It's all my own fault. Can't shut up. Now take me back."

He shot me a bland look. He knew I was a bad liar and not a very big talker. I preferred to listen. And right now I wanted to get out of this very small room and away from the tower of muscles in front of me. Who had just said my name and made me stop mid-shift.

He started towards me, and I scrambled back, hitting my back against the wall again. My chest violently rose and fell as he leaned closer to me, studying my face.

"I am going to get you to talk at some point. Even if it means meeting with you every day," Birdie said with a low voice and pulled away from me. He opened the door for me and motioned me to get out.

I clenched my jaw hard and tried not to actually stomp out of the room. He followed me back to the cell block without saying anything, which was a nice change. I waited for him to unlock the barred door to the block.

The key was in the lock but he didn't turn it. He shook his head and finally turned the key. The door opened, and I marched across the open space and dropped down on my bed in my cell. I took a deep breath and looked down at my hands. The tingling had stopped, but I knew it would return tonight.

I woke up on the floor again. Everything was torn to pieces in my cell. It was light out, so I had probably not gotten any sleep, except for the 30 minutes of passing out after shifting. I groaned and rolled onto my back and stared up at the ceiling.

He had stopped me, Birdie. I groaned and again and sat up. I wasn't sure whether or not I should tell C59 about it. He knew about the shifting disorder, but he also knew nobody could stop it. Well, now Birdie could. He already had.

There weren't a lot of things in my life I could trust, but me shifting was one of them. Getting that ripped away from me was shaking me to my core. In the last week, I had not only left my home country behind, everything I knew about myself was being tampered with, and I didn't like it.

The doors opened, and I stepped out of my cell. I caught sight of Che, and he smirked back at me. Why did he always do that?

We walked on a straight line to the food court. I sat down with my tray at an empty table, knowing C59 would join me with his friends. And not long after he did. He looked tired and moody. Not a good time to talk, so I kept my mouth shut. The other guy wasn't as bright. He had come in 3 months ago and didn't know my big old friend as well as I did.

C59 slowly turned to the chatter-head next to him. I picked up my tray so my food wouldn't get knocked off the table. C59 slammed the chatter-head's face into his bowl of porridge.

"Shut. Up," he growled. I put my tray back on the table and continued eating the glue-like porridge. He pushed down on the chatter-head's head and then released him. He sat down and took a sip of his cup.

He looked up at me and gave me an approving look. He was happy; I at least knew my place. Knew how to act and how to be a good felon. I doubt I was really good at anything else than being a felon. We left the food court together, still both of us silent. We sat down outside the cells. C59 took a deep breath and looked around.

"They get more and more stupid," he said and flicked his eyes on me. I didn't say anything to that. He didn't need my opinion on this. "Sometimes I think we're the only sane people here. None of these assholes has been here for more than a couple of years."

"Neither have I," I pointed out, thinking he meant this particular facility.

"You know what I mean." Oh, he meant prison in general. "They're not like us, Cub. They're not like you."

I met his gaze, not really sure what he meant. No, not a lot of people were like me. I guess, when you grow up in prison, you end up being a little different from the rest. I scratched the stitches on my cheek and broke eye contact.

"Do you know what I mean?"

"No," I replied truthfully.

"You see people. You read them. And you think before you speak, which is pretty bloody rare in here. You'd rather stay silent than lie. I saw you when you came to the prison in Ireland. You weren't even afraid back then, though you were nothing but a wee boy."

I knew this was big coming from C59. He never said anything nice to anybody.

"When you walked in here with that damn muzzle on... Everybody knows you now. Especially since you took out those two mutts. You're doing well for yourself."

"We just have the American problem," I muttered and looked over at the barred door.

C59 sighed. "Don't we always? Have you figured something out?"

Was I really going to tell him about what happened yesterday? I should. Information had a funny way of finding its way to the person you least wanted to know about it in prison. It was fine, I was taking my time to answer, especially after what he had just said.

"I haven't learned anything," I said and hoped I was a better liar than I thought.

"I wasn't expecting you to have learned anything yet. You have just started your meetings with him. What do you talk about anyways?"

"You know, the usual." I raised myself up on the table, resting my feet on the bench just to get a little distance. I really didn't want to talk about this, and I bet C59 knew. And when I didn't want to talk about something, he would keep pressing me until I finally spilt it. Or he would beat me and ask me to stop being a pussy. Pun not intended.

"No, I don't."

"We talk about my nights." I hoped that would be explanation enough. C59 made a 'psh' sound and leaned back against the table, stretching his legs out.

"You still have that problem?" He tipped his head up and looked at me. I clenched my jaw and looked away. "You probably wouldn't have those problems if you weren't here. So that's what the American wants to know about?"

"Yeah."

"You think it goes beyond that?"

"What do you mean?"

It took him a while to answer. "Not a lot of youngsters know how to shift completely anymore." I shrugged not sure what I was supposed to say. "Don't just shrug at me, Cub. You know it as well as me."

"I don't know," I just said.

"You keeping a lid on it?"

"I'm not talking a lot if that's what you mean."

He barked a laugh. "You never have." I smiled a bit at that one too.