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With a frown, he wet his hair and ran a comb through it, trying to create some semblance of being pulled together.
Baer returned with the mugs, and they took their coffee with them outside. Ruby ran up with her usual exuberance. She nuzzled Clay’s free hand, and he rubbed her ears. “You’re a sweetheart, aren’t you?”
The shepherd barked, her head tilting to the side as something scampered in the underbrush nearby. She shot out after it and Baer laughed.
“She actually thought ‘rabbit.’ Imagined herself chasing it.” Baer sipped his coffee and watched her jumping around in the grass. “She just wants to play with it. That’s better than some of the more violent outcomes from the other animals.”
“Like I said, sweetheart. You got a good one there.”
“It helps that she has a full belly already.”
Clay finished his coffee slowly, enjoying the fresh scent of the morning, the view of oaks and swaying Spanish moss. Birds twittered from the forest, and the faint sound of hammering started up again inside the house.
“I guess we should get the obvious out of the way.” Clay paused and smirked. “So, how are you feeling about everything Flo and Jo told you?”
Baer’s mouth opened and closed twice without a word being spoken. When he finally managed to get out some words, he settled on, “It’s a lot to take in.”
A bark of laughter left Clay, and some of the old tension eased. At least he wasn’t alone in this insane asylum any longer.
“Aliens and goddesses, Baer,” he said on a sigh. “Aliens and motherfucking goddesses.”
More laughter came from Baer, and he shook his head. “I’d say I didn’t believe it, but with the magic, it’s hard not to.” Baer chewed on his lower lip for a second. “Dane?”
Clay shook his head. “Doesn’t know any of it. We can tell him, but…”
“Yeah, without the magic, kind of hard to believe.” Baer paused and took another sip of coffee from the mug in his hand. “Still, the thought of creatures coming into this world to kill us is like something out of a bad horror flick.”
Clay nodded. “Knowing they’re stealing energy through the rift worries me. We’ve got enough problems. We don’t need help from aliens.”
“If this has all happened in the past, how long does it take to find the other guys?”
A soft grunt rumbled from Clay’s throat. “And why didn’t we stop it permanently? This trickle of information we’re being given is annoying.”
Baer shrugged. “Maybe they’re waiting for the others and for us all to have our powers before they share the bad news. Because you know there is—some really, really bad news coming our way.” Baer sipped his coffee and frowned. “If we’d succeeded in the past, we wouldn’t have been reborn, wouldn’t be fighting these aliens now.”
“I know.” Fear curled inside Clay and made his palms sweat. But then, he’d been living with fear for so long, it didn’t feel abnormal. “Honestly, everything they’ve told us…I don’t know…feels right. Like I’ve been hearing things I’ve heard before. It’s enough to make me feel a little crazy.”
“Everything about this situation is crazy,” Baer agreed.
They both fell silent, staring off across the backyard. The world was suddenly a much stranger and more foreign place than it had been a day ago.
With their coffees finished, they left the mugs on the outdoor table and made their way to the clearing Jo and Flo had taken them to.
Baer immediately sat in the grass and leaned back to look up at the sky.
Clay glanced up to find a bird soaring overhead. “Can you hear that bird?”
“I think so. There’s a jumbled mess of voices out here with so many animals and birds. But there is an image, or feeling rather, of complete pleasure at the brush of the wind in my…its wings.”
“You’ll be able to actually fly. I can’t imagine what that will be like.”
They watched the bird circle around. Then Clay looked over at Baer, who had the most intense expression on his face. His brows were pulled together, his eyes narrowed, and his mouth was in a flat, tight line.
Baer caught his gaze. “I’m trying to concentrate so hard, I probably look constipated.”
Clay barked out a laugh. “You don’t.”
Baer laughed too, the tension fading from the air. “I’m sure I do. I also feel like I should roll up into a ball to turn into something small, like a rabbit.” His eyes went wide. “Why would I turn into some other creature’s main dish?”
“I’m sure you’ll be smarter than a real rabbit and be able to get away.”
“Oh, my God! I just had an image of me being eaten by a mountain lion or something.”
Clay was struggling to not laugh as Baer zinged from joy to horror. His emotions were like trying to follow a hummingbird as it darted from flower to flower. “Why don’t you become a mountain lion, then?”
