Being the one family member with no astonishing ability proved quite difficult to deal with. When everyone else are off flaunting their pyrokinesis, telepathy, mutations, wits and super strength, I'm sat here, rotting away in self pity and doubt.

They'd always try to include me in their everlasting fame and glory, but I had always stuck out. Among the strange physical features and abilities of the rest of my family, I was average. Painfully so.

Of course, I blended with the rest of society. None of them had supernatural abilities of any sort. But my mother, father, brothers and sister are all extraordinary.

When my parents had first made their debut in this small town, they had been outcast. That changed rather quickly, though, when the local authorities saw opportunity. The residents of the town all but settled their riots once the promise of protection and peace came to play. Few were still disgruntled at my families existence, and to those few, me being the odd one out was a comfort.

I gathered my things and began my morning hike up the Rocky Mountain. The government had assigned me the role of scout, to keep my family happy. They'd rather not have the family who's protecting their arses have low morality. Smart people.

Once I had reached the top of the mountain, I sat and observed. It wasn't a particularly tall mountain, nor had it been a particularly dangerous hike in all of the years I've spent climbing the damn thing. So it didn't come as much of a surprise when I discovered no threat— again.

A low rumble interrupted my pondering. Storm clouds were rolling in at an alarmingly quick rate, so much so that it began seeming unnatural. As per procedure, I removed the flare gun from its holster and grabbed the coloured capsules.

Blue. I slotted the capsule into the gun with the ease of practice. Blue quite simply meant 'storm' or 'heavy rainfall'. Damn, when I accepted this job, I didn't expect to be the towns fucking weather forecaster.

I shot the flare at a forty-five degree angle into the sky. The gun resounded with a boom at the same time as the second clap of thunder.

I looked back to the rapidly approaching storm clouds, somehow moving quicker than before. This was definitely not just a measly force of nature, there had to be some kind of magic involved. And at this point I was willing to drop all of my coins on it being the doing of one of the mythical beasts of the forest.

The thought caused a chuckle from me. Beast. It was quite nearly humorous to me. The critters and creatures that lived in the forest were hardly dangerous, as long as you know how to act around them. This town, to put it simply, did not.

Whilst the animals of this day and age did tend to have magnificent and dangerous powers, they were still animals. They didn't have such stupid things as 'evil intent', they act on instinct. It's hardly the animals fault if the human sets off its instincts.

The clouds were very nearly upon me at this point. Setting down and rummaging through my hiking pack, I finally found my raincoat. Just  as the mixture of hail and rain began it's decent, too. Guess whatever higher power that may or may not exist decided to give me some luck today.

After donning the navy coloured rain coat, zipping up the copper zip and popping all the buttons in place, I secured my hiking pack and sauntered off to the old overgrown and moss covered gazebo. It had a stone floor and steps, white metal benches and a small table at the centre that was also made of the same material. The rest of the structure was made of wood, with the exception of a stone plate sitting on top of the wood for catching the drips of water.

I shuffled into a nice little nook, intending to fall asleep and either wait out the storm or wait for one of my family members to come get me. Whilst I've hiked this mountain more than any of the other townsfolk, I wasn't stupid enough to try to get back down in the middle of a supernatural storm.

Just as my eyes closed I heard leaves rustling. Not unusual during a heavy storm, but the rustling was right next to me. In the shelter. Where the wind couldn't reach.

I peeled my left eye open to acknowledge the shrubbery and whatever was in it. Despite the bush nearly vibrating, the animal somehow remained hidden. Opening my other eye and shifting curiously, I tried to get a better look.

Suddenly, the shrubbery erupted with a cacophony of high pitched snarls and growls, the shaking becoming even more intense.

I backed up a bit, having clearly startled the critter. I began speaking to it in a calm high pitched voice. Hushing it. The snarls and growls eventually ceased, and the shaking lessened.

The storm seemed to have calmed slightly, too.

Cautiously, I began reaching my hand out to the shrubs. I felt a small electric shock, similar to the ones that come from static electricity when carpets and metal meet. Then, a small grey blob dashed out of the shrubs and bit my index finger, before making a similarly speedy retreat. The critter was not yet ready to come out of hiding, and that was understandable.

The shrubbery was yet again shivering from the movement of the animal within. The storm seemed to match the state of the animal.

'Curious.'  Upon realising something, I decided to test a theory, 'Perhaps this critter is the cause of the storm. If that's the case, then the little electric shock from earlier makes sense.'

I moved away from the shaking shrubbery, and once again began speaking high pitched words of encouragement to the critter. Slowly, it calmed down. As did the storm, at the exact same time as the animal.

Once the shaking came to a standstill, I waited. After roughly five minutes, a mouse like nose curiously sniffed in my direction, before dipping away into the shrubs again. The muzzle of the creature had sharp teeth, and so I take it that it has a protein based diet.

Turning once again to rummage through my pack, I pulled out a bag of left over jerky. I spilled the contents of the bag just passed the half way point of me and the shrubs, closer to the creature so as to not force it too far from it's hideaway.

Taking out my thermal blanket and wrapping myself up with it, I dozed off. Eventually I had awoken to another clap of thunder, so clearly the critter hadn't fully calmed yet. I glanced to the side to see the small creature nervously coming out to sniff the jerky, before taking some back to the shrubs and skittering back out for more.

I looked away and closed my eyes again. Animals like this could usually sense when they were being watched, and the poor thing was scared as it was, it didn't need me observing it while it stashed away the food.

The animal was around the size of a ferret, but it had a longer tail and the fur patterns of a tabby cat. It also had very large ears, similar to that of a fennec fox. It had longer legs than a ferret, too. Though it still slinked about swiftly the way a ferret would. It's ears, cheeks and the back of it's knees had little tufts of thicker, lighter fur. The tail was also especially fluffy.

In short, it was adorable.

Soon enough, I fell back asleep. Though I didn't expect to wake up with the critter in my lap, curled deep into the blanket. I wasn't complaining though.

The storm seemed to have stopped, too.

I absentmindedly scratched under the chin of the critter. It stirred, looking up at me before flipping it's body, shoulders leaning into my hand. I began scratching it again, and it only leaned further in.

"I have to get back now. I'll come back soon, if you want."

The creature looked up at me with a high pitched trill.

"Okay then." I huffed. Scooting the creature off of my lap, I began to pack away my thermo blanket.

The creature, whom I've decidedly nicknamed 'Baban Bach' pushes against my leg, almost stubbornly.

"What? Do you want to come with me? Is that it, Baban?"

The resounding trills and yips from the animal almost seemed like an actual response.

Undoing and shrugging off the navy coat, I stuffed it back into the bag before unzipping the top half of my hoodie. The critter seemed to understand, and clambered up into the space between the hoodie and my chest. It smelt exactly like stone and earth after rainfall. Petrichor is what they call it, if I'm not mistaken.

"The towns people are going to throw a fit if they find out." I chuckled, "I'm really going to have to find out exactly what you are, Baban. Aren't I? There's got to be at least something in our library."

I started heading down the mountain. My family are worried, I'm sure, considering how long I must've been up here. Hopefully it won't take too much convincing for Baban to stay.