I jumped to my feet as my gaze darted between the monsters on either side of me.

Coach Rick's smile held a trace of sadness. "So it was you. When I found out there was a new hunter called Bash, I figured there was a good chance you were him, but I hoped I was wrong."

"What?" My heart raced as Charlie leaned on the doorframe, smirking at my confusion. "How did you know it was someone named Bash?"

"Switch now!" Owen yelled, but I was too shocked to listen.

Coach frowned. "You've fallen in with a bad crowd, even worse than that idiot Nolan." He shuffled the papers on his desk and filed them away with a sigh, slamming the drawer shut. "You killed a friend of mine. His brother heard that witch bitch call your name, so I brought you here to figure this thing out."

"Figure it out? Don't you mean kill me?"

"Damn it, Bash. Switch with me!" Urgency filled Owen's voice.

Shaking his head, Coach said, "Aw, don't be that way. I'm not happy about it. I like you, but you haven't given me a choice."

Coach was a mimic. Dad and I went for pizza with him after track meets a dozen times. Ronnie's Pizzeria was his favorite because he said they had the best spinach dip, and he's been a mimic the entire time. It was too much to process.

"I've known you for years, and you're a monster that eats people," I mumbled as I stood frozen to the spot.

"We're not monsters!" Coach gritted his teeth. "We're survivors." He waved a finger at Charlie. "Close the door, so no mess gets out there."

"Switch!" Owen screamed.

They were going to kill me. My pulse whooshed in my ears, drowning out everything else. Time seemed to drag as Charlie reached for the doorknob. With his body mostly out of the office, I leaned forward to kick back, hitting his knee with my heel. He screeched and collapsed outside the room as I spun toward him, slammed the door, and locked it.

I'd trapped myself with a mimic. I worked to slow my heart rate and make my brain function. What was the plan?

Coach laughed as he came around the desk, and I jerked the knife from my boot. I had five inches and twenty pounds on him. If this was a fair fight, he wouldn't stand a chance, but this wouldn't be fair. Sweat ran down my temple.

He stopped and glanced from the blade to my face. "You got lucky the other night, kid. You won't do so well with me."

Claws extended as he raised his hands. Charlie banged on the door. I flinched, and Coach grinned. "Jumpy, aren't you? Don't worry; this'll be fast."

There was nowhere to run in the small room. He lunged for me. I crashed into the wall with his claws digging into my bicep. My elbow smacked into the bricks behind me, and the knife clattered to the floor. The palm I held pressed to his chest kept him at arm's length, but he was stronger than he appeared and I wouldn't be able to hold out much longer.

Coach would kill me. My breath came in gasps and the arm keeping him from me shook.

"No!" Owen cried. "Snap out of it, Bash! Switch!" He strained for control, but I couldn't focus enough to let go.

Blood trailed down my bicep as Coach's claws dug in. It dripped from my fingers, puddling on the floor and collecting around Owen's ring. The ring. It took all my effort to lift my numb hand and squeeze Coach's forearm. His skin sizzled against the iron band. Coach grunted and jumped out of my reach, grimacing at the smoking wound.

That space was all I needed to bend and retrieve the knife. As he came at me the second time, I straightened and plunged the metal into his heart. Shame washed through me at his look of betrayal, quickly replaced by a sense of self-preservation.

I didn't want to watch, but couldn't stop as Coach's skin became so tight I expected it to split. Instead, it peeled off in thin rotted sheets that turned to dust as they drifted to the ground.

He fell apart until a skeleton wearing Coach's clothes slipped heavily off the knife's tip into a crumbling pile at my feet. In less than twenty seconds, Coach was gone. I'd killed him.

The banging on the door stopped, but Owen's yelling didn't. "Bash! Switch! The other one's getting away!"

Through the office window, I spotted Charlie dragging his damaged leg in his hurry to escape. Even with an injury, mimics were fast. He was already halfway to the main exit.

Flinging the door open, I ran, squeezing the leather handle of the weapon in one hand as I ripped a throwing knife from my pocket with the other. Without slowing, I hurled it as hard as I could. The throw landed in the mimic's back, nowhere near the target.

He shrieked and twisted around to fight as I tackled him at full speed, my blade skewering the monster's heart. We fell to the ground with the mimic's claws gripping my ribs, holding us together. It didn't last long. His grasp deteriorated with the rest of him.

Blood seeped from my arm and torso as I lay on top of the remains, panting and clutching the leather handle. Mom's face swam in my mind. My vision became hazy, and I gasped as my chest tightened, smashing the air from my lungs.

Did Mom see claws like those? Did she feel them tear into her skin?

No. Stop thinking about Mom. I rolled off the pile to my back and hissed when my injury touched the wooden floor. Mom would've been terrified. She was so gentle. There wasn't enough oxygen in the gym.

"Three things I see," I mumbled, trying to focus—the white squares of the drop ceiling, the electronic scoreboard, and the basketball hoop on the other end of the court.

A shaky inhale filled my lungs. I whispered, "Three things I hear." The hum of the air conditioner, Owen's garbled words in my mind, and nothing else. I needed something else. Why did it have to be so quiet? My panic rose.

"What are you doing?" Owen yelled, interrupting my mental freak out.

"Finding three things I hear, but there are only two."

"I don't know what that means."

"There aren't enough sounds! How am I supposed to relax?"

"Um, well, mimics aren't trying to kill you anymore. That's pretty relaxing."

I choked out a laugh. "That's true." A warm calm enveloped me while I concentrated on being safe. I was alive. Mom was gone, but obsessing over the possible details of her disappearance didn't help anyone.

"Are you alright?" Owen asked.

I jumped at the sound, but loosened my death grip on the knife. "I'm great."

"Why do you need noise?"

I rubbed my hands over my face. "It's a technique for when a panic attack is starting. My thoughts wandered to Mom, and sometimes I freak out about not knowing what happened to her."

"And counting sounds helps with that?"

"It gets me out of my head. I find three things I see and three I hear. Then, I move three parts of my body. Until recently, I haven't had to do it in years."

"Are you alright now, or do you need something else? I'll whistle if that works."

Grinning, I said, "I'm good, but thanks. I'm kinda surprised you're not making fun of me."

"Man, if counting shit helps you stay cool, do it."

"It does." I smiled with relief.

"Good. Where'd you learn that trick?"

"Years of seeing a psychiatrist."

"Really? Like a shrink?"

"Yep. But we don't really call them that anymore." I dropped the weapon beside me. "I had a hard time when Mom disappeared, so did Dad. We saw a doctor together for a while and then separately when I was ready."

"How does that work? You just talk?"

I ran my fingers through my hair, pushing it off my sweaty forehead, and sighed. "Yeah, you talk about all kinds of stuff. Her favorite response was, 'How does that make you feel, Sebastian?'"

Owen chuckled. "And that helped?"

"I didn't think it would, but it did."

"Maybe shrinks aren't so bad then."
We were silent as everything that happened sunk in. We had to clean up this mess and figure out what to do next. I stared at the revolting pile of remains and shivered.

"You're pretty damn quick," Owen said. "Charlie here was surprised." There was a teasing tone in his words, but I wasn't ready to joke about it.

"I killed my coach," I murmured.

"No, you took out two mimics on your own." Owen's voice shone with pride.

"He was always so nice to Dad and me. Oh crap! He's been here for years. People will notice he's gone for sure."

"It's okay. Let's clean this up, then go see Lilla. She'll fix the rest."

Lost in memories of track meets and Coach cheering me on, I didn't move. Sunny days and races faded to images of his face, the way it melted into his skull as his eyes turned to powder and poured from their sockets.

Owen said, "Bash, you can't keep focusing on that. Switch, and I'll handle this. You should rest."

I shook my head. "No, I've got it. Doing something will help."

As I stood, I pulled Charlie's jeans out of the pile. "I guess we're making another pants bone bag." I tried to make a joke of it, but flashes of Coach attacking and how he died filled my mind.

"You know, seeing you fight reminded me of watching my brothers. I was freaking out the whole time."

Mentioning that was probably a distraction, but it worked. "You never talk about them. What were they like?" I asked as I scooped dust off the floor.

"They were kids, only fifteen." His voice cracked, and he got quiet.

"They were twins?" I wanted him to keep talking. Learning more about Owen's family was way better than reliving Coach's murder.

It took Owen so long to answer; I thought he wouldn't. But then he said, "Yeah. Nick and Nate."

"They were hunters too?"

"They trained, but they didn't do a lot of hunting. I did my best to leave nothing for them to do. Before their first hunt, I'd always think if I found Catriona, I could stop everything; they'd never have to do this."

"You put too much pressure on yourself. It wasn't only up to you."

"Maybe not. It is now, though."

I moved to Coach's office to gather his remains and tried not to gag. "Did your brothers want to be hunters?"

"They did, and they'd get so mad when I went without them." He chuckled. "They looked up to me like I was a superhero in the stupid comic books they wanted me to read."

"Well, you do kill monsters. That'd be a pretty good storyline."

He huffed. "That's worse, though. To them, it was cool, and I was a badass. They shouldn't have wanted to be out there."

Owen didn't speak while I finished scooping up the gunk. Then he said, "That's enough sharing and caring. You've got everything bagged. Make sure there's no blood anywhere."

"Coach didn't bleed, and Charlie only bled from the knife that hit him in the back."

"You bled plenty, though."

"Oh, yeah." I twisted to peek at my wounds and cringed at my sticky red shirt.

"Let's find some cleaner."

Bleach and paper towels were in a janitor's closet down the hall. I used them to wipe the blood from the wall and the floor, then returned the supplies.

"Put those rags in with the bones; we'll take them with us. You did good. Can't even tell we were here."

I swiped the cleanest towel over the area one more time before adding it to the sack of stuff to burn. Then, I stared at the woodgrain. It still had its polished shine, but everything else here had changed. "What should we say happened?"

"Don't worry; Lilla will take care of it. Let's go to my place."

"Okay." I couldn't wait to see how she could fix this problem.

"First, we switch. You rest and I'll drive."

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