Dinner that night was uneventful, at least as uneventful as it could be with Brendan watching June like he had never seen another human eat before. June felt self-conscious as it was about her caloric requirements, so being stared at like a zoo animal did nothing to make her feel better about it. Even though nothing short of six or seven plates of chicken would have satisfied her hunger, June stopped at one. But Jin and Sun Todoroki were the model of hospitality and insisted she eat more, so she gratefully accepted a second helping so as not to seem rude. She glared at Brendan whenever she had the chance, hoping he would take the hint to stop staring—eventually he did and blushed.

The Todorokis didn’t question June’s explanation for wearing Brendan’s clothes (she felt bad about telling them a white lie), and they happily explained the holiday of Autumnal Equinox Day to her when she asked about holidays in Japan. Buttons sulked off when no one gave him any chicken, meowing something loudly that caused June to nearly choke on her bite—where did he learn those words, she wondered.

They had hardly reached Brendan’s room when he rounded on her with questions. “So does it hurt?”

“Shifting? It did at first, but you get used to it.”

“Do you have powers when you’re normal? Is that how you threw Michael yesterday?”

June nodded. “I guess so. All of my senses are enhanced some, and I'm stronger, but not nearly as much as when I’m Shifted. I can still hear a lot of things if I concentrate though, like heartbeats.” Brendan, who had plopped onto the bottom bunk and slouched against the wall, sat up straight and looked oddly nervous. “So yes, I’ll know if you’re lying to me, Brendan,” she said with a smile and a wink. “But get up, we have to get ready to go.”

“Go where?” he asked as he stood.

June paused, then started to pace the middle of the bedroom. Where to start? “Someone broke into Cordelia's lab this morning. They kidnapped Mr. Moseley and took—”

“Is he the security guard that ate half of the cake at your birthday last year and almost threw up?” Brendan interrupted.

Grief over Mr. Moseley mingled with laughter at the memory—now June understood how someone could laugh bitterly. “Yeah, that’s him. The kidnapper also stole a vial of this serum from Cordelia, and it’s the only one left. We need to figure out who took Mr. Moseley, rescue him, and get the vial back.”

“Then this is a mystery,” Brendan said, and his eyes sparkled. He rubbed his hands together excitedly. “It’s like Blimey! Detectives in real life.” He walked to his closet and stopped mid-step, turning back to her. “Is this related to all the people who went missing lately?” he asked.

June shrugged. “Cordelia thinks so. She believes a demon is involved.”

Brendan did a double take. “Did you just say demon?” He started chewing his lower lip.

“Yeah, it’s a whole complicated thing,” she said. “They look like people ordinarily, and they can shapeshift too, but they turn into twisted, nightmare creatures. Shifters are supposed to hunt them down and wipe them out.”

Brendan stopped chewing his lip. “Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why are you, I mean Shifters, supposed to hunt them down?”

“Oh, I guess it’s because they eat people, and the more people they eat, the more powerful they become. They don’t age and they heal rapidly, even weak ones. Cordelia said something in our teeth—well, in her case beak—and claws prevents rapid healing, so injuries we deal out are much more permanent. No one else is equipped to stop them.”

“That is so cool,” Brendan replied. “You’re supposed to be a demon-fighting superhero?”

“I guess? Once I Shifted, in theory, I was supposed to go to some mysterious convent thing to learn more—”

“—I knew it!" Brendan said, a little too loudly. “A special school for Shifters—” But he stopped and his face dropped. “Does this mean you have to leave Seven Falls?”

June walked over to him. “Never,” she said firmly. “Cordelia ran away from that, and I could too. They—the Shifter organization of sorts, it’s called The Flood—might not even know about me, and even if they did, they can’t make me go. You aren’t getting rid of me that easily.” She pushed his shoulder playfully. “Now get ready, we've got to go find the kidnapper.”

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Smiling widely, Brendan disappeared inside the closet. “Who are the suspects,” he called out, “or is this like a needle in a haytown sort of—”

“You mean a needle in a haystack,” June said. “And one of the scientists at Cordelia’s lab had to be involved.”

“How many are there?” A wad of clothing flew past the closet door, but Brendan continued ruffling around inside, hidden from view. It was a good thing he had such a large walk-in closet, because he had filled it with a messy hoard of things that would rival any dragon’s den.

“Three besides Cordelia, but only two are suspects,” June answered. “The third scientist is my Aunt Violet, and she isn’t involved.”

“June! We shouldn’t rule anyone out, you know how mysteries work—sometimes it’s the person you least suspect. But is Aunt Violet the one at your birthday party last year who, um, sort of looks like, well…who’s kind of pretty?” His voice cracked.

June giggled. “Yes, she is beautiful. She and Cordelia are really close, which is kind of amazing. I don’t know how anyone could be friends with Cordelia.” She said it without thinking, then her thinking caught up to her. It was amazing anyone could be friends with Cordelia. It was even more amazing that someone could marry her. All this time she thought Richard had to be evil. But someone who could marry Cordelia had to be closer to a saint than to a devil. “Plus, I’ve known Aunt Violet for just about my whole life. She’s not a suspect, she couldn’t have done it.”

“June…”

“No, it’s not her. I really think it’s Dr. Crushov because he—”

Brendan snorted inside the closet. “That's ironic. His name alone makes him sound like the most obvious suspect.”

“If you say so,” June said. “He just installed a new security system at the lab.” More shuffling sounds came from the closet. “If it’s not him, then it’s Dr. Chase,” June continued. “You haven’t met him. He’s kind of slimy, but not in a guard-your-lunch-money kind of way. More like a yes-man, spineless kind of way. It’s hard to believe he’d be involved in anything violent. Still, though, maybe he got forced into it or something.”

“We should probably start at the lab,” Brendan said amidst the sounds of clothes hangers sliding. “That’s always what you do with a mystery—start at the scene of the crime.” Another garment flew past the closet door.

“Well, there’s a slight problem with that,” June said, and rubbed the back of her neck. “I may have Shifted and jumped through the window of Cordelia's office, and I may have landed near a police officer. He might have seen me so the police might be out hunting for me.”

A crash came from inside the closet. “Seriously? That’s gonna be a problem, but one thing at a time,” came Brendan’s reply. “I suppose we should start with the scientists’ houses then.”

“That makes sense. I also lost my phone when I Shifted at the lab, so I haven’t been able to get in touch with Cordelia.” Something tugged at the back of June’s mind. It was wispy as a cloud, without meaning yet. She strained to pull it forward.

Brendan emerged from the closet, dressed in black jeans and a black hoodie, and swung a hooded black peacoat around his shoulders. Because each item of his attire was black, each one visibly showed a healthy covering of Chloe’s hair. “Are you sure Cordelia isn’t involved?” He put a hand on his hip, jutted one leg forward, and looked at June expectantly.

June’s chest twisted. She couldn’t be certain about anything involving Cordelia. “She was home with me all morning.”

“The whole time?” He gave her an imploring look that didn’t seem to fit with his question.

Another chest twist, harder this time. June had been out in the forest that morning, for at least an hour. Could Cordelia fly to the lab and back in that time? Maybe, but as far as affection went with Cordelia, Mr. Moseley ranked even higher than June on the list of recipients. It seemed unlikely Cordelia would hurt him. And she’d been pretty upset about the serum being taken. “She was genuinely shaken up at the lab, and she did eventually come clean about the serum,” June replied. The nagging thought at the back of her mind slid forward and solidified a bit, but it hadn’t taken shape yet.

“What’s so special about this serum?” Brendan asked, then cleared his throat loudly. “Notice anything?” He pulled lightly on the collar of the peacoat.

“Cordelia made it to try to prevent me from Shifting."

“She tried to stop you from having superpowers?” He shook his head in disgust, then made a very big show of rubbing the shoulders of the peacoat like he was brushing off dust and looked as if he was waiting for something. June scrunched her eyebrows together. Was there something special about the peacoat? It looked normal to her. “Your peacoat?” she asked. “It’s covered in dog hair.”

“Yes! Well, no, not a peacoat.” He paused for dramatic effect and waved a hand like a gameshow host. “It’s a cloak.”

“A cloak?”

“As close as it gets nowadays. A cloak is very necessary for any adventure.”

June laughed. “If everyone’s a suspect, that makes you a suspect too, you know,” she teased, “cloak or not.”

“Buttons will confirm I was here all day.”

“I’m not so sure,” she retorted. “If you don’t change his name the relationship could go toxic pretty quickly.”

The word toxic jarred something loose, and the nebulous thought materialized in her head like a brick—the serum was radioactive! Of course!

“We’ve got a stop to make before we hit Dr. Crushov’s house. I’ll tell you on the way,” she said and stepped into the hall. Then another thought hit her and she spun and pushed Brendan back into his room. “One more thing. I need you to get something from your mom. I’ll keep your parents distracted, just get it and meet me downstairs.” Then she whispered the item in Brendan’s ear and he gulped like a cartoon character; she didn’t know the human throat could actually move like that.