One year later.
"Aubrey's stuck again."
Derek shook Sabrina's long hair out of his face and rubbed the sleep from her eyes. "What?"
Max repeated himself. "Aubrey is stuck...again."
Derek yawned. "Please tell me you mean like, she's in some weird sexual position that she can't get out of."
"You know what kind of stuck I mean."
This was decidedly not going to be a good day. "No, no. She wouldn't be stupid enough to..." He couldn't finish the sentence. He knew his twin sister's curiosity could get her into all sorts of trouble. She was unbelievably smart, but was capable of making the dumbest decisions, like ignoring the safety protocols they had set for her if it meant finding an answer to a question she deemed pressing. Derek sat Sabrina's body up and felt her boobs jiggle, which caused Max lose focus and stare open mouthed. "It is too early in the morning for this! Max, focus up!"
Max found his girlfriend's eyes again, and nodded solemnly. Two seconds later he had zeroed in on her tits again.
For the past year, Derek, a body hopper, had aligned himself with Trevor, a man who could shapeshift at will, but was often forced to against his will. Trevor's best friends, Max and Aubrey had tagged along, and Derek's sister Aubrey had offered her assistance as well. They had worked hard to help Trevor with his power this last year, and had been mostly successful.
For starters, Trevor was in almost complete control of when he shapeshifted. It was all thanks to Derek, who spent a lot of time diving into Trevor's core. An unknown force resided there, and it seemed to be the source of Trevor's shapeshifting. Derek could not tame said force, but he seemed to be able to weaken its mastery of Trevor's body.
Aubrey had tried to help in this area, as she was also a body hopper. But the first time she had tried, she had gotten stuck in Trevor's core. This was nothing new. Derek got stuck there all the time, but he wasn't alone when it happened. Because Derek's soul was intertwined with Bekka, she became an anchor for him of sorts. She could control Trevor's body and use his gift to pull Derek back to consciousness.
When Aubrey got stuck that first time, she had no one. She was weighed down in a psychic vortex, and there was no one to throw her a lifeline. Trevor's mind and body became a blank slate that was completely suggestible during this time, something that Max took full advantage of. This ended up being a good thing. Max had often taken advantage of his friend's shapeshifting and sexual desires, but apparently, he had been holding back. Max had Trevor shapeshift again and again as he acted out an assortment of sexual fantasies. No sooner had a compliant Trevor become one person, Max made him shift into another. The speed and sexual intensity that rippled through Trevor's core had allowed Aubrey to eventually break free. Even then, she hadn't wanted to leave Trevor's body. The knowledge that she had gained while trapped inside had astounded her.
Aubrey had learned fragments about the entity inside of Trevor. It was ancient, and far beyond her understanding. She thought it would have frightened her, but the second she joined with it, she felt complete. When she was given a chance at freedom, it had been so hard to leave. It was only her obligation to the group that she had done so. Derek forbade her from ever hopping Trevor again. But Aubrey had always been more stubborn than her brother, and found herself drawn back to Trevor's core every few months.
Derek couldn't really blame her. To him and Aubrey, the thing at Trevor's core was a siren song. It beckoned them. Being in it, surrounded by it, it felt like everything was as it should be. It was easy to see why Aubrey would want that feeling again. But Derek knew chasing it didn't help anything. The entity itself, ancient though it was, didn't seem to be particularly helpful either. It only conveyed one message and one message only, that now both Derek and Aubrey had heard.
"Unite us," was all it had ever said.
These two words were combined with a vision of an ordinary house on an ordinary street.
When Aubrey had shared this information to the group, which Derek corroborated, no one had known what to do with it. They were still reeling from the fact that Aubrey had been in so much danger, that it got put on the back burner.
It's not that it wasn't deemed important, but a lot of other things were distracting them as well. Civilization seemed to be fracturing all around them. Nation after nation became destabilized. At first, it had seemed like the fragility of an economic infrastructure here, or an uprising of citizens determined not to be ruled by a selfish dictator there, but then it happened in countries that always seemed to have it together. It seemed every month, a new nation was facing a crisis, and the cost was a rising body count. It was as if the whole world was slowly going mad, one domino at a time, and it was speeding up.
Initially, the group's goals had been simple. Help Trevor master his curse. And continually monitor and eventually stop a madman who was also a body hopper, named Nevyn. But these goals had certainly gotten more complicated as Aubrey seemed to lose focus in her desire to become lost inside Trevor, and the world going to hell around them. The one upside seemed to be that maybe they wouldn't have to stop Nevyn at all. Maybe civilization would do that for them.
But right that second, there was only one thing that mattered. Aubrey was stuck. Again. And Trevor would be a vegetable until she wasn't.
"Did you tell him?" a woman's voice asked from outside the bedroom.
"Yes, he told me," Derek answered tersely in his original voice. "Why didn't you stop her, Jasmine?"
A small, dark haired woman came in and glared at him. "Oh, I don't know. Maybe because I'm helpless for five minutes every time she hops out of me. Or maybe because I'm left reeling from the huge memory gaps you leave me with so I have to play detective and ask things like, where am I, and what day is it. All I know is, I came to, and she was gone."
"I meant like..." Derek started to say, then just sighed and started looking for clothes that Sabrina would want to wear.
Jasmine had been an unexpected but necessary addition to their party. Thankfully, she had blended in rather nicely. Jasmine had been Derek's most recent recruit, the one who had been there when Trevor tracked him down. She possessed Nevyn's gene that made her a potential body hopper, but she was so new that she had not gone to Aubrey's research center and met everyone else. Her newness made her ideal for their research with Trevor, because it was vital that word not get out about the shapeshifter's abilities.
With the promise of unlocking her own body hopping power, Jasmine had agreed to join them for a season. Her main contribution wasn't her intellect or drive or any other skillset, but to be Aubrey's main host, as Aubrey no longer had her own body, same as her brother. Jasmine was also told as little as possible, and had her memory wiped on the regular of anything they found out about Trevor or Nevyn. The only thing she knew of any value was the fact that Trevor was a shapeshifter. The group had tried to hide it, but it became impossible that first time Aubrey got stuck.
As Derek finished pulling on a top for Sabrina, he asked, "How long has she been in there?"
Jasmine shrugged and looked at Max, who hesitated. "Um...like, an hour?"
Sabrina's eyes narrowed. "I don't even have to use your girlfriend's memories to know you're lying right now."
"Uh, yeah, sorry. Maybe like, nine hours?"
"She's been in since last night!" Derek bellowed as he swiftly exited the bedroom. "Why didn't you get me? You know the longer she's in the harder it is to get her out!" The others followed closely behind as he made his way towards Trevor's bedroom. It was the biggest one in the house. It made sense, since they all gravitated towards his bed.
As Derek crossed the threshold of Trevor's room, he saw a naked celebrity laying very motionless among messy sheets. Derek was pretty sure it was a celebrity anyway. He didn't watch a lot of movies, but he was pretty sure he had seen her on a screen at some point in his life. But a naked celebrity around here was a dime a dozen. He pointed at Max and ordered, "Alright, you start us off. I'll hop into Jasmine and then Sabrina and I will..."
"Uh, it's going to be awhile before I can...perform," Max said meekly.
"You already fucked him this morning?" Derek yelled accusingly. "Are you kidding me! You're the best chance we have of jolting my sister out of..." He cut himself off and looked at Jasmine.
Jasmine responded by putting hands on her hips and rolling her eyes. "I know, I know. Cone of silence and all that. Do what you got to do, but listen, you guys have been at this for a long time and I think I've proven my trustworthiness and-"
Before she could deliver what would have no doubt been an impassioned speech on the strength of her loyalty, Derek grabbed Jasmine's wrist, which immediately began to shudder.
"Hey!" she whined. "Dammit. Well, see you when I see you I guess." And then her consciousness slipped away and was replaced by Derek's.
He wasted no time in giving orders. "Sabrina, go find your boyfriend's performance enhancing pills and make him take one. Hell, make him take two."
With a vacant look in her eyes, Sabrina obediently responded, "Okay," and then left the room.
