Inside his dorm at the University of Prince Edward Island in the City of Charlottetown, Karim Adeluyi was restless. And it wasn't just midterm madness, or the hostile stares and passive-aggressive bullshit he'd grown accustomed to receiving from some Canadian students who weren't used to seeing people who looked like him in their otherwise homogenous learning environment. No, Karim's restlessness had to do with something else altogether...
As much as Karim tried not to think about it, there were some things he could not ignore. Like his birthright. He'd been feeling anxious all day, like he had an animal inside of him, clawing away at the walls of its prison, dying to get out. Karim tried to distract himself with schoolwork, of which were was plenty. Nevertheless, he knew that sooner or later, mother nature would have her way...
Night fell, and the University of Prince Edward Island campus was quiet. There wasn't much to do in the City of Charlottetown, besides drinking, or partying, and since Karim had few friends, he didn't much care for either. A long time ago, after his cousin Mohammed Adeluyi became one of the leaders of Boko Haram, the terror group responsible for much death and destruction across his homeland of Nigeria, Karim and his family were forced to flee the country.
Coming to Canada seemed like a good idea at the time, and thus, Karim and his sister Nadia, along with their parents Yousef and Mariam Adeluyi came to the City of Ottawa, Ontario. They ran afoul of a notoriously xenophobic judge during their refugee hearing with the Canadian immigration authorities and found themselves in legal and social limbo, as far as their status in Canada was concerned.
While his family opted to stay in Ottawa, Karim decided to try his luck elsewhere. He got wind of a rumor about immigration rules being different in different parts of Canada. In Ontario, a heavily populated province, the government seemed eager to turn away immigrants and refugees, especially the ones from Africa and the Middle East. Supposedly, in small, sparsely populated Prince Edward Island, Karim's immigration changes were somewhat better, according to his attorney.
Karim went online and applied for a work permit and a study permit, then moved to Charlottetown, the Capital of Prince Edward Island. The place was not what he expected. Pretty much everyone was white, and they were clearly not used to Africans like Karim. Being African and a Muslim made Karim an outsider twice over, but he was determined to make the best of his situation.
Karim enrolled in the civil engineering programme at the University of Prince Edward Island, and began his higher education journey on the island's sole university. As a tall, dark-skinned young African Muslim, he was an exception with a gigantic E in the most homogenous of Canadian provinces. There were people on P.E.I. who had never seen a black person in the flesh prior to laying eyes on Karim. No, things were not easy for him, but Karim refused to let the xenophobic locals get to him...
Karim waited until he felt the Change was imminent, and that night, he went out for a walk on the beach. The young Nigerian avoided the beach parties, and the small bands of drunken students, lovebirds and local louts out for a good time. No, he wasn't looking for a party. What Karim needed was privacy. So he continued walking along the beach, until he came to the edge of a thickly wooded area.
Standing on the beach, Karim smiled. Alone at last. Closing his eyes, he heard the silent call of his kin in his blood. Karim's brood had lived in Africa long before humans evolved. Shape-shifters bridging the gap between man and beast, they were known by many names in Africa and the Middle-East, but one name stuck above all others. Were-Hyena, that's what the people called themselves...
As Karim got ready to unleash the Change, he paused. For there was something rising out of the water. Whatever it was, it was large, and as it approached the beach, everything within Karim tensed. For like all predators, he could sense a fellow predator. A human-like figure rose out of the surf, and as it drew closer, Karim gasped in surprise. For something both beautiful and monstrous, yet distinctly feminine, stood twelve meters from him...
"So, you're a Siren?" Karim Adeluyi asked, as he looked at the strange, pale-skinned woman with the luminescent black eyes, and those depthless orbs looked back at him, a bemused expression on the beautiful but eerie face. Six feet tall and extremely pale, with translucent bronze skin, her bluish veins showing in a pattern all over her body, this gal was definitely not from around here...
"You know what I am," the monster said, licking her lips, and her vaguely feminine voice sounded like it was coming from far away, rather than in front of him. At once Karim realized that the creature before him had not spoken, rather, he heard her voice directly in his mind. And if that weren't freaky enough, the Siren took a step closer, and Karim tensed.
For his inner Were-Hyena rose to the surface, drawn by the danger emanating from the creature standing before him, on the frosty, windswept beach. Karim had seen a lot in his twenty seven years, much of it after he left his hometown of Kano, northern Nigeria, but nothing could have prepared him for what happened next. The Siren surged forward, moving faster than anything he'd ever come across...
"Back off lady," Karim shouted, even as the Siren hissed, and her mouth suddenly filled with curving fangs. Lashing out with a clawed hand, she slashed at his shoulder, and Karim recoiled, wincing in pain. Even as he tried to defend himself, the monster came at him, relentlessly pressing her attack. Outraged, angry and in great pain, Karim stopped holding back, and let nature take its course...
Fur sprang all over the tall, slender young Nigerian's body, and his body began to twist and change. The Siren paused, clearly surprised by the transformation her foe was undergoing. The young man's eyes turned yellow, and his teeth elongated and sharpened. Spots appeared all over his fur-covered body, and he grew in size, while his body took on decidedly canine aspects. A towering, dog-like monster now stood before her, all traces of humanity gone from its feral eyes...
"Interesting," the Siren said, and the Were-Hyena roared out a challenge, then came for her. Instead of pressing her attack, the Siren raced back to the ocean, retreating to the safety of her watery domain. The creature Karim had become stood there for a few moments, then it took off, for there were humans drawing near, and it knew to avoid their kind at all cost...
When morning came, Karim Adeluyi found himself lying on the cold grass, his clothes in tatters, and the young man sighed, then got up. Stretching a bit, he looked at the sky. It was just getting light. Hurriedly he walked back to campus, which was blessedly not far from the beach. As he walked through campus in the wee hours, quite a few people looked at him, and he smiled politely but ignored them.
"Bro, you look like you had a rough night," came a voice, just as Karim reached his floor. The young Nigerian turned around, and found himself looking at a tall, slender Asian guy with a crew cut. Karim met Joseph Yukari during his first week at the University of Prince Edward Island campus. They were among the few international students present that day.
"Yeah, I got to stay away from alcohol," Karim lied, hoping this fib explained the fact that his clothes were in tatters, and he smelled like a wet dog. Not much he could do about it. Whenever he turned into a Were-Hyena, for several hours afterwards, he would smell slightly different from a regular human. All due to the changes in his body chemistry...
"Muslim guys can't handle their liquor, eh? Next time join me and the guys," Yukari said, and Karim nodded, wished his talkative neighbor a good day and then let himself into his apartment. The young man let himself fall into bed, and finally let out his breath. Dammit, last night was rough. Karim winced as he rolled on his side, for the injury he'd sustained during his fight with the Siren hadn't fully healed yet.
Karim looked around his one-bedroom spot, and bit his lip. The place didn't come cheap, given the fact that as a refugee claimant, Karim didn't have good status in Canada and thus, he was paying exorbitant amounts to study at U of P.E.I. Canadian citizens and permanent residents paid less than half of what Karim was forced to pay. Working as a security guard on the night shift to pay the bills was hell on Karim's body, but it was for a good cause...
"What in hell was that thing?" Karim wondered aloud, as he carefully touched his shoulder, which still bore the marks of the Siren's claws. Growing up in a family of Were-Hyenas in northern Nigeria, Karim was no stranger to weirdness. Still, in West Africa, the supernatural coexisted alongside the mundane. The local people knew of Were-Hyenas, and Demons, and other supernatural entities. Still, if someone told Karim a few days ago that Mermaids existed, he would have laughed...
For a brief moment, Karim considered calling his parents, but figured they had enough to worry about. Karim's father Yousef was having trouble adjusting to life in Ottawa. In the City of Kano, Nigeria, the old man was a university professor and the Imam of the local Masjid. In Ottawa, the patriarch was stunned to discover that his Nigerian university credentials did not matter, and he was forced to take on a menial job as a clerk for Loblaw's. Karim was saddened by this, but until he got his papers and completed university, there wasn't much he could do for his family...
Over the next few days, Karim settled back into his ordinary routine. During the day, he went to class, and hung out at the campus library. To distract himself, he went to the local museum and the movie theater. His favorite hangout was Harry's Kitchen, a Caribbean restaurant owned by Harold Jean-Pierre, a Haitian immigrant who settled in Charlottetown almost two decades ago. The burly, forty-something, bald-headed and dark-skinned chef ran the restaurant with his Irish-Canadian wife Susan O'Leary and their daughters, Emily and Jennifer, who studied at Holland College.
