Julie twisted her thoughts in a more positive direction. Kevin's work was important, and he had to work long hours. At the Lawrence Institute, they were working on a top-secret defense project that was supposed to save the world if the alien Kroles ever decided to attack Earth. The Kroles were known to be hostile to humanity, though direct confrontations had been rare so far. It was so secretive, all Julie knew was that Kevin was a biotech scientist and that he was studying the Krole shapechanging ability.
Julie pictured Kevin in shining armour, riding a white charger, coming to save her from some wild bug-eyed alien. She smiled a bit and dismissed the image. She had picked up a sound from among the many background noises: it was the sound of a flyer's motor, and it was getting louder. When she heard the crunch of metal settling onto gravel and the whirr of the flyer's motor running down, she knew Kevin was home.
She was at the door when he opened it, asking "How was your day?" as she always did. Kevin said "Fine," and kissed her on the cheek. Then Kevin moved to hang up his coat, and Julie went to put supper on the table.
When they had begun eating, Julie questioned him again.
"Really, how was your day? Did Wallace nag you?"
Kevin nodded.
"What did he nag you about?"
"I wasn't wearing my lab coat when I entered the ... one of the labs."
"What did you tell him?"
"I said I forgot, and I grinned at him. He hates that grin."
"So you do it to annoy him?"
Kevin didn't answer, and the rest of the meal passed largely in silence.
When Kevin was done eating, he pushed himself up from the table and went to the room he called his study. It was quite bare, containing only a small computer terminal with a large screen, sitting on a table, with a chair in front. Julie knew that once he logged into the Institute and began working, he wouldn't budge until 11:00 or 12:00.
She cleared the table, and then brought Kevin a bowl of potato chips. She set it down at his elbow, knowing that he might not touch it all evening. Then she quickly left the study, before Kevin could say anything. She knew she wasn't allowed to see the information from the Lawrence Institute blazing on the blue screen. It wasn't fair, Julie thought to herself. She could see the information, if she really wanted to. The night before, when she brought him a bowl of chips, she had seen Kevin type in his password.
Julie sighed and went to gather clothes for the laundry. She put them in the washer-dryer, checked the levels of the blue and green washing fluids, and started the machine. Then she brought a book down to the living room and began to read.
At 11:40, Kevin emerged from his study, bleary-eyed. Julie put down her book and followed him into their bedroom. They got ready for bed in silence. When they crawled under the covers, Julie reached for Kevin, caressing him, making overtures. Kevin mumbled something and turned his back, so Julie asked instead:
"Did the identification psychologists ask any new questions today?"
"They always do," Kevin replied. "Security."
"What did they ask?"
"They asked how I felt when I first intentionally killed a living animal, such as a bug."
"What did you tell them?"
"I told them about capturing a ladybug when I was a boy. I put it in a jar on my windowsill. I knew it would die, but I wanted to investigate it. When I came home one day and it was dead, I was angry because I hadn't been there to observe it. Then I felt guilty and I emptied the jar out the window."
Kevin rolled over and looked straight at his bed-mate. "Julie, you've got to realize your behavior is very obsessive. You want to know everything about me, you want to possess me. It's unhealthy to be so possessive."
Julie opened her eyes wide and shook her head a bit, but faced with Kevin's dispassionate intelligence and the authority of his conclusion, she could say nothing. So Kevin continued.
"The summer break is almost over. You should go back to college in Washington soon."
Julie's voice found its way out of her mouth. "But I don't want to go! I want to stay here, I love you!"
"You don't love me, you just want to possess me." His voice was unemotional.
"That's not true!" Julie almost cried.
"It doesn't matter," Kevin said tonelessly. "You're young, you'll bounce back." He turned away from Julie again, obviously considering the conversation to be over.
Julie held her body immobile. "But he needs me, he loves me!" she thought hysterically. But she could no longer deny the truth. He didn't need her; he just needed someone to keep house and feed him. When she was gone, he would hire a cleaning lady, until he found another girl.
She lay in tense silence, for what seemed like an hour. She was certain Kevin was asleep. Julie got up carefully from the bed and walked over to the dresser. She opened the top drawer, the one containing Kevin's socks and underwear. She reached behind the clothing to the back, until she felt the hilt of Kevin's gun. She took the gun, closed the drawer, and sat down on the edge of the bed. With her free hand, she found Kevin's head, felt his ear, his hair, his neck. With her other hand, she aimed the gun so that it would kill instantly.
Julie pulled the trigger.
A few instants later, an image was forming in her mind. Clearly she saw the identification psychologist, in his white lab coat, sitting in his white office just inside the entrance to the Lawrence Institute. He was asking her questions.
"What is your full name? What is your mother's full name? At what time of day were you born?" And then he asked: "How did you feel when you first intentionally killed a human being?"
Julie opened her mouth to answer, but she couldn't. She felt nothing.
Nothing.
Still sitting on the edge of the bed, Julie rocked back and forth, her mind blank. As she rocked, a piece of information bubbled up slowly from deep in her subconscious. The information told her how to change herself back.
She began the change.
She watched with fascination and pleasure as her hands lengthened and thinned out, becoming much stronger. Her skin grew darker, until it was dark charcoal, even black in the wrinkles where her limbs and digits bent. Her body became leaner, tougher, and her head grew larger. She felt her hair melding together and joining itself to the back of her head. Her mouth grew larger, her jaws more powerful, and her teeth sharper.
When the changes were complete, she looked at the corpse beside her. Kevin weighed exactly 76.2 kilograms, minus the blood that was seeping into the bed-sheets. She began tear off pieces of Kevin's body, consuming everything. Some of the food energy she converted to heat energy and dissipated it into the air. Some of it she absorbed, for she would need the extra mass in order to take Kevin's form.
She had a lot of work to do tomorrow.