A meeting at the market
By Strega

	It was ten o'clock and Merisa's shift was ending when the raccoon came into the store.
	
	She stopped counting money and stared.  The family-owned grocery store saw its share of wierdos, especially this late at night, but this had to be the weirdest.  The guy in the raccoon mask was short, barely over five feet, and wore a vest of plastic-looking scales that hung down over his hips.  A belt thick with pouches and tools pinched in his waist.  Broad wristbands with flashlight-like tubes running their length separated his gray sweater from black gloves.  Shorts of a scaled material similar to the vest stopped at mid-thigh, and high boots with more plastic plates armored his feet to the knees.  He even had a fake ringed tail hanging down behind.  A metal shroud protected the tail from what looked like a small jet pack.
	
	Merisa looked over at Rachel two registers over.  Rachel shook her head: don't call the manager.  Despite his weird getup the little man didn't seem threatening; if anything he looked tired.  He sat down on the bench next to the door and pulled out a cell phone, punching up something on the screen.  Maybe his shopping list.

	She finished counting the cash, made a note in the log and locked the register drawer for her relief.  She was off now and grabbed her purse, but as she headed for the door curiosity overcame her and she stopped by the cosplayer.

	The closer she got the better the costume looked.  Halfway there she saw that the gray shirt and black gloves were nothing of the sort; they were fur, part of the outfit, and he even had sharp little raccoon claws.  The armor didn't look so plasticky up close, more like ceramic, and the “flashlights” on his wristband had gem-like colored tips at the hand end.  She'd seen things like that when the store got robbed by goons with pilfered high-tech weapons; his wristbands had lasers or good-looking mockups.

	Then he looked up.  Bright, inquisitive, but tired brown eyes looked out of a mask of fur, real fur, and she recognized him.  It was the raccoon-themed superhero, part of the district's vigilante squad.  The Feral Four, she thought it was called. 

	“Oh!  I'm sorry, sir.  I thought you were a costumer.”

	He rubbed his head.  Up close she smelled burned fur.  “No, not a costume...OK, it sort of is,” and he smiled with a flash of white fangs.  “It's just it's been a really long day.  Normally I'd change before coming in, but I was on my way home and I only need a couple of things.”  The shape of his jaws and his teeth made his voice high-pitched, almost chittering.  It took getting used to.

	She sat next to him.  “Change...back to human?”  It was definitely not a costume.  The head was the wrong shape to accommodate a human skull, and she saw his tail move on its own.  Dark, intelligent raccoon eyes, snout, whiskers...not a costume.  “You're Technocoon, aren't you?”

	He nodded.  “Yes, to both.  I'm a Were, this is my were-form.  Werewolves get all the press, but there are other types of us out there.”  He put his phone away and brushed at his bicep.  Crumbled, burned fur fell away, and the smell got stronger.  “Damn, sorry.”

	“Oh my god, you're hurt! Hold on, we have a first aid kit.”  He grabbed her wrist as she shot to her feet and shook his head.

	“It's all right.  Burns heal a little slower, is all.  I'll be fine in a little while.  My own fault for not wearing full armor, anyway.”

	His pelt was short and scorched there, with reddened skin showing through.  Even as she watched the fur grew thicker, and as the view of the skin beneath was obscured she thought she saw the redness fading.

	“That's neat,” she said as he stood.  He let go her wrist with a small apologetic nod.

	“I should get my shopping done,” he said, but Merisa impulsively put a hand on his shoulder.

	“You look really tired.  Let me buy you a coffee, there's a cafe right next door.  It's the least I can do for bothering you.”

	He tilted his head to the side quizzically, and she had to smile.  Just like a cat!  He was looking her over, and she thought about what he saw.  Early 20s, Latina, a couple of inches taller than himself – he was probably used to that – no accent.  Athletic, but a few pounds heavier than she wanted to be.  Cheap clothing.  She looked like what she was, she knew: a student putting herself through college.

	Finally he smiled.  A very nice smile, too; teeth hidden, eyes crinkling, and his ears turned out a bit.”I'd like that.”

*****

	“We've met, you know,” he said as he sipped his hot chocolate. He used a straw due to the shape of his muzzle.  “I shop here occasionally, since it's on my way to and from the Four's headquarters.”   

	“You were human then, I guess.”  He nodded.

	“I'd show you, but I get smaller when I change to raccoon form.  My armor would be way too tight, and I should at least pretend I have a secret identity.”  He laughed, a short chirp.  “Of course everyone at work knows, I spend most of my time there with fur.”

	“Where do you work, Tech?”  It seemed a reasonable thing to call him.  He didn't object.

	“A government lab,” he said as he stirred his cocoa.  “DARPA light, we like to say. Mostly I take apart things we capture from mad scientists and super-villains.  Reverse engineering...they come up with the damnest stuff.” He sighed.  “And then I go do the same thing for the Four, and build gear for us.  Then I go out on patrol.  It's like working two jobs, three maybe, except two of them don't pay.”

	She reached out and covered his hand. The fur stopped at the wrist; his hand was like warm leather. Earlier he'd dipped his fingers in his water glass and apologized, explaining it was an instinctive gesture.  Water softened the tough skin and made his sense of touch better, which is why raccoons seem obsessed with the stuff.

	“Why don't you quit?  The hero gig, I mean.”

	“I've thought about it.”  It was near midnight, she realized.  They'd been talking for more than an hour.  “I've had some...well, there are disagreements within any group and the Four is no exception.  A couple of my partners have a relationship I don't think is healthy.  But somebody has to do it.  Down by the river,” he gestured with a slice of toast, “It's a slum.  Half the buildings are empty.  There isn't enough money made there to hire cops.  I think the few big businesses still going would fold if we quit and let the gangs move back in.  Savage is determined to not let that happen.  It's his territory, he's really protective of it.”

	“Oh, he's the tiger, right?  I saw him once, he's as big as a van.”

	“A multi-passenger van,” the raccoon muttered, then “We're all animal themed.  We have me, a were-rat, Savage, and Couatl, who's...well, a couatl.  A winged serpent.  I'm still not sure what his story is, but he's all right to work with.”

	“We've been talking about me all night,” he exaggerated.  “All I know about you is your name.  By the way, my real name is Matt.”

	“Well, Tech...Matt, I'm studying veterinary medicine.” That made him blink.  “There's a vet shortage and I like working with animals.  I just...”  He was still blank-faced and just when she'd started to get a hang of reading his expression, too. “Oh god, this is awkward.”

	He patted her hand. The frozen expression broke and he smiled.  “It's all right.  I actually know another vet, but he's pretty weird.  Weird by superhero standards, even, and I had people shooting ray guns at me earlier.”

	“You know, Matt, I remember you now.  You as a human.  You look different, but you move the same.  And the lab coat, kind of a giveaway now that I know where you work.”

	His ears went back a fraction.  “You probably shouldn't spread that around.  I don't have any arch enemies, but you never know.  You...oh, man, I just realized, just being seen with me might be dangerous for you.  I should go.”

	He stood, and she did too.  “Well, could you walk me home?  It's late.”

	One block down the street and one block over they walked.  The few people on the street, mostly the homeless, shot funny looks at the woman with the guy in the raccoon mask.  Maybe a few realized it wasn't a mask.  A taxi cruised by with its AVAILABLE sign lit.

	They stopped at the steps to her building.  “It's been nice talking, Merisa,” the little raccoon said.  “I'll say hello next time I stop by, human or not.”

	“Oh, I had one more question,” she got out before he could turn away.  “How does one become a Were?  Is it by being bitten, like the movies?”

	“Only if the Were is very angry, or very new at it,” he chittered.  “I was bitten by what we thought was a rabid raccoon.  It turned out it was rabid, and those shots hurt, but it was also a carrier for the Were virus.  They can treat that but only if they know about it before you turn, so here I am.”

	“So there's no other way?”

	“We aren't plague-bearers, Merisa.  Weres are rare but not unknown, and a lot of research has been done.  It's only the bite, and only under certain circumstances.  And even then, like I said, they can treat it if they know about it early enough.”

	She'd been nerving herself for the next question all the way over.  “Would you like to come up for a nightcap, Matt?  I've got a bottle of wine I keep meaning to open.  I don't get much company so it's gathered dust.”

	He didn't seem to know what to say.  Finally, “I'd like that, Merisa, but it'd be rude to clank around your place in armor.  And I don't have a change of clothes for my human size.”

	“You don't have to change,” she said with a smile, and took his hand.  “I like you just the way you are.”

*****

	The next day Merisa arrived at work in a long sleeved shirt, against her usual habit. One of the scratches on her back, for which the raccoon profusely apologized, extended beneath her shoulder and almost to her elbow.  No woman had ever expressed an interest, not while he was in were-form anyway,  and while he could trim his claws they grew back almost instantly. He promised to be more careful next time.

	Technocoon, for his part, arrived at work whistling cheerfully and dove right into the current project: dissecting an impossibly efficient power generator captured from a supervillain.

	Showing up in were-form rather than human aroused little comment, for he spent almost all his time there with fur on anyway. Unlike most flavors of Were, were-raccoons do not get bigger and stronger when they change, but rather they get smaller and smarter. An eyebrow or two was raised when he went through half a six pack of Pepsi before lunch, though. Finally someone joked about it, but he just shrugged without pulling his muzzle out of what passed for a technical manual.

	"Full moon last night," he said as he reached for a soldering iron. "Couldn't get to sleep." It had the sound of a ready-made answer, and a few glances were exchanged. One assistant, who'd worried about her overworked boss, smiled.

	In the garage that Saturday night, Technocoon watched Ratbat change size and shape with renewed interest.  Two months ago the rat was limited to human, rat man, and normal-sized rat forms.  Now, after hard training, he had those plus any size of feral rat he wanted up to and past his normal weight.  His record stood at three hundred and eighty pounds of rat, more than double his normal weight; he was shooting for five hundred.

	Couatl watched with cool dispassion, his forked tongue flickering from time to time.  At his suggestion Ratbat now struggled to turn his giant feral rat form more humanoid.  At the current weight he estimated that'd be a seven and a half foot tall rat man, much stronger than Ratbat's usual fighting form.

	Technocoon monitored the rat's vitals and waited for a moment to speak.  Eventually Ratbat collapsed, panting for a break, and the 'coon looked up.

	“I've been thinking, ratty here is making some real progress.  Now that you've got the mechanics figured out, how long do you think it'd take me to learn to turn into a human-sized raccoon instead of my normal sized one?”

	If Couatl could blink he would.  The pale-scaled serpent's lidless eyes turned to regard him.  “I didn't think you were interested.”

	Tech remembered the Internet drawings Merisa showed him, of various animals – large raccoons included – doing things with human women.  His favorite was an old pencil drawing of a raccoon, easily as large as a man, belly to belly with a pointy-eared human woman.  The raccoon in the drawing went on to eat the woman, which was strange and off-putting, but everything else about it he liked.  Merisa was interested, and now so was he.

	“Well, you never know when it might be useful,” he said with a smile.