EXCERPT from RANGE - Book Four

I Am Just Junco

Selia comes out of the bathroom, her eyes darked up, her lips glowing and pink, and her golden hair flowing down her back in large bouncy ringlets.

She’s beautiful.

And I’m jealous of how easy she fits into her own skin, at how she can make small talk with strangers - even the guards in the elevator and downstairs in the lobby. And most of all, at how her face always seems to be smiling.

No wonder Ashur fell in love with her while I was away being morphed. She looks happy.

I have a permanent frown, I’m afraid to talk to anyone except Gid and Sel, and I feel like my brain has been forced inside a body I’ve never met before. Even when I came out of the tank with wings back on Amelia I never felt this awkward about myself. My replaced fingers and missing scars just make it worse. When a nightdog eats two of your fingers and a psycho slices a SEAR knife down your jawline, you’re supposed to have to live with the consequences of those things forever.

And when you cut yourself in half to save the man you love, there should be evidence of that.

But my scars have all been erased. Every bite from the mutants in the Stag, every prairie lion claw mark, every battle wound I’ve ever had inflicted on me is gone. Even the one I inflicted on myself.

Just gone.

On the outside anyway.