As much as he’d been dreading it, the first meeting between Gray and his new handler passed without any serious confrontation. She was older than his previous handlers, and seemed less in awe of his reputation. He’d gotten used to being the focus of attention and while the change was welcome, it was a bit grating to be discounted so early in the partnership.

They’d gone through the ritual exchange of naming– for a moment he’d wondered if she’d change him from Gray to something less literal, but she paused only a moment before granting him the same call sign he’d carried since he first joined the Corps. It was only symbolic, wolves didn’t use names the way handlers did, but humans had a need to title things, claiming ownership in a way that was foreign, but understandable.

The piles of paperwork that followed the ceremony was less so.

Gray walked into the wolves’ quarters to as warm a welcome as the one he’d faced in the Captain’s office. Of the fifteen wolves assigned to his section, only three acknowledged his presence and he could tell he’d lose two of those by morning. Politics were somewhat muted here, away from the heavy hand of the councils, but he was sure news of his failure was already well on it’s way.

He glanced down at the folder that contained what the Corps thought he’d need to know about his new handler and then tossed it onto his bunk, unread. There was nothing he needed to know, nothing that would make the transition an easier or any less prone to failure. He used to read them, back when he’d thought the key to understanding each other was hidden in the details.

But handlers were handlers, in the end the details didn’t matter.

Star came up behind him and leaned into his back, resting her forehead between his shoulder blades; comforting gestures held over from forms long since abandoned. She was his one constant here, and come morning, the only one he could count on to support what he was doing. He leaned back with a sigh, and tried to believe that maybe what he’d been sent here to do was possible.

“Because I was good at it.” Martin glanced over his shoulder to make sure Gray was well out of sight and then sighed, rolling his shoulders and hissing as the movement pulled muscles still recovering from the fight. “Although not good enough, apparently.”

“You lasted longer than the last few.” The Captain took Martin’s transition from the cowed persona to the more settled calm with only a raised eyebrow. “But next time you ask for a specific wolf, you might want to spend a little more time reading the files and a little less listening to the office hearsay.”

“Can’t resist a challenge,” he grinned.

“Well, this time it resisted you.” She handed over his transfer packet, pleasantly surprised that his grin didn’t falter. “I’ll give you full marks for your recovery procedure, you play an excellent omega when the need arises. The fact that you get to walk out of here under your own power is a testament to that, don’t let them forget it.” She nodded at their coworkers who were trying somewhat successfully to ignore them.

“It was good working with you.” Martin stood and awkwardly shook hands, then picked up his folder and headed out into the good natured ribbing of his fellow handlers.

She watched him go with a feeling of resignation. Martin had been the best candidate for handling Gray, now she was down to her second -and only- remaining choice. If the last handler failed as well, the wolf would banished back into the packlands and that was something she was sure neither side wanted.

“Mr. Martin,” she saw him flinch– he’d stopped being Handler Martin the moment he lost control, but this was the first time he’d had to hear it out loud. “While this is a serious setback, it doesn’t have to be the end of your career with the Corps.” She gave Gray a hard look, but the werewolf didn’t blink. “There are other wolves, less– challenging wolves, that could use you.” Martin didn’t looked particularly enthusiastic about the idea, but she nodded as if he had and the ex-handler sat a little straighter in his chair.

“As for you,” she turned her gaze back to Gray. “Martin was your seventh handler.”

“Yes,” Gray agreed mildly. He was still pointedly ignoring Martin– to a certain extent his ex-handler had ceased to exist. Once he lost control the man had been relegated to something slightly more important than furniture in the wolf’s worldview.

“That’s not a good thing.” She leaned forward slightly, not enough for Martin to notice but enough for Gray’s pupils to dilate in response to the increased threat. “Do you know what happens when there are no more handlers?”

The wolf went still.

“You have one chance left.” She pushed the manila folder across the table. “This had better be the last time I see you.”

Gray glanced down at the folder and then his gaze skittered across Martin almost apologetically before he locked back onto her. For a moment it looked like he was going to challenge her authority, but her gaze remained unwavering and he picked up the folder with a displeased hiss and stormed out of the office.

Once he was gone she relaxed, somewhat, her foot coming up off the now inactivate dead-man’s switch under her desk. Martin was watching her nervously, as if she was likely to sprout teeth and fur herself.

“Why did you join the Corps?” She leaned back in the chair, trying to get a better handle on the seemingly timid man on the other side of her table. He’d been working for her less than two weeks and the more recent failure aside, he’d seemed an odd match for the service.

1. The clouds seal off the sky, a grim undulating wall of gray that thwarts her attempts to chart their course. By the fifth day she can only answer ‘at sea’ when the prince asks where they are.

2. Superstition holds that cats walk closest to the spirit world, but even here, where the barriers are thinnest, superstition is all that they can claim. Mice, on the other hand…

3. It’s easier not to try– and the days turn to weeks turn to months and it isn’t until some well-meaning coworker murmurs condolences that he realizes a year has passed.

4. They’d tried creating magical companion animals once, as a way of expanding their mana pools. Melding human and animal into a coherent whole… Their students’ students still whisper tales of the disastrous results centuries later.

5. The downside to waking from cryogenic slumber into a futuristic world is that no one knows how anything works. Kate glared unhappily at her current handler who was honestly confused as to why her charge kept asking such strange questions. If a hovercar worked, why did it matter how?