"Near the Woods" The Supernatural Immortal "Isan no Jinro" Legacy of the Werewolf.

Nikkei_Simmer

Prologue: 過去 - In the Past (Part 1)

弱肉強食 (jaku niku kyō shoku) - The weak are meat; the strong eat.

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It has been said that there are those of the otherworldly kind. When you look out into the darkness of the night, there are eyes looking back at you. Though we don't know who they are; where they came from, they walk among us. And yet we are unaware unless they choose to make themselves known. And when they seek those of us who are human; we join their ranks, not the other way around. Welcome to the night. Welcome to Moonlight Falls

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Prologue

God knows how it happened, but it wasn't something that either of us were expecting. River, coming home from a grocery run had encountered a big black wolf that had attacked her. She came away with a rather nasty bite. After I had finished climbing the ceiling, she said that there was something otherworldly about it...that something just didn't sit right, but I wasn't paying much attention to her description of the wolf. I just wanted to make sure that the wolf wasn't rabid so I was trying to hustle her into the car as with rabies, time was of the essence. So I took her down to the hospital in in Sunset Valley and made sure that there was nothing circulating around in that bite wound. The rabies virus, once it takes hold, y'know, onset of symptoms, is pretty much incurable and you end up dying a painful death. That's the last thing I wanted to have happen to my wife, so it was off to see the doc and get that wound cleaned out and antibiotics administered.




According to the doctor, the bite looked worse than it really was; He didn't see any viruses that he recognized...so his viewpoint was that all was clear. He just gave River some antibiotics to make sure that there was no infection and told me to call him back in 72 hours. It turned out that we didn't have that long. Because the night of the full-moon was upon us in Sunset Valley and it turned out that the bite wasn't from a regular wolf.

River had said that the wolf had looked at her with a keenly intelligent gaze; as if aware of what it was about to do. Before it leapt at her, she thought she could see a calculating of its odds of success. Well, against an unarmed woman who was practically defenseless. Yeah, I'd say the odds were clearly one hundred percent in it's favour.


And despite the brutalness of the attack, there was actually only one bite.



The general restraint of said attack spoke of an intelligent mind behind the wolf-in-question. A regular wolf attack usually ended with a person's throat ripped out, bleeding out on the ground. That scenario didn't play out at least as to what I was thinking.

There's something funny about that attack...hon..." River raised an eyebrow at my statement. "Not haha funny, sweetie, but that something just doesn't add up here. You say it leapt at you practically shoulder height and brought you to the ground. In all that snapping of its jaws...that it never once brought its fangs close to your throat?"

"There were a couple times that it came close, but the wolf seemed to pull away at the last second, almost as if it knew that it didn't want to rip my throat out." That set off warning bells in my mind. Now I'm not one for superstitions, but this just didn't add up in any case. Why would a wolf be wandering the streets of Sunset Valley? Why the hell would it jump my wife and then bite her only once? Why in the hell did it attack her in the first place. And if the wolf was that intelligent...could it be masking the intelligence of a man? I examined the wounds as I changed the dressings on her arm. Yup, those were wolf fangs all right. There was nothing human about those fang marks that punctured her skin. A cold sense of fear came rushing down my spine.


River, noticing my change in mood, asked me if I was alright. "Honey, I don't like the looks of this..." I said, "We're going to have to monitor your condition very carefully over the next few days." And I was going to read up some more books on the supernatural because if my gut hunch was correct, we were going to have to flee. Humankind didn't like living with the supernatural close by and this was not a haven or sanctuary. Oh sure, I was human. But she was my wife...my spouse...whom just nine months earlier, we stood at the altar exchanging vows of "forever and always". I take my vows seriously and I wasn't about to abandon her just because of something that I suspected. We were in this together; to the bitter end.

"Honey, you're scaring me..." River said, shivering...and I pulled her into my arms holding her tightly.

"I'm just concerned...sweetie. I love you and I am worried...for you." I told her, hoping that she understood that I wasn't trying to spook her just for the sake of it. That wasn't my intent. But if there was something going on in terms of that wolf attack, we needed to get to the bottom of it for our safety and for those around us. I was going to take these next couple of days to do some reading and get some information on what this could be.


But of course, young minds work fast. We ended up not having those couple of days. Sandi put two and two together far more rapidly than I could, when River started having balance issues and stumbling. and she fell to her knees outside the next evening.



I got her settled as she was rather agitated and advised her to lay down while I called the doctor to find out what I could do. From what I had read, lycanthropy, which was what I had suspected mimicked the symptoms of rabies quite closely. But the doctor had told us that the rabies virus was not present in River's body. Could it have been latent? The doctor told me no, that there was likely something else. The concern in his voice caused my fear to skyrocket when he told me, "I used to work in Moonlight Falls treating bite victims. And this is something far more serious, Mr. Chikamori. Your wife is starting to exhibit the signs of a lycanthrope." If I had eaten, I probably would have had to throw up...since my stomach was doing the rough approximation of the tarantella dance. His next sentence shot my fear level through the roof, "If you love your wife, Mr. Chikamori, get her to sanctuary. There is no place for her around us humans." How was I going to break this to River?


River started showing a prediliction for raw meat the very next day, which unfortunately, Sandi managed to catch a glimpse of. The ramifications of that were going to be far-reaching though we didn't know that at the time.



Fear makes people devolve into their most base selves. And this situation was no exception to the rule. When confronted by this news, River's mother was not happy. And I didn't realize just what she was about to do. It was only when the screaming and yelling started that I realized just how far Fiona was about to go.

As it turned out, she had confronted River while she was eating and when River told her that she had to use the washroom, Fiona had followed her and started in on her there.

"You dare to bring that contamination into my house?!" Fiona screamed at her. "There's a child in this house...and god knows what you are now..."

"...and you didn't even bother to tell me that you had been bitten by a wolf; a currsed wolf at that?"

"Just what am I going to tell my co-workers" Fiona shouted at River. "...that...I'm the mother to a vicious animal?" River's anger was growing to the point of no-return.

"Well, mother dearest..." River hissed, "You don't want to go there...do you?" Her voice bottomed out into a savage growl. "Do you really want to see what I've become?"





As Fiona backed up out of her daughter's reach, River spat out, her voice savage, heart-broken; betrayed by rejection and full of wrath; "Do you truly understand what it is that you are now dealing with, Mother?".


River hissed through her teeth, a snarl in her voice, "It is because of the human in me, that I am not ripping your throat out right now. That is the side that is human of me." as she changed back into her human form so as to not further terrify her mother, she whispered, "That's what is keeping me human..."

"No...whatever you are...River, it clearly is not human. You don't have a place here any more. Leave...and never come back." Fiona stated coldly.

I came upon my beloved crumpled on the ground curled up sobbing as if her heart had been ripped to shreds. To tell you the absolute truth, that was what I would have liked to have done to Fiona at that very moment. I lay down to her level, put the arm that I could put around her and held her tightly. "You should leave me..." River cried, "I'm not human, I'm never going to be human again..."

"No, River..." I objected to her attempts to drive me away, "You remember what I told you nine months ago. I'm not leaving your side."

"but...but what if I hurt you...I can't live with that..." she said, her voice hitching...as another inadvertent sob rent from her abused vocal cords; hoarse from the crying.


"I'm not letting you drive me away..." I answered her...with a smirk... "Look, if it makes you feel any better. If I take the cursed bite from you...then you wouldn't be able to hurt me." I said sounding more confident than I really felt. But I needed to prove to River that I was going to stand by her, no matter what life threw at us. And this was one helluva doozy of a curveball that life just fired down the barrel at us.
"You really are stubborn, aren't you?" River said, finally laughing as she choked away the rest of her tears..." as she changed into her base werewolf form. A primal fear loomed in me, but I forced it down to remain stock-still, immobile and tried to look fearless. But I would say that her pouncing on me, with teeth bared and a savage expression on her face nearly had me recoil as I fought the involuntary reaction down.


The moon lit up the night sky and I could see River looking at me with those luminescent green eyes of hers as this primal surge went through my body. I felt this overwhelming urge to howl at the moon and succumbed to it. And we both bayed at the moon as River joined in.

I knew that we would have to get out of town as quickly as possible, so we managed to grab Franz from the kennel in the back yard and make our way to the falls where we built a little hovel that would be our little sanctuary for a while until we made enough to get out of Sunset Valley.

Nikkei_Simmer

Chapter One - 一生逃げる Flee For One's Life

It was midnight by the time that River and I managed to get to the Falls. There we set up a little rock wall - it was amazing what adrenaline and fear could accomplish because we made a ten foot high wall of rocks around our property and we managed to dig a tunnel underneath the rock wall to get to the little hovel that we would use as a sanctuary until Franz and I could manage to get enough gemstones to finance our trip to Moonlight Falls. The doctor had told me to escape to Moonlight Falls as it was a sanctuary and that was where we intended to go as soon as we had enough money. But for now we had to remain hidden.

Despite the way in which River and Fiona had parted, Fiona did not let out a single word that there was a werewolf on the loose. Whether it was that she was ashamed of birthing someone who had turned into a supernatural or whether she still had any inkling of motherhood left in her to protect her child, she didn't let any word slip that River had turned were. That was what kept me from going back and ripping her throat out. Needless to say, I was angry at the way that she treated River and as a husband, I wanted revenge. Instead, I took my anger out on a tree-stump and River, in human form, looked horrified at me in were-form tearing the tree-stump to shreds, knowing just how I was prepared to treat someone who tried to harm my beloved. All bets were off if Fiona had opened her mouth.

We did not go out during full moons as the full moon triggered our transformation and we stayed within our hovel fighting down the urge to hunt. All things considered, our urges had to go somewhere...and well...what do you think we did?

Franz was busy trying to hunt down valuable gemstones and rocks and we did what we could in order to save as much money as we could so that we could make our getaway. Franz was quite the capable Rottweiler and a whiz at hunting down gemstones and it was at the end of the third month that we had saved roughly over §200,000 in order to make our way out of Sunset Valley and start our trek to sanctuary.

It was midnight when we made our getaway and it was a rough journey. We slept by day in caves that we found; hunting by night as we travelled. Being lycanthropic made it easy to find game, hunt it down, kill it and eat it raw. It was just the gaminess of the meat that took some getting used to insofar as our palates were concerned. Franz would also hunt for us in the daytime bringing us small squirrels and other game to eat - what he didn't consume himself; he'd bring us as snacks. And thus we made our way slowly up the coast towards what we considered as sanctuary, a safe haven for those of us who, by our own luck or lack of thereof, had become creatures of the night; written about by humans with no idea of who or what we were in a lexicon of terror. What we really were was much simpler. We were just trying to survive.

It was at the end of our slow month's journey that we finally reached Moonlight Falls. And it was a welcome relief, not only for our aching feet, but for our frazzled nerves. We'd realized that there were Hunters. The Hunters were a group of humans who had made it their life-calling to extinguish those of us who were Supernatural. They had banded together in order to make their objective the eradication of anyone who they suspected had any trace of otherworldly attributes, whether vampiric or lycanthropic, fae or witchcraft - none of these were safe from the Hunters. By sheer luck, we'd managed to evade the Hunters who were on the trail of a pair of what they considered demon-spawn. They were armed with stakes and magazines of silver bullets and we suspected that they were trouble so we detoured Moonlight Falls and camped out amongst the mountains until they departed the area. Then we made haste to enter Moonlight Falls from the opposite direction.

I could have played my card and tried to eliminate them one-by-one, but they soon would have caught on and then come after us in earnest. And River just wanted to have some peace and quiet so River and I opted to outwit the Hunters with Franz's help and lead them on a merry goose-chase along the fields and forests, far enough away leaving enough clues pointing them in a whole other direction that they would be chasing their own tails for the next three months. Once they bought the bait, we rapidly made certain to shake their pursuit, lose them in the thickets and doubled back. I resolved that if they made their way to Moonlight Falls, threatening the sanctuary in any way, I'd tear their throats out and leave their carcasses for the crows to pick at.

Moonlight Falls was a nice little haven between the Pacific Coastal Range and the Pacific Ocean and nestled in an out-of-the-way area that encouraged those who just wanted a nice quiet place to get away and unwind. Here was where humans (those who believed in the supernatural and were unafraid); lycanthropes, vampires, witches and the fae could rub shoulders and work cooperatively to establish a safe haven community in which they could raise families.

We had to find a place to settle down and as River and I intended to raise a family when we were ready to, we decided that we'd pick a nice large property right across the street from the Falls where we could be lulled to sleep by the sound of the roaring falls every single night. And it was a nice little homey place to live - it was ours to do with as we wanted and I was looking forward to the family that River and I would raise together.

But even so, there was that little intrusive voice in the back of my head that said to never let your guard down. Being ignorant of what dangers there possibly were was to court disaster. So making sure that Franz did his daily roaming of the town and hunting down as many gemstones as he possibly could was primary on the list. That would keep us in simoleons and simoleons brought us flexibility in terms of what we could or couldn't do. If we had to flee, we had enough money to get out of town quickly.
River was exhausted both mentally and physically with fleeing Sunset Valley and having to shelve her grief over being summarily thrown out of the house by her mother. To that end she curled up on the couch and had a nap. She'd cried many bitter tears over the whole loss of family. With me, my mother had rejected me from an early age even when I was a human, so I knew that I was on my own and had grown a good hard carapace that almost seemed unfeeling. But it was to protect myself. River, on the other hand, had always had her mother and then to be so cruelly rejected by her for circumstances beyond her control, it was soul-crushing. The only ones that River and I had were each other and each other was whom we clung to. But it still didn't stop the ache of loss for River; the loss of whom she once considered as family.

But those were humans and we were no longer them. We were other; a mix of what the humans would consider vicious animal-like creatures that would harm the human population if given free rein. Then there were others in this town that were the undead; and even more who had witchcraft and sorcery on their side; all anathema to humans whose heads were not equipped to deal with such. And if the humans who were not sympathetic to our cause did find out that this little sanctuary existed there would be wholesale bloodshed and a government edict on the elimination of us as a species.

Preparation was key in our new reality. It meant dealing with things that a month ago wouldn't have seemed possible in any stretch of the imagination. Wrapping our heads around things such as potions or alchemy was a mind-boggling thought. It was amazing to see the glimmer of hope in River's face as she made her first vial of bliss. After all, the first toddling steps into a greater world than any human would ever know faced us. And we needed to become strong at this and fast; for our own protection.

Our little home was good enough for now. It was a bedroom with the only access through a bathroom and I dug out the basement where we stored our research area. I had a nice comfortable nook between the kitchen and the bathroom where I put my computer desk where I wrote books under a pseudonym. River opted to learn how to paint and play the guitar, two things that she had wanted to master. And with Franz helping us, we had enough simoleons for her to be able to do that and it helped a great deal for her mood since with things to do, she wasn't dwelling on the past and feeling so utterly miserable any more. At least she was able to focus.

Eventually I started a garden as we grew more secure with being seen outside our building. And a sense of normalcy resumed. At least to some extent since every so often a spectral entity would drop by and oft-try to make conversation; which just made things absolutely peachy since every time one would show up, the primal urge to run the other direction was always present. There's something disconcerting about having an entity looking over one's shoulder while picking potatoes constantly asking in a hollow voice that sounded like it was emanating from a tomb, "Whatchu doing?" Well, the one positive was that I would definitely never have need of a diuretic as long as Frida Goth was around. Memo to me: I should have made outdoor toilet facilities five feet of the greenhouse door.

And of course making food involved having to empty out the garbage on a regular basis and it appeared as though River was getting more used to the fact that she was now able to freely walk the streets again without fear in Moonlight Falls as opposed to Sunset Valley. River decided that she would make Strawberry Pie and the tantalizing smells of baking filled the air as my keen sense of smell allowed me to sniff the air smelling the aroma wafting through the air from her cooking. Even as a were, I found that I still missed the taste of bakery goods and enjoyed a good apple pie or strawberry pie every so often. Hey, why not...variety.

When I was done picking the vegetables and fruits and Frida Goth had floated off to whereever it was that she was floating off to, I decided to head down to the grocery store to sell off my wares. Since when we first moved, I had signed up to become a gardener, I was going to see how well the fruits of my labours, no pun intended, would sell. Maybe I might make enough to be promoted from cucumber smasher to something a bit more pride-inducing. While I had ridden my bike there, I noticed a fae denizen of our new fair town making their way to the grocery store as well. Apparently I had met Marigold Maldano who was notorious around these parts as someone who was tagging along on and as a human previous, she had been a supernatural fanatic. Evidently someone had finally granted her wish to become one of the fairies in town

While I was out, my beloved wife asked me to go pick up some recipe books as she was working on her cooking skill and had just levelled up to Level Three, which meant that she was now capable enough to attempt some new recipes without burning the house down. I'm not being insulting. I can't do any better either at this point. So hence the reason we stick with baking - though that really doesn't make any sense. Evidently the Baking Oven doesn't catch fire as quickly as the stove-top. Well, whatever, eh.

When River was done cooking, she went back to painting and I went back to writing, a new book called, "Dirt Under My Fingernails" which was about my adventures in gardening however it would prove to be an enormous flop. Maybe I should just concentrate on my Lifetime Wish of having the Perfect Garden. On top of that we wanted to find the secret of ever-lasting life which some people were talking about the very fact that it could be possible.


When River finally got a skill point in painting, she grinned at me and said, "Sweetheart, I'm going down to the City Hall and registering as a self-employed painter"

"Well, that's great, honey.." I replied, still seated at the computer, typing away. She shook her head, smiling and headed out. "Just be careful.." I called out, evidently, to the closing door. I presume she rode her bike and managed to get their safely. While she was out, we added another addition to the family by the name of Buffy, no relation to Summers. Evidently she was one of the stray cats around town and decided that we were as good a family as any to attach herself to and Buffy, as a name, was a lot easier to remember than Stray Cat. Plus what would happen if we had several show up at our front gate? Call them Stray Cat 1 and Stray Cat 2. What happens to 3 and 4? And if you called out "STRAY CAT!" Would they all come to the dinner bowls as one whole group? That could be an interesting proposition. But, Buffy she was, and Buffy she'll stay. And we said so long to a whole bunch of simoleons as we added a cat tree, another food bowl, a scratching post and a pet bed for Franz as well who was probably getting tired of sleeping on the carpet.

Of course, that night, we had the rather annoying visitation of our town kleptomaniac with the rather apt name of Robin Steal. I'm sure her brother works for the Canada Revenue Agency; first name, Legale. River doesn't like being woken up in the middle of the night and made sure that Robin understood that by generously offering her a "sandwich". I'm sure there was no love lost between the two of them.

But at least we had a place of our own to call home...and we were starting to feel secure as residents of Moonlight Falls. So in between dealing with trying to understand alchemy and making potions and doing the chores necessary to remain financially afloat, we were doing great and with Franz's help, we had increased our net worth to well over §1M. Which meant a nicer and much bigger home...so we took down the old home leaving only the greenhouse and built up a nicer larger home.

I knew that as a novice werewolf, that I would have a bit of trouble, but I didn't realize that transformation was something that needed to be controlled. River had much more control over her transformations than I did. And frankly that was rather worrisome as I didn't want to end up going out and involuntarily changing into my were form and scaring the living bejeepers out of our neighbours.

I was hungry so I headed upstairs and grabbed a slice of apple pie. Luckily only River saw me and she understood that I was involuntarily in my full were form. I must have made a comical sight; a werewolf eating apple pie with chopsticks.

"Are you sure you can get all the crumbs up from the plate with those?" River asked me.

"Grrr...snarl.." gesturing at my plate...I lifted my head and shook it; Negative.

"So...how are you going to clean the crumbs. The dishwasher drain will get clogged if you leave a bunch of crumbs on the plate"

I lifted the plate...gave her what appeared to her like a savage teeth filled grin, flicked out my tongue and licked the plate clean. OK...evidently that got the point across.

River being neat just winced. "Go make sure you wash off the plate before you stick it in the dishwasher...on sterilize" which I did. "You really need to learn to control...your transformations.." she said as I gave her a big were-hug. Yes, maybe I had to pay more attention to what I was doing or I'd be the one to bring down cataclysm on our heads. So it was back downstairs to the potion table for me and the alchemy table for River to see how much more we could learn.

Nikkei_Simmer

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Chapter Two - – Arrivals 到着

For the first time in what seemed like months, we felt as though we were going to be alright. Were we safe? That remained to be seen, but at least we weren’t running for our lives. And that made us feel more relaxed; probably more relaxed than it should have considering the fact that the Hunters were still out there. But at least hopefully we didn’t leave a trail that was easy to follow and we would be safe at least for the time being.

Moonlight Falls for the most part, was idyllic and quiet. But we were the newcomers. And many were suspicious of us and rightly so. Many of these long-time residents of the Falls had tasted the sting of persecution for centuries not mere months like we had and they were keenly on their guard when it came to interacting with any new inhabitants. How many of them had lost loved ones to the Hunters? How many of them had been betrayed by those whom they considered friends? We were were but we were ferals. The green glint in our eyes gave us away. Ferals were the newly turned...who would turn savage in an instant, frightened of their newfound powers and were what the longtime weres considered exceedingly dangerous.

At least that was what I read in what I could get a hold of at the library. The fairy librarian’s hands practically shook as she handed the book to me; a quaver of fear in her voice as she told me that the book, “I’m sorry...sir...” couldn’t be taken out of the library as it was a reference and had to be read on site. I made copious notes as I read and insured that I could pass along the crucial information to my wife who was steadfastly putting hours of time into trying to understand alchemy. I also dropped into the elixir shop which was a new experience as I’d never had need of going into one before. When it came down to it; this place was quite handy.

Franz was finding gemstones, metals and other artifacts including gigantic meteors and Buffy was making the small creatures of this town terrified, managing to capture birds, turtles, rodents, snakes and other items that could potentially be sold to add to our coffers. I appreciated every bit of the efforts that the two of them were making to help us, with the prime exception of the Malayan kraits that Buffy managed to corral. Yeah, I wasn’t happy about those bipolar venomous snakes that she managed to capture. Wasn’t too sure which was worse: the prospect of the snakes being venomous or the fact that we could get bitten...and die. We sold those off quickly.


The insects that were uncommon or rare; we managed to donate for some monetary return at the science centre which helped our financial bottom line. In fact, Buffy had managed to provide me with a range of rare and uncommon insects that I had to drop off and thus my next stop on tonight’s journey was to the science centre located at the local Moonlight Falls hospital a monolithic older building that appeared to have been built in the 1800s. When I had dropped the insects off, they told me that they were exceedingly pleased to see the variety of insects that I had brought; that it would help with their research and that they would pay me a decent price for the offerings. If I had any more in the future that they would be happy to take them off my hands which was a good thing since Buffy seemed to be expert in catching insects.


However we were mostly relying on Franz’s ability to find gemstones that were high-priced when cut to raise our financial bottom-line. And he was particularly good at finding soulpeace which when cut in a spire-cut would yield over §100K. When we could afford to get a science station, it would come in very handy as the ability to be able to clone anything was possible and with that our financial bottom line would rise exponentially. Both pink diamond and soulpeace gemstones were exceedingly valuable and our morale seemed to rise every time Franz brought one home which was an occurrence that seemed to become more and more common as he gained experience which meant that most of the time we were pretty darned elated and I preferred to maximize the profit with the most expensive cut that I could do as a result of the gem-cutting machine.

In the morning after going out on a seed-hunting expedition, River headed over to the fairy arboretum and did some exploring. For such a small looking location one could spend hours wandering inside. Was this a case of transdimensional engineering where when one stepped inside an object, that one was transported into another dimension? Perhaps. If anything, one was teleported into a state where one could wander for hours on end without running into walls or barriers.


While that was happening; apparently Pappy Wolff had found himself the target of a lightning strike. River found that out because when she came out of the fairy arboretum, she could smell him a mile away. Needless to say the smell of singed dog was not a great smell. He was wandering around shell-shocked and wondering just what had hit him. It would have been quite amusing however he was elderly and electrical shocks such as those could potentially cause arrythmia and potentially be fatal for him at his age. After making sure that he was alright, River was able to reassure herself that nothing was going to happen to Papa Wolff and she was able to leave him there. After all, despite the fact that the Wolffs were a rival clan to us, we were still werewolves and thus lycanthropic solidarity. Pick on one of us...you picked on all of us and the backlash from an insult to any one of us weres would bring down the wrath of all.

River, afterwards went over to the grocery store and took care of some of the harvestables that she had collected in return for being able to buy some meat which we were very short on. Weres; such as us, survived on meat and when we didn’t have any in our fridge, we were not happy. Unlike these so-called hipster...go-against-the-grain vegetarian vampires that gained popularity with that schlock hack-writer who wrote Twilight, there was no such thing as a vegetarian werewolf. What we ate was raw, blood-dripping meat; preferably freshly killed. And there was the grocery store if we could get our claws into a cow or a pig. Since meat-farming never really seemed to be much of a thing here, we had to rely on the grocery store to import fresh meat and thus every so often my beloved wife would make the trip to the grocery store and get some more meat for us. We needed to stock the fridge every time...and well...suffice it to say, it cost enough that on grocery run days; the consignment sales value was pretty much break-even. It was when we needed a big boost in our income that we consigned the soulpeace gem-cuts, otherwise we’d just store them in a storage container that hides their latent value from the tax-assessor.

After maxing out her alchemy skill, River headed over to the Vault of Antiquities to drop off some gemstones as the last stage in her mastery of Alchemy. With that complete she received a Philosopher’s Stone which was probably one of the most dangerous things there. However, we would only make use of it when necessary.



After she got back from the tasks that she had set out to do, I had to drop by the grocery store myself in order to do a few things that needed to get done. I almost thought that there may be a killing on the store grounds as I saw Ayden Van Gould and Linda Rodgers in the same area at the same time. I had heard rumors that Linda Rodgers was a Slayer (one who went after evil supernaturals), however I had no evidence and I wasn’t about to reveal myself unless she did something. But as it turns out. Ayden Van Gould had been cured of vampirism and he wasn’t a threat to anyone though I could see Linda Rodgers give him a good hard stare. Me; I just tried to keep my cool and remain undetected as a werewolf. I didn’t want any problems to manifest themselves and give us more headaches than we could handle at the moment.

But my concerns were unfounded as they went about their business and I went about mine...heading to the counter and paying for my groceries. It was a nice day to bike home. It was late in the afternoon and one had to alway keep in mind that on a full moon, if one was a werewolf; one’s lycanthropic nature came out in full force.

It was at about four in the afternoon by the time I got back from the grocery run...and I noticed that there were two individuals at our gate. They did look familiar, but what we’d gone through over the several months had enlightened us and hardened us to the fact that we couldn’t just trust anyone. We’d gone through too much to let our guard down. As I rode closer, I noticed that it was Phil, my old school buddy and Bebe; Gus and Dorie Hart’s kid. The question rose in my mind: what were they doing here? I kept a close eye on them to make sure that they weren’t carrying any weapons.

River was even more suspicious...as she’d had the experience of being betrayed by her mother, so she wasn’t as welcoming as I was to Phil and Bebe. “We’re in the same boat”, Bebe said. “A little after you left; there were tales of sightings of a large black wolf roaming the streets of Sunset Valley.” she explained. “We didn’t believe it at first. We thought they were just rumors to scare us. But...” she paused for a long moment. “Parker, Ethan, Phil and I were at Central Park...during the middle of the day and we saw it...”

River asked, “You saw the wolf?” wondering if Bebe was just making it up...to have us let our guard down.

Bebe nodded in response...then silenced both River and me, by rolling up her sleeve exposing her torn up arm just barely stitched together wrapped in bandages; and looked at the both of us a feral glint in her eye. “I saw it...” she affirmed showing her wounds to us. River and I looked at each other. This was more than just a case of a random werewolf attack.

Phil looked at us. “I had to step in to try to stop the attack...while Ethan and Parker ran; the cowards.” he spat venomously. He rolled up his own sleeve to show he’d been bitten as well. “For as much good as it did...” he growled. “Our only choice was to take her to the hospital because she was bleeding heavily from the wounds. It was just lucky that the wolf-attack missed veins or she wouldn’t be here.”

River and I looked at each other speechlessly. If both Phil and Bebe had been bitten...they were going to turn tonight. And they would end up being Ferals too. We had no choice. “So you’re seeking sanctuary?” River asked; she sounded reluctant. Phil gave her a hard look.

“Yeah...River... I guess we are...I thought...with the only people that we know here...” he said with some heat in his voice, bitterness dripping from every pore at the slight, “It’s not like we have any effing choice here now, do we?” He squared his shoulder and stared at her eye to eye. River matched him stance for stance. If there was one thing, River wasn’t about to back down and she’d had more experience being a were than he did. The last thing I wanted was my wife and my best friend going at each other in a werewolf fight because fights between werewolves were vicious and one didn’t walk away without wounds.

“OK...ok...” I said raising both hands, palms out in a universal calm-down gesture, “Look let’s let some cooler heads prevail here, OK?” I looked at River, “Sweetheart, I know that we’re a bit suspicious of anyone right now after all that we’ve gone through, but these are our friends, OK?” It was strange that I was the one who was trying to be level-headed after being betrayed by my mom so early in life, but well...maybe for River, the fresh betrayal of her mother was affecting her harder than one realized. After all it was only normal to be suspicious of others’ motives if the one person who was supposed to love you unconditionally was the one that hurt you. I turned to Phil, “So...Phil...what did you do when Bebe got bitten?” I knew he’d stopped the attack and gotten bitten himself, but I wanted to know where he’d taken her to get treatment to keep the wound from getting infected.

“Took her to the hospital...she was leaving a trail of blood from the park to the hospital and we had to have the doctors do something about what happened. I was fearing that the wolf was rabid, until the doctor told me that we should consider fleeing for sanctuary. He ran the tests, told us of a previous attack in Sunset that he’d treated and told us that two people had to leave for Moonlight Falls. We put two and two together that it was you and River because you two hadn’t been seen around Sunset Valley for several months.” Phil must have run into the same doctor that I had taken River to – the same one who worked in Moonlight Fall previous to transferring to the hospital at Sunset Valley. “After inspecting her bite, he told us that this wasn’t any ordinary wolf attack, that Bebe needed to go to sanctuary and since I’d gotten bitten too, trying to help her, that I’d have to go with her.” Phil had had his own dreams...of owning a comic book shop and well...becoming an entrepreneur and with this werewolf attack; those dreams just got shattered. There wasn’t much call for books about superheroes and villains in a place where the incredible was pretty much common-place. There was a marked tone of bitterness in his voice. “I was just about to head in to the bank the next day to see if I could get a business starter loan too...when this happened.” As insane as Phil thought he was, there was still a remarkable sense of the practical about him. Maybe he was more sane than he realized. He’d paid a high price for helping someone; for doing the right thing.

“Look...we’ll give you sanctuary...” I said finally looking at River. “There’s another wolf pack here, but I don’t know anything about them and what they’re about.” I paused for a long moment. “And I don’t want to join another wolf pack just because they’re there...right?” Phil nodded quietly. “I figure, let’s start our own pack...and wait it out...if they cross our turf, we go for the jugular.”

River looked over at Bebe, Phil and me, “So we’re starting our own wolf pack?”

I nodded. “It’s the only way that we’re assured that we’re all pulling in the same direction. I don’t know what Pappy Wolff’s goals are and I don’t know if his goals are the same as ours. If we’re going to get ahead we gotta do it ourselves.” In fact, I couldn’t place it, but I was suspicious of the Wolffs. There was an undercurrent of something hidden within that pack. I’d run into several members of the pack who were not family members, Argus Brown, Frank Renaldo, Earl Gomez and Alex Dennis. What I did find out from them was that what was family business was kept strictly between those with the last name of Wolff. The four of them were the outliers and not privy to what the intentions of the pack were. And that made me suspicious. If it came to it. There might be the possibility that the four could come to our pack, if the opportunity was right. But with the Wolff-Pack at six members plus the other four. We were still six members short of matching their strength in numbers.


A lone wolf cry rent the air as we headed inside...and the full moon crept up over the peaks of the trees. The change was upon us and River and I ended up in our feral werewolf forms. Bebe and Phil looked more human but still with green eyes and dripping fangs. It still meant that the full moon would make us even more savage than we were normally. Even in human form, a werewolf was still prone to violent urges. We were quicker to anger, more prone to use violence to achieve our end goals – our base desire to kill and maim prevalent in our dealings. And above all, we needed to hunt and that meant going after smaller prey. It was one of the reasons why it was said that one shouldn’t anger a werewolf. And that urge was difficult to contain. It was also one of the reasons why Argus Brown was considered the town thug as he was prone to lashing out at those who crossed him. Though in respects we, as newly turned werewolves were more unpredictable in our dealings as people weren’t aware of what we could or couldn’t do.

The full-moon was a time where we as weres didn’t let down our guard – it was a night where we would stay up and make sure that our perimeter was secure – that no one was trying to enter our property. Bebe headed downstairs to work on some things when River mentioned that we had a few items downstairs that could be utilized. I had just bought us a science station and an alchemy desk, not to mention I had a potion table and plumbot station. Bebe had this look in her eye that she wanted to work on herself at the brain-enhancement machine. Now most of us knew from going to high-school with her that Bebe was a technophobe...but I guess we figured that she knew the predicament that we were in and the more people who were able to utilize all the tools that we had at our disposal the better. And that was exactly what she did. By the time that she had finished sitting in the brain-enhancement machine and had it microwave her brain with certain waves that triggered her ability to remove her technophobe trait and replace it with genius, she headed over to the science machine and started working on her ability to master science – a far cry from the young woman who would get the heebie-jeebies going near a cellular phone or a desktop computer.

And evidently it also meant that she’d mastered her feral werewolf form as well.


I, on the other hand, went out to terrify the chickens and collect some eggs.