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Adventures In Living With The Mythical |
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A military veteran is adopted by a werewolf and brought into his pack. Insanity ensues. About "Life With A Werewolf" Life with a werewolf is a dramatic blog. As such the characters in this blog are not real but maybe loosely based on real people. The situations represented are not real but maybe loosely based on real things that have happened in my life. There are a multitude of ways to view life, this is simply one of the ways I have chosen to view mine. Updated Every Friday unless I can't or don't want to. If this is your first time reading this...start here: https://www.writing.com/main/books/entry_id/1040400-Welcome-To-The-Pack My book, "Dreamers of The Sea" is available now on Amazon: https://a.co/d/0uz7xa3 |
| Shifting into werewolf form is a process. One I traditionally don’t stick around for all that much unless I’m needed. It’s painful. Muscles contorting and wrenching. Bones cracking, growing, shrinking. Fur sprouting and pushing. Crash once described it to me as giving birth in multiple places on your body all at once in the span of about five or ten minutes. Although I cannot attest to the pain of bringing a new life into this world, I’m certain there is more than a couple women out there who are now crossing themselves and saying ‘thank God I don’t have to deal with that’. The key thing is the five or ten minutes. I’ve never timed him on it, but he claims to have a record for about four minutes forty-seven seconds from human to monster form. That night he beat that record by at least thirty seconds flat. “Okay big guy,” I started, and he turned and glared at me. A snarl on his muzzle that I had never seen before directed towards me. My blood ran cold for a second as I was given a sudden reminder that God or nature or whoever had gifted humanity with a far superior predator to keep us on our toes. “uh….” “Out with it,” he snarled. “Look,” I said, waving my hands in a downward motion. As if that was going to calm him down? Has that motion ever calmed anyone down? Why do we do it? Anyway, I digress. “You’re a werewolf, they’re werewolves. You honestly think running off like this will help?” “They want me. I give myself up they’ll let them go,” he said. That was his big plan? To make a sacrificial play in some sort of vain effort to save us? I had no idea I was clenching my fist until I raised it. “That’s your big idea?! To sacrifice yourself?” “Yes,” he snarled down at me. “And Mitch was supposed to keep you away from here until they were done! But you had to go and talk him into destroying my house!” “Don’t give me that,” I spat back at him, “You’re about to go out there and sacrifice your fucking life so that group of psychopaths will HOPEFULLY release our friend!” “They will,” he snorted. “It’s the only way to keep you safe.” I gritted my teeth until they hurt. I suppose it was time for one of my infamous ‘open mouth and insert foot’ statements that I’m so good at. But this one kind of turned into a bit of a speech. I’m terrible at speeches. I once in the military turned an award I was receiving into a reprimand when my squad leader at the time told me to say a few words, so I read off my grocery list and sat back down. In my defense, they never said what kind of words to say. But this speech, well, it came from the heart. So, despite it never going to be recognized as one of the all-time greatest speeches out there, it’s at least decent. “Go ahead, jackass, get yourself killed!” See there? Strong opener. Told you it was decent. Okay, sorry for the interruption. Here’s the rest of it. “That’s all you’re going to do, you frickin flea bag! I thought you werewolves were supposed to be smart or some shit. That’s your big plan? To let them kill you, possibly torture you first, in the hopes that they’ll maybe release our friends?! You know in the list of all time dumbest plays, that’s number one! You may not understand this, but these assholes want us all dead! Because we committed the crime of loving you! That’s right, I said it. We love you, you stupid, ungrateful, moronic, walking, growling, childhood nightmare! All of us do! Or did that whole ‘stand and fight’ thing we did not get that through your thick skull! You got fur growing inward as well when you shift, because that is just pure asinine! You’re our big brother! The father we never had! The strong, cool uncle! You’re the one who helped all of us heal some part of ourselves! You think we’re going to turn tail and run now, then you better check your legs and see if maybe you got neutered on your last checkup you…” A werewolf’s roar can stop a lot of things. It certainly stopped that speech. After receiving a full volume saliva shower (thanks Crash), I found myself curled up on the floor for a moment, with him standing over me, flexing his claws as if he was ready to do damage to someone. And I was the only one around. “Damn it, Jason! I love you too, but do you not think I have a plan? It’s my job as the alpha of this little pack to protect you all!” He huffed for a moment longer, then stepped through the door, slamming it behind himself. I was still huddled on the porch, shaking a bit, trying to force myself into a standing position. “Uh, you okay dude?” Sean asked after a moment. He patted me on the shoulder and it took everything I had in me to not jump. I swallowed. “I think I saw his lunch,” I muttered. “You should know better than to lay into a werewolf, man,” he said. Then after a moment, he muttered “I really wish Kris and Zack was here.” I looked him in the face, and patted him on the shoulder. That turned into a quick hug. Hey, we’re not a hugging group, but when your loved one who’s as close to you as a spouse disappears and might have been kidnapped and you might never see again, you get a hug. I don’t know of anyone who wouldn’t give a hug in that instance. “I know,” he said, “I’m like, usually the chill, go with the flow guy. But this is bullshit. Kris never hurt anyone. Why him? Why did it have to be him?” A lot of people would be incline to blame me in that position. It’s understandable, after all, I started the blog that kind of started this mess. I felt more than a little bit of guilt for The Nobility showing up. However, Sean for his credit never once through that part of things blamed me for anything. He took it as a sort of “why can’t we all just get along” type of vibe. Go with the flow, I suppose. I swear they’ll put it on his tombstone one day. What will be mine? “Pepperoni and Cheese”. But that’s because I’m a sucker for an old joke. “We got two people missing. A pissed off werewolf. And now, we’re standing here alone with just my pistol to keep us safe,” I grumbled. “We got to find him,” Sean said, looking down. “What,” I asked. “We got to find him,” he said again louder. “We got to get Kris back! Can’t you like, text them or something like you did last time?” I sighed and leaned against the fridge. “Sean, that would only work once. Next time I do that, if they even bother to come back here, it will be to blow the house up, or something. They won’t make the mistake of coming in twice.” “We could always follow them back,” he muttered. “What,” I asked. “We, I dunno, call them up or somethin, then follow them back to wherever it is they go after they give up and don’t find us,” he said. I snagged a beer from the fridge and handed it to Sean. “I know you miss him,” I said with as comforting of a smile as I could muster, “and I know you want your boyfriend back. I understand. If it was my lover, I’d want them back safe and sound too! But,” “Don’t patronize me,” Sean growled. “It’s a good plan.” “Sean! This is me you’re talking to. The king of bad plans. And even I’m telling you, that’s bad! IF they were regular humans, I’d be all for it. But Sean, those are werewolves. WEREWOLVES.” I tapped his skull. “Heightened senses, remember? Can hear a billion times better, see a billion times better, especially at night, not to mention the sense of smell. They’d see us before we even made it ten feet. Besides, that sort of tailing takes a team of people highly trained communicating constantly to pull off.” He sighed. “Or a werewolf,” he muttered. I nodded and swallowed. “Yeah, and ours disappeared.” He stood up, a grim look of determination on his face. “I’m going to do it, dude,” Sean muttered, then left the room. I scratched my head in confusion at his words. A few moments later, he returned, holding a piece of paper in his hand. “Crash told us,” Sean said, “if anything bad happened to him, and like, he doesn’t return or whatever to call this number. And dude, I think this situation counts.” I took the number from him and dialed it. After a few deep breaths, I got the hesitant “hello?” someone gives when they get a number they don’t recognize and expect at any moment to be told that their car’s warranty is about to expire and the only way to prevent themselves from dying in a horrible ball of fire is to buy an extended one right now. “Dude, just tell him,” Sean started, but I waved a hand at him to hush. “Look, I don’t know who you are, but Crash just ran off, our roommates are missing, and apparently I’m told we need to call you for help,” I said. There was a pause on the other end of the phone. “It’s a five-hour drive. We can be there in three.” There was a crash heard in the background like something had just landed on something else and knocked it off a table. “Better make that four.” |
| Cops. Interviews. Drama. Clean up. All of it filled with growled remarks and gruff responses. Surprisingly by all of us humans. Crash didn’t much concern himself with the proceeds and goings on. Being the actual ‘victim’ this time instead of the official must have been quite the turn of events for him. He seemed to take everything with humor. But I’ve learned Crash masks a lot with a joke. I guess it only makes sense. I mask a lot with sarcasm and mean behavior. Just like my statement prior to the attack. It dug at me quite a bit, but everyone brushed it off. Though it appeared that the temperature in the place had dropped some, and I wasn’t referring to air conditioning. Zack played more games in his room than in the living room. Shawn and Kris stayed upstairs when they weren’t shopping or working. We all seemed to go into our respective corners so to speak, avoiding eye contact except when we absolutely have to interact. Some people have snark. I’d like to point out here that snark is NOT sarcasm, though sarcasm can be snarky. There is a huge difference between the two, and not everyone understands it. For example, when Kris walked into the kitchen and told me that it’s my turn to cook, so him and Shawn are eating out to avoid food poisoning, that’s not sarcasm. That’s snarky, true. An attempt at a mean comment yes. But no sarcasm. Sarcasm was me telling him “Oh good! I was hoping to be able to keep my dinner down, thank you.” That went about as well as you’d expect. When I said I’m an asshole, that’s what I mean. I’m sarcastic. I like saying mean comments with the point of getting a laugh, not with the point of hurting people. When I said that, it was said to get a laugh of some kind, despite there being only me and Kris in the room. However, there are farts that have gone over in church better than my comment did. And that caused all kinds of issues. It’s like that comment I made many years ago that caused me to get banned from family gatherings involving the hunting of eggs from egg laying and decorating rabbits. What can I say? I was asking a simple, basic question involving skittles that lead to children asking their parents more uncomfortable questions than they were ready for. This is also yet another reason why I no longer drink at family functions. Or attend family functions in general, really. So, things were getting bad. I wasn’t helping the matter any by just being the jerk that I am. It was the first real time I felt my new found sobriety threatened. The desire to drink just to forget the issue was strong, but the desire to deal with the issue and get the problem resolved was just as strong, if that makes any sense. Like two warring factions in my brain who both wanted their side to win at all costs. If you don’t have an addiction, let me explain it to you. When you’re addicted to something, no matter what it is, the desire to do it doesn’t just randomly spring back like a weed. It’s not something that suddenly grows within you or upon you. It’s brought about because of both external and internal things. Your brain developed stress responses to things. For those with addictions, those ‘bad habits’ are stress responses in many ways. For some people it’s cigarettes, for others it’s pornography. For me, it was drinking. A habit that can slowly kill you. Believe me, I wish it was porn. Cause at least that wouldn’t cause so many physical health issues. Mental health is a different story, and an argument for a different time. This is how an addiction dominates you. You have an issue happen, say like a fight with a friend who has become like family to you. This issue leads to stress and anxiety. Now we all have learned responses that alleviate said anxiety. Zack’s is to kill monsters on a video game. Mine is to drink. The drinking relaxes the brain and causes your body to release endorphins that will make you begin to feel better about the situation, the world, whatever it is. Quite literally, the alcohol would make me feel better about being me. Even though it was at one point, killing me. Crash’s solution to this was far better than mine’s. He’d been put on desk duty for a few weeks while this whole mess clears up, so we were getting a more regular nine to five with him. He hated it of course after a while, cause well, according to him “werewolves are not meant to be caged up at a desk.” Which makes sense if you think about it. Crash told me to sit everyone down and talk to them, give them a real apology. A half-hearted “sorry, we still good” out on the front lawn after a major incident that I might be partly responsible for just wasn’t going to cut it. I had to Get it out there, release the garbage into the world and be done with it. Which I understood. Zack brought to the group good times, good games. Kris brought some snark to rival my own sarcasm, it’s true. But he also brought funny stories, and unique outlook on things, as well as those damn cookies he does so well. Shawn brought a relaxed surfer outlook that kind of evened everything out. We all brought something unique to the pack. Something that was greatly missing after the initial attack. Kris was at work. Shawn had the day off, for which I’m glad. I was able to tell him what was what, and ask him to sit down with everyone. He was in their room at his computer, but he smiled when I said “I want to talk to everyone. I want to apologize, and just get this crap flushed once and for all.” “Sure dude,” he said. “I’ll tell Kris. Honestly, he’s been acting a bit bitchy man I know, but he really just wants to like, put this all behind us.” “He ain’t the only one,” I said. “I’ve been bitchy and mean too, dude.” Then I patted him on the shoulder and left the room. So, we sat around and waited. It was supposed to be six o’clock when Kris got home from his retail job. Six thirty, no Kris. Seven, no Kris. Zack was supposed to get home about seven from his shift. Seven rolled around, and no Zack. Shawn was almost in a panic. After about nine at night, Crash summed it up with one phrase. He was standing on the front porch, sipping on a beer. His arm hair was standing up a bit, fur ready to ripple out of it. “The Nobility,” he growled. I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t say anything. After all, what as I going to do? My only hope was to sit there, and wait. Then pray for something to happen. Anything. |
| When we last left off, I believe all of us, Shawn and Kris, Zack and myself was being held captive on our own front lawn by The Nobility. A group of stuck-up asshole werewolves who wanted us dead because we had been allowed to be part of the pack of a werewolf, and were not weres ourselves. The house had three colorful expensive looking European SUVs in front of it on the street, two down one side, and a third down the other. Each had their headlights on. Our outside light, which flicks on of course at the slightest of movements was glowing bright as well, effectively cutting off all of our night vision. I don’t know what it did to werewolves. I do remember thinking that this would be the last thing that went through my mind before a claw or something did. I saw Crash held between two werewolves thrashing and fighting as he stared at us, despair, and fear on his wolfish face. I never thought I’d see a look like that on any creature other than human. I hope and pray that I never see that look again on anything else not human. Mitch was behind us, being held by two of the wolves. The placement of people is important to understanding the next part. In front of our house was us three humans. Behind us was Mitch, being held by two werewolves. In front of us was Crash and the other two. The jerk on the phone was standing next to the car, by the bumper, still on the phone. A vehicle’s engine revved down the street. No one paid it any heed. I’ve learned about such things. A normal human probably wouldn’t even see anything other than the cars. If they saw anything, it would be a group of people standing on the front lawn and think ‘party’ or something. Nothing out of the ordinary. They wouldn’t be able to tell what was going on. That’s what I figured when the tires squealed, anyway. Street racers will be street racers after all, and the dead of night in a neighborhood with decent roads is as good of a place as any, I guess? I never was a street racer, so I really can’t say for certain on that one. I have no knowledge of that culture. When the car jumped the curb and barreled straight at the werewolves holding Crash however, even I was able to figure out that was no street racer. It had the desired effect; I’ll give them that. We all dove, us three humans towards the right to avoid the car. The two werewolves jumped straight up to avoid it. Then Crash leaped backwards onto the hood of the SUV. Out of the woods zoomed a humongous brown figure, that crashed into the rear werewolves with a loud growl and pinned them with a snarl. I never thought I’d ever see something bigger than a werewolf in my life. Let me tell you, do NOT mess with a were…bear? Is that a term? Well, that’s the term I’m using, so it is now. I had no weapon anymore, being forced to leave it behind in the upstairs room. So, I did the sensible thing, and ushered everyone upstairs, getting us out of the fight as quick as possible. Though by the time I got through the front door, it really was over. No deaths. I’ll give them that much. I had expected a lot more bloodshed. At the end the massive creature had two pinned to the ground, Crash clutched one against one of the vehicles, and there stood Charles on top of his car, grinning like a fool. “Did good! I know I did good,” he shouted. “Yeah, you did,” Nancy shouted back to him from the passenger seat. I blinked for a moment. “Charles,” I asked, stepping back outside. “Owed you,” he said, then looked down. “And Crash.” One of the wolves pinned down snarled an insult at the bear holding him down. The bear leaned forward and snarled back, “You forgone the treaty. You’re not allowed on these shores. The Nobility does not exist here.” He looked up at me, and grinned. “The Nobility is everywhere.” It sent a chill down my spine. Despite a creature leaning on him that could literally tear a werewolf’s head off as easy as one could tear off mine, he was grinning like none of it mattered. It’s a look I’d seen before. When you watch enough videos of suicide bombers at check points, sat through enough After-Action Reviews and studied enough footage of these types of people, you begin to see the signs. More than a goose walked across my grave. An entire heard of geese did the chuck berry duck walk, complete with guitars and that cheesy Cheshire Cat grin. “Down,” I shouted as I hit the ground. That’s when things went a bit sideways. The SUV sitting by itself on the side road erupted. Explosions like this, you feel the force first. Then you hear explosion, feel the flames. It’s not like in the movies, where you see this giant fireball of flame that erupts while you get the opportunity to walk away from it wearing sunglasses and a stare cold enough to freeze ice cubes. The boom threw chunks of the car almost everywhere, including one door that embedded itself into a wall. Then flames licked and danced through the vehicle. Thankfully they hadn’t loaded any shrapnel into the car. No one died, but the explosion was a good enough diversion. The werebear was knocked backwards. Every window in our house, and almost everyone on our block shattered. Thankfuly Zack, Kris and Shawn were on the front porch and mostly protected from the blastwave. I was laying down, so most of the shockwave passed over me. Though, I was still stunned. Sitting up, all I saw was one SUV in flames, two gone, a werebear, Crash and Mitch. We sat there for a good long while on that lawn. I got checked and eventually cleared. Crash and his boss got cleared. We had a conversation, most of which turned into me berating myself with him patiently listening to me. Why won’t I detail it? Well, I promised him I’d keep him out of the blog. We talked later after everything happened and this was as far as I could get him to be included. Though, I was able to get this much within it. I sat on the front lawn, police and ambulances around us. Taking our statements, (none of them went inside the house, thankfully. Otherwise, I’d have to explain the Home Alone set up), and basically cleaning up the scene. I had taken in and exhaled a shuttering breath. Staring at Crash standing over in the distance. He was in human form, wearing a pair of shorts and a simple shirt and telling the police…well something. Not my business I guess what they were talking about. “Am I just making his life harder,” I asked. “I mean, I’ve been trying to help, but all of this insanity, is it because I’m meddling? I’m just screwing things up?” “Fuck them,” he said. “You can quote me on that. The Nobility would have come anyway. You’re just a convenient excuse.” Charles laid a heavy hand on my shoulder later on. His car was still on our front lawn. I wasn’t sure if it ran or not. He stuck around I think because no one had told him he was allowed to leave. “You have a habit of sticking your nose where it’s needed,” he told me. “But not where it’s wanted.” “Yeah,” I said, looking down at the ground. “I’m a handful to put up with.” Charles laughed. “Sometimes. But you know, if you’re feeling aquatic, just remember: not everyone gives each other the same gifts.” I thought about what Charles had said when we went inside. Hulderfolk have their own twisted logic at times which can turn out to be correct. A simple truth that we often overlook because we dismiss them as being, well, simple. But also, we were exhausted. Going on day three of no sleep, and we now had a house full of broken glass to go along with our Home Alone set up. We had windows to tape up. All of those traps and the fight to clean up after. And, oh yeah, that little matter of sealing the windows so the incoming rain didn’t destroy our stuff more. My eyes burned I was so tired. I wanted to sleep. I wanted to eat. I wanted to just be anywhere at that moment, but right there. I followed Crash as he turned to head inside. Most of the police were gone, at least we had that much. And the house itself was still standing, though it would need major repairs over the next several weeks. “Did we win round one or lose it?” His shoulders dropped a bit. “I think they got us on points. You know they’re not done, huh?” “Dude, they brought a Vbid to use as a distraction. Anyone who does that won’t be stopped by a small Macaulay Culkin routine.” “You’re right,” Crash replied. “Don’t tell Kris, Shawn or Zack that I think they’re at their limit.” “What puzzles me is why make it so weak? I mean, they could have made that thing strong enough to blow down our house, the neighbors place, and leave a nice crater in the road. You werewolves would have lived but hated life. The rest of us would be dead. Why did they make it that weak?” “I don’t know,” Crash admitted. “Unless they’re not actually out to kill you four.” I looked at Crash. My jaw dropped open a bit. “What could they possibly want with us?” “That part,” he said, “I don’t know.” |
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