WHERE WOLF? Part 1

Scott looked at his reflection in the glass door of the gym, framed by the night-lights of the city: The face was familiar; short, brown hair, brown eyes, vaguely boyish good looks. He was in his early twenties, but if he shaved away the stubble he could maybe still pass for an older teenager. Under his old hoodie and dad jeans he could barely see the radical changes to his physique. If he wanted to, he could pretend he was still the same man he was a few nights ago, before the attack.

Involuntarily, he remembered turning down the alley-way, arms laden with warm bags of chinese take-out, delicious aromas of crispy barbecue duck and fresh-made dumplings wafting directly into his face, then out of nowhere a huge, terrifying shape lunged out of the darkness and from there his memories dissolved into a blur of pain and fear before he blacked out. He had come-to later, covered in blood and barbecue sauce with his clothes in tatters, but miraculously unhurt. A tall man in a worn-looking duster and a wide-brimmed hat had offered Scott a hand up and explained his new life to him.

Shaking off his revere, Scott knocked.

"Come." A deep voice called out, and Scott grabbed the door-handle and pushed. Surprisingly, given that it was almost midnight, it was unlocked. He inhaled, and a scent caught his attention, standing out from the lingering sweat and the chemical tang of cleaning products; another wolf; a pack-mate, the man he had come to see. He smelt the scent of fresh perspiration and adrenaline telling him that the man had been exercising for an hour or more, the scent of raw beef steak, telling him what the man had eaten last, and more.

The door opened fully, and Scott saw that the man was alone in the gym. He was taller than Scott's 5' 11" by at least five inches, and his hair was a shaggy mop so blonde as to appear white. He had a strong jawline, and his eyes were a strange shade of hazel, almost looking red. The man was wearing the pants from a black martial arts gi and no shirt. Scott had undergone a transformation since his conversion to wolf, gaining a musculature comparable to that of a body-builder, but it had done nothing to remove his love-handles, and his abdominal muscles, while no doubt rock-hard, were hidden behind a modest spare-tire. Not so this man; his entire torso rippled with muscle picked out in such detail you could have used him as an anatomical model in a medical text, accentuated further by the glistening sheen of sweat covering his body. If there was a single ounce of fat on him, then Scott couldn't see it.

The white-haired man was practising martial arts moves against one of those large pillars of wood with stubby 'branches' sticking off it, which always reminded Scott of a giant mug tree. The man's arms were moving so fast that Scott had trouble visually following his movements as he finished his current set. With a final strike against the mug tree thing, the man turned on his heel and stalked over to a bench against the mirrored back wall, where he'd left his towel and his water-bottle and began wiping himself down. Without looking at Scott, the man spoke.

"You are Scott Caledonia, the prospective new pack-brother." It was phrased as a statement, not a question, but Scott felt compelled to answer anyway.

"Uh, yeah, I'm Scott. Are you Olaf?"

"I am pack-brother Godwinson, yes." Olaf took a swig from his bottle, holding it a few inches from his face and squeezing the soft plastic to shoot a jet of water into his mouth.

"Pleased to meet you." Scott stepped forward and offered his hand to the big man, who paused for a second. For a moment, Scott wondered if he'd committed some weird, werewolf faux-pas; maybe wolves don't shake hands? The image of the two of them sniffing each other's butts flashed across his mind's eye. Then Olaf slung the towel over his shoulder and grabbed Scott's hand. Scott half expected either a bone-crushing grip, or even to be hurled to the mat in some test of his martial arts skill, but instead he received a firm, but not excessively forceful, handshake.

"So," Scott continued. "Uh, I don't know how much you've heard of me, but apparently I have to do a… like a quest or whatever before I'm allowed to really join the pack or something?" Olaf stared at Scott, saying nothing. "The Alpha said that you might be able to give me some pointers on where to get started?" The big man took another mouthful of his water, "...I have to find a doppelganger who broke some rules or something? I have no idea where to even begin looking."

"Kill." Olaf stated, simply.

"I, uh, I beg your pardon?"

"Kill, not just find. Your task is to kill the doppelganger. Have you ever killed before?"

"Not, like, a person or anything. I'm not really an experienced fighter."

"Yes, I can see that." Olaf's eyes flicked up and down Scott. "Let me see your hybrid form."

"...Like a martial arts stance or something?"

"No, your werewolf form." Olaf didn't actually roll his eyes, but Scott felt it was heavily implied.

"Oh, right. Just a sec." Scott pulled off his hoodie, and the tee-shirt underneath, putting them on the same bench that Olaf had used for his things. Scott recalled how he'd been so impressed with his new build when he first transformed; flexing his huge biceps in the mirror, but now he was acutely aware of the stark difference between his lack of muscle definition, and the diamond-cut physique of his pack-brother. Olaf stood, arms folded across his slab-chest, watching impassively, while Scott did his best not to blush.

He kicked off his sneakers and wriggled out of his jeans leaving him in just his socks and underpants. He straightened up and reached inside himself for that powerful, wild, thing that was part of him now, and almost immediately felt his whole body stretch in every direction. Scott watched thick, grey fur sprout from his forearms as they ballooned with even more muscle, the tendons stood out like steel cables and his fingernails warped into sharp claws; in the mirrored wall he saw his face elongate into a muzzle, his ears enlarged and came to points, A strangely satisfying ache filled his distended jaw as his teeth re-shaped themselves into fangs. The entire process took just a few seconds.

"Ah, shit." He said, his voice now a deep bass. "I forgot to take off my socks." Indeed, ragged shreds of cloth clinging to the elasticated bands around his ankles were all that was left of them.

"Also your underwear." Observed Olaf. He looked down at the stretchy, spandex briefs Scott had chosen for exactly this situation.

"I'm supposed to run around in the nude!?" Scott paused in plucking the remains of his destroyed socks from his legs to look up in embarrassed surprise.

"It's not mandatory," Again. Scott distinctly heard the implied eye-roll in Olaf's tone. "But you look ridiculous, and prudishness is… unbecoming in an Ulven." So saying he shucked off his pants, causing Scott to reflexively turn his head away and raise a hand to the side of his face to shield his eyes as he glimpsed yet another reason to feel self-conscious around his pack-brother.

"Jesus! Maybe warn me before you do that?" Scott exclaimed.

Instead of replying, Olaf erupted into his own hybrid form, swelling until his now-pointed ears almost brushed the polystyrene tiles of the ceiling. Even covered in fur, his muscles bulged visibly; more so, in fact, now that they were swollen to super-human proportions, and unlike Scott, Olaf's fur was pure white. It irked Scott to notice that Olaf was still taller than him in this form, now by at least a foot, but he was somewhat relieved to see that a shaggy growth of fur between his pack-mate's legs spared the smaller wolf any further embarrassment.

"Now you may show me your fighting form." Said Olaf, his voice now a powerful rumble.

"Uh, I don't really have a 'fighting form', per se." Scott awkwardly squared up to Olaf as best he was able, trying to mimic the kind of martial arts stances he'd seen in movies.

"I don't think you know what 'per se' means, and yes, as I said; I can see you have no experience what-so-ever. Now, come at me."

Scott hesitated, then reluctantly took a couple of steps towards the larger wolf and half-heartedly swung a claw, balled into a fist, at his chest. Faster than Scott could follow, Olaf stepped to the side and grabbed Scott's forearm, yanking him forward and off-balance, as he did so, he brought his right knee up and left elbow down, effortlessly breaking Scott's arm so that it had a ninety degree bend in it between the elbow and wrist, with the sharp ends of the ulna and radius jutting through the skin and fur. Scott screamed.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGHHHH!!!!" Even as he hit the ground the wound was already healing; the bones were pulled back into alignment and the skin sealed over without a trace. By the time he rolled over onto his back he was able to put weight on the limb without pain to push himself back up. "JESUS CHRIST!! MY ARM, YOU BROKE MY FUCKING ARM! YOU FUCKING PSYCHO! WHAT THE FUCK IS THE MATTER WITH YOU!?" Scott rubbed at his forearm where the bone had pierced the skin even though there wasn't so much as a bruise to show what had happened.

Olaf stood at a parade-ground rest; hands behind his back, feet shoulder-width apart. He looked down his muzzle at the smaller, grey wolf.

"Only magic and silver can cause you any lasting harm, this means we can employ more extreme training methods. I guarantee no enemy you face in combat will go any easier on you than I will. Now, come at me again, and this time mean it!"

"No I'm not going to 'come at you' again; you're going to break my arm again or some shit you fucking nut-job! When the Alpha said to come to you for some tips, I thought he meant you'd… I don't know… tell me where this doppelganger likes to hang out or a list of known contacts or whatever!"

"And then what? You were just going to politely ask it to lie down and die? Without even the rudiments of combat ability you are a liability to the pack. My task is to teach you at least some of the basics. Now; come. At. Me. Again!"

"You're not going to break my arm again?"

"No."

Scott hesitantly advanced on the great white wolf, this time with both fists raised to strike. Olaf dodged each attempted blow and seized Scott's muzzle with the other hand on the back of his skull, and twisted hard, violently yanking Scott's head to the side. There was a sound like crunching celery and Scott felt everything from the neck down go numb as he slumped helpless to the ground. Again, his injury was already healing by the time he hit the mat; his vertebrae re-aligned themselves and his severed spinal cord re-connected, restoring feeling and control to his body..He felt warmth on his thighs and his fur stuck to the inside of his legs; the smell of ammonia pervaded the air.

"You… you fucking asshole!!" He gasped, staggering back to his feet. "You god-damned Steven Seagal'd me!"

"I ran over your dog with a tank?" Olaf raised an eyebrow.

"You fuck… fucking… asshole psycho bastard!! You stand there making jokes after you just broke my fucking neck!!?! Are you getting off on this!?! I pissed myself!*"

"Yeah, that'll happen when bodily control is disrupted. Just be grateful you regenerated before your bowels voided. Now, the showers are just through there if you want to wash up before we continue." He gestured to one of the doors, helpfully labelled 'Men's Changing Room & Showers'.

"RRRRAAAAAARRRGGHH!!" This time Scott ran full tilt at Olaf, with claws spread. The white wolf barely even moved his feet as he leant out of the way, and with a quick flourish of his hands he flipped the smaller wolf over his hip, sending Scott tumbling across the padded floor.

"Better." Olaf remarked. "Not in form, obviously, but you're showing some aggression at last."

Scott clambered to his feet for the third time.

"How come you didn't, I dunno, pull off my leg and beat me to death with it or something that time?" He asked, bitterly.

"You needed provocation to begin with, and you're still afraid of getting hurt, even though you can't be harmed in any meaningful way. Getting a little rough with you killed two birds with one stone; getting you mad and getting you acclimated to taking damage. Now, if I feel you're pulling your punches or otherwise slacking off, I'll go back to provoking you, understand?"

Scott nodded.

"Good, now; come at me."

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Pub: 08 Nov 2023 20:25 UTC
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