Trophy Cub - 23. In Which Many Things are Resolved on the Battlefield

The three bears struck a defensive posture, but they were outnumbered. Forty wolves charged at them as one, and while they were each able to knock down the first few that came at them, eventually each bear was overwhelmed as they were piled upon by dozens of lycans.

Now, Gunnar, Thomas, and Mike kneeled in a line in the grass surrounded by the pack of male wolves, waiting for the instructions of their Alpha to either bind them and haul them to the vans, or rip them to pieces. The males cared not which instruction was given, only that the Alpha spoke the will of the God of the Moon.

“Now that we’ve established who is in charge here,” Kane said smugly, walking in front of the kneeling werebears, “I ask you again. Where is our human? We know that he has been here in this cabin because we can smell his lingering scent, but it’s now two days old. I want you to tell me where you’ve hidden him, and I want you to tell me now.”

“Fuck you,” Thomas replied.

Kane spun in one quick motion and kicked Thomas in the face, sending him sprawling backwards on the grass.

“Wait! I…” Mike began to say, but Gunnar quickly cut him off.

“Quiet, Cub. Don’t say anything.”

“Oh, is this your cub?” Kane asked Gunnar in a sickly-sweet tone, “How touching. It would truly be a shame if anything horrible happened to him, but then that’s all up to you.”

“I didn’t even know that filthy sodomite bears could have cubs,” Nick said from behind the three captives as Thomas got back to his knees and Kane continued to stalk back and forth in front of them.

“You’re right, Nick,” Kane replied. “Bears don’t have any females to breed with. The only way that they can reproduce is by finding and turning a… kindred… human.”

Kane ended the final word with a growl and turned on his heel to stare at Mike.

“Well, Enforcer, I believe that they are hiding our pet from us in plain sight. This is our human. These fucking filthy, stinking, werebears have turned him into one of them!”

Nick grabbed Mike by the hair from behind and shifted his right hand into a set of razor-sharp claws. He held the claws to Mike’s throat and looked at Kane.

“Allow me to kill him once and for all!” Nick begged. “Please, Alpha, he is of no use to the pack in this state. We can take the other two bears back to the pack house to receive their punishment at the solstice but let me rid us of this troublesome pet for good!”

“Oh yes, by all means,” Mike said coldly in a deep voice, not afraid of Nick’s threats any longer, “Get rid of the evidence of your sins. Tell them, Enforcer, how you left me in my room for over a week with no food or water in the hopes that I would starve to death before these bears broke down my door and rescued me.”

“Quiet!” Nick yelled, but it did no good. The full attention of the pack was now on Mike who continued to speak.

“Or maybe you can tell them how you dragged me out of the pack house under cover of darkness to a seedy bar so that you could allow the pack’s pet, the pack’s property, to be fucked by strange degenerate wolves while you and the Alpha watched and fornicated with each other in the corner.”

“Shut up!” Nick screamed, letting go of Mike, and holding his hands over his ears.

“Or why don’t you tell them how much you love letting the Alpha fuck you. How before I came along, it was you that the Alpha used as the outlet for his sexual frustrations, and how you loved every minute of it. Explain to your brothers how you are sexually attracted to the Alpha, how you are his bottom bitch, and how you love lifting your tail to be penetrated by another male.

“Go ahead. Tell them!” Mike shouted.

Nick screamed obscenities with his head still held in his hands, trying to constrain himself from shifting to his wolf and fleeing into the woods. The males of the pack had turned all their attention now to Nick, pondering whether or not he was guilty of the sins which the former pet, now werebear, had accused him.

“Enough of this!” Kane shouted, and stepped forward grabbing Mike by the front of his shirt. He pulled Mike to stand and was surprised that Mike now was slightly looking down at him.

“I am the voice of the God of the Moon on this earth, and I say that it is time for this one to die,” Kane growled. “Brothers, hold him while I complete the holy task.”

But, before any of the wolves could move to hold Mike as ordered, and before any of the bears could shift forms to fight and defend themselves, a loud deep voice boomed out over the field.

“Kane! Let go of the bear and raise your hands over your head where I can see them! Surrender now and no one has to die.”

“Is it the voice of the God of the Moon?” one of the males cried out.

“No, you fucking moron,” a feminine voice rang out, answering the wolf’s question, “We’re not the God of the Moon, we’re the 1^st Infantry Peacekeeping Force of the North American Lycan Council. You sorry-ass bitches better get on your knees right now and you ain’t gonna be prayin’!”

The wolves turned to look all around the field as hundreds of figures began emerging from the trees, surrounding them on all sides. Most of the figures were dressed in camouflage battle fatigues and black berets bearing the insignia of the Lycan Council. Interspersed between these soldiers were dozens of werebears, shifted into their full-bear forms, a mixture of grizzly, Kodiak, black bears, and even a couple of polar bears for good measure.

Three figures strode out ahead of the rest of the assembled troops and took a position in the middle of the field to address Kane’s wolves directly. One was a black bear, but his fur was colored a gleaming, creamy white. Not a polar bear, and not an albino. He was a Kermode; a spirit bear. The other two figures were clad in the battle uniforms of the soldiers and carried bullhorns. One was a well-built, ruggedly handsome lycan with the name “Apollo” embroidered above the pocket of his shirt, and the other was tall and lean with angular facial features and a feminine posture. Embroidered on her shirt, the name “Banshee”.

“There’s no way out, Kane,” Apollo said, speaking into his bullhorn so that all of Kane’s wolves could hear. “We have already neutralized Samuel’s pack. If you give up peacefully now, there will be no more bloodshed today.”

Kane let go of Mike and turned to face Apollo. “We have the God of the Moon on our side,” he shouted, “You will never defeat the holy army!”

“Bitch, your holy army is already defeated, you just don’t know it yet!” Susie taunted into her bullhorn, “We’ve had your asses outnumbered and outsmarted every step of the way. Now be a good little pup and give yourselves up quietly, and we’ll see if we can’t find you a nice clean cell in a Council prison where you and your Enforcer can play ‘bury the bone’ for the next hundred years.”

“Brothers… Attack!” Kane screamed, and shifted to his wolf, shredding his clothing. The rest of his wolves followed suit, shifting into their wolf forms, and tearing their clothing away. They charged at the advancing troops, who also shifted into their wolf forms, their uniforms breaking away cleanly as their bodies changed.

Thomas and Gunnar shifted into their bears, ripping their clothing apart at the seams, and charged at the rear flank of Kane’s wolves, knocking them aside with bloody swipes of their massive paws.

The only two on the field not shifted into either a wolf or a bear was Nick, who was still cowered on the ground with his head cradled in his hands, and Mike, who turned now to Nick and began to advance on him. As Mike approached Nick, he shed his shirt, and then kicked off his boots and shed his pants as well. He stood naked in front of the cowering wolf, towering over him.

“Look at me, Nick,” Mike boomed in his deep voice. “Look at me!”

Nick slowly lifted his head from his shaking arms and turned to look upward at the massive naked werebear who stood over him.

“You made my life a living hell,” Mike growled, looking down at the shaking wolf, “Simply because I was smaller and weaker than you. You kidnapped me and forced me into slavery, and then when you decided that I was a problem, you tried to kill me.”

Nick lowered his head again and tried to curl into a ball, but Mike grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and lifted him off the ground.

“I am no longer the small and weak one in this relationship,” Mike said to the struggling wolf, held suspended off the ground by his shirt collar. “I think that it’s time that I ended things once and for all, for the good of the world.”

Mike threw Nick to the ground on his back and began his shift. As his long sharp claws grew out, he pressed his paw against Nick’s throat and dug them into the soft flesh.

“Say hello to the God of the Moon,” Mike growled, “In Hell.”

“Cub, No!” Gunnar’s voice called out from behind him.

“Why not, Papa?” Mike growled back in bear-language, not removing his glare from the wolf pinned to the ground. “It’s what he deserves.”

“He deserves it, but we do not kill those who are cowering in fear,” Gunnar replied, walking up behind Mike in his human form again, and resting his hand on Mike’s massive shoulder hump. “Werebears are the protectors of the weak. We do not kill unless absolutely necessary for the survival of others.”

Tears fell from Mike’s eyes as he retracted his claws and released Nick’s neck. He shifted back to human form and stood, pulling his Papa into an embrace and sobbing against his shoulder.

“I’m sorry, Papa,” Mike said, “I wanted revenge so badly that I nearly became as bad as they are.”

“I know, Cub,” Gunnar replied, patting Mike’s back, “But you did the right thing. You make me proud to be your Papa.”

Nick used Gunnar’s distraction to begin crawling away on his belly, only to find a foot stomped onto his back.

“I don’t think so,” Thomas said, looking down. “You’re not going anywhere but a prison cell.”

The combined forces of the wolves from the Council’s infantry and the assembled werebears made short work of Kane’s pack of males. Before long, the field was littered with wolves either subdued and bound or broken and dead. Only Kane’s wolf remained, and he was surrounded by Council wolves and bears. Growling and snapping, Kane cursed at them in the wolf-language. Apollo’s wolf stepped into the circle surrounding Kane and stood staring him down.

“It is finished Kane,” Apollo growled in wolf-speak. “Your wolves are defeated and your plan to form a holy army to take down the Council is quashed before it even had a chance. Submit now, and we’ll take you into custody peacefully.”

“I submit to no one!” Kane’s wolf shouted and lunged at Apollo.

Apollo lunged at Kane and the wolves collided in mid-air, becoming one mass of fur, teeth and claws that tumbled and rolled across the grass within the circle of troops and bears. Suddenly, the rolling came to an end as Apollo stood over Kane, his teeth clamped around Kane’s throat.

“Submit,” Apollo growled around Kane’s neck fur.

“Never,” Kane growled back and kicked his back legs up to rip open Apollo’s belly.

Apollo ended the conflict with his jaws, ripping out Kane’s throat and watching as the wolf bled out into the grass and shifted back into his human form, dead. Apollo shifted and spit Kane’s blood and flesh from his mouth onto the ground. He then stomped back across the field to retrieve his break-away uniform and get dressed again.

Susie was finishing putting her uniform back on as she strode across the field to Gunnar and Mike. Thomas came jogging out of the cabin bringing another set of clothes for himself and Gunnar.

“Break-away battle uniforms, eh?” Gunnar said, grinning at Susie and pulling her into a big bear hug, “I wonder who could have come up with that idea?”

“Just one of the many changes that I’ve made to the modern wolves’ army,” Susie replied, hugging Gunnar back. “I thought we’d never find you, Papi Bear.”

“If you hadn’t shown up when you did there wouldn’t have been much left to find,” Gunnar told her. “How the hell did this happen?”

“Well, a couple months ago, Alpha Apollo and I had to testify in Calgary at the trial of Kane’s wolves who tried to murder us at Thanksgiving. During the trial, top-secret information was released that revealed Kane was enlisting the help of the rest of the Separatist packs, as we call them now, to hunt you down and find your hideout. Once they had accomplished capturing you, the Separatists were planning to use that collaboration as a springboard to form a unified army to march on the Lycan Council headquarters in Calgary, overthrow the Council, and then begin a campaign of destruction and inquisition, sweeping through all the packs in North America, killing and converting as they went.

“Apollo and I met privately with the Supreme Alpha and asked him to put surveillance on Kane’s pack so that if he and his pack males suddenly moved out en masse, we would know, and could follow them to where you were hiding and put a stop to them before things got ugly.

“The Supreme Alpha agreed, but only on the condition that Apollo accept the position of General in the Council’s Army, and that I accept the position of Apollo’s Colonel. For the last month, we’ve been moving through the northern Minnesota packs, disarming them, and incarcerating their Alphas and officers. We’ve been leaving each pack under temporary guard and observation by Council representatives, and we are attempting to assimilate them into modern society if possible. When we received word of Kane’s mobilization a couple days ago, we immediately moved troops down here to intercept. I reached out to the nearby werebear enclave just over the border in Canada, and they immediately sent a contingent of their own forces to assist.

“Kane was tracked to the Nine Pines pack house, and we moved in a couple hours ago to neutralize that pack, but unfortunately not before Kane’s wolves had already left to capture you. It took just a little persuasive interrogation for the Nine Pines Alpha to give up your location, and so here we are.”

“Well, Colonel Banshee, I’d like to introduce you to the cause of all this commotion,” Gunnar said, smiling proudly. “You weren’t properly introduced after Operation Kindred and you missed out on meeting him at Thanksgiving when he was still a human, but now you can meet the newest member of the werebear family, Mike Bergen!”

Susie extended her hand formally to Mike, but he pulled her into a big hug.

“Thank you for helping to save my life twice,” Mike said into her ear. “I owe everything to you, Thomas, and Papa Gunnar.”

“It was worth every bit of effort, Mike,” Susie replied, “Not only to save you, but to finally bring an end to the menace of these Separatist packs and bring peace to were-kind.”

As Mike released her from his bear hug, Susie noticed two more figures approaching from the side.

“Bears, I’d like you to meet the two other people responsible for making this happen,” she said, “Apollo, Alpha of the Greater Chicago wolf pack and General of the army of the North American Lycan Council, and Ezekiel, Grand-Papa of the Atikokan werebear enclave.”

Gunnar, Thomas, and Mike shook their hands warmly, and Gunnar turned to speak to Ezekiel.

“Are you the Kermode bear we saw standing with these two as you confronted Kane’s wolves?” Gunnar asked the short bear who was now dressed in jeans and a plaid flannel shirt.

“Indeed, I am, young one,” Ezekiel replied. “I am the eldest in our clan of bears and the only Kermode. As such, the others refer to me as their ‘Grand-Papa’ and look to me for advice and guidance. When I heard that two bears and a kindred human were in jeopardy, I wasted no time in assembling the strongest bears in our village to assist in your rescue.”

“Nobody has called me ‘young one’ in years,” Gunnar chuckled, “May I ask how old you are?”

“You can ask,” Ezekiel replied, “But I stopped counting at two thousand. Let’s just say that I’m old enough to know better, but young enough to do it anyway. Congratulations on your new Cub, young one. He will certainly make a fine addition to werebear-kind for many years to come.”

“Gunnar,” Susie interrupted, “Now that your drama really is over, you can finally go back to that journey of self-discovery that you were setting out to do so many months ago. Apollo and I need to finish this war and disarm the remainder of the Separatist packs while we still have the element of surprise. If you would like, Ezekiel has offered a home for you and Mike with the rest of his clan in the enclave of Atikokan in Canada.”

“I think that my journeying is at an end, Susie,” Gunnar replied, “I have discovered that the next chapter of my life is meant to be Papa to this Cub here. So, I’ll leave the decision up to him.

“Mike, do you want to go to Canada and live in an entire village of werebears?”

“With no offence to Grand-Papa Ezekiel,” Mike replied, “That’s a tempting offer, but all I really want to do now is go back to our little home in Sturgeon Bay. I want to see Joshua and tell him everything that has happened to us! He deserves to share in the happy ending along with us.

“Most of all, Papa, I want to spend some time with you, just the two of us together, making new memories of our own. Maybe someday, when it’s time for us to move on and change identities again, Atikokan will still be there, waiting for us.”

“Atikokan will indeed be there whenever you are ready for it, young Cub,” Ezekiel said. “You are wise to choose to spend these special years with your Papa. Enjoy them! You’re only a cub once!”

“He is my trophy cub!” Gunnar said proudly, hugging Mike to his side.