Savage Beasts - 15. There’s a New Papa in Town

Mike and Gunnar stood side-by-side on their hind legs in their full grizzly forms, their clothing shredded at their feet, bracing for the impact of the dababbi monster that was charging directly at them.

“Love you, Cub,” Gunnar growled softly in the bear-language to Mike.

“Love you more, Papa,” Mike growled back, and they both struck a defensive posture as the dababbi neared them with wild anger in its eyes.

“Stop!” A loud voice suddenly rang out above all the turmoil.

All eight dababbi stopped dead in their tracks, mere feet from the bears and wolves they were prepared to rip to pieces only a moment before.

Mike opened his eyes and looked around for who had yelled that command.

It was Axel. He was still in his human form, and had stepped out into the circle, apart from the rest of the army. He held his hands up as if he were Moses parting the Red Sea, but instead of an ocean of water, he was holding back the wrath of Christopher’s creatures with just one word of command.

“Sit down! Now!” Axel commanded next, and all eight dababbi immediately sat on the ground, turning themselves as they did so to face Axel, the biggest and most dominant bear in the entire assembly of were-creatures. Their new Papa.

Mike dropped to all fours and stepped forward to sniff at the monster sitting directly in front of him. The dababbi growled at Mike’s close proximity but made no move to attack without permission from the Papa.

Apollo stood with his whistle in his mouth and his thumb on the button of the remote device that would activate the sonic weapon from the speakers arranged around the perimeter of the property. His hand holding the device trembled slightly as he walked up to the nearest creature sitting on the ground in front of him.

Like Mike, the dababbi let out a low growl as Apollo grew near it, but it made no aggressive moves.

All eyes were torn from the creatures now sitting placidly on the lawn and turned to the seven-foot werebear, the focus of attention for dababbi and lycan alike.

Axel pointed to a spot on the grass next to his feet.

“All of you come here and sit in a group.”

The eight dababbi all rose from their places scattered across the lawn and moved to sit at Axel’s feet in the place where he had indicated. The creature closest to Axel whined and rubbed its mangy head underneath his hand, begging to be petted and stroked by the Papa.

Axel jerked his hand away and looked at the monster. It looked back up at him with adoring eyes, and Axel carefully laid his hand back upon its head and stroked it between the ears. The other dababbi saw pettings being given, and they crowded around the big bear’s feet, whining for attention like lost puppies.

Axel petted each monster in turn, and then commanded them to lay down and relax. Some curled up into a ball to sleep, while others stretched out in the warm sun, happy that the Papa was not ordering them to attack or kill.

Ezekiel and Gunnar carefully walked over to Axel.

“Congratulations, Papa,” Gunnar said. “It’s a… whatever the fuck these things are.”

“I don’t know how it happened,” Axel said, “But some instinct within me told me to just tell them to stop after they ripped the old fart to pieces and turned on everyone in a rampage. It worked, but I don’t know why they’re obeying me all of a sudden.”

“It began when you fed them their meal,” Ezekiel explained. “They growled when you got close, and you growled back until they stopped and bowed their heads in submission. At that moment, you became the new dominant figure to them, and even after you had given out all the packages of meat, they wouldn’t eat until you gave them your permission.”

“Basically, you out-dominated their old Dom, and now you’re their new Dom.” Gunnar said. “You have complete control of them. What are you going to do with that power?”

“I guess I’m going to keep them as calm and docile as possible until we can get them to Duluth and visit your tribal elder.” Axel said.

“They were created by a Papa who was filled with hate and the desire for vengeance,” Ezekiel replied. “All you’ll have to do is show them the love and affection that they seem to be craving.”

“If you think I’m going to stick my dick in any of those things, you’re off your rocker,” Axel said, “But if they just need somebody to give them belly rubs and ear scritches, I guess I can do that.”

Apollo and Susie cautiously walked up to the group, along with the werebear leadership team of Mike, Thomas, Sam, Joel and Jacob.

“Remember yesterday when I said y’all were insane to think you could get these monsters to sit up and roll over?” Susie said to the bears, “I can’t believe that I’m saying this, but it looks like I was wrong. All they needed was the right master and you’ve got them eating out of your hand.”

“Ezekiel,” Gunnar said, “Please give the Elder of the Duluth tribe a call and have him make the necessary preparations to perform the ritual to remove the bear spirit from eight humans.”

Ezekiel nodded and stepped aside to make the call.

“Joel,” Axel said, “When we disabled Christopher’s truck back at the trailhead, we didn’t do any damage to the horse trailer, did we?”

“No, sir,” Joel replied. “We just flattened all the truck tires so he couldn’t get away by vehicle.”

“Perfect,” Axel said. “Take the big SUV, the one with the trailer hitch, and go back to that parking area and bring back the trailer. We’re going to need it to transport these things a thousand miles to Minnesota!”

****

Gunnar and Mike walked over to Daniel, who was kneeling in front of the remains of his Papa.

Mike knelt down next to him and took his hand, while Gunnar stood behind and rested his hands on Daniel’s shoulders.

“I’m sorry that it ended this way,” Gunnar said, squeezing the bear’s shoulders gently, “But now you have the freedom to do as you wish with the rest of your life. Will you continue to live here, or will you go out and seek new adventure?”

“I’ll keep the house,” Daniel replied, “Papa would have wanted that, I think. But I’m not going to spend the next hundred years hiding behind these walls.

“First I’m going to go and find Christopher’s cub and talk to him. I’d like to know more about the years that he spent with my brother and hear about the times that they were happy together. I’ll let him know that when it’s time for him to move on and change his identity, that he’s welcome here for as long as he needs.

“Then, I think I’ll do some traveling. I’ve lived in this country for almost two hundred fifty years, and I’ve barely left the confines of Mount Savage and the surrounding areas. I think a road trip is in order, to see if I can determine what the next chapter of my life will be.”

Gunnar and Mike shared a glance and a smile.

“That sounds like a wonderful idea,” Gunnar said. “I decided the same thing myself a couple years ago when I was trying to get over the loss of my own Papa, and it resulted in me finding a new home with this handsome cub, here.”

“Come on, Daniel,” Mike said, squeezing the bear’s hand, “Let’s bury your Papa here in the gardens the way that he would want it.”

****

A couple hours later, Joel arrived with the horse trailer. He carefully backed it through the gate and up the driveway, parking close to where the group of dababbi lay resting in the grass.

Axel and Gunnar consulted the maps to plan their route.

“We’ll have to go northwest, past Pittsburgh, and get on I 90 in Cleveland. When we get to Toledo, we’ll have a choice. Keep going west, and drive through Chicago, Madison, and Eau Claire, or turn north and drive through the upper peninsula of Michigan. Less populated along the UP, but it’s about an hour longer of a drive.”

“If you want my opinion,” Apollo said, interrupting the two bears, “I’d prefer that you not take these monsters through my pack territory. The upper peninsula is the safest way to go.”

“You got it, big dog,” Axel replied with a grin and an elbow in the Alpha’s ribs, “The UP it is. Are you going to come along as a military escort?”

“Just Susie and I,” Apollo replied. “We are going to see you and the dababbi safely to the reservation and the Elder and see that the ritual is begun. It is my understanding that the process will take seven days, correct?”

“That’s what we’ve heard,” Gunnar replied, “Why is that important.”

“Well, I just got off the phone with the Supreme Alpha. During that week, instead of sitting around on our tails, waiting, we’ve been summoned before the Lycan Council.”

“Who’s been summoned before the Lycan Council?” Axel growled angrily.

“Take it easy big bear,” Apollo said, “Nobody here is in any trouble. They want to talk to your bear leadership team, and discuss the events leading up to the destruction of the Hacker Valley wolf pack. I think the issue of bears not being taken seriously when reporting dangerous incidents has come to a head within the Council itself. Several Betas are going to be called on the carpet over this, and it may change the shape and function of the Council in the future. They want to see the two of you, Mike, Thomas and Sam, Joel and Jacob, and Ezekiel. Once we get the process started with the dababbi, we’re all flying from Duluth to Calgary for a couple days of meetings, and then we’ll all be back before the seven days are up so we can see if we have eight humans again, or if Axel here has eight ugly pets to take care of for the rest of his days.”

****

The wolf army were the first to get packed up. They thanked Daniel for his assistance and patience, and they headed out on the road back to Chicago without their General or Colonel.

Axel herded his brood of monsters into their trailer and shut the door securely. The bears all took their time saying goodbye to Daniel, and many phone numbers and addresses were exchanged. Thomas got Daniel to promise that he would come to visit him and Sam at their cabin once things were settled down and back to normal, and Daniel told him that they would be his second stop, right after visiting Christopher’s cub, Gary.

Thomas and Sam were informed by Apollo that their presence was requested by the Lycan Council after they had delivered their cargo to Duluth, and so when the bears finally pulled out of Mount Savage, they followed along with the rest of the caravan to the northwest.

****

The bears and Apollo and Susie drove straight through the night. It was a seventeen-hour drive from Mount Savage through the upper peninsula to Duluth, but the caravan only stopped occasionally to change drivers, use the restroom and once to eat.

While the rest of the crew of over sixty-five hungry bears completely took over a late-night truck stop diner for dinner and nearly gave the cook a nervous breakdown, Axel visited a nearby grocery store and bought their entire supply of beef. He came back to the trailer and opened the back, regarding the eight monsters sleeping so peacefully on their nests. He passed out a hundred pounds of meat and granted them permission to eat, and they happily ripped open the packages and feasted on the bounty provided by the Papa.

Several bears approached Axel, Sal, Marty, and Rusty-Pete after the dinner stop. Those four were on their motorcycles, and they had many offers to give them a break to sleep for a stretch while another bear rode their bikes for a while, but they turned down all offers. They were too proud of their bikes to allow someone else to ride them.

At nine in the morning, the caravan pulled into the Reservation grounds. They were expected, and the tribal Elder led a delegation to greet them at their arrival. The Elder had not known that there were so many spirit bears left in existence and was overjoyed to meet them all. Many of the delegation led the bears into a comfortable common building where a breakfast feast had been prepared for them by all members of the tribe.

The Elder stayed behind with a few of his strongest men and the eight bears of the leadership team as well as Apollo and Susie. He looked at the two lycans for a few seconds before nodding his head and addressing them as “brother and sister wolf.”

They went to the horse trailer and opened the back. Eight grotesque heads popped up from their nests, and they looked at the Papa for instructions. Axel boarded the trailer and walked among them, telling them to remain calm and to do no harm.

“This is just as the legends have foretold,” the Elder said. “We have prepared single room dwellings for each katci-to'wack'w with no windows and only one door. Each room contains only a bed upon which the katci-to'wack'w may rest and sleep as the bear spirit is driven out of them.

He turned to Axel who was busy stroking the creatures’ heads inside the trailer.

“You are the Master of the katci-to'wack'w. Please have them follow us to the site where we will perform the ritual.”

Axel told the dababbi to rise and follow him, and then he strode down the ramp from the trailer with eight creatures trailing behind him in a single file.

They followed the Elder through the village, which was empty since the rest of the residents were in the common building entertaining the army of spirit bears with breakfast. They arrived at a collection of eight square huts with metal roofs. There was a table set up in the area in the middle of the huts, and on it were eight clay cups.

“Master of the katci-to'wack'w, please have them each kneel in front of one of the doorways to the eight huts,” the Elder instructed.

Axel positioned each of the monsters so that they were each kneeling in front of one of the doorways. The Elder then began to chant in Cree, as he held each clay cup, one by one. After the chanting was complete, he instructed Axel to give a cup to each katci-to'wack'w and tell them to drink. After consuming the contents of the cup, Axel took each creature inside their hut one-by-one and laid them down on the bed. They whined with worry as the Papa took them into the small room, but he stroked their heads as they lay back and he spoke soothing words, telling them to sleep and relax. He told them that they would be here for many days, but not to fight or try to break down the walls or the door, and when Papa came back for them, they would be human men again.

After the last creature was put to bed and the final door locked, Axel heaved a sigh of relief.

“What was in the drink?” Gunnar asked.

“It was a special tea that is part of the ritual,” the Elder replied. “Its dual purpose is to calm the beast and also to begin to draw the bear spirit out of their body. The two main ingredients in the tea are the ground roots of the orpin rose, which grows in the Arctic regions of Canada, and the dried leaves of Aconitum Napellus.”

“Wolfsbane?” Apollo said with surprise.

“Indeed,” the Elder said, "But the specific plant in this tea is a rare sub-species of the common wolfsbane. Aconitum Napellus Ursus, better known as Bearsbane.”

“So that is what will draw the bear out of the body,” Ezekiel replied. “Very interesting.”

“Yes,” the Elder replied, “The bearsbane is the last thing the katci-to'wack'w have consumed before receiving nothing else to eat or drink for the next seven days and being in complete isolation. The bear spirit will be eliminated from their bodies. When we open those doors seven days from now, there will be eight human men laying on those beds.”

“Will they remember their lives before becoming the monster,” Mike asked, “or is that going to be lost to them forever?”

“I don’t know that young one,” the Elder replied. “Only time will tell.”

The group left the collection of huts and walked over to the common building to join the rest of the bears and the members of the tribe for the breakfast feast. After eating, the bears delighted their human hosts with demonstrations of changing from man to bear and displayed the many different types of bears living within their community.

When Ezekiel changed into his bear form, the crowd looked on in awe at an actual Kermode spirit bear standing in their midst. The Elder was incredibly pleased, and he invited the bears to visit their lands anytime that they wished and made them honorary members of the tribe.

When the bears began to say goodbye to their hosts, Apollo called the eight bears forming the leadership team around him.

“It’s time for us to leave for the airport,” he said to the group. “We have a flight to Calgary departing in four hours.”

Axel grumbled, but Gunnar patted him on the back.

“Don’t worry, Hair Bear,” he said with a grin, “I won’t let the big bad wolves throw you into lycan prison.”

“I’d like to see them try, Yogi,” Axel replied. “Come on, let’s go get this over with. The sooner we can meet with the Council, the sooner we can be back home again.”