Trophy Cub - 20. The Lycan Council

Apollo gazed out of the windows of his guest suite within the North American Lycan Council headquarters. The snow-capped mountains in the distance gleamed brightly from the morning sun, and the entire grounds surrounding the Council complex here in Calgary was covered in a thick white blanket.

Alpha Apollo and several others had been summoned to the headquarters to testify as the Council discussed the fate of the six wolves captured within his territory attempting to murder the five stray wolves under his protection, and to discuss the recent intelligence warning of an increase in hostile behavior among the separatist fundamentalist packs in Wisconsin and Minnesota.

He was sharing the suite with his Beta, who emerged from his bedroom now dressed smartly and conservatively in a charcoal gray wool suit and blue tie.

“You look sharp, Alex,” Apollo said, as his beta stopped in front of the mirror to check his hair.

“Gods, Apollo,” Alex replied, looking his Alpha up and down, “Didn’t your dad ever teach you how to tie a tie properly?” He walked over and pulled Apollo’s tie loose and began re-tying it for him.

“I hate wearing these things, so I never really cared that there was a right way and a wrong way to tie them,” Apollo said, tilting his head back as Alex worked to straighten him up. “Part of being an Alpha is deciding what’s proper attire for your pack, so I don’t know why I have to put this on now.”

“You’re putting this on now,” the Beta said, “Because we’re meeting with Supreme Alpha Taylor in ten minutes, and he gets to decide the proper attire for his Council chambers. And, the Supreme Alpha likes seeing pack Alphas and Betas wearing ties!”

As Alex finished tightening the knot below Apollo’s chin, there was a knock at the door. Alex strode across the room quickly to answer and was greeted by the Beta of one of the Councilmembers, arriving to escort them to the council chambers.

“Please remember to address his honor as ‘Supreme Alpha Taylor’ when you speak to him,” the Beta instructed as they hurried through the corridors, “And address any of the others as ‘Councilman’ or ‘Councilwoman’ before their names. Please refrain from speaking or interrupting the discussions while seated in the Gallery. If you feel the need to speak, please approach one of the podiums situated in the front row of the Gallery and wait to be called upon."

“Yes, yes,” Apollo said, “We know the drill and will be on our best behavior. This isn’t my first rodeo, you know.”

The Beta sniffed at his comment but nodded and continued leading the pair through the complex until they reached the Council chambers. The Beta spoke briefly to the lycan standing guard at the door, and the wolf nodded and opened the door for Apollo and Alex to enter.

Apollo glanced around the room as he headed for a seat in the Gallery. They were in a large auditorium with stadium-style seating. The front few rows had more room than the rest of the Gallery, with the seats placed in groups of four behind large wooden desks. The front of the room and focal point of the auditorium was a broad stage containing a single long curving desk on a raised dais, behind which sat the Supreme Alpha flanked on either side by the eight other members of the Council.

An usher greeted Apollo halfway down the aisle through the Gallery and escorted the pair to seats behind one of the desks in the front row.

Apollo looked around at some of the other groups of lycans seated in the first few rows of the Gallery and noticed several other pack Alphas representing some of the larger packs from the Dakotas, Michigan, Ontario, and Manitoba.

“Alpha Apollo,” Supreme Alpha Taylor began, after he and Alex had settled themselves in their seats, “Thank you for coming here today. In today’s business, we will be hearing the testimony of the wolves that you have captured as well as that of the wolves whom the prisoners allegedly were attempting to murder. We will try to determine if there is hope that the prisoners may be rehabilitated and integrated into other packs, or if long-term incarceration is necessary for the foreseeable future.

“We will also be addressing the increasingly hostile behaviors of the Wisconsin and Minnesota packs. There has been a long-held truce between the North American packs who are a part of the Council, and the separatist followers of the old laws of the God of the Moon. As long as they were left in peace to live as worship as they saw fit, they would not interfere with neighboring packs, nor would they draw attention to themselves in the human world. However, the Chicago pack are not the only ones who have lodged recent complaints about inappropriate activity coming from these religious zealots. Each of the packs represented here today have grave concerns that the separatists’ behavior is escalating and growing out of control. So, we will confer to determine the best course of action, if one is deemed to be warranted.”

Apollo nodded his head in agreement, and the Supreme Alpha banged his gavel to begin the proceedings.

“Bring in the first prisoner,” he said.

Lycan guards brought the first of Kane’s captured wolves into the chambers, chained, with a heavy iron collar around his neck to prevent shifting. He was taken to the witness stand, which was a circular raised platform with an iron railing around it, and the chains attached to his collar were securely attached to the railing in four places.

“Lycan of the Mishicot Wolf Pack,” The Supreme Alpha began, “You are accused of entering the territory of another pack without permission with the intention of committing murder. You are also accused of the kidnapping, assault, and bodily torture of five lycans under the protection of that territory’s Alpha. What do you have to say in your defense?”

“I have nothing to say to unholy filth like you!” the lycan screamed. “I do not recognize the authority of this Council, nor do I recognize any of you heathen scum as Alphas! I answer only to my own Alpha, Beta, and Enforcer, as it is through their voices that they proclaim the will of the God of the Moon!”

“But why did you kidnap, torture, and attempt to murder those wolves in Chicago?” The Supreme Alpha interrupted.

“Because the God of the Moon commanded it through the orders of my Alpha! Those wolves were abominations in the eyes of the God of the Moon, and the Omega was a traitor who assisted filthy, unholy bears to desecrate our sacred home! They deserve death! If that heathen wolf sitting over there had not stopped us, we would have appeased our Alpha and our God as commanded.”

“If you were to be given a home in another pack in another part of North America,” The Supreme Alpha asked next, “Away from the pressures and influence of your pack, would you be able to alive peacefully with your new packmates and become a productive member of their society?”

“If you force me to live with a pack of heretic wolves who do not follow the old laws of the God of the Moon, that is the last time you will ever see them alive,” the prisoner replied coldly.

“Council,” Supreme Alpha Taylor said, addressing the other wolves sharing the stage, “Do any of you have additional questions for the prisoner?”

Each member of the Council silently shook their heads.

“Fine. Guards, please return this prisoner to his cell and have the second brought in.”

“Gods,” Alex whispered to Apollo as the guards unlocked the chains from the railing and shuffled the first prisoner out of the chambers, “They’re worse than I thought. What has happened to them?”

“Two hundred years of isolation and warped religious ideologies with no dissenting viewpoints allowed,” Apollo replied. “I don’t think we’re going to get anything useful out of any of these prisoners.”

Apollo was correct. Each of the six incarcerated lycans were brought into the Council chambers one-by-one, and each used their time on the witness stand to rave about the God of the Moon and call for the blood of any heretic wolves who disobeyed the laws as handed down by their God through their Alpha.

After the last of the prisoners was returned to their cell, Supreme Alpha Taylor proceeded with the hearing.

“Next, I would like to call Alpha Apollo of the Chicago Area Pack to the witness stand.”

Apollo clenched his jaw and rose from his seat, walking across the front of the auditorium to the circular witness stand. He stood with his hands on the iron railing, leaning forward slightly.

“Alpha Apollo,” the Supreme Alpha began, “Please explain to the council how you came to have five stray wolves living in your territory under your protection.”

“Well, Supreme Alpha, these five are refugees from various packs within the Wisconsin area. Four of them were banished from their packs for the crime of being gay.”

There was some commotion from the Gallery and the stage at this revelation.

“Who determined that being gay was a crime in this day and age?” one of the Council members asked.

“Apparently, the God of the Moon did,” Apollo replied. “When their sexuality was discovered, they were given the choice of death or banishment, and it seems that the ones who chose banishment have made their way down to me. Although they have never officially joined my pack, they have banded together in their common background and have become quite the talented group of drag queens. They perform every weekend around the Chicago area.”

“What about the fifth stray?” the Supreme Alpha asked.

“The fifth is a recent addition and one of the primary reasons for the invasion by the Mishicot pack. As I have been told by the group of strays, the Mishicot pack had in their possession a human who was being used as a sex slave by the males of the pack.”

“Sex slave?” another of the Council interrupted, “What kind of barbaric cult are they running?”

“Apparently,” Apollo answered, “This sort of thing is common among the packs in question because they do not allow mating or even co-mingling between the male and female sexes unless it is for the express purpose of procreation. So, the pack males kidnap humans to ‘dominate’ and use for the purposes of sexual release.”

More murmuring and grumbling erupted from the Gallery, and Apollo waited for quiet to resume speaking.

“In this particular case, the human being held captive by the Mishicot was actually a bear kindred. A traveling werebear discovered the human’s predicament and enlisted the help of the four lycan drag queens living in my territory to assist in his rescue. During the course of that rescue, two werebears stormed the pack house while it was empty during the full moon, and encountered the pack Omega, who agreed to assist them with the promise that they take him along with them in the escape.

“This incident is what the prisoners were raving about during their testimony when they said that ‘filthy, unholy bears’ had desecrated their home. After the rescue, the pack Omega, known as Pipsqueak, or Pip for short, came back to my territory to live with the other refugees and I granted him permission and my protection.”

“Alpha Apollo,” the Supreme Alpha said, “Can you please describe for us the incident on Thanksgiving Day last year?”

“Certainly, Supreme Alpha,” Apollo began, “I received a call mid-morning on that day from a human who is a close friend of the five strays. He was concerned because they hadn’t been seen for two days, and they were expected for the holiday at the home of the bears from the Mishicot rescue incident, but they had not yet shown up there either. The human had my phone number to be used in case of a lycan emergency only. I sent a patrol team to the residence of the strays, and they found the door broken-in, and the strays missing. They tracked them to an abandoned building, where they found seven Mishicot lycans in the process of torturing the Omega, Pip, with the intention of killing him slowly while the other strays were forced to watch. The team engaged in combat with these wolves and were able to capture the six we met on the witness stand today. Only one, who I’m told is the pack’s Enforcer, was able to escape and make his way back out of our territory to Wisconsin.

“Immediately following the retrieval of the five strays and capture of the insurgent wolves, I made the call to report the incident to this council.”

“Thank you, Alpha Apollo, for your testimony,” Supreme Alpha Taylor said. “Does the Council have any more questions for the witness?”

The rest of the Council remained silent, so the Supreme Alpha adjourned the hearing until after the lunch break.

“That was very good, Alpha,” Alex commented to Apollo as they exited the Council chambers. “I think we’re finally starting to open the Council’s eyes to the severity of the issue.”

“Just wait till the afternoon session,” Apollo said.

They walked through the halls of the Council headquarters back to the wing of guest suites. They stopped at a door that was on the same floor but a few doors down from their own suite and knocked on the door.

A tall and lean wolf wrapped in a towel answered the door.

“Good day, Susie.” Apollo said, greeting the wolf. “I just wanted to let you know that we’ve wrapped up the morning session and we’ll be ready for your group’s testimony in about an hour.”

“Bitch… I’m sorry… Alpha, how do you expect four queens to be able to get ready in that amount of time in a suite with only one bathroom? At least Pip is ready, he’s very low-maintenance.”

Apollo grinned and told her to do her best. He gave the rest of the She-Wolves and Pip a wave from the doorway and then he and Alex went off to the commissary to see what was on the menu for lunch.

****

In the afternoon session, each of the She-Wolves had their turn on the stand, answering questions about the brutal existence that they endured in each of their original packs before their inevitable discovery and banishment, and then giving their testimony of the kidnap and torture by the lycan prisoners on Thanksgiving week. Susie also took some time to describe the Silver Bullet to the Council, explain its purpose, and detail how it came to play a part in the current events.

Dixie was able to fill in more specific details of the brutality of the male half of the population in the Mishicot pack, and then Pip took the witness stand last, to tell of his personal abuse at the hands of the pack’s males, and the abuse of the abducted human named Mike who was subjected to the worst treatment than Pip had ever seen of any of the pack’s pets.

“Usually, the pets would not live very long,” Pip explained. “Either they died of internal injuries soon following their capture from the rough sexual abuse, or they became mentally broken and were put down because dominating them no longer was exciting for the males. Now we know that the human in question has the semi-dormant werebear genes, so that is what must have allowed him to survive for so long. Unfortunately for him, that survival only caused the males to become more brutal and sadistic as time went on. When he was finally rescued by the werebears, he had been starved for over a week, and was close to death.”

“How many humans have you witnessed being captured by the separatist packs for that purpose?” one of the Council asked Pip.

“Over the course of the seventy-five years that I’ve been alive,” Pip said, “There have probably been sixty or more humans captured and tortured to death by the pack, and that’s just in my pack. I know for a fact that the rest of the Wisconsin packs do the same thing, and probably Minnesota as well.”

“So, you are talking about hundreds of human men and women that have gone missing over the years, used as sex slaves and then tossed away following their deaths,” Supreme Alpha Taylor commented.

“Yes, Supreme Alpha, but no women, only male humans. The females will not allow the males to keep female human slaves, because they don’t want the males creating any half-breed pups.”

“If these packs are so against homosexuality,” one Councilmember commented, “How is it that they all so easily participate in the rape of human males?”

“It isn’t about love, or attraction, or normal sexuality,” Pip explained, “It’s about power and dominance. To them, the God of the Moon demands that they sate any of their sexual urges by aggressively dominating the weak and the inferior. You can’t find anyone as weak and inferior as a human male.”

Following Pip’s testimony, the Alphas of the other surrounding packs in attendance were allowed to speak. They testified to similar incidents of aggression from many of the fundamentalist packs, and more reports of human males mysteriously disappearing from the borders of their territories, never to be heard from again.

“We have one final witness to testify,” the Supreme Alpha stated once all the Alphas in attendance had a chance to speak. “I have heard already what this witness has to say, but it has not been revealed to any on the Council yet. All in attendance will now be hearing this information for the first time.”

Supreme Alpha Taylor snapped his fingers at his Beta assistant on the side of the stage, who flipped the controls to lower a video screen next to the stage and projected the Supreme Alpha’s personal computer monitor onto the screen.

The image of a lycan male sitting in a small plain room popped up on the video screen as the Supreme Alpha explained.

“For some time now, I’ve had my concerns over these separatist packs, so for the last several years, I have had a mole embedded in one of them, reporting to me of their conduct. The behavior of his pack has never reached the level to which we’ve heard reported today, but he did have an urgent report for me about a week ago. I will not share his name or the pack in which he is embedded for security reasons.”

Speaking into his own computer’s camera, the Supreme Alpha addressed the mole.

“Are you in a secure location so that you can testify before the Council without being discovered by your pack?”

“Yes, Supreme Alpha,” the wolf stated.

“Then please proceed. The entire Council chamber can see and hear you.”

“A week ago, this pack’s Alpha showed all pack males video footage of two werebears and one human. We are supposed to watch for these three individuals when we are hunting or on patrol and report any sighting of them to the Alpha. This is to be done as a favor for another pack Alpha in Wisconsin. The Alpha went on to tell us that based upon this cooperation, our pack was in negotiation to join forces with all the packs in Minnesota and Wisconsin who were true believers, and that the combined holy army would be storming the Lycan Council headquarters in Calgary in the spring to overthrow the Council through a bloody coup. Their goal is to cut off the head of the snake and then consume the body. Without a centralized governing body to organize any reprisals, the combined army can sweep through all other North American packs and force them to convert to the one true religion or be put to death.”

Shouts of alarm and outrage erupted in the Gallery and on the stage. The Supreme Alpha thanked his mole for the report and cut the video feed.

“As you can see, the situation with these packs has taken a drastic turn. I see no alternative but to go to war. These packs have no idea that we are aware of their plan, so I propose that we make use of the element of surprise, assemble our own forces, and sweep through these territories disarming these packs and detaining their leadership. In time, we may finally be able to offer some of these wolves the opportunity to integrate into modern society.”

As the stage and Gallery erupted in overlapping discussion over the prospect of the largest lycan war in hundreds of years, Susie ran over to Alpha Apollo’s table and leaned in between him and his Beta.

“Alpha, if all of the fundie packs are joining forces to hunt down Gunnar, Thomas and Mike, we have to do something.”

“I agree, Susie, but if we have no way of communicating with them, and if we have no clue where they are, what are we supposed to do?”

“Let’s you and I have a little talk with the Supreme Alpha after this chaos is over for the day,” Susie said, the wheels turning in her brain, “If he can get a mole planted in one of those packs who can go undetected for years, then he has the resources available to put covert surveillance on Kane’s pack. I figure that if Gunnar or the others are spotted by one of these packs somewhere, that pack will let Kane know, and then Kane will deploy a major mobilization of his pack males to that location to intercept and attack. The Supreme Alpha’s surveillance can notify him of that mobilization and then Council forces can move in to stop it before Papi Bear is attacked.”

“You’re making a big assumption that the Supreme Alpha wolf cares enough about the welfare of a few bears to take that kind of action, but it’s worth a try,” Apollo said.

Susie gave him a nod and began to move to go back to her seat with the other She-Wolves until the end of the Council meeting, but Apollo stopped her with a gentle touch on her arm.

“You know, Susie,” he said, “Once we get back home to Chicago, Alex here has been bugging me for close to a year to promote another wolf to the rank of Beta so that he can split some of his workload. If I could convince you to finally join the pack… officially… I think you would be the right choice for the position.”

Susie stood up straight and looked back at Apollo. “You help me get the Supreme Alpha to go along with my plan, and I’ll seriously consider it.”