Denn's Mobile Circus - 5. Chapter 4: Intermission

CLICK!

The sound was like a large power switch being shut off. It came from up ahead. Looking toward the building, I scanned what interior I could see through the front door. When I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary, I started to scan the exterior of the building.

CLICK!

The windows on the ninth floor of the building went dark.

CLICK!

The windows on the eighth floor went dark.

I took a step away from the structure. I didn’t know who was shutting off the lights. Didn’t want to stick around and find out. Turning, I broke into a run down the pathway away from the building.

CLICK!

That was the sixth floor.

CLICK! CLICK!

The fifth and fourth floors.

It was getting faster.

CLICK ! CLICK!

That sense of surrounding spoke up, bringing something to my attention. While I was clearly running – scenery was passing by and everything – it didn’t feel like I was actually moving.

CLICK!

I looked over my shoulder and back at the building.

CLICK!

It wasn’t at a distance like it should’ve been. It was still right where it –

CLICK!

Everything went black. The lights. The scenery. Everything. The ground I was running on went right along with the lights. My sprinting feet suddenly touched down on nothing, sending me tumbling forward through the pitch black.

The tumble was incredibly gentle. Much more than my momentum should’ve permitted. One complete forward flip is what I felt myself do before I settled into what felt like a laying position with my back propped up. As soon as I settled, a sensation that made me feel both wet and cold shivered through my body, before fading away.

Along with all that, another sense: Aurey and Jo-C. Their presence inside me had returned. But it was faint.

“Aurey? Jo-C? Can you hear me?” I attempted.

Silence hollered back.

I got ready to try again, only louder, when something new popped into existence in front of – or rather, above – me.

‘What is that?’ I wondered.

It looked like a star. Just a single one twinkling brightly from some distant place in the darkness. But it couldn’t be a star. Stars didn’t travel solo. A person couldn’t look up at the night sky and see just one star.

There was movement suddenly. My entire body was doing it like something had picked me up, without me having to change position, and was carrying me slowly. Carrying me in the direction of the star-thing.

I tried to move out of the laying position, but couldn’t.

“Aurey! Jo-C! Can you hear me?” I tried again with more force.

Instead of silence, the speed my body was moving at hollered back. Like a pinball being hit by the spring to start the game, I was launched forward suddenly through the darkness and straight for the star-thing.

All I could do was watch as the star-thing grew larger while I charged closer. As it grew, I saw it wasn’t just a ball of light. It was more like a peephole that was looking in on another place. The closer I got, the more I could see of this place. It was a …shower?

Before a question about that could form, I was out of the peephole and into the room beyond. The sense of movement halted. I felt, and heard, myself take a deep pull of air into my lungs. It felt like the sweetest thing they’d ever received.

“Keep breathing, man. Keep breathing.” Instruction came from my right.

I couldn’t see who said it. Too bright and hazy all of a sudden. But I knew the voice. It was Denn.

“Just take it easy, Micah, and keep breathing.” His instruction came from my right again.

Hadn’t planned on stopping until the rage for oxygen in my lungs was finally over. I couldn’t get air into them fast enough. I choked up and coughed hard a few times in the process.

When the screaming sensation was finally gone from my chest, I shut my eyes and made the move to rub them. Didn’t remember I hadn’t been able to move until I was already doing it. And I was doing it very poorly. My entire body felt like it’d been sapped of all of its strength. Took effort just to lift my arm up so I could get my fingers in range to rub my eyes.

I blinked a couple of times, glad to see the rub had cleared my vision. It was a shower I’d seen. I was in it. The tub, actually. My body was submerged in the bath, which was filled with water and…ice.

Now I knew where the wet/cold sensation had come from.

What I knew after that was my eyes were opening back up again.

I didn’t feel cold and wet anymore. I felt dry and like I was laying on something soft but firm. It wasn’t the tub. I was no longer in it. I was in a bed. I was back in the room I remembered falling asleep in.

Daytime had taken over from night. Kev at the window was replaced by Denn sitting in a chair beyond the foot of the bed. He had a laptop with him.

I sat myself up in the bed. The fatigue was still present, but it wasn’t as bad as before. Took less effort to move.

Denn’s eyes looked over at me. A smile spread across his lips. Whatever he was doing on the laptop lost its importance. He shut it and put it on to the floor next to the chair he was sitting in.

“Good to see you up. Welcome back,” he greeted me.

Fatigue might’ve been in my body, but it was not in my mind. Denn’s choice of words concerned me.

“Am I asleep again?” I asked. My voice croaked like it hadn’t been used in a while.

“No. You’re wide-awake and back with us. You made it out.”

I was beyond ready to know what the hell this ‘out’ was.

“Out of what?”

Denn was nice enough to finally give me the answer.

*                      *                      *                      *                      *                      *

What I’d experienced was called a Break Out.

It was a process all werewolves born from human/werewolf relations had to go through due to something that happened to us during our time in the womb. As our mind developed, it would eventually become aware of the wolf spirit/human body mismatch. When it becomes aware, it’s unable to grasp the concept, so it rejects it completely. In doing so, it represses the wolf spirit so deeply that it falls into a state of slumber.

To supplement for rebuking the wolf spirit, the mind creates The Ghost. The Ghost is the mind’s idea of what a human spirit is supposed to be like. It comes into full formation once the mind itself is done forming and is moved in as a cover over the repressed wolf spirit.

This façade is maintained until the moment a werewolf hits puberty. With all the heavy processes and changes taking place, the mind forgets to repress the wolf spirit. Once puberty ends, the mind forgets the wolf spirit ever existed, and never goes back to repressing it.

So from the moment a werewolf hits puberty, a Blackout has the potential to happen. And that ‘Transition Window’ is open from that time until a nanosecond before a werewolf turns thirty-one. For whatever reason that was the magic number. If a werewolf hadn’t experienced their Blackout any time before, it would definitely happen then.

Blackout is the moment the wolf spirit awakens and reminds the werewolf’s mind that it is still very much present. Unable to comprehend the mismatch once again, the mind makes a second attempt to repress the wolf spirit.

Unlike the first time, the werewolf is aware of this subconscious event. They experience it in the form of a dream two to three days after waking up from Hibernation. The setting is always one of confinement. It can be blatantly obvious, i.e. prison; or more inconspicuous, i.e. a hospital.

Regardless of setting, the dream always has a Manifestation. It is a projection of the werewolf’s own defiant mind, and can appear as the warden in a prison setting, or as the werewolf’s own doctor in a hospital setting.

The objective of the Manifestation is to convince the werewolf that they are human. And the Manifestation needs little time to do its job. It’s very good at convincing.

If the Manifestation is able to convince the werewolf that they’re human, the mind succeeds in re-repressing the wolf spirit. If that happens, the werewolf won’t wake up. They’ll be trapped in the dream mentally and locked into a coma physically. And then, it’s as if the werewolf chose to have their wolf spirit put back to sleep. They’ll stay in that comatose state for ten years before they die.

Because Break Out operates on a dream level, members of a werewolf’s Pack can exercise an ability known as Dreamwalking. It’s an ability all werewolves have that, with proper training, allows them to enter the dreams of others. Once in, it’s the objective of the Packmates to find their captured Packmate, and get them out of whatever place they’re confined in.

While the objective is easy and straightforward, actually executing the Break Out is not. Every person in the dream, aside from the captured werewolf and Packmates, is like an alert system. If they see the face, or hear the voice, of the captured werewolf in an area where they don’t belong, the system will trip. It will also trip if it hears the names of the captured werewolf’s Packmates.

Under normal circumstances, all Packmates and the captured werewolf has to do is follow a simple set of rules. No speaking in the presence of the system on the captured werewolf’s part, or showing of face. No speaking of Packmate’s names in the presence of the system. Me, Aurey, and Jo-C had done all that. The system was treating all of us as if we were a part of it, and ignoring us, as it should’ve.

Until we reached the lobby.

That was as far as I made it through the answer, before the fatigue began to weigh down on me.

“Go ahead and rest, man. We got plenty of time to talk once you’re back at a hundred,” Denn said.

“How long will that be?” I asked.

“Rest of today for sure. Might stretch into tomorrow.”

“I hope not. I’m already – ”

Fatigue didn’t care what I had to say. It cut me off by knocking me back out.

*                      *                      *                      *                      *                      *

When my eyes opened again, it was still daylight. I was lying on my side looking toward the only window in the room. It put my eyes on Jo-C, who was sitting astride the windowsill, smoking a Blue.

The window itself was doing something I’d never seen a window do before. The frame was still horizontal, but it was not sitting across its normal window space. It sat half inside and half outside the house. It made me think that the frame was somehow rotatable.

Jo-C looked over in my direction and noticed I was awake.

“What’s up, man? I was hoping you’d wake up on my shift,” he greeted me.

“Are you all taking turns watching me or something?” I asked, noticing less croak in my voice and less sluggishness in my body.

“Uh-huh.”

“Why?”

“Because, in case you haven’t noticed, you’re doing things a lot faster than normal. So we’re keeping an eye on you to make sure you stay in the green.”

That was a concern I’d let go the night before in favor of dealing with it later. It looked like later had arrived.

“Do you know why I’m doing things faster than normal?”

“We thought it was because you’re the last member of our Pack at first. But now we know it’s because of your Trait.”

“Trait?”

Jo-C took a drag off his Blue and exhaled. Seeing him do that made me want to do the same. And it also brought a question to mind. However, first things first.

“You got another one of those?” I asked before he could answer.

“Yeah. Want one?” he offered.

“If I’ve got the strength to get out of this bed.”

I thought my body was going to act up like a little kid in Wal-Mart and not let me move. I was glad when it proved me wrong and allowed me to get up out of the bed with less effort than expected.

I was about to start the short trip to the window when I noticed that I was not in my work uniform anymore. My work pants had been replaced with a pair of blue jeans, and my work shirt had been replaced with a gray T-shirt.

The question of why I was in different clothes was about to pass my lips, when I remembered waking up in the tub filled with water and ice. Whether I was clothed or unclothed, I hadn’t taken notice. But in either instance, it answered why I was no longer in my uniform.

I resumed my trip to the window. Jo-C reached under the window frame, which sat like a partial partition between us, and handed me a Blue.

“Here you go.”

I took it.

“Thanks.”

Sitting the pack back down on the windowsill, Jo-C dug into his pocket, took out a lighter and handed it to me. I took it, lit my Blue, took that first drag….and choked.

“Might wanna take it easy with that. Your body’s still recovering.”

I suffered a few more coughs before my throat was finally clear.

“Yeah. I’ll do that.”

I took a gentler drag on my Blue and exhaled slower. No choke.

“But to answer your question, a Trait is a specific power that every werewolf has. Like mine is called Keen Sense. I can physically feel my surroundings and any changes that happen in them.”

“Is that what my Trait is?” I recalled. “Because I know I felt something like that when I was in Break Out.”

“You remember on the elevator when I kissed you?” he asked.

“Very clearly.”

“I didn’t do that to be cute. I did it to introduce you to my energy.”

I remembered how it’d felt when him, and then Aurey, kissed me.

“Was that what that was?” I inquired.

“That’s what it was.” Jo-C nodded.

“Why’d you have to do that?”

“One: to connect you with the Pack Bond. Without that connection, you would’ve only had the ability to speak telepathically, and nothing else. Two: introducing you to our energy also gave you a small piece of our Traits.”

“Oh.” Hurray for information. “Okay, I got you.”

“But your Trait is called Adaptivity. It’s a passive Trait, which means it’s always on, and what it does is allow you to adapt to suit any situation on a mental and physical level.”

“Is my Trait normal?”

“Oh yeah. Totally. It’s just very rare. So rare that we had to seek some knowledge on how to deal with it.”

“What can I expect?”

“Nothing as crazy as your Break Out, if you were hoping for more of that.”

“What was crazy about it?” I had a feeling he was referring to what Denn had been about to tell me before fatigue said otherwise.

“Oh…just everything that happened in the lobby, and on from there.”

“Why was that crazy?”

Apparently, the system that serviced my Break Out had done something it was not normally supposed to do. Usually, it could only monitor. If any of the rules were broken it should’ve stopped, stared, and alerted the Manifestation to my location. It could not act. Only the Manifestation could do that. And the two didn’t bleed into each other’s domain.

That is, unless, one is dealing with a werewolf who has Adaptivity as their Trait.

This one change allowed my system to act. There had not been a little girl with a ball in the lobby at first. It was during a moment when both Jo-C and Aurey were looking away that I got hit with the ball and the little girl showed up.

Had my Trait been done with altering the experience, we still would’ve been able to escape. However, it was just getting started. What it did next was cause Break Out to blend together with a completely separate experience that was supposed to take place two to four days after Break Out was over. That experience was known as The Confrontation.

During The Confrontation, I would’ve entered into another dream state, where I came face to face with my Ghost.

That was who the mysterious, gun-toting double of me was.

During The Confrontation, no other Packmates would’ve been able to Dreamwalk and help me. I would’ve had to do it alone. My purpose would’ve been to kill my Ghost by any means.

Without the knowledge they now had, Jo-C and Aurey hadn’t known how to proceed when my Ghost walked in through the front doors of the building. They didn’t know the rules had officially changed to become a warped mixture of some rules from the Break Out and some rules from The Confrontation.

A rule from The Confrontation was that Jo-C and Aurey could not participate. Warped version saw my Ghost doing something even the Manifestation wasn’t strong enough to do. When he’d shot them, he’d kicked them out of the experience completely. That was why they’d turned to ash and vanished like they had, instead of just getting shot and remaining.

This is where things went into territory so red, it was purple.

Had I gone back to my room, it would’ve been the same as the Manifestation winning, and the wolf spirit being successfully re-repressed. It was a weapon my Ghost would’ve never had in its arsenal under normal circumstances. Had it been able to get me back into that room…it would’ve been game over for me.

Another weapon my Ghost had in its arsenal that it shouldn’t have was being able to take me on without my werewolf abilities. When he’d kicked Aurey and Jo-C out, it warped a rule from Break Out, and erased the fact that the three of us had shared our energy with each other, and that I was connected to the Pack Bond. That was why once they were gone, so were my werewolf abilities.

Another rule from Break Out was that in order for it to be successful we had to make it out of the building. Warped version said that once I made it out of the building, a rule from The Confrontation kicked in. During The Confrontation, I had my abilities. That was why as soon as I’d made it out, my abilities kicked back in, and I was able to take on my Ghost and win both experiences.

Very glad I didn’t have anything that crazy to look forward to again; I got ready to ask Jo-C what I did have to look forward to when fatigue rang my doorbell.

“Ugh. Here we go again,” I sighed.

“Sleepiness coming back?”

“Like it forgot something.”

“Better finish that up then.” Jo-C indicated my Blue.

That reminded me I had a question for him.

“How old are you, by the way?”

“Fifteen-and-a-half.”

“What’re you doin’ smoking?”

He chuckled.

“I was wondering if you were gonna say something about that.”

“Glad I didn’t disappoint.”

“There’s a very good reason, but you’re gonna be asleep before I explain it all, so at least finish your smoke.”

“And how do you know that?”

“Because it’s a very strong part of my environment right now. I can feel it.”

“Oh.” I nodded. “Right.”

Forgot about his Trait.

There wasn’t that much of my Blue left to smoke. I finished it just as fatigue figured out I wasn’t going to answer and pulled out its keys to let itself in.

“I’ll take that. Got an ashtray over here,” Jo-C said.

I carefully handed my Blue to him under the window frame. He took it and put it out, as I went back to the bed and got into it.

“I’m glad we had the chance to talk,” Jo-C said.

“Yeah.” I nodded as one of those yawns signaled I was about to go down soon. “Me too – ”

Fatigue interrupted again, as it stepped into the house and announced its presence.

*                      *                      *                      *                      *                      *

When my eyes opened next, I was lying in the opposite direction from when I’d passed out. Daylight was still present, but it wasn’t the same shade as it’d been before. It was like sunlight from a rising sun instead of one that’d been out for a while.

My body felt like it was just short of full recovery. I could still feel the fatigue lurking, but it wasn’t nearly as heavy as it’d been earlier.

I could also feel something else. Someone was in the room with me. Lifting myself up and looking toward the foot of the bed, I saw exactly who I was expecting. Aurey was sitting in a chair, with its back against the wall housing the window. He was asleep with his feet put up on the bed. I could hear him snoring lightly.

The sudden need to urinate hit my bladder, informing me that I had minutes before an accident was imminent. Remembering where I was told the bathroom was, I made my way as quietly as possible from the room to it.

Turning on the light, I realized I was back in the bathroom that housed the tub I’d woken up in. Shutting the door behind me, I went to the toilet and decided on taking a seat instead of standing up. I didn’t know how sensitive werewolf ears were, and I was about to piss with some force. I didn’t want to wake everyone up with the sound of urine hitting water and porcelain.

Five minutes was how long I’d swear it took before my bladder was finally empty. Throughout the process, I’d had a sensation that made me feel like I was peeing weird. I could feel the urine coming out of the hole, but for some reason it hadn’t felt the same around the head. It’d felt wet, like I was peeing into something that was covering it, but that something could empty just as fast as it was filled. I’d wanted to take a look, but I didn’t want to deal with the sting of cutting off the stream. With that concern now out of the way, I pushed my jeans down past my knees, grabbed hold of my dick, and took a look at it.

I was stunned to find out that despite being circumcised at birth, I suddenly had foreskin.

I understood that physical changes were supposed to happen when I Shifted. I’d seen and experienced that. But I hadn’t been expecting any physical changes to my un-Shifted form. Especially one like this.

‘This is gonna be awkward to ask about,’ I thought.

Remembering hygine lessons I’d learned way back in elementary and junior high, but hadn’t had to worry about, I rolled the foreskin back, tore off a piece of tissue and dried everything off. That done, I stood and pulled up my jeans, and noticed I didn’t have any underwear on. Question of why that was was on my mind as I washed my hands, dried them, and left the bathroom.

I’d left the bedroom door slightly ajar. I opened it as quietly as possible and shut it in the same way. Aurey was still knocked out and snoring in the chair. I made my way toward the bed.

“Bet that felt good,” Aurey said suddenly, freezing me mid-step.

His position hadn’t changed and his eyes weren’t open.

“I’m sorry, man.” I apologized. “I didn’t mean to wake you up. I was tryin’ to be quiet.”

Aurey opened his eyes and sat up in the chair.

“No harm, no foul. Just glad to see you back on your feet. How’re you feelin’?”

“Almost back to normal,” I answered, completing the trip to the bed and sitting on it.

“Everything feel right?”

“Yeah. All except for…” I caught myself as I realized what was about to jump out my mouth.

“Except for what?”

“Uh…”

Yep. Incredibly awkward.

“Let me guess. You didn’t used to have foreskin ‘til now, huh?” Aurey took awkward from incredibly to totally.

“Uh…yeah…” was all I could get out.

“Don’t worry about it. It’s normal.”

“Really?”

“Yup. I mean think about it. You ever seen an uncircumcised dog?” Aurey put that image into my head.

“Because I really go around lookin’ at dogs’ dicks.”

He chuckled. “You know what I mean,”

I chuckled myself and shook my head.

“Okay, no, I haven’t.”

“Well, we ain’t no different. So welcome to it, ‘n’ keep it clean. Cuz things will start growin’ in there if you don’t.”

Couldn’t help but laugh.

“Any more changes I can look forward to?”

Aurey pointed at me. “Lift up your shirt.”

Not sure what to expect, I did as instructed. What I saw had me staring in just as much shock as when I’d noticed I had foreskin. I let my shirt drop and took a look at my arms. I rolled up the left leg of my jeans as far as it could go and then did the same to the right.

My body had never been flat. It’d always had form. One could see the potential for muscle and size by looking at it. It seemed like that potential had been reached. Form had given way to tone and size. In my arms, my legs, my chest, my mid-section, and – I figured – in places I was not willing to look at with Aurey in front of me, I’d gained muscle and mass.

I lifted my shirt back up, looking at my abs.

“I have abs,” I said. “As far as I know dogs do not have abs.”

“That’s cuz dogs ain’t werewolves. When it comes to our bodies, they automatically develop to their peak potential. No work out or diet required. If Transition happens after your body is developed, then it’s brought up to speed during the process.”

I took another look at myself and couldn’t deny that I liked what I saw. I hadn’t been an enemy of the gym. Worked out as often as I could. Ate right. But my body just never seemed to give a damn and reflect the effort. That was until now. While I was impressed, I couldn’t help but feel that I should’ve been bigger and more muscular.

“If I’m at my peak, why am I still closer to slender than bulky?” I asked.

“Cuz that’s not your body type. Peak potential varies from body to body. This is yours.”

Didn’t keep me from wishing I could’ve gotten a bit more.

“Anything else I need to look out for?”

“Not physically, but you can look forward to some changes in your mood ‘n’ in your line of thinkin’.”

“Such as?”

“Remember your Break Out, back when we were on the elevator?”

“Yeah.”

“Remember how strong your anger was?”

Yes. Yes, I did.

“Will it always be that powerful?” I inquired.

“Unfortunately, but you’ll get used to it. It only feels like it does right now cuz it’s new to you.”

“Yeah? How long does that take?”

“Not long. You’ll see.”

I sighed and shook my head.

“Man…” I admitted. “I hope you’re right, because I am honestly scared to get pissed right now.”

Aurey nodded.

“Been there, done that. Brought the shirt ‘n’ took it back.”

I chuckled, caught off guard.

“But why is it so strong?” I asked.

“Our kind is more emotionally driven, so we feel ‘em stronger than humans. Their effect on us is stronger, too.”

I nodded.

“Yeah, you got that – ”

Something caught my attention. The feeling of the second person to put their presence inside me stood up to be noticed. It was coming from behind me, toward the front of the house. And it was moving.

“We’ve got a guest on the way,” Aurey said. “Guess who?”

Didn’t need to guess.

“Jo-C,” I answered, as I felt his presence move from the front of the house and down the hallway.

He stopped in front of the door leading into the room me and Aurey were in and gave a light knock.

“Whatdya want, Shorty?” Aurey answered the knock.

The doorknob turned and the door came open. In stepped the owner of the presence.

“You know I hate it when you guys call me that,” Jo-C said to Aurey, shutting the door behind him.

Aurey shrugged.“And?”

“And I’m gonna kick your ass the next time you call me that.”

Aurey leaned forward in the chair and looked directly at Jo-C.

“Sssshorty,” he challenged.

A dirty look fell over Jo-C’s face as he glared at Aurey. Then, in the same way I’d seen him do the night before with Kev, he sighed/rolled his eyes and turned his attention to me.

“How you doin’, big brother?” he asked.

“Hangin’ in there,” I answered. “At least until the next wave of fatigue rolls over me.”

“I’m pretty sure you don’t have to worry ‘bout that happenin’ anymore,” Aurey said.

“How do you know?” I looked to him.

“Cuz I ain’t pickin’ it up on you.”

“What do you mean?”

“My Trait is an ability called Tuning. Lets me become one with my surroundings, people, or animals. I can feel what they feel, or what they don’t feel.”

“He can also tune out,” Jo-C added. “Say like he was trying to track a suspect in a room full of people. The suspect sees him and gets scared. Aurey would feel that fear and could tune out the people in the room to track where the fear was coming from and locate the suspect.”

“That sounds like your Trait,” I said to Jo-C.

“Similar, but not quite. Aurey can actually affect people and his environment with his Trait. I can’t affect my environment. I can only feel what’s in it.”

“Ah.” I understood. “So how much of your guys’ Trait do I have in me?”

“Just enough to access it on a basic level. So it tends to function more passively.”

“That’s why during your Break Out you could feel everything and where it was without looking. That, as you already know, was my Trait,” Jo-C said.

“‘N’ mine helped you out when it came to the general feeling of the area you were in,” Aurey said.

Now I understood why I’d felt the way I had after making it out of the building; that sense that something was off about my surroundings. And I also understood something else.

“You used your Trait on me back on the elevator, didn’t you?” I pointed at Aurey.

“Guilty as charged.” Aurey held up his hands.

“So, you can take away what a person is feeling too?”

“I can’t take it away. Just tune it down.”

I nodded with new understanding.

“I can see why you couldn’t tell me anything until we were out. You would’ve had to explain a whole lot.”

“That’s one reason. Other reason is cuz it would’ve affected your Break Out,” Aurey said.

“How so?”

“The more you know, the more your mind knows. The more your mind knows, the better it arms the system. If it knows too much, it can make a Break Out close to impossible to pull off.”

Had to admit the answer made sense.

“So, it wasn’t that we didn’t want to tell you. We just couldn’t,” Jo-C said. “But the plus side is from here on out, we can tell you everything.”

“Good. I was just about to ask that question,” I said. “So what do I have to look forward to next?”

“You basically made it through the hardest parts. There’s just one more, and you’re golden.”

“And what is that?”

“I bet you guys talked about the Pack Bond last night, but you didn’t talk about Pack Energy, did you?”

“I’ll bet you’re right.” He had my attention.

“Remember how we were talking about energy earlier?”

“I do.” I nodded.

“Well, each of us Packmates all have our own specific energy. That combined energy is called Pack Energy. That’s the power source of our Pack Bond.”

“Okay.” I didn’t see what was so hard about the concept.

“Like you know already, when we kissed you on the elevator, we introduced our energy to you and you introduced yours to us.”

“Yes.”

“That energy is a part of you now and your energy is a part of us.”

Jo-C held up his index finger. “But wait. How do you make energy that’s not yours?”

“You tell me,” I invited.

“You don’t. So that means you have to go and get some more when you run out.”

“How do I do that?”

Jo-C fixed me with an impish grin. “You’re smart. You figure it out.”

“What? I’ll have to kiss you again?” I figured.

“That’s how it’ll start.” His impish grin grew more impish. “But that’s not how it’ll finish.”

A unicorn could’ve opened the door, pranced into the room, hit a back flip, morphed into a woman, then walked back out of the room, shutting the door behind her, and I still would’ve been more surprised by the conclusion I’d reached.

“Are you sayin’ what I think you’re sayin’?” I wanted to be sure.

“If what you think I’m sayin’ is a certain three letter word, then yeah, that’s what I’m sayin’,” Jo-C nodded.

“How does that even work?” I had to know the answer to this.

“Sex creates raw energy. When you hit your peak, you release a huge amount of energy.”

I hadn’t wanted that to make sense as well as it had.

“I don’t think I’m feelin’ that.” I had to be honest.

“You’d be the first if you said you were,” Aurey said.

“So what if I just never take any of your energy again?”

“That’d be a good idea if it weren’t impossible.”

“What do you mean?”

“When our energy was introduced to each other, it was permanent. Since its energy you don’t create, you’ll start feelin’ for it when you run low. If you let it get too empty…well, let’s just say what happens ain’t pretty.”

“What happens?”

“The need for the energy you’re short on takes over. Whoever you need a refill from; you’ll go at ‘em ‘n’ take it. Won’t matter where you are or who’s around,” Aurey’s answer caused me to pull back.

“So…essentially I have no choice, and I have to do it? That’s what you’re saying?”

“Yup.” Aurey nodded. “Kinda fucked up, ain’t it?”

“Kinda? I mean, I don’t even know ya’ll like that. And second I’m…” My mind halted my almost loose lips.

I was not ashamed of my orientation. It’d taken me time to get there, but I wasn’t. However, I did not go around putting it out there. Unless they were gay themselves, people looked at and treated a person differently when they found that out. I’d seen it all through high school. Saw it at tech school. Saw it on my computer tech job with a co-worker. Had already had more than enough of being treated differently thanks to me being a black male. Did not need a third strike.

“Attraction doesn’t matter. Just the energy.” Jo-C picked up where I left off. “Case and point; outside of our Pack, the only penis I handle is my own. And older women are nice…but I don’t wanna get freaky with somebody who’s old enough to be my mother.”

“Who said anything about attraction?” I inquired, having not missed that detail.

“That’s what you were about to say, wasn’t it?”

“Maybe. And if so, how did you know that?”

“We can smell it. Gay men and women have a more fragrant scent.”

“Really, now?” That surprised. I’d thought he was going to say it was his Trait.

“Uh-huh.” Jo-C nodded. “So in case you haven’t figured it out already, we don’t care and we still love ya.”

Talk about blindsided.

My mouth opened to say something about it when another realization hit me.

“Oh, God!” I objected.

“What?” both Aurey and Jo-C inquired.

“In order to get your energy, and you to get mine, me and you are gonna have to…”

Couldn’t even finish the sentence.

“‘Fraid so, big bro.” Jo-C nodded.

“Oh, hell no, man! That’s like fifty different shades of illegal doin’ something like that with you.”

“If I was outside of this Pack, then yeah it would be. Age of consent is sixteen for werewolves. I’m less than half a year away from that,” Jo-C informed.

“I don’t care.” I shook my head. “I can’t do it.”

“Dude, did we already forget about the part where you don’t have any choice?”

Had actually.

“No.” I lied. “It’s just…I…I can’t man, I can’t.”

“But you will.” Aurey nodded. “‘N’ you’ll hate yourself till you accept that it’s not cuz you want to, it’s cuz you have to. Comes with the species. Don’t mean you’ll get out there ‘n’ wanna start bonin’ fifteen-year-olds all of a sudden.”

“Yeah, but…” I didn’t want to accept that they were right. “What if I use my Trait and adapt so I don’t need to do that. Is that possible?”

“Can he do that?” Jo-C was equally curious.

“No.” Aurey shot me down. “You can’t adapt out somethin’ you need in order to live. It would be the same as you gettin' drowned. Your lungs would adapt ‘n’ be able to inhale the water, extract the oxygen, then send the used water out like it does air. But you can’t adapt to not need oxygen.”

Good, but also bad, to know.

“Bonus points for the idea, though.” Aurey gave me a thumbs up.

I was defeated.

“Damn.” I sighed. “I’m not ready for this.”

“We know you ain’t, brother.” Aurey nodded his head. “No werewolf ever is. But if you let us help you through it, you’ll be all right. If you resist, well…you already know how that’s gon’ turn out.”

What else could I do? Wasn’t like I had a choice. Illusion of? Oh yes. Actual? That was a fat-ass NO.

“Bet you could use a smoke right about now, huh?” Aurey said to me.

I had to be real. “Like a muthafucker.”

It cracked Jo-C up and even made Aurey laugh, as he stood up and stretched. “Then let’s go outside and have us a smoke.”

*                      *                      *                      *                      *                      *