Denn's Mobile Circus - 9. Chapter 8: The Midway

Jo-C didn’t hang around to explain why playing tag as a werewolf was so much better than playing it as a human. He rushed into the main house to get his shirt, leaving me and Aurey on the front porch to get our pants on.

“You’d think he was five and we were going to Disneyland with the way he’s acting,” I said as I picked up my jeans and readied to put them on.

“You remember when we were trainin’ earlier ‘n’ you kept wantin’ to stay Shifted, but you couldn’t?” Aurey asked, as he picked up his own jeans.

“Yeah.”

“Where we’re about to go, you can do that.”

I’d already pulled the right leg on and was getting ready to pull up the left. I paused.

“Oh?”

Aurey, who already had the left leg of his jeans on, and was working on the right, paused and grinned over at me.

“Startin’ to sound like Disneyland yet?”

A grin of my own began to surface.

“No. That sounds even better.”

But as both of us finished the chore of getting our clothes on, I started to see some flaws in the proposed event. Depending on its location, an old roundhouse sounded like the perfect place for homeless people to squat at, or for teenagers to go make out at. It didn’t sound like the right place to go and do what we were about to go and do.

“On second thought, that sounds pretty risky. What if humans see us?” I spoke up.

“Unless they’re good enough to get passed our officers, they won’t,” Aurey answered.

“What do you mean?”

“Were not just goin’ out to some random place, if that’s what you’re thinkin’. The roundhouse is what’s called an Urban Playground. Our public works department owns it. W.I.L.D.’s police division patrols it.”

Hearing the name Urban Playground and combining it with public works brought a strangely logical answer to mind as to what purpose the facility might serve.

“Why do I get the feeling an Urban Playground is some type of werewolf dog park?” I put my hypothesis out there.

Aurey started to respond, then, cracked up laughing instead.

“What? Am I right?” I asked.

He was about to answer when the front door of the main house opened up and Kyla stepped out. She started toward our direction, and then stopped once she caught sight of us.

“You two, shirts and shoes,” she commanded, then pointed to the main house. “Ándale”

“What’s the rush?” Aurey inquired.

“Our trip is a last minute arrangement so, we gotta go like now.”

“Got ya.”

With my own question answered to Kyla’s appearance on the scene, I grabbed my cup and followed her and Aurey into the main house.

*                      *                      *                      *                      *

“It looks like a rapture rolled through here,” I said of the front room, which had been full of music, people, and activity the last time I was in it.

That was no longer the case. Me, Kyla, and Aurey were the only bodies present. The music was off. The television and game system were off. One system controller sat on the floor, while the other one sat on the couch. Cards and dominoes games sat abandoned on the dining room table.

“When we have to move, we move,” Kyla said.

“I should say so,” I agreed. “Are we the only two not ready?”

“No. There’s still a few more stragglers besides you two,” she replied, as I made my way over to the recliner where my shirt was waiting.

I picked it up, arranged it correctly, and put it back on.

“Ah! Just the nigra I was lookin’ fo’.” Kev’s voice came from behind me.

I turned to see him coming to a stop in the doorway leading into the hallway. His shirt and shoes were all on.

“Speaking of other stragglers,” Kyla remarked.

“Who are you talkin’ about? I’m right where I’m supposed to be. How about you?” Kev responded.

“I came to get them so we can go to the back yard.” Kyla indicated me and Aurey. “That’s where we’re supposed to be.”

“Well, I need to holla at my cousin real quick. If ya’ll would please excuse us, we’ll be out there in a minute.”

“That’s fine. Just don’t make me have to come back in here to get you.”

Kev looked Kyla up and down in mock distaste.

“Girl, I know you ain’t tryin’ to threaten nobody, especially in their own house.”

“You know I don’t make threats. I make promises,” Kyla responded, smiling.

“Well, how about you promise yourself that you can make it through that dining room, into the kitchen, and out the back door in the next ten seconds?”

Kyla looked like she wanted to do more sparring of the words, but instead, rolled her eyes.

“You’re lucky that we’re getting ready to go,” she remarked.

Kev lifted up his wrist as if he were looking at a wristwatch.

“Eight, seven, six…” he began to count down.

“Oh, shut up!” She slugged him lightly on the shoulder, before starting to take her leave.

“I’ll grab your shoes for ya.” Aurey said to me as he followed Kyla’s lead.

“Thanks. I appreciate it.”

Both of them made their exit. Once they were out the back door, Kev lowered his voice and asked, “How’d it go out there? You good?”

Knew exactly what he was referring to. However….

“How do you know about what happened out there?”

“I got my sources.”

It took half a second to guess who at least two of them were.

“You know you’re gettin’ kinda of personal, right?” I wasn’t going to answer the question without a little static.

“Regardless. Just answer the question.”

Now it was my turn to look him up and down in mock distaste.

“Uh, I know you better take that bass out your voice before I walk outside, get my shoes, and leave you standing here in question.”

“Hey, I’m tryin’ to look out for yo’ ass, okay? I’m tryin’ to make sure yo’ ass is good and ready to keep partying.” He emphasized each yo’ by poking me lightly in the chest with his finger. “So, now that I’ve spelled it out, I would appreciate it if you could please answer the question.”

My look of distaste became one of approval.

“Now, see if you would’ve just asked me like that the first time, we could’ve skipped all the drama.”

“I’m about to knock the drama out of you if you don’t answer the damn question.” Kev’s look mirrored that of his words, but his smile betrayed him.

I chuckled, figuring I’d given him enough static.

“Yes, I’m good,” I answered. “And, because I know what you’re about to ask next; it didn’t go nearly like I thought it would. Especially once Jo-C walked out there.”

“When he did, I expected one of you to walk back into the house shortly after. My money was on you.”

“You would’ve lost that bet. By the time he walked out there, that mess already had me in a headlock when it came to Aurey, so that sharing was going to happen. The only reason I let it happen with Jo-C is because I didn’t want to risk the alternative.”

“I definitely feel you on that. I know that wasn’t a easy choice to make, but I’m glad all of ya’ll handled that before it got to that point. You don’t ever want to experience the alternative. Trust me.”

I knew the meaning of those two simple words when they came from him.

“Sounds like you know something about it.”

“You know I don’t say that unless I do.”

“What happened?”

“It was when Taj and Imani joined the Pack. He was our first male and neither one of us was down – like Brandy – with sharing our energy with each other, so we both resisted.”

“And lost?”

“Actually we made it all the way through the last day. Vonna and Imani thought we were lyin’ and had done it, but didn’t wanna say anything. But we made it. When that next morning came around, the girls had gone to the store. I was walking out of the kitchen and into the dining room. Taj was coming down the hall. All we did was make eye contact with each other to speak, and nigga….”

Kev shook his head then, looked toward the dining room. I followed his gaze and found myself looking at the dining room table.

“Let’s just say that’s not the first table we had when me and Vonna moved in here.”

My first thought was the obvious.

“Oooh! Ya’ll didn’t….”

Kev nodded.

“Yes, we did.”

I lowered my voice to a whisper.

“Ya’ll…fucked?”

“Fuck is afraid of what we did,” Kev whispered as well.

The first side of things made me want to laugh. That’s some good, old-fashioned, home-style sex when the dining room table gets destroyed in the process. But that second side cut the laughter off at the throat. It’d damaged my psyche being uncontrollably driven to do what I’d had to do, and I was attracted to men. I could only image how strong a blow it would be to a straight dude’s psyche to be uncontrollably driven to the hardest core of same-sex contact.

“Did that mess you guys up?” I asked.

“Yeah, at first. I think it was two or three days before we could even look at – ”

“Babe, why are you out there holdin’ things up? You know we got places to be.” Lavonna’s voice cut in.

We both looked in its direction and saw her standing in the center of the hall, where it split left and right.

“Because I wanted to check on my cousin. Can I do that?” Kev answered with playful boldness.

Lavonna smiled and gave him a “you don’t have to get smart” look.

“Yes, you can do that,” she said to him, and then to me, “Micah, honey, no disrespect intended. We’re just on a tight time limit to get to where we’re going.”

“None taken. I know we gotta keep it movin.’”

“So we better get back to it,” Kev said, before turning his attention back to me. “Keep what we talked about in perspective. You’ll see why later on. We’ll meet you out back in a minute.”

*                      *                      *                      *                      *

Kev’s advice kept me company during my travel to the back door. After what we’d just talked about, it wasn’t hard to figure out why he’d wanted me to keep it in perspective. Getting beyond Jo-C’s age wasn’t the last hurdle I had to clear. There was also the subject of the three women in my Pack. We were going to have to share energy with each other as well. While it didn’t bother me nearly as bad as the previous hurdle, I did wonder how it was going to affect my performance. Could I still release energy without being even slightly aroused?

I put further thought on that away for later as I opened the back door and walked into the backyard. With the exception of Kev, Lavonna, Denn, and Brendi, everyone else was out there. The ladies had congregated by the tables, which were clear of all the alcohol bottles I remembered from earlier. Further across the yard, the gentlemen had taken seats in chairs, which they’d arranged in a semi-circle.

Aurey noticed me and held up my shoes. I nodded and went over to where he was. I grabbed a chair of my own along the way, sat it down next to him once I arrived, and took a seat.

“Thanks,” I said, taking the shoes and sitting them down on the ground so I could put them on.

“You came out faster than I thought,” he said.

“I would’ve been longer, but Lavonna got us back on task. They’ll be out here in a minute.”

As I got ready to put the left shoe on I noticed the lack of socks. It hadn’t escaped my attention that I hadn’t been given a pair of those, or a pair of draws since I’d woken up. It had also not escaped my attention the lack of some, or both when it came to those around me.

“Is it against werewolf religion to wear socks and draws?” I asked as I put on the shoe.

“It’s not against the religion, just not necessary for it. Your normal body temperature is higher now. Puttin’ on socks ‘n’ drawers will make you sweat,” Aurey explained.

Had not noticed a change in my body temperature.

“What’s my temp at now?”

“Between a hundred ‘n’ eight, to a hundred ‘n’ ten.”

My eyes gave Aurey a wide, cartoon look.

“Won’t that fuckin’ kill a person?”

“It would definitely kill you if you were a human,” Takuro answered.

“Why are we that hot?”

“Metabolism. Since ours is faster, it creates more energy. More energy in the body means more heat.”

“Hell, if that’s the case, then everybody sittin’ here should be on fire right now.”

I didn’t think anyone would get the joke, seeing as how sharing energy had nothing to do with metabolism. I was wrong. Takuro, Aurey, Taj, and Jo-C all cracked up laughing so hard it caught the attention of the ladies.

“My god, what’s so funny?” Imani inquired.

The others couldn’t collect themselves to answer. I remained mute. Kyla noticed.

“Micah, what’s so funny?” she asked.

All I could do was start giggling myself, as I kept my eyes forward on my laughing victims. I was not about to look anywhere near her direction.

“Micah…” she tried again.

I cracked up laughing. The joke itself, seeing the other guys laugh so hard, and being found out as the weakest link when the ladies started asking questions was too much.

“Uh-huh. Ya’ll over there talkin’ about somethin’ nasty, huh?” Imani insinuated.

Because we all laughed harder at the statement, which was 1/4^th of the truth, the ladies assumed it was the full truth.

“Boys will be boys, no matter what species,” Koko said.

They teased us a little more as we recovered. We’d just gotten well enough to respond when Denn and Brendi walked out of the front door of the safe house. At the same time, Kev and Lavonna walked out of the back door of the main house.

“What was that, the synchronized door exiting event?” Jo-C remarked on the occurrence.

Of which the two parties were oblivious until he’d spoken up.

“No, baby, we just cool like that,” Lavonna answered.

“Uh-huh. I’m checking your phones later,” Jo-C said, feigning disbelief.

“All right, ya’ll. Let’s head ‘em up and move ‘em out.” Denn gave the leave command.

Parked not too far away in the driveway was the familiar black truck I’d ridden in before. Parked in front of it was a dark-gray truck that was the same make and model as the black truck. My Packmates started for the black truck, while Kev and his Pack went toward the dark-gray truck. I put on my other shoe then, got up to follow.

Jo-C, who was the first one to the truck, opened the passenger back door and got in. Kyla and Andrea were ahead of me and Aurey. Both of them were talking, before they turned back to face me and Aurey and started toward us.

“All right Micah, it’s been decided. You’re coming to sit with Kyla and me in the bed of the truck,” Andrea informed.

“Well, okay,” I replied, thinking the decision was made because they still planned to find out what me and the other guys had been laughing about.

“You can’t let the man pick for hisself?” Aurey remarked.

“Yeah. He can choose to go with me.” Kyla pointed to herself. “Or, with her.” She pointed to Andrea. “Or, with both of us.”

I gave a chuckle at hearing the three choices for my one option.

“You and Jo-C can come and sit with the cool kids if you want,” Andrea invited, taking my left arm in hers.

Kyla took my right arm in hers. Then, both the ladies led me to the back end of the truck, where we got in through the open bed and hatch panel.

*                      *                      *                      *                      *

Aurey accepted the invitation to come sit with the cool kids in the bed of the truck. I thought Jo-C would do the same, but he declined. He liked the idea of having the whole back seat to himself more.

“Why’s that such a big deal?” I asked.

“Do you know how comfortable these seats are? With all of you back there I can lay down, stretch out, put in my buds, and get psyched for the game. So, if you guys say something to me and I don’t respond, that’s what’s going on,” he answered.

We were using Packspeak to communicate instead of our extended senses to hear over the noise of the moving winds created by the various open windows on the truck, because I hadn’t had that training yet. I knew how to access my extended senses without Shifting, but not how to hold that control for an extended period of time.

“So, I bet you’re wondering why a bunch of drunken, mostly adult werewolves are going out to play tag like a bunch of kids, huh?” Andrea asked me.

“I’ve got something of an idea already. Me and Aurey were talking about it earlier,” I replied.

“Is that what you guys were talking about when I walked out there?” Kyla asked.

“Yup,” Aurey replied.

“What all did you tell him?”

“I was startin’ to tell him what a U.P. was when you walked out. I’d already told him that we get to stayed Shifted when we go to one.”

“Yes, we most certainly do,” Andrea said.

“You think you’re ready for that?” Kyla asked me.

“Almost. I’m just concerned that once I let the wolf out I won’t be able to put it back in and…yeah. How’s that gonna work? Will it be worse than it was during training?”

“Sounds like you had more you wanted to add to that,” Denn pointed out.

I was hoping I’d covered that up pretty well. Surprised me it was Denn who noticed and spoke up.

It’d already been explained that outside of Blackout and Brownout, the wolf could not steal control away from me. Even though it couldn’t do that, Shifting still had a profound effect on me. Along with the aforementioned concern, there was the one I was being called out for excluding.

The only reason why I hadn’t brought it up was because I’d been expecting someone else to say something. But, nobody had said a thing. Not after I’d woken up from Break Out, where I’d felt it for the first time after Shifting. And not during training, where I’d felt it every time I was trying to keep control.

It’s a shame that it wasn’t until this moment that a lightbulb suddenly popped on in my head. And it was colored red with warning. What if the reason nobody had said anything was because it wasn’t supposed to be happening? What if what I was experiencing was another abnormality brought on by my Trait?

“Do you remember when we were talking the other night and I asked you if it was normal to feel like another mind takes over you during Brownout?” I proceeded to inquire about the unaddressed concern posthaste.

“Yes,” Denn answered.

“Is that other mind supposed to go away after Brownout, or any time after?”

“No. It’s supposed to stay with you. I’m sorry we didn’t get into that then, but it would’ve led into the conversation we’re about to have right now. We’d already told you so much, adding this would’ve been overkill.”

The ton of bricks, which’d started to settle on my shoulders, lifted.

“You know what man, I’m not even mad. I’m just glad to know it’s not some bizarre shit my Trait is causing.”

“No. It’s not your Trait. As a matter of fact, that shouldn’t have any negative effects on anything else for the rest of your Transition.”

“Good to know.”

“But, we do need to discuss the other mind. How does it feel so far? Does it still feel like it’s trying to take over?”

“No. It doesn’t feel like it’s trying to take over. But, I do notice that I feel a kind of…pull from it when I’m Shifted. Not like it’s trying to take me over, but more like it’s….”

I tried to find the words to explain it accurately.

“Like it’s trying to get you to see things from its point of view exclusively?” Brendi finished my comment a few moments later with the accuracy I was looking for.

“Yes!” I nodded. “That’s it exactly!”

“That’s a normal thing that’s supposed to happen too.”

I’d had my suspicions as to what the other mind could be. Hearing Brendi say what she’d said prompted me to ask, “Is the other mind a wolf’s mind?”

“Yes, it is,” Brendi answered.

“But, it’s not just a random wolf’s mind. It’s your mind as it would be if you had the body to match,” Denn informed.

Unexpected news was unexpected.

“Really now?” I inquired.

“What? You thought it was just some random wolf in there?” Brendi replied.

The humor actually made me smile a little.

“Hell if I knew until now.” I sent some back.

“Well, now that you do, have you noticed any changes in the way it feels since Brownout?”

“Yeah, actually. It doesn’t feel like this outside entity with its own thoughts and its own existence acting through me anymore. Because of what Denn just said, now I know why it feels like another me…but not me. It still has its own thoughts and its own presence, but it feels like it’s in co-existence with me now.”

“Good. That’s how it’s supposed to feel.”

“And how about that pull? How did it feel the last time you felt it?” Denn asked.

“Barely noticeable,” I answered.

“Also good. Now, it won’t be tonight, but I will tell you to expect that to change.”

Did not like the way that sounded.

“Like how?”

“First, understand what the pull really is. It’s the need to let the wolf out; the need to be in our natural state of mind and our natural form.”

“What we’re in right now isn’t our natural state of mind?”

“No. The state we’re in right now is a conditioned state of mind. One created by all those years spent out in the human world.”

The comment made me remember discussions about The Ghost.

“Does letting the wolf out and being in our natural state of mind make us forget the conditioned state?” I asked.

“Not at all. It’s burned into us like a brand. We couldn’t forget it if we wanted to,” Brendi answered.

“You make that sound like it’s a bad thing.”

“It’s six in one hand, half a dozen in the other really. It’s an advantage werewolves from a human/werewolf relationship have over those from a werewolf/werewolf relationship. Since they never get immersed in humanity like we do, it’s a lot harder for them to grasp the concept of it and integrate themselves into human society. Most don’t get it down until they’re in their late thirties or somewhere in the forties.”

“Are they not raised around humans or something?”

“They are not. They don’t get to go out into the ‘human world’ for the first time until they’re eighteen.”

“Well, there’s the problem right there. How does that even work?”

“They’ve just got a different way of doing things. They usually live in rural areas, or towns instead of in the city. The residents of those areas, or towns are other werewolves, so the children are brought up around their own kind and know what they are from jumpstreet. And Transition for them happens as soon as they enter puberty.”

“Oh.” I was surprised to learn this. “Sounds like we get the short end of the stick when it comes to things.”

“Yeah, we kinda do. Especially because of our half a dozen eggs in the other hand. We have to deal with the pull on a mostly continuous basis.”

“How strong does that get?”

“To the point of unavoidability.”

“How’d I know you were gonna say something like that?” I jeered, shaking my head. “So, it’s just like the need for energy?”

“Not quite,” Denn replied.

The pull, Denn explained, was only similar to the need for energy in two ways. The first; it was something we had to do. Outside of the need for energy, it was the only other thing that fell into that category. The second; it was also felt as an urge that grew in strength over time.

Beyond that, though, the two were as different as night and day in the way they were handled and the patterns they followed.

The slight, barely-there pull I’d started to feel when Shifted was how it began. Usually, it followed a weekly wax and wane type pattern. At the beginning of the week the pull would be slight and only feelable while Shifted. But that pull would get stronger every day until by the end of the week it would be strong enough to feel when I wasn’t Shifted. That was where U.P.s came into the picture. They were places in, or on the outskirts of the city – or town – that werewolves could go to in order to let the wolf out safely and discreetly.

This same cycle would start up again the following week and follow the same pattern. Same with the next week, and the next week. By the end of each week after the first, the pull would be stronger than the previous week. All Pack members fell into sync when it came to this cycle, so everyone was always at the same point at the same time.

“So, what’s the purpose of going to a U.P. to let the wolf out if it just keeps getting worse every week?” I asked.

“The million dollar question,” Denn replied.

Our wolf minds came complete with wolf instincts. The most dominant of those instincts was the one to hunt. That was why the main activity at a U.P. was tag. It provided the targets, the chase, and the capture, which was enough to actually trick our hunting instinct for almost a good four weeks. When the end of that fourth week rolled around though, the U.P. trick wouldn’t work anymore. That was when it was time to go to what was called a Reserve.

Reserves were huge plots of land that, like U.P.s, were owned by werewolf public works. They were areas that were out in the actual wild and were heavily protected by W.I.L.D. to insure humans didn’t find their way onto them.

Unlike a U.P., Reserves weren’t something we went and did for a few hours. We usually stayed for two or three days. During that stay, there were no games of tag. There was actual hunting. Not the kind that involved hiding in a location, using a fake call to lure an animal in, then making the kill with a gun. It was about tracking the animal, chasing it, capturing it, and making the kill up close and personal with our own bare hands.

Yes.

That was the one detail that was missing from the U.P. experience. We got to chase and capture…but not kill. That was why the pull kept coming back stronger each week.

I just wanted to know one thing.

“Do we hunt humans?”

“For food, no. Our bodies are too similar. It would be like eating another werewolf. But there are those of us who do like to hunt humans for sport,” Denn answered.

“Even if it is against a big-ass bookself worth of laws,” Brendi added.

That was not the kind of answer I’d been expecting. Given the conversation up until this point, I was almost sure they were going to tell me that we either did hunt humans for food, or that we had some uncontrollable urge to go after them. I was ecstatic to know that neither of those was true. But, it didn’t sit well with me to know that there were werewolves out there who hunted humans for sport.

“Is it a thing ya’ll see a lot?” I asked.

“Not a lot, but more than we’d like,” Denn answered.

“Do we deal with cases like that?”

“Yes, our division does. But so far, our Pack has never had to deal with one personally.”

“I hope we never have to. Werewolves like that won’t like me very much.”

“You’ll find that point of view is shared by everybody in this truck.”

That others in my Pack might be good with hunting humans for sport was a thought that hadn’t even crossed my mind. The confirmation that they weren’t was definitely welcomed.

“Well, at least hunting them isn’t something that’s out of our control. I am very happy to hear that. But to jump back to that whole letting my wolf mind have exclusivity thing, I’m not happy to hear that. It’s already hard enough to get myself to Shift back while I’m in my conditioned state of mind. I’m not seeing how a switch to a state of mind I’ve never tried before while coherent is a good idea,” I said.

“What I’m about to say isn’t to pressure you, it’s just to give you some food for thought. Did you ever consider that your wolf mind might be better suited to handle being Shifted?” Denn asked.

Believe it or not, I actually hadn’t. Still....

“I don’t trust that side of myself enough to do that.” I stood firm.

“I know you don’t. But you’re going to have to learn that trust, because you can’t run from it either.” Denn did the same.

And he was right. I couldn’t run. However….

“You said all Packmates are supposed to fall into sync and feel the pull at the same time, right?”

“That’s right,” Denn answered.

“Am I not in sync yet? Because I don’t feel it.”

“Right now you’re falling into sync. You shouldn’t start feeling it escalate for another couple of weeks.”

“Do ya’ll feel it right now?”

“Yes, we do. So, for us this will be like a regular trip. For you, it’s a sneak peek that not many get the opportunity to have. Tonight, you get the choice to choose if you want to go all the way, part of the way, or not at all.”

And that was another gathering load of bricks off my shoulders. I’d already had my fill of unavoidable activity for the day. I was glad to know I didn’t have to look forward to a second, new occurrence.

“Okay.” I nodded. “I can handle that.”

“So, does that mean you might consider going all the way tonight?” Jo-C asked, reminding me that the entire conversation was being broadcast live across all of my Packmate’s stations, and not just between the three of us.

“In the words of Damon Wayans: Ehh…no.”

“Aw, c’mon, Micah. Don’t wuss out and waste the only chance you’re gonna get to do this on your terms.”

“Says the one who wouldn’t even get out of this truck on his first trip to a U.P.” Aurey contradicted.

“I don’t think I was talking to you, but since you brought it up, no, I wouldn’t. Remember how well that turned out? Maybe I don’t want Micah to make the same mistake. You got a problem with that mister tried to Tune the wolf out and failed?”

The revelation had my attention immediately.

“Did you really?” I asked.

“Yeah.” Aurey nodded. “I did try.”

“What happened?”

“Almost five hours of pure hell,” Brendi answered.

By the time Aurey was done explaining it to me, I understood what she meant.

I never would’ve guessed it, but before and during his Transition, Aurey had been a man cursed with a quick temper. With anger being what it was to us, it’d already caused him to have more than a few Trigger Shifts – Shifts triggered by fear or anger –. Naturally, he’d been afraid he wouldn’t be able to keep what control he did have over his anger if he went all the way. That was when the birth of an ocean happened. He knew he couldn’t stop from going over completely. But, nobody’d said that he couldn’t tune the wolf mind down once he did.

Unfortunately, the attempt backfired completely. Instead of tuning down his wolf mind, he unknowingly tuned down his conformed mind. As a result, it caused him to rely exclusively on certain canine behaviors for the next five hours. One such behavior was marking territory and locations.

“As in you were going around pissin’ on stuff?” I wanted to be clear.

“Like R. Kelly in a room full of teenaged girls,” Kyla answered.

It shouldn’t have been funny. But when combined with Kyla’s words it cracked me up.

“Well, at least you weren’t in your right mind and didn’t know what you were doing,”

Aurey looked at me and chuckled.

“I wish I could say that,” he answered.

“Wait…you knew what you were doing?”

“Yup.”

“And…you still did it?”

“To me, I wasn’t doin’ nothin’ wrong. I needed to know where I’d been ,‘n’ how far away I was from all the other places I’d been. It was all about navigation.”

“Navigation? I always thought that was about territory.”

“Territory is part of it, but navigation is the main use.”

“How do we use that for navigation?”

“Our sense of smell can reach up to two miles away. Once you know your scent, you can smell it on the air ‘n’ track it.”

“Wow.” I shook my head. “Our instincts go all the way down to something like that?”

“Oh, yeah. It’s all there,” Andrea answered.

“I bet that messed the whole U.P. trip up.”

“It was all good until everyone else found out what I was up to about an hour later. Then, we had to go,” Aurey replied.

“And guess where our fearless leaders put him when they had to leave. Where all you cool kids are sitting right now,” Jo-C revealed.

My eyes locked straight onto Aurey.

“Man…you didn’t?” I asked, hoping I was wrong.

“Don’t worry, that was years ago. All this has been washed more than once since.” He chuckled.

“Did they lock you back here until you were good again or something?”

“Nope. They made the mistake of lettin’ me out once we got back to Kevin ‘n’ Lavonna’s.”

“Lord, what else did you do?”

“I tried to get into the houses after I tagged the front yard, the back yard, the outside of Kevin’s truck, ‘n’ the outside of ours.”

“And you still had piss left for that?”

The question wrapped in a joke made everyone laugh.

“We kept thinking the same thing that whole time,” Brendi said.

“At least ya’ll can’t say I wasn’t efficient,” Aurey remarked.

“You were almost too efficient. Trying to keep you from gettin' into the houses was the real headache,” Denn said.

“Why? Did you keep trying to take the keys or something?” I asked Aurey.

“Didn’t need to. All I had to do was for someone to walk into the house. Then, I’d either tune myself out ‘n’ make ‘em forget I was there, or tune myself in ‘n’ make ‘em think they wanted to let me in,” he replied.

“Okay, now I’m seeing how that would be pure hell. You weren’t even right, man.”

“Those of us who were around at the time agree,” Denn said.

“Who wasn’t around for that?” I asked.

“Me, Andy, Jo-C, and you,” Kyla answered.

“Whoa. So, outside of our alpha and beta, you’re the first.”

“Yup,” Aurey replied. “Jo-C came after that, then Andy, then Kyla, ‘n’ then you.”

“That’s why me and Andy don’t have any U.P. stories to share with you. We learned from these two,” Kyla said.

“Speaking of, I guess it’s my turn to share with you now,” Jo-C said.

Unlike Aurey, anger hadn’t been his problem. His had been with the wolf mind itself. Due to the fact that he was going through puberty, it made being Shifted a more intense – and sometimes annoying – experience. That was with his conformed mind in control. He’d wanted no part of re-experiencing what it was like with his wolf mind at the helm.

Knowing there was no way to prevent it, Jo-C had come up with the idea to simply sit in the truck and not participate in the U.P. activities.

“I was okay at first. I had my earbuds in. Denn was taking his turn to sit in the truck with me. Life was beautiful,” he began. “Now, ask me what I forgot about.”

“What you forgot about?” I asked.

That got some assorted chuckles; Jo-C’s being part of them.

“I couldn’t see the others or hear them, but after a while I started to feel the ripples in the air from what they were doing.”

“Oh, no. Your Trait.” I realized.

“Yahtzee.”

At first, he hadn’t thought the ripples would be a problem. He knew how to block them out so they wouldn’t affect him. Unfortunately, this could only be done as long as no other parts of himself were open to receive the ripples. Due to the circumstance, he could not completely close off his wolf mind from being open to receive.

Even with this turn of events, Jo-C had still been confident the ripples wouldn’t be a problem. He’d thought that at worst, all it was going to do was make him Shift without wanting to. He hadn’t expected it to go any further than that. So after he’d given in and allowed himself to Shift – but with his conformed mind in control – he’d thought that was it. But the ripples started to act as fuel for the wolf mind, which did it’s very best to repeatedly seduce its then twelve-year old subject to seeing things exclusively from its point of view. It was so smooth in its seduction, that he wouldn’t realize he was actually giving in completely until it was almost too late. That would cause him to snap to and fight to keep the exclusivity from happening. It created a vicious game of tug of war that lasted for almost an hour before the pull finally won.

“I seriously thought everyone was going to hate me forever, because I was not nice at all while I was fighting,” Jo-C revealed.

“What happened?” I asked.

“I might’ve gotten paranoid and thought that everyone was trying to turn me into a monster, because they kept telling me to stop fighting. I also might’ve said some very nasty things to people, and I might’ve fought, especially when they tried to take me out of the truck to keep me from ripping up the back seats.”

“How were you doing that?”

“I kept digging my fingers into the cushions, which is a very bad thing to do when your claws keep trying to grow in.”

“Oh, I see. Damn, boy, you tried to fight.”

“With every fiber of my being. But I still lost. Moral of the story, by the way.”

It’d flipped my mind hearing what his first trip to a U.P. was like. It was as if he were talking about a completely different kid. Not the one who’d provoked my Disneyland comment earlier.

It was enough to put a question on my mind.

“So, what changed, Jo-C?” I asked.

“What do you mean?”

“What took you from wanting nothing to do with the wolf mind to now?”

“You’ll find out when you go all the way. Other than that, there’s no real way to explain it right.”

“Seriously? You can’t even describe it in a sentence? A word?” I wasn’t buying it.

“I would if I could. But, it’s different for every werewolf. So, I can’t.”

“Oh.” That, I could buy. “All right.”

“And on that note, we’ll be coming up to the checkpoint in a couple of minutes,” Brendi informed us.

“Nice! Just enough time for a quick song! Leaving discussion again,” Jo-C announced.

As he settled in for a quick tune, my thoughts turned unsurprisingly to the place we were fast approaching. Two minutes wasn’t going to be nearly enough time to come to terms with all the knowledge that’d been imparted to me. So, I let my mind turn to the situation I would be coming face to face with first. How far, if at all, was I ready to go tonight?

*                      *                      *                      *                      *