#ontheluis

Kaden couldn’t believe that another full moon had come so soon. He was far from ready for it. As much as he figured he should sit back, stay at home, duty didn’t disappear just because he was having a rough go at the moment. Human lives still depended on him. So he geared up, headed out, tried to focus on the task at hand. He wasn’t sure he could handle any field work deep in the woods, not this month. He’d circle the perimeter of the edge of town, make sure nothing came too close. It was all but a guarantee he would accidentally run into Ariana, too. This was fine. It’d have a direct impact in helping people. Or at least that’s what he was telling himself. A chill ran down his spine. A wolf was near. Kaden wasn’t sure if he was relieved or disappointed. It didn’t matter. He lasered his focus on the feeling, listened for any growls or footsteps, any heartbeats. Shit. Shit, there were plenty of heartbeats around the corner. And chatter. He just hoped he could get to them before the monster did, wherever it was. 

Luis’s claws tore open the top of the SUV with ease of a can opener. Steel alloy peeled back and the interior plastics tore away with it, exposing the cowering family of prey to the full moon’s light. Some screamed while others peered up in the clammy paralysis of shock into blue lupine eyes that reflected the flickering car lights. 

But a life-saving reflex from the father hit the gas pedal a second before the feast could begin. The topless car careened out of the desolate parking lot in a sharp turn, leaving skid marks on the damp tarmac. Luis’ balance was thrown for a second but a lept gracefully off the quick metal thing before untrolled speed sent it colliding into a road divider. 

Claws clicked on asphalt concrete as Luis stalks towards the car crushed against the median strip cinder-blocks and the sobbing prey trying to struggle out of their metal prison. 

The sounds of metal crunching and scraping echoed around him and Kaden didn’t have to concentrate on heartbeats anymore to figure out where the fuck to go. He turned the corner and saw a werewolf shredding into a car like it was paper. “Hey!” the hunter shouted, hoping to get its attention. It didn’t work. So Kaden pulled out his gun and fired off a shot at the monster’s feet. He didn’t dare risk aiming higher, not with innocent victims still trapped in the car. The last thing any of them needed was an accidental stray bullet. 

His distraction seemed to work. The wolf turned his attention towards Kaden. Good. That was-- Putain, that wasn’t actually all that good. Kaden took off in a sprint towards the forest, hoping to lead the wolf away from the scene of the car crash. The question was if he could keep the wolf’s attention long enough to make this into a fight. As he ran, he ignored the pit in his stomach; the one that came as soon as he thought about what the end of this fight would look like. Guess he’d figure that one out later. First thing first, he had to keep from getting mauled to death.

Luis hesitated to leave the huddle of prey, but the new scent had been accompanied by cracking noise that shot pain though Luis’ ears. Instinct recognized the new scent as a threat, and Luis bounded after the Hunter. 

Leaping up over dumpsters and off parked cars, the tawny werewolf tried to gain on this next prey. A low overhanging fire escape gave Luis his chance. Luis jumped up onto the incompletely closed ladder with a sharp screech of claws and metal. The hulking quadruple struggled to dash across the narrow fire escape. 

Railings burst as Luis tried to use the height advantage to pounce down on Kaden. 

Kaden was hoping the wolf was going to run off towards the forest, the beast clearly had other ideas. So it was going to be a chase, huh? Putain. Nothing new, but that complicated things, for sure. Definitely not time to switch to the knives. Kaden tracked the creature’s movements, followed along towards the alleyway, shooting as he went. Bullets hit metal, brick, he hoped one or two might sink into flesh. Shit. Shit, he wasn’t supposed to be killing was-- No, he-- Fuck, he couldn’t sort out his fucking goals anymore. 

And it looked like he wasn’t going to get a chance to. The werewolf turned on its heel and threw itself at the hunter. Putain de merde. Kaden shot up at it some more and tried to roll out of the way, but it was impossible to avoid any piece of claws. They slashed into the edge of his side, tearing at his shirt and raking against his flesh. Kaden bit down, trying to hold back the majority of his scream. Better him than those people back in that car or anyone else. He tried to shove the gun back at his side, but properly putting it away was less important than pulling out the biggest knife he had on him, Last Chance. With the wolf on the ground, disoriented from his daring leap, Kaden kicked at its leg behind the knee before plunging his knife straight down into its back. There was no mistaking that he hit flesh this time. Satisfaction. That’s what he should be feeling. So what the fuck was that pang of guilt doing there? No. Not now. This wasn’t Ariana. He knew that full stop. He couldn’t let this wolf destroy the town. He was a hunter. This was a hunt. He was going to keep shit simple. 

Luis let out a high canine whine of pain. There it was again, that different kind of pain, an acidic burning inside of him. This was the second time that Luis had felt something like this, evoking  vague recollections of a hunt in a warm place full of mocha scents and small male prey holding pale metal that felt like death. All Luis’ primal mind understood was that this one was like the one somehow, a danger he needed to survive. 

Compared to the Hunters decades of training, Luis was feral and new, lethal instinct devoid of experience. He lunged up, bit, and raked at Kaden with the blind frenzy of a wounded animal. The werewolf tried to regain his feet while trying to knock the Hunter back, seeking to use brute size to his advantage in close quarters.  

Stabbing a werewolf wasn’t anything new, not for Kaden. He’d done it plenty of times before. Something about it felt wrong. He couldn’t say why. Stopping the wolf from hurting people, easy. That made sense. So why was hurting it and killing it such a fucking question now? Shit. It was a question he didn’t have time to ponder. Big fucking monster, small fucking space. As the wolf lashed out at him, Kaden slammed himself against the wall and slid down, ducking away from the claws and teeth as best he could. He slashed out with his knife again at the wolf’s back legs but he was knocked into the corner by the wolf’s body. Shit. He had to get out of here. He had to get the wolf out of here, too. 

Luis snarled in pain at the new slash seeping down one of his back legs. Red rage swallowed everything. The dingy alleyway, gleaming stars, and sounds of distant cars imploded in a mindless fury that throbbed in the werewolf’s skull. Luis came at Kaden with the hateful lethality of a creature killing out of sheer wrath rather than predation. He needed to live and this painful male thing with the metal had to die, now! Anger and survival was Luis’ totality in that moment, nothing else existed. 

Luis tried to leverage the corner against Kaden, using his larger mass to box the Hunter in and cut off room to escape. He darted forward with a flurry of lunging snaps of his maw that weren’t meant to actually harm Kaden, only drive him back further into the alley-brick corner. When Luis’ instinct felt that this prey must be pinned enough to be immobile, the werewolf tensed before throwing everything he had in a leaping pounce. Lunging arced up into a fang-first descent towards Kaden, lunging towards his soft throat. 

Kaden’s back was against the wall. In a very literal sense. Putain. The options were looking slim. His grip around the knife tightened and it felt like the only way out was the typical methods, the only way he was taught. The only thing drilled into his mind since birth. Kill or be killed. It was the only way. That’s what it always was. He would take his knife. He’d drive it through the wolf. And this would be done.

Only he couldn’t. He saw the teeth. He saw the claws. He knew what was coming towards him. And he knew he should fight. Instead, as soon as the beast lunged towards him, he ducked and threw himself to the ground. The wolf slammed into the brick wall, ramming into it with full force, likely aiming to tear the hunter limb for limb. Kaden felt claws scrape across his back, but it was fine, he could crawl away. Only he didn’t get the chance. The wolf went limp and collapsed on top of him with a thud. Fucking hell. Kaden cursed and grumbled as he pushed his way out from under the pile of fur and muscle and bone. Not exactly how he planned on resolving this situation, but he supposed it worked all the same. He bent over his knees, trying to catch his breath and figure out what to do with the creature in question. He couldn’t just leave it here and risk it waking up without the hunter around and start whole fucking shit over again. Kaden stayed int place for a while, hands on his knees, pain shooting through his back and arms as he looked down at the monster. All he had to do was cut it open, silver though the heart, end it. Simple. Easy. It probably wouldn’t even struggle.

Who even were they?

The thought sent bile churning, threatening to push its way past his throat. He swallowed back, kept himself bent over a while longer as he assessed the situation. Putain de merde, was he catching some sort of bug or something? Why the fuck was his mind so scattered over a fucking werewolf? Palms rubbed against his face, wiping away his confusion. Right. He had to do something. Get the monster out of here. He reached down and flipped the wolf on its side. Fireman’s carry looked out of the question. Not at that size. Guess he’d just have to drag the beast to the truck, see what he could do from there. It wasn’t the kindest way to bring a werewolf to the woods. But as far as he was concerned, it was far more kindness than this monster had earned. 

Luis blurrily opened his eyes. Pine needles pressed into his back and the lingering cold lifted goosebumps across his bare skin. Luis coughed, twigs snapped as he stirred. The motion elicited a shuddering intact of breath as pain seemed to flare up Luis’ body, ripping up from his leg like a razor drain straight up his spine. The lingering dark spots of unconsciousness receded from his vision until Luis could clearly see the slash down his right calf. 

Luis had gotten used to even bullet wounds not being that big of a deal, just shallow wounds already closing at sunrise. But this wasn’t healing. It was like that one time Rio got him in the neck. Which meant...silver? Oh shit. 

Luis abruptly became aware of someone else there with him. To be honest, it wasn’t often that anyone else was like...alive...when Luis woke up. Surprise mingled with the pain and rising wariness. 

“Who’re you,” Luis demanded, words still slurred as his body recovered from the trauma of transformation. 

The walk through the woods with the werewolf in tow was long and fucking painful. Kaden watched his breath make puffs of fog every time he paused to lean over and catch his breath along the way. If another werewolf found them, he was fucked. Fucking hell, if the goddamn werewolf he was dragging around woke up, he was more than that. Why was he even doing this? What backwards fucking bullshit had brought him to this? He couldn’t find an answer. He didn’t have one. Not one he wanted to ruminate. So he kept dragging the damn werewolf through the damn woods.

After a while, he found a clearing, far away from the town center and a spot with radius enough he figured the wolf wouldn’t have time to hunt down any humans. Not any reasonably sane ones who were home or in the more populated areas of town. Kaden considered leaving it here, walking away and being done for the night. But what if it woke up? Was he still responsible? His hand reached for his knife instinctively. He knew what he should do, what the safest solution was. He’d done it plenty of times. Hell, he should have done it earlier. The blade glinted in the light of the moon despite the fact that the sun would show its face again soon. Kaden stood there, knife at the ready, hovering above the monster, contemplating, unmoving. 

He nearly missed the fact the sun had started peeking its way past the horizon. Before Kaden could find his decision, fate made it for him and the monster’s body started to transform back into its humanoid form. The bones and muscles contorted and twisted, bending back into place in a way that looked even more painful than when Morgan regrew a limb. Kaden took a few steps back, eyes wide and knife still in hand, but his eyes couldn’t look away from the transformation happening in front of him. He wasn’t sure what the hell he had expected when this was all said and done, who would be there waiting when it was over, but it sure wasn’t this. It was just some kid, maybe Rio or Blanche’s age. Putain.

Kaden’s knuckles went white around the hilt of the knife. This was never a situation the hunter had found himself in. Not once. His stomach plummeted and he wasn’t sure if he should answer or just fucking cut ties and run. “I could ask you the same thing,” she said flatly. 

The dappled rays of dawn played across Luis’ face as they filtered through the canopy, the shifts stark against the lingering forest gloom. Luis lifted an arm to shield his face and look down at the much larger impression his wolf body had made in the forest undergrowth and grass. His naked human form seemed so small and wane somehow inside of that larger imprint, making the feeling of weakness at knifepoint all the keener. 

 The man here with him in the early morning hush was handsome in a way that might’ve made Luis embarrassed to be naked if the stakes weren’t so high. The scar on his narrow face struck Luis as familiar. His scent was familiar too, though not from Luis’ human life. That combined with the weapons on this guy’s person and the wound on Luis’ leg pretty much put the pieces together. 

“You're one of the hunters, the ones with silver, like Rio,” Luis mused eventually, knowing he’d once again understood Alcher and Arianna’s warnings way too late. 

Luis watched the Hunter’s knuckles tighten around the knife, and misinterpreted the spike in Kaden’s heartbeat as a reaper’s resolution. 

“I don’t want to die,” Luis admitted, as he looked up at the Hunter who was silhouetted in dawn’s light like the halo of some avenging celestial. “But,” the young monster hesitated, now way too used to waking up surrounded by mangled bodies to protest innocence. Maybe the small part of Luis that still believed in a just world felt that this had to happen, even if it hurt. 

“If you're goin’ to kill me, because of the stuff I’ve done, to keep people safe,” Luis swallowed. “Be quick?” 

As Kaden’s grip tightened around the knife, it shook and waivered in the air, tiny beams of light from the sunrise bouncing off it. He tried to steady his hand, but no amount of will would stop it from shaking. He clenched his jaw as if the pressure against his teeth would keep the knife in one place, would keep him from betraying his uncertainty. 

It was easier when the eyes he was looking into was that of a monster. It was easier when there were teeth and claws lunging at him. The outline of where the wolf once lay was still there. Kaden tried to concentrate on that. This was a werewolf. One who was out of control, about to kill a whole family just hours ago. This should be a simple solution. Knife. Heart. Done. 

But the kid spoke.

Something stung at Kaden’s eyes. “I am,” he said starkly, hoping he had hidden any quavering in his voice. “Wait. You know Rio?” Fuck.

Fuck. He knew Rio. He couldn’t--

This was a simple solution. 

Kaden dared to push the knife closer towards the kid. No, the werewolf. 

“I don’t want to die.”