The Wisconsin Werewolf

by Alex Gedgaudas

  “Is that a j-joke?” I stammered through my tears. “Erik, the werewolves…Matt shot, D-D-Darren…”

  “Okay,” said Cale slowly, again speaking to me as if he thought me fragile and about to break. “Do you remember anything else from these last couple weeks?” He spoke slowly and carefully, almost as if he thought of me a child he was trying to be very patient with.

  I didn’t know what he meant. But before I could answer, someone was behind me. A pair of strong arms pulled me against a muscled chest. A cheek with a five-o’clock shadow brushed against mine. I trembled as Darren hugged me from behind; I had no idea he was nearby, let alone right behind me. It was my struggling to get away from him that I noticed something very strange, something wrong. I wasn’t in my clothes from the night before. Yesterday, I had sat in the conference center parking lot wearing jeans, a long-sleeved white shirt, and a simple dark green hooded jacket.

  This wasn’t right. As I looked down at myself, I was wearing an oversized hoodie with the logo of The Forest. It was three sizes too big, draping past my knees to resemble a dress. At that moment, I was no longer sure if I was wearing a bra or even underwear. My legs were scratched and bruised; my feet were dirty as if I had been in the mud.

  “W-w-what’s going on…” I stammered, my heart racing.

  Darren again tried pulling me in for a hug, but I wanted none of that. He repeated the action only for me to scramble away, my bare feet slapping against the floor as I hurried to get away.

  “Maybe you should leave her alone,” said Nico quietly. My back was against the cold white wall of the basement. I was surrounded by the boy band and Darren, alone and outnumbered.

  “Maybe you should hold your tongue, Nicolas,” said Darren coldly, shooting Nico a look so cold the Hispanic boy bowed his head and said nothing more. It was only when Darren tried approaching me that someone else spoke.

  “She doesn’t know,” said Jamie weakly, also bowing his head when Darren’s cruel gaze transferred to him. “Look at her; she doesn’t—” His words were cut off as Darren was suddenly holding him by the throat. He had launched toward him with speed. Jamie gasped and spluttered as Darren’s grip tightened. Not one of the boys moved to help him; all silently watched this exchange or tried to ignore it the best they could.

  “Let him go.”

  That voice belonged to the one person of this monstrous group I wasn’t afraid of. Matt emerged from the basement elevator a few feet from me, his eyes on Darren and the gasping Jamie in his hand. None of us had heard the elevator descending. Matt didn’t show any significant damage from the bullet wounds received the night before. He looked tired; but that was it. We locked eyes only momentarily, but it was enough to inspire me to hurry toward him. I wrapped him in a huge hug that he immediately returned. I finally felt safe. Only it wasn’t a long embrace; Matt quickly hid me behind him.

  “What did you say?” Darren released Jamie to turn his narrowed eyes on Matt. Jamie coughed before backing away, more spluttered coughing escaping him. I trembled behind Matt as Darren watched us with an incredulous face. Too many expressions crossed his face. Betrayal morphed into anger.

  A low sound that sounded similar to a whine escaped Bobby’s throat. The others looked suddenly worried as Darren slowly approached Matt.

  A methodical laughter escaped Darren. “It appears the rumors are true; you’ve been gaining the impression that you make the rules around here.” Chaz and Bobby spared each other small knowing glances, making me feel it was those two who were the most loyal to Darren.

  Even though I was trembling and terrified, I could make a few small notes. Matt had his head down as Darren approached, his expression unreadable. I held his hand as I hid behind him. For a moment, I felt Matt was going to react the same as the others. I thought he would remain quiet and timid, not wanting to upset Darren further. That seemed to be the sole reaction every one of the boys held. They didn’t want to go against what he said. But that’s not what happened.

  “I didn’t stutter. You heard me just fine,” said Matt quietly, his eyes not meeting Darren’s.

  A warning snarl issued, the sound coming from Chaz. None of the others spoke, and it seemed as though they might have been holding their breath in anticipation as to what could happen next. “So the rumors are true; you wish to leave the pack,” said Darren coolly.

  “I—”

  “Otherwise,” growled Darren as he continued, “you wouldn’t be involving yourself in business you don’t belong in.”

  “You made this my business the second you started targeting her,” said Matt curtly, his blue eyes slowly raising to watch Darren. “She should have never been involved—”

  “She is to be my mate, boy,” said Darren. It was strange hearing him speak to Matt as if he were a child when Darren himself looked no more than twenty-four. “Remove yourself from her grasp or I’ll exile you on that alone.”

  To what seemed to be the surprise of the others, Matt didn’t back down. He was suddenly outraged, disgusted. “There is a difference between mating her and involving her! I didn’t figure it out at first. Maybe I didn’t want to believe it…you’re truly sick.” He shook his head with nothing but disgust coating his face.

  This time, a growling issued, sounds coming from Chaz and Bobby. Darren raised a hand to silence them.

  “I’m sick?” he asked with a laugh. “The worst that would have happened was her one day carrying my child, no different than my past mates.”

  My mind was spinning, and I was having trouble processing that information, but I couldn’t think too much about it before Darren was talking again. “You’re my beta,” he said to Matt. “You are the one who allowed Jamie to do what he did—”

  “No, I didn’t!” defended Matt adamantly, his expression suddenly outraged. “I had no idea what happened that night! I’d have killed him before I let him do it! You, you are the one who gave him the idea!”

  My mind was spinning. This suddenly explained why the boys all respected Matt. He was quite literally their second in command.

  “And so what?” said Darren with a nonchalant expression. “The hows and whys are no longer important; what’s done is done.”

  “What’s done is done,” Matt breathed in wonder. His pained eyes shot me a look behind him before looking at Darren with pure loathing.

  “It appears we’ll need to establish some new rules,” purred Darren before looking between Matt and me. “First off—”

  “How about y-yyou stop k-k-killing people?” I finally found my voice; it was raw, almost unwilling to speak. Everyone seemed surprised that I finally spoke. All eyes soon fixed on me. I pressed myself closer against Matt, flinching as Darren tried once more to approach me. My words seemed to take everyone by surprise. For a second, I thought it was just because they were surprised I spoke at all.

  “She really doesn’t know,” breathed Darren in wonder. He ran a hand through his shaggy dark hair. “How does she not know…”

  “Maybe it’s a gender thing,” tried Cale quietly.

  “Maybe it’s mental,” pondered Nico, his theory spoken quietly as well.

  Was this mind manipulation? It sure felt like it. Maybe they were trying to drive me insane. My teeth were chattering as I trembled in place.

  “My beautiful queen, you have no idea just how amazing you are.” Darren smiled, approaching Matt to beckon me over to him.

  I stood my ground, trembling behind Matt and not wishing to anywhere near the alpha of this group. “How strong, how powerful. I knew from the very first moment I laid eyes on you that night, we were meant to be.”

  The boy band didn’t mock their alpha’s words or comment on how ridiculous Darren sounded. They stayed respectively quiet, Jamie and Cale’s eyes never leaving their individual phones as they continued to play around on them. Disturbingly, the boys seemed well used to the mad ramblings of their leader.

  “You kill innocent p-people,” I whispered in horror, my eyes brimming with unshed
tears. I felt nothing for his declarations. Darren was nothing but a calculating monster. The boy band were his respectful minions.

  “It’s amazing how the body works,” marveled Darren. “How it can heal itself. How a female can carry a child and grow it inside of her womb. How the brain can suppress horrific trauma.”

  “She can’t be allowed to live,” said Cale dully, finally peering up from his phone. It was amazing how during such an intense discussion, the redhead was still checking his phone. It looked as if he were watching a funny video on YouTube. Quite a few individuals growled at his declaration, the sound frightening and unorthodox to come from the boys when they currently resembled humans.

  “He’s not wrong,” said Perry. I didn’t know he was down here as well. At some point, he had joined this impromptu party. His entrance had been quiet. He stood dressed for the day in his black dress pants and plaid button down shirt. In Perry’s hands was his familiar black binder.

  I jumped with fear when Darren again tried to approach me.

  His jaw grit together. He glared at the way I held myself against Matt. Walking away, Darren went to the side of the room where there were boxes pressed up against the wall. Against one in particular was something large and floor length. It was draped by a large red blanket. Darren removed the blanket with ease to reveal the object was a mirror.

  “Show her the monster, Matthew,” he drawled. “Show my mate that she has nothing to fear from me, for I’m not the monster she thinks me. Show her.”

  At that fearful moment, I felt it was Matt who had murdered all those people. Mr. Thompson, Laurel, Jonna, Richie, and all my new coworkers from The Club. I allowed Matt to gently hold my shoulders and slowly walk me over to the mirror. As I came face to face with the image of myself, the sight was alarming. My bare legs were thinner than they had ever been, courtesy of my recent drastic weight loss. Thick coats of mud and grime covered my legs, but it was my face that was terrifying. My hair was a mangled mess, snarled, and a few strands sticking to my face. But it was the blood that was the most terrifying. Bright red blood coated my cheeks, my forehead, my neck, but most importantly…my lips. I could suddenly recognize the weird taste of copper on my tongue. The strange metallic texture I could only recall tasting a time I had accidentally split my bottom lip open after a childhood bike riding accident. I wiggled out of Matt’s grasp to approach the mirror, not being able to comprehend how my image looked so frightening. My hands were covered in dry or congealed blood; it saturated underneath my fingertips and only added to the horrifying look.

  The entire boy band gathered around to watch me study my reflection. Everyone stared at me; some looked with pity, others tinged with curiosity. Matt’s expression was heartbroken pity. I could only pay attention to the look on his face for he was closest to me. My red, tear-stained eyes took in my mirror image, my hands slowly crawling up my face to feel the caked blood.

  “W-what is t-this?” I stammered through my tears.

  Darren watched me with a blank gaze. “You’re currently looking at the werewolf whose been terrorizing Wisconsin,” he said matter-of-factly. “The beautiful ripper who has torn apart every last person she once held contempt for.”

  Maybe those were the magic words. That was all that was needed. Those were the words that released a flood of memories to suddenly storm my mind, bringing me back to moments I hadn’t been able to recall up until that very moment. Maybe it was trauma. Maybe my mind had wrapped itself in its own cocoon, blocking memories out because I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself if I had known the truth.

  It was only after Darren spoke that the memories came back to me. One was dim, clouded by a night that had been spent getting entirely too intoxicated. Halloween night. The night of the employee party, I had drank too much. I had been leaving to find Miranda so she could drive me home. Instead I came across Jamie outside the club; he had a bottle in his hands, one that he had been drinking from. He offered me his bottle to drink. Now as I recalled that specific memory could I remember what happened entirely. I had staggered in place, but only after eagerly drinking from the bottle, not questioning sipping from it. But it was now replaying that drunken memory that I could see where problems would arise. The bottle I had drank from held the saliva of Jamie, the saliva of a werewolf. According to Matt, that was one of the few ways you could be transformed into one. What completed the process was eating a heart…

  Another memory flashed through my mind, instantly replacing the memory of Halloween night. I had been wandering the dark backroads behind my house, miles from home. Part of my mind was still intact. I stalked my house and came across the sleeping Miranda and Simon in their individual rooms. Hunger told me to go to them.

  Fear of that hunger led me outside.

  I was lost and angry, hungry out of my mind but at the same time not knowing what I was hungry for. It had been well after midnight, pushing one in the morning. Mr. Thompson had been outside his house, just coming home for the night. He was in the wrong place at the right time. The old man screamed when he saw me, for my eyes were a piercing yellow, my face mangled with a type of change I couldn’t explain. The same was with the rest of my body. My hands weren’t at all human; my nails had sharp talons while my nose and mouth extended like the muzzle of a dog. I was a vicious hybrid, not entirely a werewolf but not entirely human, either.

  Mr. Thompson’s giant pet Rottweilers had barked and howled, but they cowered in fear when I approached. Mr. Thompson tried hiding from me inside his house to no avail. I had too easily ripped apart the screen door to launch myself inside. He hadn’t been fast enough to reach a gun that resided in his den.

  The old man screamed again as I had reached him. But he hadn’t screamed for long before I ripped out his jugular and proceeded to feast on him. That was my first kill. I devoured his heart, completing my transformation.

  The proverbial floodgates continued to release one memory after another. Another night when I again had the same insane, uncontrollable hunger, I was in a forest. It was twilight; the sun was almost settled completely. My rational mind couldn’t explain how I had gone out there; I remembered I had been running through the forest. I was eager to get away from the scents of Miranda and Simon. I wanted to rip their throats out, but I knew that thought was wrong.

  Laurel Reed had been backpacking. I had first known it was her because she had cut her knee on a thorn bush moments earlier. The scent of her blood lured me to her. But it was inner dislike for her that caused me to attack. Laurel never got the chance to scream. Her death, as gory as it was, was quick. Jonna’s death had been just as quick days later; she had been no match for my seemingly insatiable appetite that occurred at night. I ripped through her flesh as easily as a knife slipping into soft butter.

  I killed Richie as easily as I had killed the young women. The grown man had put up a decent fight, but he had been no match as I too easily launched myself on him to slit his throat with nothing but a single clawed finger. My animalistic mind had no real sense of right and wrong. After feasting on his dying body, I sliced off his head and took home the decapitated object as my trophy.

  The massacre of the employees of The Club had been the most gory and horrific. The sound of screaming and the sight of all of that blood haunted my nightmares every time I closed my eyes. Two young women had tried to help each other by throwing rocks at me to halt my eating of their coworker to no avail. My murderous rampage didn’t conclude until every last person no longer held a pulse. By that time, I was more experienced in wolf form, capable of doing heavy body damage with my teeth and razor-sharp claws. I was the perfect killing machine, perfectly capable of taking down every last innocent soul, one by one.

  Back in the present, I fell to the ground on my knees as my mind grappled with the insane realization. The memories confirmed who was the villain. It confirmed why the boy band had helped me when it came to covering up the crimes. They were never defending their alpha; they were hiding my crimes.

>   If only Simon was here to witness it. Everything was now coming full circle, suddenly making sense even though previously I had no idea.

  Erik hadn’t been the alpha when he confronted me. When he had hit me, he was trying to stop me. The teenage boy had been smarter than any of us had given him credit for; he could see my changes. The dramatic weight loss that attributed to my rapidly changing metabolism, considering I was technically no longer human. The sudden hostile nature I was capable of displaying, the aggressiveness I was showing my own siblings even though I had never once shown them attitude before. My sleeping in during the daytime and my outrageous desire to stay up during all hours at the night. I had attributed the change in my diet and not being able to sleep due to stress. But my meals now contained more meat than I had ever eaten before. It was because I was now a carnivore who craved it.

  All this time, little did Simon and I know there had never a member of the pack to fear. There was never an alpha to fear. I had been the werewolf haunting Wisconsin all along.

  Massive sobs escaped me as I struggled to recognize the ugly truth before me. Cale and Perry were right; I couldn’t be allowed to live after the horrifying acts of murder I committed. I deserved to die.

  The werewolves circled me, not allowing me to run away as I broke down. Even if I was able to, I wouldn’t have gone anywhere. I was a danger not only to my siblings but to innocent civilians. As I cried on the ground, I didn’t move as everyone stalked closer, perhaps to kill me.

  EPILOGUE

  The sun was bright and burning on the hot summer day Nelle Jenson pulled into the busy parking lot of The Forest Resort. Sweat was making her blonde bangs stick in clumps to her forehead. The drive through the busy downtown had now made her ten minutes late. The town was full of tourists and college kids home for the summer, no one seeming to look before they crossed a street. Twice Nelle had nearly run over a college kid not looking as he crossed. One of the boys had flipped her the bird even though he was in the wrong.