The Beast Inside - Second place winner: Kitsuneume

The Secret Of Woods Challenge - Day 2 from Werewolf Week 2021

Chapter One

I stumbled back out of the cave and deeply inhaled the clean air of the Forrest, a hidden part of Indiana, as I tried to get my bearings back again. Where were the others? I knew I shouldn't have let them take me here, the Alpha's son Jordan always went out of his way to give me a tough time, reminding me of my place in this pack, in this world and that was all the way down at the bottom.

I looked around shakily and coughed from the smoke escaping out from behind me in that cave that wasn't a cave but a secret bunker still inhabited by the scientists too busy now trying to get away as well from whatever caused the fire and the damage.

I shuddered recalling the damage I saw, the empty cages, the others escaping, fire licking walls and wires sparking and the deep, impossibly big gouge marks of a creature I couldn't even begin to guess at what caused them.

Those scientists well and truly reaped what they sowed tonight by injecting that strange stinging serum that made it feel like my insides were on fire as they plunged it into my neck. I screamed for help but the others in Jordan's group was just as helpless as I was to it's effects.

My body was still shaking and I looked around but I couldn't see any of the others still here, their bikes had gone, meaning they had left me behind to die as I was the useless mutt that couldn't even become like one of them truly, the reject in the next prestigious generation of the most powerful pack in this nation.

I looked down and a single tear rolled down my cheeks, that I quickly dashed away with my hands, before any more fell. It would be all too easy to disappear now, to slink off into the darkness and start a new life but my only living relative, the only person I cared for in that pack of elitists was still there, my Grandmother, serving as their venerable shaman and healer. I wasn't going to leave her behind for man nor supernatural beast.

I began to walk back to the pack's homeland in the dark.

-

The Alpha's house shone brightly, every window lit and obviously everyone in the pack had gathered in the biggest room there to hold them all in, the pack meeting room.

I went into the building and walked step after painstaking step. My bare feet were bleeding and my naked body was scratched up but I still continued to drag my beaten form down the corridor towards the voices that were raised high.

The doors were opened and as I began to push my way through the crowds, the ones nearest the back turned to look at who was disturbing them and one look at my appearance made them stumble back and make room for me. Then the next row did the same, equally shocked and silent at seeing me and it was like a wave was spreading from each row of people I passed as I heard Jordan carry on his tale to his father, the pack leader and Alpha.

'It was Brianna's fault!' Jordan exclaimed loudly in a whine that was grating.

'We were happy at the party being held here Alpha,' Maisie added, to back up her boyfriend Jordan, 'but Brianna dared us to go to this cave, she wanted to show us how brave she could be. She was always hanging around us, trying to keep up and now, now she's killed herself over her own foolishness,' Maisie bawled out and grabbed Jordan's shoulder to heave her sadness and shed her crocodile tears in showmanship.

'Lies!' A male voice growled deeply and I jumped, startled and looked around in confusion but saw no one speaking.

'That cave wasn't empty,' another teenage boy stepped forward and said, 'there was scientists and soldiers who caught us by surprise and injected us with some funky stuff that hurt and changed each of us somehow by giving us some kind of extra ability,' he said excitedly and lifted his hand up and a small flame was conjured within it, the pack members gasped aloud.

Alpha Garrett looked haggard but thoughtful as he stroked his chin and began to issue orders to his betas. 'I need you to investigate the caves immediately. Capture anyone still there and find out why they are trespassing on our lands and what they did to our children!' He growled out and his betas nodded to him.

'Also retrieve the child's body if she's still there, Mistress Anna would wish to bury her granddaughter,' Alpha Garrett said and looked like he had suddenly aged after saying the last part quietly.

He turned to his son and group of friends and spoke to them, exacting his power as their Alpha, 'Do not go experimenting with these new found abilities until we know more, you could endanger the pack and your own lives,' he told them sternly and only turned to walk away after seeing Jordan and the others bow their heads in submission to him but he was pulled up short at the sight of me standing there, obviously not dead as was claimed prior and he arched one eyebrow and beckoned to someone to cover me up as he stepped closer to me.

'Explain what happened child?' Alpha Garrett asked me gently and Jordan behind him spluttered a protest, his father shot him a look to stay quiet.

'We were caught by strange people and injected I remember but not how the lab was destroyed and how we,' I licked my cracked lips, winced, amended and looked at the others, 'they managed to escape. They were gone by the time I woke up and got to the entrance.'

Alpha Garrett nodded, taking in more details of myself and comparing the others state of being dressed still in the clothes they started the night with. 'You were injected as well?' He asks slightly intrigued.

'Yes Alpha Garrett,' I nodded.

'Did it do anything to you child?' He asked me gently.

'I- I don't know Alpha Garrett,' I honestly replied, 'I don't remember what happened after the injection went in,' I explained. His hand once again clasped his chin in thought and his eyes narrow speculatively.

'Whose idea was it really to go to the cave tonight?' He asks and Jordan and the others started clamouring to interrupt me.

'Don't believe a word she says!' Maisie screams defiantly.

'Brianna's always been a worthless member of this pack, always telling lies about others to keep her place here!' Jordan yells out angrily.

'She's a dud!' Yells another girl from team Maisie.

'She doesn't belong with shifters if she can't shift!' Calls out a boy from team Jordan.

'She's only here because she's tolerated for Mistress Anna's sake!' Maisie drove the final barb home and I trembled under their onslaught but still I held my ground.

'It was Jordan's idea Alpha Garrett,' I said with finality and closed my eyes, expecting the punishment for impugning the Alpha's son. As it was repeatedly pointed out, I was a useless member of this pack.

'You're not useless,' a man's voice growled in my ear and I flinched at how loud it was. I felt the wind moved towards me and felt the stinging slap slam into my face, causing me to fall onto the floor. I opened my eyes to see Maisie stood over me and Alpha Garrett trying to regain order in his pack.

'I will teach these pups a lesson. A female must always be respected!' The same man's voice growled loudly and I screamed in pain and changed before everyone's eyes into a giant grey wolf that shredded the iron wood floors that had lasted for centuries under its claws as I watched on in shock inside my own head as the wolf prowled towards Maisie and Jordan.

'I can teach them some respect?' The man's echoing voice asked me and I frowned, confused.

A new voice entered the fray now and clapped her hands to get my attention. A gentle hand patted the giant grey wolf.

'It looks like the seal on an ancient one has somehow been broken and a Berserker Wolf is amongst us once again Alpha Garrett,'my Grandmother Anna informed him and the wolf growled as I smiled upon the sight of Jordan and Maisie fighting each other to run away the fastest from me.

'I think I would enjoy being respected for once,' I told the strange male's voice and the wolf let's loose a howl that shatters all the glass in the house, causing it to fall outside.

'That is but a taste my female,' the male replied huskily to me. The serum had caused me to finally shift and had unleashed an ancient warrior on the modern world.