Werewolves: Project Leotie - Chapter 1

Undercover werewolf operative Colonel Elan Williams secretly develops a serum to suppress the inner beast in an effort to 'cure' lycanthropy. Unfortunately, these experiments result in unforeseen consequences...
[This short story takes place 16 years before the events of Haven Rising. ]

One can only kill a man so many times before enthusiasm for vengeance wanes into disinterest. Death and dismemberment are an exhausting and bloody business and not for the faint of heart. Even those of a stout constitution would find themselves flagging after the second or third murder. 

Satisfaction giving way to routine gave the doctor time to reflect on his patient's torment through the dispassionate lens of both scientist and philosopher. Pain both ushers us into this life and takes us out of it. The suffering we experience in the interim, however, is what makes the journey between those two points unique. Love and loss, for example. That always cuts deeper than the sharpest of blades.

"This may sting a bit." 

The doctor stepped up to the reclined chair and slipped a needle into the bound werewolf's right arm. It was easy enough to jab through its fast-healing skin—he'd done this hundreds of times before and knew just the right angle and pressure to apply. He placed his thumb on the back of the syringe and pushed slowly down on the plunger, injecting a clear liquid into his prisoner's vein. 

The humanoid wolf squeezed his eyes shut and gritted his teeth—anything to keep him from focusing on the agony. In the end he ended up howling. He always did; it was just a matter of time. 

Attendants in the hallways knew better than to poke their heads into the doctor's business, but the howls still got them scurrying away as fast as their feet could carry them. The doctor used to enjoy that. He used to enjoy a great many things. Now he felt nothing, and the stench of this room was starting to remind him of rotting corpses in a tomb he couldn't escape from.

"Madness," he muttered to himself. "If results take much longer it's going to be me in that chair..."

Ordered footsteps approached from the hallway beyond the operating room doors; it was a gait familiar to the doctor and not one he was terribly pleased to hear approaching. The doors swung open, admitting a tall, muscular man dressed head-to-toe in impeccably maintained military regalia. His grey-speckled brown hair was close-cropped and unremarkable, capping a face seemingly chiseled from stone.

"Doctor Erison," the man said, his greeting curt but professional. His eyes wandered to the restrained prisoner and back to the doctor again.

"Colonel Williams," Erison replied. "I'm afraid the latest batch of tests aren't finished. I wasn't expecting you for another two hours."

Williams shook his head. Those green eyes had grown cold. "Timetable's moved up. I need a progress report."

"The alterations don't seem to be taking," Erison said. "We've mapped the creature's DNA, but isolating what makes it unique and applying that to our human volunteers has had less than satisfactory results."

"No," Williams said. "Not that."

"Not that?"

"I'm not interested in the drivel. We're alone; there's no need to maintain cover."

"Oh." The doctor rubbed a sweaty palm over the back of his balding head. "You're sure?"

"Erison..."

"Of course." Dr. Erison waved the colonel further into the room and onward to the prisoner. "I must say, colonel..." He cleared his throat awkwardly. "I'm growing uncomfortable with this project. It's not work to be proud of."

"Doing what's necessary is rarely comfortable," Williams replied. "Progress report. Now."

"It's just..." Erison was really sweating now. He was pushing his luck and he knew it. "The methods we're using. They're barbaric, Elan."

"We don't use that name here," Williams said. "Not now, not ever. These methods didn't seem to bother you much when you volunteered for the assignment. Do I need to remind you that this is the werewolf who killed your wife in cold blood?"

"It was a pack feud," Erison muttered. "I've had my vengeance a hundred times over. He deserves a clean death."

"He's an animal."

Erison shook his head. "We're all animals, Elan."

"Animals don't work to cure their savagery. We can choose a more civilized path."

"You call this civilized?" the captive werewolf said. It was the first time he'd spoken in days, and it was enough to jolt the doctor out of his self-imposed melancholy. "You've had me sliced open more times than I can count! Cut off fingers and toes! Not even the most vicious war-leader would do these things to a rival pack. Just kill me and be done with it!"

Williams grunted. "It's talking again," he said. "Muzzle it."

Erison hesitated for a moment before stepping over to a metal drawer littered with medical implements and returning with another syringe. "No need for a muzzle," he said as he injected the bound wolf for a second time. "I was about to sedate him, anyway." The captive's ranting grew less coherent over the next few seconds and eventually his eyes closed, his muzzle hanging slack. "He'll be out for at least four hours. No more interruptions."

"You're stalling for time, doctor," Williams said. "I can see those wheels spinning in your head while you think up the next excuse."

"Sir, I—"

Williams crossed his arms and stared down at the man. Erison couldn't stand up to such a gaze for long. Even for a werewolf the colonel had an enormously powerful aura about him. He radiated danger. "Progress report," Williams said. "Now. If this prisoner isn't wolf enough for you to get results then the project might need to source another. You might not like who I choose."

Erison swallowed audibly despite his mouth being bone-dry. "It's still experimental," he finally said after a lengthy pause. "The inhibitor could play havoc with the subject's metabolism."

"But it prevents the change? Silences the beast?"

"From the tests I've done so far, yes. But clinical trials will take time. Years if we want to be sure it's safe for the pack." 

Williams shook his head. "Never mind that. Put together a kit that can be used off-site."

"What do you intend to do with it?"

"That's none of your concern," Williams said. "Do you have samples prepared or not?"

"Yes, but—"

"Hand them over."

Erison bit his lip and abandoned the comatose patient, leading Williams through the operating suite toward a refrigerated alcove, cordoned off by a secure door of clear plastic. Bullet-proof. Level five. That was the clearance level on his pass card and he was the only one in this wing with access to hazardous materials. Even Williams himself needed to go through him to get what he wanted, though in truth his asking was a mere formality. The colonel always got what he wanted, regardless of access level.

"You have a subject in mind?" Erison gingerly picked up seven stoppered vials of clear fluid from a tray and placed them in a leather case beside a syringe. "They'll need to be monitored for side-effects."

"You handle your business, doctor," Williams said, "and I'll handle mine." He took the case and tucked it under his right arm. 

Erison bit his lip and looked back in the direction of his patient before daring to ask a question that he'd voiced before, perhaps one too many times. "If I could only abandon the pretense," he said. "I could move so much faster if I didn't have to answer to those damn government suits! The random inspections slow me down and they require progress reports at every meeting. Satisfying their demands for results on the super-soldier program has gotten difficult enough that I'm spending almost half my time justifying your budget!"

"I should let you get back to work then, doctor."

"Colonel…" Erison said, "They're going to shut us down unless we deliver a viable hybrid. I'm sure of it." 

It was the antithesis of everything they were working toward, rectifying a mistake of nature bolstered by human meddling. But the government demanded grist for their ever-churning war machine. They hated werewolves because they couldn't control them. But hybrids? Patriotic soldiers enhanced with a wolf's strength, agility, and healing? That was something they could work with. Unfortunately it was the one thing that Williams and Erison would never give them.

Williams paused for a moment, halfway to the door. "I'll speak with Rivera," he said. "Have her pull General Greene's men off the case." His confidence was wavering, held in place by a desperate need to set the world right. He tapped his foot rhythmically as he thought. "It's dangerous. She's as opposed to the super soldier program as we are, but if she presses the army to abandon its research you'll lose your funding. And if she finds out what we're really doing here…"

"She'll burn this place to the ground," Erison finished the colonel's sentence. "I know. That's why I'm counselling patience. But if you want faster results, then we have no choice." 

Williams put his hand to the door, pushed it open, and walked out into the hallway. Two nurses in bloodstained scrubs whisked by around him as he turned back and watched the doctor closely.

"I'll make the call."

End chapter 1.