Howl 4
A/N- Okay, so many of you were right...I just couldn't finish this in one more chapter. For those who signed up for something shorter I apologise, this has taken on a life of it's own...in my defence...I have been shamelessly encouraged!
Maura rushed from the bedroom searching for Jane, though certain she would not find her there. The room was empty and dark, the fire had long gone out and the chill ran through Maura's already cold body, causing at least some drip of icy sensation within the numbness.
Maura caught sight of a piece of paper which had been forced onto a nail on the back of the door and she moved to retrieve it.
Sorry I skipped out on you Maur,
I wouldn't usually but believe me, it's better this way,
Stay here, Please! And if I don't make it back,
Wait until darkness falls tomorrow and then head North,
There is a farm about two miles away that has a phone you can use to call someone to come and get you.
It was amazing to meet you, I won't forget it.
Don't worry about the future, you're a genius woman, you'll find your way.
Jane x
Back at the table where Jane must have written the note, she had left out a bottle of whiskey and a glass. Maura raised the glass to her lips, traces of the liquid where in the bottom of the glass and the scent of Jane's lips clung to the rim. Maura ran her tongue over the glass, tasting the mix of Jane and the booze. She filled the glass and drained it quickly before she noticed the other item on the table, a piece of wood that may have been the leg of a stool except that one end had been whittled, sharpened into a point. A stake. To protect herself with or to allow her to choose her own way out?
Maura paced the floor, the rest had done her some good, she felt stronger, more alert, more comfortable in her new skin. The thought may have worried her except that she could also feel the undercurrent of primal energy stirred by a new rush of adrenaline. She couldn't just wait here, stand by while anything could be happening to Jane. Her fingers couldn't still, they twitched at her sides.
Maura crossed to the door and threw it open, greeted by a bright blue kind of darkness, the full shining moon casting it's glow over the whole scene. She could smell and taste the crispness of the evening air, but there was no sight of the cloud of condensation that Maura would expect to see as she would exhale into the cool of the night.
Unfamiliar silhouette's littered the horizon and Maura searched it for anything recognizable, she could see solitary trees, the line of a fence. Which way would Jane have gone? Maura had no idea. She backed into the house and let her hand search for a cloak she had noticed earlier hanging by the door. She knew that it wouldn't warm her but it may hide her from view and somehow she she felt more secure.
Maura made her way to the edge of the clearing that surrounded the ramshackle house, she turned her gaze from the left to the right and all around, she could end up wandering around in the dark all night alone or she could stumble into ... Anything. But the urge to find Jane was strong, she couldn't push it away. Maura closed her eyes and looked inward, turned her attention to new senses, to a pull, a tug she could feel in her chest, in her throat. Maura stepped out, she followed that pull.
Maura moved quickly now, pulling the cloak about her, the hood raised, flitting her gaze from where she was headed to the changing ground, rocks, sticks, mud puddles, she dodged them all easily, feeling lighter on her feet, carried by the thrill of the night if not by fear alone, she kept moving. She could feel that she was getting closer, a certainty that she was headed to Jane, she had noticed branches that had clearly been disturbed and could picture Jane running through here, fast.
Maura was unsurprised when she caught sight of a large stooped figure, walking out into a clearing just before her, huge strides, long arms swinging like those of an ape beside it. Something about the creature made Maura confident in her assumption that this could not be Jane. Was she nieve to think that she would recognise her no matter the form?
This must be the other wolf, the one that made Jane. Maura watched as the wolf stopped and turned his head in her direction, she couldn't see his eyes or any of his other dark features, only his teeth, the moonlight illuminating their white points. Maura thought she saw his nose crinkle and her amplified hearing caught the sound as he sniffed the air, his ears twitched as if they had a life of their own. Maura felt the snarl as much as she heard it, the sound stripping her skin as she looked over her shoulder to see Jane, three feet away, looking past her to the wolf.
Jane's transformation had begun, Maura could clearly see that her muscles, biceps, triceps and deltoid, which had been well developed earlier, looked strangely over developed now, pumped too large for the rest of her body, her veins protruding like road map lines along her skin. Jane's face was different, the shape at the middle seemed to have changed, elongated into almost a muzzle, yet Maura found her hot chocolate eyes unchanged.
A voice cut into the darkness, it seemed to come from all around them, but it was calm, not raised, smooth as silk. Each sound articulated with relish.
"Did you enjoy my gift Jane? I chose well didn't I?" Charles Hoyt stepped out from the shadow and seemed to bring it with him.
"I just knew you'd get along, I saw something in her...something wicked...something marvelous. I knew that you'd see it too."
Jane looked only at Maura now, the Doctor shrinking under the gaze, she wanted to go to her, explain, make the anger disappear, but as she moved she saw the look turn urgent, warning.
"Go!" Jane yelled at her, venomously. "You shouldn't have come!" The accusation comes out more plea and Maura can see the intense concentration followed by a look of pained restraint on Jane's face. Jane is clinging on to some semblance of control, her fists clenched, claw like finger nails drawing blood at the center of her palms, that ran neatly down her wrist to drip onto the floor. Maura saw the droplet fall in a kind of slow motion, at the sight of the blood she felt an almost unquenchable thirst in her throat, she licked her lips and swallowed it down tasting the dusty dryness.
Hoyt slowly, sensuously, withdrew a bright blade that glinted in the moonlight.
" I have to admit, Jane, I did wonder which way it would go, I thought you may kill her yourself, finding what she has become, but I knew deep down that your instinct to protect, to save, would be stronger than ever. Isn't she just such a hero Doc?"
Hoyt took a step in Maura's direction and his pointed tongue flicked through his lips and he spoke to Jane while moving his eyes over Maura.
" She likes to cut people up, did she tell you? we have that in common." His eyes sparkled with delight as his smile curled up into his eyes.
"I'm going to hurt you Hoyt." Jane promised. And in that moment Maura saw her let go a little, she saw more of the wolf.
The wolf man growled viscously now and Hoyt raised a hand in the air to command him to stay, which earned him an impatient sounding bark but no movement in protest.
"And I'm sure we'll both enjoy it." He shot back. "And you Doctor...you sold your soul so quickly? Maybe you were always looking for a wolf woman? She is beastly, isn't she?"
Maura didn't respond, she couldn't help look at Jane for what to do, getting herself here was the only thing she had thought about, not what she would do when she arrived. Maura could see a thin layer of hair standing up on Jane's arms, a T shape of it across her chest that seemed to be spreading like a fungus over her skin, Jane bent her knees and crouching put her head in her hands.
"Goooooo!" She screamed and the end of the word turned into a howl, Jane's head lifting back to complete the sound.
Maura ran, she backed into a tree thirty feet away, hitting it hard and clinging to the strong wood beneath her hands as she watched the scene.
Hoyt gave out a full bodied laugh as he watched Jane's transformation complete, the wolf taking over, the coat full and thick now, ears high on her head and soon she stood over him on hind legs, her full height now seemed much taller, she growled menacingly.
The wolf man now barked over and over and hopped from one foot to another in anticipation, turning away and then coming back but not getting any closer as if bound by an invisible chain. Hoyt held up the stilling hand again and uttered a calm hushing sound to his companion.
"Shhhhhhh now."
Hoyt pointed the silver scalpel at Jane's throat and she seemed to move into it. She didn't attack, she didn't strike. Hoyt eyed her curiously before his sly smile returned.
"That won't work Janie, you think you can give yourself up and I'll let the Doctor go." He grinned as he saw the truth he had guessed in her eyes, he tutted. "I thought you knew me better than that Detective. I would cut you up myself and then send the hound after her." Jane flinched. "But that isn't the way any of us wants it, hmmmmmm?"
Maura could not see Jane's next move as she faced her back, but she did see Hoyt's face as he witnessed Jane's act of provocation, threw a look over his shoulder just in time to catch sight of his pet lunging hungrily toward Jane and slashing at her chest.
Hoyt had stumbled backwards and shouted. "No! Get Back."
Jane was thrown to the ground heavily with the beast on top of her, she snarled savagely and clawed at the forelegs that pinned her in place, the animal took advantage of his position and snapped at Jane's throat just as she managed to push some of his weight to the side and roll them slightly over. The wolf man had her between his teeth just barely and released her in hopes of getting a better bite.
As Jane got her large hind legs and paws underneath her attacker and set her haunches to push him away, She saw the face above her change, still and stare as if seeing a vision that wasn't there and then crumple in on itself, a high pitched yowl rang out and the body above her seemed suddenly more weighty.
As the Wolfman slumped down onto Jane, he revealed the face of his killer and once his master. Charles Hoyt looked down on the pile of wolf, with thinly veiled disgust, he shook his head slowly, almost knowingly.
"Bad dog!" He said to the lifeless heap of fur that still had the very end of the silver scalpel jutting out of his back, just beneath the left shoulder.
Jane rolled the still warm body off her and scrambled to her four legs, hearing the movement as Hoyt withdrew his final weapon. Jane looked up at the gun that was now pointed at the center of her head.
"No silver bullets Janie." Hoyt assured her. "Tranquilizer. So that I can put you to sleep while I play with our mutual friend."
A low deep growl rubbled through Jane but she lowered herself slightly, her shoulders and haunches had been poised for attack. She stood down.
Hoyt smiled at his victory and for the first time since his own wolf had taken him by surprise, he scanned the scene to find Maura, at the very moment that Maura hit him across the shoulders from behind with a substantial log. There was a thud as the wood hit ground and a second as Hoyt followed it.
Jane leapt onto the body of Hoyt and tore at the nearest flesh she found, which was that of his upper arm, her teeth punctured the skin and as she thrashed her head the skin and muscle ripped away to expose blood and bone.
"No!" Maura shouted loudly. "No! Jane! No Jane." louder, with more authority.
Jane's face was spattered with blood, fur black with it, her ears pricked up and she considered Maura. Maura dropped to her knees and shuffled closer to the wolf form of the woman she had just met, but already felt connected to.
"Please Jane." Maura begged and saw at once the wolf grin tighten, a warning growl stating that this was her territory, would be her kill, her food.
Maura took another step and Jane's growl was more ferocious in pitch, her mouth foaming around her bared teeth. Maura felt that one more movement could be her last but also trusted that it would not be. The rusty smell of blood on the air curled around a desire in Maura that she found difficult to subdue. Difficult but possible.
Maura focused and tried again, she slowly raised an upturned palm and held it out and open for Jane to see, she brought it closer and was allowed to touch it to Jane's head. Maura stroked finger tips gently through the soft shiny pelt, past an ear and along the back of her neck into thicker fur.
"Please Jane. Can you hear me? Don't kill him, not like this." Maura said quietly by the wolf's ear. "He should pay, for what he's done, we should take him to the police. Give all the families of all those girls some peace, some justice." Maura continued, her hand still in Jane's fur. "Please Jane."
Maura looked Jane in the eyes and slowly moved one hand around to the ground at the side of Hoyt's body and picked up the gun he had dropped there, she held it up and showed it to Jane, looking for her agreement, even approval.
Jane barked once, a short sharp sound and then sat back and waited.
Xxxx
A/N- Thank you muchly for all reviews and for following this fic. At this point I have no idea how long it will continue but there will be another chapter soon. xx
