"So you're saying the riot was instigated deliberately, by Esben."

"Yes."

David sighed and ran a wary hand through his short curly hair. "Why this charade, Tasha? Why let Sarah think she's free if you're still reporting back to him?"

"Because Esben wanted to gauge how Sarah would behave with perceived freedom in comparison to her behavior in captivity under constant observation."

"Ah. Did he get the results he wanted?" David's eyes narrowed.

"Perhaps," Tasha shrugged.

"Why did you show her that article? You know full well that it was based on falsehoods."

"Because Esben told me to make Sarah distrust you."

"Why?"

Silence.

"Tasha, why are you doing any of this? You seem like you know this is wrong and I believed you when you said you wanted out, that you wanted to start doing the right thing. Why do you-"

"Esben has my son, David!"

David stopped. "What?" he said after he had a moment to process that.

Tasha was on the verge of genuine tears now. "I gave birth to my son just two weeks after I graduated from college. My ex-boyfriend wanted nothing to do with me or the child once he found out I was pregnant. What's more, he got arrested for dealing illegal drugs on-campus."

Her voice cracked with emotion, forcing her to take a moment before she went on. "Esben took me under his wing. I mean, he took care of both of us and told me I would always have a job with him no matter what, as long as I did whatever he said. I didn't know that would mean he would my own child away from me. I don't even get to see him anymore, David! I don't even know where Esben is keeping him."

David drew in a long, slow breath and let it out slowly. "Let me guess. If you don't do exactly what Esben wants, he has threatened to harm your son."

"Yes."

"Alright." David licked his lips, already trying to think of the next course of action. Indeed, everything was a mess and seemed to be all over the place. "For now, let's just allow Esben to think that I know nothing and that he still has you under his thumb."

"To what end, David?" Tears streamed freely down Tasha's face now. "I am so sick of this. I just want my son back!"

"I know." David put his arms around her and drew her close, giving her a small pat on the back as she cried into his shoulder.

"David," Tasha suddenly pulled back just a little, looking at him with alarm. "You were bitten."

"I know."

"That means you have some of the venom inside you. What if you become a werewolf, too?"

David frowned, focusing on the way he felt for a long moment. Yes… that fear had been a large part of why he'd gone through the metamorphosis in the first place, along with the fear of being attacked by a large wolf. He distinctly remembered the stinging, burning sensation of the venom entering his veins upon being bitten, but now…?

He felt nothing. He felt normal.

"According to Esben's notes," David said, "anyone who was infected with venom would then experience a series of constant flu-like symptoms that either succeeded in turning them into a werewolf, or killed them."

Tasha touched his forehead, then shook her head in disbelief as she lowered her hand. "You should be burning up by now."

"I should also be experiencing muscle pains and various other flu-like symptoms." David said. "My… change into the creature has often resulted in me being cured of many things, Tasha, including poison and even deadly diseases when my metabolism increased."

"...Incredible," Tasha breathed.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Meanwhile, Sarah was feeling a mixture of emotions as she roamed aimlessly in wolf form. Her original impulse was to return to the forest, but… to what end?

She couldn't get the mental image of David's transformation out of her mind. Just… what was he? What made that happen? How did it happen?

She felt incredibly guilty at her own impulse, too. Had she truly sunk so low that the only way she could react was to attack another living human, regardless of what he'd done? Was that how she really wanted to behave in the future?

Maybe it was a sign she had been a bit out of touch from humanity for too long, separated from her own species to the point where she simply reacted on feral impulse sometimes now. The fact remained, though… for the first time, she had bitten a live human. This wasn't like hunting wild game for food.

What kind of monster had she become?

She needed answers, and maybe on some level… she needed to at least see if she had harmed him in any lasting way. If she had, she would need to seek some sort of atonement for her actions, correct?

Having the ability to move swiftly in wolf form, she found herself back at the house quickly enough… to find that the front door had been smashed from the inside out. That was definitely damage that she herself had not done…

She shifted back into her petite human form, which allowed her to creep more slowly and quietly without notice (though any passerby would get a free peep show of her nudity if she wasn't careful… but people rarely came down this street this late) and she used her sensitive hearing to focus on what was being said inside.

Yes, Tasha and David were in there… and they were talking.

"So it looks like your own metamorphosis saved you from the werewolf venom."

"Yeah, it would seem that way."

Sarah felt a mixture of relief and bafflement, but continued to listen in.

"David, I did see something interesting in the observations you wrote down the other day. You were at least starting to make a baseline comparison between the changes in body chemistry, neural activity and molecular density of the tissues and bone structures that Esben had managed to observe in a werewolf, and your own metamorphosis."

"Hmph. Well, it's all theoretical, especially since I've never been able to study my own… problem quite so intricately."

"Are you saying that you hoped to use the research from the werewolf condition to help your own?"

"Perhaps."

Sarah felt her heart sink as a fresh surge of raw anger flowed. So that was it, then? Not only had Esben and David apparently pooled their knowledge and discoveries, but now that David had some kind of affliction of his own, he wanted it gone.

David was just like Esben, then! Using whatever was at his disposal to meet his own end. And to think that she had allowed him to examine her, to touch her, and she had even transformed in front of him like a willing circus animal…

She transformed and took off in the direction of the forest.