"Werewolf," gasped Doctor Wolf, "I never thought that those creatures could possibly be werewolves….ha werewolves are real, they're actually real!" giggled Doctor Wolf, as shock replaced pure excitement.
"Wait did you say werewolf? As in full moon loving horror movie monster?" asked Joel clearly not believing what he must have misheard.
"Yes, werewolf. Now I don't know much about lycan genetics and how those creatures spread, but do either of you know if the specimen was recently bitten by a werewolf?" asked the woman now staring at Eric as if he was the missing piece to her life's work.
"Not recently and he never mentioned encountering anything like that before," responded Joel looking at Eric in a new light.
"Eric doesn't bring up much about his past but surely he would have mentioned something like that," exclaimed Sheila, having a hard time believing what the doctor was getting at.
"Any unusual scars, ones that resemble bites or deep scratches?" asked the doctor, checking the unconscious teen's arm for any unusual marks.
"No, nothing like that, just ones from cuts and scrapes, and one burn," said Abby blatantly, earning strange looks from her parents.
"What you think I haven't seen him shirtless? Who do you think patched him up after his first encounter with Jean? She threw her fork into his shoulder!" Abby huffed, trying to hide her blush at what her parents were implying with their stares.
While it wasn't the first time Eric had been threatened by a zombie, Eric wasn't expecting the little old lady to hurl a fork at him across the table when he asked her if she could pass the salt. Eric had taken it surprisingly well, gasping as the fork lodged itself in his shoulder, then simply getting up and asking Abby to join him in the kitchen, where she removed the fork, applying pressure to the wound. The fork hadn't gone deep, missing tendons and muscle, so they bandaged him up, gave him a quick kiss, before returning to the kitchen and yelling at Jean. She then turned her anger to her parents, for allowing the situation to get out of hand, saying that if they were going to have any members of their "special diet" club over for dinner, they needed to either send her and Eric over to his house or promise to keep their guests from looking at her boyfriend as dinner. The wound healed quickly but had left a small scar, one of several adorning Eric's body from a life of clumsiness, bullying, and most recently zombie hunting. She hadn't noticed his scars until they'd taken a trip to the beach, a kind gesture on Eric's part in an attempt to take her on a relaxing date after making the mistake of walking in on her parents "making dinner" if that's what you could call that. Along with seriously considering going vegetarian, she'd called Eric, she'd rushed over to Eric's house, tears in her eyes. He'd immediately ushered her inside and they had spent the day watching cheesy comedies until they fell asleep. The next morning, he offered her breakfast before taking her for a nice day at the beach. When he removed his shirt she was surprised to see the various scars littering the school's "safe kid", who Eric confessed had been roughed up quite a bit by bullies as a kid, not to mention one deep scar from Dan who had tried to "teach Eric how to defend himself" and a few newer one from dealing with Zombies. He'd promised he'd be careful, but now due to her carelessness, Eric was facing the consequences for her family's actions.
"Hm no chance of cross-contamination, yet his results appear completely normal except for those antibodies. This one is definitely a mystery, where did you get that book?" Doctor Wolf sighed, her voice tinged with irritation by the lack of evidence on how Eric got these antibodies, snapping Abby out of her thoughts.
"Each Knight is given a copy of this manual. It's supposed to be a guide to rare and dangerous species thought to be extinct. Sasquatch, Yeti, Zombies, and those Vukodlak things," replied Joel, handing the worn leatherbound book to the scientist.
"Brilliant, this is probably the most concrete documented evidence of the supernatural that I've ever seen…" Doctor Wolf trailed off as she became engrossed in the old book.
"Does it say anything about the cure?" asked Sheila, snapping the doctor out of her trance.
"It just says that the Vukodlak were initially hunted by the Knights of Serbia, and were nearly hunted to extinction. However, when the outbreak in Posica happened the Knights were forced to strike a temporary alliance with the creatures as they were the only ones immune to their bite. Once the two sides had herded the zombies into Posica and the uninfected free of the town, they burned Posica," said the Doctor, clearly fascinated by this new development.
"But what makes these giant dog things so special that the Knights of Serbia joined forces with them?" questioned Abby, realizing that something from the story was clearly missing.
"Hm, let me see here…..ah here it is! According to this, Vukodlak are immune to the zombie toxin. A bite will not result in a Vukodlak transforming, instead, it's just extremely painful. Apparently, they can even survive a severe bite if they can avoid standard infection and treat the wound!" Doctor Wolf stated.
"What does this mean for Eric?" asked Joel, glancing nervously at Eric, hoping that Doctor Wolf would have good news.
"It means that if we can get his wound healed, you may have yourself the first steps to a way to stop the transformation as soon as a person is infected" she smiled, the thought of how many awards she'd receive for this.
"Wait, there's something else here!" called Abby, pointing at the ancient Serbian text, where a corner of the page appeared to split, where it appeared that two pages were stuck together. Puling the two pages apart, Abby carefully revealed the concealed pages.
The new pages were adorned with a "Mr. Ball Legs" on one page and an illustration of a wolf head on the other. A single line of Serbian text adorned the first page, and a numbered list of some sort adorned the other, half the page clearly severed. "What's it say?" Abby asked turning to her father, as Joel carefully picked up the book.
"It says, 'The heart of the Vukodlak King is the key to the cure'," muttered Joel, his eyes growing wide as he viewed the next page.
"What is it, honey?" asked Shelia, noticing her husband's reaction.
"It's an ingredient list...for the cure," gasped Joel, causing everyone's jaws to drop, they all just stared at the book not noticing the shifting of fabric.
"Hey guys...what'd I miss?" croaked a familiar voice, shattering the silence.