Taken
#4 of Transformation
Korey was just a regular fur: he lived in a middle class house, he lived with his boyfriend- who's name was Damien, went to the bar with his boyfriend and Damien's sister whenever she could rope them into it, and exercised everyday. What wasn't so regular was that he did not start out as a fur, he was transformed into a fur by one of his exes, who just so happened to be a werewolf. Korey was now a wolf fur with chocolate brown fur with lighter brown paws and muzzle, and had been so for almost ten years now. His boyfriend was the one who helped him transition into furry society, Damien was a light red fox. Damien was also being employed by the werewolf leaders to keep track of the hundred or so werewolves living in Oregon. Damien used to have a partner that was in charge of hunting down the werewolves that had gone rouge, but soon after Korey arrived and moved in with Damien, he had decided to train Korey in how to hunt down and kill rouges, then retire and live off the sizable pension he had stored up after so many years in a dangerous job. Furs were best equipped to take down rouges, they had all the advantages of the werewolves- superior speed, strength, endurance, and senses- but they did not have to change into full animal form to gain those qualities. Furs had the best of being human and animal, with none of the downsides.
Not that there were many werewolves that went rouge, Korey had only had to take down five or six in the last decade, but someone had to be there to ensure they would not expose their own secret. Damien had most of the work, he had to keep tabs on all of them in the area. All Korey had to do was go in, take them out, and leave. Korey had been so efficient with his job that there had not been a rouge in this area in three years, though he would give most of the credit for his proficiency to Damien, Damien kept very good records on the werewolves. So Korey had their exact schedule down, with any weaknesses they might have, before he even left his house. Though the last one had gotten smarter, he had ran as soon as he heard Korey was coming. It had taken Korey months to track him down, but since then there had not been any trouble. Damien just had to call up the offending were and threaten to sick Korey on him, that was usually enough to get them to toe the line. If not, Korey would make his own call, and so far that had scared them into silence. Suffice to say, the Pack leaders were pleased with Korey, his paycheck was proof enough of that, he had kept many from going rouge recently and saved them a lot of paperwork. He could have easily afforded a bigger house, but it was just him and Damien so they really did not need a bigger house. Also, his job was not really 'legal', there was just no other way to keep the werewolves' secret. So obviously, every time he was called in it caused paperwork for the Pack so- even though they could handle the paperwork- he kept a lower profile to save them the hassle of needless rumors about his line of work.
The phone was ringing as he struggled out of his sleep, he had had a long night. Damien's sister Carey had hauled them off to the bar again last night, not letting them go home until... he looked over at the clock... three hours ago. They had not gotten back in until three in the morning. "Whoever is calling had better have a good fucking reason to call at six in the fucking morning" he grumbled as he reached over to grab the phone. "Hello?" he said still half asleep.
"Korey? This is Mary, there has been some problems recently." It was Mary, the werewolf elder who was the usual to contact them as she had the best people skills. Not that Korey needed someone with good people skills, its just that among werewolves, having bad people skills can mean a very different thing than non-werewolves. Werewolves were not very tactful in general, but elders seemed to have the worst manners of all of them.
"Who's the problem now?" Korey sighed, so much for sleep.
"We don't know."
"Damn, where is the problem?" Damien could figure out who it was with a location.
"We don't know"
"Then why the fuck are you calling ME? Damien handles the unknowns." Korey was getting pissed, if she called just to chat he was going to raise hell.
"We need you both to come to Seattle." Mary said.
"Damn, when do you need us?" Seattle was where the elders came for meetings, if they had to go there it had to be important. Which meant he was going to have to kill something.
"As soon as you can, and I can't give you any details until you get there."
"Fine," he sighed, "I'll call you when we get there." They hung up and Korey turned to Damien. He decided not to wake him up yet, Carey was harder on Damien than Korey. Damien needed to work out more, though Korey loved Damien's slim body, he did not stand up well to dancing at a bar all night.
Korey slipped out of the bed and began packing their clothing quietly. Once he was done with that he decided that since he had to wake Damien up eventually, he might as well wake him up with some breakfast in paw. He popped some toast in and quickly fried up some eggs, after starting the coffee of course. It was torture to expect someone to wake up so early with no coffee in their system. He downed his first cup black while making the eggs, the next he added some cream and honey so he could drink it slower.
After he had the food ready he set it all on the table ready to eat and went to get Damien. He walked up to Damien's side of the bed leaned down and scooped him up in his arms.
Damien blinked dazedly and looked up at Korey, "huh, what time is it?"
"Way too early in the morning, but Mary has summoned us to Seattle so I intend to whisk you away to eat breakfast. Heavy on the coffee just how we like it." Korey joked to the groggy fox in his arms as they entered the kitchen. He deposited his load onto a seat with food and coffee in front of him before attacking his own food as only a wolf can.
Damien dove first for the caffeine before demolishing his food as well. They had their food gone and were up to get more coffee in less time then it takes the average teenager to eat a slice of pizza.
"So why does Mary want us to go to Seatle?" Damien wanted to know.
"I have no idea, she wouldn't tell me" Korey replied, still annoyed at being woken up so early.
"Which means something big is going on and we wont be home for a while. I'll call the post office to have them hold our mail while you get our plane tickets." They were ready to leave in half an hour.
They took a taxi to the airport, and boarded the plane with no problems. Korey had decided to leave his usual arsenal behind, if he needed any weapons he could use his spares at Mary's house. Anyway they were a hassle to deal with at an airport.
On the relativly short flight they searched for recent killings in Oregon that they could link to a rouge. They found results right away, they were not good. There were four killings in the last month that sounded like a werewolf attack, the thing was that each of the victims were werewolves themselves. The police were thinking a serial killer with a large dog to help, or a fur that liked to walk on four legs. Someone was hunting their own kind, and we had to keep the police from knowing who.
"I hate flying" Korey said after they were in the air. He was uncomfortable with everyone staring at them.
"Yeah, you would think people would get used to us eventually." Damien replied.
"There are not enough furs in Oregon, they are all probably trying to avoid back woods stereotypes." Korey joked.
"Hey, as a techie I resent that. I probably have more tech in our room alone than most of these people have in their whole house." Damien was definitely a tech wiz, Korey did not know how to use half the things Damien sets up in the house, but Damien could tear apart and put back together all of it. "Don't make me get a pocket protector to prove it!" They both started laughing.
"At least there isn't a child yelling that he wants to 'play with doggy' again." Korey shuddered at the memory.
"But his parent's faces were priceless!" Damien chuckled.
Soon after that their plane got to the ground so they had to find all the luggage and escape the airport. They took a taxi to Mary's house to find out what all this was about. The door opened on the second knock to reveal a very stressed Mary.
"Come in hurry, we need to fill you in on everything so you can start as soon as possible." She lead them into the dining room before starting in on the information. "Four werewolves have been murdered in the past month. We believe we know who the next target is, but we can't find him." She put a stack of files before them on the table before continuing. "That is everything we have on the murders so far."
"Who is the next target?" Korey asked. "If you are sure he is the next target we might be able to draw in whoever is doing this. By the way, how do you know that he is the next target?"
"Because whoever is doing this is aiming for you, but you are just a bit difficult to target directly. He will kill until he gets you in the open. If that won't work he will target someone he knows you will try to protect." Mary said.
"And the only werewolf that could be used to draw me out is..." Korey did not want to say it. He had not seen him for years, but he was still grateful to the werewolf for giving him his new life.
Mary finished his sentence for him, "Zander."
"And how do you know he is after me?" Korey asked.
"The pattern. It took us forever to figure it out. It was all too random, but when we looked at where you were in relation to the kills, we found that they were all within twenty miles of you but no closer then ten miles. Even when you traveled it was within that range." Mary explained quickly. She pointed out a few charts that showed where the kills were, and where he was at the time.
"Where is Zander right now?" Damien asked.
"Don't worry about that. We have informed him of the situation, as we have with all the werewolves, and told him to take extra precautions." Mary said.
"Why isn't he in hiding?" Korey asked. He was irritated that they were not doing anything to protect him.
"We cannot allow this opportunity to go to waste. We have Zander under discrete survailance, but we must allow the killer to think we have not figured it out yet. Which means that you cannot contact Zander, or expose yourself in any other way, until you catch him." Mary explained.
Korey went silent. Sure he had not seen Zander in years, but he still could not stop thinking about him. Not that he would ever consider leaving Damien, but he owed Zander a lot for giving him his new life, and he had not forgotten how he had felt when Zander finally asked him out. "So why did you call me in if you had this all under control?" He said so quietly that it would not have been heard if his company was human.
Damien heard the frustration in his voice and went to him, wrapping his arms around his wolf.
"We need you close by to help once things go bad." She replied. A perfectly timed call rang on her cell phone just as she finished that sentence. She answered it immediately. After a few minutes she looked back at them and said, "Things just went bad. Someone called to check in on Zander, but he did not answer. His house was empty with little sign of struggle. Though they did smell something chemical that did not belong there, we are guessing it was a sedative."
"How could they get in without forced entry?" Damien asked. Korey was lost in his own guilt about putting Zander in such danger.
"We do not know. The only signs of struggle could either be a fall, or something that was already there." Her eyes flashed with anger as she went on to say, "the idiots I posted there figured he would call if he needed them. They were only calling once a week to check in on him. So we do not even know how long he has been missing! If the council would only ever LISTEN to me, and give me permission to call you in when we need you. Instead of AFTER the harm is already done. Things like this might have never happened," her voice lowered and she sounded close to tears as she muttered the last part, "and Christopher might never have died." She quickly recovered her composure and hid all of her inner turmoil behind the walls she had erected where her sorrow resided, and bled into rage.
The other two were oblivious to this however as Korey sank into a nearby chair. They did not notice as Mary strode up to them and put a hand on each of their shoulders. "I am sorry, I did not want it to have to come to this." She said sadly.
Korey felt strange, his ears started to ring as reality seemed to pull away from him. He fought to hold on to conciousness, he was barely aware of Damien dropping to the floor beside him. He struggled to lift his head and ask "why?" Before he finally dropped to the floor, half on top of Damien.
Mary cleaned off the syringes in her hand and put them away to be disposed of later.