captainryan | (no subject)

The werewolf gives an amused rumble. He knows these tactics. They're designed to slow tracker dogs down and make their handlers doubt that they have the right trail.

But they are not dogs with handlers.

He ignores most of the knots, using both scent and sight to find where the man re-emerged and following it to the next knot. The stream is trickier. The water washes away the glow, leaving only patches and short tracks where the man exited to lay false starts. The 'wolf bounds up one bank and down the other until he finds the true exit, a good ways upstream and made more obvious by the glittering path that leads away.

They've lost time, but not nearly as much as the man did laying the trail.

She'd trusted him to unravel the confusion and sort through the tactics used...Rachel had taken it upon herself to run trap interference and do scouting along the flanks so Ryan could concentrate on the task.

Yes, the prey had lost time...

And they were simply faster than any human, no matter how well trained. It wasn't long before that poisoned taint was in the air once more...

Prey smell, human smell, blood smell...but also gun oil. The human's been moving straight, trying to put distance between himself and his pursuers, but he'd expected more time. They're here, now, and he has nowhere to run except a house that is familiar to both he and the wolf, if he can get there in time...

The 'wolf is done being cautious. He's hungry and puts on a burst of speed charging straight for his prey. The human whirls, the MP5 coming up with a sharp banging rattle as the slugs tear through the 'wolf. There's a yelp of pain even as the 'wolf slams into the human, knocking him down. The holes have closed, but there's still blood smell, his own blood smell, and it drives him mad with hunger.

The werewolf attacks again and the human, Ryan, can't hold him off. The teeth find his throat and there's a sharp tearing wet sound as the 'wolf bites. The blood is warm and black, hot, too hot, burning, tastes all wrong. The werewolf rears back, trying to spit it out, but it's pouring from the wound down his throat, till there's none of the black left in the human.

Ryan's on his feet in a moment, hand at his throat. He can still feel the teeth closing around his neck though there's no mark there now. He backs towards the house eyes flicking between convulsing werewolf and the woman. Was she human? She didn't move like one.

Rachel watched. Analyzed.

These were two mind fragments of the person she had promised to help. One destroying the other wouldn't do the job she'd promised...but the attack had needed to occur. The poison had to be drained.

The human shard was alive, healed in his purging...so Rachel nodded quickly to the house and turned her back on him. The poison had infected another shard...a shard that could do infinitely more harm.

Ryan doesn't know what's happening. Hadn't the woman attacked him before? And now it seemed she was going to attack the werewolf. He can puzzle it out later. Right now, the house was looking like a very good idea. If she wants to commit suicide by werewolf, by all means, go ahead. It gave him time to prepare.

He has to kick down the door. It had been locked and nailed shut against the pack. He remembers listening to the hammering. The toolbox is there, hammer laying on nails, and he repeats the action that happened months ago. It won't keep the werewolf out, but it'll give him advance warning when it breaks in.

Outside, the 'wolf is just getting to his feet, still coughing and hacking, black spittle foaming at his mouth. He snarls at Rachel. MOVE! he roars, moving after the human prey, HIS prey.

One day Rachel would have to ask Suzi just what kind of person the woman had taken into her house...not today though. Today there were greater worries...like the poisoning, even as the frantic sounds of hammering began to ring out.

She knew what the poison was...but it wasn't her poison to drain. That had to happen between the shards...when they weren't going to die within heartbeats of meeting at any rate.

That left...blunting some of the poison, the Anger. She could do that. Poisoned she snarled, holding her ground. Worry about that first

He wouldn't, she knew that.

He doesn't bother answering, instead sweeping out with one powerful arm to knock her aside.

Inside the house, Ryan drops the hammer back into the toolbox and looks around to see if there's anything else he can use. The house is exactly as he remembers it before he changed: the windows are boarded up, the back door locked, the side door blocked off with a kitchen cabinet.

He died here.

And for what? It should have been a simple mission. Lure the target out, take it down. There was only supposed to be one. But there had been five and he and his team had failed in the worst way possible. It's one thing to have an unsuccessful mission. It's quite another to find out that Special Weapons did indeed get their werewolf and to discover that the mission wasn't a complete loss. It had been a bit of good news to know his death was useful after all. For Ingram to decide that his death meant nothing, that Witherspoon could go free and not use what they'd found, that his death was devoid of purpose...

He slams his fist down on the kitchen table hard enough to knock over the glow sticks and rattle the sword against the wood.

He was dead because of that thing out there, and it was for nothing. And here it was, back again for another worthless, pointless death. He knows he'll lose. The bullets only slow it down, they don't kill the damn things. It'll break through the door or a window and he'll empty his clip into it and sure, it'll slow down for a moment or two, but in the end it'll catch him. It'll catch him and drag him down and claw him open and start eating him while he's still-

No. No, he'll shoot himself before he'll let that happen again.

Rachel? Didn't sweep aside so easily. She curled around the arm, absorbing the blow, she rolled to her feet and she dove for his. Years of training, centuries of pain...it made her good.

Very good.

She never attacked never dealt a blow, just was there, time and time again when the werewolf was going to advance. Blocking, impeding, another stone to wash that anger against.

But she could feel the rising despair in the house behind her, and it made her snarl. Obviously the shard wasn't going to help himself...so...with an inward wince, she took another crashing blow that sent her spinning through a boarded window, wood thick and harsh against her back...yet somehow she landed on her feet and skidded backwards. Her eyes never left the window, knowing that she'd be followed.

But she had moments, a few precious heartbeats, in which to talk this shard around. Unfortunately? She was never the best with words "Ryan!" she called, knowing she'd skidded far enough into the room that he was near.

Ryan rushes to the other room in time to see the werewolf start to push its way through the remaining boards. His face sets in a grim mask as he steps forward and empties the MP5 clip into the beast, driving it back, keeping it out for a little longer.

He replaces the empty clip with his last full one, and when he looks up again, the smoke has cleared. The wolf is nowhere to be seen. They're smart bastards, though. He wonders what it's up to.

In the mean time...

"Who are you?" he asks coldly, turning the MP5 on Rachel.

Rachel stood up a little stiffly, stretching out her newly bruised back with her attention still on the window "Point that at me and you'll eat it" she said conversationally. No hint of anger, no growl, just a statement.

"Suzi sent me. She gives a damn about you, so here I am. Now, you can choose to die here, give up...but you damn well better tell me what to tell Suzi if you are that stupid"

The sub-machine gun stays trained on her until she mentions Suzi. Only then is it pointed down as he gives her a hard look.

"Do you know what you've gotten involved in? That thing can't be killed," he informs her briskly. He doesn't know how he got here. He should be at Milliway's with Suzi and Deitmar. But here he is, and no way out that he can see. He suddenly found himself wishing he had asked how Wells had blown up the house.

"I'm not giving up. I'll fight until I go down, but I will go down. And then I'll end it." It's almost funny. He died of a bullet to the head last time, too.

As long as he didn't make a move to actually shoot her before he dropped the gun, then she had no reason to take it from him. "I've more an idea than you do. She wants you back to yourself" she sighed.

Outside? Outside the world was doing odd things. Scents were shifting about, and the windows and doors were hard to find, even the broken one...blurring...buying time...

"What do you remember of the last few days?"

He's about to snap that there's no time for this when he realizes that he doesn't, and suddenly he understands that something more is happening than just him randomly appearing back at the Scottish house while chased by a single werewolf.

There's a frustrated howl from outside and his head snaps up to watch out through the windows. "The last thing I remember is starting to work on the pells. The moon was still waxing then." He drops his gaze back to her. "What's happening?"

Rachel? Still never looked at Ryan, but she drift between him and the window, a shield once the Wolf got in...because he would. "You lost it. Snapped. Became more an instinctual, passive creature than any human or wolf. Basically, from what I can tell, you splintered your psyche and personas."

"We're in your head by the way." There wasn't any time to break it to him easily.

Ryan blinks at that. He remembered working on the pells, remembered the sword snapping against the wood. He'd been so furious and the sword had snapped under the strain and he just...went with it. He let go.

Ryan suddenly looks much paler. "Is Suzi alright?" Deitmar could take care of himself, but Suzi?

She glanced over her shoulder, emerald eyes literally glowing. "If she were hurt, I wouldn't be here" she admitted simply. Before now? She'd not known him. "But she's frightened, and she misses you."

And because of that? Rachel would happily take any damage necessary.

Ryan nods, silent. He wants to ask more, but now is not the time, not when the werewolf is howling outside.

"I've splintered my psyche," he says instead, realizing that she must be psychic and that's how they're in his head. He's not happy about that, but he'll worry about it later.

"How do I repair it? Don't tell me I have to kill that thing because I've already told you it can't be done. Not without silver."

"Killing parts of yourself is never a good idea" she sighed "It drained you of the poison, but got infected, and is less able to deal with the twisting I believe." she'd answer any other questions much, much later.

"Question is, Ryan, are you willing to go back?" because...he knew how. The path was always there.

Ah, so that's why it had been easier to think straight after the werewolf had ripped out his throat. He shudders at the sense memory, one hand flying to his neck, making sure the flesh is still whole.

"Of course," he asserts in answer to her question. He was, wasn't he? Why had he let go in the first place? Because he wasn't thinking straight. The anger had blinded him, skewed his thinking. What guarantee did he have that wouldn't happen again?

None. The anger was still there, just in the werewolf. What did that mean? Nothing good, surely.

"I need to lessen the rage. I need to control it," he tells Rachel. The problem there is he doesn't know how.

She listened, to him, to the wolf outside...and nodded "Yes, you do. It's too poisonous right now though" she admitted. She had...experience with such.

"With your permission, I'll drain some of it, the darkest parts. You should be able to handle the rest." it had all the finality of a one time offer.

Ryan frowns, worry etching its way across his face. "Handle it how?" If he can't even kill it, how the hell is he supposed to do anything else with it?

"Stop running would be a start" she shrugged. It was his mind, his psyche. She'd dealt with her own splinters in ways that only made sense to her...

"Do I have your permission?" Yes or no, Ryan, the clock was ticking...

"Yes," Ryan says grimly. He knows he doesn't want to face it at full strength. That this woman is willing to do so for him when he doesn't even know her he finds very brave and very foolish. It's not something he would do.

"What's your name?" He feels he should know who's putting herself at risk for him.

"Wise choice" she sighed grimly. He wouldn't do it...no. But Rachel? Was a hero. She specialized in doing the brave, foolish things...and doing them well enough to come back from.

"Rachel Grey" she called over her shoulder, as she was already moving towards the window, something like flame dancing in her hair...

She didn't want to hurt the wolf any more than she had to, it was why she had held back from attacking earlier...but things were changing, and this was for his good as well as the human shard's. So, it was a flame wrapped woman who darted faster, deadlier towards the enraged creature. It was slim, warm legs that hit his chest hard enough to bowl even a giant over...

And it was burning, clawed hands that latched onto the wolf's chest, just above his heart, drawing enough blood to reach the poison. She'd absorb as much as was needed, even knowing how much damage a girl her size could take when foolishly straddling a werewolf's chest.

Ryan watches her go, leaving for the slightly more secure kitchen once she was out the window. He can hear the wolf snarling and growling, and occasionally roaring in pain. God, he wants to disappear out the back door and just let her hold it off for as long as she could.

'Stop running,' she'd said. He paces the kitchen floor, removing the MP5 strap from his shoulder. It hadn't helped him then, it won't help him now. He'd have to face it. He was afraid to face it. The bastard terrified him. Not what it was, but what it could do, what it did to him. What he could do to others, to Suzi and Deitmar.

He finds he's holding the sword on the table. He stares at the blade, remembers the feeling of the metal sliding through his back.

He came here to catch a werewolf. He failed, or thought he had until Wells told him otherwise. He'd been pleased; his mission hadn't been a complete loss. Special Weapons had their werewolf. And then Witherspoon told him that Ingram had decided not to use the data. And the partially successful mission he had died for suddenly meant nothing.

His grip tightens on the hilt. That's why he's angry. He died for nothing. And he let go because he couldn't function with it. How long ago was it? How long had he been hiding in his own head?

The sword is melting under his hand, glowing red hot, then white as it shape softens then runs together. It’s searing his hand, but somehow he knows he can’t let go.

That life is over and done with. The molten metal is shining. What ever happened has happened. He can’t change that. The steel starts to reform. It’s been three years for Wells. His world’s moved on. Did he really expect it not to? The metal cools in his hand, soothing the burn. Britain has to do what’s best for herself, and if that involved negating his sacrifice, so be it. It was for the greater good. The ends justify the means.

He looks at the new sword that has formed. The blade is shining steel, hilt and pommel gold. There’s a design of chains on the grip, and set at the butt of the pommel is a dark brown tiger’s eye with a wolf’s head carved into it. Farris.

This is who he was now. And the wolf is just as much a part of that as anything else. He wouldn’t have grown close to Suzi otherwise. Deitmar would be nothing more than a sparring partner. Both would have little more meaning than as a source of income. Instead they were pack. They were family.

And, perhaps, that is what scares him most of all.

Ryan walks to the front door and it opens easily under his touch, as though the nails holding it shut had vanished. He steps outside under the waning moon, sword catching the silver light.

Rachel, he suspects, will know to let the werewolf up.