A Savage Rescue.

(Closed)

It was a quiet night, Nathan liked quiet nights, too much noise made it hard to concentrate, and on a night like this one, with the moon full in the sky, cutting through the city smog like a floodlight, Nathan needed to be able to concentrate. Nathan you see, is a werewolf, able to shift his bodily form to that of a beast at will, and call upon the instincts of his more primal side. Normally the beast is kept in check, rising only when challenged, but on the night of a full moon it grows unruly, seeking blood at the slightest insult.

So as you can imagine, on nights like this Nathan takes it easy, he stays at home in his little one bedroom apartment, puts something slow and easy to listen to on his old CD Player, and doesn’t bother with anything other than a pair of sweat pants as clothes go. This night however, that started out so wonderfully peaceful, was doomed to take a far less relaxing turn.*

A shrill and piercing scream of terror sounded through the darkness, only to be quickly silenced by persons unknown. This brought two thoughts to Nathans mind, the first came from his human side, it was a simple response, woman in trouble, play the gallant knight and go to he rescue. The seconds simplicity made the first thought sound like a well written thesis paper, for the beast thought only one word, prey.

The divide was problematic, Nathan wanted to save the girl, the beast wanted to save one of her legs for later, but either way, they both called for action. Nathan sprang to his feet, instantly heading for the window to the alley outside, barely keeping the beast far enough in check to remember how much easier it is to open the window than it is to bust through it. He moved out on to the fire escape, surveying the scene below, the alley was dark, building hiding it from even the moonlight, but he could see fine, a gift from the beast.

Three men, if they could be called that, one of them sounded as though his voice had only just broken, had cornered some poor girl at the back of the alley, two of them standing back while the third started on the girls clothes with a knife, slowly stripping it away piece by piece, he wanted her terrified. Nathan had seen all he needed to, he could save the girl, and the beasts cravings could be sated by the fools, he jumped from the fire escape, letting the beast take his body as he soared through the air, his baggy sweat pants barely managing to stay in one piece as his form bulged with new muscle, bones growing and shifting beneath his flesh as dark fur rapidly grew across his skin, his hands turning to claws and his face becoming that of a wolf. By the time he landed at the mouth of the alley, haloed by what little light was filtering in from the street, he was no longer a man.

His landing was by no means silent, even his idiot prey heard him, but like the fools they were they hesitated, giving the beast time to hide, the only evidence of his presence a low growling noise coming from behind the dumpster. “The fuck was that?” one of the two standing back asked, all of them now looking behind them “Hell if I know man, go check it out, I don’t want some rabid dog trying to fuck my leg while I'm balls deep in this bitch” the man who had been working the knife ordered as he waved the blade in Nathans general direction, keeping his other hand securely balled in to a fist in the girls hair to stop her from running.

The two went to investigate, both taking out knives of their own in anticipation of fighting an underfed dog, both of them almost dropping the knives when they saw what was waiting for them. Nathan watched them, holding the beast back and giving them a chance to run, if they ran they would live, if they didn’t... well, then the beast would be fed. The one on the left recovered from the shock first, an idiot in a red hoodie and pants practically around his ankles they were so loose, he lunged wildly, pulling his knife back to presumably strike at the beasts neck. The beast was faster though, pouncing on the poor fool and responding in kind, one claw effortlessly batting the knife away, while the other pinned him to the ground before the beasts powerful jaws found their way to his neck, quickly removing a nice chunk of it. It would have made a nice snack, but as the beast was throwing his head back to swallow the meat a pain lanced though his back, again and again, fool number two had come to his senses, no, that wasn’t the case, he was just in a blind rage in stead of silent shock, stabbing the beast in the back with all the strength he could muster time and time again, not that it did any good.

With a roar the beast turned, claws raking across his abdomen and practically disemboweling him in one strike, but yet again he was denied his meal, though this time the pain was preceded by a loud snap of gunfire. The last of the thugs had produced a gun and had started firing like mad, he was lucky if every second shot hit, but he still managed to burn his way though the magazine before the beast was on him. Only this time, it wasn’t the beast in control, the gunman was still next to the girl, letting the beast loose in a situation like that would only lead to them both dieing, so Nathan took the lead, calmly walking up to the gunman who was still madly pulling the trigger on his empty pistol and cleanly snapped his neck, no muss, no fuss, the only blood on him was from his friends.

Now came the painful part.

Nathan focused on returning to human form, which was difficult between the urges to both feed on the meat around him and to kill the girl along with the rest of them, but he managed, forcing him body to collapse in on itself, losing almost a foot in height and nearly as much in width, bullet fragments popping out of his wounds as they began to heal. And then he was human again, even with his wounds healing, having them still present while in this form was hell, but at least it took his mind off the taste of blood in his mouth.

He slowly turned to the girl, looking at her from under his shaggy black hair, his well muscled chest caked with blood as it heaved in an attempt to supply him with enough oxygen to breath again “Are you” he started, realizing he was about to ask if she was ok, which she clearly couldn’t be after that experience “Are you hurt?” he asked instead, straightening himself up, even without all the added mass from his wolf form, he was a well sized wall of a man “Do you need help?”

Katie blinked up at the man. The very large man. She was beyond screaming. What just happened had been too strange and horrifying. If it really happened. The one who had grabbed her had smacked her around pretty hard. She had a bruise forming on her left cheekbone. It stood out against her pale skin. She swayed a bit on her feet. What she had just seen--her brain was struggling to make sense of it. She must have been hit in the head harder than she thought.

She looked up at the man taking in his shaggy masculinity. God, he was covered in blood. Had he been hurt? She took a deep breath and put her hand to her bruised cheek then tucked a wayward strand of red hair behind her ear. "A little." She looked down at herself as if she just realized that her blouse and and bra were in tatters. She crossed her arms over her breasts. Everything was taking on a dreamlike quality. Not a dream. It was as if she was waking up from a nightmare but it was still going on.

The blood the screams. The ... creature. That was the crazy part. She must have imagined that. She swayed again and her knees buckled.

Nathan almost didn’t notice her fall, his mind was still hazy with the beasts bloodlust, and he was having a surprisingly difficult time of not looking at her chest, he may have disagreed completely with the methods used, but couldn’t fault the thugs in their taste. He quickly closed the gap between them and caught her before she hit the ground, pulling her close to him but at the same time trying to avoid pressing the larger patches of blood against her.

“I've got you, don't worry” Nathan tried to reassure her, though he didn’t know how well he was going, talking was most definitely not his strong suit. As a mixed blessing, the beast began to calm, its desire for violent solutions slowly draining away until they were only a dull embers rather than the inferno they had just been, whether this was of its own volition, seeing this girl as no threat, or because the touch of a fair maiden had soothed the savage beast, Nathan didn't know. The downside to this was he now had less to focus on, his pains were sharper, and his more human urges relating to the girl in his arms griped him and refused to let go.

“Come on, we should leave” without waiting for a proper response, Nathan moved one arm under her legs and swept her off her feet “Someone will come to investigate those shots soon enough.”

Katie was no 'delicate flower.' She wasn't the sort of woman to pass out or be squeamish, but what had happened tonight was a special case. She didn't actually lose consciousness, it was just suddenly her bones turned to jello now that the danger had passed. Probably all of the adrenaline had run out.

He was very strong, but real enough and no beast. She chalked it up to the trauma of the attack and hits to her head. He picked her up liked she weighed nothing. Her arms went around his neck. The bare skin of his chest felt very warm against hers. She felt safe in his arms.

She didn't say anything, but she was conscious, and she wasn't struggling, she even looked peaceful, Nathan liked the way she felt in his arms, it felt right, she belonged there, she belonged to him. Nathan looked away from her, shaking his head free from those thoughts and heading off towards the buildings back door, he couldn't let his mind be clouded by the beast right now, that's what it had to have been, the beast was the one wanting to claim her like a possession, not him...

It didn't take long to get back to his apartment, through the overly lit rear lobby that made the blood on them painfully easy to see, then up the dark stairwell that hid the dark red stains once again. "We're here" he said as he opened the door and carried her over the threshold, finally placing her back on her feet once inside and closing the door.

The apartment itself was sparsely furnished, only lit by a lone desk lamp ever since the light fixture broke, the music was still playing though. Nathan had no idea what was actually playing, the last tenant had left a CD player and one CD, a mix tape labeled smooth jazz, but it worked fine enough, so he never bothered to invest in something else to play.

“The fridge is over there, if you want something to drink” He said, gesturing to the little kitchenette in the corner of the room, he wasn’t really sure what to say, how does one be comforting after being seen as a wild murderous beast? “Anyway, I should probably go clean up” he headed off towards the only door in the room, presumably leading to the the bedroom and bathroom “I'll be sure to leave you some hot water though.”

Katie was steadier now. The incident in the alley becoming hazy. Probably her mind's way of shielding her from the realities of what nearly happened--of what did happen.

She had been walking to the subway after working late at the law office. There had been too many things that needed wrapping up before the long weekend. She had her pepper spray out--just in case. She had taken some self defense classes, but never needed to use anything she learned. Until tonight.

She set down her pocketbook. How she managed to keep it through all of what happened she didn't know. Maybe her knight in shining armour picked it up. She heard the water in the shower. She tried to arrange her shredded blouse to cover her.

She could really use a whiskey, but she guessed he was more of a beer guy. She opened the fridge and pulled out a bottle of Sam Adams--good taste in beer anyway. She rooted in a few drawers to find the bottle opener. then walked into the main room.

She realized she was wandering aimlessly around the place looking at his few possessions. Nothing gave her any clues about this man. Finally, she sat down. She toed off her pumps and sat back. She let the strains of Sade's "Smooth Operator" wash over her. She closed her eyes and tried to let her mind go blank. But the images of the alley kept intruding. She stood up and paced again. She wrapped her arms around herself and drank her beer. She heard the water turn off.

Nathan tried to be quick in the shower, but even with his experience at cleaning blood he had to take his time if he wanted to keep the towels when he was done, and call him crazy if you want, but Nathan wasn’t a fan all his things having blood on them. Once he was done he left the shower running on cold while he dressed to wash away the last of it, his new clothes consisted of a fresh pair of pants and an old singlet, he considered putting on something nicer, then checked his closet and remembered he didn’t own anything nice.

His head dropped with a sigh, but then noticed something he had completely forgotten about, an old garbage bag at the bottom of his closet, more leftovers from previous tenants. He turned off the shower and headed back to the lounge, hesitating when he saw her again... He just couldn’t help but think of her as prey, hell, even if he didn’t have a beast howling in his ears he would want to jump her and finish what the punks outside had started.

“You found the bottle opener, good” Nathan latched on to the first normal thing he could think of, drinking, anything to keep his mind of what he wanted to do “There's an old bag of clothes in the closet that the last people left here” he said as he headed to the fridge to grab a beer of his own, he did have something harder in the cupboard, but he didn’t trust himself with it at the moment “you're free to anything you find in it if you want to get out of the ruined stuff you're wearing now.”

Nathan savored the taste of the beer, hoping that she would take the offer of clothes, after the impromptu alterations her current clothes weren’t exactly modest, and he needed to axe as much temptation as he could. Unfortunately, Nathan had last seen those clothes about a year ago, so he had forgotten that his guess at the time had placed them as belonging to a sex worker of some kind, and can only be called modest with a good stretch of the word.

"Um, thanks." Katie said. Her arms were crossed over her chest which made drinking her beer a bit difficult. But she was feeling a bit steadier now--at least physically. "Anything is better than this."

He cleaned up nice. She took in his broad shoulders in the tight shirt. And his arms. But he wasn't musclebound. He moved with a natural grace. She wondered if he were a good dancer. It surprised her that she could think this way after what she went through, but already the incident was receding like a bad dream. Probably her subconscious's way of shielding her.

"I'll go get cleaned up. Thanks again." She picked up her purse from the floor mindful of how she moved in her shredded blouse.

The bathroom fixtures were old, but she was surprised at the level of cleanliness for a bachelor. No fancy soaps or shampoos or pink razors--so, no regular girlfriend.

She dropped her purse in a corner and stripped. She avoided looking at herself in the mirror--she didn't want to know how bad she looked. She could feel a bruise forming on her cheek and knew she had plenty more on her body. She removed her ruined jacket and tattered blouse. The skirt might have been salvageable but she didn't want the reminder of what happened. of what might have happened. Her bra and pantyhose were ruined. She pushed everything into a pile.

She turned on the water and adjusted it to her liking and stepped in. Her whole body sighed with relief. She let the water run down her body for some time before realizing she'd better get washed before the hot water ran out. She used his generic soap and shampoo trying to envision all that had happened going down the drain.

She got out of the shower feeling much better. More relaxed. She wrapped her hair up in the towel and padded into the bedroom to investigate the bag of clothes. She picked through the things trying to come up with something that didn't make her look like street walker. Considering the neighborhood, that was possibly what the last tenant did for a living. Lovely.

The jeans fit her all wrong. Too tight in the hips and butt. All the skirts were much shorter than anything she would wear even though she had decent legs, years of ballet growing up, and consistently hitting the gym kept her in shape. She picked through the bag trying to find a top and found underwear--a few pairs of thongs. She decided she would rather go commando than wear them, even though everything smelled clean. There was just something distasteful about wearing someone else's panties.

Her breasts were small enough that she could go without a bra, but she found a few lacy pushups that fit well enough.

She pulled the makeup bag from her purse and found her comb and did what she could to her damp hair.

She finally emerged with her still unfinished beer wearing a short denim skirt and black short-sleeved tee with a deep vee neck that showed more cleavage than was her style. She gave her hero a weak smile. "We haven't been properly introduced, I'm Kathryn Grady. My friends call me Katie."