Reconnaissance

Chapter 10

~~ Reconnaissance ~~

Ian could barely keep his eyes open, as he stood in a vast space of bright white light. The space stretched for over an infinitesimal distance. There was no end, nor a beginning.

He felt weightless, yet heavy. Empty, yet full. Lifeless, yet brimming with life. These contradicting feelings made his head throb like his heart was in it. But then again, he felt serenity at the same time. He was greatly perturbed.

‘Where am I?’

‘What is this place?’

Those would have been his questions, that he usually asked when he found himself here, but no, he had grown self awareness and already knew this was a dream.

After about a minute of floating or standing, Ian observed as the scenery changed from a white boundless space to a terrain dotted with tall trees.

He brought down his hands from his eyes, rapidly adjusting to the lesser intensity of light. The ground had grasses and rocks coexisting on it.

Ian was very familiar with this place. This was in the woods, in Huntsville town. But something felt different. The ambience in this place was pure and serene, unlike the usual gore and frightening feelings. It was as though the place had been cleansed by something remarkably pious.

‘What am I doing here?’

Like his question was some sort of trigger, he felt his feet cement to the ground as the entire terrain moved towards and behind him like moving trains. The transition stopped and he staggered.

If this were have to happened in reality, he knew he’d have puked from the massive inertia.

He soon felt the atmosphere change again as a distortion in space occurred. Just some meters before him, space contracted. To his perception, he saw the air squeeze like paper.

The contraction in space was so tight, a hole was ripped open. The hole was initially pitch black, then transited to multiple colors. Colors that were existent and nonexistent.

Then the hole contracted like pouted lips, and spat out a humanoid being. The being landed on its fists and one knee, the ripped space behind it closing up in succession.

It had red fur that danced to the billowing wind, and elven long ears. It slowly rose to its feet, reaching a height of 8ft. It was non other than the daylight Werewolf!

Gasp!

Ian gasped in shock!

The Werewolf heard this and tilted its head towards the stunned Ian. With a growl, it dashed at him and attacked with its claws!

~

Gasp!

Ian gasped again, this time, waking up to reality, on his bed.

Oof… Oof…

He coordinated his breathing to regulate his heartbeat. Successfully doing so, he sat up and rested his back on his pillows.

He was shirtless, his lower half covered with his white duvet. He checked his body to see the state of his wounds. But he didn’t even feel any pain at this point.

He loosened the bandages around his arms, legs and abdomen, only to see that he was completely healed. This shocked him and at the same time, didn’t. After all that happened yesterday, he was beginning to believe that all his metaphysical stipulations were real.

This thought reminded him of the dream he just had. Unlike most humans who usually wake up with amnesia or hazy memory, that they most times forget what they dreamt, it was not so for Ian. He could remember every single one of his dreams perfectly.

He theorized this was because of his high IQ and photographic memory, or something beyond the ordinary, which he didn’t want to know about.

He checked his digital alarm clock on the drawer beside his bed. It was a few minutes to twelve noon.

He skipped school today because of his injuries and it was a Friday. He wasn’t really affected by this. Aside from being grounded, he was actually glad not to have gone to school today; it was a field trip day anyway. The only thing that hurt him, was not seeing Kira’s face that day. He missed her even though he knew little to nothing about her. He regretted not talking to her like Chase had said. Maybe she’d have given him her number or email or something.

The rest of his family won't be returning till night today. Jocelyn had an important conference meeting at a border town to Huntsville and she’d be giving a speech in front of a lot of prestigious people. Peter and Avery followed her to show support. Though, Peter still had a case at work, he loved his wife more than anything.

Sigh… Ian sighed and rolled off the bed. He dropped his feet on the floor and he lumbered into the bathroom. He soaked in the foamy hot tub for long minutes till his mental state was leisured. He cleaned up and came out thereafter.

Clad in brown shorts and a grey top, he rushed downstairs into the kitchen to grab some snacks, and returned to his room, locking the door shut. He tossed the snacks on his bed and crouched by the drawer to take our some of his favorite novels. As he did so, he noticed some packets of drugs on the drawer. They were his medications to ease his pain and quicken his healing process. But that wasn’t necessary anymore.

He raised a brow and checked himself, then retracted his gaze back at the drugs.

“Nah-ah,” he shook his head negatively, picking up the drugs and stood up. He opened the door and grudgingly ran down the stairs, entering the kitchen again, disposing off the drugs into the waste bin. He was about to turn and leave, when his instincts pricked him.

Anyone could find them there. They had to be disposed properly without a trace.

He took them out of the bin and headed for the sink. He opened the drug lids and emptied the contents into the sink. There was a button by the wall of the sink. He pressed it and he could hear grinding noises form within the sink. He opened the tap for a few seconds to rinse everything down and he went upstairs.

Immediately he entered his room, he locked the door again and threw the containers out the window. That out of the way, he grabbed his books and collapsed on his bed. Since he’d be the only one at home till night, eating snacks and reading was the only thing he could think of now.

He had barely flipped through four pages, when he heard knocks on his window. They were persistent.

‘Huh?’ he dropped the book from his face and he saw Chase outside the window. He too was relieved from school today.

‘Of course. Who else?’ he smiled sarcastically as he jumped to his feet and strolled to the window.

He unlocked it and pulled it up.

“How many I help you?” he asked.

Chase just ignored and hopped in. Ian closed the window afterwards.

“You could have at least greeted,” Ian shook his head, seating on his bed.

“Heh… That can wait. I heard you’re grounded,” Chase asked, folding his arms and standing before the seated Ian.

“Yeah, man. Two weeks,” Ian sighed.

“That’s harsh, bro,” Chase took his seat beside him.

“Yes, from Peter? Totally expected. But my mum?... I feel like I don’t even know her anymore. I think she hates me now,” Ian sighed again, ruffling his white hair with his fingers.

Chase chuckled, “Pfft! She doesn’t hate you, bro. In fact, she loves you, really loves you.”

Ian was still ruffling his hair, “What makes you so sure?”

Chase smirked, “I overheard her speaking to my mum at the hospital in my ward. My mum wasn’t all too worried ‘cause she’s a nurse, and thanks to you, I hardly had a scratch on me, just drowsiness and fear.

“Your mum asked her how she was able to act so calm, even when she knew the state I was better than anybody. Then my mum advised her and stuff. That was when your mom opened up and said she only grounded you because she wants you to be safe. She’s afraid to lose you, Ian.”

“Wow? Really?” Ian was a bit elated from hearing this.

“Uhn-uhn,” Chase nodded.

Ian’s lips twitched till they formed a relaxed smile, “That’s comforting. Phew… ”

“Yeah, yeah. Now come on. I didn’t come all the way here just to tell you that,” he said, dragging Ian up along with him. “It’s high time we watched this,” he smiled, raising a DVD movie in his hand.

Ian’s eyes widened, “Suited Mercenaries part 3?! I thought that wasn’t out till next week.”

Chase scoffed, “Let’s just leave it at ‘I know a guy’.”

“Fine by me,” Ian shrugged.

“Okay then,” Chase turned and unlocked the door, and walked out of the room.

Ian was about to follow when he heard Chase shout, “Don’t forget the snacks!”

“Oh…” Ian quickly packed the many snacks and rushed out of the room.

“I can’t believe you planned to eat all those yourself,” Ian heard Chase mutter from downstairs.

They inserted the DVD and watched the whole movie that lasted for almost two hours. It was an action/thriller themed movie, where the main characters go on different missions and heists.

This instantly sparked Chase’s memory. He remembered another reason why he risked coming here. As the movie ended, he turned off the TV and turned to Ian, who was seated on the same couch as him.

“Dude, there could be a post credit scene!” Ian complained, throwing his arms up.

“We can always check that later,” Chase rolled his eyes. “But there’s one thing we can only check once in our lifetime…”

“And that is?” Ian asked in anticipation.

“Your stepfather’s stuff,” Chase smiled.

Ian let out a depressing sigh, he was expecting something more exhilarating. “Peter’s stuff? For what?”

“Since he works for D.O.D.T, I feel he should have some of his office stuffs at home. We could check for clues about this werewolf that clearly doesn’t follow the basic shape shifting rules,” he rubbed his chin. “I mean, they usually fully transform during the full moon, and half shift at day…”

Noticing that his geeky friend was going off track, Ian interrupted, “He does have a study where he usually goes at night to finish up some work.”

“Oh… Great. Lead the way,” Chase shrugged.

Ian led him to the locked study’s door and Chase trotted forward with hair pins in his hands.

“Watch ‘n learn,” he said squatting and inserted the pins inside the door knob, trying to pick the lock.

One… Two… Three minutes passed and he was still at it. More minutes flew by, and Ian left to grab a drink. He returned to see his friend still at it.

“How long is this gonna take?” he asked exasperatedly.

“Just… a few more seconds,” Chase hurriedly replied.

“That’s what you said, like thirty minutes ago,” Ian frowned.

Chase stood up and stretched his back, “It’s not as easy at it seems.”

“Just give me that,” Ian took the pins from Chase and squatted by the door knob, inserting the pins into its lock.

After long minutes of trails and failure, they exchanged again and again, till a combined effort opened the door.

Thud!

They collapsed inside the study and laid there for a couple of seconds before standing up and searched through the place, that resembled a library.

“Yo! Ian. I think I found something,” Chase called and sat on the only chair in the room, holding a set of papers in his hands.

Ian reached him and read over his shoulders, “Whoa! That looks just like the Werewolf.”

“Yeah, right? They call it a Mystic wolf, a specie that doesn’t exists on earth, but myths have been told that it resides in a different world from ours,” Chase summarized according to his mental capability.

‘Another world?’ Ian’s eyes dilated.

“This is bullshit! Of course it’s from earth. The myths are probably fake,” Chase scoffed.

“Not really,” Ian answered and backed away from the cushioned chair.

Chase swiveled the chair to face Ian, who had his back at him, “What do you mean?”

“Well… I had this dream….” Ian started.

‘Seriously not a surprise anymore’, Chase muttered to himself.

~

Deep in the woods…

It was dark already, probably one of the darkest nights this year as the moon was completely shielded by the clouds. Only the few dotted stars helped luminate the environment.

Whoosh! Whoosh!

A blur scaled past trees in seconds, two other blurs coming behind it. The race lasted a few minutes before the first blur decided to stop. The other two stopped also.

The two were silhouettes with normal human heights. They wielded long katana blades that glistered from the twinkling lumination from above. The symbol of a triangle, with Japanese texts inside a circle, was etched onto the sheen blades.

The first blur was a humanoid with dirty brown fur over its curved body. It had broken claws and blood red fangs. Its eyes glowed blue, its face was a mess of blood and ripped skin.

It was a werewolf.

There was another werewolf in Huntsville?