The Private Lives of Werewolves, Pt. 1

Lucien undressed and re-dressed himself in the mirror. He took off his gray sweater and white shirt, zipped and folded them neatly, and placed them on the sink. When Lucien got down to his underwear, he transitioned into his “A” Blues hanging on the door: blue trousers with that scarlet stripe on each side, white button-down, that midnight blue coat with its erect collar, and the black dress shoes, spic and span. He adjusted his Sam Browne until it was just right. Medals on the left breast, ribbons to the right. He couldn’t forget the gloves, so he carefully slid them on before tucking his barracks cover under his arm. When he looked in the mirror, his dirty blonde hair was no longer shoulder-length—it was cut shorter.

“Lucien. Are you okay in there?” A deep voice came from just outside the door.

Lucien’s heart gave a start and he blinked quickly several times. His hair returned to shoulder-length. His “A” Blues returned to gray sweats. “Y-yeah. I’m good. Comin’ out,” Lucien reassured. He picked up his duffel bag next to the door and walked out to see Jace, a tall and dark-haired man, sitting on the edge of the hospital bed. Lucien could smell his own scent still on the bed, as if the sheets had not been changed—as if he had never left its clinical comfort. His senses were already heightening gradually.

Jace stood up and walked toward Lucien, taking the duffel bag from him. “I’ll take that. We have to go through the discharge.” Lucien laughed humorlessly, the first show of emotion since he had woken up that morning.

“Haven’t you heard? They don’t call it the discharge here. They call it Lycan Registry. I come out of service just to go right into being a second-class citizen,” Lucien spat. Jace looked at him apologetically, cupping his cheek. Lucien took a deep breath, his blue eyes closing as Jace traced his thumb over the familiar jagged scar over Lucien’s left eye.

“I’m sorry all of this has happened. But I’m here with you…every step of the way.”

“Let’s just…go.” So, they went. They were directed to the registry by one of the receptionists, and they walked into the office. There was already two people in the office, speaking with two of the four registrars.

“Hello, I’ll be able to take you here,” one of the available registrars said. The four stations were side-by-side, walled off for some semblance of privacy. Lucien and Jace walked to the end station on the left. They sat down in the two seats placed in front of the desk. “My name is Delilah. I’ll be helping you get situated.” She was a plump woman with reddish brown hair in an up-do. Her name tag was pinned to her light blue button-down: St. Lucaine Preternatural Hospital, Delilah Connery. She picked up a clipboard on her side of the desk, looking away from her computer. “Who is the patient that received St. Lucaine care?”

Lucien scoffed at the word care. Jace cleared his throat uncomfortably, nodding his head towards Lucien. “Lucien was the patient.”

Delilah smiled politely, and Lucien shifted in his seat—she was too chipper for his tastes. He took the clipboard that was offered to him, starting to fill out the usual hospital information. When he finished and handed the clipboard back, she looked to Jace. “And who might you be?”

“Jace. Jace Sobel—”

“He’s my husband,” Lucien chipped in.

“Excellent! I’m glad you had support at this time.” Lucien strained a smile, but if Delilah noticed, she didn’t comment on it. “So, I just have a few questions to fill in for you as part of your registry. This information is for government records and, for the most part, will not be used. The exception is your timely correspondence to New York’s pack, Bridgebane. From this moment on you will have up to 2 weeks to make contact with either Bridgebane’s Alpha King or the Second Commander to alert them to your presence. If you do not adhere to this time frame, St. Lucaine will unfortunately have to forward your information to the Pack. At that point, you have 24 hours to either leave New York or arrange a meeting with Bridgebane for your membership. Do you understand these terms?”

Lucien didn’t speak for a long pause, soaking in the information. He wanted to grip Delilah by shoulders and shake her, ask her if she even cared about what she was doing to him. Did she even care that he had been attacked?

“Luci,” Jace whispered, squeezing Lucien’s knee. The touch was almost as sudden as his attack had been, and it made Lucien jump in his seat. Jace pulled his hand away as if Lucien had stung him. “I’m sorry.”

Lucien shook his head. “It’s…it’s okay.” He looked to Delilah. “I understand. Ask your questions.”

Delilah nodded solemnly before going on: “Full name and original birthdate?”

Lucien wanted to make a smart remark about why she didn’t just look at his form, but he swallowed that. “Lucien Moishe Sobel, born 31 October 1993, O-940 hours.” He wasn’t sure his time of birth was useful, but it was a habit.

She tapped away on her keyboard. “New birthdate?”

Lucien’s face contorted with confusion. “New birthdate?”

“It’s the date in which you were attacked and infected with your strain of lycanthropy.”

“Uh…September. 17 September 2032. I’m…not sure of the time.”

Delilah smiled. “That’s okay, it’s not necessary.” She paused to type something in. “Location of your origin mark and the circumstance in which you received it?”

Fuck, I don’t want to think about that. It was too late though. Lucien squeezed his eyes shut, and he couldn’t get that image of snarling teeth and dark brown fur out of his head. He instinctively reached for Jace’s hand and squeezed it. “My left side…just under my ribs. I was attacked during my service with the Marine Corps by a rogue lycan that I assume was newly infected too…an Omega.”

His eyes opened again, and Delilah continued to tap. “Okay, almost done here…just two more questions.” Though, Lucien had already zoned out, and Jace had to answer for him.

When they finally got done, Jace drove them both home.

“So, I was doing research on the Bridgebane Pack,” Jace began. “The Alpha King actually turns out to be a woman, her name is Sevora Sloan. Strange name, right? Anyway, Bridgebane’s pack house turns out to be really nice, it’s this big ass chalet they had built in Upstate New York. And—”

“I don’t want to talk about Bridgebane.”

“But—”

“I have two weeks. Let’s talk about something else.”

********

The next three days were hell for Lucien. His first night back at his home was strange. He had forgotten where everything was, he couldn’t even make a bowl of late-night cereal unless Jace pointed him to where the bowls and silverware were placed. Jace had redecorated a bit, moved around some furniture. Before he made himself cereal, Lucien had stubbed his toe on a small table, and that was a mini death in itself.

Lucien couldn’t go to sleep right away, so he resorted to 20 push-ups and 30 sit-ups next to their bed. Jace woke up when he heard grunting noises and felt so bad he joined Lucien on the floor. That was at 12 o’clock in the morning.

In the morning, Jace had to go to work. He took as much time off as he could to take care of Lucien while he was in the hospital, so Lucien couldn’t imagine keeping him from his college students any longer. Jace loved what he did.

Unfortunately, that left Lucien to his own devices. No one would think to hire a newly-infected lycan. What’s more, there was a law against it. Somehow, struggling to sleep during the night seemed preferable to being useless in the day.

But then he tossed and turned more the next night. It increased on the next one. He dreamt of endless gunfire and snarling, trapped between his service as a Marine that he was familiar with and his life as a lycan that he was just getting to know. Lucien broke out into a heavy sweat, and he woke up. His heightened hearing made the pounding of his heart overbearing. He hiked up his knees and placed his head between them, his hands gripping the back of his head. It was hard for Jace not to stir with all of Lucien’s movement.

“Luci…” Jace called, but his voice was a shot into the dark—you wouldn’t know if it landed. He reached for Lucien, but what Lucien felt wasn’t a hand. It was claws going down his back. But he felt stronger now; he wouldn’t go down without a fight.

“No!” he yelled. He gripped at Jace’s arm hard, and most of it was a blur. But when reality faded back in and he realized what he was doing, Lucien pushed himself back with quickened breath. Jace groaned in pain. Lucien quickly got to his feet and staggered into their bathroom, where he sat in the shower, the cold water turned on.

********

Lucien woke up in the shower, just in his underwear. The water was turned off. Why he was in the shower didn’t dawn on him yet, so he looked around in confusion. He slowly rose to his feet, lest he slip and fall. As he stepped out of the shower, his keen ears heard voices. Three of them—Jace and…who?

“When will he be waking up?” a feminine voice asked.

“It won’t be long now,” Jace replied, hopeful.

“Wouldn’t want him to miss out on beauty sleep,” a deep voice had said sarcastically. He had a thick accent.

He moved into the bedroom and grabbed his robe that was hanging over one of the bed posts, pulling it on. Lucien tied it up before he went out to see what was going on.

The three voices came from the living room. Two people that he didn’t know looked him over while Jace sat in a chair. He didn’t turn around.

“What’s going on?” Lucien asked, his voice rough from sleep.

The brown-haired and green-eyed woman in the room came forward to greet him. She looked to be in her 40’s. She offered a hand to Lucien. “Hello. Lucien Sobel, right? My name is Sevora Sloan, I’m the—”

Lucien didn’t need her to explain; he remembered what Jace had told him. He took her hand and shook it. “You’re Bridgebane’s Alpha Queen.”

Sevora smirked, shoving her hands into her back pockets. “I prefer Alpha King, but whatever floats your boat.” She gestured to her friend with her head. “This is Aindrias Ó Cathasaigh. He’s Irish and doesn’t let anyone forget it.” Aindrias had a solemn face, and he gave a nod of acknowledgement.

“Nice to meet you, Sevora…Aindrias. I don’t understand though, I thought I had two weeks.”

“Yes, usually the two weeks are given. But, your situation is more…precious.” Lucien didn’t know how to reply to that, so he settled with a look of confusion. “It has come to our attention that you may be struggling with PTSD. Your husband called us in, and we don’t take these things lightly. He has told us that you’ve recently been discharged—”

“Honorably discharged,” Lucien corrected.

Sevora rose her hands as if to surrender. “Honorably discharged. Your service coupled with being attacked while on duty is very liable to cause you more stress than the normal civilian who is infected. It’s not too common, but we have received reports before about those struggling with PTSD and them triggering their shift prematurely—before their first full moon. It would be irresponsible of us not to check in because the moment you became infected was the moment you became our responsibility.”

Lucien looked from Sevora to Jace, staring at the back of Jace’s head. “You called them? Told them this?”

Jace didn’t answer, but he stood up, only half of his face showing. “Let’s talk in private.” He was careful about walking around Lucien so that only half of his face was showing. Lucien looked at Sevora and Aindrias, who both looked equally grave. Then, Lucien followed after Jace, who shut their bedroom door behind them.

“You don’t get to diagnose me! I’m fine! I’m—” Lucien had walked into the room, anger sharpening his tongue until he turned around to see why Jace had been avoiding looking him in the eye. There was a bruise on his jaw, and he saw scratches on Jace’s neck. Jace was dressed in sweats, but he unzipped his sweater to reveal that he was shirtless. On his chest were some more scratches, and when Jace took the sweater off completely, Lucien saw bruises on his arms. He was speechless. It all came back to him, how he had hurt Jace.

“I went unconscious and woke up next to the bed. You weren’t in the bed either. I was…dizzy, but I got up and found you in the shower. I really wanted to help you, but I—I was afraid to touch you, so I let you stay there,” Jace explained, tears in his eyes. Lucien came forward, and he took Jace’s hands, careful not to touch the bruises. “This infection is affecting you strongly already. I’m still human, Lucien…I’m not a match for your strength. I want to help you so bad, but I can’t do that if you kill me. Please, let them help you.”

Lucien’s tears dropped to the bruises on Jace’s arms. “I am…so sorry, Turtle,” Lucien finally responded. “I’ll go with them. I’ll never do this again.”

They shared an embrace, though Lucien had to do so with extra care. After a while, their legs wobbled from the emotion. They slowly shifted down to the floor…rocking and holding each other.

previously posted to an LGBT+ Amino under my own account