Post by Logan on Jun 4, 2012 22:45:02 GMT -5
It is dark despite the full moon.
To a human, this night might be a beautiful setting – well-lit and ghostly, moonlight filtering through branches and scattering upon the leaves – a dreamscape. Shattering the illusion is the beast that lurks within the fantasy, a creature illuminated only in silhouette and shape, hulking and twisted and masked within the bracken. To the beast, the night is bleak, an ugly mirror of reality; to the beast, vision is a sense better left untrusted, and the night is dark.
There are other things in the forest, his kind and more, but not for miles yet; one came through here recently, souring the air with fear and blood, but has since moved on. Territoriality is important to the beast; he drops his head and wuffs once, twice, inhaling the residual molecules the intruder left behind. The trail is cool, but not quite dead – it is enough to pique his interest. He follows, head low, massive body moving swiftly through the undergrowth; a stiff breeze ruffles his black coat, the chill encroaching on his skin.
He shivers, and in that instant, there is a sound. Something moves nearby – unrelated to the hunt at hand, yet intriguing. The beast lifts his head, scenting with keen nostrils, relying on a trusted sense instead of his half-blind eyes. Something familiar lingers, something that dredges up old emotion and memory that he, with his animalistic brain, cannot yet place.
The werewolf known as Nathaniel cannot remember, but something inside him knows.
With a crunching of leaves under massively clawed paws, the beast turns to the new trail and stalks down it, blue eyes glinting in the half-light. Ahead lies his quarry and, animal brain in control, the wolf rumbles low and warningly from the dark; it is the smell that stays his hand, the half-retained memories that hold him back.
Curiosity: a dangerous trait, but one that even the wolf still possesses.
There are a hundred myths surrounding werewolves and each book tells it a little differently. Logan can’t be sure what is truth and what is make-believe, especially in a world where men turn into monsters. Full moon theories abound within the hunting circle and through experience, Logan knows that full moons make for good hunting.
It is with a healthy amount of trepidation that Logan gathers the essentials – his shotgun, his revolver, and a small flashlight he won’t use unless necessary. His mark is out there lurking in Blackwater’s woods and a seven year old girl is long-passed due her justice.
The dark of the forest swallows him in and though Logan tries not to make a ruckus, the displaced litter shifting beneath his feet give away his location. He has danced with this mark before and Logan has established the wolf to be a brazen, angry thing. If he makes his presence known, if he makes it clear he’s hunting after the beast, then the animal will take it as a challenge, an insult. It will hunt him in return and eventually it will make a move.
He can only hope he manages to get a straight shot off before the beast gets one over on him.
There is a sound, sudden and too close. Crunching leaves, breaking twigs. Logan has his shotgun primed towards his best guess as to where the noise is coming from. A low growl follows and he immediately adjusts, snapping his barrel to point straight at the rumbling dark.
The beat of his heart is steady but fast. It could be excitement, it could be fear. It could be the natural reaction to a predator. He is only human, after all.
His finger rests on the trigger, he adopts a bracing stance. The instant the wolf makes a move towards him, Logan will fire.
In a perfect world, the smell would register. In a perfect world, Logan would look into the beast’s eyes and soothe his ravaged soul, recognizing the creature immediately as a one-time friend. In a perfect world, the two men would laugh and joke and bond over a beer.
Perfect worlds don’t exist.
And unfortunately for both Nate and Logan, the wolf is in control tonight. Perhaps it’s a result of his restrained shifting, or perhaps the beast has just decided to crawl to the surface – but either way, there’s little of Nathan left inside that canine skull that isn’t bound to age-old instincts and driven by needs his human form can’t put to words. There’s few memories for him to even attach that cluster of scent molecules too, much less make any coherent sense of it – and really, when it comes down to it, the wolf doesn’t want to. Curiosity only gets you so far. Under that, all that’s left is instinct.
Moonlight glints off the man’s gun. The beast’s weak eyes can still process the shifting of light, but more than that, he smells the metal, thick like blood, and the sweat in the air; hear the beat of his heart and recognize the calm that still lingers there. Humans have never been his preferred prey; he has never laid fang upon them. It is a desperate move that has brought him this close, guided on by ideas mostly forgotten, as though something other than this outcome could ever have possibly occurred… But that train of thought is beyond him, now. There is only the human, the wolf, and the gun.
The beast’s tongue flicks out, tasting the air as it washes over his nose – and then, only then, does he make his move.
It’s a last-ditch effort on humanity’s part that may be the saving grace for both of them. The wolf’s muscles flex, yes, and he makes the ultimate, deadly leap for what some part of his animal brain perceives as prey – but it is in this last effort that he fails. A sudden twist swings him away from Logan, any plan of attack aborted with sudden, stark realization – the forest once again filling his field of vision –
-- and in all likelihood, to then be washed out in a white blaze of pain and gunpowder.
It’s with a sharp inhale that Logan pulls the trigger. The shotgun cracks loud and sudden, kicks back into his shoulder with enough force to bruise. It was a messy shot, he’d stepped back and stumbled, a physical indication of his mind and body not working in tandem. The wolf had changed direction at the last second, a surprise move that Logan could not process in time. But that’s not what has the hair on the back of Logan’s neck standing on end.
Those eyes were blue, not brown.
That was not his mark.
There is a shadow of a suggestion ringing alarms inside of Logan’s head, like he should know what to do, like he should understand the unsettled, pins and needles feeling spreading through his gut like cold molasses. Logan doesn’t understand because there’s no lines of logic to follow, no pleasant little point A to point B he can use to make any connections.
He is left there breathing audible, bewildered breaths. He is left there feeling like something is askew and wrong, but there’s nothing he can do about it. Logan is shaken up enough by the encounter that the rest of the night is botched. Logan doesn’t believe in ghost stories but when he was young, they put him on edge, and right now he feels like a kid that just saw a ghost.
That feeling follows him on his careful trek back into Blackwater proper. That feeling sticks with him and chases away any hope of a good, honest few hours of sleep.
Morning comes and Logan is showered and dressed, and out the door within fifteen minutes. He is restless because something still feels off, like there is an invisible puzzle he is supposed to put together but he can’t see the pieces. There is one thing Logan knows – the werewolf was shot.
He thinks maybe he should be keeping an eye out for a local with a pronounced limp.
Or an angry mob.
It would be just his luck for Blackwater to be one of those towns – the kind where the human population isn’t quite so human.
Oh hell, it feels like he’s been caught out and he isn’t even sure what’s what. Then it hits him, maybe Nate has seen or knows something Logan might be able to use. It’s a start. He’ll just have to shift from hunting down animals to hunting down Nate. Shouldn’t be too much of a problem, he hopes, and thinks it’ll be nice to see a friendly face after what was a supremely strange night.
Shitting fuck fuck--!
Last night is a horrible combination of drunken blur and animalistic fog, the two combined to present with little detail and less clarity. Somewhere in all that, the mist is punctuated with pain – pain which he knows now for the reality it is, the masking adrenaline long worn off and the stoicism of his wolf left behind in the forest.
What remains is unpleasant.
For normal, human Nathaniel, the holes in his leg and the blood on his bathroom tile are nothing that can simply be shrugged off for his “other half” to deal with. He’s pissed at his wolf, pissed at himself, and something close to frightened by the few facts he can still piece together from the night previous. Though the blood all appears to be his own – none crusted under his fingernails in that sick way it tends to following a kill – the idea that he may have come anywhere near to attacking a human is a testament to his stress, and the thought twists his stomach in knots. He’d finally given in to his wolf’s desperation, allowing it the night – as per Billy’s edict – to roam free, and the whole thing had nearly backfired.
He’ll have to talk to her about getting permission to shift outside of… operational hours. Bottling the beast up further is only going to make his control that much worse, he knows now; resisting shifting in the first place had always felt like a bad idea, but he could hardly have anticipated the consequences.
Still, he feels like he should have known.
Nathan distracts himself with patching the mangled flesh of his outer thigh back together – lucky for him, the distance had been enough that the pellets of the slug had dispersed, catching his leg with a painful spray of side-shot. All that firepower, and he was lucky to get away with little more than a graze. But small favors aren’t much when you’re sewing your own skin back together, and by the time Nate is done wrapping some gauze and tape around his leg he’s about had it with the whole thing. He hobbles down the hall, pissed as all get out, and finds a fresh change of clothes before stumbling outside.
Because what makes the most sense to a man after getting shot, is to hop around your town like nothing goddamn happened.
Sunglasses on to block his piercing glare from the gentle souls of Blackwater, Nate doesn’t make it far before he begrudgingly turns around and hobbles back to his front porch, fuming. The man collapses tiredly into the rocking chair kept there – some last holdover from the house’s previous owners – and hoists his injured leg up onto the porch’s railing with a sigh.
What a goddamn miserable day.
Logan isn’t scared so much as he is worried. He has no idea who that wolf was, what it wanted, or if it remembers him. There could be a world of trouble and hurt headed his way, and if he was a smarter man, he’d just pack up and leave. The reality of it is the fact his mark is still out there and he still has a job to do, a promise to keep.
There is also the issue of Nate, who Logan has come to consider a friend, and his potentially hazardous choice in real state. He decides after he’s done asking some questions, he’ll try to goad Nate into moving. Drop a hint, maybe? Ah, hell, Logan has no idea what he’s going to say. It’s not as if he can tell the guy there are monsters in your backyard, get the hell out of dodge.
He’ll figure something out.
Maybe.
He is a distance away, likely unnoticed by the fuming Nate, when Logan sees the Vegas boy hobble back onto his porch. That is one hell of a limp, Logan thinks, and in that moment all of his wandering, hypothesizing thoughts coalesce, condense, and pinpoint onto a conclusion that he hopes to god is just him being a fool.
It is with a bitter conviction that Logan tugs at the rim of a familiar hat and makes his way towards Nate’s home. He keeps his head low, tucked down, like he’s trying to save his eyesight from the glare of the sun. Logan takes a few of the wooden steps but stops short of the main platform.
His hands are in his pocket and he lifts his head. Storm gray eyes lack their usual cheer and there is a seriousness on Logan’s features that speaks to his age. ”That is one hell of a limp you got there, Nate.” It feels like liquid, cold iron is slowly seeping into his gut and Logan’s voice holds a suggestion of an accusation, a conclusion that he has not directly addressed. He looks into the black of Nate’s sunglasses and thinks --
Blue, not brown.
His fool’s conclusion is feeling less and less like his imagination. Logan looks down, swallows, his brows knit and he seems to be thinking, and maybe a little torn over what those thoughts are about. It only lasts a second before his keen, clear eyes are back onto Nate.
”Take your glasses off. You know I hate it when I can't look a man in the eye." The flat statement is followed with a humorless, lopsided smile and Logan laments his straight-forward nature.
It’s only a moment or two later when Nathan’s thoughts of drinks – that he really should have brought something out if he’s gonna mull around in a rocker, something appropriately southern; a mint julep – are unceremoniously interrupted by a familiar stranger. A one-time friend. With a face and a smell and a flash of pain all combined, the memories strike home and strike true; the man remembers what he did the night before, or at least remembers enough to assume.
Logan. Logan had been there, and Logan had nearly shot his leg off – though, Nate muses, he can’t really blame him.
Nate’s ready this time. He’s been caught one too many times unprepared as of late, and it’s rubbing him the wrong way – but not now. This time, when his searching hand slides into the hidden breast pocket of his jacket, his questing fingers find their mark… upon his carton of Marlboros. Casually, slowly, he withdraws the small box and taps out a cigarette, a lighter produced a moment later, and he takes a deep drag before nodding in acknowledgement of Logan’s presence – and statement.
What more is there to hide? Logan could have assumed anything he liked, had he been more mundane, but the steel in his voice and the look in his eye tells Nathan all he needs to know – that Logan is more aware than Nate could have ever assumed, and this whole friendship is about to crash and burn. He can make no other conclusion about their meeting in the woods, both on the trail of some other wolf in the night; and Nate’s nose knows Logan is no lycanthrope.
He wonders, idly, if Logan will kill him, and is somewhat frightened by his own calm. Logan does have that effect on him.
Always willing to acquiesce, Nathan slips off his sunglasses and hangs them from his collar before returning Logan’s hard gaze. The lines on his face have smoothed some since their shared journey out west, but there’s a solemn sadness reflected there that is strikingly familiar. It’s just the source that’s different; a confused betrayal that almost mirrors the older man’s. He drops his hand to the armrest, cigarette still burning, and offers up his most inviting smile.
”I don’t let friends stand on the threshold. C’mon up.” Nate shift as he speaks, dropping his bum leg back to the ground with a wince, and shrugs at any proffered – knowing – glances. He waves the man onward encouragingly - c'mon, he won't bite.
”Not as bad as it could have been. But I guess you already know that.”
Logan catches those blue eyes and he holds them, and wonders how he didn’t make the connection earlier. It makes no sense for him to think such things because there was no possible way for him to know, but it explains why he felt like he’d seen a ghost after the encounter. He isn’t sure what he’s feeling at the moment and he sure as hell doesn’t understand why his chest is full of something that stings disturbingly bitter like betrayal.
Really, he has no business feeling betrayed. A few days spent sharing stories on the interstate does not equate to a lifetime of knowing one another. Everyone has their secrets and Logan hasn’t exactly been completely forward. Still, the bitterness lingers, and part of Logan thinks maybe he should be angrier or more upset. Mostly he just feels bewildered and at a loss.
Nate invites him up and makes like he’s hurt, and Logan feels an instant pang of guilt. He latches onto that feeling because guilt means something here, he isn’t sure what exactly, but it means something. ”You should probably go to the hospital, if you’ve haven’t.” Logan thinks Nate probably hasn’t, and considers that a special level of stupid, but he keeps the rebuff to himself.
He sits in the chair next to Nate and stares out into Blackwater, and it’s here the two men likely fall into an awkward silence with plenty of false starts to conversations swimming around in their respective heads. Logan is reminded of the time he got into a fistfight with his best friend. Logan’s father dragged him over to apologize and the two boys just sat there in brooding silence until one of them finally swallowed their pride.
“Ah, hell, Nate.” Logan breathes out in exasperation, turns a pair of vexed eyes onto the younger man.”I’m sorry I shot you.” He means it, despite everything. ”Couldn’t react in time when you pulled away.”Logan leaves it at that because as much as he thinks it means something that Nate called off his attack, there are still questions lurking in his mind. Questions like-- what Nate was doing out there in the first place. Questions like-- what if it hadn’t been someone Nate knew, if it hadn’t been Logan.
Someone might be dead.
Logan wants to think Nate could not be capable of such things but after last night’s display, he isn’t so sure, and that uncertainty swallows him down into a state of disquiet that he thinks is best not to analyze.
There’s a ghost of familiarity about this whole situation, about the friends he chooses to keep and the problems he makes for himself. What the hell sort of hand was life dealing him, leading Nate to first Julian, and now Logan? As if he had enough luck to turn yet another dangerous acquaintance into a friend, or at least weasel out of getting seriously hurt – and Julian had only given in after Nathan had saved his life. Round two doesn’t look nearly as favorable, given that Nate had only rescued Logan from himself.
The only positive outcome Nathan can hazard to believe in is that Logan will simply leave him in peace, and he finds he’s not satisfied with that result.
But dealing with Logan’s particular brand of werewolf-related sentiment is something Nate has ample experience with. There’s no protest of denial, and even his brief sense of pain at feeling lied to is fading in the face of logic: what reason would Logan have had to reveal this to him? If he points a finger at his friend, he must also point it at himself. Nate knows this, but emotion is fickle, even if the idea dampens it. The hurt remains.
Nate responds with something like a scoff, shrugging the notion of a hospital away with a dismissive wave of his hand. ”You’re a bad shot, Duvall. And it’s not the first time I’ve patched myself up.” A pause, lips pressed thin. ”…Though the first under those circumstances.” He hopes the implication is clear: he doesn’t exactly make a habit of pulling down lost humans in the moonlight. Far from it.
He leans back into his chair with a sigh as Logan joins him, feeling a wash of relief at his stay of execution, the cigarette calming his agitated heart. They sit, two men in silence on a southern front porch, words and questions unspoken and palpable in the air between them. When Logan speaks again, Nathan meets his frustrated gaze with a raised brow and a self-conscious smile, embarrassed at his own admission.
”Don’t worry about it – I think I asked for it. I’m sorry about… the whole thing,” he waves his cigarette for effect, a gesture to encompass the entire night previous and every mistake. Hesitant, Nate lowers his voice as well as his eyes. ”That doesn’t happen. My wolf remembered you, it’s the only reason it got that close to begin with.” He hates it, admitting the wolf is something else, something both inside and outside of him; hates talking about it like some other thing to Logan. He inhales deeply from his cigarette, letting the conversation sit, standing between them like an unfinished wall.
”…D’you want to come in for a drink?”
Logan is quiet for a good long while. He has listened to everything Nate’s said and if it takes him a while to internalize hidden phrases and unspoken admissions, Logan figures he deserves to take his time. It shouldn’t hit him this hard, given his choice of occupation. There is no way to tell what has his stomach pulling into tight knots. Could be the guilt from shooting Nate. Could be the hypocritical bite of anger born from the nature of secrets. Could be he’s just upset they had to find out this way.
A suspicious nature is a requirement when it comes to what Logan does – werewolf hunting. The most innocent and unassuming person can often turn out to be the worst sort of monster. He gets what Nate is implying, that he’s not like that, that last night was a fluke, an unfortunate happenstance. Logan wants to believe him and he supposes wanting is a start. Still, he feels like he’s been unmasked before he was ready to show is true face, and it is hopelessly uncomfortable. Nate likely feels the same.
He should leave because that’s what Logan does when things get difficult between him and his so-called friends. In a small diner in Ash Fork, Arizona, Logan admitted to as much. Talked about how people weren’t quite so familiar to the point they felt like strangers. Gray eyes turn to look at Nate and while the younger man understandably doesn’t feel quite so familiar, he doesn’t feel like a stranger.
And so when Nate invites him in for a drink, Logan stands and offers him a hand up, aims to pull one of Nate’s arms over his shoulders and wrap his own arm around the younger man’s waist. He knows it’s best Nate keep his weight off of the injury.
”I would rather get a look at your leg.” He admits while stepping inside of Nate’s home. ”Don’t care if you’re a certified doctor, shotgun flak can cause all sorts of trouble.” Logan is being patronizing but Nate’s wound gives him something to focus on and he can’t help but be worried. Werewolf healing mojo –if it even exists—be damned, stray shrapnel can lead to infections and fevers, and worse.
There’s still that lingering hesitance, an uncertainty that Nate can’t fully dismiss and throw away; trust has bitten him back more than a few times in the last few years, and as much as Logan is suspicious, the feeling is mutual. Regardless, he accepts the offered hand and holds himself tight against the other man, hobbling – with assistance – back indoors and into his living room. He collapses on the worn couch with a sigh, and pulls the coffee table closer to put his leg out straight.
”There’s some beers in the fridge, if you want anything. It’s all free game.”
But the hunter’s all business and no pleasure. Nate groans in disapproval at Logan’s continued insistence that he check out his wound, but bites back making another mocking joke at his bad aim – because clearly Logan is just trying to check how much he hit, right? Still, it’s an awkward part of his body to have cleaned up by himself, and he’s comfortable enough with the older man to give in; he clambers back to his feet, with a sigh. Rolling his shoulders back, Nate unclasps his belt and unceremoniously drops his pants.
What? Logan had totally asked for it.
”Here,” he grunts, hiking up the side of his boxers to peel back the gauze padding and show off the very obvious wounds left behind, carefully cleaned and stitched closed. It certainly isn’t pretty, but Nate’s at least attempted to take care of it. ”You have a lot of experience with this sort of thing…?” His tune is more joking than accusing – as if he patches up any of the werewolves he’s ever shot.
”I’ve been shot before. Doing my job, that is.” Not as a wolf – never as a wolf. And definitely not by friends running around with shotguns in the woods, but he's been around violence to know he got insanely lucky. ”…You think it’s that bad?” Nate cranes his neck to try and stare at his own leg, but just ends up losing his balance and throwing a hand out against the back of the couch. This day probably would have gone better if he'd just never gotten out of bed.
Nate is so damned feckless and brazen when he drops his pants that Logan looks away like some sort of inexperienced virgin. The frustration and annoyance are back but this time they spring from a different source. The old hunter is no stranger to want but it’s difficult because he has to be the friend here, the support. It’s an irritating joke of the universe that Logan is slotted to become a father figure to just about everyone. Makes him feel like a bull put out to pasture, like he’s no longer in his prime – and maybe he isn’t and that’s the worst of it all.
”It kind of goes with the vocation.” Logan’s voice acts as Nate’s opposite; it is humorless, serious. He takes a knee near Nate, means to get up close and personal with his unfortunate handiwork. Calloused, rough fingers touch here and there, testing while his eyes look for any indications of impending rot or infection. ”I only kill the bad ones. ” There will be no right time to address the elephant in the room so Logan just goes for it while he’s down there free from Nate’s eye contact. ”The ones that can’t control themselves.” He’s looking at the stitches now and wondering how Nate managed so well at what had to be an odd angle. ”I don’t go looking for trouble. Don’t want it, do my best to avoid it.” He says the following with a hint of remorse, ”But sometimes I find it anyway.”
He would prefer Nate head to the hospital for proper care but somehow knows that’s not going to happen. The stitches, while not pretty, will work as long as Nate doesn’t do anything stupid and put too much stress on them. “You’re fine.” An innocent observation that Logan instantly regrets. He is out of sorts enough to feel like he’s coming on to Nate without coming on to Nate, at what is a supremely inappropriate time. ”Your leg is fine.” He quickly amends and stands up, and still feels like he needs to make his intentions clear. ”What I mean to say is you did a good job patching yourself up. Should be fine, so long as you take it easy for a while.”
The two men are toe to toe and Logan’s gray eyes are looking into blue. The unrelenting directness of Logan’s stare can often be unsettling. His features are stone cold but there appears to be conflict lurking somewhere in the lines of his features. Whatever ghost is hanging over his head is banished when Logan breaks eye contact and steps away.
”I should get going. My wolf is still out there.” And he still has a job to do. It is a damned good excuse to turn tail and run. ”I’ll give you my cell number.” Once again he feels the ridiculous need to establish he’s just trying to be the friend – no ulterior motives. ”So you can call me if you need help.” He finishes lamely.
There can’t help but be only awkward silence in response to Logan’s matter-of-fact statements, the werewolf keenly aware of the man’s fingers on his thigh. It’s enough that each prod elicits a hiss of exhalation in teeth-gritting pain, muscled through. Like a man. The sharp reminders are enough to keep his thoughts from wandering too far, grounded home, and the conversation only reinforces that. He certainly hadn’t meant to be any added trouble in Logan’s life.
An opportunity comes to break the tension, and Nate seizes it, desperate.
”You shared a bed with me, Duvall.” He can’t help the smirk that plays on his lips, reflected in his tone. ”A little leg action making you uncomfortable, or should I stick to keeping my ankles covered?” Nate wants to set Logan at ease so badly, but the gestures seem to keep falling flat; won’t share a beer, won’t cop a feel. Won’t joke about his ankles. What’s this relationship coming to?
”…Yeah,” he manages finally, and for lack of ability to see Logan out, Nate just sinks back to his couch and waves a hand at the door. ”Hope you’ll forgive me if I just, y’know, stay here.” And didn’t move for the rest of the day. ”…Good luck on your hunt.” I think. If Logan is telling the truth – and Nate is inclined to believe him, as it can’t just be his good looks that have kept him alive – he does have some support for the man’s crusade. That doesn’t make it feel any less twisted. He takes down Logan’s number when it’s offered, punching it into his cell phone, but more for nostalgia’s sake three months down the road than in any belief he’ll need the man’s aid.
”...Stop by, got it? Before you go.” Wherever it is Logan will end up next, it’s likely far from Blackwater. Nate’s eyes seek the hunter’s out one last time, shrouded.
Because he knows Logan will go.
