Werehouse
     Part 2
by Randy McSporran

It was just starting to rain as James walked silently along the bank of the river, hands thrust deep into his jeans pockets. The old man had paid him £500 for the whole deal. Getting Danni into the warehouse into the first place and then getting her back later, after her...Well, after whatever had happened. Looking out over the water he remembered the dead look in her eyes as she emerged from the warehouse just the other day and the terrible shock when she had changed. But most of all he remembered the pitiful howling as they had locked her into the underground cell and walked away, and the way Gaz had laughed. With a deep sigh he pulled the wad of cash out of his pocket and threw it into the river, waiting for the swirling current to carry it away before moving on.

The door to Danni's cell was slowly sliding open as she regained consciousness. She fought through a drug addled mind and hazy vision to recognize the man in the lab coat framed in the doorway. He removed some items from his inside pocket then stepped over the filth that covered the cold metal floor to approach Danni's hunched figure. Danni groaned as she saw the man's toothless grin and started to close her mind off from the impending pain.

"Just a quick looksee for now lass", he rasped. "No need to get your knickers in a twist".

He laughed feebly at his own joke; Danni was naked.

"Please...no more".

"It's too late to complain now dearie, the disease has already taken a hold. It won't be too long before we have to move you into one of our 'special' rooms".

Danni looked briefly at the filth encrusted, windowless metal cube that had been her home for what seemed like a year and tried not to think about what the special room might be. The old man was at Danni's side now and she shuddered as she felt his leathery hands on her body, rubbing up and down her arms and legs.

"Looks like you could do with a razor girlie".

Danni didn't respond, she just lifted her head slightly to see what the man was talking about. Her legs were much hairier than normal, she must have been locked away down here for days, surely someone was
looking for her by now.

"I know what your thinkin' lass, but no ones gonna come a lookin' for you, we had people take care of that", the old man said with a leer as he lifted Danni's lips to inspect her teeth. Danni didn't really know what he was talking about, but the meaning was clear. She was in trouble, and she was completely alone. 

Jenny grinned as she slid into the driver's seat of her Dads new BMW, normally she'd never be allowed to drive anything let alone this but since her folks were away for the weekend.... She glanced at her reflection in the rear view mirror then adjusted it slightly to get a better look at herself. Finding nothing wrong she smiled to herself,
shifted the mirror back to see down the drive, and gently slid the car into reverse. Idly she turned on the radio, more interested in passing the time than listening to anything in particular. Jenny wondered if Danni would be there tonight, she hadn't seen her in about a week. Probably still embarrassed about what had happened
between them. Jenny sighed, it hadn't really bothered her all that much, but it was gonna be difficult to bring the subject up to let Danni know that, especially if she never left her house.

Danni wasn't there, neither were James or Gaz, but as Jenny walked into the pizza place she saw just about all of her other friends. 

"Sorry I'm late guys, I had to wait for my parents to leave before I could nick the car", Jenny said with a grin as she joined the others.

"Don't worry about it, it's not like you missed anything interesting", said Phil.

"So what exactly did I miss?".

"Like I said..."

"Nothing interesting, yeah I know", Jenny smiled.

Jason smiled back "we just ordered and tried to decide what to do tonight".

"So what did you come up with?" asked Jenny.

Clive answered "about the best we could think of was either going to the cinema or heading back to my place and having an orgy".

"Aren't your parents at home?" someone at the other and of the table asked.

"Yeah...but they wouldn't mind, hell they'd probably join in".

Jason looked at Clive "sometimes you disturb even me".

"Thank you my friend".

"What's showing tonight anyway?" said Sara, changing the subject.

"Um...American werewolf in Paris or...I don't know. Some girly romance thing" David helpfully answered.

"I think we should see that werewolf one" said Jenny, a peculiar gleam in her eye.

Amy gave Jenny a strange look "I thought you hated horror movies?"

"What?....um...yeah. I don't know, I just feel like watching a werewolf movie". Jenny stammered and then cleared her throat. A wave of heat had passed through her body, gone as quick as it had arrived.

"Ok", said Jason "the cinema it is then".

At that point an ugly woman arrived with the pizzas.

"Anyone order something with plenty of meat on it?" asked Jenny hopefully.

When Danni next woke up she found herself strapped back onto the table from her original visit to the warehouse. Only this time two more of the beds were occupied as well, but unfortunately the only light in the room that was on was directly over her head, making it impossible to see anything other than their covered shapes. Danni struggled with the leather straps at her wrists and ankles that were holding her down, and at the noise a shadow detached itself from near one of the other beds and moved over to Danni's side. Danni stopped
struggling expecting to see the old man leering at her, instead a young woman appeared out of the shadows and smiled warmly at her. The woman was pretty enough and would have been more so if it weren't for
the fact that she appeared to have been working far to hard for far too long.  The woman reversed the chair by Danni's bedside and sat astride it.

"Good morning", she said "how are we feeling today?"

"Scared, confused and altogether pissed off since you ask" Danni responded bitterly.

"Of course, I'm sorry. I used to be a nurse a long time ago, I guess some of the bedside manner training is a little hard to shake off.

Let's start again shall we?" without waiting for a reply she carried on. "My name's Claire and I'm what you might call an assistant to Jacob".

"Jacob?" Danni asked.

"You know, the old man who keeps looking in on you".

Danni thought 'looking in on' was much too nice a way of describing the things that that man did to her, but decided it'd probably be best to keep such thoughts to herself. At least until she decided whether this Claire was a friend or foe. 

"Oh" she said.

"Anyway I help him with his research and he helps me with my...um...little problem".

"Little problem?"

"mmm"

"Who are these other people here?"

Claire glanced around at the other beds, "You seem to have started a trend since you volunteered to help Jacob".

Volunteered? "I see", said Danni slowly, keeping her feelings in check. "What exactly is your little problem if you don't mind my asking?"

"The same as you of course", said Claire pushing up the thick sleeves of her sweater to expose forearms thickly covered with blond hairs from the wrists right the way up to her elbows, she caught Danni's gaze on her.

"Believe me I've tried shaving, creams, everything but it always grows right back, I've got the disease"

"What disease?" Said Danni, even though she was fairly sure of the answer. 

Claire grinned exposing teeth that were just slightly sharper than is natural for a human, "I'm a werewolf".

Jenny walked slowly through the foyer of the cinema, feeling strangely trapped. As much as she wanted to watch a film about people turning into animals (she didn't even want to think about why that concept suddenly started making her feel aroused), she had a strong urge just to run around naked out side. Jason walked up to her side and playfully put his arm around her waist "why you lookin' so glum?" he asked.

"Hmm? Just feeling a little restless is all" answered Jenny moving closer into Jason's embrace.

"You wanna leave these guys to it and go get a room somewhere?" Jason said with a wide smile.

The idea instantly appealed to Jenny who was starting to feel warm again, but she resisted, "I don't think Joanne would be too keen on that do you?" she said with a grin.

"Probably not, but it'd be worth the risk".

Jenny laughed.

"There I put a smile back on your face, let's go enjoy the film".

Danni frowned slightly, "disease?".

"Yeah, you know, like aids or something" said Claire putting her hand on Danni's forehead to gauge her temperature.

"I thought being a werewolf was just something you were, like what colour hair you had. Actually no, scratch that. I thought werewolves were just some made up story or myth of some kind. However recent personal experiences would have me believe the contrary....so if it's a disease that means it can be cured right?" Even as the words left her mouth she knew it was pointless to hope. Even if there was a cure there was no way the old man...Jacob...had infected her just to have her return to normal a few days later.

Claire reversed her hand and moved it slowly and gently down the side of Danni's face. Danni felt the prickling of small hairs on her skin but couldn't tell whether they were sprouting from the back of the nurse's hand or from the side of her own face. 

"No", said Claire. "No cure, not yet. That's one of the things Jacobs working on".

She stood up slightly from the chair and leaned over Danni's bound form.

"You know you really are a pretty young thing," Claire said turning her head so that she could look directly into Danni's eyes.

Despite the terrible situation and the absurd shift in conversation Danni couldn't help but become a little turned on by the other woman's sudden advances.  She knew that it was probably due to whatever Jacob had done to her, the disease as Claire had strangely put it, but that didn't help. She squirmed slightly pressing her
thighs tightly together and moaned. 

"That's quite enough of that you two, going on like bitches in heat".

Jacob appeared behind Claire and grabbed at her shoulder, pulling her up.

"Go and see to number sixteen", he rasped in her ear.

"Number sixteen?" Claire sounded confused.

"The little boy, you stupid girl". Jacob roughly pushed her in the direction of one of the other occupied beds and watched her stumble off in that direction before taking her seat next to Danni.

"Bitches in heat" he mumbled to himself with a chuckle, and then louder "Now then girlie what have you been up to hmm?"

The movie had been playing for about a half hour now and Jenny wasn't impressed at all to say the least. The plot of the film intrigued her certainly, but it was the way it was carried out that ruined it for her. The special effects in particular. She remembered walking in on her older brother once when he was watching the original and, not realizing why she suddenly cared so much, she thought that computers had a long way to go before they could make transformations look as realistic as could be achieved with make up and prosthetics. And so
her attention wandered.

"Your assistant there was just about to explain what the hell it is you're doing to me". Said Danni, her courage somewhat restored by the normalcy of her conversation with Claire.

"Was she indeed?" said Jacob unhelpfully, "it didn't look that way to me".

"Well...she...." Danni struggled to find a way to defend Claire's actions, unsure of why she was doing so.

"Don't worry about it lassie, it's that time of the month for her. You too I see". Jacob leered.

"Eh?"

"Full moon my girl. Does strange things to someone in your condition". The old man explained.

"I'm a werewolf right?" Said Danni, not a trace of sarcasm in her voice.

"Not exactly, you've got a disease; the symptoms of which emulate, as you say, werewolfism. Indeed it may well be that this disease is the source of all the werewolf legends". The old man paused, "feel better now?" he asked cheerily.

"Not really, not unless you're planning on curing me, apologizing for whatever it is you've done and letting me go", Danni regretted saying that as soon as she saw the look of fury on the old mans face, at any other time it might have been comical seeing a shrunken, wrinkled head with only a few remaining teeth scowling in anger, but Danni was well aware of what this particular man was capable of. Jacobs's anger dissipated quickly, replaced with a smile of anticipation. Standing up he grabbed the sheet covering Danni's naked body and wrenched it off of her onto the floor. 

"No sense in waiting for nature to take it's course", he said. "Let's hurry things along shall we". It wasn't a question.

Reaching into the top pocket of his grubby lab coat he removed two syringes, he placed one down on the table next to Danni's bed and held the other up to the light, removing it's safety cork. Danni tried to move out of the way as he thrust the first needle into her arm, but the effort was futile, and she grimaced as she felt the
fluid drain into her system. But instead of the pain that usually followed such tests she began to feel a comfortable warmth spread through her body, pretty soon it was more than just comfortable. "nnngh...what was that", Danni said between moans.

"My own private blend of hormones and aphrodisiacs, pleasant isn't it girlie".

But Danni was too caught up in the fierce pleasure, almost bordering on pain, that was coursing through her body. Then she began to feel something else, something she remembered from before, something stirring deep down, a part of her mind trying to free itself. The heat intensified and her skin started to burn like it was on fire.
Danni started to scream but what came out sounded much more like an animal than a human. And as she howled her body tensed and writhed, testing her bonds to their limit as her body become incredibly muscular and her strength increased tenfold. Danni was too far gone in pleasure and pain now to fully realize the extent of the changes in her body, but Jacob stood by watching casually as the first dark strands of hair began to appear on the struggling girls body. He saw it darken first the fleshy parts of her arms and legs, then as that lengthened into fur he saw it spread over the rest of her, over her belly, shoulders and finally onto her face. Danni's back suddenly arched as the lower part of her face pushed itself outwards, forming an animals muzzle. Her next howl exposed her fangs, still bloody from being forced out of unwilling gums. Then it was over and the thing
that was Danni collapsed back onto the bed breathing heavily and glaring at her tormentor.

"Aren't we testy tonight", said the old man, still incredibly calm. "I suppose that's what comes of using women as test subjects".

He sighed and made a few notes on a pad that he had produced from another pocket, then picked up the second syringe.

"I hope for your sake that this works, I've had some terrible failures in the past. Most of which are still alive", he said. 

Although the part of Danni that was still her realized that he didn't really care either way. Her new body barely registered the pain from the second needle, despite the fact that it contained considerably more liquid than the first, but when the effects kicked in she growled in anger, then screamed in pain. Jacob looked over her body
seemingly much more interested in what effect this second injection would have. The pain just kept increasing forcing ice hot needles of agony into Danni's brain, her vision blackened and then, mercifully,
she passed out.

Jenny was almost relieved when the end credits of the film appeared on the screen since, despite the curious attraction she felt towards the beasts, she still felt a desperate urge to get outside. She began
to stand up. "Come on guys, let's get out of here".

"Hang on Jen, they sometimes stick other bits of the film on after the credits", said Clive.

"Yeah remember Liar Liar?" someone else added, but Jenny was no longer paying attention, instead she just sat and fidgeted in her seat as the cast list rolled up the screen. She reached under her seat to the half empty cup of Tango beneath her seat and took a long drink. She tapped the person sitting next to her on the
shoulder. "Wanna drink?" she asked.

"Cheers", said David taking a swig from the proffered drink, noticing Jenny's hand as he did so. For some reason only the tips of her nails had been painted bright red, it almost looked as if they had grown
half an inch during the evening. He passed the cup on down the line of friends at a gesture from Jenny.
By the time it came back it was empty and Jenny threw the cup onto the floor.

Danni came round a few minutes later, back in her original form, if somewhat tired, pale and sweat covered. Her vision cleared and she saw Claire looking at her curiously.

"Feeling better?" She asked.

"No" answered Danni, weakly.

"You should", said Claire. "That's the first time he's ever managed to get the reverse process right, you should see some of the terrible things downstairs, then again maybe not", she added all in one breath, her smile still in place.

Danni raised her head to look directly at the other woman. "Please", she asked "explain to me about this disease".

Claire slumped into the seat with a resigned expression on her face.

"Ok, here goes. You've heard of werewolves right? Of course. Anyway we, that is Jacob and me, figure it's caused by a virus. One that gets into your blood and then slowly changes you into something different, something stronger and better than normal so that the virus in you has a better chance of survival", Claire paused for breath and Danni jumped in, "slowly?".

"Yes well, I'm not explaining this too well am I? You see, this virus is in your blood. And so when something happens that forces your blood to pump around harder and quicker, like excitement or fear, your capacity for which is greatly enhanced, the virus multiplies rapidly and exhibits itself as a sudden transformation, but then when you calm down again parts of the virus die and you change back. Sort of. If you want a proper explanation you'd be better off asking Jacob".

Danni knew just how pointless that would be, "carry on", she said "you're doing just fine, what about the other parts of the legend, full moon and silver and all that?"

Claire took a deep breath and continued, "Most of it has some basis in fact, silver does indeed kill the virus, but after only a couple of hours after infection the virus is so much a part of you that it is you, so to speak. Hence killing it would kill you too. The full moon's just a little bit more complicated, because it does force you into changing and we're not too sure why. Jacob thinks it's something to do with tides, after all if the moon can pull at the sea it wouldn't have too much difficulty in moving your blood around a bit. Anyway the problem is each time it happens, each time you transform I mean, a little bit more of the virus survives and so over time you
slowly start to resemble the werewolf in your normal shape. Or rather your normal shape becomes the same as.....look you can see how it's happened to me, and how it's happening to you". Claire held up her slightly hairy, long nailed hands for inspection and then used them to indicate Danni's own body, which was indeed hairier and more muscular than even that morning.

"Every time you change a little bit more of your humanity slips away, until you eventually become a monster for good, and that's why I'm helping Jacob to help find a cure, to help find me a cure". 

Danni couldn't help but wonder whether Jacob's particular interest in this whole thing was to find a cure or to make things worse.

"But that's not the worst part", said Claire oblivious to the look on Danni's face. "It's very contagious, but only through exchange of body fluids, hence the need to keep you strapped down I'm afraid".

"Very contagious?" Asked Danni remembering through all this horror the tiny bite on Jenny's lip.

"Absolutely, hell you could probably get it just from drinking from the same glass as someone who's infected. Anyway I'd get some rest if I were you. The full moon's gonna come up in a bit".

Danni groaned and lay back on the bed as Claire got up and walked off into the shadows.

As Jenny stepped out of cinema into the cold night she immediately felt a strange feeling in her face which was intensified when she lifted her head to look at the newly risen full moon. A strange itchy feeling crept over her skin, at least that skin which was exposed to the white light cast by the moon. And then suddenly that feeling of
claustrophobia which had slowly been building up through the film reached a crescendo and with a scream Jenny bolted off into the night. She easily jumped the four-foot fence surrounding the car park of the cinema and ran on into the woodland, passing by two teenagers whose beer cans paused on their way to their mouths as Jenny dashed by, leaving a trail of clothes in her wake. "Man did you see that...."

Jenny's friends were left on the stairs at the front of the cinema looking in shock at Jenny's rapidly retreating figure. "You think we should go after her?" Amy asked. 

"I don't know, she looked kinda....weird", David said. 

"Yeah man, and I don't feel none too good", Clive added.

"Me neither", said Sara. "Let's just go home".

"Probably something we ate....good movie though", said Jason.

To be continued…