C8 FRIENDSHIP

PRESENT

That night, Jack could do nothing but stay locked in his room, trying to distract himself and thinking about the possibility that he was a murderer. No one could know about his involvement in the case, or about Kurt. He didn't have to deal with it, they were wolves after all. Werewolves didn't exist and all of humanity knew that, there was no way to find out anything. Unless one day he was captured as a wolf and magically woke up as a human, his life would end there. He tried not to rush. He got into his notebook and looked at some news already published by the company about what had happened. On the home page, a wall had been created, but it was anonymous. The whole company began to share their grief, lamenting the death of the boys.

Logged into his account, Jack tried to leave the most sincere comment he could, even though he hated them, but the guilt was too consuming for him to do anything about it. A few minutes later, he saw that Kurt had left a short text as well. Finally, after the exhaustion, he needed to relax and take a shower more calmly.

While he was in the shower he realized that the smell was in the air, the strong smell of wolf was there, and his breath gasped for a few seconds. Seconds were enough to terrify him. As the water ran down his body, Jack tried to calm himself down, he didn't even know why he needed to do this, but he knew he did. He counted to ten, slowly. “You're all right,” he repeated to himself. “You're all right,” he repeated. “You're okay,” and he kept going, until the fifth time he growled. Quickly, Jack stepped out of the shower, dried himself off, and paused for a moment. His breathing was still irregular. He tried to count to ten again, but he had barely reached five and the growling sound happened again.

His fear grew as he walked to the bed, trying to breathe, attempting to calm himself, but he could not. In a few seconds, he returned to the bathroom and splashed some cold water on his face to improve the situation, but it had no effect. The smell of wolf began to fill the air more and more, and his breathing became even heavier. When he returned to his room, he was surprised by the ringing of his smartphone. It was Kurt, calling. Without a second thought, he answered the phone.

“Jack, something's going on, isn't it? I'm feeling a weird tingling,” Kurt asked, his breathing heavy as well. Jack said he couldn't breathe properly, his voice indicating the truthfulness of the information. “Try to calm down, try to think of something. I'm feeling something peculiar too, I've locked myself in the room,” Kurt told over the call. Jack, still struggling, told his partner that his teeth and claws had already grown in and that his body was twitching too fast. “What? No, Jack, you can't, not in the morning, please don't change, just try, I don't know, maybe, damn, I don't know, man,” his concern was clear, as was his gasping for breath. Jack set out to answer one more time, but couldn't.

Jack screamed and dropped the device and Kurt tried to contact, but Jack was already writhing on the floor, struggling against his new skin, unable to do anything. Kurt could hear everything, every scream, every growl, but it was still Kurt. For a moment, all sounds ceased. “Jack?” asked the voice on the other end of the line. All he heard back were growls, and he knew Jack was no longer there, the wolf was. He ended the call.

Jack spent the early morning hours as a wolf, trying not to break anything in the apartment or make any noise that would disturb the neighbors. He possessed a little conscience at that moment. He thought that Kurt had transformed too, but was surprised hours later.

First Kurt knocked on Jack's door, but there was no answer, so he decided to open it since he had a copy of the key. There was nothing strange in the environment, everything seemed normal. He didn't hear any strange sounds. He went a little further inside and found his smartphone turned off, which justified the missed calls. Suddenly, he heard a noise coming from the bathroom, someone vomited. He walked over and opened the door to find Jack sitting on the floor, human and almost naked, vomiting into the toilet bowl. “You're all right, thank God,” Kurt relieved himself. “I was anxious”. Jack said that he had turned back into a human a few minutes ago. Because he was more conscious than normal, he could feel the backlash of the change and claimed it hurt less, but it was unbearable just the same. Kurt helped him up from the floor. Kurt then told him that he had felt strong indications of transformation, but that he had not changed, while Jack told his version of the shower. “I'm sorry, man. I'm truly sorry,” Kurt said, slapping his friend lightly on the back.

Last year, Kurt barely knew who Jack was, and Jack barely knew who Kurt was. They were in the industry together but were limited only to work. All Kurt knew about Jack was that his family had a good reputation and that he suffered from some things he didn't like to talk about. He had no interest in him and no other people. He liked to be alone. Jack also liked to be alone, but whether he liked that or not, no one knew. At the time, the company was already prominent and the two of them were already part of the team.