Bitten twice shy (the change series 3 )

Chapter 5: Pain pain pain

Molly

I was delirious and constantly in and out of consciousness, pain ripped through my whole body and I felt like I was on fire. It went on for hours and hours, I felt like I was in literal hell but part of me stayed focused on the fact I was still glad I had done this, that after this I could be with Trick as a proper mate, I would be safe around him, and he wouldn’t be worrying about how close we could get while he was in wolf form.

My insides felt strange, like I could feel things moving around inside of me, white hot pain burned through me as what felt like my rib cage scraped across my skin inside.

“She’s about to change!” Grayson said, with Kai’s help he uncuffed me and got me onto the floor on all fours. I already knew what to do because I’d watched Paula go through it, for her, it had failed and left her wheelchair bound, for me, it would be so much worse if I couldn’t get through it.

“Work with the pain, not against it,” Grayson kept repeating to me.

He got everyone out of the cage and locked it, speaking to me through the bars he said, “just remember that Molly, work with it, the second you try to fight the pain you’ll be dead, let it flow through you.”

Ok, let it in, I can do that. I feel my bones break and realign, and I scream, I dig my nails into the ground and shouldn’t have because they break and add more pain, I scream and scream, I don’t think I can do this, no, I can’t, Trick was right, everything’s becoming so loud, I can hear the very blood rushing through my veins, worse I can hear my bones breaking inside, I can hear all sorts of weird and disturbing noises going on inside of my body and I don’t like it.

I panic, I want to rock, but I can’t, my body won’t let me, I want to flap my hands, but I can’t do that either, all I can feel is pain and there is so much noise! So much noise pounding through my ears, my head hurts, I can’t think, I can’t breathe, I need it all to stop! Everything goes black and I pass out.

I wake up and try to cry, but I can’t, my face feels strange like it’s being bashed in with a hammer, every bone and muscle and tissue in my face feels like it is being torn and broken and stretched. I’m drowning in pain and noise. I faintly recall seeing Grayson above me holding defibrillators in his hands, had he shocked me back to life? Had I died?

“Molly, focus!”

Trick’s voice, I cling to that, I cling to him, I think of him, being with him, how happy we will finally be, I think of Jerry and Paula, how much they need me, they can’t lose another family member. I use my autism, Trick thought it would be what killed me because of the sensory overload of such a transformation, he was right, it almost did, but having autism meant I also fixate on things a lot, to an obsessive level at times, I fixate on Trick, on my niece and nephew, I fixate on what is at the end of this pain, I have no idea if it works or helps or if I just get lucky, but I feel my bones sliding into place, pain is still there, but my bones don’t feel like they are all wrong anymore, I look down at my hands, they look deformed and wrong, I see fur slowly covering them, not wrong, paws, they’re paws, I feel fur spreading across the rest of my body, pain slowly fades away and when it’s finally over I collapse to the floor exhausted.

I don’t stay exhausted for long, I become scared and confused, I look around this strange place, see strange creatures on two legs, what were they? They were making strange noises I couldn’t understand, everything is black and white, everything is noisy, the sound of my claws on the floor, the sound of breathing in the room, the sound of movement above.

Slowly my vision turns to some colour again, not much, and slowly I’m able to think as me again, and not just as a wolf, I hear someone whisper in both disbelief and relief, “she f.ucking did it.” Not just someone, Trick, my mate. He smells so good, he smells like the crisp cold air on a rainy day, vanilla, the forest, male, very male with a hint of sandalwood and violence. The last one surprises me, how can violence have a smell? Yet, I knew that’s what I was smelling, was it some kind of pheromones he gave off? I don’t know, but it’s an oddly nice smell, I guess I would be learning new smells that I never knew existed.

I whined softly at Trick, and Grayson opened the cage. Trick crushed me against his chest holding me so tightly, my fur felt wet, had he been crying? Trick never cried, I didn’t think he COULD cry. I licked his face and he laughed, “of all the people who become a werewolf, of course it would be you that acts like a puppy.”

I nuzzled my face against his neck and he stroked my head and kissed it. “I love you so much, babe,” he murmured.

Grayson bent down and said, “you are so f.ucking lucky Molly, it’s a f.ucking miracle you survived, your heart stopped, you were dead for almost a minute and when I revived you, the change shouldn’t have still been going on, the minute you died it should have stopped the change process and been a failed attempt, I don’t know if it’s because Trick bit you a second time and got so much saliva in your bloodstream, or something else, whatever the f***k it was you’re lucky, the strain on your heart after being revived and still being brutalised by the change, you shouldn’t even still be breathing.”

“How is it possible she’s still here?” Kai asked.

“I think she got extremely lucky, she already got through most of the change before she died, when I brought her back the change was almost complete, there wasn’t much longer for her to suffer through, the healing effects must have kicked in too, they must have because I don’t know how else she didn’t have heart failure or a heart attack.”

“Let’s focus on the positive, I’m sure Molly could do with that right now,” Natasha smiled.

“Yeah, I’ll go change,” Trick said and then to me, he grinned, “meet me outside sweetheart.”

Grayson stood up and said, “I would usually run with you, teach you how to adjust in your wolf form, but I guess Trick can, you and me can run together another time.”

I gave a soft whine of acknowledgement, and he laughed softly, “you really don’t behave like a wolf.”

I noticed no one touched me, only Trick had. I tried to go to Natasha to try and find a way to ask her, but obviously, I couldn’t speak. I did a lot of head titling to show I was confused, I rubbed my body along her legs and looked up at her tilting my head again.

It took her a few tries, and she finally asked, “are you trying to figure out why we aren’t touching you?”

I tried to give a nod and she laughed. “Ah, remember we said we don’t like to be touched in wolf form? We are just respecting you and your space, Tricks different because you two see one another as mates, he is your mate now right?”

I gave another awkward nod, and she grinned, “that’s why he feels comfortable touching you the same way he would if you were human, it’s the same for you too now, you can touch him safely when he’s in wolf form.”

There was a little side entrance back down the tunnel that led to this room, Grayson opened it up for me and said, “you’ll find Trick outside, if you can’t, remember to use your nose.”

I went out into the fresh air and breathed in the night air, it was a gorgeous smell, so was the forest, I could smell everything, I could smell the earth, the trees, the leaves, if I breathed in deep enough I could just faintly smell traffic in the far distance.

I caught Tricks scent and excitedly ran towards it, I found him waiting in wolf form by the forest. I was running happily towards him and then slowed down, anxiety grew in the pit of my stomach, what if he still didn’t want me? What if he still might hurt me? I slowed to a walk and when I was a couple of feet away I lifted one paw in the air and kept it there, too afraid to take another step.

Trick padded towards me and my instinct was to bare my fangs and give a soft growl, a warning to stay away from me, I was afraid he would hurt me.

He slowed his pace but kept coming, he ducked his head low and giving me a soft whine he came and nuzzled my neck. His tongue licked across my mouth, a wolf’s version of a kiss and my fear subsided, he liked me. I whined happily and wagged my tail, he saw my tail swishing and snorted, I think he was laughing. He jerked his head towards the forest and turned to go inside, wanting me to follow and I did.