Sim was sitting up, watching TV. Sim gave him a wide smile when he saw him. Hank's heart lurched. He loved his son, and he knew now how much his son loved him. Yet, he couldn’t ignore the fact he had almost killed his son, and perhaps worse, cursed him. He didn't know if he could forgive himself.
"Why didn't you tell the police the truth, Sim?"
Sim's smile disappeared. "How could I? You may not be my biological dad, Hank, but you are more my father than he ever was." Sim took a deep breath. "When I called you to tell you my real father didn't want anything to do with me, you didn't hesitate before telling me to come back and live with you, though I know how you like your solitude. You could have as easily told me to get lost, but no, you took me in, and raised me as your own."
Tears welled in Sim's eyes. "When mom died, and my real father turned away from me, I lost everything. I had no family, except you. You have done so much for me; I couldn't possibly tell the police anything other than what you told them. I fell out of a tree." Sim wiped the tears from his eyes, and Hank had to do the same. Sim smiled again. "Plus, there is no way they would believe my father turned into a bear and attacked me."
Laughing, Hank smiled at his son.
"I love you, Sim."
"I love you, too... dad," Sim replied.
Crossing the room, Hank gave Sim a huge hug and kissed him on his forehead.
Sim eyes lit up as he remembered something.
"Oh, and can you believe it? My wounds are all healed. The doctor said it was some sort of miracle, or something." Pulling his gown up, he showed Hank where he had been injured, and it was, indeed, unharmed.
Hank's smile faded.
"Let's get you home," Hank told him.
Sim gazed at Hank for a moment, wondering why Hank wasn't happy or surprised he had healed fully. "Umm. Okay." Standing, he went to the closet. Hank brought him a change of clothes, which he hurriedly donned.
It was true. He was totally healed. In fact, he never felt better. It was almost if he was on caffeine pills and pain medication. Feeling no soreness or stiffness, he felt overly awake. Sim didn't understand what was going on, but he was sure Hank knew something he wasn't telling. If it was true, it meant something bothered him about the information, or otherwise he would have told Sim.
Hank was like that. He didn't shield him from much, he pretty much gave him the facts, no matter what they were, even if they hurt Sim's feelings… or his ego. And, though Hank had a short temper with most people, he was somehow able to keep it in check with Sim and expected Sim to also tell him the straight truth, regardless if it hurt or angered him. It was something Sim always admired about him.
So many of his school friends went through life ignorantly unaware of life’s truths. He didn't envy them when they entered the real world and had to fend for themselves. The first times in their lives when someone told them the hard truth, it would crush them.
They arrived home a few hours later. Again, he mentioned how it was amazing he healed so fully to watch Hank's response. Hank wouldn't meet his eyes but nodded. He told Sim since he was feeling so much better, he should get outside and start collecting firewood.
Realizing Hank knew something about his miraculous recovery and didn't want to tell him, made Sim a little pensive. Watching Hank, he walked to the door. Meanwhile, Hank crossed the room to the sink and began to put the flatware away. Still, he wouldn't glance at Sim. Sim frowned and stepped outside into the warm sun, but cold air of northern Canada.
Hank stopped putting the plates away as soon as Sim stepped outside. Standing there, leaning on his hands, he gripped the side of the sink, head bowed. Sim was suspicious he knew more than he was letting on. But, how could he tell him what his fast healing could mean? How could he tell him whatever happened from this point onward was Hank’s fault? Sim would hate him, possibly decide to leave.
Squeezing the sink hard, he forced himself to release his grip, shaking his head. He would tell Sim when the time was right, whenever that was. Turning, he went upstairs to his room. He didn't glance back to see the deep imprints in the steel sink his fingers had made.
Walking deep into the woods, Sim searched for good-sized fallen limbs to take back to the house to use as kindling. Contemplating the meaning of his quick healing, he wondered what Hank's knowledgeable silence meant.
A wide stump, and the remains of an oak tree, uprooted and laying on its side, rested in a swath of destruction where it had fallen. The stump had broken away and been pulled out of the dirt before it finally separated from the rest of the tree, left behind by the force of the falling giant.
The inside of the bole was hollow as it had been for some time for it to snap off during a high wind. A smile broke his face as he approached the stump. Ever since he moved to Canada, one of his favorite past times was to find stumps such as this one and to flip them over, or to try to lift them. Sometimes, as he got older, he could lift them and would attempt to toss them as far as he could.
It was absolute fun. It was something he needed now. Striding over to it, he kicked at the few remaining strands of tree and bark connecting the two. They broke with ease, like snapping toothpicks.
Lowering himself, bending his knees, he wrapped his arms as far around the stump as he could manage. Taking two deep breaths, he held in the third, and lifted. The stump lifted off the ground with such ease; he staggered back a few steps. Sim was stunned for a moment and examined the stump.
The rot devastated the bole, but hadn’t affected the stump, so there was no reason for it to weigh so little. Cautiously, he hefted the stump experimentally a few times. It was like tossing a balloon which was an exaggeration, but it was a lot lighter than it should be.
Sim peered around and found a fairly open area with a few trees and saplings. Taking a few steps forward, he launched the stump with all his might, his muscles bunching and releasing as the stump left his grasp. It arced high into the air and went about twenty feet before slamming into a tree yards away from where he should normally have been able to reach. It hit the tree about ten feet up, which means he could have achieved a lot more distance with his throw.
Not believing his eyes, he stared in the direction the stump. His arm itched a little and he glanced down. The roots of the stump must have dragged across his skin and scratched it in several places.
Numb from the experience, he felt no pain; so instead, he went over to where he had thrown the stump. Upon examining the tree trunk, it was gouged and dented as if run into by a car- a flying car. The stump itself had split partially upon impact.
Again, he lowered himself down and went to reach around the stump. Catching sight of his arm, he noticed the scratches were gone from picking up the stump the first time. Not a single trace left. He stared intently at his arm, as if expecting the scratches to reappear by magic. Staring from his arm to the stump and back again, it was as if something in his head clicked into place.
Standing, he gripped one of the stump’s roots by hand and lifted it easily off the ground. Sim found a much longer opening through the trees and swung the root back, bringing it forward with remarkable speed. When he reached shoulder level, he let go, sending the stump deep within the forest, a lump of nature traveling impossibly through the air.
He couldn't be sure, but he guessed it traveled almost thirty feet before hitting the ground, and rolled another ten, maybe more. He smiled. Realizing what happened to him, he understood why Hank was so hesitant to say anything. He must have thought Sim would be upset. Well, Hank was wrong, Sim wasn't upset, he was ecstatic.
Hank was prone to brooding. There were times he would be in a funk for weeks. Of course, that had been before he met Jennifer. And, like most of his unwanted traits, that, too, disappeared with her lovely smile. When she died, he brooded again for the first time since before her, and he only came out of it because Sim needed him.
He was brooding now. And this time, he didn't know who could bring him out of it. Laying on his bed for over an hour, he had only
gotten up once to go to the bathroom.
As was often when he brooded, he generally ate a lot. It wasn't uncommon for him to put on ten pounds or more during his brooding sessions. A growling stomach forced him away from his bed, he trudged downstairs. His mind was so focused on getting something to eat out of the fridge, he never noticed Sim sitting at the dinner table, waiting for him.
"Have you been able to rapidly heal all your life?"
At the question, Hank's hand froze on the handle of the refrigerator.
"You passed it to me, didn't you? Somehow, when you attacked me, you passed whatever it is to me, right?"
Turning his head, he peered in Sim's direction. It was impossible to read his emotions at the moment, but Hank felt it was the time for the truth.
"I believe so. I don't know for certain." His voice quiet.
"I thought so. I was outside collecting wood and scratched myself. Within moments, those scratches disappeared, so I know what happened today at the hospital wasn't a fluke." Sim glanced at him. "I know you are strong, but are you stronger than you should be, dad?" Sim watched him questioningly.
For the first time, Hank noticed Sim slowly rolling an iron spike back and forth on the table, making a soft drumming noise like a woodpecker searching for insects in the trunk of a tree.
"I don't understand your question."
Sim stood and approached him with the iron spike.
"I mean, can you do this?" Holding the iron spike up, using two hands, he began to bend the spike. Hank’s eyebrows climbed as it did, indeed, bend slowly. Muscles straining slightly, Sim exerted some effort, but didn't appear to be straining at all. Hank's eyes widened in surprise.
"How on earth did you do that?" Hank asked.
"You mean you can't?"
"No. I mean I might be able to bend it a little perhaps." He confessed; his brow furrowed.
Sim’s face scrunched up. "I don't understand. I would have bet anything this was the same thing as the healing, something you passed to me in the attack. I'm sure I couldn't do it before yesterday." Tilting his head in thought. "Here, take it." Sim passed the spike to Hank. "You try it."
Taking the spike from Sim who raised an eyebrow at him and a quick nod. Hank grabbed both ends of the spike and proceeded to pry them apart, to straighten out the spike. It bent with ease. He dropped the spike in surprise, but Sim let out a laugh and clapped his hands together.
"I knew it!" he exclaimed. "But you said you didn't have excessive strength, right?" Hank nodded dumbly. "It means it manifested itself after your transformation." Sim tapped his finger against his bottom lip in thought. "When I realized you transferred the ability to heal rapidly to me and I suddenly had super strength, it was like a light bulb went off in my head.
“Suddenly, I remembered what I learned in psychology. During the early 19th century, many doctors considered lycanthropy a mental disease brought upon by the moon. Because of the effect it had on some people, it moved into the belief, because of the moon, some people changed into werewolves. It was also commonly believed at the time, lycanthropy was a disease transmitted when a werewolf attacked someone, and the person lived through the attack. It appears, somehow those people got it right —lycanthropy is passed through the blood of the victim if they manage to survive an attack of a Werewolf, or Werebear in your case." Sim wore a satisfied smile on his face at the conclusion of his history lesson. Hank was impressed.
"You know, I’ve heard of lycanthropy and werewolves. Though my father told me I carried the curse in me, I never bothered to find out anything about it. In fact, I think I was so embarrassed my father told me something like that, I actively avoided learning about it. Now it seems I shouldn’t have," he concluded.
"Well," Sim began, "the question is now, what do we do with the information?"
It was a question neither one had the answer for, but the decision was going to be decided for them soon enough.
Several weeks passed since the night of the attack and both Sim and he were exhausted over learning all things Were. They spent an inordinate amount of their free time together to research as much as they could. The information they found was sparse, at best. Were-creatures were beings of legends. No one had reliably witnessed one, though there were many who claimed to have seen Werewolves which was the most common, of course, and the most popular. Books, movies, and games all covered the minutia of Werewolves.
Little was mentioned of any other Were-creatures, though they did see some mention of werebears, wererats, and weretigers. Most fabled information was centered on Celtic mythology.
It was said the Druids were shape shifters and could take the forms of beasts of nature. This, for the most part, was one of the origins of the myth — of Druids taking the form of beasts and humans shifting into half human/half animal forms.
The problem was the Druids, for the most part, kept no written histories. Everything was passed down verbally. And, like all things to get passed down in this manner, they were subject to the teller’s interpretation.
After several weeks of in-depth study, both Sim and Hank believed they were well versed in all things involving lycanthropes, from myth to supposed scientific studies. In the end, there was nothing conclusive.
There was one sticking point they both could agree on. Almost all information surrounding lycanthropy tied it directly with the full moon. However, when he first transformed there was no full moon.
Neither one could make a guess as to why it was. Either the mythology got it all wrong, or there was something else to trigger it. They were going to find out this evening, though. For tonight was a full moon, the first one since Hank's transformation and his subsequent attack on Sim. Tonight, they would find out if there was any truth to the myth. Sim joked they should call the “Myth Busters” and see if they wanted to prove or bust a huge myth.
Red and yellow flames danced about, creating a ring of glowing trees surrounding Hank and Sim, as Hank dropped a fresh log onto the fire. Sitting across from him, Sim wore a light coat against the night chill. They decided to wait outside for the possible metamorphosis.
So, they sat, enjoying the campfire, both watching the full moon rise over the treetops. Something about it made it seem swollen and fat as it made its steady climb above the horizon. As it was nearing its apex; Sim and Hank were anxious.
"You know, if you are wrong, and I am the only one who changes, I might kill you this time?" He spoke to Sim across the fire.
"I know. But, I'm right," Sim said firmly.
"I hope so. If I start to change and you don't feel anything…" Hank stared at him to emphasize his point. "Run."
Sim snorted. "Obviously."
Hank couldn't help but smirk. Sitting back on his log, he resumed waiting. It didn't take long. A moment later he felt his body break apart as he grunted in pain. Sim watched from across the fire and had come partially off his log. The pain assaulted Hank so intensely he could hardly focus. The one thing he could tell, Sim was not changing. Sim had been wrong.
"Run!" Bellowing out to Sim, he doubled over. The bones within his body thickened and elongated; his muscles and skin adjusted to compensate. Sim stared at Hank for another moment, turned and ran.
Two steps and Sim cried out, crashing to the ground, sliding before coming to rest in a fetal position.
Somewhat aware of what was happening to Sim, pain wracked Hank’s body. Consciousness slipped away, but he clawed his way out of the fog of pain to hold onto himself, barely managing to do so. Slowly, he rose to his full eleven-foot height.
Flexing his arms to the sides, he spread his claws out wide. His paws were huge and the claws jutting from them were sharp and long. Glancing down, he saw his body was covered in fur and heavily muscular. He was most impressive. Parting his maw, he let out a growl that rumbled out over the still night.
A growl answered him, and Hank gazed across the fire to see a bulky figure, almost his mirror, except in size, rear up from the ground. The Werebear across from him was ro
ughly nine feet in height and not nearly as bulky as Hank.
Hank’s eyes grew big and he stepped back at seeing the feral aspect in the eyes of Sim. It was as if his son didn't recognize him. When he launched himself at Hank, leaping across the fire in a hard-headfirst slam, knocking him back, there wasn’t much doubt. Hank twisted as he fell back, pushing Sim off him in one swift move.
"Sim! It's me!" Hank yelled but was forced to dive to the side as Sim charged him. This time Sim reached out and dragged his claws across Hank's abdomen.
Skin and muscle tore as one of the claws tore so deep it scored bone. Rolling, Hank sprang to his feet. He knew he could stop this, but he didn't want to hurt Sim. He tried to reach him one last time.
"Sim! It's your father." Hank watched as Sim turned and made to pounce once more.
"Stop!"
Sim stopped. Lowering the arm he had raised to ward off the blow, which would have followed had Sim pounced, he gazed at Sim. There was fire in Sim's eyes, but he didn't move. Hank didn't understand it. He hadn't been able to reach Sim, but somehow, he had gotten him to stop attacking. Slowly, Hank approached, but Sim made no more moves to attack.
Reaching out with both arms, he settled his paws on Sim's shoulders and looked him in the eyes. Lips curled back in a snarl, Sim revealed sharp and nasty teeth. Hank searched his eyes for some sign of his son.
"Sim. It's Hank. Your father. Listen to me. You've got to hold on, son. Hold onto yourself. Don't let the beast take over."
Talking soothingly, Hank felt the muscles in Sim’s arms release, and his vicious snarling ceased.
"Yeah, son. Don't give in. I know you are stronger than it. You've got to stay focused. Think of Jennifer. Think of your mom. Don't lose it, son."
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