It wasn't easy getting the man (the werewolf) to the safe house, but by sunset they had managed. Carrying him through the forest had probably been the most difficult part. He wasn't a big man and he was fairly thin, so Cara had been able to lift him on her shoulders. Andie helped when Cara grew too exhausted, though she was a bit small to support the man on her own. 

They stole clothes from one of the dead mercenaries as they passed by them on the way back. Cara figured if they did happen to pass anyone, it was easier to explain an unconscious clothed man, than a naked one. Cara had originally been planning to use the clothes to bandage up some of his wounds, but they seemed to have already cauterized. They also took as many tranq darts as they could find from the mercenaries. Cara wanted to make sure they had enough to regularly dose him. They needed to find someplace secure to lock him in, and soon, otherwise a bullet would be their only option.

Their own truck was miles back and would have taken hours to walk back to with the extra weight on their shoulders, so they decided to take one of the mercenaries' big black trucks. They didn't intend to drive this truck far, only back to their own, but they did find some useful supplies in the back: handcuffs, restraints, a muzzle. Cara didn't find it particularly humane to put all of this on the man, but Andie made it clear that their safety and the safety of others had to come first if they were going to do this.

Once back at their own truck, they shifted the now heavily restrained man into the back seat of their white pickup. They abandoned the black truck, along with everything else to do with the mercenaries behind them. It would be discovered eventually, but Cara and Andie wanted to be far away by then. They'd ditch their own truck as soon as they could, however first they needed a safe house to keep this man. Logan had dedicated his life to building a network, so that no matter where they were, there was somewhere safe to go. Even still, options would be slim for them; they didn't just need a place to hide, they needed somewhere that they could secure a werewolf.

Andie drove the truck, while Cara kept vigil on the back seat, one hand on the tranq gun. Cara also made the call to Bethany; they needed help and she would be the one to give it. Bethany made much of the same protests Andie had, but ultimately the conversation went the same way. Cara felt such warmth in her heart, such love for these two women that would help her through anything.

Bethany worked her magic while they drove south (not yet knowing exactly where they were going) and she managed to get back to them with the address of a safe house in Port Severn. It was the summer home of a going-on-elderly couple. Their teenage children had been taken years ago by vampires, and they had gotten in touch with the hunters in the hopes of getting them back. The teens didn't survive, but in the process of trying to find them, Bethany and Logan had needed a secure place to interrogate one of the vampires, so they had converted part of the basement of the summer home into a cell. The cell was apparently still there and construction had been done to hide it away. In truth it was the most ideal spot they could have hoped for.

The house was tucked away in the forest, far from the main town centre, something Cara was very grateful of. They could see the lake (Little Lake it was called; an overly quant name for such an occasion) through the trees as they drove along the poorly paved road. There were other homes dotting the edge of the lake, but all were fairly removed from each other. Looping around a small inlet of the lake, they saw a mailbox at the end of a driveway with the address they were looking for.

They drove up to a large two-story cottage with beautiful wooden panels over the exterior, interspersed with large pane windows. There was a lovely porch stretching out from the front of the house, supported by columns decorated with limestone brickwork. The chimney stood high above the house in similar fashion. The roof narrowed considerably past the outcrop covering the porch, but a loft with more of that beautiful wooden paneling broke it up. The garage appeared to be an afterthought, stuck on to the left of the house with little of the grace shown by the rest of the architecture.

Andie came to a quick halt in front of the garage; they would figure out how to open it later, first priority was the man in the back. Bethany had given them instructions on where to find the spare key (under the decorative gnome in the garden). She had also given them a cover story. They were family friends of the McCaffrey's (the owners of the house), up here for a little vacation. Anyone who questioned them could contact the McCaffrey's and confirm. Cara had to admire the speed at which Bethany had pulled all this together.

Andie got the door open and Cara carried the man into the house. There would be time to appreciate the home later, but for now they hustled to the back, through the kitchen and into the pantry. The McCaffrey's had done a good job at hiding the secret door, shelves shifted forward just enough, a couple carefully placed bags of rice to hide the latch, but Cara and Andie had been told where to look. Andie cleared the floor and opened the secret hatch to the basement. The staircase was narrow and Cara needed Andie's help to get the man down safely. 

Andie found the light switch at the bottom. This hidden space was small, unlikely more than ten by ten feet Cara estimated, and the majority of that was taken up by a large cage on one side of the room. There were heavy steel bars (each coated with silver) that were evenly spaced, stretching from floor to ceiling along the length of the room, except where a door had been fixed into the bars. There was even a steel toilet fixed into the corner of the cage (they had held the vampire here for a while apparently). The floor, the walls and the ceiling were all solid concrete around the cage. The only exception was the opposite wall outside of the cage, this was just drywall. Once Cara had time to explore, she would find that this section used to be part of the larger basement but had been sealed off by the addition of this wall. The air was thin inside this cramped space; they would need to do something about that if this man was going to be here for a prolonged time. For now they left the hatch open.

They got him into the cage, removed the demeaning restraints and then locked the door. Andie then left to take care of the truck. The plan was to drive it back up north, though not as far as Sudbury, and find a decent place to either ditch it or scrap it. Then to track down another car she could purchase off the books for cheap and drive it back down.

Cara planned to stay right where she was to keep an eye on this man and what would happen once he woke up. She grabbed some of the cushions and pillows from the upstairs couch and built herself a comfy spot to sit and wait. She slipped a pillow through the bars and under the man's head as well. Then she simply waited, tranq gun in one hand, loaded pistol in the other.

It got chilly down in that small room, barred off from all the summer warmth of the outside world. Cara went upstairs to grab some blankets, and saw once she was in the kitchen that night had set in. She looked out the window and could see the sliver of the moon through the trees. It was nowhere near full, but certainly still felt ominous.

She grabbed the blankets and went back down the hatch. It took her a moment to realize that the man's eyes were now open. He was still lying on the ground, but he was very much awake. His face was contorted in pain and his hands were clutching his sides. She wasn't sure what she should say to him, and what came out sounded a lot like the talks she gave to restless spirits.

"Hey, you're okay, everything's okay now. You're safe." He still seemed focused on holding his insides together (perhaps a very literal way of looking at it). She moved close to the bars so she was only a couple of feet away from his face. "Hey, look at me." He did, with trembling, concerned eyes. "We've taken you to a safe place. We're going to do everything we can to save you."

"There is no saving me," he cried out, through clenched teeth. "I'm evil. I've hurt people. I don't know how many. I don't want to hurt you." Tears flooded his eyes. "Kill me." Cara's heart hurt as those soft words were spoken. This was a man in need of saving, as much as any poor soul she'd ever come across.

He started to change. Cara had never seen the change first hand. She would see it many times after that night, but it would never get any easier to watch.

Hair started to burst from every inch of his skin, tiny drops of blood being pushed out. He writhed on the floor as his bones stretched and popped into new shapes. The crunches sent Cara's stomach twisting. Once the claws grew out over his fingernails, he started ripping the clothes they'd dressed him in to shreds. Cara could see new ribs forming through his stretching skin. The dark wolf hair grew thicker and covered his form entirely. Watching his face change was the most disturbing for Cara. His ears changing shape was like watching wax melt. The new fangs came before his jaw stretched, giving a frightening visage that was all teeth and gums. A wolf snout eventually formed over these hideous teeth, his nose mashed in with this process. Worst was his eyes, those kind, sad eyes that seemed to cry out on their own as they changed to the yellow eyes of a predator. 

All the while the man screamed, though somewhere in the process his moans became howls, and not howls of pain either, but of savage joy. The wolf was free and ready to hunt. But when it lunged at the bars they held strong.

Cara gripped the pistol and the tranq gun tight. She considered knocking him unconscious again, but that wouldn't do. They needed to know if these bars could hold.

The wolf continued its barrage on the bars, reaching its arms through, trying to snare her. The bars didn't so much as budge and the wolf jolted back as the silver covering the bars burned its skin. Cara was feeling confident; this might work. After over an hour of vicious assaults on the cage, fighting through the burns, the wolf seemed to have the same thought. It took a rest from attacking the bars, crouching in front of them instead. It stared directly at her, seldom blinking. It was breathing deep too, taking in her scent. It's marking me, Cara thought. It'll come after me should it ever escape. And it wants me to know that. It wants me to be afraid.

Then the wolf stood up and stretched to its full height. God it was tall, near a foot and a half taller than the man had been. It started sniffing around the top of the bars. Its checking for weak spots, and if there is any, it will find them. The wolf roared and then recommenced its assault, this time targeting the walls, clawing into them. The concrete got marked up, but held.

It was morning before Andie returned, probably not easy to find a new car in the middle of the night. Cara's night had gone much the same way, the wolf attacked, then it rested, attacked, and then rested. She didn't see it sleep, though she figured being unconscious most of the day was probably enough for the wolf. She grew tired, but didn't dare nod off in the same room as the wolf.

She hoped Andie would be willing to take watch for at least a few hours while she slept. Leaving the cellar, the sunlight was unnerving, but also a great comfort. It put a smile on her face to see Andie pulling up in a rust red car. Cara went out to greet her; she needed a moment of fresh air after a night in that box of a room.

Once she stepped outside, she saw immediately the troubled look on Andie's face.

"What's wrong?"

"I just heard from Bethany, I'd been trying to reach her all night, but hadn't been able to get a hold of her." Cara's breath was already catching in her throat. She figured it must be Logan; that something had happened, that he'd passed. "Jack and Gregory are missing."

Cara stood speechless for a moment. The breeze off the lake drifted past and very faintly they could hear the bellows of the werewolf in the basement.