The Lycan

White Coats

As they walked through the trees and back towards the field Jasper felt his senses coming back to him. His mind was slowly catching up with the shift, the wolf that had been slowly pushing back was almost back to its full force.

Shifting did not reverse the effects of being forced as a lycan, but it did delay the wolf from running his body completely. Lycans lived their lives tuned to their animal instincts. Instead of the human in control and the animal having input in here or there it was the exact opposite. The wolf ran the show and the human, if forceful or strong enough, could take over for short periods of time. In a lycans case, the human is the voice in the back of their head. Thats why, often more times than not, when the lycan animal gains enough strength when they are a child, it will finally shift and stay shifted unless its lenient enough to be in human form to work the modern world.

Jasper is a garbled mix of the two. He wasn't born a lycan, but being forced for years to become one didn't make it any easier.

—

The doctor's office wasn't busy, but that didn't make Jasper any less on guard. The office was settled in the middle of the small town of buildings that made up the pack. In the waiting room Jasper couldn't help but snort at the new smells, shaking the new environment and the nerves from his body, towel wrapped securely around his waist. Despite this and the hot summer day, he felt cold and exposed in his human skin- not just because it was a doctor's office.

When the nurse called his name he was led to stand on a scale that looked suspiciously like the one in the vet's office. They also measured his height and it took the last of his energy just to stand up straight even against a wall. After all that he was led to an odd room with floral print on the walls. It was shaped and stuffy and had weird furniture and had no windows.

"Here, you want to climb up here? There's a stool if you need it." Jasper stood in place and glanced at the table, not revealing anything through his expression. When Sebastian led him forward with a hand at the back he put up little resistance only because it was his mates doing. Sebastian ended up lifting him onto the table and Liam sat on the stool beside the table, leaving himself there for comfort.

Jasper reached up and started to tug softly at his hair, pull on his ear lobes and fidget. He did not like waiting and in this loud room of silence it was even worse. Despite his fidgeting he felt stiff, his wounds were healing, a little slow but he would be fine. A nurse had come before and asked if he wanted to have them stitched up but he had refused- already passed his uncomfort point today. His human arms and legs, his hair, his face all behaved differently in this form. He felt like he couldn't communicate.

The door to the small room opened, breaking the silence and the tension. In walked a middle aged woman with a white lab coat on. He remembered the white coats, and before anyone could react he was on his feet, stumbling down and limping back into the opposite corner. His eyes flashed glowing amber, small constant growls left his lips, he kept his eye on her, his eye on the white coat.

Liam had stood and tried to approach, which he let happen, but he didn't allow him to get into his zone of safety.

"Alright," the woman said, "I see I do not look friendly, okay? I'm taking it off, okay? I'm just going to hang it out here." He watched as she took the coat and hung it on the outside of the door, and out of his sight. His growls died down and his lips uncurled, he stood up straight and finally let Liam through all the way to him, where he gently placed his hands on his arm.

It took his wolf a couple of tries, but eventually he let the woman back to continue his inspection.

"Would you like your mates to leave the room while I do my exams?" Jasper looked up at his mates from his seat on the table, Liam looked hopeful and Sebastian looked... guilty.

Jasper shook his head no.

Dr. Stauber continued on with her exam; she opened and closed his mouth, shone a flashlight in his eyes, and did a once over of his entire body, focusing on the healing wounds and old scarring.

Finally he was let down off the table and was allowed to sit between his mates on the equally uncomfortable plastic chairs.

"Well, I can sum this up without going into detail for your mate's sake, but to put it gently, he has not had a good past. Which I'm sure you've probably summed up yourselves. Based on his weight and the state of his body he has probably been starved for years- no, he definitely has. The amount of emaciation shouldn't even be possible for us wolves. Another concerning fact is the scarring all over his body, almost 55% of his body has scar tissue. When the nurse had him do the hearing test, his left ear showed signs of about 25% hearing loss- very mild, but it could be due to the scarring from around that ear as well."

"I'm very sorry all of this has happened, and I cannot imagine what you have gone through." She once again addressed his mates. "Now onto your concern for his hip dysplasia. His wolf is obviously strong and will heal this naturally, thankfully no surgery required. But this means he was a wolf for too long, I'm afraid he'll have to use a cane as a human for the rest of his life. His wolf will heal and probably no longer be affected, though. It would heal best if he didn't shift for at least a couple of months."

If Jasper was in wolf form his ears would have pinned back by now. A few months? The human part of him was a little thrilled, but the wolf who was in control grumbled his displeasure.

Sebastian and Liam glanced back at him worriedly. "I don't know if he can do that, I mean, the wolf is mostly in control, he hasn't even spoken to us yet."

"Yes, and whether this be from the lycans doing, a personal choice of not doing so, or some other reasoning we do not know, but he may never choose to speak aloud- even if he can."

Hearing it all out loud Jasper realized how much had changed. How much of a burden he has become. And he couldn't even leave to set out to do the one thing he promised he would, save his brother.