“Yes. He’s staring out the window.”

Bronte heard Joshua talking, “Nah, that’s fur. Like, a whole lotta fur. And it’s moving.”

Suddenly in the background, sirens scream, but it’s muffled, like they’re trapped under a giant, fluffy rug. “Joshua, get away from the windows!” Selina said.

Joshua scoffed, “Great, just what we need – a fur-nado. Talk about a bad hair day.”

Selina starts to say something when Bronte looks up to see several blocks away from her, a fur wave rolling closer, swallowing buildings like a cosmic vacuum cleaner. Her jaw drops as she sees the biblical pestilence of dark clouds, halating the sky, freight-training the horizon, muffling screams as a tidal wave rose from the ground to hundreds of feet in the air. Instead of refracting sunlight, the dead-white engulfs the world with slow movement through the metropolis and countryside. Sirens wailing, rising, and falling… then…

“It’s not funny anymore. The fuzzy apocalypse has monsters in it.” Selina says as she hears Bronte crying. “Bre’ come on. You can make it to us. I have a pastry you can hold while I film this for TikTok. #FurReal #TheEndIsFluffy.”

Bronte sees people run, scream, and stumble, some even sprout fur themselves, like a bad special effect in a B-movie. She can still hear Selina on the line, “Okay, maybe not TikTok. This is more Twitter material. #WerewolfWatch2023 #PrayForHairspray.”

She heard Joshua shout, “Sorry Selina! Survival of the fittest, and I got a killer meme to post! #ApocalypseSelfie #LivingMyBestFurLife (literally).”

“Okay. I’m going to come. Be looking for us.” Bronte whispered urgently.

But as she hung up, a shadow, long and predatory, slithered out of the dust. It coalesced, taking the form of a woman, but one warped by hunger. Her face, once human, was now a contorted mask of fangs and snarls. Eyes swelled with a feral appetite. The woman’s form twisted, bones snapping and reshaping. Fur sprouted, dark and matted, obscuring the remnants of humanity.

Bronte’s breath hitched, a dry rasp in her throat. This wasn’t the woman she vaguely remembered from her phone call, the one who promised to meet them at the safe house. This was something else, a predator cloaked in skin, its gaze fixed on the vulnerable prey in Bronte’s arms.

Seda, sensing the shift in her mother’s aura, whimpered again, burrowing deeper into Bronte’s chest. The woman-beast took a step closer, the ground trembling under its weight. Bronte tasted bile in her throat, her cigarette forgotten between numb lips. She knew, with a chilling certainty, that the fight for survival, the dance with death, had just begun. A mother’s primal instinct against the jaws of the nightmare. Bronte, fueled by the innocent trust in her daughter’s eyes, was ready to face the monster that dared to stand between them and the dawn. Her tears flowed freely, her heart breaking at the inevitability of the situation. Her eyes followed the monstrous creature, a werewolf with enormous flashing teeth, approaching menacingly.

With determination, Bronte bent down to cover her child with an arm, feeling the looming threat huffing into her hair. She tightened her grip protectively. The werewolf licked her face, its dark tongue dripping with saliva, as if tasting her tears, making her shiver. Suddenly, the creature’s scalpel-sharp fingertips cut the mother’s cheek, but the pain hardly registered in her mind. She felt death staring into her soul as she shielded her crying child.

"NO! Please don’t do this! Spare my child!" she cried out with raw emotion. Her heart-wrenching scream pierced the sun, carrying her pain and desperation beyond the confines of the street. Her powerful screams of grief and anguish echoed, evoking tears from the cosmos itself.

She KNEW by instinct she would die, but she vowed in her soul that her daughter shall live. Unfazed by the feral werewolf, Bronte continued to stare defiantly into the beast’s eyes, daring it to harm them. Her body shook with fury, tears streaming down her cheeks, and her eyes filled with willpower. The gut-wrenching moment seemed to inhale deeply as the mother’s heartache and haunting scream reverberated through the road, leaving an indelible mark on the ferocious werewolf.

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

Unexpectedly, a strange purr came from behind the creature, distracting it. The werewolf snapped anxiously in the air and then rose, towering over them. It huffed, then inhaled deeply.

Silence returned to the world.

Looking around, Bronte saw the aftermath of the pandemic of werewolves, a surreal landscape of a horrific apocalypse. At the corner stood a woman they had seen once before, Lángrén. She walked over to the single mother and child, offering her hand to help them stand. Lángrén stood before the young lady, a heavy burden weighing on her heart. She took a deep breath, her voice steady as she spoke the words she knew would cause pain.

“I’m sorry,” she began softly, “I need you to understand that what I’m about to do is not out of malice or cruelty, but a desperate need to save your lives. This is the only way.”

Bronte looked at Lángrén, confusion and fear etched across his face. “What do you mean? Save us from those… things?” The mama blinked in confusion as Lángrén tapped her cheek with her finger. The mother reached up and touched the cut on her cheek.

Tears welled up in her eyes as she hesitated, trying to find the right words to express her regret. “You’re in danger,” she finally said, her voice choking with emotion. “There’s something you don’t know about the world, about your lives. I can’t bear to see you, or your kind, suffer.”

She paused, her hand calming as she reached out to gently touch the child. “You won’t feel the change for a while. When you do, becoming human again is the nasty part. But in time, it will grow easier. For you. For your child.”

Bronte’s eyes widened; disbelief written all over his face. “How... How is that possible? I feel fine. It only scraped me.”

I know,” Lángrén replied, her voice full of regret as confusion swelled in the mother’s eyes. The child stopped crying and locked eyes with Lángrén. Tears streamed down Bronte’s cheeks as she struggled to comprehend the magnitude of what Lángrén was saying. This woman she’d seen in grocery stores and at the post office in their community.

“So, what are you saying? What do you need to do?” Bronte nervously asked.

With a heavy heart, Lángrén took a step back, her resolve firm, but her pain evident. “You’re welcome to stay. My husband and children will help you and your child. I have some…old friends that I have to meet.”

Bronte’s hands trembled, but she looked into Lángrén’s eyes, seeing the concern that swirled within them. “This will keep my daughter safe?” she asked, her voice breaking.

“Yes,” Lángrén whispered, her heart breaking. “This is the only way to save you in this new world.” Bronte nodded, numb in thoughts and emotions.

“Okay,” she said. Her voice laced with resolution of her decision.

"Okay. Head south by the railroad. When you get to the corner gas station, turn east, opposite the sun. Go about a quarter mile. When you’re there, look for the fifth house on the right. Knock near the bottom of the stairs, and my husband will come out. He’s not one of us, but he knows what’s going on. I’ll be back to help you and your child transition.”

Bronte stood in a daze, and her jaw clenched as she watched Lángrén shape-shifted easily into a off-white furry werewolf. The beast’s eyes held a strange compulsion and swelled with compassion.

As the werewolf’s teeth sink into her shoulder flesh, the gut-wrenching pain mashed-up with the sound of tearing fabric as Lángrén’s powerful jaws clenched into her bones. Lángrén’s breath was hot, filling the air with an intense Aglaia odorata scent. The terror of the moment was amplified by her panicked breathing and the rapid thumping of her heart. The intensity of Lángrén was less a nightmare vision, but a feminine ferocity. Her elongated fangs dripped with saliva and Bronte’s blood.

The sensation of the bite itself was searing and sharp, as its teeth punctured her skin. Her muscles and nerves tensed with agony. Adrenaline flooded her system, amplifying every sensation and heightening her senses. Uncertainty caused her to experience a strange mix of relief and terror. Bronte realized seconds later that the Lángrén had released her from the gripping bite. The pneumatic bite force exerted was light-years stronger than a saltwater crocodile during the dinosaur era. She was left shaken and traumatized, with the brutal memory seared into her thoughts. Bronte looked at the site from the bite and noted the bloody wound had already begun to heal. The nightmarish reality made no sense to her.

Lángrén shifted back into human form and laid her hand on Bronte’s elbow. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t watch you die. Now go!”

Bronte checked on her child. She was shocked to see that a bite nipped on her toddler’s cheek was swiftly healing, and the child had not cried in the least. When and how fast did this Lángrén creature before she did that? What will the future hold for her baby?

“Go!” Lángrén urged Bronte.

The mother took off running with the child. The child stared back at Lángrén as she watched them leave. Lángrén spotted trillions of fur follicles rolling in as a swarm. Coating everything in its path. Bursting through glass, sliding through anything with a crack.