A feeling of dread comes upon me. I open my eyes and find myself still lying in the tall grass. Something is wrong here it shouldn't be dark already, and I can barely see unlike I usually can at night.
Could this be a specialist that is using illusions to trick me? That is one possibility, or it could just be a vivid, or lucid dream. I can say for certain that none of this is real, the forest is completely quiet. No birds, no wind, it's as if time itself has stopped.
I need to figure out what's going on. The best way to find out if it's an illusion or not is to inspect the surrounding area for anything out of place. Illusions are not perfect and they always leave subtle hints that can be difficult to recognize. They mimic the real world as best as they can unlike dreams.
Unfortunately, there is nothing here. Everything seems normal except for the lack of sounds. So I guess this is a dream after all, but vivid dreams tend to be rare and this one feels a little too realistic. There is this feeling of overwhelming fear as well, what exactly is going on? I can't shake this feeling that someone is watching me, someone that I can't see or smell. Now that I think about it, there are no scents either.
"Do you remember me?" I hear a disembodied voice say coming from behind me.
I turn around a see a shadowy figure behind me, I can just make out enough to know that its form resembles that of a human. I feel like I've heard that voice before, even though it's somewhat distorted.
"It has been a long time. But surely you must remember what you did to me." It says.
"I did terrible things to many humans. Do you really expect me to remember a specific one?" I say.
"I saved you and your brothers' life when you were young because I pitied both of you. I took you in and raised the two of you like my own children. The others thought of you as monsters and tried to kill you. You were only children at the time, no child should have to go through what you two did." There is a long pause. "In the end, I was wrong about you both. I tried to change you, but your hatred of us got the better of you."
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
"It seems you have forgotten. Suppressed memories perhaps?"
Since this is just a dream all I am doing is talking to my subconscious. Seems strange when you think about it, I'm basically just talking to myself. If I do have suppressed memories about my childhood, it would make sense that my brain is just trying to get me to remember. Whoever this human figure was he is long since dead.
"My hope when I was alive was to make both of you be kind to humans so that your race would not be hunted down like animals anymore. You failed me and made me suffer because of it. It's your fault that this happened to me." it says.
"Why are you telling me all of this. What does it matter anymore what happened so many years ago?"
"Because I want you to suffer, I want you to know that everything that has happened to your species since that day is your fault. Both of you are the cause for your races suffering, all of the pain, misery, death they endure from the humans' oppression is your fault."
What is it talking about? Sure I have made some sacrifices along the way that ended up hurting some wolves, but I only did it if the means were justified. I don't kill other wolves unless I need to, like it being self-defense or the situation with Lapu.
"I have devoted my life to save as many of us as possible. How is any of this my fault." I yell at it.
"You will suffer just as I did, all because you control your own selfish needs. Now all wolves suffer because of you. You have forgotten your past, but it will catch up to you and you will remember that fateful night."
This thing is really getting on my nerves, or I should say myself. I need to find out what it's talking about. How could I have caused all of this? The suffering of our entire species, it's saying that my brother and I did all of this?
My brother already paid for his lack of self control with his life, and I have been trying to make up for what I did. What this is saying doesn't make any sense. Is he saying that it was our fault that the humans are hunting us, our fault that we have to keep ourselves hidden from them?
This thing apparently won't give me any direct answers. Did I forget what my childhood really was about and replaced it with a new one?
According to this thing, I will eventually remember what really happened all those years ago. I remember my childhood being really nice. My parents and my brother all got along well and we didn't have too much trouble with humans. If what he is saying is true though, then all of those memories are a lie.
"How do you know what's going to happen, that I'm going to suffer just like you. Your not the person that I made suffer, your just a figment of my imagination." I say.
"That may be true but as you already know, I am just a collection of suppressed memories you have of me. I may not be the same person, but I am the same person that you remember. All of my emotions come from your own memories of me." The disembodied shadow walks over to me. "You must wake up, it is not yet your time. We will meet again."
As soon as he finished his sentence I wake up back in the tall grass where I went to sleep. The sun is just disappearing over the horizon, and if not for the dream I just had I would say I feel well-rested.
I sit up and contemplate what just happened. I go over again what he said in my head and try to find out if there was a hint that I missed. As much as I try I just can't think if there was anything that I did miss. It was being extremely vague about my past. Either way, I guess I'm going to have to wait to find out more.
I look around and see the report for the job that I'm supposed to do, I had almost forgotten about it. I pick it up and start reading it. I skim over most of it, there is something about a black market and a female wolf that is helping to run it. Apparently, she is at risk of exposing herself to the rest of the humans there.
They even have a detailed report on her, I guess they have investigated her before. According to this she is a half breed, which means she was born a werewolf but also has a human form. Pure breeds of the other hand do not have a human form, their lineage is not saturated with human crossbreeding.
Skipping over her past crimes we get to her abilities, it says she is a water manipulator. Fire is weak to water so I might have to be careful confronting her. Her name is Chenoa, and she was last seen on the eastern side of Seattle.
That must be where the market is. Good thing for me that I have been there before. Black markets are frowned upon by the Order but they do not consider them illegal. In fact, they can help our species, wolves that are not good at hunting can simply buy a human there from someone that is.
This is definitely going to be more interesting than my last job.