Jessica hunched in the center of the football field, alone beneath the swollen moon. Spring wind knifed through her white-tipped fur, raising goosebumps prickled beneath her fur. Her once-elegant prom dress hung in tatters around her elongated frame, sequins glinting against white fur as her curved claws sank into the turf.

  The bleachers loomed empty and silent—evidence of the homecoming crowd's panicked exodus when Mark's first bones had cracked and shifted. Only the distant wail of sirens and the steam of her breath punctuated the stillness, small clouds dissipating in the breeze.

  She tilted her lupine muzzle toward the sky, amber eyes reflecting moonlight. The transformation had torn through her—it always did—but now raw power surged through each sinew, intoxicating in its primal intensity. Her senses sharpened: grass crushed beneath her paws, stale popcorn abandoned at the concession stand, and most alarming, the chemical reek emanating from the shadowed end zone.

  Mark.

  He lurched from beneath the scoreboard—a mountain of crimson muscle. He stood eight feet of bulging limbs and pulsing, crimson hide. Scraps of his tuxedo dangled from his massive shoulders like funeral pennants. Sulfurous eyes locked onto Jessica, pupils narrowed to slits.

  "Jessica..." His jaw worked unnaturally around teeth too numerous for his elongated mouth. "You... made... her... betray... me..."

  Jessica's ears flattened against her skull. She balanced on powerful hind legs, shoulders braced. Her voice emerged as gravel over velvet, distorted but clearer than Mark's mangled speech.

  “That is not true," she growled, her paw-like hand reaching out. "She risked everything for you, and you know it."

  Mark's roar split the silence, reverberating across empty rows of seats. His fists hammered his own chest, the impact cracking like thunder across fifty yards of manicured grass.

  "NO!" he bellowed, spittle flying from jagged teeth. "NEED IT! MINE!"

  Jessica crept forward, each footstep placed with predatory precision. "You never needed that poison," she growled. "You are already popular. The guy who decked Ryan Parker after he keyed your truck. The same Mark who spent three hours in the rain coaxing Mrs. Thornton's tabby down from that oak." She let her voice drop, though the inhuman growl remained. "The boy who's sketched Tiffany's name in his notebooks since seventh grade."

  Mark's massive frame convulsed. His clawed hands clutched his temples as he staggered backward. "No... serum... can't... lose..." Blood vessels bulged across his forehead, pulsing beneath thinning skin.

  "Your dad locked it away for a reason," Jessica pressed. "That formula is killing you, cell by cell."

  Mark's howl morphed into something raw and broken. He crashed to his knees, cratering the turf with each slam of his fists. Jessica seized the moment, closing the gap between them while keeping her movements fluid and unpredictable.

  "Fight what it's doing to you, Mark. You're stronger than those chemicals."

  Twenty yards separated them now. Jessica tracked the throbbing veins in Mark's neck, watched the unnatural compound surge beneath his skin. His chest heaved with labored rasps as his brain waged chemical warfare against itself.

  "It... burns..."

  "I know," Jessica replied, her voice softening despite its bestial edge. "Changing always does. But you can master it."

  Mark's head snapped up, eyes suddenly focusing with terrifying clarity. "No," he snarled. "I don't want... control."

  His muscles bunched, and Jessica had mere fragments of a second before he exploded across the field, covering ground with impossible speed for something so massive. She twisted sideways, but his talons snagged her arm, closing around her limb with crushing pressure.

  Bones splintered beneath her fur. A yelp tore from her throat as she slashed instinctively. Her claws carved furrows across his chest, releasing rivulets of dark blood that sizzled against the night air.

  Mark flung her aside. Jessica's body hurtled through space before crashing into the metal goalpost with a sound like a car wreck. She crumpled to the grass, her vision fracturing into starbursts.

  Move. NOW.

  Her werewolf metabolism knitted her fractured bones together, but the jagged ends still grated with each breath. Mark thundered toward her again, each footfall gouging the carefully manicured field.

  Jessica rolled clear as his fist crumpled the goalpost like aluminum foil. She bounded away, putting precious yards between them.

  "Mark!" she called, tasting copper on her tongue. "This rampage solves nothing!"

  "You've always..." he stalked toward her, drool stringing from his distorted jaw, "...lorded over everyone. Little Miss Perfect. Sheriff's daughter. Everyone's pet."

  Jessica's ears perked in genuine shock. "What? I've had your back since I had joined the squad."

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  "LIAR!" He wrenched a fragment of twisted metal from the goalpost and hurled it like a javelin. The makeshift spear whistled over Jessica's ducking head, embedding itself in the turf with a dull thud.

  "That serum is twisting your memories," Jessica snarled. "Turning friends into enemies."

  Mark charged again. This time Jessica feinted, dropped to all fours, and darted between his tree-trunk legs. As she passed beneath him, her claws sliced through his hamstrings in two savage swipes.

  Dark blood sprayed across white fur. Mark's bellow cracked with pain as he pivoted with unexpected agility. His backhand caught Jessica across her muzzle, sending her tumbling across chalk-lined grass. Iron flooded her mouth as she spat crimson onto the turf.

  Reason totally failed. No choice now.

  Years of practice had taught Jessica to leash her werewolf nature, to cage the beast beneath human logic. Now, she deliberately unlocked those mental barriers. She surrendered to the wolf's ancient instincts, letting them flood her consciousness.

  A deeper rumble built in her chest. Her muscles coiled tight as piano wire. Her amber eyes dilated, fixing on Mark with the cold calculation of an apex predator.

  "If that's how you want it," she said, her words barely recognizable as human language.

  Mark's massive shoulders dropped an inch. His clawed hands unclenched, and the murderous gleam in his yellow eyes dimmed to a confused glow. Something primitive in him recognized the shift in her demeanor—prey becoming predator. He hesitated, just long enough.

  Jessica launched across thirty yards in a heartbeat, white against the darkness. She collided with his chest, the impact driving both of them backward. Her claws found purchase in his tough hide while her jaws snapped inches from his jugular.

  They crashed together, a tangle of fur and crimson skin, painting the fifty-yard line with streaks of blood. Mark's brute strength prevailed. He seized Jessica by the scruff and hurled her away.

  This time, Jessica twisted mid-flight, landing in a crouch with claws furrowing the earth. She circled warily, analyzing his movements. Mark possessed overwhelming power but moved with the clumsy coordination of a newborn in his altered form. If she could outmaneuver him...

  Mark didn't grant her time to strategize. He lowered his head and barreled forward, blind rage fueling each pounding step. Jessica held her ground until the last possible instant before springing upward, twisting in mid-leap to land behind him. As Mark skidded and flailed, she pounced onto his broad back, claws piercing deep into his shoulders.

  "Remember yourself!" she shouted, fighting the wolf's urge to rip and tear. "That serum is eating your brain!"

  Mark's massive hands grasped backward. Jessica evaded his clutching fingers, raking her claws down his spine. He thrashed and howled, spinning wildly to dislodge her.

  Jessica clung like a burr, but Mark slammed backward into the remaining goalpost. The impact sandwiched her between unyielding metal and his massive body. Ribs shattered inside her chest, puncturing soft tissue beneath. A whimper escaped her lupine muzzle as she slid to the ground, each breath a knife-thrust of agony.

  She sprawled across trampled grass, her fur matted with blood. The wolf's accelerated healing struggled against catastrophic damage. Blackness crept at the edges of her vision as each shallow breath rattled in her perforated lungs.

  Mark towered above her, chest heaving, wounds already sealing themselves. His yellow eyes glittered with something beyond triumph—a sadistic pleasure at her helplessness.

  "Win," he grunted, raising a fist the size of a cinder block for the killing blow.

  "Mark!"

  The feminine voice cut through the night like a silver blade. Both creatures turned toward the sound.

  Tiffany Barnes stood at the field's edge, homecoming dress shimmering under the stadium lights. Her red hair tumbled free around her shoulders, escaping from what had been an elaborate updo. Mascara tracked down her cheeks, but her chin lifted with defiance.

  "Mark," she called again, taking one tentative step onto the field. "Stop this. Please."

  Mark straightened, forgetting Jessica entirely. Emotions warred across his distorted features—confusion, recognition, longing.

  "Tiff...any?" The name clawed its way from his throat.

  "It's me." Another step forward. "I came back for you. When everyone else ran, I came looking."

  Mark's entire body trembled. "Why?"

  Tiffany's voice cracked. "Because I love you, you idiot. Always have."

  Something fractured in Mark's monstrous countenance. His yellow eyes softened, rage draining away like water through sand. He shuffled toward Tiffany, each step carrying him farther from Jessica's broken form.

  "Love... me?" The words seemed to physically hurt him.

  "Yes." Tiffany didn't retreat, though Jessica spotted how her hands quivered at her sides. "Not this... creature. The real you. The boy who hides poetry in his chemistry notebook. Who tutored me through calculus last year. Who watched me from across the field during every practice.”

  Mark stumbled as if struck. His claws dug into his own scalp as a keening sound escaped his throat. His crimson skin pulsed—darkening then lightening as something battled inside him.

  "Real... me..." he croaked.

  Jessica struggled to rise. Her bones knitted together with agonizing slowness. She couldn't stand, couldn't fight. All she could do was watch Tiffany take another step toward the beast her classmate had become.

  "Come back," Tiffany whispered, palm outstretched. "Please."

  For one crystalline moment, everything balanced on a knife's edge. Mark's posture softened, his massive hand reaching for Tiffany's with surprising gentleness.

  Then his face contorted. He clutched at his chest as the serum surged through his system, fighting his attempt to reclaim control. An inhuman shriek tore from his throat, and when he looked up again, his eyes held nothing human.

  "MINE!" The word erupted from him—possession, hunger, and fury fused into a single sound.

  Jessica saw the next moments with brutal clarity. "TIFFANY, RUN!" she screamed, the effort sending jags of pain through her damaged ribs.

  Terror flooded Tiffany's face as understanding dawned. She spun to flee, but her heels sank into soft turf. She stumbled, precious seconds evaporating as Mark charged, each stride devouring yards of distance.

  Jessica forced herself to move. Grinding pain shredded her chest as she managed to get to her knees, but no further. Her healing worked, but too slowly. Helplessness crushed her as Mark thundered across the field toward Tiffany, who had regained her footing but could never outpace him.

  "MARK!" Jessica's desperate cry echoed across the silent field as the gap between predator and prey closed with terrifying speed.

  Tiffany's scream pierced the night as Mark closed the final yards between them, massive arms outstretched to claim what he believed was his.