Framed Under a Full Moon (Emerald)

Today was a normal day at the institute or so it seemed, the entire campus seemed to be doing well despite the cold winter months. Heck even those who used to feel uneasy around the winter months seemed to be in a good mood. And the one that was the most uneasy in the winter was none other than the accused herself Emerald Lupin. There was luckily no snow on the ground and this was an odd little warm patch in the normally cold months in New York. Not that it was at a temperature she would have liked it to be at but it was still nicer than freezing none the less.

However, the first thing Jorge Cervantes would have seen would not be the young wolf woman outside chilling out in the colder weather. Instead he would see a fairly large black wolf walking about rather jauntily, with her blue eyes wide open, looking about for any signs of her predator for the day. She didn’t look like a scared animal quite on the contrary; she looked like an animal that was playing with another animal, which was exactly what she was doing. All of a sudden a small streak of dark orange fur jumped and tackled the huge animal letting out a happy bark. With a howl of dismay the wolf fell over, allowing the small green eyed fox to climb onto of the wolf with another bark of joy. It was clear to see that these two animals weren’t exactly normal because under normal circumstances a wolf and a fox would never interact in such a way.

The wolf feigned death for a little bit, doing a rather convincing job of it before the little fox bit her ear, pulling at it gently.

“Emmy! Did I do a good job? Come on quit playing dead! I want to know if I’m getting better at stalking and hunting!” The little fox shifted into the form of a fifteen year old girl, though by first glances no one would be able to tell, her face was youthful and while her body was developing it was clear to tell she was a late bloomer. She was dressed in a long sleeved shirt with multiple stars on it with a thick red jacket hanging over it along with a pair of jeans. Curious green eyes looked over the wolf, short brown hair falling into her face. What could be noted, however, is how the girl had large orange fox ears poking out from her fur and a tail of a similar color out of her pants.

The wolf rolled out from under her younger sibling and shifted into the form that was On Jorge’s file, the girl Emerald Lupin. Though she looked far more wolfish than she did back in the days of the mutant camps, muscles larger, and teeth sharper and face more wolfish looking. Her hair was even longer and thicker than it was in the picture. Otherwise though it was undoubtedly the same girl from the file, wolf tail and all. Though instead of looking like she wanted to knock out the cameraman she had the biggest grin on her face she could muster. She was dressed in thicker clothes than her younger sister and while she looked absolutely freezing it didn’t seem like she minded too much though, she merely ruffled her younger sisters hair, standing up with her sister in tow. Emerald wore a thick green sweater with warm pants on. Though it wasn’t that cold outside, the cold had always bothered Emerald so much to the point that she couldn’t go out when it was snowing, an old phobia of hers making its lovely appearance. Luckily though it wasn’t snowing and it was clear and sunny enough outside to keep her warm while she was training ruby.

“You did good, I couldn’t even catch wind of you that time, you managed to hide you scent well. Your far better at stealth pounces than I am kiddo. You did good little sister.” Emerald smiled, Ruby over course acted happily over this, bolting inside the house to call their mother to tell her how much she had improved. After all this was the day they called home and let their parents knew how they were doing. This was when Emerald noticed the car driving up and the man dressed suspiciously like a detective. The girl had seen enough of them in her time as a mutant to know of what they looked and dressed like. Besides, she hadn’t always been on the right side of the law so she had to know how to avoid them, but today the werewolf didn’t feel like being rude or anything to the officer and merely went over to the driver’s side door once the man parked the car, knocking on the window politely.

“Hello Detective, It’s a fine day today isn’t it,” Emerald asked, leaning against his car, whether he got out or not was up to him but she was speaking loud enough for him to hear even if he stayed in the car. “So what are you doing here today?”

Being hunted by the police before gave the werewolf a natural distrust in anyone who wore a badge. It was kind of a force of habit of hers to tense up, a little, being on guard with the people that had shot at her multiple times and had aided the general public in locking people in camps. Then again she shouldn’t be too tense around this guy though, his scent seemed fine and she could smell the heavy scent of water off of him. A scent she formally had on her own body before the previous spring break where she lost that ability forever.

Emerald glanced at Jorge, her body becoming a little tense, but decided to act a little more light hearted. Well at least her idea of light hearted which may be different from the general publics. She gave a soft smile to the detective, trying her best not to scare the hell out of him with her teeth, something that happened a lot for some reason. “Come on Detective Cervantes, walk with me on campus we can talk and walk.”

The werewolf started walking with the good Detective beside her and as the uneasy silence grew, she bit her lip nervously. “So Whats all this about?” She asked, her tail wagging back and forth curiously. This was when she let out a light laugh, Emerald now thought she knew what all of this was about. It was quite possible it was something she did on the last full moon. “This isn’t about that guy I stole from is it? On My werewolf moon out in the woods, I knocked him out and took his clothes. Because he said he wouldn’t press charges because no one would believe that he had been knocked out by a naked chick. My clothes rip when I go all big wolf on the full moon and most the time I remember to set up set of spares by the cave but I just forgot last moon. I’ll give them back if he wants them, I just didn’t think he would send the cops after me for them.” While a part of Emerald figured this wasn’t about the poor teen she stole clothes from, it was worth a shot. And maybe that way she would get a laugh out of the good detective and put him more at ease. Somehow though, she didn’t think he was in the mood for playful banter.

At first Emerald had gotten a chuckle out of the guy, which was a good sign in her book. At least that way he was in a little bit of a better mood. Though, that mood seemed to fade as a more serious expression was placed on his face. This was When Emerald realized things were about to go terribly, horribly wrong.

Of course he asked her where she was on her full moon days? Had she messed up her timing? Had she escaped into the city on accident or maybe she had slipped up and ended up killing some poor hiker. Emerald’s face turned into that of worry, knowing the terrible things her third form could do to people. Though she often didn’t remember or break free of the beasts control when she needed to, she saw the aftermath and it was never pretty. While worry was on her face at first, when Jorge finally described the murders there was a brief flash of absolute horror on her face. Quickly though she erased it, not wanting the dectective to think that she was guilty. However, Emerald had a feeling she knew who was guilty and she didn’t like how history began repeating itself.
. “I’ve been at the Finger Lakes National Park most of the time, Ranger Mike can tell you that, he’s a forest ranger who clears out one part of the forest I marked as my Territory so I can hunt deer and be as far away from people as possible. One Month though I did change in the city but it was in the back room of an art studio my older sister runs. She locked me in there because she knew I was gonna change. She had cleaned it out before hand and replaced the wooden door with a steel one. Then again, you can’t take my word for it because I have no memory of the evens after I change most the time.” Emerald told him her blue eyes looking at him despairingly.

For a moment, Emerald stopped, events from the past repeating themselves in her mind as she stood there. Self Conciously, she ran her hand over her right shoulder, her finger lightly tracing over one particular section of it. Her life filled blue eyes had a far off look in them, as if she was remembering something from long ago. Slowly, she began walking beside Jorge again, biting down so hard on her bottom lip it drew blood. The girl definitely knew something and despite her brave act, this something deeply haunted her.

. “Those Girls…” Emerald began, her voice filled with sympathy and pain began to trail off as she traced her finger over the spot on her shoulder again. . “Did you have a rape kit done on them? Also Can I see the pictures of the victims, because if I think this is who I think it is, I may be able to help you with your case far better than I would like to.” Emerald told him, clenching her fists at her sides.

Watching the detective Emerald had a growing feeling in her gut that she would recognize these crimes all to well. It had been a long time since serial murders had taken place, of this matter, or at least ones she had heard about. Crimes like this would have normally gotten more publicity but Emerald bet that if anything they were trying to cover up the crimes until they had a suspect or at least one with a motive.

Once the pictures were handed to her Emerald took a deep breath, silently praying that these murders weren’t done by who she thought they were done by. “Detective, I have probably seen worse.” Emerald told him tail drooping between her legs. Her voice, though it did sound a little bit lighter than before carried somewhat of a deadly edge to it. Something was defiantly not right at the moment.

Examining the photographs, Emerald studied each individual picture, her mind seeming to get lost in memories. She examined each woman, seeing the horror on the face of their dead bodies, the bite-marks, the fact that parts of their stomachs were missing, everything, a look of recognition, fear and anger appearing on her face. The style of the kills, the looks on their faces, everything rang true to whom she was thinking of and what made matters worse was that she realized that this wasn’t even the half of it. . “He’s using them to send a message, He usually would eat the body and dispose of it instead of leaving it out.” Emerald stated very solemly, her voice darkening, her eyes lingered on a picture of the one girl that was a little different than the rest, the latest killing. She was tied to a wall with her stomach cut open, some of her innards eaten out there was less blood on this one. “This last one, hes repeating an attempted crime, his first, he usually does this when he starts to get in control of himself and hungry for something else besides human flesh. I don’t know his real name but he goes by Bloodfang and lets just say we have a history. “

Emerald ran her hand through her hair nervously, staring at the girls face, wincing a little. To imagine the suffering these girls went through before their deaths was terrifying to say the least. But what made things worse was the knowledge that these weren’t the only ones he would do this to seem to make things worse. The wolf girls body shook a little at the thought of Bloodfang finding her again.

“An Unpleasant history, I was supposed to be his first victim, I’m the only one who got away.” Emerald told the officer.

"No idea, If I knew that, I would have gone after him a long time ago," Emerald told the officer honestly, her voice holding nothing but determination. As scared as she was of Bloodfang and how much trauma he had given her she was not going to run from him any more. If it was going to come down to it, it was going to be ether him or her, no questions asked. And she wouldn't have it any other way, she would much rather die than to be "Mated" to him.

Blue eyes glanced over at Jorge for a moment, a look of realization crossing her face. "His first name is Jason, Crap I can't believe I didn't remember that. I think his last name is Franklin but im not sure, you know someone by their old nickname for so long you kinda forget what they are used to be called. That was the last bit of info I got of him since my last little incident with him." To Emphasize her last little incident with him, the werewolf grabbed the bottom of her sweater and lifted her shirt upwards enough so Jorge could see her midriff. On the wolf girls midriff was a long gnarled terrible scar that look as if someone attempted to tear her in half with claws. Though the scar was at least six months old it was still apparent that when it was inflicted it cause a lot of pain for the wolf woman. There was also various bite marks all over her stomachs and though they weren't as bad, they were still jarring.

She pulled down her sweater, a shudder going through her body."Hes about six nine, got more muscle than the damn brawny man, long claws from his fingers and he looks far more feral than I do. He is so strong he could easily crush someones bones if he squeezed hard enough, I'm speaking from experience mind you." Emerald shook her head, trying to rid herself of the old memories from the events six months ago. She paused for a long time taking a deep breathes, her body tense. There was pain past those strong eyes of hers, she felt like a a scared pup, cowering from a bogey man and she hated this feeling. Quickly, she hid any of that fear or pain she may have shown on her face and put on that determined strong look of a battle veteran.

" He loves to kill, loves to fight and loves to eat, but hes a smarter than a two bit thug. But he has the mind of an animal, hes lost himself to the beast and there is no rehabilitating him, if found, he should be killed on sight."

Emerald looked very adamant about this, obviously wanting this monster dead. He had been a dark shadow in her life for far to long and she wanted him gone.