"Since you’re so eager, we’ll begin with you Karl. You get your wish, you’ve been randomly paired with Katrina Osmond of the Blood Claw Pack" he began and I looked up in shock at my new partner.
"Karl Luther, at your service" he introduced himself in a slightly raspy voice. "And don’t worry, you’re much more adorable than Lieutenant James over there"
My face turned pink with a mixture of anger and embarrassment "Katrina Osmond, and I’ll thank you not to patronize me."
Karl’s face took on a mischievous grin, mostly hidden by his facial hair before silently patting me on the head in consolation.
Now the flush was definitely anger.
I did my very best to keep my rage in check and focus on the rest of the pairings. Each representative from the supernatural races paired with a human rep. All in all not nearly distracting enough, with the exception of one of the humans, a young man introduced as Agent Dalton from Central Intelligence, who was way too excited to be paired with a witch named Sandra and immediately began chatting her ear off about how witchcraft was always his favourite occult creatures and all things witch related, while his gaze kept being pulled down towards her cleavage before snapping back up to meet her eyes.
"What have I gotten myself into" I wondered.
As the partners began getting to know each other, and forming larger groups to accomplish the tasks their leadership had set them, I became woefully aware how little I had been told. I knew that I was to improve public perception of Lycans, and explore portals that had opened to ensure nothing dangerous was going to come out. But that was all I knew, and now realized I had no plan on how to make that happen, or how to even know where the portals had recently opened.
"Well, now that the formality is over, how about we ditch this place and do something productive?" Karl questioned with a wink.
"By productive you mean what exactly?" I cut back.
"Well I suppose we could start with familiarizing ourselves with each others strengths, skill sets and combat aptitudes" he nodded in a serious tone that went totally contrary to his body language.
"Wait, how does that translate into us leaving? I thought that’s exactly what the meeting was for?" I half shouted, forcing him down into an unoccupied seat.
I shook my head, wondering if there was actually something seriously wrong with this human. Did he not know about Lycan strength? Was he actually as crazy as he appeared? And what happened to the tingle I felt when he first walked into the meeting?
"Did your Alpha not tell you anything at all?" Karl asked with a frown.
"No, nothing at all. He told me to report here and gave me the overview letter that the council of Alphas sent out to all the packs in the region, outlining the purpose of the Task Force"
Karl laughed until his eyes began to tear up.
"Oh Petros, you cranky old beast, I hope you never change" he began "Your Alpha knew you desperately wanted to work outside the pack, but being the big softie that he is, he couldn’t bear to send you out to fend for yourself, so he called and asked me to look out for you."
I sat silent, unable to reconcile the word softie with the seven foot tall, tempermental, murderous Alpha.
"How do you know Alpha Petros?" I settled on asking, putting aside Karl’s woefully inaccurate description of my Alpha. "You must be close to agree to his request without getting something in return"
Karl smiled with an uncharacteristic happiness "who says I’m getting nothing in return?"
I shuddered a bit at what this strange human and my bloodthirsty Alpha might have agreed upon "Skip that, first, aren’t you supposed to be part of the human government contingent?"
"I am." Karl nodded as if that explained everything.
"Any other questions before we get to planning?
I blinked slowly, trying to decipher where exactly this conversation had gone off the rails. Looking over I saw both of the werewolves I was talking with earlier staring at the two of us in shock.
"Jurgen, remind me not to get on the bad side of anyone who considers Alpha Petros soft" the one called Jake muttered.
"Noted."
"Poor Lycan girl got stuck with the real crazy this time." his human partner, dressed in the uniform of a special forces soldier noted.
Voices all around the room were planning our first weeks worth of activities, from public outreach to informational social media posts to an excited Agent Dalton suggesting that a cosplay competition would be a great way to raise awareness, before quickly retracting his sentiment under the unimpressed glares of the witch contingent.
Me and Karl finally got to work, outlining a half dozen different possibilities and the locations of three newly opened portals that Karl considered safe enough for the two of them to enter and explore. Karl thought that a photo op with the two of us, with me in my Lycan form, would be the best way to introduce the lycans to the world. Saying that he was scary in a way that everyone knew and accepted, so a Lycan’s half wolf half human form with claws and fangs wouldn’t seem nearly as intimidating next to him. I had immediately shot this idea down, leaving Karl somewhat disgruntled.
"But the photo shoot in Lycan form is a great idea" Karl insisted, bringing it back to the front of the conversation.
"No, definitely not. I’m not at all comfortable being in Lycan form in front of people" I insisted. What I hoped Karl would never find out was that my Lycan form was incomplete. My mother was human, my father a kind but weak omega lycan. With one in a million level bad luck, my human genes were dominant to the Lycan. So when I transformed, I got claws on both hands but not my feet, ears and a tail, but nothing else. Tiny fangs, no wolf muzzle, not even any fur or thickened skin.
Still I had trained every day of my life to get strong enough to make pack warrior instead of being stuck doing menial pack jobs as an omega. Unfortunately, I was still mocked relentlessly by my pack mates for my deformity.