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lunarcovehq · 1 month

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Dhruv Mehta is a werewolf that currently resides in Shadow Lake and has been a Lunar Cove resident for 1.5 months, playing Frankenstein… and his monster?

ITS THE END OF THE WORLD

GENDER/PRONOUNS: CIS Male, He/Him

DATE OF BIRTH: May 28, 1989

OCCUPATION: Scientist at K Labs

FACECLAIM: Dev Patel

AS WE KNOW IT, AND I FEEL FINE

SPECIES: Werewolf

WOLF CLASSIFICATION: Omega

PACK AFFILIATION: Member

WELCOME TO LUNAR COVE, DHRUV MEHTA

Trigger Warning: Death

If you could ask God a question, what would it be?

Such a thing should not have made the boy think, facts and figures was what he knew to be true not prayers and wishes, yet hands clasped and staring at the image adorned with flowers, there were many things he wanted to ask for, wish for, though what could be granted? It was one thing to be born human and another thing entirely to feel human.

Life had been strange in a strange sort of way, powerless yet surrounded by power, strange in a curious way, eager to know, eager to want, but that wish could not be granted no matter the prayer. A child born from a union of a human and witch had a chance of having powers, but when Dhruv did not grow into any he swore there was a sigh of relief from his mother, it was easier she said, safer, the world is dangerous for people of that kind. Questions on why ended with explanations that could not satiate the boy’s inquisitive mind, why nots were met with shrugs, and the ones that were answered did not contain the level of detail Dhruv required and thus began the journey of discovery — why were things the way they were?

You never quite forget your first punnett square. The moment Dhruv came to what that was and how genetics influenced the way people received certain traits he ran to his parents, eyes wide thinking he had cracked the code – in a way he had, but in many other ways he had not. Not born within the miraged safety of Lunar Cove, he automatically became an outsider but also a secret keeper of sorts, an entirely different world confined and existed outside of the London he grew up in to which he was whisked away at a young age, yet it could not have been all that different could it? His cousin spoke of the same things, of friends and school, of hobbies and interests, he could relate yet those friends were magical while his weren’t, he was not being taught power control, there was no way he could understand when Mason talked about such things being hard work chances for him ever getting to experience that only squashed further and further as he aged.

Sensing Dhruv’s forlorn state after those phone calls, his father imparted a simple statement that embedded itself into his heart and soul; ‘somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known’ and it was go from there. Everything held a new-found beauty, every theorem, every subatomic particle, all the principles he studied contained a rightness and the knowledge only added to the excitement and the awe. Bright, gifted kid turned into a confident, genius man with achievements and degrees under his belt before his peers. He did not need to have eidetic memory like his father to state complex physics formulas at the drop of a hat, they took practice, yes, but paved way for a slight arrogance that developed over time with every correct answer. He was self-assured, one could try to disprove his statements but Dhruv’s mind grew to be like a spreadsheet, data accessible almost instantaneously, and he only strengthened that. Always pushing on the why, on that thirst to discover something, if not within himself then at least with the world he knew and grew up in. He may not understand magic but Science and Mathematics held answers and provided rational explanations for things,the why and how, they were constant and consistent and Dhruv knew, one day, he’d have all the answers.

Time moved and so did he. Family, friends, education, Dhruv fell into a steady flow but of course, as clever as he was known to be, he couldn’t possibly predict all things. A held gaze across the bar sparked a new kind of curiosity, a drink and a conversation later he realised he did not have all the answers yet, that there could be joy in figuring out something together. Chemistry was one of his favourite branches of science, the study of matter, but what truly mattered? What possibly existed beyond the composition and structure of elements? This. Chemistry was in the ebb and flow of easy conversation, in the sparkles of laughter mixed with soft smiles, Dhruv did not need to be a genius to figure this was something good. Numbers were exchanged and dates were set, and it continued to be good. Perhaps he had made a mistake to pray this would last, to wish for more sunsets and something more because he couldn’t have expected this. A seemingly ordinary day should not have been a cause for concern, but the note held little answers, the unanswered texts and phone calls that only grew in number were effort exerted in a futile way. He did not know what drove them away but it festered as something bitter within him. But time moved and so did he.

Lunar Cove had not been on the radar, in fact, he desire to step foot in that town had waned to a negligible thing, but his parents who had moved to the town a long while ago, wished for their son to join them, figuring with all the chances the outside world had to offer were taken and experienced it was time to come home. True home. Dhruv could’ve argued, and he had a little, there was so much more he could not be confined in that magical barrier but soon grew weary listening to their lectures and with a recent heartbreak that had yet to heal, he agreed.

Dhruv could study life down to the exact atom, life, however, as he had and would continue to soon discover could not be confined to the nucleus of a man and his strive for that something else, life weaved and danced to its own beat that could not be quantified. Song Seo-Joon’s arrival into his life was met with some hesitancy, and that reflected in Seo-Joon too, but the pair struck a chord despite nothing pointing to a friendship working out, it did. They talked about things, bonded on the feeling of not having magic, and Dhruv obviously subjected his friend to his rambles about theories and experiments. It was one such night, where he finished up on work, while Seo-Joon waited, that things in his life shifted again. Except the moments that define lives aren't always obvious, they don’t always scream wolf in the piercing of a needle into skin. But that’s what happened. A careless slip and a careful catch, their lives forever changed yet it was Dhruv’s heart that beat in quiet fear over their discovery, one that would have no choice but to mask as excitement. Everything forward and backwards read entirely new. Genetic structure altered to fit in this new form. Starting into a mirror, the silhouette reflected a similar, recognisable curious glance that a human once wore, but who was he now? A man, but not human, not entirely. What was he? A wolf? Could he claim to be one? The prodding uncovered one only thing: he was something strange and unnatural — he was an experiment.

Gravitational acceleration is a known constant, the mass of the action could be gauged, could he then use it to calculate the weight of a lost future?

They bent the truth but they had not failed, not entirely, a loss led to a breakthrough and cover-ups that followed made way for accolades and awards, still, an ache burned deep, this could've been something to celebrate, to smile and accept the congratulations and though those were done, it felt different from his expectations. He had an answer to something, yet it did not feel correct, he did not feel correct. Utterly lost even though there was more that could be studied, more that could be attained, Dhruv retreated into himself in the following weeks, mood worsening to be told by the Song family that Seo-Joon seemed to have skipped town. That wasn't like him, but not finding the man anywhere and texts being ignored there wasn’t much he could do. Life was just funny that way.

He stayed in Lunar Cove for a while with K labs taking research projects that he could, and joined the pack too, to have some sort of aid for this new form of his, but adjusting was tough, and tougher still was dealing with the Alpha. Nico, while goodhearted, did not, in his opinion, know what he was doing. There was care and acceptance but in the constant onslaught of unimaginable horrors, Nico’s attitude rubbed him wrong. It was one thing to want to protect everyone, a good trait one could possess, yet to only care for a select when the pack was supposedly family? Dhruv couldn’t see any bit of logic to that. A good man did not make a good leader. This led to many quiet disagreements, voicing some when things could not be held in for too long, which when expressed were dished with heavy scrutiny, but he withdrew before things got truly heated. He wanted so desperately to put thoughts into action, to change things despite knowing it’d be foolish, but what could he do? Who would listen? Certainly not Nico, he only cared for his own and Dhruv was not one of them. With rank being the lowest in the hierarchy, he was too weak in more than one way, heck some even outright said he was hardly a wolf to begin with. An error. Didn't matter that he shifted alongside them, pack bond linking them all, Dhruv was not born nor bit, had not taken life to set about this new being he was. But in a way, hadn’t he? Given up his own life for this, that ought to count. It should have counted.

With no close friends to share such thoughts with and Seo-Joon still supposedly out of town, the bitterness that brew tipped the scales and in a move so utterly foolish but also somewhat thought through, he left Lunar Cove. Taking some time to explore the country before flying back to London to piece back his broken life. However, that feeling of brokenness and sense of feeling lost persisted. The news of Mason's death had him caught entirely by surprise and shocked him to the core. His cousin, happy and bright, should’ve had a long life ahead, not have it cut so short in such a way. The rush back to Lunar Cove was needed this time, for the funeral and also to somehow make sense of the untimely demise. Answers were pieced together in a blurred states of sorrow, confusion, anger and nostalgia. He had not planned to stick around long, but the sight of familiar faces, of old feelings resurfacing, Dhruv decided that perhaps staying would be more beneficial for now.

#Dhruv Mehta #k labs #taken werewolf #dev patel #shadow lake #all

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lunarcovehq · 4 months

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Aysun Demir is a werewolf that currently resides in Shadow Lake and has been a Lunar Cove resident for one week, but where, oh, where is her wolf?

ITS THE END OF THE WORLD

GENDER/PRONOUNS: Cis Woman, She/Her

DATE OF BIRTH: June 21, 1994

OCCUPATION: Registered Nurse

FACECLAIM: Melisa Asli Pamuk

AS WE KNOW IT, AND I FEEL FINE

SPECIES: Werewolf

WOLF CLASSIFICATION: Beta (Born)

PACK AFFILIATION: Non-member

WELCOME TO LUNAR COVE, AYSUN DEMIR

Trigger Warning: Death of a child, Illness, Medical Assistance in Dying, Discussions about the legality/morality of MAID/palliative care, Medical malpractice, Mentions of miscarriage/infertility, Mentions of death

Aysun Demir was born during the early hours of the morning on the Summer Solstice in Rize, Turkey. Her parents, Leila and Ahmet, had been trying for a child for nearly a decade before she arrived, so it was safe to say she was cherished. They lived in a small compound with their extended family, her aunts and uncles, her cousins. They were a pack, a small, unnoticed, unremarkable one- and they intended to keep it that way. The species war nearly wiped out their entire lineage, leaving only a few ancestors left to carry the family name. It was those ancestors who made a decision then that they would survive, even if it meant burying their true natures so deeply that their own decedents would some day question whether they were truly anything other than human.

And that was how the Demirs continued to live their lives centuries later, following the same rigid teachings and rules to ensure that no harm could ever come knocking on their door. All the children were homeschooled, and they were most often confined to the boundaries of the family compound. A few trusted adults would go into town for necessities and to show face, but even they exercised utmost caution. Driving was forbidden for the teenagers and young adults of the pack, as was drinking and other potentially 'unsafe' activities, again all in an attempt to avoid any accidental triggering of their curse. Speaking about Supernaturals was strictly forbidden. The children were given just enough information when they were old enough to ensure that they understood one thing- there was nothing worse than triggering the wolf gene.

Though it might've seemed extreme, it worked. The pack lived in relative peace in their corner of the woods, decades passing with not a single turned-wolf among them. They were as good as human as far as anyone was concerned, and by the time Aysun's generation came around, the idea of their true werewolf identity was something of a fairytale, nothing more than a story to tell around a campfire or scare children into behaving.

And perhaps that was why things eventually unraveled in the form of a young pack member who sought to challenge the rules, convinced they were only in place to control them rather than to protect them. Aysun was ten when her then fifteen year old cousin Ozan stole the keys to his father's truck in the middle of the night. Ozan would later claim that he didn't see the homeless man crouched at the side of the dirt road, not until the truck was rolling over him, at least. Her cousin didn't even stop to check if the man was alive or not, gunning it all the way back home. When he returned, the pack elders were waiting for him, and though he accepted his punishment for going on a joy ride, he didn't mention a word about the homeless man who may or may not be dead because of him.

Things were fine for another week, but then the full moon came, and the entire pack watched in horror as Ozan's body contorted and he cried out in pain, the transformation taking over him. Aysun had watched from behind her fathers legs, eyes wide as saucers. She only caught a glimpse of her cousin dropping to all fours before she was being ushered away with all the other children. It was the last time she saw Ozan, come morning, he was gone and all the adults seemed to carry a sort of heaviness with them. All she was told when she asked was that Ozan had to leave for the safety of the pack. And all she knew was that her father had a big role in advocating for that decision.

Things were different after that, it was almost like a sore than was left unattended to fester. The rules were stricter than before, but despite how suffocating it became, everyone followed them without fail.

It didn't stop the hunters from finding them anyway.

It turned out that, despite being banished, Ozan continued to linger in the woods surrounding the compound, scared and alone, unknowingly attracting the attention of the hunters. The assault could hardly be considered a battle, her family was sorely unprepared, having unlocked none of the defenses that would've allowed them a fighting chance. It didn't matter to the hunters that they were un-triggered, they were still vermin to be exterminated based on potential alone. Aysun doesn't have many memories of that night, having blocked most of it out, but the next thing she remembered was being on a plane to the US with her dad, her mother noticeably absent.

They didn't speak about that night ever again, nor did they speak about her mother. It was almost as if none of it happened and they just left Turkey for a new beginning for the heck of it. Though he never acknowledged it out loud, Aysun watched the weight of it overcome her father like a sickness over the next few years. Unsure of how to make things better, she did the only thing she could think to do- follow his rules obediently, and never put him in a position that would break his heart further.

Though Ahmet continued to lead the household with the teachings from the pack, he also acknowledged that some changes had to be made. They needed money, a way to build a life and sustain themselves. It was because of this that he begrudgingly allowed Aysun to pursue higher education. Being thrust into the public school experience after being squirreled away for so long was jarring to say the least, but Aysun excelled in school, even if she had no social life to show for it, and in no time she was graduating with a degree in nursing.

The first nursing job Aysun was hired for was in pediatric oncology at the local hospital. Despite the grim nature of her job, there was something rewarding about helping families through the worst times of their life. With her gentle nature, it was unfortunately very common for her to get too attached to her patients. That was what happened in the case of Daisy, a sweet little five year old with late stage leukemia. Aysun was the admitting nurse when Daisy had first come in with her family following her diagnosis, white-blonde curls bouncing around her cherubic face as she skipped down the halls giggling. The little girl had taken a special liking to Aysun, and vice versa, so she was often assigned to the family. In the span of a few months, Daisy became just a shell of what she used to be, blonde ringlets long gone, sunken cheeks and sickly distended belly. The chemo hadn't worked, neither had the radiation or the surgery, and with each new treatment and test, it became clear that Daisy was only getting worse.

It broke Aysun's heart to watch it all happen in real time, to watch Daisy's parents mourn her while she was still technically alive, to watch the life slowly drain out of her as she was switched to palliative care. The little girl was constantly in pain, the kind that all the narcotics in the world couldn't fix, and she continued on that downward spiral until her parents had had enough. They wanted to end her suffering, they couldn't put her through it anymore. They'd read about something called MAID, medical assistance in dying, a way for them to give their daughter the ultimate gift of peace. Aysun wasn't sure how she felt about the concept, but she could see the toll it was taking on the whole family.

And so she helped the family bring it up to the doctors- only to have it shut down. Despite Daisy's death being obviously imminent, the laws in their state decided that she'd have to suffer to the end, until her body decided it was time. It was unfair, it was unjust, but there was nothing they could do about it. They tried to fight it, but the family couldn't afford expensive lawyers, nor could they afford to fly Daisy to one of the few states where it was legal. The news devastated the family further, and Aysun couldn't count the number of times she'd sobbed together with Daisy's parents as they watched the little girl's slow decline.

It was a rare slow shift that night, and Aysun only had one patient. Daisy. She sat with the girl for most of the night, a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach as she watched the labored rise and fall of the little girl's chest. The family had been in earlier, as they were every day, and as Aysun sat there she replayed over and over in her mind the moment Daisy's mother told her she'd started praying her little girl would just pass. Daisy was in and out of consciousness most days at that point, so drugged up on a cocktail of narcotics to try and manage her pain. It still didn't work, she could tell by the furrow of the girl's hairless brow, by the soft groaning sounds she was making with each exhale.

The sinking feeling in her stomach grew and grew until it swallowed her whole.

On quivering feet, Aysun left Daisy's bedside, moving toward the medication room. It was time for one of Daisy's scheduled narcotics, she basically had the girl's whole chart memorized at that point. The other nurse on shift barely looked up from her phone as she walked past with the vial in her pocket. All narcotics were meant to be double checked with another nurse and co-signed for accuracy, but she knew this particular nurse was lax on the rules, just telling others to sign her name for her. Aysun didn't like the nurse all that much, but it would work in her favor that night at least.

The one nice thing about the palliative area of the pediatric oncology ward was that there were no monitors, no jarring sounds. So Daisy instead passed away listening to the gentle playback of her favorite tv show, her cold hand clutched in Aysun's warm ones. The syringe and vial, which was more empty than it should've been, were already discarded, the narcotics sheets signed and squared away.

She sat with Daisy long after she stopped feeling her heartbeat flutter against the inside of her delicate wrist. And maybe she was imagining it, but she could've sworn the little girl was smiling.

At shift change in the morning, she informed the doctors that Daisy had passed away in her sleep, and as she'd been at deaths door for so long, the news was met with was words of sympathy and hugs. Despite her shift being over, she stayed until Daisy's parents got to the hospital, and she stayed as they all cried tears torn between sadness and peace.

The weight of what she'd done didn't hit until she'd checked her phone after, to see all the missed calls from her father. He drove her to and picked her up from work, as she didn't (and couldn't) drive, he was likely waiting in the carpark wondering where she was. All at once Aysun thought she was going to be sick. Despite her intentions, and despite the circumstances, she'd caused a death.

What had she done.

She was sure her father could tell something was wrong when she got in the car, she could tell he wanted to ask, but long gone were the days they actually spoke to one another freely and openly. They hadn't done that since they left Turkey, and so the car ride home was long and painfully silent. Once she was in the safety of her own room, Aysun quickly looked up when the next full moon would be- two weeks. That didn't give her much time at all.

She didn't sleep a wink that night, though she did silently sob into her pillow, a war waging within herself on multiple fronts. She was glad Daisy was finally at peace, but had she done the right thing? How was she going to explain to her father what'd happened, that she'd triggered her curse? What would he do when he found out? What was she going to do in two weeks time when she shifted for the first time? Thoughts of Ozan flittered through her mind unbidden, his howls of pain ringing in her ears, the look of horror in the faces of the adults around her. The look on her father's face.

No. She couldn't do it

There was no way for her to reverse what she'd done, and she wasn't even sure yet if she'd want to reverse it even if she could. Perhaps in part it was cowardice, but all she knew was that she couldn't put her father through this all over again.

And so, with the tears still wet on her cheeks, Aysun began throwing together a few items in her bag, moving quickly in the darkness. Knowing her father was likely asleep in the living room, she quietly pushed open the window of her ground-floor bedroom before sneaking through. Back home in Turkey, she'd overheard some of her aunts and uncles mention a place called Lunar Cove, a safe haven of sorts for their kind. That sort of talk was forbidden in the pack, especially around the kids, but she'd been eavesdropping with her cousins. The memory had been hiding in her mind all that time before coming forward when she needed it the most.

With one final look over her shoulder at the run down little house she'd so desperately tried making into a home for her and her father, Aysun set off.

#Melisa Aslı Pamuk #melisa pamuk #Aysun Demir #shadow lake #shadow lake hospital #all #nonmember werewolf #taken werewolf

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