They'll never know it's me inside the skin of this wolf. If I hang around long enough in here, they won't even notice me after a while. They're used to wolves – they're always everywhere: that's their problem. And then I shall stake out my route and track everything down. And I shall find what I'm looking for. And steal it. And store it. And sell it back to them later, when they do realise the danger that has been dormant for so long. And if my assumption is right, they won't even have changed the combination of the safe. They have no concept of how precious that substance is, so they have no concept of how to protect what is valuable. I shall find my way. I shall lay my track to their lair. But this way is no good. But I shall detect a new path. I shall persist. And I shall succeed, because they are too naive. They are not wily enough to deal with me. And even if by some fluke they catch me, they'll never fit hands of this size inside their handcuffs. And now I shall find a means of access suitable for this new gigantism that has been inflicted upon my feet.
I can pass by only feet away from them, so inured are they to the presence of the wolf, which is what they perceive me to be. Even the warden, with his gun and his handcuffs dangling from his belt, stoops to fling me some scraps from the table. (There is, of course, a notice on the board about not feeding wolves, but nobody pays it any attention.) I pad past him, making sure not to take up too much of his valuable time, in case he gets suspicious of my lingering, and I sidle up the disabled ramp that my memory has rediscovered at the rear of the building and I make my way to the floor with the room that contains the safe.
I hide around a corner. The security man is doing his rounds. He is long-standing, reliable. He is considered to be a safe pair of hands. He knows where his bread is buttered. He is locked into the irregular but constant rhythm of his misplaced legs, like a slow-frozen gallop expressed in the metrical feet of a poem – a staggering iambic pentameter: de-dum; de-dum; de-dum; de-dum; de-dum. He knows that the work he does is valuable, even if others don't. He is aware of the latent danger in the wolf, even if others fail to notice. He is not swayed from his duties. His experience has told him what is important. He has not had a life of trivia. He can surely still remember when he was locked into an iron lung that must have felt just like a giant pair of handcuffs around his whole body, squeezing the breath out of him, squeezing the breath into him.
And breathing is getting difficult in here as well. It feels as if every atom of oxygen in my lungs is in handcuffs. But now he is gone, and now I can push open the door of the room and check the safe. Now I must be careful, because a four-legged creature on its hind legs is something they would notice. I move the wheel, clumsily but successfully. As I suspected, the combination is the same, and I snap the door open with a swipe of my artificial paw-wrapping. And now I have it. So much value, so much power, so carelessly guarded. But listen! I can hear the sound of feet. Should I lock it away again, or can I wolf it down and regurgitate it later? It's a high risk strategy for something so valuable. It's a high risk strategy for the state of my health as well.
But my health is not so valuable that it's not worth taking a chance with. I know my lack of importance in the order of things. But now what is happening? Now I feel hot. Now I feel on edge. I must be getting feverish. My suit is getting tight. Too tight. It squeezes me. It handcuffs me in. My suit is starting to burn me. Filaments and elements and particles and shreds and molecules of the essence of the wolf are blistering into me and bubble-drowning my skin, spearing their scorch marks in, echoing the sharp-toothed malice down. The lupine spirit has now leaked into me, leaked into its permanent residence, safe and secure inside me. I attempt to limp away, so as not to be under their feet, but it is too late. They have discovered the theft. I hear loud voices. It was stupid of me to think that they wouldn't notice.
So now they have me. I could pretend to take no notice, but I would convince nobody. What I have is more valuable to them than it is to me. My head is starting to clear, and I can now remember the struggle, and I can now remember managing to bite – and infect – each one of them on the soft flesh just above their feet, as they laboured to hold me down, kicking me, hitting me with sticks. So now they might have captured me, but they'll never fit these paws inside their handcuffs. I am captive, but I am also safe, secure in the identity of the wolf.
I await my fate, and their means of securing me, which will be something far worse than handcuffs. They will not kill me – not yet – because I am too valuable to them. They know that if they kill me without neutralising me, they will still not be safe. But they will tether me by my feet somehow, and they will stretch me and they will cause me great pain – I know that. But what they don't realise is they will never retrieve their booty, for I have now ingested it, so now they have no antidote and so even though it will almost certainly kill me, they will soon come to their state of plague-cursed lamentation. The order has now changed. They are no longer in charge. They will soon face the long-planned revenge. They are about to taste the malediction. They will soon have to take long and bloody notice of the leakage of the wolf.
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