43 CHPT 43: Night Terror Motivation.

Claude took his first few steps into the forest slowly remembering how happy he was running through it every morning and feeling absolutely at peace. It felt different from other forests— despite how large the forest was, he was absolutely positive he was safe and knew that anybody coming here would understand they don't belong.

He walked through the forest hearing the familiar and calming ambience of birds and other woodland creatures, a doe watched him from the distance and ran off as he met its eyes.

He stepped out of the forest and saw the cabin in the middle of the grass, it looked desolate and uninviting. It was dark inside and the water bowl that Gil would leave out for Frosty in the front of the cabin was empty.

He crept closer to the cabin feeling absolutely terrified. After inching his way onto the porch he hesitantly reached for the door knob— stopping right before touching it, his nostrils were bombarded by a certain painful smell.

Claude lightly sniffed the faint smell of lavender that always radiated off his father even when the man didn't shower. The smell lingered faintly and led to the water bowl behind him before it disappeared, telling Claude that his father filled the water bowl and left days ago. He wasn't here...he's dead— brutally forced into an abomination and massacred.

".....Shit...." Claude said as he clenched his fists and his bottom lip trembled. He couldn't go inside, it was too much— a home without his father didn't feel like a home at all.

"[Hey, you've done enough for tonight. We can sleep out here and talk tomorrow.]" the voice said.

Claude turned to head away from the house, deciding to sleep in the grass or in the forest. He stopped in his tracks noticing a pit-wolf now stood in front of him. The creature was large...muscular....beautiful. It's icy blue eyes conveyed a sadness that mirrored his own.

"Frosty?"

The Pit-Wolf whined and began to pace back and forth while looking at him, the hairs on his back rose and his ears went back flat against his bulky head.

"[Wait, are you telling me you named a Pit-Wolf?]"

"Yes, he's family. What's wrong with him?" Claude asked.

"[He doesn't recognize you.]" the voice said flatly.

"The hell he does, I've only been gone for three weeks."

"[You seem to be unaware of how different you look.]"

Claude suddenly looked at the hair that now hung at the sides of his vision, "Shit....well he can recognize smells." He realized.

He then dropped to one knee and held his hand out with his palm facing the stars. Frosty crept closer but kept whining softly and growling.

"It's ok buddy, you know me. Come on man I raised you." Claude said in a calm and low voice. He soon felt a wet nose lightly bumping his hand followed by the sound of aggressive sniffing. After a few seconds Frosty nudged his hand away and began to lick Claudes face.

Frosty stopped and Claude noticed he didn't look entirely happy, his eyes still held an intense sadness to them.

"[It knows?]" the voice asked after realizing the Pit-Wolf understood Gil was dead.

Claude sat down with one knee raised for his arm to rest on, Frosty sat next to him seeming to match his depressed and enraged demeanor. Tears began to fall down Claudes face as he finally let the full reality of the situation consume him. The tears came down effortlessly in thick streams as he replied to the voice.

"Yea, he knows."

***

Claude watched helplessly as Dolion held his father by the throat, he tried to move....he fought with everything but it felt like the only thing responsive and functioning were his eyes and ears— set up like his own personal torture theatre.

SNAP!

Claude felt his heart stop as the monster they turned his father into fell silently into the grass. He looked into the eyes of Gil and watched as they lost their bestial bright yellow glow and became the dead eyes of his father. A voice played all around him, it was wretched enough to make his ears bleed and his skin crawl.

"YOUR WEAK AND SO IS THAT SNIVELING LITTLE BRAT!"

***

"RRAAGHH!!"

Claude woke up slashing at the air wildly as he roared.

Frosty jumped into action wondering what spooked Claude and began to sniff around.

Claude sat up in the grass sweating heavily and breathing like he just ran a marathon, he looked at his hands that were reached out in front of him and noticed something that was slowly becoming familiar.

His fingernails had changed into claws and thick black hairs covered the outside of his forearms. He felt blood drip down his lip from accidentally biting it with his lethal white fangs.

"Fuck.....my nightmare upgraded." Claude said as he got up and began to stretch while fighting the urge to throw up.

"[Claude, you really need to excercise. It's important that you burn energy...like now.]" the voice said out of nowhere.

"Don't worry, I planned to anyway....Frosty let's go." He replied while Frosty trotted behind him.

Claude converted his negative emotions into his running and sped through the forest at incredible speeds. Frosty found himself getting tired from matching Claudes pace.

A low hanging branch stood in his path and he jumped over it.

FWOO!

He jumped so high that his head hit the leaves of the tree which was about 15ft in the air. He landed and rolled to soften the landing seeming to be unfazed by his incredible vertical leap.

After running for an hour he jogged to his exercise equipment still feeling full of energy.

The voice tried to talk to him every now and then.

"[Claude.]"

"....."

"[Claude, we can talk now.]"

"Later!" Claude snapped.

He approached the pull up. As he reached and grabbed it, he noticed he no longer had to jump and now had to bring his legs up so they didn't hit the ground while he hung from the bar.

He attempted to do a pull up. He felt the various muscles in his back and lats flex and come to life, followed by his bicep and forearm muscles. The old black v-neck he wore suddenly felt very restricting so he let go of the bar and removed it.

"Hah.....better." He grunted.

He went back to hanging from the bar and did his first pull up.

"WAH!"

Pwoof!

Claudes newfound strength caused him to pull so explosively that his hands came off the bar as he launched himself into the air. He hit the ground painfully and looked at his arms with surprise— noticing the increased size and definition of his muscles for the first time.

He eventually found that holding one of his dumbbells between his legs helped him stay rooted to the bar.

He finally felt fatigued after doing 30 pull ups, 45 push ups and 60 squats with 60lbs of added weight.

Claude now sat in a small but fairly deep pond inside the forest to clean himself off. As he washed the dried blood from his side wound and knuckles the voice spoke again.

"[I think it's time we talked.]"

Claude sat in the pond and looked up at the oranges hued early morning sky— trees slightly covered up the view but also made the sight better.

"Yea I agree."