Marvin Downings operated with precision. After an emergency surgery performed on the righteous deity, Gospel, his hands no longer needed tools to repair the body. They emanated the light of the divine and healed whatever he touched. Though that turned around a failing career, the good doctor was troubled thousands of patients later. The motivation in a challenging procedure was the difficulty. As his hands fixed whatever ailment they touched, he lost the fervor to restore the bodies of those in need. He’d always lived for the pursuit of perfection. With no mastery left to attain, his drive was dwindling.

Two weeks without showing up and a line of hopeful people winding in the hospital parking lot, awaiting his light-work, Marvin got a call from his head nurse, Sally Anne. She left him three voicemails before he finally picked up.

“Doctor Downings, if you don’t get here soon, I’m going to start giving out your address.”

“Tell them I died.” Marvin hung up the phone. Sally Anne called right back.

“No no no. You have a responsibility. They need you. If you won’t come on your own, I’ll drag you here.”

“Do it.” Marvin hung up again.

Twenty minutes later, as the doctor lay in his bed reading a book on advanced quantum mechanics and subtle physics, chasing true complexity, honking outside drew his attention. Sally Anne leaned out her car window and shouted for him to get ready. Marvin intentionally dragged his feet as he did so. He came outside with a stubbly beard, a t-shirt and shorts on, looking at Sally Anne as if she were the problem.

“You look gross, but this will have to do.” she shoved him past the lawn and into the passenger seat, running around the car and taking off quickly.

“I just can’t do it anymore.” Downings said under his breath.

“Listen, doctor… I’ve been at the hospital dealing with everything you’ve missed. Twelve hours a day on a good day. It’s been long enough.” she sighed. “I know it’s a lot for you. I’m there watching… every patient. Don’t forget that. I see how you’re losing yourself every time those hands touch another wound.”

Marvin realized that Sally Anne misunderstood and thought he was overwhelmed. “That’s not the problem. I could treat every person on the planet without any stress. I don’t know the last time I had a patient almost die on me. It doesn’t happen anymore. Not even close.” he bent forward in his seat and his head rested on the dashboard. “If these hands remove the healing process, what’s the point? Why did I go to school for eight years to learn every possible thing there is to know about the human body? Why can’t the whole world just have this ability and leave me out of it?”

Sally Anne listened quietly, seeming to hold her breath and the car steadily came to a stop. Marvin turned to look at her. Her eyes were wide, terror written all over her face. His heart began to race, seeing a thick fog outside the window. 

Just as he began to lift his head, Marvin watched a dark blur scrape off the hood of the sedan, sweeping Sally Anne out in one motion. Fog surrounded him as he slumped down into his seat, wondering what was happening.

When he finally rose, the fog had lifted. The only sign of Sally Anne was a trail of blood leading into the woods. Marvin followed the drops, noticing the amount picking up the further he got. She was still alive.

A little clearing was where the trail thinned and then vanished. Marvin searched around to see on a fallen tree torn clothing and chains on the floor below it.

Rustling in the trees caused Marvin to go a little further into the woods. He came upon the blood trail again. As it thinned again, he hid behind a tree, peeking forward. It was still foggy this deep in the thicket. He could see a figure on the floor. But he didn’t know whether it was Sally Anne, or something else. From behind the tree, he stepped slowly, trying not to make a sound.

Marvin’s first step was on a stone, but he still heard a loud CRUNCH. He looked down to see a bare foot on the ground beside his.

“Help.” a man’s voice said.

Marvin backed away as fast as he could to see a naked man. His face and hands were painted with blood. His eyes were squinting and he stumbled forward towards the doctor.

The doctor felt obligated to offer his assistance. He laid his hands on the man’s chest as he stood there, feeling for whatever was wrong. There was a strange energy feeding back through them, but otherwise, nothing to heal.

He quickly realized if there was nothing wrong with the stranger, the blood was not his own. Sally Anne.

Marvin ran to the figure on the floor, finding only an indentation in the leaves. As he stood there, searching for any sign through the dense fog, he did notice something moving. It circled him once, and was clearly not the slight frame of his head nurse.

The doctor held out a hand in the fog, illuminating a small area. He shook with fear as he heard branches behind him snap.

Marvin was pounced on, his back slamming onto the earth as he gasped, unable to catch any air to breathe. Instinctively, he placed his hands on the attacker. Thick, black fur on its neck surrounded his fingers. He poured all his energy into his hands as he looked up at the beast’s face. Bloodshot eyes and massive fangs stared back down at him. Drool spilled onto the ground beside him. As Gospel’s divine healing flowed into the creature, it began to shift. The fur receded, the body shrunk, the face softened. It was Sally Anne.

But the energy wasn’t enough to heal her. She snapped back into wolf form and chomped down, taking a bite out of Marvin’s shoulder. He screamed and began to pass out, the last thing he saw was the man covered in blood approaching the beast from behind and slamming it on the back of the head with a large stone.

Marvin awoke dizzy, his transformation beginning. Fur sprouted from his skin as he yelled in refusal. Sally Anne lay beside him, contusion on the back  of her head where the stranger struck her. The doctor stalled his shift to lay his hands on her. He healed her, careful for his new claws not to slice her skin. The wound closed up and Sally’s breathing normalized. The stranger was nowhere to be found.

In the middle of the woods, Marvin sat in confusion, halfway from man to wolf, waiting for Sally Anne to regain consciousness.

“What happened!?” she asked him frantically. “What happened to you!?”

“Hey, hey. Whatever I got, you got it too. Don’t look at me like that.” he said defensively. “Let’s get to the hospital. People need us.”

Sally Anne drove them back to the hospital, Marvin looking forward to the new challenge of being Wolf M.D.