*A look around those gathered and he begins to speak, his voice soft at first* Cold. Wet, that's what he first felt. The man wakes up slowly, realising he's in water. He stands quickly and looks around, fighting the wave of dizziness that suddenly hits him as he moves too fast, his head spinning. A hand goes up, and he touches his head and the bump that was not there the last time he remembered. Then again, as he looks around, he realises he was not in a forest the last time he can recollect. *The voice begins to pick up now* He walks out, shivering from the cold, his clotes soaked. He begins to strip then, removing the clothing and then placing them aside, the winter air warmer than the freezing touch of the water. He quickly strips and looks around, judging where he is and then heading off to civilisation at a jog, going back to some safety maybe still watching for whatever it is that took him here.

*A pause before he speaks again* A low howl suddenly came, rising in the night like a percussor for what was to come. A quick glance back shows a wolf unlike any other wolf he's ever seen. It's big, nearly the size of a small pony and completely white, like a snow wolf. It's eyes are glowing a red and that's when he turns to get around a tree. The next time he turns back it's gone.

The man continues to run onwards for 10 minutes utterly alone, the forest gone quiet as if in mourning. There's a feeling of waiting in the air, as if something is about to happen and it won't. Not yet. And as he runs he feels the eyes on him, those glowing red orbs… staring at him, watching. He doesn't see it again, not fully, a glimpse of something here, a crackle of a twig snapping and then nothing. And so he runs back to his house, to get what he might need to fight this thing.

As he breaks into another clearing it's there. Waiting for him. It's eyes still glowing this red. But even as the wolf moves forward the man is going for a stick of wood he sees. It's oak, a branch broken off during a previous storm and as the beast jumps he swings the piece of wood and watches in amazement as it breaks. But the wolf doesn't stop, instead jumping again for the man's throat, meaning to rip it out. The man turns away, barely in time, the wolves claws digging into his chest and leaving a trail as they drop past.

He's not dumb, he can't fight this creature, a creature that was not stopped when hit, which broke good oak when he swung at it. He had felt some of it's body as it jumped at him and he dodged. He knew nothing natural could feel so hard. And so he ran as fast as he could, hoping to lose it in the forests. *A long pause as he looks around those gathered, walking around quietly* He turned around and tried to go the other way, tried to see if it was following him. It wasn't, not that he could see anyhow and so he ran and tried another way to go back. So he ran. And ran and ran. It stepped out then, right in front of him. It's eyes beginning to glow red once more. And so he stepped back, watching it. And it backed him off with lunges and snaps, forcing the man back. And the man stopped, having enough of it and as the beast lunged for him once more he jumped, grabbing a branch and swinging his legs at it. *A pause once more as he looks around and speaking* The beast took it in the jaws and fell backwards. And as the man dropped down to the ground once more the beast rose, unhurt. And the man watched this, incredulous. And he turned to run once more, to find someplace where maybe he could win this fight.

So he ran, and as he ran he looked back and the beast seemed to smile, watching him. As he turned around once more the beast let out a howl, the very same howl he had heard earlier, a howl speaking of what was to come, of a reckoning and a fight. And of death waiting. He ran and each time he tried to escape he was stopped by the beast, always being kept.

In the end, he gave up trying to escape, having tried to get to somewhere where he could stop this creature to find a place to stand. He returned to the clearing he first met the beast and found it waiting there once more. But this time it was differenent, this time he meant to fight it and either kill it or die trying. And even as he moved forward the beast changed, shifting and growing taking the form of a man. Stunned, surprised and scared the man might have been, remembering tales told to him of creatures that changed from man to wolf and back to wolf, that could be hurt only by silver. But he would not let himself stand down and he would not give up. The fight between them was one sided, nothing that the man could do hurt seemed to hurt the creature. He punched it, he kicked it, he threw it against the trees and used the branches to hit it. And it all bounced off the man-wolf. It never seemed to slow it and it never seemed to hurt. In the end, when he could no longer fight, when his body had taken all that it had and given it to him to use, when his bones had been broken and his breath pounded out by him by the man-wolf again and again, it stopped and stepped back.

He tried to stand and made it up onto one knee, watching the creature quietly which spoke at last. And these were the last words he would hear, the last on that side of life *his voice drops down now in pitch though it still carry's the clearing* "You have two choices, you can give up and lie down and I can finish this quickly or you can join me, join me and live as my servant"

*The voice rises once more to his normal level* The man heard this, and he made his choice without thought, without hesistating. He took a swing against the man-wolf rising from his feet, making his own choice. Forging his own destiny and not taking what others would hand to him as a by the by. And as the wolf-man caught him and held him, just before he sank his fangs into his neck, it spoke once more "Welcome to Clan Gangrel. You've passed"

*The voice stops completely now and looks around the gathered faces, looking at each one and weighing the faces he sees before speaking one last time* And that is what it means to be Gangrel, to be part of a line of honorable warriors who will never stand down and who will never let others choose their own destiny's. We make our own lives and we live with the choices we make. *He turns, watching them before he smiles and walks away to a side, concluding the story.*