White Lightning Productions

>>>NOT KRIS<<< (the I'm not Kris sign)(how Zen)

Actually, I 'm not sure that some really deep kissing wouldn't start the process. If the precursors and enzymes are present in breast milk, then they're probably also present in Saliva.
However; that sort of kissing usually leads to what got Sarah into the "Fuzzy-Toothy" set... intimate contact.

Ah, but the question still stands. CAN a kiss transfer it? Concept of "was it the bullet or the fall that killed her?"

Here's a question I came up with when I was reading another part of the forum. Maybe it's been asked before but is there a small private college anywhere in the PitW universe that's just for Weres- ?

It's possible, but it hasn't popped into my imagination yet, and it's certainly not the college in the town Peter and Sarah are bound for.

(Also, I have the horrible feeling such a college would bear a disturbing resemblance to Patrick Henry University. No, no link. Google it if you want to be terrified for the future...)

I think you mean Patrick Henry College... or hell, any other "Bible College".

I dearly hope this doesn't drag the forum into the endless "debate" between creationism and, er, most legitimate scientific fields, but I can't resist the tag line you've presented me.

Evolution is NOT A THEORY. It is SCIENTIFIC LAW. It can be observed in real time and proven via scientific experimentation. Self-replicating systems that change over time and pass along their traits to their offspring will adapt to changing environments. It is as absolute and immutable as the law of gravity. The THEORY is Natural Selection, which argues that life got the way it is today because animals with high-fitness traits outbred those with low-fitness traits. And the only reason we can't prove that is because we don't have access to a time machine. There's nothing more irksome than some ignorant boob yelling "evolution is only a theory!"

Incidentally, Darwin was a devout Christian who believed that God was the one who set the chain of evolution in motion in the first place. This sorta puts him on the side of intelligent design, yet almost have the Christians I've spoken to condemn him as an atheist. Fun.

I doubt you'll run int o that many bible thumpers in here, actually....

people of a variety of fatihs? maybe... but not.... "You're condemned to HELL it you beleive in E-VO-Lution! BTW, please pass the pornography."... too easy.

And yeah, I run into the 6000/7000 year arguement myself, my easiest rebuttal is this. "The earth is clearly much older. However, I will cede that the Jewish people are approximately 6000 years old, as the Bible is the history of a people, in a specific region."

The only question more confusing about the science vs. magic debate amongst weres would probably be the religion debate. If it is magic, the magic of whom?

Magic vs Religion? Easy, in a way. If it's your religion, it's Miraculous. If it's useful to your religion, but not necessarily of your religion, it's magic.
If it's somebody else's religion, it's black Sorcery.
Sam Clemens commented on the thing: "Mankind has found the one, true, way; several of them, in fact."
Magic can be explained by the so-called Transistor effect: A small, low voltage can control a much higher voltage if the proper conditions (such as a semi-Conductor material) exist. Magic postulates that certain materials, mental states, and ceremonies can provide this "Semi-conductor".
As to the age of the Earth, it's really less important as to "how long it's been here", than to "how long will it be habitable for humanity?"
If there's no humanity, then the whole question's moot, isn't it?
Even the Creationists agree with that.

Bumping this up to see if anyone's got questions.

Maybe we can avoid issues of magic and evolution at this point...

Ok, here's one for ya.

Given that werewolves have exceptionally acute senses, are they therefore more vulnerable to pepper-spray, stink-bombs, , flash/bang grenades, and other forms of attack that depend on overwhelming the senses rather than damaging the body?

More vulnerable? It depends. Werewolves are more acute in all senses. While this does mean that they can be temporarily disoriented by sudden assaults on those senses, it also means they can use the other senses to compensate far quicker and more thoroughly than humans. A human hit with a flash-bang, for example, can't use smell or touch to do anything more than maybe find the walls and floor- for up to a minute he's completely vulnerable- whereas a werewolf will still have smell and touch plus the instincts to use them to maintan some situational awareness.

Also, there's regeneration to consider. If you only have one flash-bang and one stink bomb, you may as well not bother, because UNLIKE a human, you have the life of the flash-bang plus about three seconds max before the werewolf has sight and hearing back in full operation, and maybe a couple seconds more for rational thought to follow... if the werewolf, at this point, gives a damn about rational thought.

So, all in all, maybe a werewolf would be more disoriented by that sort of thing, but it wouldn't last nearly as long and he wouldn't be nearly as vulnerable as a human.

one would think that having supernatural fortitude would compensate for this at least somewhat. i would think that some form of hideous stench causing device would work though. i'm not going to try to bring real physics into this though. everytime you bring real physics into a fantasy discussion, god kills cat-girl.

Were's are, as Kris pointed out, very fast on the recovery. Considering the historical records of Werewolves, (even though they don't really exist) you get the feeling that the ones that got caught were the "Slow" types, who didn't split the scene when the Church or Temporal authorities closed in.
I suspect that a sensible Were' would have the tendency to flee from a Flash-Bang grenade attack, a Generic Bang grenade attack, W.P. smoke, teargas, and all the other goodies we have in our arsenal.
If there's a window, they'd probably go out that. If there's only a doorway, and you're standing in it...well, you'll recover from those claw marks on your face and body (from the Were's feet) in under a month: Gauranteed...although there might be some lasting side effects.
Given their low population; they aren't likely to stand and fight: survival lies in running away to reproduce somewhere else.
There are other things that are lethal to Were's: even a big stick will do the job, if you pulp the Werewolf's head and body.
Remember, Wolves are not fighters! They will give ground to almost any other predator who puts up a strong showing. They "fight" in the pack to keep and establish position and dominance; and it's rare that there is blood spill, unless it's for the position of Alpha.
Wolves are not agressive against other creatures except in the hunt for food, and even then, it's in a Group, not alone.
Kris's Were's have all these things going on in their minds, as well as the Human thought/instinct patterns; no wonder that Thralls are so feared and disliked: They are effectively Crazy! Dangerously Crazy!
What I see the "training" as being is keeping the Thrall under control until the Human stuff can start to take over and set up some controls over the Wolf instinct patterns. It's there, as was evidenced by Dr. Abe's ability to control Sarah. She obeyed him because he established dominance, as another Wolf would have. The Human part understood his commands. Now, Sarah has to re-establish dominance over her own body in the same way, only from the inside. She will have to Integrate two different sets of instincts into something that the Human part of Sarah can use sucessfully.
...and be ready for opening day in College.
Not fun.
>>>>>["not Kris" sign]<<<<<

This also might be a good chance to mentin that yes, there are werwolves in this world (though not in this story) who have had to deal with Flash Bangs, as well as IEDs. Remember that 1 in 1000 rule... well, given that the military allows lycanthropes the additional chances of (a) getting away form their home pack in early adulthood, and settled elsewhere, and (b) flexing their muscles... male werewolves especially seem to have alot of agression that they need to 'get out of their system' in constructive ways. So in the armed forces, the numbers are actually skewed, almost as high as 1 in every 800.
Given who's been mobilized, currently as many as 1 out of every 600 soldiers currently in Iraq is a werewolf. There may be anywhere frm 175 to 230 lycanthropes currently on the ground in Iraq. (Werewolves & Werebears, at least, prefer infantry positions.) That's the easy part. Covering for them is the hard part.