You grab his paw quickly, avoiding his thrashing claws, and with a hard tug, you pull it out. Immediately, the werewolf gives a howl and falls to the ground, shuddering. You watch, fascinated as its hulking, furred form gives way to a thinly-built younger man who stares up at you from his prone position.
"You pulled the thorn out?" he says quietly.
"Yeah...that thorn turned you into a werewolf?" You ask, confused.
"Of course it did," he says, looking at you with a puzzled expression, "It's a lupus thorn, isn't it?"
"Uhh...yeah," you say, completely lost, "They just don't grow where I'm from."
"Oh, you're from the outside then?" he asks, gesturing back to where you'd just walked from.
"Yeah, how'd you guess?" you ask, rather happy that you don't have to pretend to be a local.
"There's more of you coming in now, more than there ever were," he says. "Most of you fit in well enough, but some of you...meet a bad end."
"A bad end?" you say, now uneasy. "Like torn apart by werewolves?"
"Well, you see...the thorn only turns you into a werewolf while its stuck in your flesh. You just happen to be lucky that it was in a vulnerable location, one where you could grab it."
"So, if you'd bitten me, nothing would have happened?" you say, "Beyond me getting killed?"
"Oh no," he says, shaking his head, "Werewolf saliva is almost identical to the venom in the thorn, but is just as temporary. You'd have changed tonight, but been normal tomorrow, unless you got bitten again or stabbed by a thorn."
"This is insane," you say, "where the fuck am I?"
"Far from home," he replies.
"So if these thorns are so bad, why don't you guys come out and burn the plants they grow on during the day? It seems like it would make things a lot safer," you tell him.
"Well, the venom has a certain addictive quality to it. When you're first stung, you experience a raging euphoria and massive high. Then the transformation occurs. A lot of people are quite addicted to it all. During the day, they protect the plants. Some of them have even made concentrated teas, so they can change during the day, or powder the thorns and their roots, and snort it, which has a cocaine like effect along with the change. It's impossible to get to the plants."
"You've GOT to be fucking kidding me," you say. "A werewolf drug?"
"Oh yes," he says. "Much of our world is consumed by it, and more fall to it every day. The real danger isn't of the ferals, who guard the plants during the day, but of the secret ones who live in the city."
"The secret ones?" you ask..mystified by his quasi-mystical modern day epic tale.
"Whole families that mingle with the rest of us during the day, but at night mothers, daughters, fathers and sons use the thorns on themselves to transform, and infect as many others in their neighborhood as possible."
"That seems silly," you tell him, "If EVERYONE is a werewolf, then there's no prey."
"If that happens, your world will fall," he says ominously. "Even now, some of the scientists of the addicted are looking to find a way into your world, your dimension. If that happens, an army of werewolves will pour onto your streets, and the cycle will begin again. They will bring the Lupus thorn into your dimension, and plant it in your grass. It will grow, fuelling the army and your world will become ours."